An Update on Doubletree Hotel in Evansville

Officials from the Hilton Doubletree were in town Thursday, taking another walk through tour of the new hotel. They were doing one more inspection to make sure all areas of the new hotel are coming along as expected. Months before the hotel is..

HE SKY’S THE LIMIT FOR SKILLED TRADES

By Tom Purcell

The demand for skilled laborers – electricians, plumbers, HVAC technicians and others – continues to soar, and that’s a good thing for America.
According to the Society for Human Resource Management, skilled-trades jobs have increased by more than 1 million since 2012 – “the most of any profession.”

The pay is better than most people are aware. Skilled tradesmen enjoy average earnings of almost $22 an hour. Seasoned tradesmen can earn six-figure incomes.
With the glut of unemployed college graduates – many of whom must repay thousands of dollars in college loans – more young people are considering careers in the trades.
I think it’s great.

Our country was built by people who worked with their hands.

Ben Franklin was the youngest son and 15th child born to a working-class father. He only attended school for two years. As a teen, he became a printer’s apprentice, a messy blue-collar job.
His trade helped him master communication, business management, politics and human nature. He would go on to publish influential newspapers and books. He franchised his printing business in other cities and became wealthy enough at the young age of 42 to dedicate the rest of his life to his country and to inventing many innovations that we still use today (the potbelly Franklin stove comes to mind).

George Washington, a farmer, toiled in his gardens to cross-breed the perfect plant. He was forever trying new ways to cultivate and harvest his crops. His creativity and inventiveness are on display at his beloved Mount Vernon estate, which I visited many times when I lived in Alexandria, Va.
To be sure, many of the Founders of our country were farmers. They were humbled daily by the unforgiving realities of nature. Not one of them was afraid to get his hands dirty. Hands-on labor made them sensible and innovative. And their good sense and innovation are evident in the simplicity and practicality of the Constitution.

We need a resurgence of “blue-collar” common sense.
Blue-collar workers cannot “BS” their way through their work. An electrician mixes up the hot wire and ground wire only once. A carpenter is kept honest by his level – he measures twice, cuts once. A plumber’s skill is evident when the water valve is opened and the pipes don’t leak.
Blue-collar workers have no choice but to develop horse sense – to develop efficient ways to solve real problems.

There was a time in America when many white-collar jobs were also infused with horse sense. An employee started as a bank teller right out of high school. He’d work his way up, through performance and sound judgment, to the highest levels of the organization.
The journalism profession worked the same way. A young person would start in the mailroom and, through grit and hard work, would gradually acquire the skills needed to gather and report the facts in an objective manner. Reporters who came up the ranks this way were grounded in reality.
So I hope more millennials forsake the white-collar world to become skilled laborers.
I hope we stop glamorizing careers on Wall Street and in the legal profession and many other paper-pushing businesses.

I hope more people use their hands to produce something of value every day – and use their practical, decision-making abilities to help resolve other challenges we face.
Hey, unemployed, college-indebted young people, are you paying attention?

We have a shortage of skilled tradesmen in our country. With the economy poised to expand, the sky will be the limit for skilled trades.
Don’t be ashamed to get your hands a little dirty.

A BETTER SOLUTION THAN TRUMP’S BORDER WALL

written by Ron Paul who is an American author, physician, and former politician.

Just one week in office, President Trump is already following through on his pledge to address illegal immigration. His January 25th executive order called for the construction of a wall along the entire length of the U.S.-Mexico border. While he is right to focus on the issue, there are several reasons why his proposed solution will unfortunately not lead us anywhere closer to solving the problem.

First, the wall will not work. Texas already started building a border fence about ten years ago. It divided people from their own property across the border, it deprived people of their land through the use of eminent domain, and in the end the problem of drug and human smuggling was not solved.
Second, the wall will be expensive. The wall is estimated to cost between 12 and 15 billion dollars. You can bet it will be more than that. President Trump has claimed that if the Mexican government doesn’t pay for it, he will impose a 20 percent duty on products imported from Mexico. Who will pay this tax? Ultimately, the American consumer, as the additional costs will be passed on. This will of course hurt the poorest Americans the most.
Third, building a wall ignores the real causes of illegal border crossings into the United States. Though President Trump is right to prioritize the problem of border security, he misses the point on how it can be done effectively and at an actual financial benefit to the country rather than a huge economic drain.
The solution to really addressing the problem of illegal immigration, drug smuggling, and the threat of cross-border terrorism is clear: remove the welfare magnet that attracts so many to cross the border illegally, stop the 25 year U.S. war in the Middle East, and end the drug war that incentivizes smugglers to cross the border.
The various taxpayer-funded programs that benefit illegal immigrants in the United States, such as direct financial transfers, medical benefits, food assistance, and education, cost an estimated $100 billion dollars per year. That is a significant burden on citizens and legal residents. The promise of free money, free food, free education, and free medical care if you cross the border illegally is a powerful incentive for people to do so. It especially makes no sense for the United States government to provide these services to those who are not in the U.S. legally.
Likewise, the 40 year war on drugs has produced no benefit to the American people at a great cost. It is estimated that since President Nixon declared a war on drugs, the US has spent more than a trillion dollars to fight what is a losing battle. That is because just as with the welfare magnet, there is an enormous incentive to smuggle drugs into the United States.
We already know the effect that ending the war on drugs has on illegal smuggling: as more and more U.S. states decriminalize marijuana for medical and recreational uses, marijuana smuggling from Mexico to the U.S. has dropped by 50 percent from 2010.
Finally, the threat of terrorists crossing into the United States from Mexico must be taken seriously, however once again we must soberly consider why they may seek to do us harm. We have been dropping bombs on the Middle East since at least 1990. Last year President Obama dropped more than 26,000 bombs. Thousands of civilians have been killed in U.S. drone attacks. The grand U.S.plan to “remake” the Middle East has produced only misery, bloodshed, and terrorism. Ending this senseless intervention will go a long way toward removing the incentive to attack the United States.
I believe it is important for the United States to have secure borders, but unfortunately President Trump’s plan to build a wall will end up costing a fortune while ignoring the real problem of why people cross the borders illegally. They will keep coming as long as those incentives remain.

FOOTNOTE: Ron Paul is an American author, physician, and former politician. He was formerly the U.S. Representative for Texas’ 14th and 22nd congressional districts.