The following is a guest blog from Robby Toner.

The first thing that went through my head when I read what the CEO of Titan Tire Corporation said about the French and their work ethic was “yep, that’s exactly why the rest of the world thinks we’re such ignorant assholes.”  It’s because we are.  The thing is, it’s not even what Maurice Taylor is saying that’s the issue, it’s how he’s saying it.  He doesn’t qualify his words or make any attempt to show some type of compassion or understanding about French culture before he leads into his objective argument.  He simply tosses cultural differences aside as if his technical college never forced him to take one of those silly “arts and humanities” classes to round out their degrees.

The French aren’t interested in your arguments about work ethic and 40 hour work weeks.  They’ve been there, they know what that reality is like, and they’ve chosen a different path.  What I’d really be interested in is how much Maurice Taylor could be persuaded that the French have got this one right by spending a little time in their country and working by their rules.  I spent nine months in France teaching English to elementary children.  I didn’t work much, about 20 hours per week or so, a bit less than even the French standard (the French work week is actually 35 hours).  The mindset is different there.  They give you extra time for lunch, and people fill up the tables outside local cafes and restaurants since they have adequate time for a sit down meal.  It’s a remarkable act of community engagement that breaks up the work day.

The French believe that you should work to live, not live to work.  That doesn’t mean you can’t be passionate about what you do and make an impact in fewer hours, it just means a slightly different idea of exactly how many hours with and away your family is reasonable.  Once the entire economy is forced to obey by these rules, it levels the playing field in all domestic markets and the population enjoys extra time off.  Is this at a loss in production?  The numbers show no, and that that might be changing, but even if it does, who cares?  Why are we so obsessed with working?  Are we really meant to work ourselves into a state where our bodies no longer function ideally and then see what we’ve got left in us?  Forget that.

You can say what you want about the French, but they’re healthier, more educated, more visited, and more devoted to the things in life that really matter than we are.  I find that humbling, and I think it’s sad that our immediate reaction involves cynicism and cultural ignorance.

My favorite part is when people think that the French are doing all of these things at a huge expense to their debt ratio.  Here’s a list of the top countries’ debt to GDP ratioshttp://www.economicshelp.org/blog/774/economics/list-of-national-debt-by-country/

… look who’s higher up than France?  AMERICA.  The French are doing more with less, their country is less in debt than ours is yet they are afforded more time off and more access to quality healthcare and services than just about any other place.

Instead of criticizing the French way of life maybe Maurice Taylor should be asking for tips on how relieve stress of his employees and maintain profitability.  This is America, though, and we don’t ask for help, we lend it.

Republicans have a huge problem.  They desperately want to be the party of fiscal restraint, but have no idea how to get there without losing even more of their dwindling piece of the electorate pie.  The latest tactic employed by more senior members of Congress is to publicly go on the warpath for programs that really don’t make any sort of a dent in the budget what-so-ever, just so they can be on the record as “wanting cuts”.  They are also not shy about “wanting cuts” to entitlements yet refuse to get specific about which ones.  Doing so would risk being held accountable by seniors and the poor during the next election cycle.

Case in point.  Eric Cantor recently lamented on twitter a $4M spend on IRS TV.  Mitt Romney went way out on the limb with 100 times this amount, $445M for killing Big Bird and PBS.

Here’s where we need Ross Perot to step in with some PIE charts and explain to the American people what these suggestions actually mean.

Even Mitt’s commitment to defund PBS  amounts to 0.014% of the 17 Trillion dollar federal budget.  Maybe that’s what it is.  Trillion is just too big of a unit to comprehend.  Million, Billion, Trillion.  What’s the diff?

I can’t even show the impact of this on the above chart because it would not be visible to the naked eye.

As the PIE chart shows, 60% of the budget goes towards Medicare, Social Security, and Labor, and 18% to the Pentagon.  This is where the real meat is.

The dilemma they have is getting specific about the meaty parts.  That’s tricky business.  The usual tactic is to offer up vague proposals for spending cuts and then point the finger at the other guy for not having a specific proposal.  Both sides engage in this.

I think the American people would be okay with the labor spend if we could actually have something to show for it.  Where’s our Mt. Rushmore?  Where’s our Timberline Lodge?  Where’s our Hoover dam?  I’m not seeing it or anything close to it.  I understand Obama inherited a leaky ship and QE I and II were just about trying to keep the ship from sinking.  But still, we don’t have much of anything to show for it and that’s unsettling and opens up the door for massive criticism about where did the money go?

I just wanted to take time out this morning and thank Eric and Mitt for their detailed suggestions and then see if I could put them in perspective with an actual PIE chart.  Turns out it’s not possible.

I can’t stop watching the O’Reilly factor.  In the past I’ve had the opposite problem — I couldn’t watch for more than 5 minutes without becoming extremely irritated at the right wing bias, segment after segment.  But now, I’m irritated if I miss the Talking Points.  So what’s the diff?

The difference is I look forward to watching O’Reilly pound sand.  He complains about the left and the hypocrisy of the drones.  He complains the main stream media is in bed with Obama.  He whines that the country has gone to hell in a hand-basket and I’m loving every minute of it.  And it’s only just beginning.  As long as the Dems hold the white house, the whining will continue ad-nauseum.

The biggest challenge I have now is keeping from grabbing the remote when Dennis Miller comes on.  I’ve always wondered if O’Reilly realized just how not funny Miller is.  He reckons himself the king of the witty analogy.  The producers at the show however overlooked the necessity for a laugh-track to go along with his commentary.  The guy is simply … not funny.  That part’s a challenge, but today I endured.

But I’m a rank amateur at pointing out the hypocrisy of O’Reilly.  If you want high entertainment, I highly recommend any of Al Franken’s books, especially The Truth, with Jokes and Lies and the Lying Liars who Tell Them.  He goes off on O’Reilly with the kid gloves off and it’s hysterical.

O’Reilly can’t hold a candle to exposing hypocrisy like Al Franken does in his books.

Jindal nails it