Way to go, Congressman West! I hope the Democrat leaders are paying attention.
Sunday, January 29, 2012
Oakland Occupiers at It Again
The Occupy movement, which seems to occupy some who should be classified (as the Bible terms are) “sons of Belial” or “worthless men,” has apparently reawakened in Oakland. Even the mayor, Jean Quan, previously their defender and encourager, now has “lost patience” with this foolishness.
According to an AP article by Terry Collins, protesters threw bottles and rocks, and spray painted graffiti on walls, while police responded with tear gas and orders to disperse. Further,
More than 400 people were arrested on charges ranging from failure to disperse to vandalism, police spokesman Sgt. Jeff Thomason said. At least three officers and one protester were injured.
On Sunday, Oakland officials vowed to be ready if Occupy protesters try to mount another large-scale demonstration. Protesters, meanwhile, decried Saturday's police tactics as illegal and threatened to sue.
Of course, in liberal Oakland, they’ll probably find a judge foolish enough to take the case. I recommend reading the entire article.
The Occupy movement has to be one of the stupidest protests in American history, and there have been some weird ones. They are not so much protesters as they are simply a mob bent on destruction for no coherent reason. They are no better than the mob that destroyed things in London not long ago. I just hope the police in Oakland and elsewhere will bear down and break up their little party.
The Occupiers claim to have a right to do what they’re doing, but they obviously are not interested in other people’s rights, i.e., property rights, peace and quiet, etc. The police should vigorously enforce the law and need not be excessively gentle with these people.
If the protesters don’t like America, maybe they should try some other country, like Cuba or China. I wonder if ACORN is out there trying to register them to vote.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
STOP SOPA/PIPA Efforts Showing Favorable Signs
Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) activist Trevor Timm on The Alyona Show on Russia Today discusses the PIPA and SOPA bills which would censor the Internet by shutting down sites on copyright issues. The proposed law is believed to be subject to a great deal of abuse. The government has tried several ways to restrict and eventually take over the internet, this being the latest.
EFF is one of the most active organizations in protecting Internet freedom. Content providers and media entities (MPAA, Time-Warner, RIAA, etc.) are more than able to protect their own interests. Special government help for these rent-seeking organizations is unnecessary and dangerous.
PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.
Video: fightforthefuture.org/pipa Tell Congress.
via Vimeo
Further reading:
Free Speech Is Only as Strong as the Weakest Link (eff.org)
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Let’s Hear It for Romney!
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| Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. Photo: Dreamstime |
Of course, Gingrich has rescinded his criticism (sort of), and Perry has quieted his after losing a key donor over it, but the fact is that capitalism, properly understood and practiced, is simply economic freedom. That’s what we’re losing under the Obama Administration. It is true that this criticism of Romney sounds eerily like Obama.
Romney’s comment that he “likes to be able to fire people” ought to be taken as a positive statement about competition, in stark contrast to liberals’ ideal that says no one should ever be fired, especially if they are part of government. See Ann Coulter’s excellent column on this.
Maybe Romney’s strategy now is to simply wait out the campaign until his rivals knock each other off by such ill-advised criticisms of him and each other. He’s been a presidential candidate for years now, so he has learned something about what it might take for success in politics. It begins to look more and more like he’s the inevitable candidate, and if that trend continues, Republicans had better get behind him (or someone) in a unified manner, or else we’ll see four more years of Obama.
The only “capitalism” President Obama likes is crony capitalism which is very like fascist corporatism. This, of course, is not capitalism, but “private enterprise” in collusion with government, involving exchanges of political favors. It also involves government taking over private companies, removing them from their owners and handing them over to unions and other politically-connected cronies, meanwhile, leaving investors with little to nothing (see GM and Chrysler).
Obama’s “green-energy” policy has brought some “green” to some of his cronies, at the expense of taxpayers and future generations, with nothing worthwhile to show for it. Solyndra got an over-half-billion dollar loan guarantee, then went bankrupt (as should have been expected). The government even considered bailing them out. Chevy Volt draws a subsidy now equal to about $250,000 per car. Its flaws are becoming more evident. The problem is that this is crony capitalism at its worst. It’s incompetent, and possibly criminal, government involvement in things that, if financially viable, would be developed by private industry, perhaps profitably, and without government involvement.
The Obama Administration showcases their abysmal economic ignorance. Normally, everything the government finances or helps finance, is a money-losing operation, but under the current regime, it’s not just marginal losses, but incredibly huge, economy-damaging losses, that show no sign of improvement.
Romney, like all the candidates, has his flaws. He does not seem to be as thoroughly conservative as we might prefer. But which candidate is? The main smaller-government conservatives are/were candidates Michele Bachmann (now out) and Rick Perry (slipping, but still in the race so far). Ron Paul is for smaller government, but has troubling positions on some foreign policy and other issues. We’re left with Romney, Gingrich, Santorum and Huntsman, of whom, it seems to me, only Romney speaks of smaller government.
I like Huntsman’s position on stopping corporate welfare and all subsidies. I like some of Gingrich’s ideas on entitlements, for example, stop paying crooks. I like Santorum’s social conservatism. I liked Herman Cain’s refreshing approach to running for office and his tea party appeal. I actually thought Michele Bachmann might be the best all-around conservative in the race, but, alas, she couldn’t get going.
What I want to see is a Republican president who can get this country back to normal. Something like Warren G. Harding did after the unbearable Wilson. Something like Ronald Reagan did after the unbearable Carter. We now have a president who’s more unbearable than either Wilson or Carter, and four more years of the Obama regime will come close, if not actually accomplish, the final decline of America as a free and prosperous country. We’ll be more like a third-world dictatorship. We’ll be more like Cuba, the workers’ paradise.
Employment is the top issue. Romney knows more about correcting the problems than anyone else in the race. Private-sector experience trumps all political career experience in this issue. Romney says he knows how the economy works. Obama does not know how it works, except he seems to know how to hurt it.
In the Washington world of deeply confused Keynesianism, the great contrast of the Austrian School of economic thought offers much common-sense counsel and analysis of the problems of today and the past. A plain explanation of Austrian principles is contained in a fairly brief video found below. Austrian economists (so called because pioneers of their school of thought were Austrians, such as Ludwig von Mises and Frederich A. Hayek) accurately predicted such events as the Great Depression and the more recent housing bust. Austrian theory provides a rational explanation for the business cycle.
Actually, the only candidate who claims Austrian economic views is Ron Paul, and in the economic area, he is right. But to me, the main requirement for economic views of a presidential candidate is economic freedom: low taxes, free-market capitalism, reasonable, i.e., minimal, regulation, and a strong non-interventionist bias, and no collusion between government and business. In other words, keep government out of the economy (and most other things) as much as possible.
Perhaps our next president will recognize the ticking time bombs of our economy, as well as those of our world. The present regime does not.
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Christmas Greetings
Christians and others need to consider the gift God gave to us in Christ, whose birth we celebrate. He came for the express purpose of dying for our sins, and to offer eternal salvation to all who would believe in Him. His is the greatest and most beneficial message mankind has ever received. It is truly Good News.
The following video features the Christmas story read by Herman Cain with his wife Gloria and some military family members, as well as Christmas greetings and a song “It's Christmas in America.” (YouTube video I found at Daily Caller.)
I hope you enjoy it, and, especially, I hope you have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
This is (probably) my last post of 2011. We look for better things in 2012. God bless.
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Some Comments on President Obama’s Economic Speech of December 6, 2011
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| President Theodore Roosevelt. Photo via Wikipedia |
The comments cover a good deal less than the entire speech (video found here and here), but I believe they address the main ideas he expressed. The text is found at the Washington Post website. The president’s words are in bold, mine are not.
For many years, credit cards and home equity loans papered over the harsh realities of this new economy. But in 2008, the house of cards collapsed. We all know the story by now: Mortgages sold to people who couldn’t afford them, or sometimes even understand them. Banks and investors allowed to keep packaging the risk and selling it off. Huge bets – and huge bonuses – made with other people’s money on the line. Regulators who were supposed to warn us about the dangers of all this, but looked the other way or didn’t have the authority to look at all.
It was wrong. It combined the breathtaking greed of a few with irresponsibility across the system. And it plunged our economy and the world into a crisis from which we are still fighting to recover. It claimed the jobs, homes, and the basic security of millions – innocent, hard-working Americans who had met their responsibilities, but were still left holding the bag.
The president conveniently leaves out the fact that banks were under heavy pressure from the government to make these loans, and Fannie and Freddie purchased them. The Democrats in Congress, led by Barney Frank, would not permit the needed regulation of Fannie and Freddie, claiming that they were on sound footing. Financial companies issued extremely risky derivatives, which should have been stopped by government regulators but weren’t, and now, banks have it set up where derivatives take priority in bankruptcy, over the interests of investors. See Gary North’s informative article here.
Community agitators like ACORN (which previously employed Barack Obama) increased pressure on banks to make the bad loans. The “breathtaking greed” was driven and incentivized by the government through purchase guarantees and “affordable housing” pressure. Banks shared blame as well, but it was primarily a government- and Federal Reserve-caused situation. The bailouts (under Bush’s administration) set the tone for further legislation handled in an “emergency” fashion, (Obamacare, cap and trade, etc.), with little to no debate and in the dark of night, with 1,000-plus-page bills which were not read and perhaps not yet entirely written when voted upon. This is the fault of government.
But this isn’t just another political debate. This is the defining issue of our time. This is a make or break moment for the middle class, and all those who are fighting to get into the middle class. At stake is whether this will be a country where working people can earn enough to raise a family, build a modest savings, own a home, and secure their retirement.
Obama is correct that the middle class is at stake. It is Obama’s policies that are destroying the middle class through ensuring massive unemployment and an economic environment that discourages business growth and hiring. His answer is higher taxes and more spending. More “stimulus,” when the stimulus to date is proven ineffective.
Now, in the midst of this debate, there are some who seem to be suffering from a kind of collective amnesia. After all that’s happened, after the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, they want to return to the same practices that got us into this mess. In fact, they want to go back to the same policies that have stacked the deck against middle-class Americans for too many years. Their philosophy is simple: we are better off when everyone is left to fend for themselves and play by their own rules….
According to Obama, the government needs to make sure a good outcome is experienced by all who “work hard.” The task of government in the economy is punish fraud and abuse, and to provide an appropriate, rather than oppressive, tax and regulation environment. The Federal Reserve has harmed the economy through massive money printing and artificially low interest rates that discourage investment and saving. The government should not interfere with the free market, which they constantly do through corporate welfare and “crony capitalism” which is actually not capitalism but more like fascist corporatism.
They should stop all subsidies, bailouts, and special tax treatment, and trust the free market, in which companies and individuals pursue their own self interest without government interference.
Now, just as there was in Teddy Roosevelt’s time, there’s been a certain crowd in Washington for the last few decades who respond to this economic challenge with the same old tune. “The market will take care of everything,” they tell us. If only we cut more regulations and cut more taxes – especially for the wealthy – our economy will grow stronger. Sure, there will be winners and losers. But if the winners do really well, jobs and prosperity will eventually trickle down to everyone else. And even if prosperity doesn’t trickle down, they argue, that’s the price of liberty.
It’s a simple theory – one that speaks to our rugged individualism and healthy skepticism of too much government. It fits well on a bumper sticker. Here’s the problem: It doesn’t work. It’s never worked. It didn’t work when it was tried in the decade before the Great Depression. It’s not what led to the incredible post-war boom of the 50s and 60s. And it didn’t work when we tried it during the last decade.
It’s called free market capitalism and it does work and will work whenever it’s allowed to operate. The reason the Great Depression got so bad and lasted so long is that government tried to fix it. There was a depression in 1920 that started out as bad as the one in the 1930’s, but lasted less than two years, because neither the government nor the Fed did anything to interfere. They didn’t enshrine the mistakes as they did in the 1930’s and in the 2008 collapse. The government should have simply let the recession run its course, and by now, bad debt would be liquidated and we’d be back to normal growth. But no, politics trumps all. See Tom Woods's eye-opening video on the 1920 depression here.
When Obama says “It’s not political,” he would be more accurate in saying, “It’s not just political, it’s very, very political.” He is the servant of the unions, the radical environmentalists, and the socialist left.
This speech, delivered in the form of populist rhetoric, is an attempt to make the case for socialism. Theodore Roosevelt was something of a “Progressive,” as some liberals like to be called today, but people don’t generally understand that Progressivism is the belief that economic, social and cultural decisions that people traditionally make for themselves, should instead be made by a group of elite “experts,” acting for all. Thus we got big government, big bureaucracy, less freedom, and even eugenics. Now we have abortion, and may soon have more government-rationed health care and government-rationed or mandated who-knows-what.
Remember that in those years, in 2001 and 2003, Congress passed two of the most expensive tax cuts for the wealthy in history, and what did they get us? The slowest job growth in half a century. Massive deficits that have made it much harder to pay for the investments that built this country and provided the basic security that helped millions of Americans reach and stay in the middle class – things like education and infrastructure; science and technology; Medicare and Social Security.
Actually, we had strong job growth, compared to today. The deficits came mainly from wars that started after 9/11/2001 and continue today. And Bush’s worst deficits pale in comparison to those racked up under the Obama Administration.
Obama wants more “investment,” i.e. government spending, in education and infrastructure. But if the economy could just be allowed to recover, these issues would be taken care of without massive borrowing and endless debt.
We simply cannot return to this brand of your-on-your-own (sic.) economics if we’re serious about rebuilding the middle class in this country. We know that it doesn’t result in a strong economy. It results in an economy that invests too little in its people and its future. It doesn’t result in a prosperity that trickles down. It results in a prosperity that’s enjoyed by fewer and fewer of our citizens....
According to Obama, we need government in control to make sure the incomes and outcomes are what they should be. But experience has shown that government is hardly qualified to run anything outside its actual constitutional responsibilities. They are poorly qualified to give guidance on running business or the economy, when their own business and their own finances are out of control. It’s the private sector that needs to be able to invest, not the government. But politicians put many roadblocks in the way: bans on energy development and oppressive EPA regulations, just to name two.
America can’t afford four more years of Obama. That should be the focus of the GOP message. A few more years down the current path and we’ll be worse off than Greece.
Wealth and income inequality is not the problem. It’s simply a convenient propaganda component to stir up class envy, which, I repeat, is the very life blood of liberalism, and class warfare is its process.
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Some Thoughts on GOP Candidates after the Debate of November 22
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| Newt Gingrich at CPAC FL 2011. Photo: Dreamstime.com |
Newt Gingrich has taken the lead in the polls for now among GOP presidential candidates. His debate performances have been impressive and, for his campaign, efficient, since it doesn’t cost anything (other than transportation and scheduling) for him to participate. With his campaign all but written off earlier, he has come back to score substantially improved poll numbers.
Gingrich looks like a candidate with the depth of knowledge and ability to articulate his positions that a president needs to have. He has years of experience in government and in study of the important issues. It appears that he can be trusted with presidential responsibility. He has avoided shouting matches with his GOP opponents and saved his strong criticism for Barack Obama and the Democrats. He correctly foresaw the failure of the super committee and early and rightly pointed out the foolishness of that process.
(It’s a campaign video, but his assessment of the super committee is quite correct.)
On immigration, he said that long-time residents who came to the
If Newt is the nominee, he will be under intense scrutiny and will be attacked for his personal moral failures. If he succeeds in getting elected, it will be because the voters see him as such a great improvement over Obama that his past sins can be overlooked, or at least left in the past. Presumably, he has overcome the personal mistakes of past years.
I’m sure I wouldn’t agree with him on every issue, but I don’t agree with anyone on all the issues. I think he would make a fine president, and that he would get America on track back to normalcy. He understands the threat of radical Islam and the threat represented by our soaring budget deficits and incessant borrowing.
Brit Hume of Fox News commented on Newt’s poll numbers improvement (Daily Caller via Yahoo! News):
Another candidate showing depth of understanding is the much-unfairly-maligned Rep. Michele Bachmann. She demonstrated an impressive knowledge of complex foreign affairs issues, such as Pakistan policy. Given this and her previous debates, she has shown a good grasp of economic and social issues. I think she is thoroughly qualified to serve as president. She is hampered mainly by liberal smears against her that too many people unthinkingly accept, as with Sarah Palin. Generally, whom liberals fear, they smear.
Speaking of smears, Herman Cain was given the treatment by the Democrats, being accused by a woman who (just coincidentally – not!) lives in the same building as David Axelrod, and another woman who happens to work for the Obama Administration. These charges didn’t stick because voters have better access these days to sources other than the toadying Mainstream Media, and could find no substance to them. Cain’s defenders appear far more reliable than his accusers.
Probably none of the candidates can really be written off now, but, in my view, the race is going to get down to Romney vs. an anti-Romney in the person of Gingrich, Bachmann, or Cain. Possibly Rick Perry, if he can continue his improved debating. Ron Paul is still a factor. As for Santorum and Huntsman, their numbers remain very low, but it’s a year until the election and a lot can happen. There’s also a vice-presidential slot to fill.
As for “electability,” if Republicans can get together on a nominee, and run a reasonably competent campaign, they should be able to defeat Obama very decisively. America’s hopes for prosperity, military strength, freedom, and constitutional government increasingly depend on that.
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