Category Archives: Political Commentary
The End Of The Depression
There was one other anniversary that I forgot to mention yesterday. Sixty-four years ago, Franklin Roosevelt breathed his last, and with his departure from this world, so ended his war on the free market, and the economic depression that he had so nurtured for a dozen long years. It was not mere coincidence that the post-war economic growth was so large — there was no FDR to continue to hinder it with his whimsical and arbitrary tinkering. RIP to both.
What The Tea Parties Are About
This is both an interesting, and scary graph. The most important thing to me is not just the sheer magnitude of the Obama deficits, but the respective trends of both administrations.
Note that the Bush deficit was decreasing every year until 2008, when it got hammered by the TARP (at least I’m assuming that’s the cause, though it could also be a result of the slowing economy throughout the year, not to mention Congressional spending increases under the Democrats starting in late 2007). Note also that this was happening despite the evil Bush “tax cuts” (which obviously weren’t really tax cuts — they were just tax rate cuts that actually were reducing the deficit, despite the out-of-control spending by the Republican Congress).
In contrast note that the Obama plan is ever-increasing deficits after 2012, whether you believe administration or CBO projections. And though they decrease in the near term, they never get as low as the worst Bush deficit before they start to sky rocket in the teens. This, simply put, is fiscal insanity. And increasing taxes on “the rich” (as they’d surely love to do if they could get away with it) isn’t an option. There simply isn’t enough money there, and if there were, it would tank the economy even more, with even larger deficits from reduced tax receipts and automatic increases in non-discretionary wealth transfers. Also, estimate the integral under the curve. That’s an accumulating debt, with an ever-increasing proportion of the deficit going to interest, particularly when people become reluctant to loan money to a budding Weimar at low rates.
People who will be protesting on Wednesday won’t be protesting against a party. They’ll be protesting against a government completely out of control. But unfortunately for the Democrats and the left, they will be seen as the much larger part of the problem, because the Republicans are now at least giving lip service to reduced spending and reduced government. But they’re going to have to work very hard to live down their spending spree of the “compassionate conservative” (read, “progressive lite”) Bush years.
[Evening update]
“Liberal doughboys afraid of tea parties.”
Liberal bloggers and media groups can’t get the Tea Party phenomenon out of their heads. It wasn’t supposed to be this way, to them. Ordinary people getting together to protest against the liberal establishment. There is a cognitive disconnect. There must be a plot; the vast right-wing conspiracy at work.
So true to form, Media Matters sounded the horn that this was not a real protest, it’s a Fox News segment. Kind of a made for T.V. reality show, with a cast of tens of thousands. Think Progress joined in with “Spontaneous Uprising? Corporate Lobbyists Helping To Orchestrate Radical Anti-Obama Tea Party Protests.”
And the netroot blogosphere heard the call. FireDogLake proprietor Jane Hamsher posted “What Part of ‘FNC TAX DAY TEA PARTIES’ Don’t You Understand?” Hamsher also promoted “citizen-organized protests” which were unlike the “Fox-organized” Tea Parties; I guess she didn’t catch the irony of promoting counter-protests to protest other people promoting protests. Anyway, almost no one showed up for the counter-protests.
Gee, I think I have one of those in comments.
[Monday morning update]
More tea-party panic:
What’s the big deal? ACORN, MoveOn, and Soros get to pull puppet strings year after year, and that’s ok. But God forbid Fox News puts so much as its imprimatur on Tea Parties! No way! That’s too sinister, too insidious; and makes the whole movement illegitimate and inauthentic. Whatever…
Jane Hamsher and Oliver Willis are probably asking “Who the hell are this Tea Party bunch? Where did they come from?” I’ll tell you who they are, Jane and Oliver. They’re your worst nightmare: they’re small-governmenters first and party-loyalists second.
And we’re not laughing with you, Jane and Oliver. We’re laughing at you.
[Bumped]
[Update a few minutes later]
More on Crazy Jane and the other panicked and paranoid leftists (like my commenter):
She’s implying because freedomworks listed the Texas Tea parties and Dick Armey is part of freedomworks that the Tea Parties, Houston in particular, are being organized by “Corporate lobbyists”. Houston Tea Party has never spoken with Freedomworks or Dick Armey, though we do know that Freedomworks has offered legal advice to different Tea parties, we’ve not sought it. None of that should imply they are running the show unless you go to the point of just making stuff up.
The “Corporate lobbyist” line is a laugh. Felicia is a local Mother of two who worked with some local grassroots groups like Raging Elephants. I was someone who was trying to be apolitical the past 4 years until I took a good look at was going on, and I was laid off last week and currently unemployed. There are other organizers and volunteers with us. None of them come close to the description “Corporate Lobbyist”.
And no, this woman is nuts, Fox News is not organizing the Tea Parties, they’re just jumping on board (like a lot of people are trying to). But she’s seeing Dick Armey and Fox News as the boogeymen in the closet…
So… I’ve had my LMAO moment for the day. How about you? 🙂
Edit: More on this silliness:
If we’re being organized by “corporate lobbyists” then where the heck is my check?
Yeah, me too. How do I get in on this hot “corporate lobbyist” action?
Government-Run Health Care
Someone please explain to me why it will get better when it applies to all of us?
Whenever I think of government health care, I can’t help but think about the DMV.
Staged?
When I heard about the effusive response from the military to the president’s visit to Iraq, I was dubious about it. It didn’t make much sense, given the polling of them last fall. So is this why there was so much support among the military?
“We were pre-screened, asked by officials “Who voted for Obama?”, and then those who raised their hands were shuffled to the front of the receiving line. They even handed out digital cameras and asked them to hold them up.”
Take a look at the picture at AP and notice all the cameras are the same models? Coincidence? I think not.
Can you imagine the howls of outrage from the left and the press if the Bush administration had pulled something like this?
Good Show
This worked out better than I expected:
An American ship captain was freed unharmed Sunday in a U.S. Navy operation that killed three of the four Somali pirates who had been holding him for days in a lifeboat off the coast of Africa, a senior U.S. intelligence official said.
One of the pirates was wounded and in custody after a swift firefight, the official said.
I have to say that I found this grimly amusing:
“The negotiations between the elders and American officials have broken down. The reason is American officials wanted to arrest the pirates in Puntland and elders refused the arrest of the pirates,” said the commissioner, Abdi Aziz Aw Yusuf. He said he organized initial contacts between the elders and the Americans.
Arrest and punish kidnappers? Why, that’s crazy talk. At least in Somalia. Fortunately, now, there’s only one to worry about having to deal with. I would have wrapped the three they killed in pigskin and tossed them to the sharks as an example, but I guess these days, that’s crazy talk, too.
Anyway, congratulations to the US Navy, who did their job. And what the hell was the FBI doing there, anyway?
[Update mid afternoon]
What is a “pirate source“?
An Attempt At Common Sense In MO
The Missouri House has passed a bill allowing concealed carry on college campuses in the state. Of course, the universities (or at least U Missouri) respond with the usual idiocy:
“Missouri’s college students should be allowed to learn and exchange ideas in an environment free from the threat of concealed guns,” University of Missouri System President Gary Forsee said in a news release Thursday. “It is hard to imagine that such a proposal could gain support given the magnitude of gun-related tragedies experienced on college campuses across the country.”
Yes, it is hard to imagine, given the illogical hysteria on the subject, much of it fed by the media. And of course, the police are unhappy:
MU Police Chief Jack Watring said at the MU Faculty Council meeting Thursday that he was opposed to the legislation.
“I don’t think most students in an educational environment need a weapon,” he said.
Well, you know what? Most students wouldn’t have one. Most students won’t bother to get the permit. But they’ll be free riders, and safer, because of the few who have one now, or will get one in the wake of this law passing, because they’ll now be able to use it. As Eugene Volokh notes, not allowing students to carry on campus effectively prevents them from carrying much of anywhere, and it’s a violation of a fundamental human right:
Many universities ban firearms, but some research I’ve been doing reveals that some universities ban firearms and stun guns and chemical defensive sprays, either in dorm rooms or in the university as a whole. This basically leaves students entirely without any defensive weapons, and also has the effect of disarming dorm residents when they go off campus property, since they have no place to store the defensive weapons when they’re back on campus.
This strikes me as quite shocking, especially with regard to women students who are in the age range where the danger of rape is at its highest. The university basically leaves them as sitting ducks, unless they’re willing to violate the university policy. Even if the university tries to compensate by offering a good deal of on-campus policing (some do and some don’t), it surely can’t protect the students when they leave campus.
It should be shocking, but it isn’t. And listen to this next excuse:
Watring said…that the biggest concern with the concealed carry provision is the tactical problems it would create, such as the ability for police to identify a suspect in a situation where many people are carrying weapons.
That’s not an argument against allowing guns on campus. There is nothing unique about a college campus in that regard. It’s an argument against allowing concealed carry anywhere. Which is, of course, what many law-enforcement types would like, because it gives them more power over the sheep.
And it’s a stupid argument, to boot. I’m pretty sure that if there’s a mass shooting, it’s not that hard to figure out who the suspect is — it’s the guy shooting lots of people. And if this law passes, in most cases, if history is any guide, by the time the police arrive the shooting will be over, and the suspect subdued or dead, as was the case at the Appalachian University Law School, or the Colorado Springs church shooting, or the numerous other times when there were armed law-abiding citizens present. The only time that the police have to deal with a live, armed shooter is when everyone else has been disarmed (Columbine, Virginia Tech, etc.), because that’s the only circumstance in which he can continue the murder spree for the many minutes that it always takes police to arrive.
And of course, as always, we have the usual slander against CCW permit holders:
But Rep. Chris Kelly, D-Columbia, said he was worried about the possible combination of drinking and weapons on college campuses.
“College boys who round up 25 opossums half drunk can do amazingly interesting things with fireworks, bottles of gasoline, with all kinds of interesting devices,” Kelly said.
“Fraternity boys are a very inventive lot, let’s make sure we give ’em guns to play with too,” he added with sarcasm.
I wonder if Rep. Kelly can put together a correlation matrix between people who have been diligent and responsible enough to go through the process of getting a concealed weapons permit, and inebriated pyromaniacal frat boys? Because I’ll bet it’s pretty damned negative. I also wonder why he thinks that people who would engage in such drunken antics would have any qualms about possessing illegal guns on campus?
Stupidity and illogic continues to abound. And if this bill fails, and there is a mass shooting on a Missouri campus, we’ll know just who to blame this time.
[Sunday morning update]
A commenter indicates that I probably painted law enforcement types with too broad a brush, and he’s probably right:
I am a police officer and I would like to clarify a few misconceptions. If you ask any police chief about their position on concealed carry legislation you will get the same answer that you would get if you ask a political appointee. This is because most are elected or appointed by and serving at the pleasure of a politician. Most officers, myself included, support concealed carry. We know better than most how long it takes for us to arrive and just how long each second is in a tragedy such as a school shooting. We also understand that the sick and twisted out there among us won’t leave their weapons at home before a killing spree because they might get in trouble for concealing.
My apologies to any other officers who think I mischaracterized their position on the issue. Most probably are sensible on this issue, even if they can’t publicly say so.
[Update in the afternoon]
Oh, and my answer to frequent inane commenter “jack lee”‘s question is “…none of your goddamned business.”
The President’s Distractions
Thoughts from Mark Steyn:
Only a week ago, the North Korean missile test was an “annoying distraction” from Barack Obama’s call for a world without nuclear weapons and his pledge that America would lead the way in disarming. And only a couple of days earlier the president insisted Iraq was a “distraction” — from what, I forget: The cooing press coverage of Michelle’s wardrobe? No doubt when the Iranians nuke Israel, that, too, will be an unwelcome distraction from the administration’s plans for federally subsidized daycare, just as Pearl Harbor was an annoying distraction from the New Deal, and the First World War was an annoying distraction from the Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s dinner plans.
…Er, okay. So the North Korean test is a “distraction,” the Iranian nuclear program is a “distraction,” and the seizure of a U.S.-flagged vessel in international waters is a “distraction.” Maybe it would be easier just to have the official State Department maps reprinted with the Rest of the World relabeled “Distractions.” Oh, to be sure, you could still have occasional oases of presidential photo-opportunities — Buckingham Palace, that square in Prague — but with the land beyond the edge of the Queen’s gardens ominously marked “Here be distractions . . . ”
As it happens, Somali piracy is not a distraction, but a glimpse of the world the day after tomorrow. In my book America Alone, I quote Robert D. Kaplan referring to the lawless fringes of the map as “Indian Territory.” It’s a droll jest but a misleading one, since the very phrase presumes that the badlands will one day be brought within the bounds of the ordered world. In fact, a lot of today’s badlands were relatively ordered not so long ago, and many of them are getting badder and badder by the day.
As I’ve noted in the past, the main thing that finally saved the economy from Roosevelt’s tinkering was the “distraction” of World War II, and then his death. It recovered nicely after the war, once the economic sage of Hyde Park could no longer prevent it. I hope that the current president finds lots of distractions from his own plans for the economy.
Getting It Half Right
Yes, Congress is a problem for NASA. But not because it doesn’t give it enough money. As Clark notes, NASA has plenty of money, if it wanted to, and were allowed to spend it sensibly. The problem with Congress it that it won’t let NASA do so, even if it wanted to. It will always be more important to Congress where the money is spent than how it is spent, which is why government space programs are so cost ineffective (and that was true going all the way back to Apollo). Apollo succeeded because it did have huge bales of cash thrown at it, but it certainly wasn’t politically sustainable or affordable, any more than redoing it will be.
Prosecutorial Misconduct
Not just for Ted Stevens, but was it also related to Scooter Libby?
[Update a few minutes later]
This just points out that while elections matter, they don’t necessarily matter as much as they should, due to entrenched civil servants below appointment level, which is why the CIA seemed to be at war with the Bush administration for much of the past eight years (not to mention the State Department). And the administration never seemed willing to even try to do anything about it (for instance, no one was ever fired for all of the leaks to the New York Times). I’d be curious to know if Ms. Morris ever prosecuted a Democrat.