Category: Politics

Props to Obama’s First Two Days

I have to say that it’s nice to have a Democrat in power again. I have some Republican readers out there (just embrace it, Kevin; talk to Taylor — he’ll help you) who I know will find it very annoying for me to be joining in the celebration of Obama’s first couple of days. But, I have to say, that I like what Obama’s done so far: moving to close Guantanamo and the CIA’s secret prisons is simply awesome. The very existence of these programs is not only Un-American, but, I believe, unconstitutional.

Where, in our Constitution, does it say that the United States can take people into custody and detain them for years at a time without bringing them up on charges? I was hoping that the justice system would actually reject Bush’s programs, but the years went on and nothing happened. It seemed that someone in the Bush Administration decided to leave the people detained in Guantanamo for the next President to sort out. (I felt this even before Bush got re-elected in 2004.)

For that matter, Iraq seemed little more than a talking point in the “War on Terror” in Bush’s second term; other than sending some additional troops into Iraq, what really changed there? For that matter, what did the additional troops accomplish other than to give John McCain something to ramble on about during his campaign for President? I love what The Daily Reckoning’s Bill Bonner said about the Iraqi journalist throwing a shoe at Bush: “What’s wrong with our American journalists? Have they no shoes?”

Indeed, I wondered the same thing about a lot of people. How could we allow the Bush administration to rewrite the power of the executive branch before our very eyes and have so little outrage? So, I am pleased to see Obama’s first acts being so definitive to curtail the obvious abuses of the prior administration. Although, Wall Street doesn’t seem quite so happy about it.

As Taylor pointed out in his last comment,

“The percentage decline is the worst ever for the Dow on a president’s first day in office. That would break the old record, 2.9%, set on Nov. 22, 1963, when Lyndon Johnson took over after John F. Kennedy’s assassination.”

Of course, there’s a maxim on Wall Street that the first two years of a new Presidency will be down years and the last two will be good ones.

Still, that was a particularly violent reaction to Obama’s first day.

Although, I made money. As you can see in the chart below, Barrick Gold has been doing just fine over the 3 months since Obama was elected President. On that fateful day of which Taylor spoke, when the Dow was down 4%, Barrick was up some 5.8%. What can I say? Gold’s been treating me well.

Barrick Gold Over the Last 90 Days
Barrick Gold Over the Last 90 Days

That’s not to say that I think this stock isn’t going to see some rocky times ahead. I do think the forces of liquidation are taking a breather — for now. The volatility of this week is more the Wall Street traders showing their displeasure at the forces of Socialism that Obama represents. But I expect it to stabilize over the next few weeks. In fact, I’m expecting a bit of a rally. It’s going to be a sucker’s rally, though; but I still expect it’s going to trap a lot of people who are thinking that the worst is behind us.

Barrick will probably be taken down a peg or two in the upcoming collapse, but it’ll come back. I can’t say the same for the rest of the stock market. We’re making the bitter transition from a consumer-driven economy to a producing one. The first stage is that the businesses that catered to consumer spending need to leave the scene to clear the field for the new companies. That means you can expect a lot of companies going bankrupt this year.

As for me, I’m doing a bit of trading. As you can see from that chart of Barrick, it seems to be hovering between a range of $31 and $36. That’s a pretty healthy trading range to buy in at the bottom and sell at the top, and that’s what I’ve started doing. I’ve turned some extra profit from it so far. I expect that all my profits will be taken out by the upcoming collapse, but those profits should help to cushion the blow. It’s the buying at the bottom where you can expect to make some real money.

I can only hope that these easing up on the powers of the executive branch may indicate that, perhaps, my fears of him being the next FDR and implementing a lot of BS controls — such as gold confiscation — may prove false.

Mercifully, false.

Is Blogging Illegal in Italy?

There’s an interesting story recently that is worth mentioning. A Sicilian judge found Italian blogger Carlo Ruta guilty of the 1948 law of publishing a “clandestine newspaper.” Despite the fact that the Italian constitution gives its citizens the right to freedom of expression, Mr. Ruta was ordered to pay a fine and shut down his website.

How was it decided that Mr. Ruta’s blog constituted a newspaper? It has a headline. By that criteria, it must be a newspaper. And since it wasn’t registered, it is therefore a clandestine newspaper.

This is a ridiculous finding as many Italians have pointed out because, by the headline criteria, practically the entire internet is illegal in Italy. Digging a little deeper it seems that the content of Mr. Ruta’s blog (the connection between local government and the mafia) is a bit of an inflammatory subject in Sicily, so this ruling was simply an expedient way of shutting him up. I’d like to think that this case gets appealed and saner heads prevail, but this also goes to show a few things.

First, that laws have far reaching consequences beyond what their authors envision. The 1948 law was written in the aftermath of Facism and was meant to stop radical political newspapers from polarizing the population. Despite however well intentioned the authors of the law may have been, it remains a clear case of government overstepping its bounds. If people are guaranteed freedom of expression by the supreme law of the land, then government has no business saying otherwise.

Second, it goes to show how well politicians passing laws in an effort to seem like they are doing something productive often have far reaching, unforeseen, pernicious effects. The politicians of 1948 were trying to seem popular by assuring the populace that they were on watch of a resurgence of Facism. It’s understandable for politicians to busy themselves passing silly laws, but everyone else seemed to forget that no laws on the books stopped Hitler and Mussolini from taking power. Those two dictators broke several laws, including some constitutional basics, in their assumption of power, but no one was able to stop them at the time. As obvious as it may seem to you and I, the government needs to understand that it does not improve the situation by passing a law that says, in essence, it’s illegal to break the law.

Every time politicians act to better their public standing by passing silly laws, the liberty of its people ebbs a little more. The more laws accumulate, the more almost everything under the sun becomes illegal. Of course, the justice system would bankrupt itself if it tried to prosecute everyone, so instead the state selectively targets its dissidents by selectively invoking laws that don’t seem to apply to anyone else- as we see here.

I’m not too concerned about my blog running afoul of Italian laws, but maybe I should be. After all, Ernest Zuendel was a Canadian citizen who, while extolling the virtues of Hitler, ran afoul of German laws banning Holocaust denial. He was declared a threat to national security, tried in a German court, and sentenced to jail time. Does anyone else find it ironic that, in the name of combating Facism, the states of Germany and Italy have taken on government powers that are vaguely reminiscent of… Facism?

Still, it’s not the German and Italian government that worried me as much as the good old government of the USA. Giving aid and comfort to the enemy was declared by the Military Commissions Act to be the equivalent of being an enemy combatant. According to that act, should you be suspected of being such an a person, you get tried by a military tribunal.

Considering what we’re seeing happen with these Italian and German laws, I don’t even want to consider the kind of abuses that can occur with a law as draconian as this. It’s high time we as Americans get serious about liberty, and there’s no better place to start than to call for the repeal of laws such as the Military Commissions Act.

Yet another gift to us from the Bush Administration.

Open Letter to The Kansas City Star

The editorial board of the newspaper The Kansas City Star recently shoehorned the Libertarian Party in with their story about how Joe the Plumber lost a lot of respect for John McCain after he came out in favor of the Wall Street Bailout. Here’s what was said:

… the nation’s largest third party also opposed appropriating $14 billion of taxpayer money to bail out the American automotive industry.
“It’s insanity,” said Libertarian Party spokesman Andrew Davis. Instead, the Libertarians favored letting the auto companies file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, taking down the U.S. economy with them.
Now, that’s sane.
The Libertarian Party — founded in 1971 as an alternative to the two main political parties — proudly stands for smaller government, lower taxes and more freedom.
The Buzz says the party also stands to lose just about every election its candidates run in.

As a self-respecting Libertarian, I can’t let these kinds of snide comments slide. Hence, I have written the following letter to the editorial board of the Kansas City Star.

To whom it may concern:

I read your “Buzz” commentary with concern regarding how you treated the idea of an auto industry bailout. Specifically, you dismissed it out of hand as somehow less than sane without explaining your reasoning. You then instead engage in an ad hominem attack of the Libertarian Party as being a party that is only capable of losing “just about every election its candidates run in.”

You have done a great disservice to your readership. First and foremost, you have not provided any information for your readers to consider regarding the auto industry bailout except that it will, somehow, ensure that the auto industry will “take down the US economy with them.”  Not so. An economy depends on industries that are able to profitably render goods and services that are needed by its people. If an industry cannot do this, as the US auto industry has been unable to for years, then losing the industry will not “take down the US economy.” Instead, it will free up the labor and resources used in an unprofitable industry and make them available to be put to work in a more profitable one. A process which economic Joseph Schumpeter labeled “creative destruction.”

The alternative is to hinder our economy by taking resources from other areas of the economy and use them to subsidize a failing industry. This has never worked. In order for the free market to allow for societies to most efficiently allocate its resources towards what consumers most want, businesses have to be allowed to fail. It is a painful but necessary process. Japan avoided this process to their detriment in the 1990s; the resulting “zombie companies” functioned as a drag, not a boon, on the overall Japanese economy and greatly contributed to what’s now known as their “lost decade.”

Now that I have provided a logical argument as to why the Libertarian Party was actually correct in its assessment, I would like to continue on and discuss how you treated it. As the Libertarian candidate for State Representative in 2008, I feel I know something both about the party as well as the function of the American political process.

The US Constitution set up a ‘winner takes all’ political process: the candidate with the most votes wins. This engenders a compromise-based, collation-building strategy towards gaining the necessary votes to win. Consequentially, many people see little difference between the two leading parties, Republicans and Democrats. Indeed, the last two Presidential Republican National Conventions showcased speakers Zell Miller (in 2004) and Joe Lieberman (in 2008) who were formerly prominent Democrats. The general flavor of the two parties is that the Republicans believe in free markets whereas the Democrats trust in the guiding hand of government, but this financial crisis has shown that, when the chips are down, there seems to be precious little difference between their approach to economic crisis. For most voters in the last two Presidential elections, Iraq seemed to be the only issue that divided them, and even that seemed a rather ephemeral difference.

Given that both parties provide very little real difference between them, third parties remain the only choice for people such as myself who refuse to compromise their principles in the name of victory. As such, you are correct in saying that we Libertarians are not in danger of overtaking American politics by storm anytime soon. However, this is not to say that our ideas are not worthwhile or shared by many Americans. In fact, political quizzes have shown that many Americans hold Libertarian views despite the fact that they vote for other political parties in an effort to chose the lesser of two evils.

That the numerous discussions I have had with ordinary Americans showcases their desire to vote for their traditional party, not because they actually believed in it, but out of fear of the other party winning the election, represents a failing of our political system. That both parties favored a Wall Street bail out that everyday Americans overwhelmingly opposed, has shown how unresponsive our political system (where 98% of all incumbents are reelected) can be to the true wishes of the people.

Such is the world that we all live in, and one would think that a newspaper would use the influence of its editorial board to rail against such injustices. I see that sadly, this is not so. What I have provided in this letter is a logical argument for my ideas that your infotainment-minded editorial board appears to lack. I feel this is yet another failure of the system our forefathers set in motion. Jefferson believed that a free press was the “fourth estate” that would keep the branches of government responsive to the needs of the people.

Were he alive today and in possession of your newspaper, I believe he would see that this was a naive belief.

Sincerely,

Preston Poulter (www.prestonpoulter.com)

The Republican Blind Eye

In continuing our discussion, Taylor posted a comment on my most recent blog. There are some specific points from his comment that I’m going to further address in this post. First, in a continuation of my earlier post, Taylor’s arguments speak to his experience. For him, and other Republicans, the system works well. The police are there to protect his property from those who might want to take it. He seems to feel that his elected representatives have similar belief systems to himself (as long as they are Republicans), and that the only flaws in the system lay in that it takes too much of his money in taxes. 

It would also seem that one of the central planks in Taylor’s arguments is that the way the system works for him is the same way the system works for everyone, or, as he put it, “I don’t need to understand anything about ‘inner-city blacks’ experience because fortunately for me I live in a country where the same laws (criminal) apply to everyone equally.” This argument is ridiculous on it’s face. Never in the history of civilization have criminal laws applied equally to everyone. There has always existed a privileged class and those who are less privileged and to think that they would be treated exactly the same in the eyes of the law is merely a naive way of saying that the system works just fine.  

There are countless examples of people being treated differently under the law. One of the pernicious things about the structure of the American legal system is that every year more laws get added to the books, and this allows law enforcement officials to pick and chose which laws they want to enforce, against whom, and at what time. When Florida Greenpeace boarded a ship to check if it was trafficking in illegal mahogany, the Bush Administration used a law from 1872 to prosecute them. Never mind that that 1872 law was originally authored to stop people from boarding ships to lure away sailors to nights of booze and women, and that the last instance of its use was in 1890, let’s prosecute them for it anyway.

Speaking of old laws, poker players in South Carolina have been routinely harassed by police who are arresting them for the victimless crime of playing poker in a home game. The law they violated came into being in 1802 and prohibits anyone from playing “any game played with card or dice.” Yet I have a feeling the Monopoly players of the state, and probably the VTES players for that matter, can rest easy; it’s only the poker players they go after.

Both of these situations are examples of people in power wanting people brought down and finding some reason in the law to do it. The thing is Taylor, I feel I know you well enough to know that you don’t have a problem with the idea that Greenpeace was targeted with selective prosecution. I suspect it wouldn’t bother you in the least. You seem to feel that Greenpeace is part of the “they” that you feel opposes you, and whatever tools need to be used against it is just fine. I can understand this attitude, but please don’t be so hypocritical or naive as to say that we are all treated equally under the law. 

If you still aren’t convinced, I might ask you to consider the many elements of racism present in our “War on Drugs.” The penalties for drugs preferred by whites, such as powdered cocaine, are far less severe than the the drugs preferred predominantly by blacks such as crack cocaine. To quote an ACLU report, “distribution of just 5 grams of crack carries a minimum 5-year federal prison sentence, while for powder cocaine, distribution of 500 grams – 100 times the amount of crack cocaine – carries the same sentence.” That same report goes on to say:

The racial disparity in the application of mandatory minimum sentences for crack cocaine is particularly disturbing. African Americans comprise the vast majority of those convicted of crack cocaine offenses, while the majority of those convicted for powder cocaine offenses are white. This is true, despite the fact that whites and Hispanics form the majority of crack users. For example, in 2003, whites constituted 7.8% and African Americans constituted more than 80% of the defendants sentenced under the harsh federal crack cocaine laws, despite the fact that more than 66% of crack cocaine users in the United States are white or Hispanic. Due in large part to the sentencing disparity based on the form of the drug, African Americans serve substantially more time in prison for drug offenses than do whites. The average sentence for a crack cocaine offense in 2003, which was 123 months, was 3.5 years longer than the average sentence of 81 months for an offense involving the powder form of the drug. Also due in large part to mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses, from 1994 to 2003, the difference between the average time African American offenders served in prison increased by 77%, compared to an increase of 28% for white drug offenders. African Americans now serve virtually as much time in prison for a drug offense at 58.7 months, as whites do for a violent offense at 61.7 months. The fact that African American defendants received the mandatory sentences more often than white defendants who were eligible for a mandatory minimum sentence, further supports the racially discriminatory impact of mandatory minimum penalties.

And let’s not forget the study described in Michael Brown’s book Whitewashing Race: The Myth of a Color-Blind Society that being black would statistically more than double the chances of being convicted of a cocaine related crime and add, on average, more than 40 months to the sentence holding all other things equal. 

Of course, I don’t expect you to pick up a copy of that book any more than I expect that you’d watch the movie of Rendition that explores a real-life case of abuses at the hands of President Bush, whom you consider a personal friend. The suggests that you consider material such as books and movies that are unsympathetic towards the Republican cause are meet with “I haven’t scene (sic) Rendition – I typically don’t use my money to fund liberal hacks.” Which just goes to show that you, and the other Republicans like you, are willfully ignorant. It’s not that information has not been offered to you to refute your assertion that the system works just fine, it’s that you have chosen to ignore it. I can only believe the reason is because you rather like the way the system works for you and would hate to see it changed to where it wold be more fair for everyone.

In my last blog I compared this to sort of willful ignorance to that of the Germans during the Second World War who were also willfully ignorant. You attacked this by saying:

These are some the scary fallacies you put forward. The difference is more than obvious. In the former 1) The persons actually committed crimes 2) Their possessions were not seized by a government 3) They were given a choice to fight or go to jail – they choose to fight. In the latter 1) They were falsely imprisoned 2) Their possessions were seized 3) Their labor was a means to an end in a dastardly program of genocide.

Are you seriously going to compare being given a choice to fight in a war with being systematically exterminated?

Taylor is ignoring that my original post also noted that blacks were disproportionately drafted into the army. Hence, there is a form of systematic extermination going on at the time that greatly bothered the civil rights leaders of its day such as Martin Luther King. In regards to my other point, that offering deferment to drug charges in order to get more (predominately black) people to fight a war they didn’t believe in, you seem to be suggesting that they have made an entirely free choice and should just accept the consequences, however fatal. 

Taylor is ignoring the coercive hand of government in this decision that was carrying out a policy of prosecuting people for the victimless crime of drug possession. Even if we buy Taylor’s later (and rather contrived) argument that drugs are not victimless, the racist execution of the war on drugs and its use as a tool for recruiting for the unpopular Vietnam war undermines his assertion of equal treatment for all.

Lastly, Taylor is making an extreme argument of personal responsibility here. In essence he says that people should be free to make decisions, such as fighting in Vietnam, that may prove fatal to them. If we accept this argument, then that means that we are all responsible for our own well being and that if we make decisions that ultimately lead to our death in a rice patty rather than serving out a prison term, then we should allow people to make these decisions. 

How ironic then that Taylor, and other Republicans, insist that blacks be free to make such harmful decisions as dying in Vietnam, yet they are NOT allowed to make the decision to damage their body with drugs. In essence, Taylor is saying that our bodies are the property of the US government to do with as it sees fit. If we chose to damage government property by taking drugs that would harm it, then it has recourse to instead use our bodies to fight wars. This is an argument of extreme totalitarianism, and the only reason anyone would make it is if there body in particular were not at risk. 

Taylor again argues that prostitution is not victimless because, “Prostitution is also not a victimless crime. I have a friend who works for a NGO involved with human trafficking – most of which is underage or barely legal women forced into prostitution. So again, don’t preach that jons are beyond reproach, they enable the problem.”  This argument does not fall far from the hypocritical tree from which it originated. Blacks are free to chose to allow their bodies to fight and die in Vietnam, but foreign women are not allowed to use their bodies to be engaged in the sex trade.  

I, for one, feel that our bodies are our own property to do with as we will. That includes destroying it at the time and method of my choosing if I so desire. Hence, drugs and prostitution are victimless. Furthermore, I feel that people should be allowed to spend and risk their money in whatever way they want. So I see no problem with home poker games in South Carolina. Any argument to the contrary says that the greater good of all must be considered in regards to how I spend my money and what I do with my body, and opening that bottle now allows the government to dictate whatever terms it wants in regards to laws and legislation that has the potential to extinguish liberty altogether. Anyone interested in reading more about Libertarian ethics is urged to pick with the book, For a New Liberty.

Ultimately the problem with Republican rhetoric is that is extremely inconsistent. It jumps from demanding personal liberty and freedom from the government in one case, and then demands government authority and virtually totalitarian power at other times. This is not new in history of human events, but is instead the telltale pattern of a powerful class using its influence to ensure that the government works, not only FOR them, but AGAINST others. This is the reason why, when the discussion of American politics comes up, I tend to start the discussion with, “The Republican party is all about power.” Lastly Taylor, I must apologize for my anti-Republican bias, but if I am forced to chose between which of the two American parties to oppose, the Facists or the Socialists, I’m afraid I have to oppose the Facists.

Answering Taylor’s Question

Taylor, longtime friend and blog reader, recently wrote this comment:

“I hate it when you do this. Not trying to be antagonistic, but that is hard to do when you make such fallacious statements throughout your blog. But here goes:
So what is the solution? I see a pattern in your blogs that criticize ‘x’: identify problem -> identify Republicans as instigator of problem -> offer no solution.
I read 1 stated complaint and 1 implicate:
Stated: private business profiting from high incarceration rates is bad
Implicit: ‘making stuff illegal and locking people up’ is a bad policy
I agree that if incarceration rates were not high there would be no reason for the market to respond with providing services. But to suggest that private prisons are killing off their inmates and the government is turning a blind eye is a bit far-fetched isn’t it? I mean, personally, I could care less. They are prisoners, and in my opinion, we should devise a zero-sum expense model to deal with them instead of pouring tax dollars into such a system. But, the liberals in the country will cry foul, so, oh, well.
As for the policy, let’s list who is incarcerated ( in no order ):
– murderers
– thieves
– rapists
– drug dealers
– Martha Stewart
Which of these categories of criminals do you suggest we set free? I assume you are not going to come forward with some radical policy like hang ’em all, and, I assume the Libertarian in you will say, ‘just set all those drug-dealing gang-bangers free.’
If that is your solution, put it forward for discussion.”

I hate to make an example of my friend, but he is bolstering my case by writing that: “personally, I could care less. They are prisoners”.

This is the attitude that typifies Republicans.

This speaks to Taylor’s experience. Presumably, he has never had any serious problems with the police, and so anyone who does must be a bad person. The notion that we are locking anyone up unnecessarily is viewed as preposterous, as is the notion that the prison system is anything but just.

I’ve heard many a Republican say that we are simply too soft on our prisoners. Prisons need to be harder. The time spent, tougher. As one-time Republican candidate for Texas governor, Clayton Williams said during his campaign, “We need to introduce our prisoners to the joys of busting rocks.” It’s an attitude I can understand. Republicans feel part of the system, so the system must work for them. Surely, any allegations otherwise must be “far-fetched.” Government would never stoop to the level of locking up people unnecessarily. That’s just crazy talk.

Unfortunately, this attitude is very naive.

I remember reading a story in the Wall Street Journal about the history of an Alabama mining town that used prison labor in the mines. Mining was a dangerous profession, so many prisoners would die. When the prison population got too low, the local sheriff would go out and arrest people so that the mine would have more workers. (Far from being far-fetched, Taylor, this kind of stuff is hardly uncommon.)

And, let’s take it from the local level of an Alabama town to the national one.

When the United States was fighting in Vietnam, Republicans seemed to have few qualms about the fact that drug offenders (who were mostly black) were being forced to fight — and die — for a war they did not believe in, merely to avoid jail time.

I find this kind of hypocrisy grossly unsettling.

I don’t see the material difference between the Americans who let drug offenders fight their war against Communism for them in the rice patties of Vietnam, and the Germans who let the Nazis falsely imprison the Jewish population so that their wealth could be confiscated and the state would have plenty of labor to fight their own war. Both are examples of a citizenry on the “right side of the law” allowing themselves to be willfully ignorant of the system’s darker side. I find it even more ironic that these “law and order” types are the very same people who want to make politics more religious and talk about Jesus’ love for everyone.

From my experience, religious faith challenges its believers to sympathize with the experiences of the downtrodden. In the Bible, does Jesus not ask his followers why they did not visit him in prison, and then go on to say that, “whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.” I understand the hypocrisy that is to call for a more holy nation while, at the same time, call for harsher prisons. I understand it, but I don’t have to like it. And so, I apologize to Taylor for using the pages of my blog as a pulpit to wage war against the hypocrisy of our nation, but that hypocrisy is the true root of our decline into a decadent empire.

If we would spend time with those who have a different experience of things, we can learn from them. If Taylor and the other Republicans calling for “law and order” understood the experience of inner-city blacks who many times feel that the police are part of the “They” that is out to get them, they might come to this discussion a bit differently.

If they had ever had a family member incarcerated for a victimless crime such as drug possession, and seen the hardships that the family had had to endure, they might come to this differently.

If they had known anyone who got drafted, or took prison deferment and died fighting a war they didn’t believe in, they might come to this differently.

Now, to come back off my soapbox, and answer Taylor’s question.

Our growing prison population is a symptom of our hopeless “War on Drugs”. Although I think it was obvious from my original post, if we would end our prosecution of victimless crimes such as drug offenses and prostitution, we would dramatically reduce the prison population, and with it, our need for prisons. And if we would but understand, as Jesus asks us to in the book of Matthew, that prisoners are still people and that they are worthy of our fair treatment and to still be considered people with rights, then I doubt we would allow these conditions to exist to begin with.

The Republican lies of “law and order” are merely an appeal for the state to gain more control over its citizenry.

Similarly, it was just a few short years ago, that the Republicans under the Bush Administration told us that the CIA and military intelligence needed to be allowed to torture people so that we could win the “War on Terror.” What I find so galling, is that Republicans like Taylor seem to swallow these arguments hook, line and sinker — and then turn around and tell me how much we need to get government out of our lives. I sincerely doubt they they have viewed movies, such as “Rendition“, that highlight the abuses of such programs.

If they did, I sincerely doubt they would be comfortable with handing these powers over to the government under any circumstances.

The Main Focus of this Meeting is … to Schedule Another Meeting.

The leaders of the G-20 nations met in Washington DC over the weekend. The discussions that were had were in secret, but it seems that the main result of the meeting was the schedule the next. You see, these talks were not attended by President-Elect Obama. Instead, the assembled leaders had to make do with George W. Bush who will only be in office for another couple of months. That would make it rather hard to get any serious business done.

Politically, I think it was the right decision for Obama to not attend. The goal of the meeting was not going to be desirable to the United States. The roster of G-20 leaders basically amounts to countries the US owes money, who want less protectionism  in order to help their own economies, and those who have been burned by buying “toxic debt” from us. Often, a single country can be filed in more than one of these categories. What is happening here is nothing short of an intervention. As if the friends and family of the US were forcing it to sit down and listen so that it might come to understand: “you have a problem.” And, after interventions, discipline and recovery is supposed to follow.

Really, who wants that?

Obama is in a particularly hard situation. He was elected on the Democratic ticket and they are already calling for a bailout of GM. Of course, by doing so, they will be protecting the jobs of autoworkers who have been one of the most ardent supports of the Democrats for decades. So Obama is caught between the nations of the world who want to have a “talk” with him and his own party that is basically saying “The Republicans have thrown money at their backers for too long; it’s time we get to throw money at ours!” It’s a no-win situation. By not attending, he’s at least playing hard-to-get.

I can’t imagine a worse time to be President than right now. While I feel that Obama will play the politician and negotiator, and try to say as little as possible for as long as possible, the forces at work can’t be kept waiting forever. They will want an answer. GM wants a bailout, and the G-20 wants the US to get its financial house in order. Doing both isn’t possible and neither is putting the question off forever. Returning the US to the path of financial discipline is an unpopular one in the best of times; today, doing so would involve alienating the very party that got you elected. Meanwhile, throwing more and more money at the collapsing economy will just hasten the collapse of the dollar on the world stage. The G-20 leaders, seeing that the US is not ready to end its addiction, will start making plans for how they will alienate the addict and instead do business with one another. And that can’t be good.

This is most likely the beginning of the end for the dollar.

The US is simply in denial regarding how bad the situation is, and the G-20 isn’t going to be able to penetrate a denial of that magnitude. Regardless of how many incidents you try to recount to the addict, until they’ve bottomed out, there is just no talking sense to them. I’m sure Obama can be made to see the reality of what is happening, but I doubt he has the ability to convince a nation that now’s the time to kick the “print more money” habit that has seemingly played out so well for it. Failing that, what else can really be done but to delay the inevitable?

And so the chase has begun — between our creditors who want to schedule a serious meeting so that we can have a little talk — with the REAL President in attendance this time — and the man who cannot, try as he might, find a win-win solution to all of this.

Who’s Afraid of the Big, Bad Robber Barons

As I’ve discussed in this blog before, I am a fan of what’s viewed as “shock radio.” Specifically, I really enjoy both Howard Stern and Bubba the Love Sponge on Sirius Channel 101. I’ve been a Sirius subscriber since 2005 and I’ve really enjoyed it; I’m listening to Sirius Pops right now as I compose this blog. My only complaint with them is that they might not resign Bubba whose contract ends in December, and that would really annoy me. I’m hoping they won’t do that. If you’re looking for a good Christmas present this year, I do heartily recommend that you give the gift of Sirius. 

The reason I bring Bubba up is because he often discusses politics and “Spice Boy”, one of the shows cast members, lamented that the “Republicans just know how to work better.” Work in the parlance of that particular radio show meant that they knew how to lie well and present a convincing story for others to believe. This is just another way of restating the rather old joke, “No, I don’t belong to an organized political party. I’m a Democrat.”

Case in point, a right-wing friend of mine just sent me this story about how Barack Obama won’t let any gun owners be part of his administration. Well, at least that’s what the Illinois State Rifle Association says because apparently some questionnaire asks:

“Do you or any members of your immediate family own a gun? If so, provide complete ownership and registration information. Has the registration ever lapsed? Please also describe how and by whom it is used and whether it has been the cause of any personal injuries or property damage.”

Therefore, Barack hates gun owners. Therefore, he’s coming to confiscate everyone’s guns. Of course, these days the President of the United States is a rather powerful person; you know, “Leader of the Free World” and all of that jazz. So it stands to reason that there might be people out there who might try to do the President harm- hence the Secret Service and all.  And it does stand to reason that perhaps Barack’s security team might want to know about firearms an applicant has access to and whether they’ve ever caused any “personal injuries”. I don’t know. If I were going to be President (and I’m thankful I’m not ever going to be) I’d probably want to ask that question to. 

To me, what this story really sheds light on is the gullibility of the Republican base. They seem to get worked up by all kinds of stories about Barack’s radical Muslim heritage or his ties to black radicals that clearly mean that he hates America. Now I know that the Democrats have their fair share of ignorant voters as well, as the Howard Stern show’s Sal Governale recently showed. I’m sure that the Republican attack stories, which are mostly not true or grossly exaggerated, will continue to make the rounds, but the Republicans soundly lost the last election so I expect I will start hearing a lot more left wing lies than right wing for the next few years.

Case in point, I recently called the Randi Rhodes show. I used to listen to her on the now defunct Air America radio in Dallas back in 2003 and 2004. Yes, you heard me correctly. I so hated the Bush Administration and his legion of flag-waving minions that I was driven into the arms of the any who would have common cause with me, and in this case the arms happened to be Randi’s. Her show was a bit hard to take, even back then. She doesn’t seem to know when a bit has gone to long and she just beats her audience over the head with her parody elements and impersonations. That, and it seems like at least 40% of her on air time is devoted to commercials. 

Well, things didn’t work out to well for Randi. She got kicked off of Air America radio for calling Hillary Clinton a “whore”. Probably just as well, Air America went bankrupt. Well now Randi’s doing Podcast and a streaming radio show over the internet. Yesterday she was talking about AIG and the bank bailout and I thought I’d give her a call. Randi kept saying that the only way to prevent abuses in the banking industry was through regulation. In fact, she said that’s all a government could do. 

That seemed an absurd assertion. You can’t regulate away human greed. As I pointed out in my call to her, industries that are prone to greed and abuse will simply take control of the agencies that are supposed to be watchdogging them as the drug industry has done with the FDA. Truly, if she wants to end the reign of the few powerful organizations such as AIG, then what we need is not a bailout, but a liquidation. If allowed to fail, the big organizations would cease to exist. Their assets would be sold to the remaining companies who are hopefully more virtuous (or at least better funded) and life continues on. If instead, the government bails the industry out, then the big are not only allowed to grow bigger, but now they have the implied guarantee of future government bailouts the next time they get into trouble. Honestly, you Democrats, if big companies are what you fear, then you should become cheerleaders for liquidation, not advocates for endless bailouts!

Randi cut me off. She told such talk would lead back to the bad old days of the “Robber Barons.” That Barack Obama was someone who could regulate away the abuses of the system caused by greed because he had come without lobbyists and would therefore take Washington control away from the evil corporations and give it back to the people. She wouldn’t let me get a word in edgewise, then she went to commercial break… again.

I find two things vaguely humorous about this. The first is that Randi had just been saying that we need to keep our expectations of Barack down because “He’s only human.” Yet she then went on to tell me how he, free from lobbyist control, was going to liberate the Washington world from the greedy bankers. The second was the whole “Robber Baron” thing is a huge Democrat talking point. We can’t go back to the days before the Federal Reserve and the New Deal, and all those other wonderful government programs. Hell no! That’s back when the Robber Barons robbed us blind! Except they didn’t. The later half of the 1800s was one of the most prosperous times for us all as a people. The real wages of the average worker increased year after year despite the fact that there was no minimum wage laws. People were far more free to do as they pleased when it came to the wonderful vice laws of today’s society.  Really, when you look over the history of the time, I don’t see the part where the evil Robber Barons swoop in and take away everyone’s money- probably because it never happened. 

The Robber Barons are just an old Democratic chestnut. They are the equivalent as the Bogeyman: a shadowy figure who is up to no good and will get you when you least expect it. This is, of course, merely a lie put forth so that people will seek the protection of the government. The Robber Baron is the Democratic equivalent of the Islamic Terrorist; he is that figure who is so terrible that we must look to the government for protection. Here’s a question, who can name one? Come on, think hard. If they were so terrible, certainly we should be able to remember at least one.

Well here’s one for you, Jay Gould. As it turns out, he really wasn’t such a bad guy. Sure, he tried to take money from people, but not the working man. He didn’t have much worth taking. No, Mr. Gould was a Wall Street raider. He endeavored to take money from the other people that had it: the Rockefellers,  Morgans, and Vanderbilts. Don’t believe me, here, read it for yourself in Dark Genius of Wall Street: The Misunderstood Life of Jay Gould, King of the Robber Barons. Now I’m sure Mr. Gould would have loved to own a monopoly and rip off the average consumer, but that’s not what he did. Instead, that’s what the bankers did. 

The real mustache twirling villains in the tales of the late 1800s are not the Jay Goulds of the world, but rather the “money trust” of Rockefeller and Morgan. The banking families had huge wealth, but they wanted more. They wanted a lock on the power to create money and government protection in case their organizations were ever in danger. So they set about creating what G Edward Griffin called the The Creature from Jekyll Island.  And it is a monopoly far worse than anything Jay Gould or Bill Gates could put together. What’s worse, it had a mandate from our government that says it gets to basically do whatever it deems necessary to make sure that its member banks stay profitable. 

So really Randi, who’s afraid of the Robber Barons of the 1800s. Not me. I’m more afraid of the ones who are with us today… and have the power to print our money.

My Experience with Democracy

First an apology for not posting for a while. I lost my internet connection for a few days and it wasn’t restored until today. So I wasn’t able to follow the election results all that closely yesterday, but I was certain that Obama was going to win. For that matter, I was sure Obama was going to win back in 2006. It just didn’t seem any big mystery back then that the nation was tired of George Bush and that whichever Republican won the nomination was not going to be able to combat the last eight years of a sagging economy and an unpopular war in Iraq. There was another election I was fairly sure the result of my own. 

Yes, for those of you who don’t know, I ran for office. Specifically I ran for State Representative District 115. The Libertarian Party asked me to. I felt bad that they didn’t have a gung-ho guy in District 115, so I signed on as a “not so gung-ho” candidate of District 115. My campaign wasn’t the most inspired ever run. I printed neither signs nor buttons. In fact, I spend no money to promote myself whatsoever. I did answer a couple of questionaries sent to me by the League of Women Voters and other voter information groups and I did attend one GEICO sponsored “come meet the candidates” luncheon. Yes despite my complete lack of enthusiasm, I somehow managed to appeal to 8248 people. Yes, I won a full 19% of the popular vote in the race for State Representative against Incumbent Jim Jackson. Don’t believe me, you can read it for yourself at USA Today.

I must confess I was astounded at the number. I don’t know 8248 people. How on Earth could that many people have voted for me, without ever meeting me? Well I did get a chance to vote for me, so that’s only 8247 unaccounted for. My mother said she voted for me, and I suppose I can believe her. And an ex-girlfriend whom I hadn’t heard from in a while who saw my name on a ballot. As for the remaining 8245, I have no idea. I’m beginning to suspect that they may have voted for me without knowing me at all. 

Come to think of it, how many of Jim Jackson’s 35,599 actually knew his name before stepping into the booth? I know I’ve often gone into the booth to vote for some candidate of issue at the national or local level and then started befuddled at the array of candidate I had to chose for local elections. I think it’s highly possible that the vast majority of the roughly 44,000 voter could not pick either of us out of a line up. Let’s be frank, I don’t think those voters knew us from Adam. 

So it was with astonishment and mirth that I saw that somehow over 19% of the voters (8248) actually voted for me. Given that I was the only choice other than Republican Incumbent Jim Jackson, I think that this is a fairly good indicator of how many people just decided to vote against the Republican on sheer principle. Well, I suppose I was happy to make my name available to people so they had someone to vote for other than the Republican. 

Recently I began to have doubts that Democracy worked at all. After this experience, I feel fairly certain that it doesn’t. Until tomorrow, your steadfast candidate is signing off.

Obama’s Infommercial

I don’t watch a lot of TV, but I heard about Barack Obama’s infommercial that addressed our current economic crisis. Being that our current economic crisis is my main focus on the pages of this blog, I felt I had to go out of my way to give my readers the lowdown on what he said and what he’s promising. I found a copy of the text of the infomercial as well as the video at the LA Times.

In reading through it, I must say I felt moved. Obama has a talent for really speaking in a way that moves people that I must confess being envious of. Certain lines such as:

We measure the strength of our economy not by the number of billionaires we have or the profits of the Fortune 500, but by whether someone with a good idea can take a risk and start a new business, or whether the waitress who lives on tips can take a day off and look after a sick kid without losing her job – an economy that honors the dignity of work.

The line is pure fluff, but it’s moving fluff. Americans have witnessed CEOs getting rich by bankrupting the companies they run and I’m sure they are tired of it. It is a bizarre perversion of the free market system, which is supposed to reward people in proportion to their contributions, to instead reward greedy managers who bankrupt the company they were entrusted to grow. At least when Michael Milken was destroying companies one could argue that he was doing a service by buying them, breaking them up, and selling off the smaller pieces to the interested parties. Simply bankrupting a company serves no useful purpose and is damaging to the country and the economy. But what is Barack going to do about it? How can the President, regardless of how well meaning, somehow restore the economy to where it honors the “dignity of work”? Well, here are some of his specifics:

What happened in the financial markets was the final verdict on eight years of failed policies.  And we’re now going through the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

A few weeks ago, we passed a financial rescue plan.  It’s a step in the right direction … and as president, I’ll ensure that you, the taxpayers, are paid back first.

But we also need a rescue plan for the middle class … starting with what we can do right now that will have an immediate effect. 

As president, here’s what I’ll do:

Cut taxes for every working family making less than $200,000 a year.

Give businesses a tax credit for every new employee that they hire right here in the U.S. over the next two years … and eliminate tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas.

Help homeowners who are making a good faith effort to pay their mortgages,  by freezing foreclosures for 90 days.

And just like after 9-11, we’ll provide low-cost loans to help small businesses pay their workers and keep their doors open.

None of that grows government.  It grows the economy and keeps people on the job.

He’s basically talking about handing out loans like Santa Claus. If our current financial crisis should tell us anything it’s that easy credit is not the way to prosperity. The other part he’s promising is tax cuts. I never meet a tax cut I didn’t like, and I think he’s on the right track here, but if the Republicans have taught us anything it’s that tax cuts don’t help the economy unless they are accompanied by a reduction in government spending. The typical Republican course of action of raising spending while cutting taxes is not a true tax cut, but rather merely displacing the tax onto future generations… plus interest. 

Sure enough, later in the talk, Barack promises to do just that. 

I’ll also go through the federal budget, line by line, eliminating programs that don’t work … and making the ones we do need work better and cost less.

And one of the biggest savings we can make is to change our policy in Iraq. 

Bingo. You want a method to jump start the economy, here it is. Unfortunately, this is not a new promise coming from a politician hoping to become President. And it does beg the larger question as to why Obama hasn’t already done this. The federal government releases its budget every year, so why hasn’t he already gone through this years budget and outlined some areas of clear waste. You don’t need to be President to do that. 

Of course he did identify one clear area of government spending that he’d like to eliminate in terms of the occupation of Iraq- which is excellent. However, this war has grown unpopular, so it’s not like it’s hard to come out against it. If he were, on the other hand, to come out against some of our other stupid wars, such as the “War on Drugs”, then it’s doubtful the good moral people of this country would actually elect him- which is a shame. It’s a huge drag on the economy that we spend tax money to lock up people just for getting their groove on with substances deemed illegal. 

While we’re at it, let’s talk about another stupid government war: the “War on Poverty.” This is another war where we just need to admit defeat. Social Security has merely been a convenient tax from which the politicians will raid. As it stands, there’s no way we can afford all of our pledged free Medicare and Social Security payments to senior citizens. And unemployment insurance does have a crazy way of subsidizing unemployment. 

Unfortunately, Obama’s not going to touch any of these issues. In fact, he seems to be stating in the rest of his speech that he’d actually like to increase spending in these areas. So, while he may go “line by line” through the federal budget, I’m guessing we’re not going to see any real change. I’m also guessing that this is the reason he doesn’t get into specifics but instead speaks in generalities. 

Oh well. I suppose that’s how politicians get elected. What a crazy system.

Bush Tells Banks to Stop Hoarding and Lend

In the promotion for Naomi Wolf’s new book Give Me Liberty: A Handbook for American Revolutionaries Ms. Wolf states that the United States has recently been overtaken by a coup. She further asserts that George Bush will not release the presidency but will instead declare martial law.

As someone who loves liberty and distrusts governments (in general) and the Bush Administration (in particular) I have to admire Ms. Wolf’s spirit, but I also have to disagree with her assertions. George Bush will not declare martial law. I believe it’s simply not in his nature.

We’ve never meet, but I feel I’ve come to know George W. Bush over the last nine years or so. I started out disliking him because of his politics, warming to him as a leader who would not hesitate to deliver a good country butt-whopping to Osama Bin Laden, and then watched as he proceeded to use 9/11 as merely another political tool to justify invading Iraq and getting him re-elected. I not the first to doubt the sincerity of our President regarding finding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, but by his 2004 election campaign I was convinced that the justification for the war had been entirely manufactured. At the time a lot of Republicans vehemently disagreed with me; now they just change the subject. 

I realized that our fearless leader was carrying out the tried and true politics of fascism: praise Americans for their self-perceived virtues, preach fear, make power grabs for increased legal authorities and oversights, and work closely to favor certain corporations. In that way, Ms. Wolf and I do see the President in a similar light, but she takes this to its logical conclusion: surely aggressive grabs for power must come from a power mad figure who will not release control. That is where we disagree. 

I don’t feel that Bush is really all that power hungry. In fact, I think he’s sick of politics. I know it’s strange to try to analyze inner motivations of someone I’ve never met, but I’m not even sure Bush ever wanted to be President to begin with. I think the Bush family and friends thought that he could become President and encouraged him to do so. To my way of thinking,  Bush is merely the puppet for the “advisors” behind the scenes who developed the plans to invade Iraq long before Bush even took office. And so I envision Bush looking upon his Presidency much like his college must have seemed to him: important stuff but really he’d rather be doing something else. Even since becoming a politician, Bush has had to study all over again- except instead of tests he has to study for, its debates, speeches, and press conferences. 

That’s perhaps why Bush’s politics have seemed so fluid. He started out preaching about the power of free markets combined with small governments. Then, much like college, he passed that test and went on to study entirely new material that didn’t necessarily relate much to the past material. It would seem the course curriculum of Bush’s Presidency started with a lot of early testing on small government, then moved on to how to build public support for a war, then spent some time delving into how to build a police state, and is now being tested on Socialism and international coordination to intervene in the function of the marketplace.

I’m certain that all of this has taxed the poor man’s brain. Let’s face, that’s a lot of material to cover in eight years- much less make it seem part of a coherent political agenda that has any consistency at all. So while Ms. Wolf is pointing to Bush’s power hungry politics, I’d like to inform her that that was last year’s material. He’s a Socialist now. Case in point, Bush is now telling the banks how to run the banking business. I suppose in some ways this might be perversely justified. After all, it would seem the government has recently become a major stockholder in the major institutions of banking and it is only natural for large shareholders to feel that they have a say in how the company is run. 

Still, it does strike me as rather hypocritical for a man who bankrupted so many oil companies to tell bankers how to do their job. Ironically, the advice that Bush is giving them (i.e. get out there and lend more money) was exactly the thing that got them into this pickle to begin with. After all, in terms of lending money, once banks have given billions of dollars to people who had no means of repaying it, there’s really no where to go but down. 

I wonder who convinced Bush to be a Socialist. They certainly seem to have been excellent tutors for him. These days he can rattle off rhetoric that would have made FDR and John Maynard Keynes proud. After all, it was in regard to the banking industry that FDR opined “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Bush, like FDR before him, is telling banks to ignore their natural fear of bankruptcy and get out there and lend some of this money the government/Federal Reserve is giving you so that we can start inflating again.

It’s sad that we as a nation have now been reduced to seeing Bush parroting the most influential figures of the school of thought and political party he was supposed to be staunchly opposed to, and I can’t help but think that it must eat at him. I’m sure that he doesn’t like the notion that he’s made a terrible mess of our nation and I’m sure he must be secretly blaming the course instructors who gave him the notes to study to begin with. “Why the hell am I having to give the speeches of FDR?” he must be wondering. 

And as such I’m sure that Bush will step aside when the time comes. He must tacitly admit to himself that things haven’t gone all that well and that it’s time to step aside and let someone else can in and fail spectacularly. As for the voting public, it would seem that fake Socialism just won’t do. “Why buy imitation when you can get the real thing?” might be the thoughts of many people voting for Barrack Obama- a man who has been much more consistent in his Socialism than our current President. As Bush demonstrated in the 2004 election, the American people want consistency. They don’t want Capitalism Warmonger one day, and then Socialist international coalition builder the next. 

So soon it will be Obama’s turn at the wheel and we in the United States will get to see how a real Socialist does things. I can hardly wait.