tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18159212252614780582023-11-16T03:11:25.483-08:00Skeptical PoliticsMy Contrarian/Libertarian Take on Tiresome Political Events
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<img src="http://www.bloglines.com/images/sub_modern3.gif" border="0" alt="Subscribe with Bloglines"></a>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.comBlogger202125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-42024997850551947212016-03-22T16:31:00.001-07:002016-03-22T16:31:00.719-07:00Dear Media: Castro Is Not 'President' of Anything | David Boaz<a href="http://fee.org/articles/dear-media-castro-is-not-president-of-anything/">Dear Media: Castro Is Not 'President' of Anything | David Boaz</a>\<br /><br />
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Call Castro what he is: Military Dictator. Obama may need to be diplomatic, but the press doesn't.McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-5536121171957122512016-03-02T10:12:00.001-08:002016-03-02T10:12:55.828-08:00Trump and Sanders Are Both Conservatives | Steven Horwitz<a href="http://fee.org/articles/trump-and-sanders-are-both-conservatives/">Trump and Sanders Are Both Conservatives | Steven Horwitz</a><br /><br />
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"Both Trump and Sanders believe that with the right people in charge, there’s no need for rule-based constraints on political power."<br /><br />
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Political parties agree on use of state force; they just disagree on who should be doing the beating, and who should be beaten. This isn't liberalism -- it's fascism.McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-60900508935700920592013-04-29T20:59:00.001-07:002013-04-29T21:00:11.931-07:00"Get Big Money Out of Politics!" -- Only one way to do that...but you won't like itA friend comments on a story about a corrupt state Attorney General:<br />
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<b>Yet another example of why we need to get big money out of politics.</b></div>
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Wrong, of course. My reply:</div>
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<b>Getting money out of politics cannot ever happen.</b> An entity with the power the government has to make or break you, to side with you against your competitors or the other way around, to make rules that hurt you or help you, to send you to jail or outlaw your most profitable product, to tax you into oblivion, to demonize you to justify whatever is popular to do to you -- <b>people will spend as much money as they must to control an entity like that.</b> For better or worse.<br />
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And they will. And you can say "No, don't spend money to defend yourself" and those are empty words. Worse, you can say "No, don't spend money to seize this power for your own benefit!" and It Is obviously To Laugh. And tell the good not to take power to do good because that power is dangerous; and feel their resentment.</div>
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<b>The Founders figured out there is one and only one way to reduce the incentive</b> of the ambitious to seize the power of government - and that is <b>to greatly limit the power of that government. </b>Both the power to do evil, <i>and the power to do good</i> - for they are the same thing, just in different hands. In my hands, good; in your hands--not so much.</div>
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The ambitious will scheme into the night and you will not long suppress them. Those of good intentions will complain of limited government power to do good -- not able to acknowledge that power does not come with that kind of restriction in the long run. <i>There is no such thing as "You are authorized to use power to Do Good."</i></div>
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But no... Let's by all means have an all-powerful government that is not limited in the good it can do, but only limited in the <i>misuse </i>of power. Yes, let's do that.</div>
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Wake me when you figure out how.</div>
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Meanwhile, mercy upon our descendants.</div>
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mac</div>
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McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-72951019385458246422013-03-21T09:57:00.003-07:002013-03-21T09:57:32.202-07:00Fun with the Comcast Beast<br />
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Wasted half an hour on the phone with Comcast (wasted first ten minutes trying to find their phone number on their site) attempting without success to reduce service to save on my monthly bill.</div>
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I have "triple play' which combines TV, internet, and landline in one bill - which has grown to $175 a month over the past year or so. Once again I am reminded how well Comcast organizes its pricing structure to discourage exactly what I was trying to do.</div>
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Last year I reduced my internet speed to save money; the standard service is around 12mbps; the *only* lesser option is 1mbps, for which I save about ten bucks. One, or 12 - cute, huh? (Of course, Comcast's internet people can't help themselves: The speed has risen over the past year to 3mbps.) Happily I found that I can tolerate this speed just fine, since I don't watch high-bandwidth shows on my computer anyway, nor do Skyping.</div>
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So i called thinking to cut back on the TV side -- research shows that dropping down to the basic package drops off all the channels you most like, such as AMC and the housing shows my wife likes -- so I figured to cut back on HD, since we hardly ever use it (not sports fans) and would not miss it. Turns out that the DVR, which we <b>do </b>like, works on the HD package *only* -- drop to the "classic" (non-HD) service and bye-bye DVR. </div>
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Also discovered that their DVR will indeed show on the other TV using a wireless gadget <b><i>that should have been installed last year when I got the DVR</i> </b>but the tech didn't install, and nobody told me about. To have the tech come up and hook it up right will cost me -- $50. No, since it was their mistake, they'll discount that to $35. Nice.</div>
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Several "how about this package combo?" discussions later, all of which result in getting more service for <b>just a bit</b> more money, I gave up. It is not possible to reduce these costs. I suspect if I cancelled the phone element of the triple play, the remaining double--play items would add up to -- $175 a month.</div>
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I get my cell service from AT&T; I think I need to drop by and see if they can do anything for me. I suspect I will get the same treatment from them too, but the prospect of poking Comcast in the eye is hard to resist. I've been a happy Comcast customer for more than a decade (and its predecessors for another decade before that) but I can no longer afford it. One advantage of AT&T in my case is that I could presumably just drop my landline altogether, since I get my cell service from AT&T. (Last year I threatened Comcast with switching to AT&T and got a temporary fifteen dollar a month discount.)</div>
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Any of you have experience with AT&T's internet and TV service? Is it bad or tolerable, and is it just as gouging as Comcast?</div>
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Mac McCarthy</div>
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McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-9724153203694657112012-10-28T17:13:00.000-07:002012-10-28T17:21:22.318-07:00Reason Foundation California Voters’ Guide: November 2012 CA Ballot Propositions<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">By Adrian T. Moore, Ph.D</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">15 October 2012</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Executive Summary</span></h2>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It is election season and that means Californians once again face a daunting package of ballot questions on difficult public policy issues. This year’s initiatives cover a wide range of topics including taxes, campaign contributions, criminal justice, budget reform, food labeling and much more. As has been the case in years past, the ballot measures are not always as straightforward as they first appear. Some are grounded on questionable assumptions and value judgments. Others, despite admirable motivations, would nevertheless lead to unintended or unforeseeable adverse consequences. Some of these initiatives would empower the government to restrict individual freedom and choice in the name of uncertain benefits. And several would further burden California taxpayers by dramatically expanding the size and scope of state government.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">California’s unemployment rate is at 10.7 percent (as of July data), and the current state budget is already billions in the red due to shortfalls in tax collections. Voters are going to have to look seriously at the choices these initiatives represent.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The nonprofit and nonpartisan Reason Foundation evaluated the 11 initiatives on this year’s ballot. We provide a "plain English" summary of the arguments for and against each proposition, some information on supporters and opponents and funding of the campaigns, and some discussion of what Reason judges voters should think about when deciding on each proposition.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Here, in brief, is the 'free minds and free markets' perspective on each proposition.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Proposition 30: Governor Brown's Temporary Sales and Income Tax Increase</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A constitutional amendment that increases the state sales tax increase to 7.5% for 4 years and raises income taxes on the wealthy for 7 years to bring in an additional $6 to $9 billion each year.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">It does not guarantee more education funding. While Prop. 30 funds are dedicated to education, all the other funds in the education budget are not, so Sacramento can, as it has before, shift other money out of the education budget to displace incoming Prop. 30 funds.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> The 2012-2013 California budget is a record breaking $142.4 billion. Why, with record spending overall, is Sacramento cutting school funding? Sacramento doesn't need more money; they need to prioritize.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Few things could be more harmful to the economy than raising taxes on millions of small businesses, as Prop. 30 does. When businesses have to pay more taxes, they hire fewer people and/or raise prices. California already has among the highest taxes in the nation.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Why put more money into a system that doesn't use the money it has well? Less than 50% of K-12 funding goes into the classroom, the rest to administration and overhead. And at the University of California, in recent years while faculty grew by 33%, senior managers increased by 194% percent! If we give them more money, more money will go to administration and bureaucracy, not into classrooms.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Proposition 31: State Budget and Funding Reforms</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A bundle of budget and spending reforms, notably including shifting to a two-year budget instead of an annual budget, requiring cuts or new funds to balance any new spending, letting the governor make spending cuts in a fiscal emergency, requiring performance reviews and measures for state and local budgets, and publication of all bills at least 3 days prior to a vote.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">California does have a big problem with lack of oversight of spending programs, and hence with a lack of results. This would give the legislature the opportunity to conduct more oversight.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Performance measures and reviews for budgets does bring new transparency to the process and makes it easier for voters, media, and watchdogs to understand where money is going and what is being done with it.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Proposition 32: Restrictions on Union and Corporate Campaign Contributions and Payroll Deductions for Political Funding</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Prohibits unions, corporations and government contractors from contributing to candidates and their committees and from automatically deducting money from worker's paychecks to use for political purposes.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Contribution restrictions are not best way to solve the problem of special interest politics, but they can have some effect.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">This initiative will likely not reduce spending on campaigns, but will shift much of it to indirect expenditures, which candidates do not control.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">This will force unions to convince members to donate to political efforts, rather than rely on default giving, so unions may have fewer resources to spend on politics.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">It will severely restrict the "pay to play" practice of government contractors giving to campaigns of officials who decide on contracts.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Proposition 33: Auto Insurance Based on Driver's History of Insurance Coverage</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Allows insurance companies to offer customers switching from other companies a type of good customer discount for continuous coverage.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">It is ridiculous that the state decides what discounts an insurance company can and cannot offer. This is a step in the right direction of giving that discretion back to the companies.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">This will allow responsible people to pay lower rates. It may mean irresponsible people or those who chose not to insure to pay higher rates. That seems fair.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Proposition 34: Replace Death Penalty with Life in Prison</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Replaces death penalty with life without parole. Applies retroactively. Requires murderers to work and pay restitution. Creates a new $100 million fund for unsolved homicide and rape cases.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">• California’s death penalty is not working well. The average stay on death row is 20 years. It costs $90k more per year for each death row inmate than for ordinary inmates.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">• 140 people on death row have been exonerated. We know the system is imperfect and sometimes condemns innocent people. Death is permanent; life in prison offers a chance.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">• The money saved by not having to hold people in very expensive death row conditions is better used elsewhere.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Proposition 35: Increased Punishment for Human Trafficking</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Increases punishments for people convicted of human trafficking. Makes sex traffickers register as sex offenders and requires registered sex offenders to disclose their Internet accounts.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">This does address a gap in the law around kidnapping and sex with minors that can allow traffickers to avoid prosecution.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Making prostitution legal would substantially decrease incentives to traffic, and would free up lots of police resources for human trafficking.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Unfortunately, since this bill could easily include consensual adult prostitution, it would undermine the usefulness of the sex offender registry.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Proposition 36: Reform of Three Strikes Law</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Changes Three Strikes so that criminals get a life sentence only when the third strike is "serious or violent" or is a certain kind of sex, drug or firearm offense. Allows resentencing some three-strikers whose third strike was not serious or violent, unless one of their strikes was for rape, murder or child molestation. Non-violent third-strikes would be punished with double the normal sentence for the crime committed.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">This initiative still punishes repeat offenders much more than first-time offenders. Three strikes appears to have reduced crime; will heavier sentences do as well?</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Life sentences do cost a lot. So does crime by recidivists.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Things would be different if California did not have a 75% recidivism rate. California needs to focus on that more than how to lock more people up. Learn from other states that have much lower recidivism.</span></li>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Proposition 37: Labeling of Genetically Engineered Foods</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Requires labeling of foods with GMOs. Prohibits labeling or advertising such food as "natural." Exempts labeling foods that are "certified organic," even if they do contain GMOs.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">GMOs are safe. Without exception, serious studies find GMOs do no harm, including reports by the International Council for Science, the American Medical Association and the World Health Organization.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The many and bizarre exemptions to the labeling rule show this is not really about providing consumers with information, but rather about forcing some selected food producers to label their foods with a frightening label.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The FDA argues that there is no scientifically valid process for determining if food contains GMOs or not, so it is unclear how this bill could be implemented.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Proposition 38: Tax Increase for School Funding</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Increases income taxes on most Californians for 12 years to raise about $10 billion a year earmarked for schools and early childhood development.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">• It does not guarantee more education funding. While Prop. 38 funds are dedicated to education, all the other funds in the education budget are not, so Sacramento can, as it has before, shift other money out of the education budget to displace incoming Prop. 38 funds.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The 2012-2013 California budget is a record breaking $142.4 bn. Why, with record spending overall, is Sacramento cutting school funding? Sacramento doesn't need more money, they need to prioritize.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Few things could be more harmful to the economy than raising taxes on millions of small businesses, as Prop. 38 does. When businesses have to pay more taxes, they hire fewer people and/or raise prices. California already has among the highest taxes in the nation.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Why put more money into a system that doesn't use the money it has well? Less than 50% of K-12 funding goes into the classroom, the rest to administration and overhead. And at the University of California, in recent years while faculty grew by 33%, senior managers increased by 194% percent! If we give them more money, it will go to administration, not into classrooms.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Proposition 39: Tax Increase on Multistate Businesses and Funding Clean Energy</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Requires multistate businesses to pay about $1 billion per year more taxes in California by removing a current loophole. Half of revenues go to green energy programs.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Taxing business has a direct effect on job creation. This tax will reduce jobs.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Taking money from companies that are producing jobs and growth and giving it to ones that require subsidies to grow does not create jobs.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Did we learn nothing from Solyndra?</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Proposition 40: Redistricting State Senate Districts</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A yes vote confirms the Citizens Redistricting Commission boundaries. A no vote overturns them and sends to courts to redraw.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The people who wanted voters to vote NO on this withdrew. All parties want a YES vote on this initiative.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">For a more detailed discussion of these Propositions, and their funding sources and supporter lists for pro and con, see </span><a href="http://reason.org/news/show/california-voters-guide-nov-2012" style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 22px; line-height: 1.1em;" target="_blank">California Voters' Guide: November 2012 Ballot Propositions</a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 22px; line-height: 1.1em;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 22px; line-height: 1.1em;">at the Reason Foundation.</span><br />
<br />McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-21754947135132993942012-01-04T16:29:00.000-08:002012-01-04T16:29:44.155-08:00The Ron Paul 3rd Place Finish--What Will It Mean for the Future of His Goals?Venture Beat talks about <b>Why the Internet Was Wrong</b> in predicting a bigger vote total in Iowa:<br />
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<a href="http://venturebeat.com/2012/01/04/why-the-internet-was-wrong-about-ron-paul/">http://venturebeat.com/2012/01/04/why-the-internet-was-wrong-about-ron-paul/</a><br />
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Good points. These were noted beforehand; the vote seems to have illustrated the problem of predicting elections from just counting the tech savvy. Not surprising.</div>
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OTOH see Reason's<b> "The Bright Side of Ron Paul's Third-Place Finish."</b></div>
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<a href="http://reason.com/archives/2012/01/04/the-bright-side-of-ron-pauls-third-place">http://reason.com/archives/2012/01/04/the-bright-side-of-ron-pauls-third-place</a></div>
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Lemonade.</div>
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But I hope <b>Point 2, especially, </b>is true, and Paul gains influence in that party via his delegates; we badly need his messages to continue to be pushed, even on a reluctant Republican leadership.</div>
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Likewise, Point <span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, georgia; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px;">7) "</span><strong style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, georgia; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px;">Ron Paul, and more importantly his ideas, are in it for the long haul</strong><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, georgia; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px;">."</span></div>
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Finally, I hope this year segues into<b> a Rand Paul future</b>..... The Kid is awesome!</div>
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</span></div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-26296083816308229532011-12-16T21:29:00.000-08:002011-12-16T21:40:06.075-08:00Ron Paul vs. The Warmongers<br />
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Ron Paul was terrific in the Dec 14, 2011 Republican candidate’s debate -- the Fox News hosts actually asked him more questions and let him speak more than ever. The result was a strong statement of his positions.<br />
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The hosts, stung perhaps by widespread carping at their blatant ignoring of Paul in previous debates, did what journalists always do when put on the spot in such circumstances: We go into "You want attention? How about <b>this</b>!" mode, where we throw trick questions at you, hammer you on points we don't hammer others on, express a level of incredulity not visible elsewhere, and other debate tricks.<br />
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None of these had much effect on Paul, who's spent two decades putting up with ignorant media grilling and supposedly trick questions designed less to explore your positions than to force you to alienate some large interest group.<br />
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But where candidates typically hedge like mad when pushed into such stupid corners, Ron Paul is not afraid to take strong stands that make some voters mad. His strength is in his key, foundation points: Less war, less aggressive foreign policy, more paying attention to the Constitution, and more awareness that it's not a choice between property rights and civil rights.<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>WHAT?? YOU DON'T WANT WAR? ARE YOU NUTS?</b></span><br />
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The strangest set of reactions to Ron Paul came in response to Paul's forceful insistence that the U.S. should not threaten war with Iran.<br />
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The Fox hosts kept demanding to know what Paul is going to "do" about Iran, and kept balking at his refusal to declare war. Paul pushed back at the assertion, as fact, that Iran is close to having a bomb (Paul quoted Israeli officials skeptical of that claim), ignored assertions that Iran will attack Israel once it has such a bomb, and kept insisting that we engage in diplomacy.<br />
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He also made the mistake of acting like a statesman -- pointing out perfectly good reasons why an Iranian government would want an atomic bomb aside from wanting to attack Israel. He pointed out, twice, that we had talked Libya out of its bomb, then attacked Khadafy and he ended up dead -- hinting that the only people we invade are those who don't have a bomb. He pointed out that neighboring countries, and the US, have the bomb, so it's hardly surprising Iran would want one for defensive reasons.<br />
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This willingness to consider how things look from the point of view of other countries earned Paul contempt from the hosts and from his rivals.<br />
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Each of the other Republican candidates in turn announced their readiness to "get tough" with Iran -- Paul had provoked a most shocking display of red-meat warmongering tough talk from the other candidates.<br />
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It's clear to any American with open eyes that if any Republican other than Ron Paul is elected President, the US will go to war with Iran.<br />
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During one of the debate breaks, when commentators evaluated the "performance" of the candidates thus far, in terms exactly as if they were talking about a football game at halftime, one said Ron Paul had hurt himself with his pacifist talk -- the reason being, a majority of Americans believe Iran will soon have an atomic bomb -- which implicitly means that they would reject Paul for not talking tough on Iran.<br />
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This is inane, on many levels.<br />
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The public is being sold a bill of goods on the threat of Iran, as Paul himself pointed out several times on stage; this is <b>exactly </b>the kind of bullshit the administration fed the public in the lead up to the Iraq war -- exactly the same.<br />
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That should worry anyone - again, Paul pointed this out: Haven't we learned <i>any </i>lessons from the Iraq war?<br />
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In addition, there was that odd, automatic expectation by these experts that the job of candidate Ron Paul is to find out what the public thinks, and then pretend to attack that problem, even if the public is wrong or misled -- is this really the way they prefer the country to be run? Did John F. Kennedy have 'Profiles in Courage' ghostwritten for nothing? Pandering is apparently the obligatory strategy<i> as recommended by the journalist experts!</i><br />
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The next day, analysts on NPR again raised this issue of Paul's 'pacifism' playing against the natural instincts of the Republican electorate -- a position which owes much to the reflexive belief among Democrats that all Republicans are warmongers. Then several interesting things happened.<br />
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One of the commentators disagreed, though: He said that Iowa Republicans have traditionally been the most noninterventionist in the country: He pointed to its noninterventionist Congressmen prior to World War II, and said that Iowa was one of the first states to come out against the Vietnam War.<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>HAVE WE LEARNED NOTHING?</b></span><br />
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Then they turned the discussion to the previous day's big event: The formal 'ending' of the war in Iraq, with the withdrawal of most US troops. The question was put: Was it worth it? The first commentator said no, considering what it cost us. The second said only time will tell, because it will depend on how Iraq evolves in the coming years.<br />
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But the third guy became quite heated in disagreeing: The Iraq war was undertaken under a cloud of lies: Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11, they weren't harboring Al Qaida, they didn't have weapons of mass destruction, they were no threat to the United States. The war was sold to the public under false pretenses, and 'the generals' didn't support it, he said: This wasn't the Pentagon's war, it was a war pushed entirely by civilians: Bush II, his VP, and members of Congress.<br />
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I listened in amazement: The guy is, of course, right. But further: Of all the Republican candidates in the previous evening's debate, every candidate excepting only Ron Paul talked about Iran in exactly the same way they had all talked about invading Iraq only a decade go. <b>Only </b>Ron Paul thought the country should have learned a lesson from the mistakes of Iraq. Only Ron Paul claimed we are once again being sold a bill of goods -- just like the last time. Only Ron Paul wanted to halt the rush to war. Only Ron Paul was willing to question the claims about Iran's threat to us and to Israel.<br />
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One thing should be clear to everyone: If you want an end to the endless march to war, the constant saber-rattling by blowhards talking tough with the blood of your sons and daughters, learning nothing and believing anything -- you will only get that with a Ron Paul presidency. Every one of the other warmongers will have us heading off to war as if this were World War I all over again.<br />
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As if Flanders Fields never happened - nor Iraq, nor Afghanistan, nor Pakistan -- nor Somalia, nor Yugoslavia, nor any of the rest of our militaristic jingoistic warmongering.<br />
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This is perversity of the first water: Pols more afraid to lose an election than interested in the good of their country. And, worse, a press corps urging them on.<br />
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<i>Disgusting</i>.McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-52955781131520191402011-12-02T18:29:00.001-08:002011-12-02T18:29:29.993-08:00After the Supercommittee?<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #fdfdfd; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 14px;">Cato scholar </span><a href="http://cato.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=98c97f42691d5de57bc944822&id=c5e3f8df52&e=3c752add5e" style="background-color: #fdfdfd; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 14px; text-align: left; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Daniel J. Mitchell</a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #fdfdfd; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 14px; text-align: left;"> discusses sequestration and the aftermath of the supercommittee’s collapse in </span><a href="http://cato.us1.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=98c97f42691d5de57bc944822&id=2c34874aa5&e=3c752add5e" style="background-color: #fdfdfd; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 14px; text-align: left; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">an op-ed</a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #fdfdfd; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 14px; text-align: left;"> for </span><em style="background-color: #fdfdfd; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 14px; text-align: left;">National Review Online</em><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #fdfdfd; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 14px; text-align: left;">:</span><span style="background-color: #fdfdfd; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12px; line-height: 14px; text-align: left;"> </span><br style="background-color: #fdfdfd; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 14px; text-align: left;" /><blockquote style="background-color: #fdfdfd; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 14px; text-align: left;">
<span style="background-color: white;">Taxpayers just dodged a bullet. Even though Republicans on the so-called supercommittee were willing to break their promises and support a tax hike, a 1990-style budget deal was not possible because Democrats demanded too much and offered too little in exchange. This is good news for fiscal responsibility. Simply stated, any agreement would have been a typical inside-the-Beltway pact featuring real tax hikes and empty promises of future spending cuts. And if the 1990 tax-hike deal is any indication, that would have resulted in more red ink rather than less….</span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"> </span></span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">For fiscal conservatives there is no possible compromise with either the hard Left or the rational Left. Both of those camps want bigger government. Both want higher taxes. And both oppose real entitlement reform.</span> <span style="background-color: white; background-image: initial;">The only real debate on the Left is how quickly to race in the wrong direction.</span></span></blockquote>
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<a href="http://cato.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=98c97f42691d5de57bc944822&id=5e8d408f2e&e=3c752add5e" style="color: #336699; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Mitchell</a> is the co-author of <em><a href="http://cato.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=98c97f42691d5de57bc944822&id=5b6b5726dc&e=3c752add5e" style="color: #336699; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Global Tax Revolution: The Rise of Tax Competition and the Battle to Defend It</a></em>.<br /> </div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-47976061053196631492011-11-30T11:06:00.001-08:002011-11-30T11:14:00.577-08:00Democats, Republicans--both the same. Ron Paul would be a real kick as President, wouldnt' he?<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.917969); color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">Friends discussing the current administration's assaults on the U.S. Constitution (provoked by the proposed new law to allow takedown of Web sites on mere allegation of copyright infringement), wondering what ever happened to the Constitution. The subject of detainees in Guantanamo arose.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.917969); color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">One says of Obama: "</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.917969); color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">This is a professor of constitutional law, now a US President. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.917969); color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">He knows damn well that Guantanomo is a cesspit of bad prior POTUS behavior, but one rooted in extra-territorial precedent. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.917969); color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">My altruism says: free them."</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.917969); color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">Another replies, "</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.917969); color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">Mine too. But my inner soldier says, "...and have a firing squad greet them the second they step through the exit."</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.917969); color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">This is, indeed, a difficult situation. But two observations:</span><br />
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One: If, as Ron Paul points out, we weren't sticking our military noses in every corner of the world, we'd have fewer of these Constitutional sticky bits to deal with. When you act badly, your good choices become limited. I have a whole rant about this, but never mind for now.</div>
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Two: As a Libertarian, I was not interested in which pol won the last presidency, but I hoped that with a liberal Democrat in office, we'd at least get some of the things Dems like to consider themselves good at (and blast the Repubs for being bad at), like: less war; more respect for freedom of speech and other civil liberties. it would almost be worth paying the price in taxes and limits on property rights to back away from our many wars and our many assaults on our liberties.</div>
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Instead, we get more of the same. It might as well be Bush II up there. </div>
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The ironies abound: When the Bushes were in charge, we got all the taxes, regulations, and gigantic new government agencies the Dems are supposed to do, and none of the restraint on the growth of government the Republicans claim to favor. And of course we got the Republicans' wars. With their predecessor, Clinton, similarly, we got the best Republican president the Democrats have ever had -- lower taxes, reduced regulatory intrusion, plus a Democrat benefit of few/limited military nosiness. We didn't know how good we had it.</div>
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So you get foreign-policy adventurism, growth in government power, growth in government spending regardless of ability to pay for it, and continued assaults on our liberties, with a general annoyance at the notion the Constitution might limit any of this -- from whichever major party you vote for. Or stay home and not vote for.</div>
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It would sure be a hoot if Ron Paul got nominated and then, even more improbably, elected. The likelihood of that guy, based on his history, voting for more spending, more taxes, more invasions, more civil-liberty assaults, and so on, is very low. It would be fun to watch D.C. turn upsidedown.</div>
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But unlikely all around: If he makes much more progress in the polls, they'll have to start mentioning him in every race roundup instead of only occasionally in passing, and when he gets too far up there, they'll go try to find a way to do a Herman Cain on him -- the political press's nuclear option when they want to get rid of somebody but don't want to acknowledge their complicity.</div>
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[end rant][God I hate politics]</div>
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<span style="font-family: arial;">Mac McCarthy</span></div>
</span></div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-85988846260708387672011-11-20T13:34:00.001-08:002011-11-20T13:35:22.366-08:00Watch out, Ron Paul is Leading in the Polls<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: x-small;">Keep one thing firmly in mind as the election season rolls along: Now that Ron Paul is rising so high in the polls that they can no longer completely ignore him (he's number 2 in some polls), expect the media to switch from pretending he doesn't exist to paying all too much attention, of all the wrong kind, to him. </span></div>
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They will dredge up lies and misquotes and glitches from his past. Since they can't just come out and say "We don't like this guy's ideas because we're liberals and he's not," they'll fall back on ol' reliable: personal attacks. Be very careful not to fall for these attacks, or eventual rumors about this act or that belief. They will try to paint him as a complete nut case, or a fascist, or a racist, or - given his age - around the bend.</div>
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None of these will be true. I've been following Paul for nearly 20 years, ever since he first got into the House. He's exactly as he pretends to be, has radical ideas (like a foreign policy of "mind our own business"), and even in areas where one might disagree with him -- he's against abortion, which is a problem for some people, and he, yes, actually doesn't completely believe in evolution (sadly) -- but in those areas he says it really shouldln't matter because - and this is KEY - he doesn't think the federal government should have control over those areas. And in a right-thinking world, the US President's beliefs in these and many other areas would not matter any more than his opinion of who should be winning American Idol -- it should be none of the Federal Govt's business. And that is the best answer of all.</div>
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And remember another thing: Sooner or later you'll find positions he takes that you simply don't agree with. After all, the only person who could run for president with whom you'd agree completely and totally would be yourself - but you're not running.</div>
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Keep reminding yourself to focus on which candidate you agree with the most - not completely, because there won't be such a candidate. And which candidate has positions you agree with that are the *most important* positions. So: His foreign policy positions, for example, I think are absolutely vitally important to the future health of our country. And finally, keep in mind which topics he can, as president, actually have an impact on -- some things, like foreign policy and certain kinds of regulations, he can rule by fiat as president - heck, all his predecessors have. In other topics, Congress has to support him, which they won't. So if you agree with him on something you think it important, and he can as President actually act on, then that's an important position. If there's something you disagree with him about, but it's less important -- or it's something he couldn't do anything about anyway -- then it's less important.</div>
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I remember when George McGovern was running against Nixon, and I disagreed with George about his domestic policies (he was a leftist Democrat--interestingly, he's changed as he's gotten older) but I agreed with his get-out-of-Vietnam policy. Belatedly I realized that his domestic policy ideas didn't matter because he'd never get the Congress of that day to go along. But the war he could end by fiat (since it was being run by fiat). So the thing I agreed with, he could do; the think I didn't like. he couldn't do anyway.</div>
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I've voted with that in mind ever since...</div>
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<br /></div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-18327635157598261622011-08-16T12:22:00.000-07:002011-08-18T21:19:26.067-07:00How The Press Blatantly Ignores Ron Paul - Without Guilt<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">First, view this spectaculary funny, angrifying, and distressing Jon Stewart snippet: <span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #242b30; font-weight: bold; line-height: 19px;"><a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/08/jon-stewart-whats-with-tvs-bias-against-ron-paul/243683/">Jon Stewart: What's With TV's Bias Against Ron Paul?</a></span></span><br />
<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 19px;"><br />
</span></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Stewart is dead on. I couldn't believe the baldness with which they skipped right over him in the news coverage, and jumped down to the lower votegetters. It's shocking, really. The Atlantic columnist on this page makes many of my points explicit, so read his essay below the clip.</span><br />
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</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Then read this NYT article, <a href="http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/16/ron-paul-he-who-shall-not-be-named/?smid=tw-thecaucus&seid=auto\">"<b>Ron Paul: He Who Shall Not Be Named,"</b> </a>on whether they are ignoring Ron Paul -- and follow the logic of why they dismiss him. If you can follow it, that is.... How bald does this have to get before everyone admits that the punditry and political press have their own agenda?</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Their insider argument to themselves is as follows: </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b>1. Ron Paul, let's face it, simply can't win</b>. It doesn't matter how much money he raises, how well he does in polls, how well he does in straw polls. He's too radical to win. A limited number of very noisy supporters accounts for all his success, and that won't stand up to the real election. So there's no point in covering him.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b>2. All the other candidates</b>, no matter how poorly they do, could conceivably get elected.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b>3. BECAUSE they are all middle of the road to some degree</b>, whereas Ron Paul is simply too radical to win the voters.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b>4. Therefore we can leap ahead to the assumption</b> that he can't possibly win, and we can ignore him (except for eyebrow raising dismissals once in a while).</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So -- it's a horse race and nothing but a horse race. Except there is a clear judgement call mixed in there, despite denials of taking sides: He;s too radical <b>in our opinion</b> and we judge that most others will agree and not vote for him.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">What's wrong with this seemingly not unreasonable argument is that it assumes a lock-in to the status quo of political opinion. All opinions, ideas, and suggestions that are outside the middle-of-the-road conventional wisdom are unthinkable -- which creates the mystery of where change comes from in the world of politics? We wait for a powerful mainstream politician to suddenly get a fresh idea and risk his career on it?</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Every major political and ideological shift of the past hundred years has come from the so-called fringes -- once-radical ideas that gradually gain traction as the public mulls them over (and becomes fed up with conventional solutions that aren't working). </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But the press believes that the <b>last</b> thing it should ever do is treat the political sphere as a battleground of ideas. The safest thing for the press, as for the conventional politicians, is to treat it all as a horse race. Period.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So Ron Paul, who has fought against our multiple wars for ten years while both parties have dragged us deeper in, until now a growing number agree with him, is a radical. </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">What excuse do they have when, as happened in the Republican debate, everyone on stage starts moving in Ron Paul's direction regarding the war? Or the Fed? Or other issues? How do they dismiss him then?</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We're getting to see....</span><br />
<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">--mac mccarthy</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
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McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-50736645824465757912011-07-28T18:55:00.000-07:002011-07-28T18:55:23.535-07:00"What If You Had To Run Your Business Like A Government?"Frederic Paul has the genius idea of turning around the old saw about how we should run the government 'like a business,' and instead asks, "<a href="http://www.allbusiness.com/finance/accounting-budgeting/16219757-1.html">What if you had to run your business like a government?</a>"<br />
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The result is a hilarious list of ten crazy-making limitations, obligations, and stupidities you'd face. For example, "2. <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">Your business plan requires you to focus on your least-profitable customers."</span><br />
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It makes a great read, and I urge you to go read it, it'll give you a rueful laugh.<br />
<br />
And when you're done laughing, see if you can derive from it the insights our Founders had two hundred years ago.<br />
<br />
Because this article is (or should be) clarifying: These problems are <i>exactly </i>why we should hesitate to seek, as our first choice, government solutions for our problems. Because it's hard -- really, really hard -- for governments (at all levels) to solve problems -- by the very nature of political government. Which is, that government is at its core, and must be, political. (Even dictatorships; maybe especially dictatorships, which would help us understand why the rulers of Libya and Yemen and Pakistan don't just spontaneously start to 'do the right thing..)<br />
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The limitations of government are <b>inherent </b>in the nature and structure of government. They can't be 'fixed' by electing this or that political party, or ideology, or "good government" candidates, or honest John Doe's. Or by political will, or a sudden dose of realism on the part of voters. It's why the current (as of this writing) argument over raising of the US Federal debt ceiling is at an impasse -- 'compromise' say the pundits; who themselves wouldn't dream of compromising on <i>their</i> core political beliefs (compromise is always the job of the other guy).<br />
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Governments are <b>bad </b>at solving problems. Especially big problems. Especially problems that have political elements -- as almost all problems do. Especially problems that give rise to 'special interests,' or solutions that themselves give rise to more 'special interests.'<br />
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This was the fundamental insight of the Founders. You can't construct a government that will be composed of 'the right' people. So government power will from time to time (try: most of the time) be in the hands of bad people -- or people whose ideas of how to use that power you don't agree with.<br />
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So we should be <i>very selective</i> about what we ask government to do. And try really hard to find <i>other </i>ways to fix problems and address issues -- ways that don't rely on the weak reed of government.<br />
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("But they have so much POWER! and MONEY! If only they'd do what I want...." Sigh. We'll never learn....)<br />
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If you <i>really </i>care about an issue -- you should be willing to invest in coming up with a solution that minimally relies on the successful operation of government laws and rules, government regulations and bureaucrats, government police forces, and (most of all!) government politicians.<br />
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Listen, we know this at a basic level: We all hate office politics -- so why do we love government politics? Do we delude ourselves into thinking the people who exercise political power in government are on our side more than the office 'players' are on our side at work? Or on the condo board? Or the PTA board? Or the neighborhood committee?<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEtwRIB5xaYIvBoQQxcZHbRVuuPgmYWAoGswtAFS6I7MXTs5rMW0bQm-eweQS4Pxt1aAqp_1-J8ms3EqCpHhItELKJ4qXt6QKCiuFqwO2U7k0Q3AWpmwXZmmPQ8u6OD-4Tw4yIZlfLViY/s1600/The+Law+cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEtwRIB5xaYIvBoQQxcZHbRVuuPgmYWAoGswtAFS6I7MXTs5rMW0bQm-eweQS4Pxt1aAqp_1-J8ms3EqCpHhItELKJ4qXt6QKCiuFqwO2U7k0Q3AWpmwXZmmPQ8u6OD-4Tw4yIZlfLViY/s1600/The+Law+cover.jpg" /></a></div>I sincerely commend to you the most important book about government ever written: <b>Frederic Bastiat's 'The Law'</b>. -- It's under 100 pages long, can be bought for a song on <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Law-Frederic-Bastiat/dp/1572460733">Amazon </a>or downloaded as a <a href="http://www.fee.org/pdf/books/The_Law.pdf">free PDF</a>.<br />
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Bastiat was a lawyer and member of the French Assembly in the 1840s, during a period of radical unrest in France. One of his most interesting arguments was that giving government <i>responsibility</i> for difficult, even unsolvable, national social problems meant dooming the government to failure -- and as the government fails at task after task, respect for the government is diminished -- to the detriment of all.<br />
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One example he used was feeding the poor; he argued that making the government responsible for ensuring that everyone was properly fed was foolish, especially for those in the government. You'd surely fail. There would always be those not helped. In 19th century France, the problem was far more severe, and difficult to solve, than the present day of prosperity. So all you'd be doing is ensuring that the government would be hated for its ongoing, unavoidable failures, and constantly be under attack.<br />
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In other words, if you really cared about helping the starving people, you'd try to find a way to help them without dumping it into the laps of politicians. It's so tempting -- they have all that money, they can steal from/tax those damned rich (the ones richer than me, I mean), they can issue orders and pass laws at will -- all that power! But the nature of political government makes it unlikely that, if the poor are improved, it will be anything the government has done. In fact, all too often you'll find the government a stumbling block in the way of reform, new markets, lower prices, better choices, and more opportunity. Why would you want to do that to poor starving people?<br />
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It's a very interesting book, makes points I've never heard anyone else make, and does so succinctly and directly. I recommend it to you.McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-21328930713519451592011-07-05T22:01:00.000-07:002011-07-05T22:01:17.272-07:00Crowdsourcing The Fight Against CorruptionIndia is a nation famed, if that's the word, for official corruption -- the oppressive bureaucracy is made worse by the expectation that every single useful thing you want them to do comes at an extra-legal price.<br />
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Official attempts to control corruption are, as everywhere, useless.<br />
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But the Web changes everything. Someone set up a site where Indians can report examples of bribes requested, bribes paid, bribes refused. It is described in a BBC News piece title "Bribery in India: A Website for Whistleblowers," by Mukti Jain Campion, at <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-13616123">http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-13616123</a> . The site they refer to is called I PAID A BRIBE, at <a href="http://www.ipaidabribe.com/">http://www.ipaidabribe.com/</a> . There you can, anonymously of course, Tell Your Bribe story (and flag it as 'I Paid a Bribe,' 'I Didn't Pay a Bribe,' and "I Didn't Have to Pay A Bribe.'). It makes fascinating reading.<br />
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It's slowly having some effect. The driving test unit in one Indian state was notorious for demanding bribes (and not correctly testing drivers, so bad drives were getting licenses - a double wrong). The embarrassment caused by the reports o I Paid A Bribe forced the unit to implement the world's first automated driving test center, where your skill at driving the course is monitored and reported by machines rather than bribe-hungry officials.<br />
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Fascinating stuff!McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-34896516167275204182011-04-24T20:21:00.000-07:002011-04-24T20:21:22.044-07:00Ron Paul: The Founding Father<a href="http://www.esquire.com/features/ron-paul-profile-0511">Ron Paul: The Founding Father</a><div><br /></div><div>Ron Paul profiled in Esquire - of all places!</div><div><br /></div><div>How far he's come. Without changing a thing.</div><div><br /></div><div>He's also completely unflappable, in front of any kind of audience or any kind of journalist.</div><div><br /></div><div>Mr. Relentless - he's having a long-term impact, and that's good for all of us.</div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-8825692753632419762011-03-25T17:01:00.000-07:002011-03-25T17:01:50.316-07:00Myths and Facts About Nuclear Power (Reason Magazine)<div style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span><span style="font-family: Arial;">In a feature today, Reason magazine Columnist Veronique de Rugy <a href="http://reason.com/archives/2011/03/25/the-truth-about-nuclear-power/singlepage" style="color: #0065cc;" target="_blank">debunks</a> several myths about nuclear power, including:</span></span></div><div style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span><span style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</span></span></div><div style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-family: Arial;">Myth 1: Nuclear power is a cheap alternative to fossil fuels.<br />
Fact 1: It isn’t.</span></div><div style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
Myth 2: Risk is the main problem with nuclear power.<br />
Fact 2: Cost is the main problem, not risk.</span></div><div style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
Myth 3: The spread of nuclear power has stalled in the U.S. due to a hostile regulatory environment.<br />
Fact 3: Nuclear power has stalled because it is simply not profitable.</span></div><div style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
Myth 4: Nuclear power is the key to energy independence.<br />
Fact 4: More nuclear doesn’t mean less oil.</span></div><div style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span><span style="font-family: Arial;">While we're on the subject, read:</span></span></div><div style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span><span style="font-family: Arial;"><a href="http://www.thedaily.com/page/2011/03/24/032411-opinions-column-japan-dalmia-1-2/" style="color: #0065cc;" target="_blank">Shikha Dalmia: "Glowing Endorsement" -- Japan's Failed Nuclear Subsidies</a></span></span></div><div><span><br />
</span></div><div><span>God bless facts!</span></div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-36708848123942807652011-03-17T17:38:00.000-07:002011-03-17T17:38:48.128-07:00What’s a Disaster?<div>The Independent Institute:</div><div><br /></div><a href="http://www.independent.org/blog/index.php?p=6453"><b>What’s a Disaster?</b></a><div><br /></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(48, 51, 36); font-family: verdana, georgia, times, 'times new roman', serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px; "><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; "><strong>A Citizen’s Guide to Surviving the Fear Mongers</strong></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; ">Many people make big bucks these days scaring you about what’s happening, or about to happen, in the world. The media folks top the list, obviously: the more frightened you are, the more of their content you watch. There’s a second reason why media people exaggerate: the storyteller’s bias. When someone comes rushing back to the cave to tell about the saber-toothed tiger he just saw, the attention and adoration of his listeners depends on the size and ferocity of the tiger. Tell them it was a small, dead tiger, and everyone goes back to sleep.</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; ">...To counter these professional fear-mongers, we need an objective guide to the disasters we are likely to face, a scientific ranking that enables us to gauge the harm in each case. The scale proposed below is based on the number of deaths involved; one can assume a proportional economic and environmental harm....</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; "><br /></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; ">READ THE REST AT <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); line-height: normal; "><a href="http://www.independent.org/blog/index.php?p=6453">http://www.independent.org/blog/index.php?p=6453</a></span></p></span></div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-38187077662323557282011-02-15T11:28:00.000-08:002011-02-15T11:28:12.542-08:00Here's How Tea Partiers Are Like Libertarians--in Driving Republicans Crazy<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: x-small;">A friend points out that the Tea Party is not Libertarian.</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: x-small;">Indeed not, unfortunately. They only half get the Libertarian story.</span><br />
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</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;">But they are very similar to Libertarians in one important, interesting, and entertaining way. </div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;">The Democrats and the Republican mainstream for the most part are only ideological to the extent that it doesn't interfere with party politics -- it's party before all, including the best interests of the country, the voters, et al. </div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;">Thus you have the Democrats opposing the war when a Republican president is running it, then losing all interest in curbing US warmaking once a Democrat is running things. There are various reasons, rationales, and excuses for this (the Republicans do the same thing, except on the spending side), but mainly it's because the apparently ideological protests against war, or against spending, are just clubs to beat the rival gang with. An excuse; if circumstances change, they change clubs -- I wouldn't be surprised if you could find historical periods when the clubs were in opposite hands than they are now.</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;">The Tea Party partisans, though, like the Libertarians, are extremely annoying to the mainstreamers because they act as if they believe their asserted ideological principles should actually be acted on once they get into power. Which is so insane that the mainstream members of the two main parties hardly know what to say. Thus the chaos in DC at the moment as the Tea Party-elected Representatives keep insisting, in the teeth of all historical precedent, on trying to actually *cut* the budget -- as in "spend less money this year than we did last year," which is not the standard DC definition of "cut," as you know. Libertarians like Ron and Rand Paul act the same way when in office, which leaves the DC residents reeling in incredulity.</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;">And I enjoy watching them. </div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;">Jerry Brown has a tendency to do things from time to time that give the unavoidable impression he'd actually like to achieve the results he and other politicians campaign on but never actually get around to accomplishing. So he'd like to help poor people - actually, not in theory. And improve the schools - really, not just in the sense that they get and piss away more money. And fix the budget - really, not just use the budget process as a political club and not care the actual impact on the state. </div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;">I greatly enjoy that, too.</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;">And I also enjoy the beneficial side effect of the greater mainstream media attention being paid to Rand Paul and to Ron Paul -- Ron is getting more MSM facetime than he's gotten in the whole twenty years he's been in office. This can only be good for the nation.</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;"><br />
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</div><div style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Mac McCarthy</div></div></span></div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-50351158028526504122011-02-04T21:31:00.000-08:002011-02-04T21:31:03.216-08:00Rand Paul is Right: End Foreign Aid to Wealthy Nations... Including Isreal - the third rail of foreign-aid politics, apparently.<br />
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Here is an article on Senator Rand Paul's excellent argument on the matter:<br />
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<a href="http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/rand-paul-is-right-end-welfare-to-israel-and-the-rest-of-the-world/">http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/rand-paul-is-right-end-welfare-to-israel-and-the-rest-of-the-world/</a><br />
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He's got a point. It's not just Isreal -- we support Japan, South Korea, and a lot of other nations who should start by helping themselves and then if they come up short, call us.<br />
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Instead, our government loves the idea of handing out money because they like to think it gives us "leverage" over their nations and their policies.<br />
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Which is proven when we stop aid and embargo them to punish them. This worked well for Cuba, which is now a democracy, North Korea, Iran, and Iraq before we decided to invade them instead because, apparently, it was even more expensive.<br />
<br />
Sigh.McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-43505724207529765152011-01-19T16:50:00.000-08:002011-01-19T16:50:02.915-08:00New Drug Danger: Placebos!Great comic:<br />
<a href="http://gocomics.typepad.com/.a/6a00d8341c5f3053ef0134859a632a970c-pi">http://gocomics.typepad.com/.a/6a00d8341c5f3053ef0134859a632a970c-pi</a><br />
<br />
New danger, ban placebos, yes?<br />
<br />
;-)<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://gocomics.typepad.com/.a/6a00d8341c5f3053ef0134859a632a970c-pi" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://gocomics.typepad.com/.a/6a00d8341c5f3053ef0134859a632a970c-pi" width="225" /></a></div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-51292022068532885412011-01-19T16:46:00.000-08:002011-01-19T16:46:14.069-08:00Re: "Looking for Loughners Would laxer commitment rules make us safer?"<span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: ff-meta-web-pro-1,ff-meta-web-pro-2,'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif;"><div style="border-width: 0px; font-family: Georgia,georgia; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline-width: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><br />
<br />
My comment to a Reason article, title above, at </div><div style="border-width: 0px; font-family: Georgia,georgia; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline-width: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> <a href="http://reason.com/archives/2011/01/19/looking-for-loughners#comment_2093940">http://reason.com/archives/2011/01/19/looking-for-loughners#comment_2093940</a></div><div style="border-width: 0px; font-family: Georgia,georgia; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline-width: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Another way to look at this kind of problem is to see it as a set of tradeoffs, rather than a situation with a clear, crisp solution.</div><div style="border-width: 0px; font-family: Georgia,georgia; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline-width: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">On the one hand, making involuntary commitment easier increases the risk of taking away the freedom of people unnecessarily, even opening opportunities for people to game the system to get rid of annoying relatives, enemies, rivals. In the old days, remember, that was the complaint: Too many harmless people locked up. Books, plays, and movies with this theme were common at one time: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Harvey with his six-foot imaginary rabbit, The Curious Savage, and even Miracle on 34th Street.</div><div style="border-width: 0px; font-family: Georgia,georgia; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline-width: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">So we changed the rules, and now it's much harder to commit someone involuntarily. This really means that the tradeoffs lie in the direction of not locking up someone who eventually becomes dangerous, and thus innocent people losing their lives -- sometimes just the crazy person, who commits suicide when he could have been helped.</div><div style="border-width: 0px; font-family: Georgia,georgia; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline-width: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">As we move the slider back and forth, we trade security for society on the one hand and concern for the individual on the other. If we choose to change the laws to make involuntary commitment easier, we have to recognize that the tradeoff is that we will have people who will be committed who shouldn't be; it's inevitable. And if we don't change the laws, we will have people die at the hands of insane people; that, too, is inevitable.</div><div style="border-width: 0px; font-family: Georgia,georgia; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline-width: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Of course, admitting to tradeoffs is not the way to win in politics or in public forums, to we tend to absolutism: Our way is best, not simply better, it is without negative tradeoffs or costs, and the other side's ideas are uniformly bad, period. We win arguments that way; we don't get closer to any useful truths.</div><div class="commentactions" style="border-width: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 10px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: 700; margin: 0px; outline-width: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 9px; vertical-align: baseline;"></div></span></span>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-62483524144439697922010-12-22T12:36:00.000-08:002010-12-22T12:36:21.275-08:00Misunderstanding the First Amendment (in re: Assange and Wikileaks)<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">In an excellent article by Jacob Sullum of Reason Magazine, <a href="http://townhall.com/columnists/JacobSullum/2010/12/22/is_julian_assange_a_journalist_for_first_amendment_purposes,_it_doesnt_matter">"Is Julian Assange a Journalist? For First Amendment Purposes, It Doesn't Matter" </a> , the author argues that the First Amendment is not restricted to journalists.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">In the comments section, a lengthy dispute revolves around the applicability of a 1917 law restricting release of secret documents, and whether Assange qualifies for "protection" under the First Amendment if he's not a US citizen. This comment regarding the latter point is typical:</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">"<i>Since when does the first amendment apply to those not living in the United States?"</i></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">This goes to the heart of a <u>serious misunderstanding</u> of the First and other Amendments making up the Bill of Rights. It's a mistake I see repeated endlessly in the press and from the lips of pols.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
<u>The First Amendment does not "apply" to specific people</u>; it does not "<u>guarantee</u>" the right of free speech and press; it does not <u>carve out an exception </u>to the infinite power of the State; <u>it is not a limitation</u> that should be worked around or bypassed when inconvenient.<br />
<br />
The First Amendment (and the other 9) is an *<b>emphatic reminder*</b> from the Founders that the Constitution <b>GIVES NO POWER OR AUTHORITY </b>to the U.S. government to exercise any control over speech and press. Period. The Constitution <u>does not grant such power, and this amendment underlines the point,</u> and *<b>attempts</b>* to block workarounds by ambitious politicians and bureaucrats. It emphasizes the point that the government "shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press."<br />
<br />
If the government <u>is granted zero authority to limit free speech and press</u>, the question of whether the individual in question is a citizen of the U.S. is completely irrelevant, as is the question of whether he is a journalist. The First Amendment does NOT say "The government shall make no laws regarding freedom of speech or of the press -<u>- for citizens</u>, or for journalists as defined by the government."<br />
<br />
Does it?<br />
<br />
<u>No interpretation of the First Amendment can create or invent authority</u> for the government to make laws restricting freedom of the press or freedom of speech. If you happen to find a 1917 law that appears to say otherwise, then it's an argument for viewing that law as an <u>unconstitutional power grab</u> by the government -- that law does not override the First Amendment.<br />
<br />
I am repeatedly disappointed to see conservatives and liberals alike view the Constitution as an inconvenient block to Righteous Action, one that needs to be bypassed regularly -- often by tortured interpretations of other parts of the Constitution that serve to make the Constitution and its Bill of Rights into pure nonsense (hence the "Ink Blot" interpretation of the 9th and 10th Amendments).<br />
<br />
The Constitution is a (limited) <u>grant of authority</u> to the federal government, beyond which it may not go. It is not a list of citizen rights. Citizens have all rights not otherwise limited by the grant of authority (and there's an amendment that says that too, which is also generally ignored, and with which you are likely not familiar either).</span>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-2847721838341375082010-12-12T19:40:00.000-08:002010-12-12T19:40:04.313-08:00Surprising article in NY Times on Ron Paul's rising star in Congress...."<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 34px;"><nyt_headline type=" " version="1.0"><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/13/us/politics/13paul.html">Ron Paul, G.O.P. Loner, Comes In From Cold</a>" is the headline, but they mean his appointment to the </nyt_headline></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 34px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;">chair of the House subcommittee on domestic monetary policy, which oversees the</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 34px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 34px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;">Federal Reserve</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 34px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 34px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;">as well as the currency and the valuation of the dollar -- his favorite subjects and his bete noire combined into one handy package.</span></span><br />
<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;">The story is both fair and richly interesting. Give it a read! (I have been a Paul enthusiast for more than a decade, long before he was anybody more than "Dr. No" of the House.)</span></div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-3796639207872023632010-12-12T12:27:00.000-08:002010-12-12T12:27:43.980-08:00"Governance in the Age of Wikileaks" -- TNLA colleague, Tristan N. Louis, digs deeper into the whole Wikileaks controversy than you've likely read elsewhere -- in his three-parter (be sure to read all three parts) he considers the illegal actions of government opponents to Wikileaks:<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.tnl.net/blog/2010/12/12/governance-in-the-age-of-wikileaks-part-1/">http://www.tnl.net/blog/2010/12/12/governance-in-the-age-of-wikileaks-part-1/</a><br />
<br />
Breaking the law by supporters of Wikileaks:<br />
<a href="http://www.tnl.net/blog/2010/12/12/governance-in-the-age-of-wikileaks-part-2/">http://www.tnl.net/blog/2010/12/12/governance-in-the-age-of-wikileaks-part-2/</a><br />
<br />
and freedom of expression in the age of Wikileaks:<br />
<a href="http://www.tnl.net/blog/2010/12/12/governance-in-the-age-of-wikileaks-part-3/">http://www.tnl.net/blog/2010/12/12/governance-in-the-age-of-wikileaks-part-3/</a><br />
<br />
Well worth reading all three, for a fully rounded perspective!<br />
<br />
macMcWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-6895273692723203892010-10-14T10:16:00.000-07:002010-10-14T10:16:00.957-07:00Drug Decriminalization in Portugal: Lessons for Creating Fair and Successful Drug Policies | Glenn Greenwald | Cato Institute: White Paper<a href="http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=10080">Drug Decriminalization in Portugal: Lessons for Creating Fair and Successful Drug Policies | Glenn Greenwald | Cato Institute: White Paper</a><div><br /></div><div>This is important reading as California prepares to vote on marijuana legalization. Portugal made radical changes a decade ago -- how did they do it, and was it a success?</div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1815921225261478058.post-9744877669889291662010-10-08T15:01:00.000-07:002010-10-08T15:01:33.537-07:00Time to Reconsider our Overseas "Defense" Commitments....This letter appeared in the WSJ today, 8 Oct. 2010, and I agree with it entirely; my emphasis added:<br />
<br />
<br />
<h1 class="boldEighteenTimes" style="font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 18px; font-weight: bold; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Less Government Means Less Defense Spending, Too</h1><div class="times" style="font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Arthur Brooks, Edwin Feulner and William Kristol claim that military spending is not the prime driver of our current fiscal crisis, but the Pentagon accounts for 23% of the federal budget ("<a class="" href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704483004575524763315951380.html?mod=article-outset-box" style="color: #0253b7; text-decoration: none;">Peace Doesn't Keep Itself,</a>" op-ed, Oct. 4). It is inconceivable that this spending should be exempt from scrutiny in a time of soaring deficits.</div><div class="times" style="font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Rather than Congress constantly writing a blank check, the process of military budgeting should begin with a discussion about <b>security necessities and their costs.</b> That isn't a discussion that Messrs. Brooks, Feulner and Kristol seem anxious to engage in—unsurprisingly, since all three support the disastrous military interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan.</div><div class="times" style="font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Of course, cutting spending without a <b>corresponding reduction in commitments</b> is a recipe for overburdening service members taxed by too frequent deployments to far-flung places. But it is already obvious that <b>most of what America spends on its military—often erroneously labeled "national defense"—really defends others who can and should defend themselves.</b></div><div class="times" style="font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">It's time for advocates of free markets and limited government to recognize that a vast military presence around the world is <b>utterly inconsistent with those ideals.</b> If we agree that government intervention domestically often has unintended, harmful consequences, we should recognize that the same principle holds true internationally, in spades. If we believe that the Constitution created a government whose most important duty is to "provide for the common defence" and "secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our posterity," <b>we should not be so willing to deploy the sharp end of that government's power in support of those who are not parties to our unique social contract.</b></div><div class="times" style="font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The Brooks-Feulner-Kristol approach to military spending amounts to another form of foreign aid, a massive wealth transfer from Americans to non-Americans, helping them finance generous social welfare systems. It is time to get our allies off the dole.</div><div class="times" style="font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><b>Ed Crane</b></div><div class="times" style="font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><b>Christopher Preble</b></div><div class="times" style="font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><i>The Cato Institute</i></div><div class="times" style="font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><i>Washington</i></div>McWonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05434794805492018385noreply@blogger.com0