It is dangerous to be sincere unless you are also stupid.
George Bernard Shaw
S&P Lowers the Credit Rating of Nine European Countries
This is one of the items I intended to put into yesterday's "Lightning Round" occasional feature when I found myself going against my design format creating extended commentaries. There is a general problem here that I have mentioned, especially in dealing with our unsustainable entitlement boondoggles: aging of the population. This puts a squeeze on a likely stagnant or even shrinking workforce. Japan and Europe are facing these problems sooner than us; the Baby Boomers here won't be finished filing for their senior benefits until 2030. We have a federal government in a state of denial; cities and states are in defined benefit programs that may very lead to cuts in basic services to maintain contractual pension obligations.
I think history will record the Obama era as a tragic mistake in American, maybe even world history. We have over a $15T deficit. Even if the federal government did not spend another cent, it would take almost 8 years (assuming a modestly growing economy) to work off that debt. This guy in the White House has done NOTHING--absolutely NOTHING to cut spending. You know those bombs on TV action series where the government agents have to cut just the right wires to disable them? The federal budget is filled with similar booby traps--you have mandatory spending, automatic budget increases, at least 3 different types of federal employee pay increases--even if you stop the madness of new programs. You have defined benefit systems that allow some military personnel to retire from working for a living as early as 40 with stipends exceeding the average household income! You have an all-but-bankrupt Post Office which is one of the few in the developed world NOT privatized with the majority of facilities running at a deficit, but the Congress blocks facility closures! What are these people doing to future of our children and grandchildren?
There are a lot of people out there predicting we are in the early stages of the next great depression, an imminent financial Armageddon. I'm not predicting that, but I think that the progressives have done permanent damage. The question is no longer whether there will be pain in the future but how bad and how long.The problem is that the federal government has grown too big for us to deftly maneuver our way through icebergs.The GOP House has tried and the best they've been able to do is slow the rate of increase--still over a $1T deficit. Look at what's happening in Europe, a preview of our future: college students agitating, protests over raising the minimum age for national pensions, etc.
Only Germany has survived the latest S&P ratings with AAA ratings intact. Even France and Austria have been dinged, and the problem children (Spain, Portugal and Italy) have also seen themselves downgraded. How long can Germans pick up the slack for the rest of the European Union? What this means in practical terms is that countries have to pay more money to service the same amount of debt and it will be harder to raise more debt without paying a premium. If somehow Obama managed to get reelected this fall (I'm not sure why voters would think Obama has any credibility in fiscal responsibility): how much more damage will Obama leave future generations by using the veto power to resist long overdue necessary fiscal reforms?
The MSNBC Sniper Soundbite Ads:
The "Lean Forward" Propaganda Campaign:
Thumbs DOWN!
I don't usually watch the NBC-affiliated USA Network, but I was recently watching one of their original crime/drama series' episode marathons and I started these mini-political sound bites from MSNBC's progressive prime time hosts (Ed Schultz, Rachel Maddow, Al Sharpton, Lawrence O'Donnell, etc.) I understand these things have been going on for some time over the past several months (going by a recent Internet search), but I hadn't really seen them before, at least the occasions I've watched the USA Network or other cable networks.
For all the criticisms I've made of Fox News; these aren't plugs for the shows; we don't see, say, the host's show and time--just a cryptic one-sided predictable soundbite. I tried to find clips and transcripts for some of the ads I've been seeing but haven't (this may be an artifact of my Internet searches, but even when I went to the above-cited link, I didn't find the promos I saw running on USA Network, and I didn't see links to transcripts); I prefer not having to recite from memory and prefer being as accurate as possible. This sort of hit-and-run propaganda only serves to preach to the choir; it's intellectually dishonest.
I'm not going to write an extensive rant here, because the back and forth is a familiar dance, and I'm bored. The MSNBC progressives would sound more interesting if they weren't taking their talking points from Obama's own rhetoric. The sound bites are paraphrased from memory.
"All we've heard from the other side is that tax cuts to job creators work. Well, where's the growth?"
Well, first of all, taxes are only one cost factor in the decision to expand, which reflects the supply and demand for relevant goods or services, expected competitor moves, availability of capital and resources, general economic conditions, etc. By the way, the Bush and Obama Administrations both increased the regulatory burden on businesses, which mitigated the positive effects of tax policy, and tax changes that the progressives are referring are INDIVIDUAL or household income tax burden, NOT business; business tax bracket rates are the highest among developed nations after Japan recently cut its high level tax rate. (And let's not forget it was Clinton and Dems in 1993 whom RAISED the corporate income tax rate to the existing 35%.) So the progressives are disingenuous here, confounding apples and oranges.
(I should point out a salient issue behind the job creator rhetoric: a certain type of corporation, subchapter s corporations, is taxed at the individual rate; a key conservative argument is if you revert to the Clinton tax hike rate, subchapter s corporations could be taxed at an even higher tax rate than a globally uncompetitive 35% bracket rate for other corporations! Subchapter s corporations are typically smaller/entrepreneurial businesses. Progressives are basically arguing that some subchapter s corporations are more equal than others.)
Second, the progressives are disingenuously asserting a 1993 Clinton high end tax bracket (39.6%) is the "real" tax rate. Let us do a reality check: at the beginning of GHW Bush's term in office, the top rate was 28%. Bush agreed to an increase to 31% in exchange for spending cuts (which, of course, never happened). Clinton then increased the top rate to 39.6%. By 2003, GW Bush had returned the high end to 35%. In fact, the Bush tax cut has been in effect roughly as long as Clinton's tax hike.
On a side note, not us not forget (but the progressives fail to acknowledge) that the Republican-led Congress in 1997 passed a tax cut package among other things slashed capital gains by a third. A major part of the balanced budget or budget surplus Clinton, who initially resisted the legislation, and other progressives have the unmitigated gall to take credit for have a lot to do with increased capital gains tax receipts
But let's go a little deeper into the math. The fact of the matter is that the Bush tax cuts were enacted: more workers were employed than ever before; higher-income people paid the highest proportionate amount of the income tax burden in recent history;and the federal government revenue increased to the highest amount in history. The progressives are trying to obfuscate things by wanting to tie the bubble busts in the credit and housing markets to tax policy (vs, say, monetary policy), which is patently absurd and arbitrary. What we do know is that the fundamental law of supply and demand works: you increase the costs of wages (e.g., taxes), you decrease the tax base. In other words, restoring the Clinton tax hike would have adversely affected the tax base, effecting economic growth and federal revenues.
There are other talking points raised by the progressives, but basically there's a feeling of entitlement to the assets of higher-income workers. There are a number of things one should take into consideration: for example, households and businesses have been shoring up their balance sheets since the credit bubble burst. Consumers are less likely to spend when tax cuts are temporary in nature (e.g., the payroll tax holiday). The liberals are also failing to recognize the beneficial impact of low inflation since the economic tsunami and free trade helps stretch the dollars of lower-income workers.
My Greatest Hits: Jan 2012 Edition
As faithful readers know, I revamped the appearance of the blog; one of my motivations to changing the design was to get improved statistics on blog readership, including specific posts (presumably by clicks to links in Internet searches, emails, etc.)
[Just a brief aside here if you want to share my individual posts with others: I'll use the browser Chrome and the Mozilla email client Thunderbird for an example (specific instructions may differ by browser or email client). In my browser window/tab, I can find post links at the timestamp at the bottom of a post or in the archive section at the right of the blog: right-click and select "copy link address". Then in my Thunderbird compose window I would type and select the desired link text in the message body (e.g., the word 'here' in 'click here') and then select the link option in the right pulldown menu (box icon) at the end of the formatting bar (or select the 'insert' menu option and choose 'Link'; alternately, there's a CTRL-L hotkey). Right-click in the 'link location' box of the popup and select the paste option.]
I now get a listing of specific posts that presumably are accessed through links in Internet search engines, emails, etc. What I've noticed is that some days I can get more hits on a post I wrote nearly two years ago than my current post. As you know, since my daily posts have a multi-feature format (a daily quote, two or more commentaries or main features, periodic features (political potpourri, Sunday talk soup, etc.), recurring features (political humor), and musical interlude), so I can only speculate on what readers are responding to.
This is a new feature, primarily for the benefit of new or regular readers whom haven't read all of my previous 1125 posts over the past 3.5 years; I can only speculate on how or why the readers selected these posts, but every mid-month starting this month I'll list and briefly summarize the 5 most popular linked posts over the past month:
- Miscellany: 4/05/10. The lead commentary is my rant on a Bob Schieffer (CBS News) FTN commentary related to a then recent New York Times story which, in my opinion, outrageously smeared Pope Benedict, attempting to link him (on very thin inferred "evidence") to institutional cover-ups involving a very few rogue priest child predators. I also wrote a commentary criticizing neo-conservatives whom seem to be spoiling for a confrontation with Iran.
- Miscellany: 8/22/10. Most likely this post was selected for its unlikely contrarian, long and unique commentary against a unanimously passed Texas College Transparency Law. Before going further, let me say that I dislike pretentious, politically spun titles of legislation. I mean, for instance, if you were a legislator, would you like to explain to constituency why you voted against, say, the We Love Our Military Veterans Act? (I just made that up, but so help me if someone actually did independently come up with that title..) "You can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig..." If you are a regular reader, you know I like to mock this stuff: the name I invented for the so-called financial reform act is Dodd N. Frankenstein.
As a former professor, I have my own perspective: I am highly critical of how universities assess professor performance; most parents or students don't have the background to evaluate puffed-up vitae or syllabi or assess the comparability or quality of similar degree programs across universities, and it's questionable how useful target data are without proper context (for example, I wouldn't have the medical background as a patient to judge the competent performance of a surgeon, I don't know the reputation of a journal in the discipline or how to attribute journal article contribution among co-authors, etc.)
I also would want to know if there's a hidden agenda underlying the legislation. For example, if I was teaching a course on philosophy, history, or economics, I might want a student to read original writings of Karl Marx (among other figures, such as Adam Smith) for academic, not ideological reasons. The bottom line is, don't have unrealistic expectations about any resulting data and its utility. Do taxpayers have a right to know how their tax dollars are spent? Of course.
- Miscellany: 10/23/10. This post is written just before the mid-terms and has some relevant obsolete coverage; I suspect the real reason for recent access to this post has to do with my critique on Obama's "pick and choose" emphasis on small business. Ironically yesterday I wrote a related extended commentary: there are a variety of government subsidized loans, contract set-sides for women-owned/other small businesses, etc. It's somewhat amusing to see Democrats implement business-unfriendly policies (increased tax/regulatory footprint) on one hand and then push for increased funding for the SBA on the other.
- Miscellany: 7/29/10. I suspect because I did a brief follow-up on a then recent post (see below) of the Shirley Sherrod kerfuffle. The lead segment involved a recent graduation of a niece. (This may be why her older sister recently wrote to me telling me she didn't want to be in my blog. I have only rarely mentioned relatives; I think in one case I announced the marriage of one of my nephews and I covered the golden anniversary of my maternal uncle's ordination.) Note that my political views are not necessarily shared by any relative.
- Miscellany: 1/01/12 Happy New Year! The only post on my top 5 list since the mid-terms for some odd reason. I suspect it has to do with a reprinted subway art poster of maternal aphorisms, but I have an interesting commentary on Georgism and Elizabeth Warren.
- A Bonus Selection: Miscellany: 7/24/10. This post oddly pops up in my traffic sources even before the blog design update. It probably has to do with a criticism I made over former government bureaucrat Shirley Sherrod's threat to sue Andrew Breitbart, a conservative website owner, over a video excerpt. Briefly, Shirley Sherrod got into trouble for giving a speech where at one point she vocalizes how she felt at the time being disrespected by a white farmer in financial trouble; she had the right connections to help the farmer, but she wasn't going to use them. Ms. Sherrod then goes on to explain how she later had second thoughts and did come to the aid of the farmer; she had come to the realization that the real issue was more class-based, that poor people had to stand together against the rich, powerful interests. Let's ignore the divisive class warfare rhetoric: what Ms. Sherrod admitted was that she didn't do her job, at least initially, to help out this farmer (whatever reason or race) is a breach of professionalism, period. What can you do when she openly admits to doing the wrong thing? Put the genie back in the bottle? I never really saw this as a race issue; it was bureaucratic arrogance. Now the mainstream media went to bat for Ms. Sherrod with the "discovery" of her redemptive act of helping the white farmer in question; the farmer and his wife announced support for Ms. Sherrod. The administration had initially terminated Ms. Sherrod--and keep in mind the whole video was available to the administration at the time of termination, but once the mainstream media made Andrew Breitbart the issue (for "distortion" in leaving out the redemptive side of the story), the administration backtracked and offered her job back. It would have been far more prudent for Ms. Sherrod to have simply said, "You know, initially I didn't feel like helping that farmer, but..." There was really no reason for her to say, "You know, I had the power in the situation and I could have helped him out, but he didn't treat me right." You can't do that. There's nothing in the law that says, "You don't have to do your job if the customer makes you feel bad." You file a complaint about the customer with your supervisor, but you do your job.
Styx,"Show Me the Way"
