The two terrors that discourage originality and creative living are fear of public opinion and undue reverence for one's own consistency.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
The Fox News/Google GOP Presidential Debate: Some Reflections
In my judgment, Mitt Romney clearly won this debate; it wasn't even close. But I want to comment on a number of specific points. Some of these will reflect on issues where my pro-market (economics libertarian) views contrast with many media conservative (law-and-order) standpoint. I suspect many of my readers don't like my pro-immigration views (I've sometimes seen readership go down after I write my position), but I don't write my opinions to be popular: I write them with conviction.
I don't think Rick Perry effectively presented his point of view on a couple of points--the HPV vaccine mandate and immigration.
Gardasil. First, for readers who did not read my comprehensive commentary on the Gardasil issue last Saturday, I recommend it as background. I have a nuanced opinion regard Rick Perry's decision to mandate the vaccine for tweenage girls. I did criticize Rick Perry earlier for what I considered his throwing Heather Burcham, a HPV vaccine advocate and dying from cervix cancer, under the bus. Perry last night referenced to Ms. Burcham although not directly by name. Here's the major point: there was a mandate, but parents could opt out. That is, children would be permitted to attend school; their parents simply had to sign a form. Here's what we know: women who die of cervical cancer have DNA markers of known strains of HPV, a sexually transmitted infection, one of the most common strains that many, if not most sexually active people have been exposed for at least some period of time during their lives. Gardasil is known to block those cancer-causing HPV strains. This is one of those rare cases where we know the cause of a cancer--the second most deadly to affect women worldwide--and can control it via a vaccine; vaccines are more effective when administered to an uninfected person, hence targeting 12-year-old girls before they become sexually active. (Doctors in the US are able to control for it indirectly through pap smears, a common diagnostic test.)
The charges regarding Gardasil product Merck's small campaign contribution or employment of a former Perry staffer are weak; for example, chief critic Michele Bachmann herself has taken in much more campaign contributions from pharmaceuticals. At the time, Gardasil was the only FDA approved vaccine to protect against salient HPV strains. (A second vaccine has since been released.) Texas, in fact, repealed Gov. Perry's executive order, and only two states mandate it--Virginia and DC; Virginia doesn't enforce its mandate. Perry has admitted the way he went about doing this was mistaken
What is truly pathetic here is the two most widely-known women in the GOP Presidential field, Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin (not a declared candidate but often included in polls), have been criticizing Rick Perry's initiative, which by any objective analysis was motivated by a concern for women's health, and his executive order did include an opt-out procedure. It was not a case, say, of a school vaccinating one's child without parental knowledge or consent. I myself have been highly critical of health care mandates, but this isn't a case of, say, couples with fertility problems or men with erectile dysfunction trying to get other policyholders to subsidize their treatments.
Immigration. There were a cluster of points being made here. If I had been Governor Perry, I would have started off by rattling off a number of things all the conservatives could agree on: the President's shameless immigration policy by cherrypicking for political purposes which unauthorized visitors his Administration will pursue, his failure to crackdown on sanctuary cities, and of course operation Fast and Furious, which exacerbated violence by drug criminals in outlying border areas. Finally, I would have attacked the Administration for in essence failures in enforcement, aggravating crime in some areas (e.g., Phoenix). Why should city and state taxpayers have to take on the costs of ineffective border enforcement by the federal government? In fact, if I'm not mistaken, Perry is attempting to bill the federal government, and I would have stressed that point last night.
Second, there was a question of constitutionality of border state (and others) attempts to enforce immigration policy. Personally, I think it's morally hazardous policy and unconstitutional. Unconstitutional because border protection is a national/federal responsibility, and if states and municipalities are undergoing costs (in particular, crimes) because or inadequate border protection, those costs should be charged to the federal government.
Third, there is a question about fences--in particular, fences along Texas' contiguous border with Mexico. Rick Perry has responded in a number of ways, but basically he argues that he prefers things like drones (I'm not sure about whether satellite technology is also relevant). There are various things to point out. The first is something former Arizona governor and DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano has also said: build an X-foot wall, and they'll bring an X+1-foot ladder. Second is the fact that fences don't keep criminal elements from burrowing under the surface.
But let me point out some things which you won't hear from the anti-immigrant ideologues. First, we are in a pattern of reverse immigration. A lot of that has to do with diminished job prospects in a tough economy and improved opportunities within Mexico itself. The number of illegal immigrants since 2007 has gone down by 1.5 million; furthermore, only 1 in 7 returning illegal immigrants has anything to do with INS. According to Pew Hispanic Center, the number of illegal immigrant entries dropped by nearly two-thirds from 2005 to 2009.
Second, there are roughly 11 to 12M illegal immigrants, with just over half (50-53%) of those with unauthorized entry; the remainder include people with initially valid visas or border crossing cards but have violated the terms of their authorization. On a mixed-status household basis, roughly 8.8 of 16.6M people, including at least one illegal immigrant parent and children, involve an unauthorized immigrant. Of the 4.5 M children, some 3.8 M are American-born, which the Supreme Court has decided are American citizens based on the Fourteenth Amendment
Third, the economic impact of illegal immigrants is distorted. For example, many aliens purchase domestically produced goods and services (supporting professional services, e.g., real estate and law) and pay directly or indirectly various taxes (e.g., sales, property, payroll, etc.); one of the reasons underlying unauthorized entry is a dysfunctional temporary worker visa program, which can delay lawful entry by up to 3 years or more. Far from being a drain on the economy, an application of the US Applied General Equilibrium model suggests legalization of unauthorized workers would be a benefit to the US GDP of 1.27% or $180B, and eliminating all unauthorized workers would cost the economy in terms of productivity and lost higher-paying jobs by some $80B. Also, some of the government revenue/cost figures used by ideologues are disingenuous (note the above model took public expenditures into account); for example, given the fact that half of American workers pay no federal income tax (and many state and local income taxes are also similarly progressive), the fact of lower than average wages earned by unauthorized workers yield no relevant income tax revenue is an artifact of our progressive tax system; it is arbitrary and unfair to single out unauthorized workers among all other American citizens earning similarly low income.
One could argue, based on the above, that increased compliance (e.g., additional border patrol boots, fences, etc.) costs are counterproductive: instead of gathering visa fees and open, fair taxation of labor, we drive the economy underground: the coyotes--the criminals smuggling people across for thousands of dollars--profit, labor gets transacted in cash, etc. Farmers struggle to get labor to harvest crops; shortages of crops result in higher food prices. Labor shortages affect other aspects of the consumer experience, e.g., wait times to get served.
I have differences on two other points: employer verification and college residency costs. First, I don't believe it is my responsibility as a businessman to serve as a virtual ICE agent. I may need labor to achieve my business objectives. It's bad enough I have to withhold employee taxes for various government entities. But my issue is finding a person with the ability, skills and attitude to do the job. All I care about is his job performance, not what country he was born in, a fair wage for a decent day's work.
Second, I really, really disliked the attack on college resident tuition rates in Texas for children whom may have at least one unauthorized entry parent. I lost a lot of respect on this point for Rick Santorum. We already know on average most children in mixed-status family are American-born. These children are not only US citizens by birth, but they are Texas citizens/residents. A lot of these children have lived contiguously in the state to easily establish a Texas residency requirement. Many of these kids have never been been south of the border. These kids grew up in Texas schools, and yet someone is saying they shouldn't qualify for the same rate at state universities as their fellow classmates? Why? Haven't their parents paid (directly or indirectly) the same type taxes as others in their line of work? The exclusion of these American citizens/Texas residents based on status of their parents is discriminatory and unconscionable.
Is Obama A Socialist? NO. Mitt Romney was exactly right (and the only candidate, I believe, whom answered the question correctly). Obama IS a big spending liberal . Socialism involves state ownership of capital (e.g., if Obama was, say, to nationalize our domestic oil industry). There is a general distinction of negative and positive rights. The former involve the rights of the individual to be shielded from the coercive actions of others (e.g., you cannot keep me from expressing my point of view); the latter compel us to act on behalf of the rights of others, e.g., if I don't have resources, you must provide me with a public defender; you must guarantee me a livable stipend upon retirement; if I can't afford private education, you must provide me with an education; if I don't have money for health care, you must guarantee me life-saving medical treatment. This became explicitly addressed during the 2008 campaign; I recall writing about the famous 2001 WBEZ radio interview where he essentially said that the Constitution should guarantee positive rights but he isn't hopeful that the courts would agree. Now if you agree with positive rights for someone with no resources, that, in fact, necessarily means that person is being funded by other individuals, i.e., redistributionist. I would agree that he is a crony capitalist but not a socialist (although, granted, we still hold stock in AIG, the GSE's and car companies, but that was set in motion by government interventionist actions during the economic tsunami).
National Right to Work. This is an interesting question, because do we address crony unionism at the state or national level? Since union actions can affect interstate commerce, it can fall within the federal scope of the interstate commerce clause, hence Taft-Hartley enabled states to pass right-to-work laws, i.e., an employee is not coerced to join a union as a condition of employment. Some 22 states have right to work laws (free to join or not join a union). In compulsory-union states, according to the Supreme Court, an individual is required to cover only his share of costs relevant to cover the collective-bargaining process--not, for instance, political activities. Technically, I would argue that these rights (e.g., the First and Fifth Amendments) are intrinsic to our Constitutional rights. I completely agree with F.A. Hayek:
The need for special legislation concerning [union privileges] would probably not have arisen in common-law countries. But, once special privileges have become part of the law of the land, they can be removed only by special legislation. Though there ought to be no need for special 'right-to-work laws,' it is difficult to deny that the situation created in the United States by legislation and by the decisions of the Supreme Court may make special legislation the only practicable way of restoring the principles of freedom.I support, and the Republican Party should endorse, a National Right to Work Law to restore basic individual rights to workers in the remaining 28 states. Of course, I support the passage of state right-to-work laws in the other states.
The Democrats, of course, in general are crony unionists; we saw this play out on the stage in Wisconsin early this year. We saw the public sector unions zealously protect unsustainable collective bargaining powers, holding the state taxpayers hostage to corrupt political bargains. The outrageous attempts of the Obama Administration to try to stop Boeing from opening a new plant in a right-to-work state (South Carolina) reinforces the need to protect basic human rights, not to be forced to subsidize a third party against my will as the price of exercising my natural right to work.
Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups
Fleetwood Mac, "Dreams". Fleetwood Mac's only #1 hit and a Nicks composition. I've extensively commented on other Nicks' songs. I've found at least one good discussion of the song's lyrics here. I differ somewhat on my take. Rain is a heavily used metaphor in songwriting, symbolizing sad times or difficult periods; thunder can represent arguments, conflict or heartbreak. She makes it clear that it's his (Lindsey Buckingham's) decision to leave ("you say you want your freedom"). The way I take the line "thunder only happens when it's raining" is that conflict was part of their both being vested in their relationship, but it didn't characterize the whole of their relationship. I think "players only love you when they're playing" is not so subtle warning to Lindsey that the women he is meeting, e.g., groupies, are more motivated by superficial reasons, like his fame and fortune, not in him as a person, not like, for instance, when they first met while in school, when he as a junior asked her as a senior to join the band he was playing in.
I personally think she is being somewhat defensive here; she's hurt because he's leaving her, and she's telling him he won't find in these other women what they had together; perhaps he'll be sexually gratified, but these women really don't love him, and he'll find himself lonely, trying to rediscover what they had together.
What's interesting here is we hear a lot of songs out there that say similar things, but then we hear a typical response to the effect, "once you realize these relationships won't fulfill you like our relationship, I know you'll be back, and I'll take you back". Stevie isn't saying that at all; you feel a melancholic sense of resignation, of letting go; she knows that he won't be back, and she tries to put her best face forward wishing him well. He'll eventually learn the truth of these superficial relationships on his own, he'll learn from his mistakes, and maybe one day he'll find genuine love down the line: she still cares for him and truly wants him to be happy and not lonely.
This is an unusual song in many respects (e.g., a sad song with a dance beat to it). Oddly enough, I don't play it that often because I find it somewhat depressing and I prefer other breakup songs like ABBA's "Knowing Me, Knowing You". I think in "Dreams" we don't see any wistful hint of the good side of Lindsey's and Stevie's relationship (I think it's certainly implied) and so the song seems incomplete to me.
In the unlikely event Stevie ever read my interpretation, I suspect that she would shake her head in amazement of how clueless I truly am. That's true; I have had lousy judgment and experiences when it comes to dating.
