When you hold resentment toward another,
you are bound to that person or condition
by an emotional link that is stronger than steel.
Forgiveness is the only way to dissolve that link and get free.
Catherine Ponder
Facebook Corner
(Tom Woods). A hostile visitor asked on my website: "Do you really think the solution is to return to isolationism?... Isolation is not the solution, it is part of the problem."
I replied:
"I generally dismiss the views of anyone who uses the government's propaganda term 'isolationism.' This shows a herd mentality and an inability to engage in independent or critical thought. Someone who uses a term beloved of both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney -- talk about being part of the problem!
"This is the same propaganda we get domestically: why, if we don't intervene in agriculture, and banking, and industry, and consumer products, and nutrition, then X and Y will occur. And both domestically and internationally, the state grows richer and more powerful whenever enough people are duped into believing this.
"Wouldn't the world have been vastly better off had there been more "isolationism" (what a stupid word -- I feel stupid even typing it in ironically) in the US during World War I? Whatever you think will happen if the US stops exploiting its population to pay for its overseas presence (which is all about protecting us and not enriching certain groups at the expense of the general public, of course!), it is insignificant nothingness next to what interventionism wrought in 1917."
Ah, yes...the "war to end all wars": how did that work out? What is just about the State stealing the economic future, liberty and lives of young Americans to meddle in remote regional conflicts with nebulous connections to our own security made by middle-aged or geriatric policymakers? None of us are arguing for separation from the rest of the world: we believe in the win-win nature of liberalized global trade.
But we need to be prudent in the application of force and explicitly consider the unintended consequences. Other nations must find a way of arbitrating differences without undue reliance on the American military; we must not engage in morally hazardous foreign policy. Will foreign leadership make decisions that we feel are wrong? No doubt. But we should not exacerbate said conflicts, and I think true international leadership lies in modeling policy which is constructive, relying on persuasion than force.
[Other discussant] you do realize that Japan bombed Pearl Harbor as a response to sanctions by the US government.. A fact quite overlooked by most Americans is that FDR wanted in the war so bad he could taste it.
You have to be careful not to suggest that Japan was justified to engage in preemptive, unprovoked military aggression because we chose not to trade. Japan had been a military aggressor for decades. Also keep in mind the US and Britain had areas of influence in east Asia.
I do think it is fair to say that FDR knew that Japan would not respond well to American sanctions and demands, he knew that Germany would likely honor its alliance with Japan in the event of war, but he also needed for Japan to make the first move to win public support.
[Following a related discussion of "isolationism" after WWI:]
You are both wrong. The US was not responsible for post-WWI developments (like destabilizing reparations), although one could argue that there were unintended consequences. I do not regard a single nation's decision not to trade as an act of war, based on the voluntary principle--an act of war would be something like a blockade on a nation dependent on imports or if we cooperated on the equivalent of a blockade of sanctions. But there's little doubt that FDR was looking for a pretext to enter into the war, and the American people, just a generation after the "war to end all wars", were wary of getting involved in any new war. "Dangerous non-intervention"? Absurd.
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| Courtesy of Illinois Policy Illinois |
Illinois Policy Institute announced a political action spin-off in 2014. Here I respond to a "progressive" troll:
"Special interests and lobbyists flooded the state capitol last week as lawmakers rushed a pension bill to the governor’s desk. But as has become the norm in Illinois, an important stakeholder was left out of the conversations: the really, really rich people who finance our operations and the GOP." There, fixed it for you.
Parasites, courtesy of the Illinois Jackass Party, have run Illinois into the ground since I escaped Illinois a decade ago. You morons have run out of excuses to blame the state's mismanagement. This self-defeating Politics of Envy convinces only the other economic illiterates in the state.
(Catholic Libertarians). It's amazing to me how people use the defense "It costs too much money" when defending the position of denying the right to a trial to an accused criminal, but then are complacent with taxpayer money going to politicians, corporations, and wars.
There, but for the grace of God, go I.... What about the loss of the person's contribution to the economy? What about the huge costs of constructing and operating prisons? What about those individuals whom have been wrongly arrested and/or convicted?
(Independent Institute). Research Fellow Randall Holcombe: "When you pay people to be unemployed, then not surprisingly, you get more unemployed people. The extended unemployment compensation is responsible for a substantial amount of current unemployment."
This assumes that the long-term unemployed are receiving government handouts. In fact, many people survive by selling assets, draining rainy day funds, etc. In my area of IT, I've found employers are absurdly selective. I remember when I left academia in the early 1990's during a recession: schools that normally attracted a dozen applicants were now getting 80 or more applicants. They resorted to arbitrary filters like, we don't have a female faculty member in the department or, say, we don't have a professor specializing in computer networks. But hiring an ABD over an experienced professor? The same thing is happening in the professional ranks--oh, you don't have exposure to this minor skill that you could pick up in 2 days? Better hire a 3-year professional over a 20-year veteran with multiple advanced degrees. I've been in boom/bust periods before, and this is different. It's not a matter of adjusting salary demands, willingness to move, etc.
How about lack of decent jobs? Not one single problem here!
http://money.cnn.com/2013/12/06/news/economy/jobs-numbers/
"But that 13.2% underemployment rate would have been a record high before the start of the recession. And the percentage of Americans who have jobs, the flip side of unemployment that can't be distorted by people dropping out of the labor force, has stayed relatively unchanged for the last two years." In other words, this economy is barely keeping pace with new labor entrants, and most employers are not even looking at those whom haven't been able to find work for over 6 months--and that includes highly experienced, multiple-degreed workers.
Has Mike Rowe done the dirtiest of jobs, i.e., been a corrupt politician?
Via Cato Institute
(Responding to a "progressive" troll":) If 'every man' built his own infrastructure......uhm yeah
We don't have to pay incompetent, inefficient government to set perverse incentives (e.g., "free" roads) and poorly design or maintain roads (bridges, whatever). The private sector is more than willing to do it better, faster, cheaper and well-maintained.
Who is this progressive troll? Guess which monopoly controls competition for infrastructure by the private sector--the government. What kind of idiot compares retail stores and groceries to government? Government can throw you into a cage if you do not pay your "fair share" to fund government failures; stores cannot force you to buy from them or even enter their store. Libertarians have no problem with voluntarily paying for desired goods and services--they don't want to be enslaved by feckless, spendthrift, incompetent government.
(Independent Institute). "In spite of its alluring name, the welfare state stands or falls by compulsion. It is compulsion imposed upon us with the state's power to punish noncompliance. Once this is clear, it is equally clear that the welfare state is an evil the same as every restriction of freedom." —Wilhelm Ropke
Don't you mean the corporate welfare state that DWARFS social welfare? If you make $50K a year you pay $36.00 for social welfare but $4000.00 for corporate welfare.
This is "progressive" troll statistical crap. According to government spending sources, we are spending about $521B per year in social welfare across several categories (after pensions, health care, education, and defense). I haven't seen more recent figure but so-called "corporate welfare" (like farm subsidies) amounted to about $92B per year in a 2007 Cato Institute piece. Let us not forget that many of these resulted from FDR's attempts to micromanage the agriculture sector--and put floors on commodity prices to "protect" farmers. Those of us who advocate a free economy want both social and corporate welfare eliminated or at least significantly moderated.
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| via LFC |
(The Independent Institute). Senior Fellow Benjamin Powell: "Before we embrace the policy prescription of Krugman the pundit, let’s ask the opinion of Krugman the economist... Krugman the economist should know. He co-authors an Econ 101 textbook. The 2008 edition clearly states, 'when the minimum wage is above the equilibrium wage rate, some people who are willing to work—that is, sell labor—cannot find buyers—that is, employers—willing to give them jobs.'”
Austerity and trickle down have failed repeatedly and yet the right wingers keep bending over for their corporate masters
Trickle-down government, Politics of Envy taxation, government intervention in the economy easy money, and ineffective deficit spending lower economic growth, yield fewer jobs and lower the standard of living for the lower income. Who, except economically illiterate types, would want that?
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| Via LFC |
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| Via Michael Cudahy LOL |
I think the thread of comments is very confused. My understanding is that the GOP is shying away from a reform that would basically take away the tax advantages of employer-sourced insurance and instead redistribute the tax savings to households on basically a flat basis (remember McCain's 2008 healthcare proposal?) The idea is there is a perverse incentive to maximize tax advantages through expensive plans and/or income (for example, if you are in the highest tax bracket, you are basically getting a 40% subsidy on the cost of your insurance). The post heading is sarcastic--a suspected Dem attack on removing the tax advantage though employers. How would employers react to the change in tax incentives? So instead of a radical reform, they might simply tweak the tax incentive, i.e., cap the advantage for expensive (e.g., union) plans or a flat advantage, so higher-income workers get less of a subsidy.
Most of us libertarians don't want the State meddling with tax incentives/penalty. Health care is just another market. Simplify taxes and let consumers decide how to spend their dollars. But the overriding principle is equal protection--either everyone gets a tax advantage or no one does. So the authors suggest that the GOP man up and offer a McCain-like universal tax credit instead of simply tweaking employer-based healthcare tax policy.
I agree. But I think the sarcastic heading confused readers.
Political Cartoon
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| Courtesy of the original artist via the Independent Institute |
Bruce Springsteen, "Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town". His politics may be derivative and predictable, but he knows how to rock an old holiday standard.
