Miscellany: 9/11/14

Quote of the Day
Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. 
The important thing is not to stop questioning.
Albert Einstein

I Was Working At A Wisconsin County Client: 
Never Forget 9/11

I had to be at the facility at 7:30 AM (on top of an 80-mile commute from northern Illinois), basically to ensure that the test upgrade databases and application processes were up at 8 AM (the county DBA's were responsible for overnight backups). The fellow contractor Indian developer on the upgrade team lived locally and usually watched Today before driving to the courthouse. He arrived at work shouting incoherently about some plane flying into a building. My initial inference was that it was maybe some Cessna which ran into mechanical problems and went back to my work--I was tech lead on a critical upgrade project to go live in just a month. I noted, with exasperation, how all the county employees seem to be huddled around portable TV sets somebody brought in; I was getting briefed in bits and pieces by colleagues and county workers; it was clear something was very wrong: these were airliners purposefully flown into skyscrapers, then the followup Pentagon and Flight 93 incidents. The entire airline system was shut down; I recently connected to a former fellow high school freshman who was married to an airline pilot on another unrelated flight, and he was diverted to an interim destination. I probably didn't see any footage until I got home at 9 PM or so and got on the Internet. The next several days were surreal; there were fears of a follow-up wave of attacks. I arrived at the courthouse to find a group in prayer out front and joined in. I saw more bipartisanship in Washington in the aftermath than I had seen in years.

There were severe economic consequences that went well beyond the devastated travel industry. I had never applied for the Wisconsin gig. I was interested in an Austin project the company was recruiting for. The president of the consulting company was worried about the Wisconsin project, whose references led to the Oregon and Austin wins. He explained the Austin project was still in the future, but he had a DBA problem on his reference project, which was behind schedule and on a fixed bid. He didn't want to work with independents and he didn't want to cover travel from California. He wanted me to go perm and claimed his company had never had a layoff in its history. He mentioned hiring a road warrior consultant from the East Coast who never billed a single hour (all travel expenses covered) and left on his own after 6 months. I did single-handedly bring us back on schedule (I think the client demanded a one or 2-week extension to do additional testing, which the company gave them, despite having to eat the extra costs, mostly in the hope of landing a follow-up project). After a successful cutover going live, I was told to report the next Monday to do some Oracle patching on internal installed training Apps; instead, I found myself scheduled into an exit interview. I think most of their government clients had frozen projects in the pipeline.



Chart of the Day: Male Privilege

Courtesy of Carpe Diem

Image of the Day

The Fascist Amendment To Restrict Political Speech Fails Cloture Vote: Thumbs UP!

This bogeyman nonsense about campaign money buying elections has been thoroughly debunked over the years. For example, GOP candidates for Senate from Missouri and Indiana, both veteran politicians, not novices, who seemed to be all but certain to win the 2012 general election made unforced errors discussing women's issues of little relevance to national policies and they were never able to regain momentum. I have pointed out that wealthy candidates don't necessarily win office (Romney and Perot come to mind) despite the ability to spend millions of their own money. Eric Cantor was decisively defeated by an underfunded unknown economics professor for renomination this year. Charlie Crist, then governor and establishment-favored Senate candidate in 2010, got crushed by an unexpected challenger, Marco Rubio.

Is life unfair? No doubt. I couldn't get elected dogcatcher--I don't have a voter-friendly surname (imagine if I had been the write-in candidate in the 2010 Alaska Senate election...) I've rarely had decision-making power to impose my will, even when as a problem solving expert, I knew the right decision to make. I've had to convince bosses or other business meetings to my point of view. I've had to negotiate and compromise. I have a phenomenal work ethic and would be relentless trying to  cut spending, burdensome, anticompetitive regulations; I would build or join coalitions. Unlike most people, I'm very good at both the "big picture" and details. And I truly have no incentive other than the future of my fellow citizens; I'm already doing that in this blog. I've done all of this without a penny from anyone. I'm a true believer in the free market. That being said, the chance I could ever win a political race is laughable (even with all else, I've been far too direct, even in this blog, where I'm sure I've said something that offends almost everyone else). I didn't mean to make this a conversation about me, but let's just say I don't mind other people getting credit, I wouldn't be in it to get my name on infrastructure, and I'm not interested in being there for the rest of my life or in some prestigious or lucrative post-political career. I wish there were people like me running for office. The idea that I would be a shill for some crony capitalist is laughable; I want to do away with corrupt tax or regulatory gimmicks.

The Net Neutrality Kerfuffle

If you haven't noticed, there's a new gadget I've configured to run in the upper right corner of the blog: don't break the Internet (see here for the relevant website and its sponsoring parent, Tech Freedom, here). I don't want to get into an arcane discussion here, but there is a lot of propaganda going on with proponents in favor of meddling with the Internet through dysfunctional, pushing-on-a-string regulation. In some cases, companies like NetFlix (disclosure: I used to subscribe when I lived in California and subsequently in Illinois; I discontinued for service and budget issues and had a negative experience where they initially claimed to have not reclaimed one of the discs back) have tried to co-opt the net neutrality issue in what I would regard as a classic crony capitalism setup; NetFlix can account for up to a third of peaktime Internet used capacity some evenings and obviously has a vested interest in any regulatory rulemaking; crony capitalists preditably try to engage in regulatory capture--basically writing terms to businesses it can't impose in a competitive marketplace, typically at the expense of smaller competitive rivals (just to throw a sample concept, suppose the existence of an upstart videosharing service).

To understand some of the kerfuffle, one needs to understand the concept of Title II, a broad authority used to rationalize federal overregulation of landline communications. As Tech Freedom points out, No, Title II Doesn’t Ban Prioritization OR Mandate Free Interconnection, (The former discussion refers to the bogeyman of a two-tier, zero-sum arrangement of the last mile to the customer's point of access; the latter has to do with the criticism that NetFlix wants to socialize some of the costs of getting its content to its customers.)

To a great extent, the FCC under Clinton and Bush generally let the Internet businesses find their own way to meeting market demand:

“This debate is no longer about net neutrality,” said Berin Szoka, president of TechFreedom. “A radical fringe has hijacked the conversation in an attempt to undo two decades of bipartisan consensus against heavy-handed government control of the Internet. Al Gore may not have exactly ‘invented the Internet,’ but President Clinton’s FCC chairman Bill Kennard deserves much credit for choosing not to embroil the Internet in what he called the ‘morass’ of Title II. Kennard’s approach of ‘vigilant restraint’ unleashed over $1 trillion in private investment, which built the broadband networks everyone takes for granted today. Abandoning that approach  would truly break the Internet.”...“Invoking Title II would trigger years of litigation,” continued Szoka. “It’s not clear the FCC could ultimately ‘reclassify’ broadband at all, and even less clear the FCC could, or actually would, follow through on talk of paring back Title II’s most burdensome rules, like retail price controls. Even if ‘reclassification’ stood up in court, the FCC still couldn’t do what net neutrality hardliners want: banning prioritization. The FCC would succeed only in creating a dark cloud of legal uncertainty. That would slow broadband upgrades and discourage new entrants, such as Google Fiber, from entering the market at all.”

Now basically there are multiple ways to get data from a content provider like NetFlix to an ISP: directly or through a third-party CDN (content delivery network) (think an Internet backbone carrier with access points to ISP's; CDN's tend to have asymmetrical data exchanges--more data going into an ISP than going out of an ISP, and they pay for a certain service level agreement (say, to minimize buffering of a video to an end user) (See Rogowsky for a good summary of this). Rogowsky has another excellent post where he points out that NetFlix's self-serving "strong net neutrality" is little more than "net neutrality for the strong".

NetFlix in fact used its own CDN in an agreement with Comcast (Comcast's data-carrying revenue is a miniscule amount of overall revenues) that not only cut out middleman costs but improved delivery speeds by over 60%. Geoffrey Manne has a related post:

In short, the Netflix-Comcast agreement deals with something known as interconnection – how big content providers transmit their huge files over the internet’s backbone in order to get to Comcast (and other ISP) last mile facilities in the first place.  Net neutrality deals with how traffic is handled once it arrives at the last-mile, and whether it makes sense for certain traffic to receive priority treatment once it gets there.

Big content providers have always had to pay someone to manage delivery of their shows, movies and services. Typically these companies use specialized services called “content delivery networks” (CDNs) to manage this traffic as it travels from the provider to the ISP, which then moves it over its “last miles” to individual customers and screens. CDNs often build significant infrastructure of their own to improve speeds, and content providers (including Netflix) have always paid for this.

Mr. Hastings figured he could confuse longstanding, widely accepted interconnection practices with the debate over net neutrality, hoping politicians and regulators who favor net neutrality might help him get a free pass on interconnection costs.
But free to whom? Someone has to pay for the infrastructure needed to handle Netflix’s traffic. If Netflix (or Cogent) doesn’t pay, everyone using the network would have to, whether they were Netflix customers or not. In reality, Hastings was looking for a government handout... Competition has forced prices for these interconnection services down by a remarkable 99 percent in recent years. ISPs can do nothing to thwart interconnection, and, in fact, Comcast has every incentive to keep the online video spigot wide open.

Do you think government intervention would have cut costs 99%? The market did that without government inertia of bureaucracy or equally incompetent judges, all while running profitable businesses... BEWARE OF UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES.

The Economics of Back to School



Facebook Corner


(Reason). Does Sarah Palin think the American president is responsible for security around the world? Maybe. Lots of people do, especially people who want to be president. How can a president prevent chaos from exploding in the normally serene Middle East while charging in, striking hard, and getting out?
So many commenters are hung up on the author's paragraph which includes the phrase "normally serene Middle East"... It's obvious that the author is mocking Palin's oversimplistic view of a surgical operation to take out ISIS. In some cases, the enemy of your enemy (say, Assad) is not necessarily your friend. It must be be wonderful in Palin's view of the world where all bad guys wear black hats...

Eliminate the Death Penalty!



Proposals



Wrong hand, dude!






Political Cartoon

Courtesy of Michael Ramirez via Townhall

Musical Interlude: My Favorite Vocalists

Barry Manilow,"Trying to Get the Feeling Again"

Miscellany: 8/21/13

Quote of the Day
If a man be gracious to strangers
it shows that he is a citizen of the world, 
and his heart is no island, 
cut off from other islands, 
but a continent that joins them.
Francis Bacon

Drones Beyond Civil Liberties and Warfare

Detrick provides some interesting insights on a certain level of deregulated airspace access to local law enforcement and certain private-sector operators like from film making and farming. Clearly trespassing within immediate private property airspace without the knowledge or consent of the owner would be an unconstitutional invasion of privacy or (without warrant) search. But smaller drone technologies could facilitate more granular, feasible searches for missing children, hikers, survivors at sea, etc., surveillance for extended property security, etc.



More on the 77-Centers

You know, when feminist ideologues start trying to compare jobs and compensation on purely subjective assessments of "comparable work" (public sector unions also promote similar rubbish), it's not respectable. There are market supply-and-demand considerations underlying specific job compensation. Factors like hours worked, availability during off-peak hours, lifestyle choices (e.g., road warrior), nature of the work (say, working on an offshore platform vs. a desk job) and tenure/experience explain much of a difference; employers have no reason to pay males more than their market worth; any female entrepreneur could easily arbitrage wage differences to establish a competitive advantage. I think somewhere in the discussion a point is made that male business owners make more than female business owners.A casual Google search revealed the following excerpt:

But one question haunted me through the years: If an employer has to pay a man one dollar for the same work a woman would do for [77] cents, why would anyone hire a man? If women do produce more for less, I thought, women who own their own businesses should earn more than male business owners. So I checked. I found that women entrepreneurs earn 50% less than their male counterparts. 

It’s not that women are less effective or productive–they just have different priorities. A 2001 survey of business owners with M.B.A.s conducted by the Rochester Institute of Technology found that money was the primary motivator for only 29% of women, versus 76% of men. Women prioritized flexibility, fulfillment, autonomy and safety.

I'm not sure I agree with the wording of the first sentence of the second paragraph, because I think jobs and compensation are linked to productivity; I would probably rephrase it as the notion of compensation reflects fungible trade-offs, some involving harder-to-quantity subjective benefits. For example, traditionally lower public sector pay reflected higher job security, not unlike how corporate bonds in the private sector have to pay an interest premium over safe Treasury debt to attract investors. Sometimes compromises are made to accommodate family life; for instance, a promotion might require relocation to a more rural area where the spouse's professional opportunities are more limited; if a husband spends a lot of time traveling away from home, a wife may prefer a more limited job commitment, say, to cope with time demands of parenting (e.g., a child is ill and can't go to school).

I can't help but smile when ideologues start complaining how predominantly male school janitors make more than lunch ladies. Well, you know, we males have been brainwashed by the promotion of stereotypes like strong, virile, bald Mr. Clean. At one stretch during my freshman year, I had to mop floors at 6 AM on an empty stomach and felt like puking on multiple occasions; I got paid the same minimum wage. Would I have preferred ladling slop on the serving line to attractive coeds at a more godly hour? In a heartbeat--even at a lower wage. If lunch ladies would rather earn more money by mopping up after student vomit and cleaning toilets, they should apply to be a janitor. Maybe a lower supply of lunch ladies will drive up their wages, or a higher supply of custodians will drive down the same...



A Notable Camille Paglia Quote About Hillary Clinton

As a registered Democrat, I am praying for a credible presidential candidate to emerge from the younger tier of politicians in their late 40s. A governor with executive experience would be ideal. It’s time to put my baby-boom generation out to pasture! We’ve had our day and managed to muck up a hell of a lot. It remains baffling how anyone would think that Hillary Clinton (born the same year as me) is our party’s best chance. She has more sooty baggage than a 90-car freight train. And what exactly has she ever accomplished — beyond bullishly covering for her philandering husband? She’s certainly busy, busy and ever on the move — with the tunnel-vision workaholism of someone trying to blot out uncomfortable private thoughts.

I for one think it was a very big deal that our ambassador was murdered in Benghazi. In saying “I take responsibility” for it as secretary of state, Hillary should have resigned immediately. The weak response by the Obama administration to that tragedy has given a huge opening to Republicans in the next presidential election. The impression has been amply given that Benghazi was treated as a public relations matter to massage rather than as the major and outrageous attack on the U.S. that it was... As far as I’m concerned, Hillary disqualified herself for the presidency in that fist-pounding moment at a congressional hearing when she said, “What difference does it make what we knew and when we knew it, Senator?”.

I'm sure Marty O'Malley must be happy with an implicit endorsement. I wouldn't mind seeing O'Malley buried in a national landslide. I think the Democrats have a bigger problem: they have been running on basically the same platform for 40 years; despite every budgetary weapon the Dems have thrown at the economy, we are 4 years into an "Obama Recovery" with anemic growth rates, the lowest labor participation rate in decades, the highest structured long-term unemployment, all-time high in food stamps, and high levels of low-skill unemployment. (I agree that Bush presided over low growth, but we also achieved record high federal revenues during his second term, and he was bookended by two major asset bubble bursts.)

I think more importantly, the chickens are coming home to roost over corrupt unsustainable deal making with public sector unions and exploding Baby Boomer entitlement costs; Detroit is just an earlier manifestation of things to come. The Dems can no longer promise more and more spending. Especially notable are the unmitigated disaster of ObamaCare and Obama's horrendous track record on civil liberties/domestic spying and interventionist foreign policy, both serious deviations from his rhetoric before entering the White House. In ObamaCare it's not just that Obama is illegally deferring the employer mandate for obviously political reasons, but blown deadlines, waivers, promises about no effects on people's existing insurance, etc., have thoroughly debunked the myth of government competence.

How will the Democrats respond in a world where unpopular program cuts are necessary to save programs and deregulation is needed to restore a measure of necessary economic liberty? Will a brave Democrat emerge to contradict the litmus-test policies over the past decades?

I think Paglia is wrong; it's not the age of the politicians; it's more of an uncritical belief in the efficacy of centralized government. There's only so much longer they can kick unfunded entitlement liabilities down the road, try to sidestep public employment reforms, and maintain globally noncompetitive economic policies.

The Murdered Australian Baseball Player Kerfuffle

The revelation that three "bored" teens of color recently murdered a white baseball player "just for fun" has not escaped my attention. I get the fact that many conservatives want to highlight the hypocrisy of the mainstream media and certain black "leadership" whom have portrayed Trayvon Martin as a victim of "white" Hispanic-on-black crime on the matter. But I wanted briefly respond to a comment made in a Libertarian Republican post:

Most self-described libertarians will remain silent on the killing of the white Australian by three black teenagers because on cultural issues they're just like liberals.

No, I'm speaking for myself and not necessarily any other libertarians. I think Chris Lane's murderers should be prosecuted to the fullest extent to the law. When one of the alleged killers tweeted "90% of white ppl are nasty" and "Ayeee I knocced out 5 woods [whites] since Zimmerman court!", there can be little doubt that this was a racially-based crime, a "hate crime" if there ever was one. But I'm more interested in justice in the taking away of Mr. Lane's unalienable right to live, not exacerbating racial tensions, not trying to score political points over an unjustifiable cold-blooded murder. I did not like to see the race card played during the Zimmerman trial, and I don't want to see it played in the upcoming trials of these teens. The vast majority of black people I know would be horrified by what these young men have done. All people of good will mourn the deaths of both Trayvon Martin and Chris Lane.

Political Cartoon

Courtesy of Robert Ariail and Townhall

Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups Redux

The Beatles, "Magical Mystery Tour"

Miscellany: 8/05/13

Quote of the Day
It is never too late to be what you might have been.
George Eliot

Earlier: One-Off Post: Bill O'Reilly, President Obama, and the Race Problem

The Grumpy Economist Vents On Immigration

For the most part I agree with Cochrane's piece (HT Boudreaux of Cafe Hayek), In particular, I love his discussion of what got him to publish his op-ed in the WSJ:

Boiled down to one sentence, where this all started. Grumpy reads the news. Reaction: "You guys want every American to have to ask the permission of the Federal Government in order to get a job??? Have you lost your minds? How many founding fathers are rolling over in their graves?"

He's talking, of course, about E-Verify. I've mentioned similar sentiments, like the employer becoming an INS agent. A basic point, though, John: isn't the federal government already doing this through I-9 paperwork, etc.? They are only automating and securing the process:: of course, a biometric ID card is, as Cochrane suggests, the first step down a slippery slope which limits our freedom to act anonymously and it would be only a matter of time NSA was able to fold that information with communications metadata to track citizens.

There are a couple of interesting points he raises:

The Senate bill promises higher caps for "guest workers." Ponder what "guest worker" really means. Come to America, pick our vegetables, clean our bathrooms and tend our gardens at the invitation of a powerful employer. Pay taxes. And when your visa runs out, go back where you came from—there is no place for you here. This is how Middle East sheikdoms treat Filipino maids and Palestinian construction workers. Is this America? 

First of all, Cochrane seems to be oblivious of the facts that (1) labor protectionists (particularly unions) have opposed working visas from the get-go, and why this blog, among other voices, advocates liberalized guest worker programs to alleviate one of the main reasons for unauthorized entry, (2) not all workers intend to immigrate (I worked for a client in Brazil in 1995 for a few months, but I had no intent or desire to become a Brazilian citizen); some types of work are seasonal (e.g., harvest), and (3) it seems odd for a free marketer to make value judgments about work: aliens are willing to work at agreed wages--and the pay may be far better than for comparable work in their homeland if they can find it (it's possible Cochrane sees this as zero-sum with immigration opportunities for low-skilled workers; I endorse liberalized immigration quotas for all types of workers, including low-skilled). I'm looking for ways to open labor markets to foreign workers, and a work visa is one of those options. I have no objection for an alien with prior work history in America applying for immigration.

Here is the crucial question for genuine immigration reform: How do we respond when someone says, I have heard of your freedom. I am tired of the corrupt police in my country, the bought-off courts, the oppression of rulers, the tyranny of the religious or ethnic majority. I want to join the one country on earth defined by an idea, not by conquest, religion or ethnic identity. No, I don't have a special skill or a strong back useful to your politically connected employers. I want to come, drive a cab, open a convenience store in a poor neighborhood, work long hours, pay taxes, send my children to school and, eventually, vote.

I absolutely agree. My ancestors immigrated to New England during the nineteenth century, among other things, working in textile mills, timber and farms; they weren't necessarily college-educated or healthcare/high tech workers with politically connected employers.

In the current vision of immigration reform, millions will still be trying to sneak in, and millions more will remain here working illegally. E-Verify and the border security wall prove it. If people could work legally, there would be no need for a system that endangers everyone's liberty to "verify" them. And there would be no need to build a $45-billion monument to imperial decline— our bid to outdo the walls of Hadrian, China and Berlin—to stop them. [Only the ruins won't be pretty enough to attract Chinese tourists a few centuries from now.] 

I do think there is a legitimate concern about open borders in a post- 9/11 world; we cannot rely on the Mexican government to enforce our immigration policies. For instance,  I would not like other countries to release their prisoners at unprotected sections of our borders. I do think providing a liberalized legal access path would alleviate the problem of illegal crossings, an underground economy and criminal activities in smuggling people across the border, etc. However, I do suspect Cochrane is correct in his view that the Senate bill (not to mention prospective House legislation) doesn't liberalize immigration enough to fix the problem of unauthorized entries. Neither side really wants an expansion of immigration; Democrats are mostly concerned about legalizing currently unauthorized workers, whom they hope will be attracted as voters to social programs. And I have to say, every time I write something pro-immigration, my readership takes a hit.

I didn't have room to talk about the 11 million already here. One decent thing in the Senate bill is to recognize that we can't go on like this with 11 million people relegated to second-class status. However, making them wait another 13 years before they can become citizens... Didn't we once have a revolution about "taxation without representation?"

This, I think, is a post-WSJ add-on comment. Cochrane makes an interesting point, but as I recall, the issue was British taxes imposed on colonists without their participation. The colonists were paying for their own governance through their own taxes. So the analogy would be more like us imposing a dedicated tax on non-citizen residents. Such residents do have access to schools, public safety, access to emergency health services and other benefits; they also aren't required to assume duties of citizens, e.g., conscription, jury duty, etc. I myself have  no problem with shrinking the critical path for citizenship. But we often have waiting periods. For instance, I was 16 when I started college and I was paying for room-and-board from work-study--and I was paying FICA taxes on that income, Texas sales tax, etc. for years before I could vote. And ask Don Boudreaux about how meaningful one's vote is--and look at what people have done with their votes--they've elected people like Charlie Rangel, Richard Nixon, Willam Jefferson, Bill Clinton and, yes,--even Barack Obama!

The Boston Marathon Tragedy: A Reflection

Cochrane in the above commentary made reference to this excerpt from Mark Steyn

But it's the differences between the simulation and the actual event that are revealing. In humdrum reality, the Boston bombers were Chechen Muslim brothers with ties to incendiary imams and jihadist groups in Dagestan. In the far more exciting Boston Police fantasy, the bombers were a group of right-wing militia men called "Free America Citizens," a name so suspicious (involving as it does the words "free," "America," and "citizens") that it can only have been leaked to them by the IRS. What fun the law enforcement community in Massachusetts had embroidering their hypothetical scenario: The "Free America Citizens" terrorists even had their own little logo – a skull's head with an Uncle Sam hat. Ooh, scary! The Boston PD graphics department certainly knocked themselves out on that.

Abandoned backpacks are not new security concerns; almost every airport I've been in cautioned travelers to report abandoned objects like backpacks; I even saw a Hallmark Channel movie about a husband whom evacuated his wife's shop when he spotted an abandoned backpack.

The fact that Boston police were simulating a backpack terror attack eerily contiguous with the real  thing was ironic. But, as I pointed out through a recent Williams' quote (on useful profiling), over 95% of terrorist attacks originate from Islamic extremists. Yet the lawless Obama regime has continued to focus on right-wing and/or Tea Party groups, as Steyn so vividly relates above. Remember the Weather Underground from the 1970's? Not exactly a right-wing group, nor environmental terrorists, animal rights radicals, etc.

Tea Party But NOT Nativist Libertarian

I have a love/hate relationship with the Libertarian Republican blog; it seems about two-thirds of their posts have to deal with some aspect of Islamic radical stories (a number from Europe). They seem to be a fusion of military conservativism with libertarian/free market positions on domestic issues. and seem to regard a more limited military perspective "left-libertarian". I see a less interventionist perspective as philosophically consistent with the approach taken with domestic policies and don't see myself as soft on defense; it's more a pragmatic matter of learning to choose one's battles. I don't think spreading one's resources thin by focusing on the internal affairs of countries of little strategic importance is in the interests of a strong national defense.

I haven't even read the Daily Beast article "Why the Tea Party Is a Nativist Libertarian Movement", but the title itself I take to be a smear. But one of the LR editors wrote a post "Libertarian Nativists: Hey! That's us!!" If you go to the blog's principles, you see something like "protect the border first", but not anti-immigrant. "Nativist" groups have included the Know-Nothings, the KKK, etc. (I think the post author confused 'patriotism' with 'nativism'). I think the anti-immigrant populists have tried to co-opt the movement as part of the resistance to the Obama regime, but most libertarian-conservatives, like the Paul's, Amash and me, are anti-E-Verify/pro-immigration, and I think we reflect the philosophically consistent center of the Tea Party movement. The anti-immigrant right has been around at least since 2007, years before the birth of the Tea Party.

Political Humor

The White House approved an exemption in Obamacare coverage for Congress and members of their staff. Members complained that the Affordable Care Act will cost them thousands extra a year in premiums. Wait a minute. It's their bill. If it's too expensive, why did they name it the Affordable Care Act? - Jay Leno

[Because they thought the law didn't apply to them...]

Anthony Weiner has been on the Internet having obscene chats, and he uses the name Carlos Danger. When Donald Trump heard about it, Trump demanded to see Carlos Danger's birth certificate - David Letterman

[Donald noted that Carlos is an Hispanic name, and we have an illegal alien problem.]

Political Cartoon

Courtesy of Glenn Foden and Townhall
Fish story: Obama talking about the one that got away

Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups Rdux

The Beatles, "Back in the USSR"

Miscellany: 7/18/13

Quote of the Day
There is no moral precept that does not have something inconvenient about it.
Denis Diderot

Motown Goes Bust

My maternal uncle, the son of a mom-and-pop grocer, was an amazing pastor whom was also a born businessman/administrator; he didn't really discuss the minutiae of running a parish with me (it was none of my business), but in a sense his career was like a number of DBA gigs I inherited--one's predecessors kick the can down the road, and the client has no idea of the status quo. I won't go into a lot of examples here, but I've seen application software literally years behind in necessary patching, and I remember asking a client DBA whether a certain production error/warning he was asking me about had occurred in his test environment, and it turned out the test database had crashed weeks earlier (something he wasn't even aware of)--because someone (I suspect the DBA because of the missing file's unusual location: Oracle complained unable to bring up the database) deleted a key database file. In other cases, databases had not been updated as required by contract for the client, certain configurations were done incorrectly, Oracle standards were not being followed, etc.  I have a knack for turning around situations like these.

My uncle has a similar knack for "the buck stops here" and turning around drifting parishes. It seemed he always had some long-overdue infrastructure to repair, parking expansions (including getting zoning permits, etc.) In many cases, he inherited parish schools, almost always a drain on parish finances. More importantly, and this is the point for raising the example, he was facing unfavorable demographic trends; I recall one of his parishes was in New Bedford; now the population drop is not nearly as dramatic as in Detroit, but it has gone from the 120K's in the 1920's to the mid 90's. But you have city parishes thinning out, say,yuppies moving to the suburbs, You have big older churches with significant repair costs, with fewer, older, often fixed-income parishioners. It's hard to make ends meet, say, if people can only offer a buck or two for the  collection plate (but I've never heard a pastor complain). Now take into account sensationalized sex abuse scandals, and many parishioners signify their displeasure at the collection plate  (My uncle has never discussed that topic; I've picked it up from other stories.)

Detroit, of course, is far more complicated than running a parish or application systems. I discussed Orr's selection by Gov. Snyder as emergency manager in my March 18 post.  Although I did not explicitly predict failure of Orr's ability to negotiate necessary concessions from creditors and especially unions, my skepticism was clearly implied ("if Orr can somehow" vs "when Orr.does such-and-such"). I think that the public unions think the crony Obama Administration has their backs in corrupt bankruptcy proceedings Remember less than a year ago how Obama vowed he would never let Detroit or Toledo go bankrupt (Obama's tweet here)? Not one penny of federal money for a Detroit bailout! Detroit put the Democrats into power, and the day of reckoning has arrived.

Follow-Up Odds and Ends

• Gov. Perry Signs Late-Term Abortion Reform, There's some evidence a few of Planned Parenthood's most notorious clinics are shutting down. 
• I checked at Safeway today to see if Twinkies were on sale. (Not to buy, you understand. My doctor has me on a low-carb regimen so I was stocking up on 3-lb packages of turkey burgers for $5.) I did see a rack for Hostess products picked clean. A lot of competitors were seriously discounting prices, very predictable. I assume that  they sold out--I don't see the purpose of maintaining empty racks with posted prices.

Next JOTY Nominee: Nancy Pelosi

Every recent national poll I've seen shows the House Minority Leader Pelosi the most unpopular national figure. But my patience for the uncivil, condescending demagogue is wearing thin:

“I don’t know if my [GOP] colleagues need a lesson on the birds and the bees. I really don’t get it,” Pelosi said.

On the Cover of the Rolling Stone

You would think that the iconic music/culture publication would stick to their tried-and-true formula, say, featuring the cleavage of Nicki Minaj (sorry about that--I just read Geraghty's piece which in passing mentioned one of the magazine cover's  recurring themes (celebrity bosoms), and I did not like the rap artist's role as judge on American Idol). But even given bad publicity is good for the magazine business, why exactly are they featuring "Terrorist McDreamy" on the cover? This guy helped kill innocent people and many more people lost limbs. I don't mind a story on the suspect but I don't like the sympathetic cover. Does the magazine really want to reinforce monsters that they might get a flattering photo on the cover of a national magazine if their actions are atrocious enough? Appalling precedent!

Courtesy of Rolling Stone: Dzhokhar Tsarnaev
The Remake of a Terrorist as a Glamor Icon

More Military Family Reunions







Political Cartoon

Courtesy of Michael Ramirez and Townhall

Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups Redux

The Beatles, "Yellow Submarine"

Miscellany: 7/07/13

Quote of the Day
Life improves slowly 
and goes wrong fast, 
and only catastrophe is clearly visible.
Edward Teller

Spitzer Joins Weiner In Competition For NYC Sleazeball Comeback of the Year

I regularly refuse to consider gigs in NYC or California. The unofficial winner of my 2008 JOTY contest is seeking the post of city comptroller. The Gray Lady sees no difference among having a secret mistress, being a male exhibitionist sending out photos to unrelated women, and a former attorney general going from busting call girl operations to becoming a client as governor. I'm not here to defend Congressman Sanford (R-SC), but he previously served as Congressman in the same district for 3 terms, and he's hardly the first divorced/engaged/remarried Congressman. I do think infidelity reflects on character and integrity, a key criterion for many, if not most voters, but I am more concerned  with job-related qualifications, experience, and political philosophy.

Congratulations to Andy Murray, British Winner at Wimbledon

I was so used to NBC "Breakfast at Wimbledon" I didn't realize that ESPN is in the second year of a long-term contract to cover the event. Murray won the marquee title for his country the first time in nearly 8 decades, one of the longest droughts since the Red Sox won the World Series for the first time since Babe Ruth donned one of their uniforms.

Heroine of the Day

Jiyeon Kim, left, flight attendant on crashed Asiana Airlines Flight 214
Photo Courtesy of Eugene Anthony Rah via WSJ

 This courageous petite young woman was carrying passengers, unable to evacuate under their own power, piggyback before the passenger cabin was engulfed in flame. To any  doubters of flight attendants as safety professionals, Ms. Kim performed effectively with extraordinary grace and compassion under unimaginable circumstances.





Facebook Post of the Day

I just noticed this NSA statement from a couple days ago. According to the statement, "NSA does not object to any lawful, peaceful protest."

Does not object? What, do we need NSA's permission to protest these days? And what if NSA *had* objected?

As Americans, we need to stand together now to protect our rights. Our government grows bolder and more arrogant with each passing day. Set aside the partisan politics and defend liberty before it's too late. - Justin Amash (R-MI)

Congressman Amash is correct; this is not government of, by, and for the convenience of the bureaucracy, and government does not exist by the consent of the bureaucrat.

It Turns Out Making Metro a More Beautiful Place Is Illegal

The phantom flower planter Henry Docter has been threatened with arrest if he attempts to water  more than 1,000 morning glories, cardinal flowers and cypress vines, and the chronically tight-budget organization has deployed personnel to yank them out as if they were weeds.





Just Say 'No' To Borrowing From Our Grandchildren To Fund Obama's Meddling in Syria

Jillette on Being a Libertarian

The reason I am embedding this video is not because I share Jillette's atheism (I don't), but because I had a similar email exchange with one of my nephews. One of the interesting things about libertarians is they can be intolerant of others in their ranks whom stray from their orthodox positions on issues, not unlike conservatives' distaste for RINO's. Rand Paul, for instance, has taken hits over last year's late endorsement of Romney (after he mathematically clinched the nomination) and his border security stance on immigration. I was recently sharply critical of another nephew not because he disagrees with me on the subject of gay "marriage" but because he was parroting judgmental politically correct claptrap on the subject, trying to impress everyone with his "enlightened" perspective on the matter. I lashed back, "Think for yourself." I am very aware no matter how well I write in this blog, there are true-believer Keynesians, pro-abortion choice, public union backers, neo-cons, etc., whom will never be convinced. Sure, every writer wants to be widely read and influential. It would be nice if some of the writers I cite, like George Will, John Stossel or Don Boudreaux liked some pieces I write, but I'm not holding my breath.

I've only heard from a handful of nieces and nephews whom have read one or more posts. Usually they are very tactful and complimentary without tipping their hand on their own political perspective; they imply they like some stuff, other stuff less so (no specificity). The most recent nephew correspondent seems to have libertarian leanings--familiar readers may recall I embedded an image a few weeks back to the effect of fiscally conservative, socially liberal. I don't think I've influenced his views; as you may recall, Ron Paul's youth support was very strong.

One other thing Jillette says is relevant to me; probably my most significant view shift has been a migration to a more non-interventionist perspective.  To be honest, I always had some nagging doubts starting with Eisenhower's warnings about the military-industrial complex. But I also gave Presidents some benefit of a doubt about information to which I had no access, and I grew up in a military family. I also lost a lot of faith in nation building and a nation under the biggest debt in world history taking on new battles. But I became far more receptive to libertarian critiques of Big Defense.

I knew my nephew was giving me honest feedback when he mentioned some of my commentaries are long-winded. Fair enough.



More Military Family Reunions









Political Cartoon

Courtesy of Michael Ramirez and IBD

Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups Redux

The Beatles, "I Feel Fine". I'm amused that the audio and video below don't quite sync...Yet another #1 hit. The Beatles would continue to chart at will but the height of Beatlemania had to be April 7, 1964 when they booked the top 5 (3 of which were #1) hits and, if I'm not mistaken, 9 of the top 10 overall

Miscellany: 6/01/13

Quote of the Day
Our obligations to our country never cease but with our lives.
John Adams

Oklahoma Tornado Redux

Overnight storms (as if Oklahoma really needed more on top of the recent Moore tragedy) reportedly have killed 9 people . My thoughts and prayers for the victims and survivors.

Jean Stapleton: RIP

Remember when CBS Saturday night had the best lineup of all time? "All in the Family"; "M*A*S*H"; "Mary Tyler Moore"; "Bob Newhart Show"; "Carole Burnett Show"? I have to admit I didn't initially get a situation comedy featuring a key ideological conflict between a politically incorrect conservative blue-collar head of household, Archie Bunker, and his free-loading, social liberal, histrionic son-in-law Michael 'Meathead' Stivic It's not so much the fact of conflict, often requiring intervention by Archie and wife Edith's only child Gloria. Even though I was more of a social liberal then, I didn't like how Norman Lear portrayed conservatives, quite different from the urbane, unflappable, highly articulate William F. Buckley, host of 'Firing Line'.. It seemed like dialogues were contrived "gotcha" exercises where Archie offers up ludicrous explanations for his beliefs and eventually lapses into name-calling. The only things more ludicrous than Archie's outbursts were  Meathead's judgmental, knee-jerk, exaggerated responses, as if he seriously thought uncivil responses were the way to influence Archie's point of view.

I think the show worked because Archie was a nuanced character, one whom loved his family. Edith, played by Jean Stapleton, was a sweetheart with wonderful quirks, like her delightfully off-key singing, as featured in the opening credits below. Jean had this way of transforming Edith's face from confusion to revelation. She unconditionally loves Archie, and we somehow know the Archie she sees and loves must be a good man, even though he often says or  does the wrong thing. She knows how to reach Archie and is a moderating influence on him. I think Edith was a difficult character to portray, but Jean deftly handled the role.

I hate to stereotype the actress Jean Stapleton as Edith; I've only run into her prior work on occasion. Probably from my perspective, she played the colorful Birdie in "You've Got Mail", bookshop owner Kathleen Kelly's wealthy  middle-aged assistant. (Birdie at one point implies that she once had a torrid affair with Spanish strongman Franco, which utterly appalls Kelly's hyper-political, snooty progressive boyfriend Frank.) Yes, it's one of my favorite flicks: how can I resist a story where "heartless capitalist" bookstore magnate Joe Fox wins the girl's heart?

Joe Fox: Well, let me ask you something. How can you forgive this guy for standing you up and not forgive me for this tiny little thing of... of putting you out of business?
[Kathleen starts to cry]
Joe Fox: Oh, how I wish you would.

Freaking awesome. [If you haven't seen the movie, Fox and Kelly were unsuspecting email partners. They finally agree to meet at a restaurant; Kelly arrives first. At that point, Kelly has launched a last-stand PR war against Fox Books; Fox, arriving later and peaking through the front window, realizes that Kelly is "Shopgirl" and decides to drop by as himself, not identifying himself as "NY152".  In the lead-up to the quote, both have ditched their significant others. Fox has slowly but surely tried to build a friendship with Kathleen, and they are finally going to meet in the big reveal. This dialogue is just before Kelly leaves to get ready for the encounter; Fox is unsure of the timing of the reveal: is it too soon? Is she ready to know that  it's been him all along? Will he lose her forever?] Maybe there's hope for me yet...



The Making of a Modern BMW

HT Cafe Hayek. Not your Daddy's mind-numbing boring auto assembly factory work. Robotics can even augment surgery (next video). Some worry about the loss of jobs to robotic technology: never mind repetitive mundane tasks are things that technology can handle well. They can operate under difficult conditions (remember plugging the BP broken pipes during the oil spill?), can cut more precisely with full-range motion, reach and operate in tight spaces, don't get tired or bored. We no longer have an agricultural economy; less than 2% of the population not only feeds America but exports to the rest of the world. There were still telephone operators while I was growing up.

I'll give another example. A well-known real estate developer in Houston at one time employed dozens of MBA's with calculators to work on proposal evaluations. My timesharing vendor employer at the time marketed a product called CASHFAST. It not only shrank the critical path and manpower to process a proposal, the technology now allowed the developer to consider deals in shorter time frames. I don't happen to believe having an MBA punching numbers into a calculator was a productive use of the MBA's time; the technology allowed them now to spend their work-time more productively, e.g., doing more value-added, ill-defined tasks. We consumers benefit from increases in productivity; lower prices free our savings and discretionary income.

How fast will new jobs develop? Here's what I know: labor regulations have exacerbated unemployment problems in Europe and to a lesser extent the US (but Democrats continue to want to push  the same type policies) The government only defers the day of reckoning and increases uncertainty: for example, when will the Fed stop its insane ZIRP policy and various QE programs? The Fed should be very concerned about the dollar losing world reserve status.  It's now down to about 60% globally and continuing to shrink. What this means is the Fed will find it is losing its ability to print itself out of trouble. It can't monetize the debt as a long-term strategy.





Why All the Pandering for the Middle Class Vote



Sowell on Obama



State Sen. Guillory (La) Leaves Democratic Party

Sen. Guillory is now the first state senator of color to serve in Louisiana as a Republican since Reconstruction. I don't think, as the senator himself noted, this is unexpected, because Guillory has had one of the more conservative Democrats, including pension reform. The final straw was partisan ObamaCare remarks by a Democratic chair. I don't think this is the start of a trend; Guillory switched parties in 2007 before running for the Louisiana legislature. But I think the message of failed social policies will become a bigger issue in future years as more black voters question how fruitful their captive support for the Dems has been, even under a black President:

On Friday, Guillory said he had come to disagree with the direction of the Louisiana Democratic Party, which he referred to as "the party of disappointment." He expressed his opposition with the party's stances on abortion, the Second Amendment, education and immigration.

"Today, the party of disappointment has moved away from the majority of Louisiana. They have moved away from the traditional values of most Americans," he said. "Their policies have encouraged the high teen birth rates, high school [drop] out rates, high incarceration rates and very high unemployment rates."

I find the older I get, the less impressed I am with politics and politicians (although Bobby Jindal is high on my list of governors; he's done some impressive things with education and pension reform). Leviathan is rotting internally with gangrene spreading; we need leaders whom have the courage to amputate excess government.



Restrictions on Transactions Involving Bone Marrow

Some body parts or fluids can be regenerated (e.g., blood and bone marrow) and others can't (i.e., most body organs like kidneys). You can do a transaction for blood, excluded by a 1984 act, but marrow was irrationally defined as an organ with transactions prohibited. Now this case was resolved almost a year ago, but it's instructive to review the process. Providing an economic incentive will likely increase the supply available (simple supply-and-demand). From the Institute for Justice:

The Institute for Justice today announced a major legal victory for cancer patients and their families from across the nation when U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder declined to seek Supreme Court review of a March 2012 decision of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that compensating most bone- marrow donors is not a crime. This decision will give doctors and their patients a powerful tool in the fight against deadly blood diseases.

This landmark case began in October 2009 when the Institute for Justice filed suit against the U.S. Attorney General on behalf of cancer patients, the parents of children with deadly diseases, a renowned bone-marrow doctor, and a nonprofit group to challenge the prohibition on compensating bone-marrow donors set forth in the National Organ Transplant Act (NOTA) of 1984. NOTA made it a serious crime, punishable by up to five years in prison, to compensate someone for a human organ for transplantation. The Act defines bone marrow as an organ. A key fact in the case is that most bone-marrow transplants now occur using a technique that extracts marrow cells from the bloodstream (rather than through the hip, as was the traditional means of procuring bone marrow) and the process is very similar to donating blood. 

What kind of incentive? Here's what one organization planned, initially obstructed by NOTA:

MoreMarrowDonors.org wants to begin a pilot project to attract new members to a national bone marrow registry by offering up to $3,000 in scholarships, housing payments or charitable donations to volunteers whose bone marrow is a promising match for one of the thousands waiting for transplants.

Political Cartoon

Courtesy of Jerry Holbert and Townhall

Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups Redux

Simon & Garfunkel,"Scarborough Fair/Canticle". I watched "The Graduate"on a classic movies channel recently, and this is a key soundtrack tune. "Scarborough Fair" is a traditional British ballad including competing impossible demands of young lovers, e.g.

"Tell her to make me a cambric shirt,
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme;
Without a seam or needlework,
Then she shall be a true lover of mine."

"Tell him to buy me an acre of land,
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme;
Betwixt the salt water and the sea sand,
Then he shall be a true lover of mine."

In their version, Simon does a mix of male/female verses (tweaking the female verses for gender and minor rewording), while Garfunkel deftly interleaves verses of a reworked anti-war version of an earlier Simon tune, now called  "Canticle", e.g.:

"War bellows blazing in scarlet battalions
Generals order their soldiers to kill
And to fight for a cause they have long ago forgotten."

The result is a timeless gorgeous but haunting arrangement (juxtaposing innocent young love with the ugliness of war), exquisite harmonies..

Miscellany: 5/28/13

Quote of the Day
People love chopping wood. 
In this activity one immediately sees results.
Albert Einstein

Guest Quote of the Day

On Income Taxes:  "When men once get the habit of helping themselves to the property of others, they are not easily cured of it." - The Gray Lady, 1909 BK (Before Krugman)

Courtesy of Joseph Thorndike, WSJ

Some Random Reflections

• The Stock Market. The market is up today based on home prices up, year over year nearly 11%, especially in the more price-volatile areas like California, Las Vegas, Phoenix and Florida, and the highest consumer confidence since early 2008. What bothers me is the frothiness in some areas, e.g., price gains of 20-odd percent in the Bay Area, CA; whereas some regression to the mean is to be expected after a market correction and no doubt there's some backlogged demand waiting for the market to bottom out, speculators may think that locking in a less than 4% rate on a mortgage where price appreciation makes owning a house a no-brainer, this pace is not sustainable, especially in a high-tax, low-growth state like California. The Fed is caught between the devil and the deep blue sea--if it increases rates too quickly, it could kill the housing recovery, one of the brighter spots in the economy; but the last thing it needs to do is feed another housing bubble. It's hard to argue, at least in some areas, Fed needs to stimulate housing purchases; they need to revert to more of a historic norm; note that the federal government still hasn't taken the opportunity to strip the mortgage interest deduction--which favors higher earners whom itemize their taxes. If you're going to do it on new mortgages it makes sense to do it when rates are lower.

The other troubling sign is the escalating use of margin debt during the stock market surge--to near the peak before the recession. Now whereas I would expect margin debt to track the major stock indexes and one can argue in terms of adjusted prices and PE levels, we are  not frothy yet from a historical perspective, it doesn't make a lot of sense for the Fed to subsidize speculative behavior. The theory that stock speculators are going to cash in and spend money in the economy is a pleasant pipe dream; more likely--they are going to try to leverage their gains. Once again, the Fed is caught in a dilemma. To some extent they've deferred the inevitable because the dollar has accidentally strengthened despite their best efforts, based on the woes of the yen and the euro and the dollar being the world's reserve currency--but it looks like China is cutting yet another direct exchange deal with New Zealand.

• Follow-Up on Nixon Discussion. In yesterday's post, I was scornful of a conservative columnist's article of those of us suggesting a Nixonian side to Obama. In fact, it's not just a conservative observation and goes beyond Chapman's narrow, simplistic distinction on misbehavior by the IRS; Will Bunch is critical particularly on the Nixonian paranoia over leaks (remember the infamous Pentagon Papers?) and the Obama war on whistle-blowers, gathering intelligence on AP personnel. Ir is part and parcel of the Administration's attempt to manipulate public opinion, disclose only what they choose, and to intimidate the press from publishing politically inconvenient stories.

In my rant on the Chapman piece, whereas Nixon did push the envelope in abusing the Presidency for his own agenda, I suggested more troublesome for me was his domestic policies and specifically his breaking the Bretton Woods arrangement (where trading partners could insist on gold for payment if they didn't trust our (debased?) fiat currency). The correct strategy would have been a sound money policy, especially a balanced budget versus putting the cost of the Vietnam War on future generations. Ben Traynor of  LFB published a broader essay on Nixonomics.

Let's start with this excerpt from his address on the decision: "Let me lay to rest the bugaboo of what is called devaluation... If you want to buy a foreign car or take a trip abroad, market conditions may cause your dollar to buy slightly less. But if you are among the overwhelming majority of Americans who buy American-made products in America, your dollar will be worth just as much tomorrow as it is today. The effect of this action, in other words, will be to stabilize the dollar." If Barack Obama ever said this nonsense, I would be screaming. It's ludicrous; it goes beyond nationalistic demagoguery--and the Dems do enough of that--remember 'buy American' with the stimulus? A devaluation decreases an American's purchasing power. Many goods, parts or resources (like oil) are imported--and those prices are passed along to customers. American goods or companies are more affordable for foreigners; for example, a Brazilian yuppie might outbid me for that south Florida condo. What will stabilize the dollar is sound money policy--no trying to print ourselves out of unsustainable deficits--, fiscal conservatism, and pro-growth policies. Nixon succeeded at none of that. The consequence? "Between August 1931 and August 1971, the consumer price index — as measured by the Bureau of Labor Statistics — went up by 170%. Since 1971, the CPI has risen 453%."

 What were Nixon's economic "reforms"? Wage and price controls and a tariff. These are anathema to bloggers like me committed to free markets and free trade. Traynor goes on to explain that the real problem was the dollar serving as the world's reserve currency; this basically means the US maintaining a trade deficit to facilitate growing global trade (we have not run a trade surplus since the mid-70's)--which it could finance (unlike other countries) by simply printing more money. Why did Nixon really close the gold window? More dollars for a given quantity of gold made it impossible to maintain a fixed exchange rate for dollars; central banks were having to sell gold to keep the price of gold low; France decided that it preferred cheap gold to dollars, with profitable arbitrage opportunities,  and Nixon was facing depletion of US gold reserves. Clearly Bretton Woods needed to be reformed, but unleashing an unfettered fiat currency can only make anyone uneasy whom remembers the early American experiment with Continentals: "During the American Revolution, the colonies became independent states; freed from British monetary regulations, they issued paper money to pay for military expenses. The Continental Congress also issued paper money during the Revolution, known as Continental currency, to fund the war effort. Both state and Continental currency depreciated rapidly, becoming practically worthless by the end of the war."

• An American History of Taxes. There's a reason I've often tried to advocate reform as a composite of consumption taxes and income taxes (flattened). The Thorndike column above does a good description of the tensions between imposing regressive and progressive taxes. The rich could avoid taxes by minimizing taxable transactions while, among other things, profiting from selling goods and services to the government, otherwise paid mostly by less wealthy individual taxpayers--not to mention special favors like deferments or noncombat roles for their sons, unavailable to the average joe. (To be honest, as I read the account of how the first income tax law came about to finance the Civil War, I felt like saying, you wouldn't have a massive funding problem if you didn't pursue an unnecessary war....)  Hearing Thorndike talk about the use of a progressive income tax basically as a concession to regressive tax policies like FICA makes me roll my eyes: a low flat/proportional income tax would still collect much more revenue from richer individuals. Raising the top bracket to, say, 94% didn't achieve its intended result because rich people could simply defer taxable events: they could wait out the government. The problem is that the government has radically expanded its costs through entitlements and social programs and imposed these costs on a minority whom get little or no benefit from these programs; it's a form of theft.
• A Financial Newsletter Commenter. I normally don't comment on every stupid thing someone says or does, but let me paraphrase here: "It only makes sense to audit rich Republicans/Tea Party members. Let's face it: they're not going to recover income from lower-earning Americans; besides, wealthy progressives are decent, honest folks willing to pay their fair share; it's obviously those rich conservatives whom obviously have something to hide. So, of course, they should be getting strict scrutiny." 

First, let me disabuse you of the notion that wealthy progressives are decent, honorable folks; many conservatives, rich or poor, tithe their income, giving to churches and/or charities. VP Biden has increased his giving in his current role, but for much of his career has given a very low percentage. Buffett makes a big deal of the fact he pays a low income tax rate--because much of his compensation is not wages, subject to high tax rates. He could easily take a higher salary instead of stock--he could also optionally pay the Treasury more than he owes--plus he could also leave the bulk of his estate to the US Treasury. The real story is these hypocrites want to impose a tax rate they're comfortable with on other people--including high earners with most compensation in the form of higher-taxed wages. Don't forget: those evil Wall Street bankers heavily supported Obama in 2008.

 Second, a lot of, probably the vast majority of Tea Party people, including myself, are not wealthy and virtually all of us are civil and scrupulously honest (I even reported pocket change in interest income over last year when I didn't have to)--we wouldn't take a government handout, even if we were eligible for one. We oppose spendthrift government on principle; we believe that this government is plundering future generations of Americans. The government should not be singling out critics of government, a violation of constitutional principles.

Audits can and should be based on things like the nature and extent of documented transactions  and objective criteria, such as unusual patterns of data, not arbitrary grounds. The fact that progressive groups largely got a pass while Tea Party groups didn't is unconstitutional at its core. The fact that they were asked for identification of donors exercising their constitutional rights to anonymous speech is also illegal. The audit process must be objective and nonpartisan; anything less undermines the principles of this republic.

Entertainment Potpourri

• American Idol Has Lost My Niece. One of my nieces, an elementary school teacher and herself an able musician (euphonium) and talented church vocalist (I have another niece whom once studied opera in Oklahoma) and I have compared notes probably for a half dozen years. She finally got time after school was out to catch up on some emails. We tend to have similar opinions on contestants, but I liked Fantasia more than she did. She basically said she blew off this season, preferring The Voice.  She didn't go into specifics but seemed to share my dislike of Nicki Minaj as a judge. She seems to prefer the differences in format. (For me, The Voice is more of an acquired taste, and I could do without the inane chatter between the mentor/judges, but I do like, for instance, a country duo is able to compete.) I don't know what AI can do to get her back, I did briefly venture on AI's Facebook account; they wanted to do a brief survey of AI fans; I didn't post an entry but reviewed some of the comments, like "bring back Simon Cowell", with which I agree. Another fan wrote that AI lost her permanently. I've asked my niece (no response yet), whether the AI alumni judges might make a difference--I suspect not. I saw a Google news link that implied Jennifer Hudson was negotiating but had not yet signed on for next season. The next season's auditions start in a few weeks, so I expect some signings to be announced soon,  but I'm very negative on the idea of alumnus judges

Speaking of AI alumni, who wouldn't want to duet with Jagger? Carrie now dominates the country genre, but in the video below, she takes on a role as rock chick; I wonder if Linda Ronstadt ever joined Jagger on "Tumbling Dice"?

Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups

Bruce Springsteen and the E-Street Band, "Tunnel of Love"



Fellow Americans Helping the Moore, OK Tornado Victims

Miscellany: 5/20/13

Quote of the Day
Only as high as I reach can I grow, 
only as far as I seek can I go, 
only as deep as I look can I see, 
only as much as I dream can I be.
Karen Ravn

Thoughts and Prayers for the Oklahoma City Tornado Victims

From the CNN Update page:

• At least 51 people -- including seven children at an elementary school -- were killed when a massive tornado struck an area outside Oklahoma City on Monday afternoon, officials said.
• The tornado was estimated to be at least 2 miles wide at one point as it moved through Moore. The preliminary rating of the Moore tornado is at least EF-4 (166 to 200 mph), the National Weather Service said on Monday afternoon.

Hearing that emergency teams are desperately combing through the ruins of at least two elementary schools taking hits breaks my heart; let's pray they find survivors.

The last time I was in Oklahoma City I was working for Oracle on an IT project for the State of Oklahoma. A few years earlier I attended a human factors symposium in Norman, co-hosted by a Native American University faculty member and friend, Jim Trumbly. (Jane Carey, now retired, was the leader of our fledgling group: human factors was on the periphery of MIS research; one of the ISU faculty also attended at least this symposium. The latter took a year to establish a campus research center, which led to my temp appointment there. Getting to teach their ACS graduate class in human factors was my favorite time ever in a classroom. Let's face it: teaching stuff like COBOL is not as much fun as you might expect.) I liked Oklahoma; I was interested in a faculty position in Tulsa, but they were targeting female candidates.

I mentioned in a prior post I slept through a tornado. We were living in family housing at an old army post near Salina, KS (our backyard was bordered by a wheat field) while my Dad was serving in Southeast Asia. We didn't take a hit, but my mom and siblings were up and would speak of the tree in our front yard nearly bent in half; one of my siblings asked my mom whether he should wake me up. As I recall, there was some sort of military airplane/model near the post entrance, and they were finding pieces miles apart after the storm. I'm not sure how I managed to sleep through it. But no such luck in Houston during the hurricane there; the windows rattled so viciously I thought they might explode at any instant and spent a lot of time in the bathroom.

It reminds me: I was pulling for fellow libertarian/magician  Penn Jillette whom easily won the Celebrity Apprentice All-Star showdown against country crooner Trace Adkins based on merit--but Trump named Adkins winner last night. Pathetic on Trump's part; no doubt Jillette's recent public criticism of Trump and his show played a role, although Trump, to his credit, put it out there. Personally, I understand Jillette, in trying to appease Trump's thin-skinned inflated ego, didn't want to sabotage his charity's chances of benefiting from his potential victory, but I would have respected him more if he had told Trump to blow it out his ears. It was pathetic of Trump to put it out there; his clear intent was to put Jillette on the spot--not for anything Jillette did on the show. (Let me finish this discussion with a plug for Jillette's chosen charity here, which provides programs addressing needs of intellectually disabled individuals in the Las Vegas area.)

Why did I bring up the Trump show in this discussion? Trace Adkins was playing on behalf of the American Red Cross, which, as Adkins continually reminded viewers helped his family out during a fire emergency while he was on tour. (I'm sure Adkins must be a wealthy entertainer and didn't need Red Cross services to take care of his family; there must be more to the story than what I've heard.) I myself have contributed to the Red Cross on multiple occasions (it would not surprise me to hear of an Oklahoma appeal soon; here is a current press release). But to be honest, the Red Cross is Americana, like Mom and apple pie; how does Trump deny a victory to the Red Cross? I would--because Jillette was the better contestant.

O'Malley Polling at Zero Percent in New Hampshire

I know--we are still in year 5 of the Black Hole of American History, aka the Obama Presidency. It's still early to talk about 2016, but the Master Legal Plunderer of Maryland, the former wunderkind mayor of Baltimore, isn't gaining any traction yet against the likely geriatric candidacies of Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. O'Malley is term-limited, and he will be out of office after the general elections next year. How do I hate O'Malley? Let me count the ways--class warfare tax hikes, industrial policy, Prisongate; his cartoonish partisan rhetoric on the Sunday morning talk shows.... I personally think the Dems would be better off running a red state former governor like Brian Schweitzer or Joe Manchin (although both men are seriously flawed as conservatives and probably couldn't hold their own states). I think people who seriously believe Hillary Clinton's 60% approval ratings are delusional: she is getting credit for not being Obama and she is largely sidestepping the issues with the economy. Ms. Clinton is not charismatic; my suspicion is that people will be looking for fresh faces and ideas; I don't think that includes a proxy rerun of the 1992 campaign. I also think they want a change from partisan gridlock as usual. Look, I'm not in a state of denial:I have no doubt many women would vote for Clinton strictly on the basis of her gender; others because they feel she's paid her dues, but she had that going for her in 2008 and couldn't get the job done. I think O'Malley's executive experience and youth play to his benefit, but he lacks foreign policy and federal experience, and he's going to need new ideas--and that means breaking with same old same old policies.

The Worst Article of the Year: Adam Hartung, "Economically, Could Obama Be America's Best President?", Thumbs DOWN

HELL NO! He's easily the worst--and it's not even close.

I don't even think the White House Press Office is this clueless: here is just one example:

To which President would you compare Obama’s economic performance?
BBBB- By all measures, President Obama has outperformed every modern President. 

At first I thought, this must be a satire, right? Someone is pulling my leg, right? But, no, I'm convinced these people actually believe this stuff, and it's all rubbish from start to finish. You have to totally suspend your beliefs in reading this swill: it's like the writer and his interviewee are living in an alternate universe.

It's hard to know where to start or how to proceed--I could refute the article point by point, like I've done for Grunwald, Plouffe, Klein and others, but I think that's hardly necessary. I'll simply make a few specific points.

Let's start with the fragment above. The author alternatively discussed Reagan and then dismisses him by referencing deficits. First, Reagan dealt with a Democratic-controlled House his full 2 terms and a Democratic-controlled Senate his last 2 years. At no time did he ever enjoy majorities FDR and Obama (in his first 2 years) enjoyed. Second, the author ignores spending and deficits: "President Reagan added $1.412 trillion to the debt during his two terms. He fought the 1982 recession by cutting the top income tax rate from 70% to 28%, and the corporate rate from 48% to 34%. He also increased government spending by 2.5% a year. This included a 35% increase in the defense budget, and an expansion of Medicare [to cover catastrophic illnesses]." One could argue increases in defense contributed to the end of the Cold War--and we saw real cuts in defense spending through the 1990's (see below). Let us not forget it's not just the case Obama more than doubled the externally held debt, but the debt exceeds GDP--when Reinhart and Roloff provided some evidence that debt loads exceeding 90% adversely affect economic growth.

Much is made of the auto bailouts, but the fact is that bankruptcies do not necessarily mean liquidations; the big difference is that Obama delayed moving on the bankruptcies, making more loans at taxpayer expense and then managed a bankruptcy process that violated the rule of law and favored his special-interest union allies. The author ignores other domestic and foreign-owned operations in this country did not require government bailouts; there is little doubt these companies had the capacity to make up for GM and Chrysler loss in sales.

Now let's deal with the fact the author seems to confound fiscal policy (in Obama's arena) with monetary policy (in the Fed's arena). Talking about new NOMINAL highs in stock indexes can hardly be traced to Obama's record spendthift ways. Let me point out: (1) we have the worst labor rate participation rates and highest long-term unemployment rate in decades; (2) we have had the lowest economy and job growth rate after a major recession since the Depression; (3) we still don't have breakeven jobs since the start of the recession in Dec.2007, never mind adding going on 5 years of new labor force entrants requiring roughly 200K  jobs a month just to tread water, never mind allow deployment of the structurally unemployed and underemployed.

The author doesn't talk about near-zero interest rates Obama's entire Presidency and their effects on savers and fixed-income people. He doesn't talk about how the proportion number of Americans investing in the stock market has declined. He doesn't talk about how gold, a money proxy, earned more than stocks over the 2000's. He doesn't mention how the purchasing power of the dollar has declined by a third over recent years, which makes things like oil imports more expensive. He loves the fact the health care sector has been recovering in stock prices (go figure--mandated purchases of goods and services, an aging population, escalating health insurance premiums while overall income remains stagnant). He doesn't talk about how household net worth has plunged under Obama, how many older people are retiring with negligible  savings and bleak employment prospects. He doesn't talk about high unemployment for less educated workers, minority groups, etc. He doesn't talk about people underwater on their mortgages.

I could go on and on. The entire piece is pure crap. I would be willing to bet this guy is a closet Democrat trying to rationalize his support for the Obama regime, but you could buy all of Revlon's inventory of lipstick and not have enough to put on this pig. (Time-permitting I may review certain points in future posts; I can't believe Steve Forbes lets incompetent hacks post their crap on his website.)

Political Cartoon

The media's phasers set to stun
Obama ready for Jedi mind meld
Courtesy of Jerry Holbert and Townhall

Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups

Bruce Springsteen & the E-Street Band, "I'm Going Down"