Countervailing Sense

Countervailing power - The Boston Globe

Citizens need to act more vigorously to restore Galbraith’s countervailing power. Otherwise, private business acting in its short run self interest will ruin us twice — once when private markets pay no heed to the risks they are imposing, and a second time when they corrupt our regulatory institutions.

When your conclusion is "citizens need to act more vigorously", you don't say how, but you fairly clearly call out "private business" as the thing to "react to", your column is pretty questionable on value. Let's try to save it a bit.

First "short run self interest". What is a typical prudent investment horizon? Answer, 10 years+. What is the longest elected term in the US government? Answer: Senator, 6 years. Representatives are 2. It is THE GOVERNMENT, not business that has a short term view. Even beyond this, Government operates on a cash accounting basis, so long term obligations like Social Security, Medicare, now Health Care, etc are not evaluated in the yearly financial statements.

Business is required YEARLY to evaluate the present value of assets, income streams and obligations, as well as futures risks and potentials. Investors make those evaluations on a daily and even hourly basis. Government does NOT, and has a MUCH more short term "next election" view of the future that completely fails to keep contact with the big picture of a "going concern".

Does this mean that business doesn't "fail", "have disasters", etc? No, of course not -- just like Government, it is run by humans. The Challenger and the Columbia both failed very publicly and with great expense, loss of life and national prestige, yet both were under the control of NASA, an agency of the US Government.

Just as NASA had no intent of multi-billion dollar space shuttles being destroyed along with the astronauts on board, BP had absolutely no intent to lose a half billion dollar oil drilling rig, eleven people, and have to deal with the loss of millions of gallons of crude and the damages caused by it. To err is human -- especially when technology is being advanced and important tasks are being carried out. Failures, even catastrophic failures are part of human life in this universe. "We" have to deal with it, but "vigor" is about as useful as a direction as "hope".

So what can we do? Can we help salvage some value from a lost effort at a column here? I believe so:

• Government sets a STABLE, PREDICTABLE playing field by the rule of law. It IS NOT "activist" -- activism is unpredictable, and just like playing baseball, football, or anything else with unpredictable rules, activist government is like the officials deciding the game. It is to be avoided. There are enough unknowns ... weather, injury and illness, etc. Government needs to avoid being one more large unpredictable element.
• Business, including suppliers, customers, investors, competitors, interacts with the exceedingly broad unpredictable nature of any production -- especially things like oil, with the daily speed of markets rather than the months and years required for political action. Disasters create losses -- as they should. Losses are just as important as gains in making sure that the best businesses survive and those that fail to deal with the reality of the real world and the markets fail. There is no such thing as "too big to fail", and the government that claims there is has signed it's own likely death warrant in finding that even that government is not "too big to fail".
• Citizens. The US is expected to be a country where citizens realize that a government big enough to give you what you want is big enough to take everything you have. Mostly we have a responsibility to educate ourselves about the wonderful construction known as "The Constitution" and the government structures it specified, realize that the "progressive" monster that has mutated from the rape of our nation by the progressives must be exposed to radical surgery if we are to survive as anything that might be called "America". "Vote the bums out" would be an excellent start -- but learning what kind of bum to elect in the future so that our future is one of growth and improvement rather than rot and decline would be an even better second step.

Simple enough, but like many simple and needful things, very very difficult in execution. The "progressive" heresy has been insinuated deeply into our nation by socialists, communists, "liberals", academics, unions, the media and of course the politicians of BOTH PARTIES (Teddy Roosevelt was a huge "progressive", Bush very much so as well -- "No Child" and Drug Benefit). While many of their motives have been "good" at times at least from the limited view of "wishful thinking", we are now in the midst of reaping the grim effluent of their misplaced efforts ... the politicization of all parts of life, the loss of meaning, the debt, the sense of malaise and hopelessness and the vacuousness of their "leadership". "Hope and change" are not leadership, they are free of any content beyond instability which is "leadership" to chaos only.

Potentially there are some limited signs that a few of the leftward middle are beginning to wake up from the hypnotism of '08, if only to realize that there is a lot of pain going around. Pray that we survive the BO hangover.

Depths of "Progress"

George F. Will - Jobs report a nightmare for Obama progressivism

Another good Will column, although I disagree with his assertion that BO cares about how badly his takeover hurts America, except to the extent that it diminishes his ability to load more and lasting destruction on the US system that he loathes.

At any time, some economic conditions would be better than others, but the more certainty about conditions the better. Today investors and employers are certain that uncertainties are multiplying.

They are uncertain about when interest rates will rise, and by how much. They do not know how badly the economy will be burdened by the expiration, approximately 200 days from now, of the Bush tax cuts for high earners -- a.k.a. investors and employers. They know the costs of Obamacare will be higher than was advertised, but not how much higher. They do not know the potential costs of cap-and-trade and other energy policies. They do not know whether "card check" -- abolition of the right of secret-ballot elections in unionization decisions -- will pass, or how much the economy will be injured by making unions more muscular. They do not know how the functioning of the financial sector will be altered and impeded by the many new regulatory rules and agencies created by the financial reform legislation. The economy has become dependent on government stimulation of demand, and no one knows what will happen as the stimulus spending wanes.

Uncertainty is a consequence of hyperkinetic government, which is a consequence of the governmental confidence that is a consequence of progressivism. The premise of progressivism is that all will be well if enough power is concentrated in Washington, and enough Washington power is concentrated in the executive branch, and enough really clever experts are concentrated in the executive branch. This is why the government's perceived impotence concerning the gulf oil spill is subversive of the Obama administration's master narrative.

Lots of business is about reducing and sometimes profiting from uncertainty -- the kind of uncertainty that is part of existence; when you might die, will crops be good or bad, where will prices be in the fall? next year? what is the demand for orange juice likely to be? etc.

As Will covers above, more and more government "experts" flailing around with no profit motive to encourage good or losses to limit evil, makes for a a world with ever multiplying uncertainty -- unfortunately, other than the boom in government, the uncertainty is really just about how low we will sink.

Death To Israel and America

JPost.com | BlogCentral | Double Standard Watch | Singling out Israel for 'international investigation'

In a world in which North Korea sinks a South Korean naval vessel killing dozens, Iran arms Islamic terrorists, who kill hundreds, Russia bombs Chechnya, killing thousands, and the United States and Great Britain, while targeting al Qaida and Taliban, kill an indeterminate number of civilians, only Israel is subjected to international "investigations" such as that conducted by Richard Goldstone and that being called for by the Security Council in the wake of the recent flotilla fiasco.

I like the contrast with North Korea torpedoing the naval vessel. If North Korea nukes somebody (or Iran for that matter), I'm sure that some on the left will feel bad (maybe depending on who gets nuked?), but the left won't hate North Korea. North Korea is a communist wacko nation that hates the US. From the point of view of the MSM and the left,  "the enemy of my enemy is my friend".

Similarly Iran and radical Islam. They are anti-American, much like BO, so while they may not always be perfect, they remain enemies of the US, and as a bonus, Christians and Jews to boot. True, the far left doesn't like any sort of religion, but being anti-American trumps even being rather extreme in your religious practices -- plus that bonus of hating Jews and Christians. The American left elite has a soft spot for radical Islam dating back from the dawn of Arafat at least.

Naturally, as a right wing Christian myself, the prophetic statements on the hatred of the Jews and Christians are too much to ignore. Nearly a complete lack of concern over North Korea torpedoing a naval ship, regular invitations for Iran's "I'm a Dinner Jacket" to speak to "get his message out" (how long can it take to say "Death to Israel, Death to America"?). One can almost hear the cackle and smell the brimstone as the left blindly fulfills prophecy.

Man was made to serve. Nobody has "their own life" -- God or Satan, choose your master.

MSM Biden Party

Reporters attend pool party with Joe Biden | The Daily Caller - Breaking News, Opinion, Research, and Entertainment

Is Fox news too cozy with conservative politicians? Probably, but at least it is heavily reported. Some news has leaked about the lefties all getting together at the Biden's for a little pool party this past weekend, mostly because of some overly gushing tweets and facebook posts.

Democrat positions must be real crap if they need to spend campaign dollars on top of the combined budgets of the NYT, NBC, ABC, CBS, NPR, CNN, etc. Oh, and "corporate speech"? Last I checked, there was no limit on how much "news" support any of those could give BO, Nancy, Harry, or any of the rest of the wrecking crew.

MSM Hopeful for Democrats

The Dems’ Plan to Hold Congress - Newsweek

It is great to see the MSM wing of the DNC working for their candidates, and to watch the contrast from how they think of the evil Republicans. Here we talk about David Plouffe, a BO political operative, and the discussion is glowing. Remember the evil of Karl Rove and the religious right?

I find the following particularly touching. Folks like ACORN turned out 15 million votes that had never voted -- we know now that was because many of them never existed, weren't legal voters or were simply sitting somewhere and were not going to vote (home bound, nursing home, cemetery plot, etc). In true Democrat tradition, as long as you vote Democrat, the "sacred right to vote" extends to the dead, the felon, the illegal alien, or the alternate spelling ... no reason that WF Berg, Bill Berg,  B F Berg, William Berg, William F Berg and a few others ... maybe the whole "Bill BUrg clan " as well ought not vote, as long as they are smart enough to vote democrat!

Hire a bunch more government workers, make up a bunch of votes ... whatever. It is all just great as long as the net result is more Democrats! Oh, and the fact that ACORN was willing to help prostitute underage girls? No issue! At least they weren't evil like Karl Rove!!!

Plouffe’s main goal, though, is to focus on turning out the 15 million people who voted for the first time in 2008—an effort that Democrats believe could wind up affecting the outcome of many of this year’s 70-odd contested races. After the 2008 election, the Obama field operation, Obama for America, was renamed Organizing for America and folded into the DNC. All of its electoral assets—the 13 million–name e-mail list, the hundreds of thousands of volunteers and “community organizers,” the precision Internet tools—came along with it. Now Plouffe & Co. plan to bring those resources to bear on getting 2008’s newbies back to the polls.

Lefty's Seeing Crisis

Op-Ed Columnist - ‘A Very Deep Hole’ on Jobs - NYTimes.com

Somehow, the combination of millions of gallons of oil blowing into the Gulf for over a month, plus BO taking a very sanguine attitude on a May jobs report that was an unmitigated disaster has even the loony left in unusual shouting range of some limited reality. Maybe BO really has at least one positive effect?

The jobs report for May, released on Friday by the Labor Department, was grim. President Obama tried to put the best face on it, but it was undeniably bad news, which is why the stock markets tanked. The private sector created just 41,000 jobs in May, a dismal performance. The government hired 411,000 workers to help with the census, but those jobs are temporary and will vanish in a few months.

Do you think that 411K out of the 450K "new jobs" being temporary census jobs MIGHT be kinda bad news? What is even worse news is that unless you are a real news hound, what you probably heard was:

Unemployment is crushing families and stifling the prospects of young people. Given that reality, President Obama’s take on the May numbers seemed oddly out of touch. “This report,” he said, “is a sign that our economy is getting stronger by the day.”

I guess from Herbert's POV, the "out of touch" is "oddly" -- from those that are a bit more reality based, Bob and BO are both normally so far in la la land that communication is difficult. 

Herbert of course can't figure out any way to improve the situation than what the Democrats have been on since '07 ... pass a lot of money from investors to people that don't invest, mess around with a lot of government regulation, name calling of business and the rich, prop up failing union enterprises and keep your unions voting for you, etc. The lefties figure we need a lot more of what they have been doing for going on 4 years now with the predictable bad results.

But, they at least seem to be very slowly realizing that it is not working. Sadly, I don't think their brains are flexible enough to see that pumping water into a sinking boat just makes it sink faster.

Can't They Just Die?

Israel, Disarmed - Charles Krauthammer - National Review Online

Nazi was "National Socialism" -- the Nazis nationalized industries, pushed government control into all areas of life -- I'm not sure they got as far as politicizing the weather, as we have here, but at least close. Oh, and they were experts at demonizing their opposition as well as having scapegoats. Here it is banks, oil companies, the religious right, Fox News, Republicans. There it was the Bolsheviks, opposition parties, the signers of the WWI armistice -- certainly COMPLETELY different. Oh wait, except for those pesky Jews.

Somehow, they are a people for whom evil seems to have an insatialble appetite -- it is almost biblical, in fact, it IS Biblical. The forces of evil hate the Jews -- be they Jihadists, backwater 3rd world pagans, the bulk of the liberal elite (except for the Jewish ones -- and even many of them seem to be up for a bit of self-loathing), or our own version of evil incarnate, BO, seething at the Jewish menace. As Charles puts it:

The world is tired of these troublesome Jews, six million — that number again — hard by the Mediterranean, refusing every invitation to national suicide. For which they are relentlessly demonized, ghettoized, and constrained from defending themselves, even as the more committed anti-Zionists — Iranian in particular — openly prepare a more final solution.

Why? I like to think because Lucifer himself would like to see the end of the "chosen people", but even in a secular world, their existence, against all odds after thousands of years is a thorn in the side of moderninity. They "ought to go away". There is no Buddhist, Hindu or Muslim equivalent of a "nation / race / religion" all rolled into one. What in the world are they? Their very existence is a spot on the orthodoxy of atheism. Can't they see that it is "not adaptive" to be a Jew? Can't they be gone already?

The intelligentsia around the world and of course "citizen of the world" BO himself can barely contain his animosity. That "stiff necked people" ... like some oil well in the gulf or tea partiers in the US. Why will they just not bend to his will? Ah, the mysteries of life to those that would be king!


 

Madison vs Wilson

George Will: The limits of the welfare state - Thursday, Jun. 3, 2010

A must read. One of the shortest and best critiques of how Progressiveism  is the antithesis of American!

Very Close To Malaise

Op-Ed Columnist - Our Epic Foolishness - NYTimes.com

It’s fast, cheap and easy. It’s something that all Americans, young and old, can be asked to participate in immediately. In that sense, it’s a way of combating the pervasive feelings of helplessness that have become so demoralizing and so destructive to our long-term interests.

"It" is more conservation -- you know, put on a sweater (or take one off, it's summer) turn off your AC, turn your heat off in the winter. Walk, ride a bike -- those are the things to break you out of those "pervasive feelings of helplessness". While you are doing that, I'm sure Bob Herbet will cut down on jet trips, limos, newsprint and no doubt a lot of other things. Liberals are SO consistent when it comes to practicing what they preach!

My my, not even two years after the coronation of BO, and these folks are in a sullen mood!

Wonder what the odds of BO being attacked by a rabbit are??

Why is it as predictable as the sunrise that when liberals actually get in charge of government they become almost immediately despondent about how hard it is, how many problems there are, and how there REALLY ought to be more "bottoms up" national brilliance so that the leaders that they espoused as the answer to everything from war, global warming and bad breath didn't have to work so hard!! Ought there not be a rule that they can just "say what ought to happen" and some folks of the right ought to "make it so"?? Seems like a reasonable approach!

Telling Stories

Op-Ed Columnist - A Storyteller Loses the Story Line - NYTimes.com

No matter how much the MSM tries to mythologize their chosen lefties and slay those horrible righties, reality is both more and less than a story. Maureen is right, to HUMANs, it's a story -- but then we have a VERY limited context compared to reality in both time and scope. Reality is also more than physics or psychology -- not everything is the result of something else, let alone somehow "proportional", nor is every human action the result of some "motivation". Chaos and quantum uncertainly exist, nature just tells us: "Deal With It".

It’s impossible not to feel sorry for President Obama, pummeled by the cascading disasters, at home and abroad, unleashed by two war-mongering oil men — plus scary escalations by Israel, Iran and North Korea.

It's impossible not to feel sorry for BO? What kind of job did he really think the presidency was going to be? Was he unaware of the job difficulties?  How about W? Was it "impossible to not feel sorry for him?" Unless Maureen is a "truther", one would think that 9-11 might have been at least a mild negative surprise for Bush.

Maureen was one of those heavily cheerleading and raising expectations for "the one". Why could we not have had a "rational election" -- not based on the demonization of Republicans or the deification  of BO? While the demonization continues on for folks like Maureen, she has suddenly realized that BO is not only a deity, he may not be much of a leader or person, let alone a quality President. Maybe we ought to be a bit more careful in our national narratives.

Did she REALLY read "Dreams of My Father" which, if it had a conclusion at all, concluded that BO's heart was that of an African Luo. Certainly fine with me -- we have had other US Presidents that were proud of their ethnicity (Reagan and Kennedy being fairly recent examples), but while his book is very clear and direct on how he finds himself in Africa, there really isn't much at all on how tribalism and the American Presidency are likely to be a good mix.

At least the loony left is starting to realize that BO isn't god. I guess we really are so far gone that one has to take that as progress!

Let The Crimes Begin

Sestak: Bill Clinton offered him job to quit race

Were a Republican in the WH, the MSM would be in full throat for a special prosecutor this weekend. For those with a memory short of full Alzheimers, we have proof.

Valerie Plame was worthy of a special prosecutor in the Bush administration -- an alleged leak as punishment for a husband leaking supposedly damaging information. Now we know that the "leak" was an inadvertent statement by Richard Armitage, generally a foe of the Bush administration, that had nothing at all to do with Valerie Plame. Never mind, we had a multiple year investigation anyway, and managed to prosecute Scooter Libby for perjury for getting some dates wrong, even though he had nothing to do with the inadvertent leak by Armitage. Such is the shape of "scandal" with a Republican in the WH. Oh, perjury? That is just one more legalism like campaign finance rules and 60 votes in the Senate that is only applicable to Republicans. Such is the America that we live in.

BO has trudged out one of this nations most prolific liars, the ever penitent Slick Willie in front of the cameras to accept the blame for this particular sordid political manipulation. An action that would be nothing but fodder for late night comedy were it being attempted by a Republican. Unsurprisingly, it sounds like the same shenanigans were pulled in Colorado.

Naturally, what we are going to see from the MSM is a concerted attempt to find any cases where a Republican in recent years, or potentially we might even get to hear some version of the "Jefferson had a child by a slave" defense. Heartwarming.

Rich Deoderant For BO

Op-Ed Columnist - Obama’s Katrina? Maybe Worse - NYTimes.com

Deoderant is another one of those human things that is "better than the alternative". Rich is trying hard to cover of the last few months and especially last weeks stench of BO that has gotten bad enough to cause even if his best left buddies if some of this problem is more serious than a few skipped showers and rancid workout wear. Perhaps there is something actually rotten emanating from their beloved BO.

There isn't anything worth really commenting on here than to to realize that poor Rich is trying hard to convince himself that BO really really MUST be more competent than Bush, and even though it looks dark right now, certainly Bush HAD to be more incompetent on Katrina than BO on Deepwater Horizon!

Apparently not convinced of his stench covering, he brings in a parade of those noxious Republicans that he and his readers hate to much for scary cameos .... Palin, Gingerich, Cheney, Glenn Beck, "creationists", Tea Partiers. From a left wingers view, it must be a fetid stew of infamy working hard to remove that hanging cloud of rancid BO left after the Thursday press conference, the Dr Spock beach party in Louisiana, and the High Schoolish attempt to use Slick Willie as a lying "human shield" for the Sestak cover-up.

Life is tough when you put a Chicago political hack that reads what he thinks off a teleprompter in the WH and then set expectations somewhere around Lincoln.

Poor Enough to Learn?

We’re too broke to be this stupid - Mark Steyn, Opinion - Macleans.ca

This is a great column, just read it. What we see increasingly every day is that we are very very stupid, but most American's don't quite understand that they are no longer rich. A decent amount of stupidity for the rich is like any other luxury for the rich -- you can get away with it. We used to be a rich country. Europe used to be rich. We got too stupid, and we got poor in a hurry.

You can drink "too much" to the tune of 10 to even 20% for quite some time and be OK, you can speed to around that tune for a good long time without a ticket. Start drinking too much to the tune of 1-2x the limits, or speeding at 1-2x the legal limit, and things go bad in a hurry.

Thus, the lesson for the stupid -- deficits that were 10-20% were "bad" -- of course, the stupid were EXTREMELY bent out of shape about those. They didn't like the spender in chief!  Now the deficits are 3-4X what they were! You drink like that, you die. You speed like that, you either die or go to the slammer  --- news at 11, the same thing is true of spending!

Here is the end of the article ... it is short, well written and very important. Just read it and skip the tease.

The green jobs, the gay parades, the jihadist welfare queens, the Greek public sector unions, all have to be paid for by a shrinking base of contributing workers whose children and grandchildren will lead poorer and meaner lives because of the fecklessness of government. The social compact of the postwar era cannot hold. Across the developed world, a beleaguered middle class is beginning to understand that it’s no longer that rich. At some point, it will look at the sheer waste of government spending, the other shoe will drop, and it will decide that it no longer wishes to be that stupid.

Expert Blamestress

Amy Klobuchar: Blame spreads with oily mess | StarTribune.

At hearings of both the Senate Environment and Commerce Committees, on which I serve, we listened to the leaders of BP, Transocean and Halliburton explain how each of their companies may not have been at fault for the disaster. Their evasive testimony reminded me of kids who knock a baseball through the neighbor's window and won't own up to their actions.

Isn't that refreshing? Clearly, big oil is to blame.They are immature to boot ... just ask Amy.

First, there needs to be a thorough investigation of this disaster. I support the creation of an independent commission, similar to the commissions that investigated the Three Mile Island and Space Shuttle Challenger disasters.

Talk about adult and courageous, Amy has gone out on a limb and suggested "an independent commission". Wow.We ought to be writing a new "Profiles in Courage" ... or potentially, "See How UN-childlike I am".

Second, the parties responsible must be held accountable. They must pay for the damage they have wrought instead of trying to put it on the backs of taxpayers in Minnesota and other states.

Oh, yea, "accountability" ... that is a cool thing. I wonder when it will actually be that a Democrat is ever "accountable" for anything? As near as I can see, "never" would be a darned good estimate. 

Third, we need to put an end to the cozy relationship between the oil industry and the federal agency that was supposed to be the public's watchdog.

What you mean "we" Senator? Now lets see, "we" elected full Democrats to the House and Senate in '06, and in '08 we elected a Democrat President to boot -- as I recall, he was the really really special "walks on water" sort. So did "we" just get official confirmation from Amy that Democrats are NEVER responsible? BO took more corporate money than any other candidate in history. Isn't there SOME point at which it might be DEMOCRATS that have to DO something about "cozy relationships"? ... nope.

Let's face it Amy, if a Republican were in the WH Amy would be screaming high and low that THEY were responsible for this mess! Oh my GOD, how awful would it be that THEY had "allowed this horrible DISASTER to go on for over a month". No doubt Republican competence would be lower than deep sea oil sludge. Oh sure, Amy would also want her pound of flesh from the folks that provide the oil to power her plane trips to and from Washington, to heat her huge home in chilly MN in the winter and cool it in the summer, and even power the computer that she typed her diatribe on. Other political parties, people that actually DO ANYTHING, they are "like kids that broke a window".

What is Amy like?

Let's face it. "SH*T happens -- at least when people **DO** anything. Did BP or anyone else want to lose a 1/2 Billion dollar rig and 11 lives?? Might that oil might have been more profitable going into one of their tankers than into the gulf? Might it not be good to learn that even with brilliant and mature Democrats like Amy in Congress and the Royal BO in the WH spending Trillions he doesn't have, blathering from a teleprompter every day, passing new laws, regulations and who knows what, sh*t STILL happens.

The only difference now is that less of everything happens, it is all more costly, and Amy and the MSM are confused about who could possibly be to blame when it STILL happens. What a pity, they used to be so completely certain.

Hopefully, come November, We The People can at least solve THAT issue for them!

The Tougher Lefty World

Why Did North Korea Do It? | Mother Jones

I've been noticing that the left seems a bit confused lately. Just a couple years ago, the answers would have been simple:

1. To show the arrogant Bush that they are not impressed  by him.
2. Because of the incompetence / irrelevance of the Bush administration policies
   
3. Because Bush as turned his back on the rest of the world with his stupid focus on Iraq
4. ... and on and on
   

In summary, it would have been "Bush's fault". The MSM is so confused, it is hard for them to even report on things like the N Koreans torpedoing a S Korean ship. Just a couple of years ago, this would have been a "clear case" that "proved" something negative about the Bush Administration, now they are just confused.

One of the huge problems with the "consistency is not an issue" position of the left is that these sorts of great learning opportunities are bypassed. Could it be that N Korea is just an isolated country with a few generations of nutcase leadership that does a lot of unpredictable things? Maybe not everyone responds the same to the brilliantly smooth rhetoric of BO. One might even start to realize that there is much more to "leadership" than "reads well off a teleprompter" -- oh wait, that would probably be WAY too much of a learning experience, but one can always wish!