Category: national politics & policies

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free trade & free markets national politics & policies too much government

Blame Policy

Petroleum-based fuels are going up in price, so naturally people start looking for someone to blame. Call up the Usual Suspects:

  1. Speculators. These futures market folks never get credit for lowering the prices of gas, but they can always be counted on to serve as easy “bad guy” targets when prices go up. Same this time. You’ve heard the rumors, the rancor. (It’s nuts.)
  2. President Obama. You know, for not allowing drilling and pipelines and such. Go to a meeting of conservatives and you’ll hear someone yell out “Drill, baby, drill!” Now, I’m all for drilling, and it’s stupid to clamp down on future supplies of oil — indeed, investors in the futures market for oil see these political and bureaucratic restrictions on exploration and mining and refining, etc., and no doubt bid up the price of oil — but really, don’t blame just Obama, blame, also,
  3. Romney and Santorum and Gingrich. All these presidential candidates have engaged in hysterical, belligerent rhetoric about Iran, threatening warfare in the Persian Gulf region. War is bad for supply lines. Compromising supply lines means compromised supplies. Which means less oil. Which means rising prices.

So of course futures traders will bid up those prices — they would lose money if they didn’t — and in so doing they make the likely future conditions palpable to contemporary decision makers.

That’s their economic function. Don’t blame the messenger.

So, if you think the U.S. should bomb Iran to prevent that country from bombing the U.S. in a few years (after which the U.S. could easily make the populous nation, full of innocents, a sea of irradiated glass), don’t gripe.

One consequence will be (must be) rising prices.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

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incumbents national politics & policies too much government U.S. Constitution

Emperor Obama

People change.

George W. Bush won the presidency pledging a dose of “humility” in our foreign policy and forswearing the temptation to rebuild failed foreign states. But after the 9/11 attacks, the U.S. went to war in Afghanistan and Iraq . . . followed by even more deadly and difficult nation-building efforts.

Presidential powers expanded.

Along came Barack Obama, the peace candidate. His advantage in winning the 2008 Democratic Party nomination was his unequivocal opposition to the Iraq War. Meanwhile, then-Senator, now Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton had voted to give Bush congressional approval to launch that war.

During the campaign, Obama recognized constitutional limits on the commander-in-chief: “The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation.”

But as president, Mr. Obama launched air strikes against Libya without congressional authorization. In fact, he refused to even report to Congress as required by law.

And then last week, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) asked Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, “Do you think that you can act, without Congress, and initiate a no-fly zone in Syria, without congressional approval?”

“Our goal would be to seek international permission,” Panetta replied, and then added, “and we would come to the Congress and inform you and determine how best to approach this.”

A republic? America goes to war on the order of one man: Emperor Obama.

But empires change. Past empires rarely asked foreign permission for their military adventures.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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ballot access national politics & policies political challengers

Seven Million for Show

Complaining about the cost of holding an election is usually done by those who fear the election’s likely outcome, not the price.

I’m not very sympathetic.

Yet, I’m in total agreement with Andrew Wilson, a resident fellow at the Show-Me Institute, whose article “Money Down a Drain: The Millions Spent on Missouri’s No-Show Feb. 7 Election,” states flatly that legislators ought to be “embarrassed” for calling “a statewide election” in which “nobody came.”

Missouri taxpayers forked out $7 million to hold the state’s February 7 presidential primary, which produced only a meager eight percent voter turnout, netting a whopping $25 cost for every vote cast.

The legislature had moved the primary date up to gain a greater edge for the state in determining delegates for deciding the presidential nominee. When that timetable didn’t work with the National Republican Party’s nominating rules, legislation was drafted to cancel the primary.

But the legislature and the governor couldn’t bring the bill beyond the draft stage. Instead, they stuck Show-Me State citizens with spending seven million for, well, show . . .  the primary having been rendered absolutely meaningless in terms of winning delegates.

Hence the low voter turnout.

There is a very simple solution. Let political parties have the freedom to run their own affairs, their own primaries. And let them do it without taxpayer subsidy.

Governments (taxpayers) pay for the general election; parties pay for their primaries.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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ideological culture national politics & policies video

Video: Nick Gillespie Interviewed by Jon Caldara

There’s a lot of interesting talk here at “The Devil’s Advocate”:

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national politics & policies political challengers

Sorry, Santorum

In Wednesday night’s GOP debate, Rick Santorum, the new frontrunner, found himself apologizing for much of his political record.

“Sure I had some votes. Look, I think we’ve all had votes that I look back on I — I wish I wouldn’t have voted — No Child Left Behind, you’re right,” Santorum stammered.

Unmoved by Santorum’s mea culpa, Rep. Ron Paul offered, “I find it really fascinating that, when people are running for office, they’re really fiscally conservative. When they’re in office, they do something different. And then when they explain themselves, they say, ‘Oh, I want to repeal that.’”

Santorum sought to explain a second time: “I supported No Child Left Behind. . . . I have to admit, I voted for that. It was against the principles I believed in, but, you know, when you’re part of the team, sometimes you take one for the team, for the leader, and I made a mistake.“

Former Sen. Santorum’s biggest stumble may have been acknowledging that he voted for federal funding of Planned Parenthood.

“I’ve always opposed Title X funding, but it’s included in a large appropriation bill that includes a whole host of other things,” Santorum began. “So while, yes, I — I admit I voted for large appropriation bills and there were things in there I didn’t like, things in there I did, but when it came to this issue, I proactively stepped forward and said that we need to do something at least to counterbalance it.”

Santorum’s counterbalancing act? Title 20 — yet more federal spending, this time for abstinence education.

How about abstinence on spending?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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First Amendment rights ideological culture national politics & policies

Contra Mandated Contraception Coverage

Regulators spawned by “Obamacare” have mandated that employer-provided medical insurance plans provide contraception as a benefit. 

The problem, as currently reported and debated, is that only churches are exempted — church-run or -affiliated hospitals, for example, are not. And so Catholic hospitals, along with other religious-based charitable endeavors, must conform, despite their commitment to age-old ideas about the sanctity of life, which they say contraception and abortifacients, especially (some contraceptive methods are de facto abortion-inducing), abridge.

Many conservatives argue that the mandate thus runs afoul of the First Amendment. But it turns out that many Republican politicians have supported similar mandates in several states.

Mike Huckabee signed one such mandate into law in Arkansas.

No big news that GOP politicians are often just as bad as Democrats, of course. But forget, if you can, the First Amendment angle. The mandate runs afoul of something even more fundamental: common sense.

Adding an umpteenth mandate to the list of regulations government places on contracts amongst employers, employees, and insurance companies hardly passes the smell test. The more benefits that government insists you contract for, the higher your insurance rates. The higher the rates, fewer are those who would willingly buy, thus scuttling the whole point of “health care reform.”

We ostensibly want more people to purchase major medical insurance. Not fewer.

It’s possible that some reformers seek precisely that, to put insurance companies out of business, leaving only government to take up the slack, as a “single payer.”

In the case of Republican reformers, however, is there a hidden agenda or just mere foolishness?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
national politics & policies too much government

Volt Gives Taxpayers a Jolt

Government Motors — er, I mean General Motors — has sold approximately 6,000 Chevy Volts, its plug-in electric/hybrid gas-burner car. Is that good or bad?

Analyzing the various state and federal government subsidies to GM as well as to suppliers of batteries and other parts for the Volt, James Hohman with Michigan’s Mackinac Center for Public Policy estimates that each car sold could cost taxpayers $250,000.The Obamobile!

Hohman admits it’s hard to be certain of the precise subsidy level because of various government incentives that may or may not get triggered, but whether $50,000 per car or $250,000, a lot of taxpayer cash has been sunk into a make that still sells for over $30,000 (and usually closer to $40,000). Nor does Hohman’s analysis include a penny of the $50 billion dollars in TARP funds taxpayers put into GM, giving the federal government an ownership stake in the automaker.

Twisting the knife another turn, GM now lobbies state governments for more handouts. Justin Owen, president of the Beacon Center of Tennessee, wrote recently in the Daily Caller: “Rather than retool its business model to become competitive in the free enterprise system, GM turned to . . . another $1.7 billion in taxpayer-funded grants and tax abatements, not from the federal government, but from states across the country.”

When GM built cars without subsidies, it produced jobs and profits and wealth. That’s all good. But having auto companies sell cars at a couple hundred thousand dollar loss per vehicle sorta takes the fun out of it.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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ideological culture national politics & policies too much government

Food Stamp Stimulus

Yesterday, we discussed the Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare’s new rule testing the financial assets of food stamp recipients to determine whether or not they qualify for the benefit.

Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack recently traveled to the Keystone State to caution against restricting access to food stamps — officially known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) — on the basis of a person’s financial assets. He contended that implementing the means test would cost money and that it wouldn’t “save the Commonwealth a single dime.”Tom Vilsack points a finger

State officials suggest Secretary Vilsack is way off on the cost of implementation. Moreover, it seems odd to argue there will be no savings at a new conference stuffed full of shrill warnings that too many poor people would lose assistance.

But two of Vilsack’s other arguments really caught my attention. First, he claimed the SNAP program is an “economic extender,” which creates agricultural jobs and positions at grocery stores and convenience marts. Second, he asserted that for each food stamp dollar provided by government an additional $1.80 to $1.90 in economic activity is generated.

In other words, food stamps stimulate the economy. It’s almost as if, even if there were no folks down on their luck, we’d still want to spread around some food stamp money for all the good it does.

Vilsack made absolutely no mention of the economic activity interrupted when government took that same dollar from the person who earned it.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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ideological culture national politics & policies

Wealth on Welfare

Should a $2 million lottery winner be heartlessly denied food stamps?

In the Philadelphia Inquirer, Jay Ostrich, public affairs director at the Commonwealth Foundation for Public Policy, tells the story of “Leroy Fick, who won a $2 million lottery jackpot, but still legally collected food stamps.”

That is, until “Michigan enacted a $5,000 asset test” for those applying for food stamps, thereby stopping “exploiters such as Fick from taking advantage of the system.”

Now the Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare is doing likewise, implementing rules to block food stamps for anyone under 60 with $2,000 or more in assets ($3,250 if over 60 years of age) — excluding one’s home, car, a second car (if valued under $4,650) and retirement savings.

With state and federal welfare spending up 52 percent since 2002, and the friendly state facing a budget crunch, an estimated 2 percent of recipients could be affected to the tune of $50 million in annual savings.

But Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter calls the change “one of the most mean-spirited, asinine proposals to come out of Harrisburg in decades.” It’s “a disgrace,” according to State Sen. Shirley Kitchen (D-Philadelphia).

The Philadelphia Inquirer editorialized against the asset test on the grounds that it would “punish families for having a few dollars in a bank account.”

Punish? Not getting a handout is hardly punishment. The law just means that those with significant assets have to buy their own groceries.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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national politics & policies video

Video: Obama’s Record Won’t Play

In my Townhall column today – The fickle finger of fairness? – I took President Obama at his word: “No bailouts, no handouts, and no copouts.” But as seen in this week’s video, below, others (like ABC’s Jake Tapper) think Obama is practicing class warfare to distract from all his landmark legislative achievements – which are so incredibly unpopular one might question the use of the word “achievement.”