Category: national politics & policies

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free trade & free markets national politics & policies

Blame China

The Great Depression was made “great” by government mismanagement.

Political action, first under Hoover and then under FDR, made things a whole lot worse. And it wasn’t just the Democrats’ misguided New Deal barrage of regulation, cartelization, and general anti-business central planning. The Hoover Era Smoot-Hawley Tariff, a huge Republican reassertion of high-barrier protectionism, crippled international markets and devastated the one industry it was meant, especially, to help: agriculture.

Protectionism is the idea that government should outrageously harm domestic consumers to “protect” domestic producers. And politicians, often thinking they must “do something” (i.e., “anything”) often feel the push to “save us all” by erecting barriers to trade. Since the crash of 2008, I’ve kept an eye on our Washington insiders, to see if they’d try to revive Thirties-style self-destructive nostrums.

Well, we’ve got a sighting.

Congress is gearing up for some anti-Chinese protectionism. An unfortunately bipartisan movement is festering there, saying China’s yuan is too valuable, making trade “unfair” for American producers. The Senate seems bent on passing the Currency Exchange Rate Oversight Reform Act.

But, according to Daniel Ikenson, what’s really going on is politics: Faced with “public approval ratings hovering in the low-to-mid teens, an embattled Congress is looking for plausible scapegoats for the dismal state of U.S. economic affairs.”

This is not sophisticated economic theory. It’s not conscientiously developed public policy.

It’s grasp-at-anything grandstanding.

And it could do a whole lot of harm.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
free trade & free markets national politics & policies Tenth Amendment federalism too much government

A Compact Solution

“We shouldn’t have to leave our country to have a reasonable health care system,” says Eric O’Keefe, chair of the Health Care Compact Alliance.

I agree, but what to do with Obamacare, at present secure from repeal?

O’Keefe points out that Article I, Section 10 of the Constitution permits states to enter into compacts with one another provided they get congressional approval. States have done so since colonial times; there are currently 200 state compacts in force dealing with issues from driver’s licensing to wildlife.

The Health Care Compact would allow states to “get rid of all of Obamacare,” and to tell the federal government, as O’Keefe puts it, “You keep your regulations; send us back our money.”

“It’s not just a way to block Obamacare,” O’Keefe explains. “It includes Medicare and Medicaid, creates a block grant of all the money and it goes into the compacting states for them to manage as they see fit. So the citizens and the legislature will work it out in their state.”

States that join the compact could set up their own health care system with the money they currently receive from the federal government, sans regulations and mandates. While some states might experiment with single-payer systems, others could expand medical savings accounts and other market-oriented reforms.

Georgia, Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas have already passed the Health Care Compact, and will likely apply for congressional approval once a dozen or more states join.

Who’s next?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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general freedom national politics & policies too much government

Decline and Fall?

Widespread unemployment, fear, and consternation: Why now?

Three answers:

  1. Imperial over-reach. No nation can police the world forever. Empires once existed for loot. But on net the U.S. doesn’t take wealth from others. Instead, we spend our own wealth “protecting” others, often confusing our “national interest” for the interests of well-connected businesses. Hardly sustainable. Flag-waving about how good the U.S. is won’t stop the decline.
  2. Churning. We pretend to live in a “welfare state,” but wealth does not consistently go from rich to poor, to compensate for disadvantages. Wealth churns from one group to another, with each power shift. Trying to live at the expense of everyone else is not just a game for the poor. Government, without constitutional limits, inevitably shifts wealth haphazardly from the politically powerless (the least organized) to the politically powerful (the best organized) — with always a cut for the bureaucracy and political insiders. Of course such a system must decline, at some point.
  3. Sub-standard standards. In too many domains of life, we’ve almost given up. Certainly folks in high places act quite low. And the people who control our money, for example, don’t even pretend to keep a stable supply, a “standard”; instead, they pride themselves on “keeping bubbles going” . . . making unsustainability our standard policy.

But Americans do have an advantage over our Old World friends and foes. We have a history of dedication to better principles. Our best bet for recovery? Return to them.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
free trade & free markets national politics & policies porkbarrel politics

Hating Cathedrals

According to Adam Gopnik, at the New Yorker, many of my readers and I hate cathedrals.

Well, he alleges that we oppose “beautiful new airports and efficient bullet trains” (not cathedrals, exactly) for the same reason that “seventeenth-century Protestants hated the beautiful Baroque churches of Rome” — as “luxurious symbols of an earthly power they despised.”

Hmmm. Disagreeing with Gopnik is a hate crime?

Americans have more than enough cause to oppose big, intrusive government. We know how it works (often not very well), we know how unfair it is (often quite unjust), and we have a traditional alternative ready at hand (Constitutional liberty).

Cluelessly, Gopnik just sees a pig-headed hatred of government that leads to a hatred of some really nifty things.

He should reconsider. Perhaps what we have is a love of liberty and justice. And that precludes some nifty things from being conjured up in certain ways.

I bet Gopnik agrees. Go back to something like a cathedral. Take Teotihuacan. The Aztecs sure made some impressive buildings. Big public works projects. But for the purposes of blood sacrifice? At the cost of constant imperial warfare and imperial rule?

No.

Same with some dream projects. No doubt taking a billion-dollar train to a trillion-dollar airport would be cool. But I’d rather spend my money in other ways. And is it really right to tax somebody else for my luxuriant transports?

No more than robbing Peter to pay Paul . . . even to build a cathedral.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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

A Million for Each Congressperson

A business filed for bankruptcy last week.

These have been tough times, so that’s not a shock. What makes the story juicy is that the FBI raided the company’s headquarters two days later.

The company? Solyndra, a solar panel manufacturer. A few months earlier, it had been boasting a profitable return on investment. And, as President Obama had proclaimed the previous year in a visit to the California outfit, Solyndra was precisely the kind of company that deserved federal government assistance. It was so cutting edge, so innovative, that it deserved a huge loan guarantee, to the tune of $535 million.

The raid occurred on the same day as the president’s “jobs” speech last week. Yet, Mr. Obama neglected to include an update on his administration’s previously self-praised policy of industrial subsidy pertaining to that very company.

Republicans are making much of this. They are themselves not immune to (indeed, during the Bush years they excelled at) just this sort of corruption.

And it is corruption. The Solyndra deal went down after major investors in the company gave millions in support of the Obama presidential campaign. It was fast-tracked as part of the federal government’s Keynesian “stimulus” spending.

This is how the politics of modern mercantilism — of systematic “business-government partnerships” — works. The moneymen support the politicians who support the moneymen.

It’s one way to get rich.

And gain (and maintain) power.

But it’s not good for the country.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Common Sense general freedom national politics & policies

The Same America

This episode was written immediately after the events of 9/11/01.

This is war. And on our shores. Thousands of American citizens murdered in cold blood. But despite our pain and suffering as a people, we are still strong. Not only militarily, but also in our love of freedom and our commitment to defend it come what may.

Some have argued that America will never be the same. In a sense that’s true: we’ll certainly never forget this savage and senseless attack. And we have much work to do to make certain it doesn’t happen again. But it’s important to be careful how we go about it.

In the wake of this unprecedented brutality, two out of three Americans say they would be willing to trade some civil liberties to get more security. But this is isn’t our real choice. Nothing about increasing our security requires abridging our civil rights. We don’t have to let the terrorists win, not in any respect. For these terrorists would like nothing better than to knock America off our foundation, our principles, the things that make us truly the greatest country the world has ever known. They hate our freedom. Let’s sustain that freedom. Let’s show the whole world: we are the same America.

The same America whose rifle shot for freedom was heard ’round the world in 1776, and is still being heard today. The same America that freed Europe from the Nazis and Asia from imperial Japan. Let it be known in the face of this terror today that we are indeed the same America, the land of the free and the home of the brave.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Categories
national politics & policies too much government

Off to See the Wizard?

Tonight, President Barack Obama will ride down Pennsylvania Avenue with his sinking approval ratings, to stand beside our most unpopular Congress ever, so he can give a speech about jobs (before the football game starts). Our prez is a good speaker, but I doubt this speech will do any more to soothe our economic stress than have past speeches.

Speeches don’t create wealth — or jobs.

But image can entice votes, and with the election year rapidly approaching, he needs to look like he has a plan.

Or at least a clue.

So, the White House back room boys have been busy re-packaging. News reports say the president will suggest spending $300 to $400 billion to stimulate the economy. But he won’t use the word “stimulus.” For some reason, that word rings hollow.

Rest-assured, his non-stimulus stimulus will be “revenue neutral.” In other words, the spending will happen now while the offsetting spending cuts (or tax increases) will happen . . . later.

Not every provision of whatever plan Obama orates will be a terrible idea, but the thrust of it — the notion that with proper central planning and fiddling by our wizard-in-chief the federal government can create prosperity — will be tragically mistaken.

We need a president who understands that Americans could pick themselves up, dust themselves off and get moving economically . . . if only Washington politicians would stop stage managing the whole show.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
national politics & policies

The High Rise Before the Fall

Many Americans who have never driven in ol’ London town have driven over the London Bridge — in Arizona. I’m an outlier, here, in that I’ve been over many a London bridge, but not to Lake Havasu’s.

But that doesn’t make me an expert on the Shard London Bridge, a London skyscraper (yes, skyscraper) nearing completion. Popularly called “The Shard,” it will be the tallest building in Europe.

So prepare yourself: Expect a major economic collapse in the old country.

Yes, for the last century, the building of record-height skyscrapers could have served as a leading economic indicator . . . of disaster. As Mark Thornton explains, record-setting skyscraper construction is

a sign of a looming economic crisis. The model has successfully identified the Panic of 1907, the Great Depression, the Stagflation of the 1970s, the Tech Bubble, and the Housing Bubble.

In a scholarly paper on the subject, Thornton cautions not to use this strange correlation “as a guide to fiscal and monetary policy” or, superstitiously, an excuse to regulate “skyscraper heights . . . to prevent economic crisis.”

But the connection between building heights and boom-and-bust remains suggestive. Extra-big skyscrapers rise during extra-big booms, themselves fueled by central bank credit inflation. That is, inflation — and its usual consequences (which include unexpected deflation and financial collapse).

If only our central banks could maintain a stable money supply, rather than constantly tinkering with money to fine-tune the economy, our biggest buildings might not serve as such good predictors of our biggest economic downturns.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
Accountability national politics & policies

The Last Dark Chapter?

Last week, the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues revealed that United States federal government researchers purposely infected unwilling Guatemalans with deadly sexually transmitted diseases (syphilis, gonorrhea and chancroid) back in the 1940s.

Between 1946 and 1948, U.S. personnel experimented on more than 5,000 Guatemalans — including prisoners, mental patients, and even children — without their consent. At least 83 Guatemalans died during the project.

In at least one case, a woman dying from the syphilis she had been given was infected with other diseases to boot. Unconscionable.

One commission member, Raju Kucherlapati of Harvard Medical School said, “These researchers knew these were unethical experiments, and they conducted them anyway.”

Anita Allen of the University of Pennsylvania added, “These are very grave human rights violations.”

Commission chair Amy Gutmann pointed out that, “This is a dark chapter in our history. It is important to shine the light of day on it.”

She’s right. And note that this dark crime was committed by members of America’s “greatest generation.” When some people have power over others bad things seem to happen — throughout history, even among people like us. Not surprisingly, holding power accountable, especially when it’s exercised thousands of miles or oceans away, has proven mighty difficult.

This ought not be repeated. If we are the government, we must do something about it. But in an era of secret CIA prisons, what’s really to prevent it from happening again?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
Accountability national politics & policies

Mann FOIA Dump

Michael Mann’s Last of the Mohicans was a great film.

But the work of Michael Mann the climatologist?

Quite another story.

He’s the biggest name behind the much-disputed “hockey stick” graph of world temperatures — the “hockey stick” being the shape of the upward temperature spike in recent times. Mann was also one of the biggest offenders in the Climategate scandal, where emails showed more politicking than objectivity going into how climate models were concocted and presented to the public.

In May, a Virginia state judge ordered the University of Virginia to release Mann’s data and emails under the state’s Freedom of Information Act. Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli and the American Tradition Institute (ATI), smelling something fishy in Mann’s work, sued for access to the basic data. ATI now has a disk with info, saying the info dump is about a third of what they requested.

ATI folks haven’t had time to study the data.

Mann has been exonerated from the charge of “research misconduct” by the National Science Foundation — the organization found no “direct evidence” of “data fabrication or data falsification.” Still, Mann’s obvious bias continues to do more than raise eyebrows.

Ronald Bailey, who reports on all this for Reason, yearns to make FOIA battles superfluous. He urges “publicly funded researchers” to place their raw data up on the Internet for public testing — true transparency (and completely in the spirit of scientific method).

Well, that might happen . . . after a few more FOIA battles.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.