Categories
Thought

W. F. Lloyd

Though nobody has ever seen two dogs making an exchange, yet a dog has been often seen to hide a bone. The dog does this from a sense of its value, properly so called. He does not do it merely from a sense of utility, or, in other words, because he likes a bone, but because he knows that a bone is a good thing which is not always to be had when wanted.

William F. Lloyd, “A Lecture on the Notion of Value as Distinguished Not Only From Utility, but also from Value in Exchange” (University of Oxford, 1833).

Categories
Today

A Farewell to Arms

On December 4, 1783, at Fraunces Tavern in New York City, General George Washington formally bade his officers farewell.

Categories
video

Video: The Deceptive Camera

Fake photography has mass repercussions on everyday life and experience:

It is worth noting that this site, ThisIsCommonSense.com, uses obviously manipulated photos. They are often collages, sometimes sketches or Photoshop cartoons. We have tried to be pretty forthright about this practice.

Categories
Today

Cold War Ends

On December 3, 1989, the leaders of the two world superpowers, the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, declared an end to the Cold War, at a summit in Malta. A little over two years later not only had the Cold War ended, the Soviet Union was itself dissolved.

Categories
Thought

Abraham Lincoln

Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the ax.

Categories
Accountability free trade & free markets insider corruption media and media people national politics & policies porkbarrel politics

Crony Carrier

Carrier, crony, cronyism, Trump, corporate, illustration

Sure, I’ve complained about the over-the-top anti-Trump bias of much of the mainstream media (which may actually have improved Trump’s public standing). But, today, I enthusiastically celebrate that supercilious slant.

Why? Because it means much of the media amazingly finds itself on the right side, panning the recent deal to save 1,000 jobs at the Carrier Corporation.

Saving jobs is good per se. We want jobs to stay here in America. But, at what price?

Thus far, the deal remains secret, but according to Politico, “The agreement reportedly includes $7 million in state tax breaks over ten years offered by the Indiana Economic Development Corporation, a quasi-public entity that doesn’t require legislative approval for its deals.”

“Quasi-public entities” always make me queasy.

“Can American companies now merely threaten to go to Mexico,” asks Chris Rossini in the Ron Paul Liberty Letter, “in order to get a sweetheart deal for themselves?”

This special arrangement’s costs are not merely monetary: Special deals for some companies at the expense of others undermine the whole concept of equality under the law.

File under: crony capitalism.

Even the socialists at The Nation say the agreement “epitomizes corporate socialism at the expense of American taxpayers.”

“I certainly think that, if President Obama had done something like this, conservatives would have been freaking out,” argues Reason’s Peter Suderman.

Many are. Well, maybe not exactly “freaking out” — but vocally opposing the idea of the not-quite-yet-president picking winners and losers in the marketplace.

Crony capitalism didn’t make America great. Our revolution’s justification prompts the antithesis.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

Carrier, crony, cronyism, Trump, corporate, illustration

 

Categories
Today

Monroe Doctrine

On December 2, 1823, U.S. President James Monroe delivered a speech establishing American neutrality in future European conflicts. The policy became known as the Monroe Doctrine.

Though a much-discussed principle of American foreign policy, it was undermined by the Spanish-American War, and proved a dead letter as the U. S. entered World War I.

Categories
Thought

James Madison

A popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy, or perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.

Categories
Accountability free trade & free markets insider corruption national politics & policies responsibility

United States of Corruption

Romney, Trump, crow, corruption, dinner, illustration

When Hillary Clinton assured her insider sponsors (as we learned through WikiLeaks) that there would be a crucial difference between what she tells the people and what her actual policies would be, she was not merely admitting to a private and a public face.

The President is legally, and by honor, bound to serve the American people, not Goldman-Sachs. What she was confessing to was more than the mere appearance of a conflict of interests.

She boasted a plan of betrayal.

In that light, President-elect Donald Trump’s international business deals seem . . . what? His first diplomatic meeting — with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe — included his daughter and partner-in-business Ivanka.

It seems to at least wander into conflict-of-interest territory, if not stake claim and hoist up a flag proclaiming Trumpistan America!

So I was very pleased, yesterday, when the President-elect vowed to step out from the running of his global business and branding empire.

Earlier, he had brushed off conflict-of-interest concerns, saying he could run his empire and . . . ours.

Apparently, his new White House appointees have convinced him that this business dealing while President was a huge problem. “I feel it is visually important,” he explained Wednesday morning, “as president, to in no way have a conflict of interest with my various businesses.”

Thanks, Steve Bannon?

Or, maybe, Mitt Romney, with whom he dined* the night before?

I hope Mr. Trump follows through with this, as well as distance himself from business partner Ivanka as unofficial policy advisor.

Americans did not reject Corrupt Hillary only to wind up with a Corrupt Trump set.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Printable PDF

Romney, Trump, crow, corruption, dinner, illustration

 

Categories
Thought

John Milton

Though all the winds of doctrine were let loose to play upon the earth, so Truth be in the field, we do injuriously, by licensing and prohibiting, to misdoubt her strength. Let her and Falsehood grapple; who ever knew Truth put to the worse, in a free and open encounter?

John Milton, Areopagitica; A speech of Mr. John Milton for the Liberty of Unlicenc’d Printing, to the Parlament of England (1644).