Categories
free trade & free markets ideological culture insider corruption

Billions and Billionaires

Where do billionaires come from?

Douglas French, president of the Ludwig von Mises Institute, reminds us where the term “millionaire” came from. It was

coined in 1720 during John Law’s “Mississippi Bubble” to describe those making vast fortunes in Law’s Mississippi Company stock that rose from 150 livres to 10,000 in the matter of months. But just as quickly, the stock and the currency wildly inflated by Law’s Banque Royale, crashed and Law was forced into exile.

Today’s plethora of billionaires — which in 15 years has increased fivefold — is (argues French) at least in part the result of Ben Bernanke’s monetary manipulations. He’s the John Law of our time. “What were once Law’s millionaires are now Bernanke’s billionaires. . . . Bernanke has been on the job for six years, and the Gates, Buffetts, and Slims of the world are reaping the benefit. But for how long?”

Keeping track of today’s billionaires has become both a form of popular entertainment (Forbes’s list) as well as a topic for careful study. The political “philanthropy” of George Soros and Charles Koch inspires both enthusiasm and dread in activists, left and right; Warren Buffett has become something of a hero to the 99 percenters, what with his repeated pitches for higher taxes on the rich.

But Buffett is a sly one. He makes his money in a variety of ways — one of which Peter Schiff recently explained: “Buffett actually stated in September 2008 that he would not have invested in Goldman Sachs if not for the implicit guarantee of federal assistance. As a result, he profited at the expense of taxpayers at the very time when they were losing their savings in the markets.”

Not all billionaires are created equal.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
Today

United States v. The Amistad

On March 9, 1841, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the case, United States v. The Amistad, that captive Africans who had seized control of the ship carrying them across the Atlantic Ocean had been taken into slavery illegally. Abolitionists returned the 35 men and boys and three girls to Africa.

Categories
Thought

John Adams

“There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty.”

Categories
political challengers

Quietly, Stunning

Wouldn’t it be nice to replace our entire current Congress with brand new people?

Tuesday’s Ohio Republican Primary was a start. Congresswoman Jean Schmidt lost to challenger Brad Wenstrup, a surgeon and Iraq war veteran. As Dennis Catanese at Politico intriguingly put it, Schmidt was “quietly upended in stunning fashion.”

“Stunning” — because incumbents virtually always win, especially in their own party primaries. According to the Alliance for Self-Governance, “God recalls incumbents more frequently than voters do.” Between 2002 and 2008, only twelve congressional incumbents lost in their primary elections, while thirteen died in office.

“Quietly” — because some folks didn’t see it coming. Sadly, not everyone reads Common Sense. Back in February, I said there may be “no better Valentine for our Republic” than the effort by a new SuperPAC, the Campaign for Primary Accountability, which targets incumbents for defeat in primary elections.

The Campaign goes after both Republicans and Democrats. Further, “[w]e are not issue-driven,” says Curtis Ellis, the group’s spokesman, who declares the goal is simply “holding incumbents accountable.”

Made possible through the new campaign finance rules won in the Citizens United court decision, the Super PAC has raised $1.8 million and spent $200,000 against Schmidt. Their Web advertisement squarely told voters:

Congresswoman Jean Schmidt was named “most corrupt” by a Washington watchdog group. Schmidt voted to increase your taxes by opposing a tax cut extension. Then, Schmidt increased the federal debt by $2.8 trillion. One bailout vote gave $50 billion to the parent company of her husband’s employer. Rock the boat. Vote in the March 6 Primary. It’s time to end Schmidt’s cruise.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
Thought

From “African Slavery In America,” (1775). The author is believed to be Thomas Paine.

“That some desperate wretches should be willing to steal and enslave men by violence and murder for gain, is rather lamentable than strange. But that many civilized, nay, Christianized people should approve, and be concerned in the savage practice, is surprising; and still persist, though it has been so often proved contrary to the light of nature, to every principle of Justice and Humanity, and even good policy, by a succession of eminent men, and several late publications.”

Categories
Today

Selma Bloody Sunday, Remagen Bridge, Rhineland occupied, Bell telephone

On March 7, 1965, Alabama state troopers and local sheriff’s deputies attacked a group of 600 civil rights marchers with tear gas and billy clubs as they reach Selma’s Edmund Pettus Bridge. Two weeks after Selma’s “Bloody Sunday,” 3,200 citizens marched for four days to Montgomery where 25,000 people protested at the capitol.

On March 7, 1945, American troops seize the strategic Ludendorff Bridge over the Rhine River at Remagen, the last remaining bridge over the Rhine River into Germany’s heartland. The bridge allowed the Allies to immediately move tanks and supply trucks across the Rhine.

On March 7, 1936, Hitler sent military forces into the Rhineland, a demilitarized zone along the Rhine River in western Germany, in violation of the Treaty of Versailles, which ended World War I.

On March 7, 1876, Alexander Graham Bell patented the telephone.

Categories
Thought

Alexander Graham Bell (1847-1922)

“America is a country of inventors, and the greatest of inventors are the newspaper men.”

“The nation that secures control of the air will ultimately control the world.”

Categories
ideological culture

Into Each Life, a Little Romney Falls

Some things I just “don’t get.”

How can either pro-lifers or Obamacare opponents trust Mitt Romney? Sure, he says he’s pro-life and he pledges to repeal the Democrats’ health care reform package. But for years he said he was for abortion rights; he switched in what’s been called a “flip-flop-flip” while governor of Massachusetts. Further, he signed into law the state’s health care program that served as Obamacare’s blueprint.

Not exactly a resumé upon which to build trust.

It’s tough to change the status quo. Perhaps that very fact drives many to such improbable avatars as Mitt.

But it’s even tougher to change the weather, and that’s also in the news.

Pat Robertson says that if we’d pray more, we’d be hit with fewer tornadoes.

I understand that prayer can have healing powers; I recognize that the theory of Divine influence on natural phenomena has a long, august history. But I learned, long ago, that rain (along with other natural occurrences) falls upon both the just and the unjust.

I read that somewhere.

But then, proponents of anthropogenic global warming think driving cars, burning coal and raising cows causes harsher storm weather, too — and that if we’d all just ride bicycles to work, we’d have Robertson’s promised “fewer tornadoes” — so perhaps implausible-to-me meteorological causation has a fairly universal appeal.

When left and right converge on the weather, it’s time to return to subjects I know more about. (Stay tuned. I’ll be here.)

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
general freedom U.S. Constitution

A Serious Mistake

“I have signed this bill,” President Barack Obama said months ago about the National Defense Authorization Act, “despite having serious reservations with certain provisions that regulate the detention, interrogation and prosecution of suspected terrorists.”

Those provisions include the indefinite detention of U.S. citizens without trial.The Fifth Amendment

Former President George W. Bush had tried that with Jose Padilla; now, courtesy of President Obama’s signature, the policy is codified into law.

“Let me be clear,” U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder told a university audience yesterday, “an operation using lethal force in a foreign country, targeted against a U.S. citizen who is a senior operational leader of al Qaeda or associated forces, and who is actively engaged in planning to kill Americans, would be lawful . . .”

Holder goes on to say that “a thorough and careful review” by the government would be required, and that capture must not be “feasible,” and that the hit be “conducted in a manner consistent with applicable law of war principles.”

But something is missing. There’s absolutely no check on this awesome power. No due process. No day in court to contest the government’s “thorough and careful review” and avoid an unjustified death by bullet or drone strike.

Moreover, these extraordinary powers, which obliterate all basic legal protections going back to 1215 AD, are for the execution of an undeclared war against a concept, “terrorism,” vague enough to provide a state of permanent war.

Asked about Holder’s position, presidential candidate Ron Paul warned, “If the American people accept that, it’d be a serious mistake.”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
Thought

Davy Crockett, who represented Tennessee in the U.S. House for three terms and died on this date in 1836 at the Alamo

“We have the right as individuals to give away as much of our own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right to appropriate a dollar of the public money.”

“I would rather be beaten, and be a man, than to be elected and be a little puppy dog.”