This is a telling post from Michelle Malkin. Pat downs and naked body scanners? Do you think SOME profiling might be more effective?
http://michellemalkin.com/2010/11/27/just-another-bomb-plotting-jihadist-yelling-allahu-akbar/
Need I explain?
Monday, November 29, 2010
Friday, October 15, 2010
Mama Grizzlies?
Anyone notice the women's movement in the Tea Party wing of the Republican party? I am amazed that even this does not get reported in the broader media. It is fairly obvious and should be a big story. Let's check out the roll call of news makers in this election from the Republican side. (if I were in journalism, I could easily find more to add)
Sharron Angle, vying for Harry Reid's Senate seat in Nevada.
Christine O'Donnell, running against incumbent Chris Coons in NR.
Michelle Bachmann, someone who is increasingly driving news on the Right.
Kristi Noem, running for Congress in South Dakota.
Meg Whitman, running for Governor of California.
Carly Fiorina, trying to take down long time incumbent Barbara Boxer in California.
Nikki Haley, running for Governor in South Carolina.
We all know Sarah Palin but she's really old news. My inclination is to credit her for inspiring a lot of what she calls "Mama Grizzlies" to break out into the larger political arena.
I'm not even commenting on the individuals and their politics. I don't know most of them that well. But it is slap-you-in-the-face obvious that there is female movement in politics coming from the Right and no one in the news is talking much about it. Is that a sign that Women as a downtrodden minority have moved out of the category altogether? Or is it just a sign that feminism isn't a gender driven idealogy but a political one, rejecting the "progress" of their more conservative brethren? Is my use of "brethern" appropriate in referring to the female gender?
So many questions. So few answers.
Sharron Angle, vying for Harry Reid's Senate seat in Nevada.
Christine O'Donnell, running against incumbent Chris Coons in NR.
Michelle Bachmann, someone who is increasingly driving news on the Right.
Kristi Noem, running for Congress in South Dakota.
Meg Whitman, running for Governor of California.
Carly Fiorina, trying to take down long time incumbent Barbara Boxer in California.
Nikki Haley, running for Governor in South Carolina.
We all know Sarah Palin but she's really old news. My inclination is to credit her for inspiring a lot of what she calls "Mama Grizzlies" to break out into the larger political arena.
I'm not even commenting on the individuals and their politics. I don't know most of them that well. But it is slap-you-in-the-face obvious that there is female movement in politics coming from the Right and no one in the news is talking much about it. Is that a sign that Women as a downtrodden minority have moved out of the category altogether? Or is it just a sign that feminism isn't a gender driven idealogy but a political one, rejecting the "progress" of their more conservative brethren? Is my use of "brethern" appropriate in referring to the female gender?
So many questions. So few answers.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Free Trade
Free trade is a highly volatile subject to discuss in any forum. It means so many different things to different people. A lot of how you feel about the subject I think has to do with your initial political or intellectual bent.
Being in business, free trade is a good thing. It means being allowed the freedom as a businessman to do what you do best and compete for customers fairly. The USA has long been a proponent of free trade and by and large lives by what it preaches. There have been instances where we haven't but that should not be used as a straw man argument to claim we are hypocrites. We've created free trade in the international community as much as any nation before us.
What often confuses people is the disruptions that are caused because of free trade. If my business makes an innovative product in the USA and decides to newly export that innovative product to say Australia. The result in Australia may be that I take business from a local supplier/producer resulting in job losses to Australians. However, the ultimate result is that Australian producers either change to compete with me or fail. Either way my innovative product (cheaper?, faster?, etc.) is now available to Australian consumers. THEY WIN EITHER WAY. If you are one of those workers that loses the job, you may not see this as fair.
However, what you can say is that the best (however the market defines that) won out and the result is more effective and efficient use of the capital in the industry and better products for the consumers. In the long run, this creates wealth.
The alternative viewpoint tends to argue that there is somehow a limit on the wealth in this world and business is about hoarding as much of it for yourself and your business as you can. This is way too static a model for wealth creation and is disproven in numerous ways.
I was arguing recently about Chinese protectionism after reading an article by Robert Samuelson in the Washington Post on the subject. He points out the protectionist policies of the Chinese government via currency control. This violates rules in free trade in the world. No one calls them on it for fear of retaliation - no one wants that scenario. But after repeated persuasive tactics, nothing has really changed. The call to do something more forceful is real.
What should have happened with China in a free trade situation is that as the Chinese export economy grew due in large part to the abundance of cheap labor, the Chinese renminbi should have risen in value via inflation due to the robust economy in China. This would have valued the cheap Chinese labor ever so less cheap until the point at which the export driven economy would have been tempered. Business might look elsewhere (India?, Indonesia?, Africa?) for that cheaper labor supply. China's economy would have seen a nice increase in the standard of living due to the rising wages and increasing buying power of a stronger currency and thus moved more toward a domestic consumption balance. The result is a win-win for the world economy and Chinese trading partners. Do some US jobs get lost in the process? Yes. But, they are jobs that could have likely moved somewhere besides China as well. And, presumably a stronger domestic Chinese economy would have allowed US businesses to increasingly sell products there.
That hasn't happened. And it isn't going to happen to any large extent as long as the Chinese government holds the value of the renminbi artificially low. The buying power of the Chinese consumer is depressed and the export capability continues untempered creating big trade imbalances. This is not healthy. It creates an unfair trade situation and the currency imbalances promote unhealthy economic situations like we have now. The consumer economy becomes debt dependent and the producer economy has its wealth depressed, addicted to exports.
At some point this pot will boil over. I can already hear it bubbling from where I sit.
Being in business, free trade is a good thing. It means being allowed the freedom as a businessman to do what you do best and compete for customers fairly. The USA has long been a proponent of free trade and by and large lives by what it preaches. There have been instances where we haven't but that should not be used as a straw man argument to claim we are hypocrites. We've created free trade in the international community as much as any nation before us.
What often confuses people is the disruptions that are caused because of free trade. If my business makes an innovative product in the USA and decides to newly export that innovative product to say Australia. The result in Australia may be that I take business from a local supplier/producer resulting in job losses to Australians. However, the ultimate result is that Australian producers either change to compete with me or fail. Either way my innovative product (cheaper?, faster?, etc.) is now available to Australian consumers. THEY WIN EITHER WAY. If you are one of those workers that loses the job, you may not see this as fair.
However, what you can say is that the best (however the market defines that) won out and the result is more effective and efficient use of the capital in the industry and better products for the consumers. In the long run, this creates wealth.
The alternative viewpoint tends to argue that there is somehow a limit on the wealth in this world and business is about hoarding as much of it for yourself and your business as you can. This is way too static a model for wealth creation and is disproven in numerous ways.
I was arguing recently about Chinese protectionism after reading an article by Robert Samuelson in the Washington Post on the subject. He points out the protectionist policies of the Chinese government via currency control. This violates rules in free trade in the world. No one calls them on it for fear of retaliation - no one wants that scenario. But after repeated persuasive tactics, nothing has really changed. The call to do something more forceful is real.
What should have happened with China in a free trade situation is that as the Chinese export economy grew due in large part to the abundance of cheap labor, the Chinese renminbi should have risen in value via inflation due to the robust economy in China. This would have valued the cheap Chinese labor ever so less cheap until the point at which the export driven economy would have been tempered. Business might look elsewhere (India?, Indonesia?, Africa?) for that cheaper labor supply. China's economy would have seen a nice increase in the standard of living due to the rising wages and increasing buying power of a stronger currency and thus moved more toward a domestic consumption balance. The result is a win-win for the world economy and Chinese trading partners. Do some US jobs get lost in the process? Yes. But, they are jobs that could have likely moved somewhere besides China as well. And, presumably a stronger domestic Chinese economy would have allowed US businesses to increasingly sell products there.
That hasn't happened. And it isn't going to happen to any large extent as long as the Chinese government holds the value of the renminbi artificially low. The buying power of the Chinese consumer is depressed and the export capability continues untempered creating big trade imbalances. This is not healthy. It creates an unfair trade situation and the currency imbalances promote unhealthy economic situations like we have now. The consumer economy becomes debt dependent and the producer economy has its wealth depressed, addicted to exports.
At some point this pot will boil over. I can already hear it bubbling from where I sit.
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
The first world tax
I don't know if anyone saw this article. I found the link on Drudge...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global/2010/apr/20/imf-tax-global-banks
They (the G20) are seriously considering implementation of the first world tax. Tax those obscene profits of banks! Do people really not understand that these taxes really will come from those who use banks and banking services? (i.e. nearly everyone)
This is just more re-distribution of wealth and its not even hidden. The UK paper refers to it as a Robin Hood tax and mentions how anti-poverty groups are chomping at the bit.
If you want to get your country and its people out of poverty, stop fighting and start producing. There are a lot of charitable people who would voluntarily share their money with you if you show an ability to put it good use.
My big question is who exactly gets to decide what is done with this money? From what authority do they derive that ability? I'm not a conspiracy theorist but I do think there is a critical mass of people in the world who believe in oligarchy - rule by the elites who know best.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global/2010/apr/20/imf-tax-global-banks
They (the G20) are seriously considering implementation of the first world tax. Tax those obscene profits of banks! Do people really not understand that these taxes really will come from those who use banks and banking services? (i.e. nearly everyone)
This is just more re-distribution of wealth and its not even hidden. The UK paper refers to it as a Robin Hood tax and mentions how anti-poverty groups are chomping at the bit.
If you want to get your country and its people out of poverty, stop fighting and start producing. There are a lot of charitable people who would voluntarily share their money with you if you show an ability to put it good use.
My big question is who exactly gets to decide what is done with this money? From what authority do they derive that ability? I'm not a conspiracy theorist but I do think there is a critical mass of people in the world who believe in oligarchy - rule by the elites who know best.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Liberty & Equality. I saw this title on the Big Government web site for an article. I briefly scanned the intro and liked the topic. As the intro there states, they are two values to which Americans naturally gravitate. They are in our value system and have been for some time, but they are not the same nor are they related closely.
Liberty relates to freedoms. In our value system as reflected in the Declaration of Independence, there are liberties that are "self-evident" and "endowed by our Creator". But we protect liberties generally in our Constitution and its Bill of Rights. That is why the Constitution is a document of negative rights as President Obama has been quoted as saying. He shouldn't be regretful of this. It is a thing of beauty and what separates our Constitution from say that of the EU with its 2000+ pages of what the EU government should do for its people.
Equality is entirely different. Equality is an outcome. It is also subjective in the social world. The fact of nature is that humans are not equal. We're not all the same height, weight, gender, skin color, ability, interests, and talents. To try to make us equal requires some all-knowing Judge to determine the equality. And that my friends is where it breaks down. Those who strive for equality in the world are often those who want to be the Judges. Marxism as it is practiced has always (show me an example where it hasn't) led to an oligarchy or autocracy. Think Russia with its Communist party leaders or similar in China. Think of current day Venezuela with Chavez playing the role of all-knowing Judge for his country.
I see this in the US today with the liberals complaining of excessive profits at companies and how unfair that is to "the people". We need to be careful. Government cannot and should not try to guarantee equality. It is contrary to our nature and ultimately the effort to achieve it comes at the expense of liberties of individuals. You have to take from some to be able to give to others.
Liberty relates to freedoms. In our value system as reflected in the Declaration of Independence, there are liberties that are "self-evident" and "endowed by our Creator". But we protect liberties generally in our Constitution and its Bill of Rights. That is why the Constitution is a document of negative rights as President Obama has been quoted as saying. He shouldn't be regretful of this. It is a thing of beauty and what separates our Constitution from say that of the EU with its 2000+ pages of what the EU government should do for its people.
Equality is entirely different. Equality is an outcome. It is also subjective in the social world. The fact of nature is that humans are not equal. We're not all the same height, weight, gender, skin color, ability, interests, and talents. To try to make us equal requires some all-knowing Judge to determine the equality. And that my friends is where it breaks down. Those who strive for equality in the world are often those who want to be the Judges. Marxism as it is practiced has always (show me an example where it hasn't) led to an oligarchy or autocracy. Think Russia with its Communist party leaders or similar in China. Think of current day Venezuela with Chavez playing the role of all-knowing Judge for his country.
I see this in the US today with the liberals complaining of excessive profits at companies and how unfair that is to "the people". We need to be careful. Government cannot and should not try to guarantee equality. It is contrary to our nature and ultimately the effort to achieve it comes at the expense of liberties of individuals. You have to take from some to be able to give to others.
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