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November 28, 2003

A Sting Operation Against the Neocon Men

The Washington Post's David Ignatius cuts through the hype of the neocon Weekly Standard's "scoop" of the "leaked" neocon memo from Douglas Feith. Turns out a captured Iraqi spy, who at this point seems to have little incentive to protect Saddam Hussein and every incentive to tell the administration what it wants to hear, says that while Iraq and al Qaeda had some tentative contacts for a number of years, Saddam decided against joining forces with bin Laden. This, too, is in the Weekly Standard piece; but somehow the neocons would rather dismiss this, along with everything the CIA and British intelligence have been saying all along, in order to keep up the fiction that Saddam and bin Laden were best buddies. Then again, with every other justification for the war up in smoke, they have to do something to keep the sheeple on their side.

(Thanks to Antiwar.com for the link.)

Posted by Mike Tennant at 01:59 PM | Comments (201)

November 26, 2003

Eat Too Many Donuts on Duty? Not to Worry!

Did you know that the federal government already has a Public Safety Officers' Benefits program, which provides death and disability benefits to policemen and firemen?

Well, now Congress is expanding the program to provide death benefits for these "public safety officers" if said officers have "a fatal heart attack or stroke in the line of duty or while training." Not only that, the heart attack need not take place while one is on duty. If it happens within 24 hours after "stressful or strenuous duty," the survivors can still collect.

Nice as it may sound to provide benefits for these folks, one wonders why it's the federal government's job rather than that of the state and local governments that hire these people. In addition, the only way the feds can provide said benefits is to steal the money from other people, which means then that, say, barbers or hamburger flippers or accountants will have that much less money either to pass on to their survivors or to purchase insurance to provide benefits to their survivors. Then again, those folks don't work for the government (at least not after May or June of each year), so they don't count. The government protects its own; the rest of us can go to you-know-where in a certain kind of basket.

Posted by Mike Tennant at 01:30 PM | Comments (187)

PC on the Government Plantation

"Los Angeles County officials have gone PC (politically correct) on PCs (personal computers) -- banning as potentially "offensive or defamatory" the words master and slave from computer hard drives and video equipment where they are used to describe primary and secondary circuits," reports the LA Daily News.

The PC thought police are out in full force. Because one busybody bureaucrat with too much time (and taxpayers' money) on his hands complained to the "Office of Affirmative Action Compliance," the entire LA County government is now combing its offices to find all equipment labeled with the offending terms and ordering the companies that produce the equipment to change the labeling on future products if they want the county to purchase them.

If the offended party were really a slave, he wouldn't have been able to effect such a change, which proves how pointless the whole exercise is. Well, it's not pointless. It serves notice to all white people that they'd better kowtow to the commie left "diversity" crowd or have their every thought scrutinized--and punished.

Posted by Mike Tennant at 01:14 PM | Comments (186)

November 24, 2003

Blessed Are the Peacekeepers, for They Shall be Numerous

Looks like the Pentagon is planning on more Iraq-type wars. They're now "looking seriously at creating military forces that would be dedicated to peacekeeping and reconstruction after future conflicts."

If you're going to run an empire, you have to have troops to occupy and "keep the peace" in all your imperial territories.

The Post is kind enough to remind us:

"The move marks a reversal for the Bush administration, which came into office strongly resistant to peacekeeping missions and intent on trying to get Europeans and other allies to shoulder more of that burden."

This, of course, is not surprising, since the Bush administration has pretty much reversed everything that Dubya said while campaigning, especially when it comes to foreign policy. Remember how Bush was going to return honesty and integrity to the White House? Remember how Clinton was going to do that, too? For whose lies will the American people fall next?

Posted by Mike Tennant at 02:08 PM | Comments (301)

November 21, 2003

It's Enough to Give You a Heart Attack

Think OSHA is about making sure loose wires aren't dangling about your office, ready to electrocute you, or about checking the scaffolding on which window-washers stand? Think again.

The American Heart Association just announced a "formal alliance" with OSHA to "share best practices and technical knowledge on the prevention, management of risk factors, recognition of warning signs, and actions for early treatment related to heart disease and stroke." Right now they're just going to train people to use defibrillators. Tomorrow, of course, there will be mandated exercise equipment, exercise breaks, cafeteria selections, physical trainers, physicians, blood pressure monitors and medications, and so on.

Just when you think there's nothing left to regulate, they find something new.

Posted by Mike Tennant at 11:21 AM | Comments (206)

November 20, 2003

Limbaugh the Libertarian?

Rush today read this article, on the prescription drug bill, on his show and then, in the midst of it, added a very interesting comment. Paraphrasing Rush's comment to the best of my memory, it went something like this (quote from article comes first, followed by Rush's comment in italics):

"'America is in the throes of entitlement overstretch. (Or, as Niall Ferguson and Laurence Kotlikoff call it, fiscal overstretch.) Our policymakers - Republican and Democrat alike - are obsessed with coercing money out of one segment of the population in order to give it to another segment. This is far removed from the government's original mission. It is supposed to focus on providing services that the private sector is not good at providing, such as national defense, law enforcement, intelligence operations, diplomacy, national parks, transportation infrastructure, and environmental protection.'--although I'm inclined to believe the private sector could do a better job of providing even these things given how they're being provided today."

Rush assured his listeners on Monday that his time in rehab didn't turn him into a "linguine-spined liberal"; but did it, perhaps, start him down the road to libertarianism? We can only hope.

Posted by Mike Tennant at 01:14 PM | Comments (237)

Biased Reporting on Drugs--but from the Proper Perspective

I clicked on Lee McCracken's link to Mickey Kaus's blog (below); and lo and behold, on that very page was a link to an excellent piece by Charles P. Pierce on the subject of drugs and sports and the draconian laws that sports drug "scandals" tend to produce.

"Now, a society that truly valued its civil liberties would have laughed the Supreme Court majority that promulgated this foolishness [ruling that high school students who wish to participate in any extracurricular activity may be tested for drugs] right off the bench. But that was not, alas, the case. Now there's a new steroid and a new push to erect another new infrastructure of unworkable and draconian rules. That will last until another cagey scientist invents another steroid that the drug warriors haven't heard of, and then the whole process will start all over again, and we discover that we learned nothing from the tragic passing of Len Bias except how to be idiots with each other."

Posted by Mike Tennant at 11:50 AM | Comments (332)

The (Ongoing) Conservative Crack-Up

I recently wrote that "many who supported the Iraq war as a war of (preemptive) self-defense would balk at the notion that the U.S. should, or can, democratize the globe. So, if the administration really means to adopt this position, it risks alienating many of its supporters. "

Today blogger Mickey Kaus reports that George Will--who was pro-war--blasted Bush's Wilsonian attempt to foist democracy on Iraq in a recent speech:

"The Columnist's Manifesto: George Will actually delivered a provocative talk in exchange for the conservative Manhattan Institute's large Wriston Lecture fee last night--basically, he blasted the Bush administration's Iraq project as a misguided Wilsonian effort to bring American values to nations whose organic history makes them non-receptive. In a Unified Theory of What Annoys Me, Will painted Bush's failure to respect nations and their idiosyncratic integrity as perversely of a piece with EU and UN moves toward supra-national governance. ... Will was especially scathing about the Clinton/Blair idea of the global inevitability of democracy and this idea's precursor, the Marxist notion that capitalism will sweep away old loyalties and prejudices."

Though far from a libertarian, Will does represent a older, saner tradition of conservatism that emphasizes prudence and skepticism about utopian schemes for social change. It's nice to see that he is honest and principled enough to criticize an administration that seems to have embraced the opposite position.

Posted by Lee McCracken at 11:01 AM | Comments (160) | TrackBack

November 19, 2003

Operation Iron Hammer

From a friend, regarding the U.S. Army's Operation Iron Hammer in Iraq:

"I got a note from a buddy of mine in Iraq today. Regarding this
operation, he wryly noted that when you're a hammer, everything looks
like a nail."

Posted by Rob at 09:37 PM | Comments (217) | TrackBack

The Importance of The Taoists

From The Prehistory of Modern Economic Thought:
The Aristotle in Austrian Theory -- a Mises Institute working paper by Justin Ptak:

The Taoists, ancient Chinese political philosophers, hold an important place in the history of economic thought as they were the first cohesive school to advocate little or no interference by the government in economic and social affairs. The founder, Laozi, was a contemporary of Confucius from the state of Sung and a descendent of lower aristocracy of the Yin dynasty. The individual and his happiness was of paramount importance for Laozi. He [believed] that government with laws and regulations more numerous than the hairs of an ox was more to be feared than fierce tigers. The inaction?of government is what allows the individual and society to develop in harmony.

Test your views on economics by taking this quiz.

Posted by George F. Smith at 08:21 PM | Comments (171) | TrackBack

Sure, Bush is Bad, but...

I still haven’t quite figured out what motivates the intense personal hatred displayed for George Bush among people on the left. I strongly disagree with his policies, but have a hard time seeing him as uniquely evil among U.S. presidents.

For instance, British writer Brendan O’Neill reminds us that Bush’s foreign policy, however terrible, hardly represents a radical break:

“[Molly] Ivins says that where previous president Bill Clinton merely lied about 'a squalid affair that was none of anyone else's business anyway', Bush lied us into war by exaggerating the threat posed by Saddam's weapons of mass destruction. She seems to have a short memory. President Clinton bombed Baghdad, in Operation Desert Fox in 1998, claiming that 'Saddam must not be allowed to threaten his neighbours with nuclear weapons, poison gas or biological weapons'. He and Blair also launched the Kosovo War in 1999 on dubious grounds - including the claim that the Serbs had killed 100,000 Kosovans. The total body count of civilians killed in Kosovo from 1997 to 1999, including by Clinton and Blair's air strikes, stands at 3,000.

“You could be forgiven for thinking that Bush was the first president ever to launch a war. What about Harry Truman, who nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing 180,000 civilians, even though US officials were aware that Japan was on the verge of surrendering? Or Lyndon Johnson, who told the Gulf of Tonkin lie in order to kickstart the Vietnam War, which killed two million Vietnamese? Or Richard Nixon, who expanded the Vietnam War to Cambodia, again on highly dubious grounds, killing thousands more civilians?”

I think the way many anti-war people have personalized their cause by focusing so much on Bush the man may turn out to be their undoing. Listening to some of the rhetoric might lead you to believe that if we just elected, say, Howard Dean, everything would be just peachy.

But in a column in the Washington Post the other day, Robert Kagan dispelled the notion that Dean is some kind of raving peacenik:

“Howard Dean is no George McGovern. He opposed the Iraq war, he says, because it was ‘the wrong war at the wrong time,’ not because it was emblematic of a fundamentally misguided American foreign policy….Dean does not call for a reduction in American military power but talks about using the "iron fist" of our "superb military."

Kagan Concludes:

“The bigger implication, which the rest of the world should note well, is that the general course of American foreign policy is fairly stable and won't be soon toppled -- not even by Howard Dean.”

And Dean is the antiwar candidate!

The point is that the U.S. policy of worldwide hegemony is a longstanding, deeply entrenched, bipartisan affair. A truly radical challenge to interventionism and warmongering will have to come from outside the system altogether.

Posted by Lee McCracken at 05:04 PM | Comments (183) | TrackBack

The Relentless Pursuit of the Truth?

I guess it should be no surprise that a non-scientific, self-selecting poll at CNSNews.com shows that 90% of the site's visitors believe that the links between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda are "significant," versus 3% who think they are "fleeting and unimportant" and 2% who think there are "no links."

The "conservative" site today has an article titled "Possible Saddam/Bin Laden Alliance Keeps Nation Gripped." Frankly, I think the nation is more gripped by Michael Jackson's latest travails, but we'll take their word for it. The article starts out by mentioning the neocon memo from Douglas Feith which was leaked to the neocon Weekly Standard without bothering also to mention that the Pentagon has debunked this memo (as linked on the STR home page today). They go on to point out that the Democrats have been caught using the intelligence failures for (gasp!) political gain; and then they restate most of the claims of the administration while only offering, in a few instances, other people's opinions that these claims are false, to make it appear that there is merely a difference of opinion about Saddam-bin Laden links rather than actual facts to disprove them.

Is it any wonder, then, that readers of this and other neocon sites masquerading as conservative sites believe there are "significant" links? It's a shame that so many average Americans with genuinely conservative instincts are being duped by these clowns. It seems that the "relentless pursuit of the truth" (as Rush Limbaugh puts it) on the official Right stops whenever the truth gets in the way of their political ambitions.

Posted by Mike Tennant at 01:23 PM | Comments (391)

Frank Dean: Definitely a Member of the RAT Pack

Subtle is not a word that could be applied to Howard Dean. While most of the other candidates try to appear moderate (even though we all know better), Dean has come out bluntly in favor of "re-regulation" of business. He proposes to re-regulate "utilities, large media companies and any business that offers stock options," which covers a huge number of businesses.

"In order to make capitalism work for human beings," says Dean, "you have to have regulation." Replace "human beings" with "politicians" (two largely mutually exclusive categories), and you're closer to the mark. For whom does capitalism work without regulation? Giraffes? Aardvarks? Platypuses? Regulation skews markets and makes capitalism work less well for human beings.

At least we can give Dean credit for being an honest socialist. The article ludicrously claims that Bush is "an outspoken advocate of free markets who wants to further deregulate media companies and other key sectors of the economy." Obviously Bush has fooled the gang at the Washington Post. Dean hasn't bothered to try.

Posted by Mike Tennant at 01:05 PM | Comments (283)

November 18, 2003

A Bill to Prevent Stealing

From a reader:

Every year Congress has some heart stopping legislation; I found one just last week. The bill is Senate Resolution 178, sponsored by Senator Dodd. It states: “Resolved, That (a) a Member of the Senate or any other person may not remove a work of art, historical object, or an exhibit from the Senate wing of the Capitol or any Senate office building for personal use.”

Yes, it seems that our elected officials have been stealing office supplies and antiquities.

That’s not all. Congressional Quarterly reported that the Senate had appropriated half a million dollars to buy back antiquities that were “filched” from the government buildings. So, they will pay the thief for returning the stolen property and no charges will be filed?

Posted by Rob at 06:36 PM | Comments (315) | TrackBack

You Can Speak Your Mind, but Not on My Time

Bono (no, not the late Sonny) uses the "F-word" on TV, and now the guardians of the Constitution--"pro-family groups," as this article puts it--want the FCC to ban such language from the airwaves. Presumably they would be up in arms if the FCC were to ban the use of the words "Jesus" or "church," but it's A-OK to pressure the government to ban speech they don't like. If they really got the "strict constructionist" judges they claim to want, those judges would rule the FCC and all its regulations unconsitutional, anyway. It all depends on whose ox is being gored.

I'm sympathetic to their cause--I hate to hear this kind of language, too--but I certainly disagree with their methods. If you don't like what's being said, change the channel or turn it off. I have a simple but effective method of doing this: I only watch reruns, mostly from the 1950s and '60s, or movies from that era and earlier. If a current movie isn't G-rated, I don't watch it (and even some current G-rated movies probably would have received a PG in earlier times). There are VCRs and DVD players and cable channels like TV Land. It's not like we're stuck with three networks anymore. Even better than watching old stuff is reading. Remember that quaint pastime?

Just remember: The weapons of coercion you wield today against your fellow man may be turned against you tomorrow. Think: RICO, PATRIOT Act, asset forfeiture, etc.

Posted by Mike Tennant at 03:42 PM | Comments (317)

November 17, 2003

Useful Idiots

Some immediate thoughts come to mind while reading. “ US agrees to international control of its troops in Iraq:"It’s bad enough that the treasonous cowards that make up the U.S. military willfully obey illegal orders to execute an illegal, unconstitutional war. Now they will take it a step further and become pawns and servants of a world government that neither shares nor reveres the principles and values of the people they claim to represent! And they do this while arrogantly, and without apparent conscious, violating their oath of “service” to, “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and
domestic.” What a bunch of phonies!

When will folks finally come to the realization that the soldiers, whose “service and heroism” they admire, are not what they appear to be. A critical examination will show they are nothing more than brain dead, brainwashed hacks, unable to think for themselves. They fail to grasp reality as they grab their ankles awaiting the next pleasurable thrust of The State. A skilled, dedicated soldier that lacks awareness, principles or a conscience is nothing more than a Nancy Boy with medals on his chest. What is also troubling is that there appears to be an endless supply of these misfits as new cannon fodder volunteers daily.

This turnover of allegiance from the US to the UN may have one positive result, however. I no longer have to feel sorry or regretful as US soldiers are picked off one after another by the Iraqi resistance. After all, they no longer can harbor the arrogant presumption that they are “fighting for us,” now can they?

Posted by Roger Young at 09:14 PM | Comments (243) | TrackBack

November 14, 2003

Names Bush won't mention

Jimmy Breslin writes about Staff Sgt. Morgan D. Kennon, age 23:

He was from the 101st Airborne in Fort Campbell, Ky. He never had a job. He went from Central High in Memphis to the Airborne. He picked a spot as rough as he could find. Then they sent him to war, proud and strong, and put him in front of a bank like a retired broken-down cop.

This is called nation building in Iraq. Repairing the infrastructure. Putting freedom into the country. Fighting terrorism.

Stand in front of a bank and get shot like he's guarding an ATM in Brooklyn.

Breslin covers the rest of the week's killed, people Bush and company would rather bury in the night and never mention.

Posted by George F. Smith at 06:16 PM | Comments (227) | TrackBack

Bush and the Founders

From an interview with Gore Vidal, author of Inventing a Nation:

[If Bush and Ashcroft had been around at the founding of the country they] would have been considered so disreputable as to not belong in this country at all. They might be invited to go down to Bolivia or Paraguay and take part in the military administration of some Spanish colony, where they would feel so much more at home. They would not be called Americans — most Americans would not think of them as citizens.

Posted by George F. Smith at 01:34 PM | Comments (390) | TrackBack

They're Syriaus Now!

The neocons at National Review Online are pretending less and less to be serious conservatives and are more and more showing their imperial colors. Today there's a piece by Jed Babbin flatly urging "regime change" in Syria. (Thanks to their friends at WorldNetDaily.com for plugging this link in a positive fashion.)

Why don't they just get it over with and admit that the U. S. should take over the world rather than messing around with one country at a time?

Posted by Mike Tennant at 08:54 AM | Comments (132)

November 13, 2003

Keith Richards, conservative

The Rolling Stones bad-boy guitarist loves his mum, donates to charity, eats shepherd's pie, and goes to church like a good traditional English lad. Or so says the Spectator.

Posted by Lee McCracken at 09:47 AM | Comments (210) | TrackBack

Knob Creek Machine Gun Shoot

LOUISVILLE COURIER JOURNAL - In October, West Point, Ky., hosted 12,000 visitors for the weekend Knob Creek Gun Range Machine Gun Shoot, billed as the nation's largest, with a separate competition for flame-throwers. Especially coveted is "The Line," where 60 people (waiting list is 10 years long to be admitted) get to fire their machine guns into a field of cars and boats, and during which a shooter might run through $10,000 in ammunition. Among the champions: Samantha Sawyer, 16, the top women's submachine gunner for the last four years. One man interviewed by the Louisville Courier-Journal said he met his wife at a previous Shoot, knowing that "if she could accept flame-throwing as a hobby, she could accept anything." Said another: "This is one of those times when you know this (the U.S.) is the greatest place on Earth."

Posted by Rob at 01:28 AM | Comments (242) | TrackBack

November 12, 2003

What's one Bush, more or less?

The following excerpt is from a Paul Krugman article:

Some say that Representative George Nethercutt's remark that progress in Iraq is a more important story than deaths of American soldiers was redeemed by his postscript, "which, heaven forbid, is awful." Your call. But it's hard to deny the stunning insensitivity of Bush's remarks back on July 2: "There are some who feel like that, you know, the conditions are such that they can attack us there. My answer is bring 'em on. We got the force necessary to deal with the security situation." Those are the words of a man who can't imagine himself or anyone close to him actually being in the line of fire.

To which I offer the following:

The Crocodile’s Toothache

by Shel Silverstein, from Where the Sidewalk Ends

The Crocodile
Went to the dentist
And sat down in the chair,
And the dentist said, “Now tell me, sir,
Why does it hurt and where?”
And the Crocodile said, “I’ll tell you the truth,
I have a terrible ache in my tooth,”
And he opened his jaws so wide, so wide,
That the dentist, he climbed right inside,
And the dentist, he laughed, “Oh isn’t this fun?”
As he pulled the teeth out, one by one.
And the Crocodile cried, “You’re hurting me so!
Please put down your pliers and let me go.”
But the dentist just laughed with a Ho Ho Ho,
And he said, “I still have twelve to go--
Oops, that’s the wrong one, I confess,
But what’s one crocodile’s tooth, more or less?”
Then suddenly, the jaws went SNAP,
And the dentist was gone, right off the map.
And where he went one could only guess . . .
To North or South or East or West . . .
He left no forwarding address.
But what’s one dentist, more or less?

Posted by George F. Smith at 04:59 PM | Comments (432) | TrackBack

Car 54, Where Are You?

The city of Pittsburgh is bankrupt because of typical government mismanagement and incompetence. (Now the mayor wants to tax the suburbs to bail him out.) Of course, as soon as the crunch began, the city cut back on the most essential services first so as to increase sympathy for the cause of tax increases. (Eliminating the hundreds or thousands of worthless, invisible, paper-pushing bureaucrats would not have had the same PR value.) One of the services cut back was the police department, in particular by closing a station in the city's West End, which all the critics insisted was sure to lead to an increase in crime.

Ten weeks have passed since the police station closed; and lo and behold, crime has not increased! The only real problem encountered is that the cops aren't hanging out in the coffee shop, munching doughnuts (and we're supposed to believe that's an unfair stereotype!). Otherwise, life goes on as usual. Hey . . . maybe we don't need the government's "protection" after all!

Posted by Mike Tennant at 09:21 AM | Comments (141)

November 11, 2003

Brits to Become Full-Fledged Slaves of the State

According to this story in the Independent (UK), Britons will be required to carry national id cards by 2013:

"Home Secretary David Blunkett said the scheme would include 'biometric' details such as someone's fingerprints or an image of their eye, stored on a microchip in each card."

Also interesting to note is how the receipt of government benefits will be tied to this new form of control:

"They will have to be produced to see a doctor, get a job and claim benefits."

And remember: it's all for the benefit of you the citizen:

"'What we know the public want, which is what we are now proposing, is a scheme that can provide them with a secure and convenient way of confirming their identity, to protect it from theft, tackle terrorism and organised crime and ensure free public services only go to those entitled to them.'"

Posted by Lee McCracken at 02:42 PM | Comments (352) | TrackBack

Lying in State

Butler Shaffer has written an excellent piece on the necessity of lies to prop up the state. He makes it clear that, regardless of who is in power, lying will occur.

"If a politician or government official were to tell me the time, I would check my watch for confirmation. And the basis for my wariness gets reconfirmed each day, as members of the political establishment announce new falsehoods. A friend of mine once told me that as a radio newscaster he was tempted to start his newscast with the comment: 'here are the lies your government would like you to believe today!'"

Posted by Mike Tennant at 09:12 AM | Comments (237)

November 10, 2003

They Won't Accept Their Own Legal Tender

Jean Butler's story as told by Marc Fisher (Washington Post, 11/09/03, free registration) gives us a laundry list of state abuses toward an uncooperative subject. Butler is assessed a $30 fine on the "public" road, charged $55 to facilitate the processing of her own fine, abused by "public servants" when she tries to pay the fine in the state's monopoly currency (pennies), and is evicted by armed "public servants" when she again attempts to acquiesce to their own demands using their own written rules. The story culminates to where she has been ordered into a state court with the threat of more fines and the suspension of her "privilege" to drive.

Naturally, Fisher never questions whether the system itself has any moral legitimacy at all.

Posted by Robert Jackson at 08:46 PM | Comments (215) | TrackBack

Lincoln Abe to the Left?! How Dare They!

The "conservatives" over at CNSNews.com are crowing because they think they've convinced the National Park Service to "unveil a 'more balanced' version of a video that's been shown since 1995 . . . at the Lincoln Memorial."

The video, which includes voice-over from Dishonest Abe (celebrity voice impersonated), features protests which have taken place near the memorial "in favor of abortion rights, homosexual rights, gun control, and against the Vietnam War." The conservatives are upset that this seems to imply that Lincoln would have supported these notions. They want footage of conservative protests added to the video; but, as the article notes, "there haven't been many conservative demonstrations at the memorial, which has been a focal point for liberals for many years."

Frankly, I doubt that even Lincoln, bad as he was, would likely favor abortion or homosexual "rights" (privileges, really); although as a consummate politician, he might very well have gone along with them if he thought it would get him votes. He quite possibly would have favored gun control, at least in regard to his opponents, and the Vietnam War (opposition to which did not arise solely from the Left), which fits in nicely with his own imperial conquest of the South. Nevertheless, isn't it telling that modern-day liberals seem to understand that Lincoln is the father of their beloved Leviathan State (hence their use of the memorial as a protest backdrop), but conservatives just don't get it?

Posted by Mike Tennant at 04:52 PM | Comments (198)

November 09, 2003

The art of legerdemain

Columnist Paul Jacobs, from his Common Sense email mailing of Nov. 9:

***************
COMMON SENSE
***************

"Let's Raise My Pay"

Every year Congress sits back and allows itself to
automatically accept an "automatic" pay raise. The
mechanism is the COLA, or Cost of Living Adjustment.

And every year I complain. Because I don't want to
ignore this self-serving conduct. Also because the
congressmen keep coming up with more crazy arguments.

People say that congressmen hand out pork to special
interests. Yes, and pay-raise-grabbing congressmen
are one of those special interests. Now senators will
be getting $158,000 a year, an increase of more than
$3,000.

The increase is "automatic." But thanks to a few
renegade colleagues the congressmen do have to show
their colors each year anyway. This time the Senate
had to vote 60-34 to reject a proposal to exempt
senators from the COLA. And there were the usual
incomprehensible rationales.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Republican,
says, "I think that our representatives of government
deserve a pay raise consistent with the work that
we've produced." Frist can't mean that, not really. I
would be happy to take him up on it but that means
the congressmen owe the U.S. taxpayers something like
4 trillion dollars.

Then there's Ted Stevens, the Republican who chairs
the Senate Appropriations Committee, which is the
central nexus of pork distribution. "This is not a
pay raise," stipulates Stevens. "This is an increase
that's required by law."

Uh, sir. It isn't required if you vote it down, is
it? And who do you think is making U.S. federal law
anyway? It's not the lawmaking body on Mars.

This is Common Sense. I'm Paul Jacob.

Can you believe a monstrosity such as Congress exists? It's as if the American people decided some time ago to commit suicide in the slowest, most painful, most humiliating way possible and came up with Congress as the solution.

Posted by George F. Smith at 10:42 AM | Comments (261) | TrackBack

November 07, 2003

Kenya Understand Why They're Upset?

Here in the "land of the free and the home of the brave," hardly anyone raises a peep when the PATRIOT Act and other horrendous laws are passed because it's all in the name of fighting terrorism.

In Kenya, on the other hand, they're actually fighting back against the laws before they are passed. What a concept!

Actually, the law sounds like the PATRIOT Act warmed over:

"Controversial aspects of the legislation include the possibility of life imprisonment, the extradition of suspects to other countries without the normal legal safeguards and powers for the police to detain terror suspects for unspecified time and to confiscate assets.

"The law also does not provide for compensation for anyone wrongly accused of terror activities. . . .

"Critics noted that terror suspects could be held without the right to contact family or legal representatives."

Naturally, the U. S. and Britain are using the possibility of cutting off World Bank and IMF funding to Kenya if the government doesn't pass this legislation. (Yes, we are friends of democracy, as long as "democracy" does what we say!) My advice to the Kenyans is this: Tell the U. S., Britain, the World Bank, and the IMF to stuff it. You'll be better off without their money and its consequent influence.

Posted by Mike Tennant at 10:51 AM | Comments (194)

Something's Not Kosher Here

If you wanted to know how best to combat a fire, wouldn't you seek out the most successful firefighters in the world and find out what they do? You certainly wouldn't seek out the government officials whose actions turned a small forest fire in California into a raging inferno.

Why, then, is the governor of Maryland, who supposedly wants to learn how to combat terrorism, meeting with officials in Israel? If there's one country in the world that has been a miserable failure at combating terrorism, it's Israel. Arguably, their anti-terrorism efforts have turned a small forest fire into a raging inferno. The Israelis are not the people to tell anyone how best to combat terrorism.

"The relationship between Israel and the state of Maryland has been extraordinarily strong for many decades, [and] it will continue to prosper under our administration," said the governor. What?! Since when do states set up relationships with foreign countries? Individual citizens get in trouble for taking foreign policy into their own hands, but it's okay for the state of Maryland to have an "extraordinarily strong" relationship with Israel?

All allies are equal, but some allies are more equal than others.

Posted by Mike Tennant at 10:31 AM | Comments (437)

November 05, 2003

Our paper-money monger

Today's Daily Reckoning, Last Man Standing, talks about Alan Greenspan and the precarious recovery:

In September '96, for example, Mr. Greenspan told his fellow central bankers: "I recognize there is a stock market bubble at this point." Then, referring to a suggestion that margin requirements be raised to dampen speculation: "I guarantee that if you want to get rid of the bubble, whatever it is, that will do it."

What became of these insights? What became of the Alan Greenspan of that era? He is no Volcker; the former Fed chief was made of sturdier stuff and was willing to go against the mob. Greenspan bent.

The Fed chief had already re-invented himself to suit his ambitions. Had not the gold-buggish Ayn Rand devotee remade himself into the greatest paper-money monger the world had ever seen...increasing the supply of dollars more than all the other Fed chiefs and U.S. Treasury secretaries combined? Had not the man who once wrote that gold was the only honest money already betrayed his own beliefs as well as the nation's currency?

Now what can he say...now that the only thing still keeping the world economy growing is the willingness of the poor, hapless consumer to keep 'extracting equity' from his home - that is, going deeper and deeper into debt - in order to continue spending?

It might take a global economic collapse to bring gold back.

Posted by George F. Smith at 07:24 PM | Comments (259) | TrackBack

November 04, 2003

Senate funds Bush's campaign coffers

The Senate yesterday gave Bush another $87.5 billion to spend. They voted by voice rather by roll call ostensibly for speed but coincidentally so they wouldn't be on record. The only "nay" vote was from Byrd. Call them what you want -- neocons, statists, looters -- but they don't represent American taxpayers. If we were to take a voice vote of the American taxpaying public -- the gullible, flag-waving, government-numbed public that gets its news from mainstream media sources -- how close do you think the results would be to the Senate's? Would there be only a handful of dissenters like Byrd? Or would they overwhelmingly agree with the Republican from Alaska who said "we will not leave the Iraqi people in chaos"? This is not money going for our defense. Whatever this war is, it is not about defending this country against attack. This is not money protecting us from terrorism. This is not money to make our troops safer -- ask the guys doing the fighting how to make them safer, and I've got a hunch most of them would suggest a one-way ticket home. This is 87.5 billion for Bush's re-election campaign.

Of course, these are not current year tax dollars -- if "we" were really so sacrificial as to hand over that kind of money, our tax bill would soar. How many Americans would go along with Bush then? Our nifty central bank will take care of the pain for now. Anyone who holds American dollars and pays taxes will eventually get the bill, but by then we'll be deep into the next crisis.

Posted by George F. Smith at 09:47 AM | Comments (270) | TrackBack

November 03, 2003

No Taxation Without Representation?

The story of Bremer's new flat tax on the Iraqi people, linked on the STR home page, got me to thinking.

Didn't the American colonists revolt against their colonial overlords under the slogan "No Taxation Without Representation?" Well, here we have a perfect example of taxation without representation. The Iraqis, "liberated" from the non-taxing (probably his only virtue) Saddam Hussein, are now being subjected to income taxation without representation. That sounds like reason enough to me for them to revolt against their colonial overlords. Of course, anyone who revolts will be declared a Saddam loyalist or foreign terrorist or other "dead-ender" who is only attacking because the U. S. is succeeding and because he hates freedom. Nobody would revolt simply to toss out a foreign occupier who now arrogates to himself the right to tax the people he claims to have liberated.

Still, if this is the tax policy of Bremer, I'd be happy to send Bush to Baghdad and Bremer to Washington. It ain't great, but it's a heck of a lot better than the system we have now.

Posted by Mike Tennant at 04:08 PM | Comments (314)

November 02, 2003

The downside to overseas outsourcing

So, the cheap labor overseas looks good to you -- you being the CEO of a US technology firm. According to a Reuters article, not every flower is a rose in those foreign markets.

Do you need reliable networks overseas? You might have to wait. India, for instance, has constant power outages.

Sixty-six percent of companies surveyed were disappointed with their outsourcing contracts, according to PA Consulting Group. "The survey shows only 39 percent of the companies would renew contracts with their existing outsourcing suppliers, and 15 percent planned to bring services back in-house."

Besides unreliable power, other pitfalls include security hazards, cultural differences, and logistics nightmares.

Most technology outsourcing is still done domestically, though the lower wages of India, Russia, and China are tempting. But the savings don't always offset the problems. Time differences between US and foreign companies can mean delayed customer queries. And how about the significant number of religious holidays in a country like India?

Nevertheless, the trend for now is strong -- work is being outsourced overseas.

Posted by George F. Smith at 09:50 AM | Comments (795) | TrackBack