January 20, 2012
What if The GOP Loses?
In the wake of the Tea Party limited government wave in the 2010 election the GOP primaries are a bit of a disappointment.
Romney is a supporter and advocate of government run healthcare. That he thinks, for now, it should be the states running healthcare and not the federal government is a difference without a distinction. And I say for "for now" because the man seems entirely bereft of core principles.
Gingrich is an unprincipled, ethically and morally challenged bombast who though he occasionally makes sense, just as often leaves me scratching my head asking WTF? He also likes government solutions to everything, as long as they're his government solutions.
Rick Santorum is a party politician. That is all he is. He is not a leader. He is not a thinker. He is a politician. In my book that makes him slime.
Crazy old Ron Paul? I like his fiscal policy of don't spend any money you don't have. Unfortunately that same idea is the core of his foreign policy and it leads him to some outright looney positions. Positions that seem to be based entirely on short-term budget savings, but with no reference to what those policies might mean in the real world.
Republicans have managed to narrow the field down to this entirely uninspiring foresome, along the way reminding me of why I am not card carrying member of the Republican Party.
To borrow phrase from another GOP also ran, here's my unconventional endorsement. I unabashedly and whole heartedly support whomever the GOP nominates to run against The One.
I will support Romney despite RomneyCare. I will support Gingrich despite everything. I will support the party politician Rick Santorum. I will support Crazy Old Ron Paul despite his misguided isolationism.
There is simply too much at stake. Another four years of an administration that rules with complete disdain for its subjects and utter disregard for the Constitution is something from which we as a nation might never recover.
If The One wins reelection there will be no chance of repealing the federal takeover of healthcare.
If the example of Kelo v New London is any indication we cannot necessarily rely on the Supreme Court to uphold the Constitution and protect individual liberty from the rapaciousness of government's quest for power.
ObamaCare includes not only the liberty killing "individual mandate" but panels of government bureaucrats whose job will be to review healthcare treatments and determine if they are cost effective. Government will be involved with, if not directly making, every healthcare decision for every individual in the country.
Those individuals, all of us, will have no say in who is making those decisions. The One has clearly shown his complete disregard for the advice and consent authority of the Senate. The Constitution clearly states that one house of the Congress cannot be in recess without the consent of the other. The House of Representatives did not consent to a Senate recess over the Christmas and New Year holidays, therefore Constitutionally the Senate was not in recess. The One decided that since that interfered with his wishes he would simply ignore the law and the Constitution and make "Recess Appointments." The Constitution be damned he will have his way.
We cannot survive four more years of a lawless and unconstitutional government.
I don't have a high level of confidence that electing any of the current GOP hopefuls would result in reducing the scope and reach of the federal government. I would be pleasently surprised if they managed to stop its growth. Much more likely we will see what we always see, that once elected their need to go along to get along will result in merely a slowing of the rate of government expansion.
A second term for The One, however, would mean full steam ahead and don't look back at "what it once was like in America when men were free."
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 07:06 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
January 07, 2012
Virtually Sailing Around the World
Leg two of the Virtual Volvo Ocean race is complete. Cape Town South Africa to Abu Dhabi.
At times I was feeling poorly about my prospects. It is hard sometimes to pick a strategy and stick to it while your position in the fleet keeps getting worse and worse. But there is a valuable lesson to be learned in keeping to a long-term plan instead of going for the quick easy short term gain. Still, doubt creeps in when you see yourself fall to 48,000th place!
I stopped looking at leg rank and forced myself to focus on the weather, both current and forecast. THe point was not to be as close to the lead as possible sailing past Madagascar, but to be as close as possible to the lead at the finish line.
I knew for the start of the whole virtual adventure that winning a leg was probably not in the cards. I don't have the time to do nothing but virtually sail around the world. I wanted to finish as many legs as possible and the whole even in the top 10%. It's a goal that keeps getting easier, in part because more people keep joining the race!
My finish in Abu Dhabi? 9,089 with a total of 164,478 boats competing.
My current standing after two legs: 14,594. I'd love to get this number under 10k.
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 09:40 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
December 31, 2011
Another Year Older and Deeper In Debt
The year is over. I just had a birthday. That means it's time for quiet reflection and evaluation.
Or not.
With very little fanfare and an appalling lack of public awareness, let alone outrage, the public debt of the United States recently exceeded the U.S. Gross Domestic Product. Let that sink in for a moment. The national debt is now larger than the value of every good and service produced in the nation.
Upset yet?
The President is about to ask the Congress to increase the U.S. debt limit by $1.2 trillion, raising the "limit" $16.4 trillion. Congress is expected to approve this increase. And even if in a rare spasm of fiscal sanity they vote down the increase, the President has the authority to veto their disapproval.
Angry yet?
The Socialist solution to this is to raise taxes on the wealthy. They argue that if the wealthy pay their "Fair Share" the problem will be solved. Not quite. If the federal government seized every penny of wealth from those on the Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans the $1.5 trillion they got would do little more than cover that debt limit increase.
Dismayed yet?
When Congress gets around to budget issues, this is how it goes. (I'm using made up numbers.) The left wants to increase spending by 6%. The right says "no way" and proposes increasing spending by only 3%. The left screams and howls about how the uncaring right is slashing government and how people will suffer. They then reach a bipartisan agreement to increase spending by 4.5% with a promise to reduce spending in the future. The right crows about how much they "saved" and the left continues to howl about how much people will suffer from the draconian spending cuts. THEY DO NOT CUT SPENDING. EVER.
Angry yet?
A debt is an obligation to pay. How are we going to pay back the $15 trillion we currently owe if we're about to up that limit to $16.4 trillion? The answer is we can't. Certainly not as long as we continue to pile up massive annual deficits. The only options we have are to massively inflate the currency and pay our creditors with worthless dollars, or just simply not pay. Cutting spending to a level at which we can begin to buy back the debt is not something we as a nation appear to be willing to contemplate.
Consider your own life. What would happen if you decided that you were going to pay your mortgage or your car loan with Monopoly money or just not pay at all. Your creditors would come after you and seize the assets. One of our largest foreign creditors is Communist China. A nuclear power that recently launched it's first aircraft carrier. We owe them $1.16 trillion. OPEC nations, on whom we remain dependent for energy, currently hold a combined $229.8 billion in U.S. government securities. How do you think they will react when we stiff them on that debt?
Worried Yet?
As a nation we have been riding the gravy train of government social welfare systems for decades. We're quickly running out of track, and the derailment will not be pretty.
Do you care?
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 10:36 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
December 17, 2011
Dim Bulbs Of Government
I have seen some celebration of the Congress passing an omnibus spending bill containing a rider which temporarily defunds enforcement of the lightbulb ban.
The passing of another stop-gap massive spending bill that probably no member of Congress knows the contents of us hardly a cause for any sort of celebration. If they had let the government shut down for a while, I would have drunk a toast in their honor. The fact that Congress is so inept and so incapable of legislating that they repeatedly find themselves in in these do or die legislative crises is beyond deplorable.
Regarding the light bulb situation, my response amounts to So F'n What.
Full disclosure I don't have any 100 watt lightbulbs in my house. Though I may still have a couple in the garage. They're great in that sort of utility situation but for general lighting in the house I'd rather use 2 or 3 60 watt bulbs than a single 100. You get as much or more light spread more evenly around the room.
For me the issue is not about the practical impact of not having a particular light bulb on the market. It is about the fact that I am not free to make that choice. I am aware that there are compact florescent bulbs available for me to purchase. I know that even though they cost more they are allegedly more efficient and have a longer lifespan. Over time the savings on my electric bill should at least make up for the higher cost. Allegedly.
I have had some CFLs in the past. I dislike them immensely. I don't like waiting for them to come to full brightness and once they get there, the quality of the light is ugly. I have had them. I have used them. I do not like them.
Thus I choose to use incandescent bulbs. I choose them because I like them better. They come on at full strength and and, even if it's just from years of conditioning, I like the light they give off. They don't last as long but they are relatively inexpensive to replace.
The most meaningful phrase in all of that lighting discussion is "I choose to use." I am, for a little while longer apparently, free to choose what sort of lightbulb I use in my home.
If we accept as a matter of course the loss of the freedom to choose the lightbulb we wish to use, then where is the limit to how much liberty the government can take from us?
This temporary delay of the lightbulb ban is both meaningless and venal. Either the federal government has the authority to regulate and control our lives to the point where they are dictating what lightbulb we must use or they don't. Where are the members of Congress who will stand up for individual liberty and put a stop to this?
Congress achieved nothing with this stay of execution for the incandescent bulb. As usual the liberty and freedom of individual Americans was used as a political bargaining chip. We are supposed to be grateful to them for this temporary easing of the government boot to our necks. To hell with that. And to hell them.
And there's this.
I had a further thought on the practical implications of the postponement of the the lightbulb ban but since I really wanted to frame the issue in terms of government eliminating our freedom to make even the most basic choices in our lives I'm putting it in the extended entry below.
more...
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 12:10 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
December 11, 2011
How Not to Solve a Government Created Problem
Why is it that whenever the government creates a problem their solution always involves more government?
The answer is really very simply and really quite monstrous in its evil. The more they can inject government into your life the more deeply and thoroughly they can control your life.
Recently at New York's Kennedy Airport an 85 year old woman was subject to what amounts to a strip search. This is the result of a "security" system that treats everyone as an equally dangerous potential terrorist threat. Personally I wouldn't feel the least bit threatened if airport security wave 85 year old Alice Zimmerman through the least stringent security possible and offered her a cup of tea.
But in the interest of appearing politically correct any person traveling through an airport is treated as equally suspect. The result is intrusive searches of senior citizens and pat-downs of small children.
But have no fear. Two brave public servants have stepped forward with a proposal to deal with this scourge. And their solution to an out of control trampling on individual liberty and dignity government agency? You guessed it. More Government.
U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer and state Sen. Michael Gianaris of Queens want the Transportation Security Administration to create the position at all airports.
Great idea. Instead of doing anything about the problem let's create yet another layer of government to act as a go between and protect the public from the previous failed level of government.
Sometimes they make it really hard to be an optimist.
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 05:28 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
December 10, 2011
Primary Redundancy
I didn't do a search, so I can't provide links to back up this assertion, but I have a sense that I have written the same post in some form during every other presidential primary season or election since I started this blog on August 30, 2003.
The essence of the thought can be captured in the expression "None of The Above."
There is not a single person currently running for the office of President about whom I could say, "I want that person to be President."
There is absolutely no one in the GOP Primary that I am rooting for to win. I think every one of them would probably suck at being President and in the end if they accomplished anything it would still be in doing more harm than good.
That said, I think all of them would suck less than the current office holder simply because it is impossible to conceive of a president more inimicable to the idea of individual liberty, free markets and limited government. Any of the GOP candidates would probably have a better harm to good ratio. But if that doesn't sound like a glowing endorsement that's because it wasn't meant to be.
There is no way out. There is no viable political alternative. We as a nation, at least those who bother to participate, will have to choose between The One and whomever the GOP chooses to nominate. Current polling shows relatively close races between The One and the two leading GOP contenders. When the sitting president has polling numbers for approval and job performance that are worse than those of Jimmy Carter and the best the opposition front runners can manage is close to a statistical tie that says a lot about the quality of the opposition candidates.
The election of The One as the first black U.S. President (OK half back but I'll give it to him) was indeed a historic event. History will no doubt also record him as one of the biggest Oval Office failures in the nation. The GOP primary this year should basically be a contest to see who replaces The One. That it looks like there will be a significant electoral contest in the general election is beyond disappointing. It's disgusting.
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 12:58 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
December 08, 2011
OMFG NOOoooooo
Do you get a queezy uneasy feeling when you contemplate a GOP choice between Gingrich and Romney? Then here's a thought that should send you screaming into the night.
Gingrich has said he would consider Romney on his short list for possible V.P.
There are not words adequate to describe how awful an idea that woul be.
Via: Hot Air
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 07:39 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
December 03, 2011
A Race to the Race
Congratulations to Telefonica for their victory in the first leg of the Volvo Ocean Race.
Also to the Camper team for second, and even the Groupama Team for finishing third. They didn't have the best race and they are probably thinking to themselves that they got third by simply being one of the three boats that managed to finish the race. But that is part of sailboat racing. Your boat actually has to make it to the finish.
Six boats crossed the starting line in Alicante Spain on November 5 racing for a finish line in Cape Town, South Africa, by way of a turning mark at the island of Fernando de Noronha off the coast of Brazil. 7,480 miles of pushing a boat to it's limits.
Shortly after the start Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing lost their mast in heavy wind and they turned back to the starting point to install their spare mast. Once they had the mast in the boat a couple of days later they took off racing again. But not having had enough time to thoroughly test the new rig, having no chance of finishing better than last, and not being sure they could make it in time to start the next leg, they decided before they had made it out of the Mediteranian that their best option was to retire from the leg and ship the boat to South Africa and be tested and ready to go for leg two.
There's was not the only disaster in the early days of the race. Team Sanya struck something in the water during the first night of racing resulting in a large hole in the bow of the boat. A watertight bulkhead kept the boat from sinking and they were able limp to the nearest port. And for them leg one became a race of logistics. A ship was secured to transport the damaged boat to South Africa. In the mean time, a team of boat building specialists flew into Cape Town and began building a new bow section for the boat. Their goal was to build a section of hull bigger than the area damaged on the boat so that when it arrived they could cut away the damage and have enough new hull to make the repair.
This is project that would normally take weeks. When Sanya arrived in Cape Town they had eight days. They are working night and day and expect they will have the boat repaired and in the water in time to race.
Ordinarily, that would seem like a heroic accomplishment of management, logistics and hard work. But then there's the Puma story.
Somewhere in the middle of the South Atlantic The Puma team also suffered a broken mast. Unlike the Abu Dhabi team, they were more than a 1,000 miles from the nearest port. They jerry rigged some sails on what left of the mast and started up the onboard diesel - very slowly. These boats carry just enough fuel to power the generator and keep their batteries charged for the expected length of the race. They didn't really have enough fuel to go very far.
But the shore team was fast into action. They made contact with a freighter that was "nearby" and would divert their course to meet Puma and supply them with the fuel they needed. As the Puma boat bobbed alongside the freighter at what they hoped was a safe enough distance to keep from being crushed, 10 gallon cans of diesel were passed back and forth on a series or ropes between the two vessels.
Fully stocked with fuel they shifted the engine into high and headed for inhabited land, the Island of Tristan De Cunha. Tristan is the most remote inhabited place on the planet and has a population of 262. The shore team was busily arranging for a freighter with an onboard crane to meet Puma at the island, hoist the boat on board and take it and the team to Cape Town. Simultaneously the team's spare mast was prepped and flown from Newport R.I.
The first ship didn't work out. I never caught the reason but they just couldn't make it. So second ship was contracted. It left from Dhurban for Cape Town to pick up the cradle for the boat then proceeded on to Tristan Cunha.
Tristan does not really have a protected harbor. They do have a break water that would not, however, accommodate the freighter. The task of lifting the boat out of the water onto the ship would have to happen in open ocean. It was only going to be possible if the wind and waves cooperated. A carbon fiber sailboat hull does not respond well to crashing into the steel hull of the freighter.
The freighter, the Teem Bremen, arrived a Tristan and they were able to load the Puma boat without incident and they got underway. If the weather cooperates the Team Bremen will arrive in Cape Town on Tuesday. The new mast transported by truck from Johannesburg arrived at the team's dock on Saturday after multiple truck breakdowns.
The in port race portion of the event is scheduled to take place next Saturday. There is a pro-am race on Friday but I don't think that counts in the points standings. The Start for leg 2, Cape Town to Abu Dhabi (5, 430 nautical miles) is Sunday, December 11. If Team Puma is on the starting line for those races it will be an astounding convergence of hard work and amazing luck.
I am once again participating in the Virtual Volvo Ocean Race and finished leg 1 in a disappointing 14,594th out of 121,060 boats. I was at one point just under 4,000 but made a couple of unfortunate tactical decisions that put me on the wrong side of a couple of weather systems. Actually it was one decision that put me on the wrong side of a weather system that left me on the wring side of the next weather system, and the next… I entered with zero expectation of winning because doing so requires and investment of time I'm not willing to make even though the winner gets a nice new Volvo SUV! I'll consider myself satisfied if I finish a leg in the top 10%, happy if I finish in the top 10,000, beside myself giddy if I finish in the top 5,000. I'll keep you posted!
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 12:00 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
No Dog in THis Fight
A while back I started writing a series of posts on the GOP primary candidates, offering my entirely unsolicited opinion and advice to my GOP friends. I've done Romney and Cain (and I know two posts does not a series make so I have some work to do on that score) because they were the top dogs at the time. Now the newest leader of the pack is Newt F'n Gingrich.
Are you kidding me?
When I suggested the GOP nominate anyone but Romney, Newt was somewhere around 7% support in the polls. I seriously didn't think the GOP could possibly be that stupid. I guess I should have learned my lesson last year when I hoped the Democrats would nominate anyone but Hillary Clinton.
That Gingrich wasn't laughed out of the race within two days of filing the paperwork says something about the GOP. That he is currently the front runner for the nomination says something even more frightening. If it's a choice between Romney and Gingrich the GOP might as well draft John Boehner or Olympia Snowe.
At this point GOP voters should stop worrying about finding a candidate with solid conservative principles and just try to find one with any principles at all.
I think I'm kind of done offering these people the benefit of my wisdom. I'm normally fond of tilting at windmills but all of this shouting into a gale force wind of electoral stupidity is getting tiring.
There are many reasons I am registered to vote as an Independent. The biggest one is that the GOP does things like make Gingrich or Romney their most likely nominees and I want no part of it. There may be some of you wondering "why not get involved and try to change things?" Well, it never changes, for one thing. For another, I live in the very small, very blue state of Connecticut. There is a Republican party here but it is about as effective and relevant as the Libertarian Party of Saudi Arabia.
In the end I will probably wind up in a voting booth in November of 2012 holding my nose and casting symbolic vote for whomever the GOP sends up against The One. That The One will walk away with Connecticut's electoral votes without even bother to campaign in the state is a given. And I'll cast a token vote for the Republican sacrificial lamb in Connecticut's Congressional contests. And I will go home feeling like I need an intellectual and moral shower with the only solace available being the end of The One's socialist reign and the return to GOP socialism lite.
Would it be too much to ask that they make it at least a little fun? Could they, just for a while, make Ron Paul the front runner?
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 08:09 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
November 28, 2011
A Lesser Stench of Corruption
A layer of filth, corruption and stupidity will soon be scraped off the floor of the House of Representatives. Massachusetts Representative Barney Frank has announced he will not seek re-election.
So long asshole.
UPDATE: Here's a link where you can send Barney a personal message. Please be sure to show him all the respect he deserves. dccc.org/Barney
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 10:27 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
November 10, 2011
And The There Was One
Not too long ago whenever I left the house I was "fully loaded." I had a PDA, an iPod and cell phone. If I were going to a child's even I would add to that a digital camera. That's why they make those cargo pants with all the extra pockets!
The PDA died and you know what they just didn't make PDA's anymore. I did the only thing I could do and got a replacement on eBay. In the mean time I got a cell phone with an OK camera that was good enough for routine events. Special occasions required something more, but those are rare and that's part of what makes them special.
The iPod had it's issues. I had to replace the battery twice and the hard drive once. Yes it was that old. Eventually it and the replacement PDA stopped working.
I bought an iPod touch. It did all the PDA stuff. It did all the iPod stuff. It did better photography. It did good enough for routine video. I was down to two devices. iPod and Cell phone.
For as long as I could I resisted the "Smart Phone." At first it was easy. If I was going to get one it was going to be an iPhone, but I was locked into Verizon and the iPhone was only AT&T. Then they came out with iPhone on Verizon and I didn't get one because I was too cheap to pay for a data plan.
Then I got a job at which a good part of what I do is design for the mobile web. It occurred to me that having a Smart Phone to actually see and test what I was doing might be a good idea. I tried it for a while using the iPod and it was OK. But so the mobile web is built around phones so I couldn't get the full experience.
So I broke down and got the iPhone 4. I did not get the iPhone 4S. It cost more and I just didn't see it as worth the extra money to be able to use a beta voice command system.
Now I have one thing to find. One thing to keep charged. And when I leave the house, one thing in my pocket.
I wish I had done this a lot sooner!
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 05:42 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
November 04, 2011
The Trouble With Herman Cain
Here is round two in my unsolicited advice and commentary on the GOP Presidential hopefuls.
Today's candidate is Herman Cain.
I am deeply disappointed in Herman Cain and his campaign over their handling of the Politico hit piece on some old allegations of sexual harassment. I don't know if there is any truth to the allegations - and neither to the political hacks at Politico. All we know for sure is that allegations were made, and that the two women who made the allegations received a very small settlement. We seem to know just enough to make it look as bad as possible for Herman Cain.
I spent 10 years working in a fairly large corporation and was forced to sit through several semi-annual sexual harassment seminars. I think most of it is bullshit to begin with.
But I don't care about that.
What I care about is that Herman Cain knows the details. He knew that true or false these allegations existed in his past. He had to know, particularly as his standing in the polls began to rise that this story was going come out. He had to know that in the current media climate it would be reported as breaking news if he ever tore the tag off his mattress.
Knowing that, he seemed completely unprepared when the story broke. His initial responses when the story broke were fumbling and ad hoc.
Ideally the campaign should have put the story out their on their own - with their own spin. Maybe use it as a personal anecdote in support of tort reform aimed at ending a legal cultural in which even those falsely accused will settle because it's cheaper and easier. Barring that and knowing the story was going to come out, they should have been prepared.
They were not.
If a candidate can't be prepared for the expected, how would he be as a President dealing with the unexpected?
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 08:07 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
October 27, 2011
Another 1%
Here's a thought that cold make a few heads explode down at the OWS camp on Wall Street and it's sister tent cities around the country.
No matter what you do, there will always be a 1%.
If you taxed away the income of the current 1% to a level where they were what they were pocketing was equal to the national median income, you would have successfully made them part of your group. Part of the 99%.
But guess what. There will be a whole new crop of people who become the new 1%. They won't have as much money to steal as the old 1% but they will be there at the top of the income ladder. Ready for you to attack.
And if you succeed in taking down that 1% there will new crop ripe for the picking.
And here's the real kick in the ass. If you keep it up long enough eventually you will become the 1%. I suspect you'll be banging a different drum by then.
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 11:43 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
October 20, 2011
A Matter of Principles
For a while now I have been mentally preparing a series of posts on the GOP candidates for President. I've watched some of the debates, and read a lot of post debate analysis. I find it interesting to compare and contrast the evaluations of conservative and liberal commentators. What one labels as too squishy and moderate the other labels as extreme. But that is a subject for another day.
Today we turn our attention to Mitt Romney. (I'm lazy and I figure if I start at the top and work down, a few on the bottom will have dropped out and maybe I won't have to do a post on John what's his name.)
In the interest of full disclosure I need to inform you that I am not a registered Republican. I was in my youth when conservatism and the idea of limitted government meant more to the party than whatever seemed expedient to win the next election. I refer, of course, to the Reagan years when "Big Government Conservative" was not yet part of my political lexicon. I was pretty sour on the GOP after the first Bush presidency. I became an official Independent after the nomination of Bob Dole. I didn't think the party could get much worse than Medicare Part D and No Child Left Behind, but then they nominated McCain. So it is with a bit of hubris that I offer my opinion and advice to members of the Grand Old Party.
The core of my advice and commentary is quite simple: do not nominate Mitt Romney.
The Republican success in the 2010 election was driven by the Tea Party. Specifically Tea Party opposition to ObamaCare and the massive expansion of the federal government. The Tea Party movement was largely centered around the principle of limitted government and much of what they advocated in terms of specific policy positions sprang from that idea. It is not by coincidence that one of the most prominent symbols of the Tea Party is the Gadsden flag: Don't Tread On Me.
One of the biggest criticisms of Romney during the primary campaign is the passage of a healthcare reform law while he was governor of Massachusetts that was a forerunner to Obamacare. Both laws share a large number of common features including individual and employer mandates.
When called out for saying ObamaCare should be repealed despite the similarities to RomneyCare, Romney's response is to make a Federalist argument. In essence saying that the states have a right to do such things and that policy experimentation by the states is a feature of the republic.
As far as that argument goes, he is absolutely 100% correct. It is a sound argument based firmly in the country's founding principles. I not only agree with this argument I advance it myself every chance I get. It is an argument in favor of upholding the Tenth Amendment and it should be made often and loudly. Romney is absolutely right.
So what.
Romney is not a man of principle, he is politician of expedience. I cannot conceive of any conservative principle of limited government under which RomneyCare or ObamaCare are a good thing. He supported and signed it as governor of Massachusetts, and he defends it today.
He has not said that the mandates and heavy regulation that are the hallmarks of both his bill and ObamaCare are wrong in principle.
You always hear and read a lot about the need to nominate a candidate who is seen as "electable." It is an absolute truth than whoever the GOP nominates will not win the general election without Tea Party support. Romney is a candidate with a political record that does not fit within the principle of Do Not Tread On Me.
Romney is the Republican establishment next man in line candidate. He came in second plastic time so it's his turn. But the rank and file would do well to reject the establishment position. These are after all the same party leaders who negotiated a small reduction in the percentage increase in federal spending and called it a budget cutting triumph.
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 06:03 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
October 16, 2011
Upgrades!
I don't know when it happened because I haven't tried in a while but either mee.nu has upgraded or it was the iOS 5 update, but I can blog from my iPod touch. A huge thanks to whomever made this work.
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 06:33 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Sign of the Times
I described briefly in the post below how I have been looking at a lot of material trying get a clearer understanding of what exactly the Occupy Wall Street and its subsidiary protests around the country are all about. One thing I didn't do was bookmark a lot of the information or make a note of where I saw what. Which is too bad because this post is all about a picture of a sign I saw in the hands of a protestor - I just don't remember where I saw it.
The sign read "Debt = Slavery." It stuck with me for it's simple overwhelming stupidity.
Slavery is involuntary servitude. It is a human being sold as property to another. It is bondage.
Debt is a freely chosen obligation. Debt is your promise to repay money that was loaned to you. Debt is a contract.
If you think debt is evil and equal to slavery, the solution is really very simple: DON'T. BORROW. MONEY.
You don't borrow. You have no debt.
I understand that being in debt isn't fun. I really really understand that. A lot. But it's not slavery. No one forced you or me into debt.
Your sign would make just as much sense - or just as little - if you substituted any other negative on the planet.
"Debt = Measles" or "Debt = Toenail Fungus."
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 04:28 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
The Half-Right Protest
I've done a lot of reading and watching of YouTube videos and news reports on the Occupy Wall Street crowd and it's offshoots in other cities around the country. I've been trying to figure out exactly what it is these people want, and what they are protesting against. It's kind of hard to figure out for a couple of reasons.
First they don't really seem to have a firm grasp on it themselves. There is no real core message with fringe elements attached. It seems to be just the fringe elements gathered around a general sense that they are unhappy with the current state of something.
Second, a lot of people on the right have exploited this lack of cohesion by highlighting some of the wackier and more extreme elements. Granted it has been rather easy to make them look foolish and idiotic, but there has been it seems no real attempt to seriously boil down what this is all about.
I think I have a handle on what it's all about. In part, they are angry about the blatant corporate crony capitalism that saw big banks and corporations get bailed out and propped up with public money. And as far as that idea goes, I am in complete agreement with them.
Yes you read that right. I agree with them.
Starting with the Bush administration passed TARP legislation that was amped up to the extreme under the Obama administration "too big to fail" companies and banks were spared their natural market fates via government intervention. The current administration took it further and circumvented bankruptcy law and precedent to hand a nice payout to their union allies when they bailed out GM and Chrysler but I haven't seen any indication that the OWS crowd is too upset about that deal.
The problem is that the OWS crowd does not object to bailouts and crony capitalism on principle. They are not upset because they don't think the government should be bailing out any private enterprise. They are not upset because they don't think the government should be picking winners an losers. Their problem is simply that they think the wrong people got the money.
They are angry that Wall Street got bailed out and rich executives got bonuses and they "The 99%" got nothing. They want theirs. They don't want to eliminate the concept of too big to fail they just want to eliminate failure. They have taken the expression "failure is not an option" and distorted to the expectation that failure should not be allowable. They ignore the context of the original quote and it's meaning that the people involved would work as hard as it took to prevent failure.
I suppose we shouldn't blame them. It's what they have been taught all of their lives. What we are seeing is an adult manifestation of self esteem education. They have gotten out into the real world and discovered that unlike their childhood soccer games, someone is keeping score and there are winners and losers. They are looking for that trophy they get just for playing.
They are right to be angry at a system in which a privileged connected few get bailed out and propped up by the their friends in Washington dispensing our money. They are wrong in their anger that the problem is not that handouts happen, but who gets the handouts.
I agree with their call for fairness - though not in the everyone gets a trophy for playing sense they seem to mean. I say get the government out the business of deciding who succeeds and who fails. No bailouts. No handouts. Win or lose. Succeed or fail. Let reality keep score. No owes you anything except what you earn.
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 09:36 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
October 09, 2011
The Occupation of Wall Street
A bunch of impotent incompetent whiners with the help of some corporate money in the background have decided to hold a slumber party which they call "Occupy Wall Street." They are doing this ostensibly to protest corporations and the influence they have in government. In truth I think they are doing this to bitch about the fact that this the only "Occupation" they are qualified for.
Their years of debt funded education in gender diversity studies have left them unqualified for the minimum wage jobs they wouldn't stoop to apply for because society owes them more.
As a tax-paying productive member of society the only thing I have to say about what they think they are owed is "Kiss. My Ass."
The sad irony is, if they were actually concerned about the symbiotic relationship between corporations and government - such as the inscestuous relationship between the current administration and Wall Street icons like Goldman Sachs - I would actually be in complete agreement. If they were calling for and end to government regulations and subsidies that seek to establish who wins and who loses in the market, I'd be down their with them.
But that's not what they are all about. They are against a system they falsely label capitalism, but which in fact is really a form of socialism that is more correctly called corporatism or fascism. And what they are protesting about isn't so much that this is the economic system we have, it's that in their view the right people aren't getting the gravy.
They see the rich and powerful manipulating the corporatist system to make themselves richer and are demanding that they get their share. They don't want to tear down the current system, they are just demanding more of its benefits. "The rich have enough. We demand our fair share."
To make this happen they are essentially threatening to hold their breath and stamp their feet until they get their way. The people at the top of the corporatist ladder will either throw them a bone to shut them up, or they will just ignore them because it will be winter soon and camping out in the park wont be so much fun.
I agree we should tear down the corporatist socialism that is destroying this country. In it's place we should put a system in which individuals and corporations succeed or fail based on their ability to earn an honest dollar. But to the unwashed masses staging pretend occupations across the country "earn" is probably the most offensive word in the English language.
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 11:15 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
September 25, 2011
Operational Success
Over the last two years and three months I have made frequent mention of something I call OPERATION GET A JOB. It has been an all consuming effort to find a new job to replace the one I lost when BIC USA decided they didn't want half of the design department. As a parallel to that operation there was also the ongoing OPERATION PAY THE BILLS.
PTB involved finding freelance work that ranged form a few clients of my own to some dreadfully boring assignments through a temp agency. But it has been successful and the bills have been paid. Operation PTB never actually goes away, it just gets a lot easier when Operation GAJ is not in effect.
I'm happy to say that after a long effort OPERATION GAJ has met with success. I'm not sharing any details because that would violate one of the few rules for this site that I haven't already violated. But I do have a real job. An actual job. With an actual salary and actual benefits.
My friend Jack has advised me to gut busy blogging before I dive into the new job and it takes up all my time. The thing is, I start the new job tomorrow, so sorry, Jack, this might be it!!!
Actually, I'm hoping now that GAJ has concluded and PTB becomes more of a background task OPERATION WRITE THE BLOG might be able to be more of a priority!
But time might be running out. Some time before November, Greece is probably going to default on it's sovereign debt. What European banks this doesn't take down will be kept afloat only with the infusion of huge amounts of capital from governments who don't really have it to infuse. This will put the house of cards that is the EuroZone on the edge. They will have done and spent everything they possibly can to prop up the system. One hiccup and it will all come crashing down because there is nothing else they can do.
We certainly don't have the resources to bail them out. Because when the EuroZone fails we're going to have problems of our own that we can't afford to fix.
I don't have a lot of hope that this can be contained as an intellectual financial crisis solved simply by the same class of banking and finance wizards who got us into this mess. Given the recent riots in Greece, England and France that ship has already sailed. I think reality is about to bitchslap the liberal socialist agenda that has driven sovereign debt to record levels around the world. Those who believe they are entitled to wealth that others produced will not give up their loot without fighting back. But I'll put my my money on reality vs left wing fantasy every time.
May you live in interesting times, indeed.
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 09:24 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
September 18, 2011
Slight of Shorthand
I read a post the other day, and I can't quite remember where it was or who wrote it, but it contained an aside that stuck with me because I think it was wrong and perhaps dangerously so. The post itself was part of the million words written debating who won the most recent GOP presidential candidate's debate. This post focused specifically on the exchanges between Governors Rick Perry and Mitt Romney over who as governor of their respective states created the most jobs.
The aside was the writer's attempt to deflect the expected criticism that governments do not create jobs, businesses create jobs. That government can create an environment in which it is easier for business to create jobs or it can create and environment in which it is harder for business to create jobs. The author asserted a politician or pundit claiming that government created jobs was just using a shorthand way of saying that government put in place a tax and regulatory structure that encouraged business to grow, invest and hire. It may have started out that way, and to some extent it may be true for those in the world of politics and those who snipe around its edges, but I think for many people the meaning has changed. It is no longer seen as a shorthand and the words have come to mean exactly what they say.
Having ceased to be a shorthand for most of the population they have become part of the growing public acceptance of the idea of the government running or managing the economy. The invisible hand of the market is being replaced by the very visible hand of government and most people don't seem to notice let alone mind. The President recently spoke before a joint session of Congress to introduce and call (repeatedly) for the passage of a jobs bill. He is campaigning around the country touting how his bill will create jobs as soon as Congress passes it. With the corollary, never left unspoken, that if there are no jobs it's because the Congress, i.e. the GOP controlled House, failed to pass his job creating bill.
There are politically involved (some would say obsessed) people who see the words "this bill creates jobs" and want to see it as shorthand for this bill creates a tax and regulatory environment in which job creation is possible. But I have a problem with that. A big problem. The underlying concept of that "tax and regulatory environment in which job creation is possible" is freedom. If business is free to grow and invest and take risks they will do so and if they are successful, they will hire. If it takes a special piece of legislation to create that freedom to operate a business, what does that say about where we are now?
Another problem I have with this slight of shorthand is not necessarily with the millions of people who take it literally and expect the government to do something to create jobs, but with one person who seems to believe it wholeheartedly. The President of the United States.
His "jobs bill" is not about changing the tax and regulatory environment to create more freedom for business to operate and grow. His bill is about the government "investing" to create jobs. His bill is about spending half a trillion dollars to stimulate demand for workers. Spend a hundred billion or so on infrastructure upgrades and school renovations and it will put construction workers to work - for a while. Indeed these will be government created jobs because government is paying for them. But they will last as long as the projects last. When the roads and bridges are built and the school projects complete those construction workers who enjoyed their government funded paychecks will be unemployed again.
And when the second pile of stimulus dollars has been spent unless there has been some significant change we will find ourselves in the same tax and regulatory morass that lead to the unemployment problem in the first place. Business will still be faced with the same unknown future regulatory burdens of ObamaCare. Energy production will still be under constant attack from the regulatory overreach of the EPA. Boeing will still be fighting the government for the freedom to open a manufacturing plant where it feels makes the most business sense. Gibson won't have it's legally imported wood to make guitars.
Yet again the left's only solution to problems created by too much unaccountable, government is more government. Yet again the right's solution seems to be more government, but slightly less more than the left wants.
And We the People? Many of them are sitting back waiting for the government to do something to fix things.
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at 07:06 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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