Stopping Piracy on the High Seas
Now that a ship of the evil, but highly influential, Saudi tyranny has been hijacked by pirates, suddenly the long-standing problem of piracy in the Indian ocean is headline news.
Crackpot neocons like Michael Savage, and his imitator Mark Levin, are calling for the US Navy to run around destroying boats and slaughtering people suspected of piracy.
Socialists/Liberals are proposing the normal, faux-pacifist solutions of more international committees and taxpayer funding to bureaucratically consider the problem, and more handouts, and of course trying to force an authoritarian central government on Somalia, sort of a reverse-Iraq, nation-destroying project.
But the real solution is, as usual, not one of more governmental intrusion, but one of more individual liberty and responsibility:
Allow private craft to be armed.
Now, most people probably don’t realize this, but there are complete bans on boats or ships carrying defenses in most nations where you might come to port. These leave craft largely helpless against piracy, even though the ban on defense has no practical benefit.
Imagine how easy it would actually have been for a ship the size of an oil tanker to defend itself, against pirates in a speedboat, armed with rifles and grenades. Especially considering the expenditure that would be justified by the value of its cargo. How good a defense could YOU afford, if you were shipping $100,000,000 worth of oil?
The pirates reportedly captured the supertanker with rifles and grenades, in a speedboat. Imagine if the tanker were legally allowed to defend itself...
Allowing/encouraging craft to defend themselves would have the added benefit of making it safer for any craft to NOT defend itself. Even pacifists, who did not arm their boats, would be protected, because any potential pirates could not know whether the boat is armed, or not. So ALL people would be safer, if only SOME would arm themselves well enough to make piracy too dangerous.
This is, of course, the story of Big Brotherment mentality, where the governments constantly arm themselves better, but tell the individuals that arming yourself is bad…and yet fail to protect the disarmed people WITH the government’s massive weaponry.
Meanwhile, of course, criminals arm themselves BETTER, because of the disarmed masses. What is easy to buy on the black market is whatever desirable thing is most wrongfully banned by a government.
Even a small boat could take out an attacker with a single shot…and yet, of course, pirates would not profit if THEY took out victims with a single shot. You don’t make any money from ransom, nor gain any loot, if you sink your target.
Therefore, if ships were allowed to defend themselves, there would BE no pirates, because it would be far more risky, with modern weaponry, than profitable.
Problem actually solved.
If, instead, we have government deal with the problem of piracy…well, when’s the last time government actually solved a problem? Actually fixed the thing they claimed to be fighting, so that the problem was simply gone, and the powers usurped to deal with it were returned to the people?
Has that ever happened?
Let’s go with liberty, letting ships defend themselves, instead of bureaucracy, spending billions to probably make the problem worse.
Pacifism Breeds Violence
There two obvious extremes of self-defense:
- Sociopaths like neocons, who want to kill other people “just in case”
- Pacifists, who will not even defend their own lives
Of the two, it’s more widely understood that the sociopaths are wrong, and cause violence where none may otherwise have occurred.
But what’s often overlooked is that the pacifists, too, actually cause violence and death.
I know, it’s counter-intuitive…the truth often is, because the world’s more complicated than slogans like “non-violence equals peace”.
In real life, people who refuse to defend human life accomplish two things:
- They cheapen life. Their actions state that life is not worth defending. They would rather they, or others around them, die, than sully themselves with taking action to protect the innocent.
- They make violence safe and easy. There are no consequences in assaulting a pacifist. No risk of getting hurt, no cost in harming others.
Now anyone who wants to be a pacifist should be allowed to do so, even though it actually brings more risk to those around them, as any known pacifist is not a factor in whether to attack someone near them…
When you do not defend your life, or others around you, unjust violence becomes cheaper and safer to commit, and you are saying that life does not have as much value as your selfish belief
It’s unfortunate that pacifists are often hypocrites, though, who wish those around them to be forced to be pacifistic, themselves. They advocate bans on self defense, whether weapons or defensive violence, and want those bans backed by a government that enforces its bans with, of all things, threat of violence.
If you insist on owning a gun, or fighting someone who is robbing an innocent person nearby, even though some pacifist-advocated law bans you doing so, how will the government enforce that ban? Fines and imprisonment. If you refuse to comply with those penalties, what will it threaten in order to get you to submit? Violence.
So let’s count that as THREE ways pacifists often violence: They cheap life, they make violence safe and easy, and they often recruit governments to use the threat of violence to force pacifism upon others.
Trickle-Down Taxation
Item #2 of the Communist Manifesto: "A heavy progressive or graduated income tax". What isn't mentioned is that this was a way Marx could make the poor even poorer and weaker, not the rich. Marx gained power from the strife caused by poverty.
One of the best-sounding of the freebies that Obama is offering to hand out (if it’s not just another politician’s empty campaign promise) is exempting everyone who makes under $200K from the income tax. This one even tempts me. Lower taxes are good for the economy, for economic freedom, and of course for everyone who earns less than that amount of money.
But there’s a serious down-side to this. How do we fund all of the other freebies he is giving out, if we are going to cut government tax revenue with this one?
Of course the answer is simple: We are going to tax the people who make OVER $200K so much more that it makes up for the loss. Obama says it’s only fair, to “spread the wealth around”.
Now this may not be quite as bad as it sounds:
- First, people who make over $100K or so pay most of the taxes, already. Unfortunately, Bush’s tax cuts were not really all that “for the rich”, and “wealthy” people already pay almost all of the taxes. It was pointed out today that there are some companies, in fact, that are forced to pay more taxes per year, individually, than 66% of all families. It’s famous that the top two percent of earners pay something like 60% of the taxes.
- Second, tax cuts boost the economy, which increases tax revenue. Both Reagan and Kennedy both demonstrated this, cutting and simplifying taxes, and having tax revenue increase.
Unfortunately, those two things aren’t enough. The billions paid by people who earn less than $200K still adds up…and tax cuts don’t all work equally well.
For example, tax cuts that favor one group over another help the economy less, while ones that spread the burden evenly help everyone more. In fact, simply spreading the burden evenly, with NO tax cut, would boost the economy more than cutting taxes for some people, while raising it for others.
Especially when the taxes (as they already, are, and will now be more) are designed to punish hard work, success, and contribution to society.
Just as a slight increase in interest rates, so small it certainly doesn’t change any one person’s mind, has a large nation-wide impact on how much people borrow, so a tax that increases as you earn more money has a nation-wide impact on how much people earn, depressing income growth.
But there’s something involved, that’s more important than ALL of that:
WHEN Barak Obama raises taxes on people who earn more money, the wealthy will not pay a penny of it.
You will.
The counterpart to trickle-down economics (which points out that wealthy people who earn more money spend and invest more, allowing all of society to become more wealthy) is…
Trickle Down Taxes
When you raise taxes on the rich, they ALWAYS respond to defend their wealth. The more money and power they have, the better they can do this. They can give themselves raises, pay accountants to shelter their income, or otherwise make up for the new tax.
But where do they get the new money, to pay themselves enough to make up for the taxes?
From you.
Wealthy people and companies can, for example, raise prices to pay themselves enough extra to make up for the taxes. Guess who pays the higher prices.
They can also cut jobs or pay among their employees, in order to make enough to pay themselves more. Guess who the employees are.
Along with those two tools of passing along higher taxes, the rich and powerful can cut quality of products, again to save for themselves. Ice cream that was once two quarts is now 1.5 quarts, and the same price. Check Edy’s and Breyer’s, next time you’re shopping. Guess who ends up paying for all the reduced-quality/quantity food. Not the rich guys…the can afford to pay a premium for consistent quality.
Ultimately, ALL costs the government imposes on the wealthy, they pass down to you.
Oh, but the tax trickling isn’t done, yet.
If They Lose, You Lose More
Let’s say you, somehow, manage to force the wealthy and powerful to pay for their own taxes.
You are now shutting thousands of people out of jobs, and, causing more hunger and poverty.
Why?
Because the wealthy don’t put their money in giant Scrooge McDuck vaults, to play in while they cackle wickedly. Instead, they either spend or invest it. Spending it creates jobs directly. If they buy a car, someone built it, someone shipped it, someone sold it, people repair it, people clean it…maybe someone even drives it as their job. The less money ANYONE spends, the less work there is. But, let’s face is, the wealthy have more money, per person, than other people, and therefore supply more jobs with money.
Poor people have to mow their own lawns (if they have them). Middle class people may be able to pay someone to mow their lawn for them. A few dozen families might, between them, manage to keep one lawncare guy employed. But one wealthy dude may employ a half dozen lawn guys, all by himself.
Take away his money, and the rich guy may have to lay off his lawn people…perhaps one hundred times the job impact of a middle class person having to stop hiring a lawn guy.
But most of a wealthy guy’s money is not spent, so it doesn’t make jobs.
Well, not directly.
Investment Creates Jobs
The “capital” in capitalism is investment.
Rich people and companies are the reason most new jobs ever get created at all, because it requires investment to build the factory, or store, or restaurant, whatever it is. Even when poorer people start their own successful business out of pocket (something pretty rare, because of government regulation and taxes), they only create large numbers of jobs as they become successful and rich.
One of the many reasons the economy is so weak, now, is because investment is so rare, thanks to punishment of investment through taxes, regulation, deflation, and the preference for stagnating money shelters like bonds and treasury notes, over the stocks to which government has proven to be so hostile.
If we are to get back on the road to economic growth, we must first get on the road to economic freedom for all, including the wealthy, who just happen to pass on ALL effects we try to have on them, good or bad.
India, an Evil Empire, Draws Attacks in Mumbai
The terrorists attacking India are as evil in their chosen tactics as were Catholic terrorists in Ireland in 1920, Jewish terrorists in Palestine in 1948, or American terrorists in Oklahoma city in 1995.
But, as with those and most other terrorists, what drives the madmen who attacked India is a laundry list of wrongs and evils committed against those terrorists’ people. When there is such horror, and all reasonable ways of getting justice are exhausted, some small part of the victims will always turn to unreasonable ways.
Just as the British Empire committed many evils, earning it strife with Ireland, Palestine, and many others, so India (once fighting that very British Empire with terrorism) is an evil empire today, repressing and oppressing people within its own borders, plus occupying lands it illegitimately occupies, like Kashmir.
There are more Indian troops per capita in Kashmir, than any other occupation force on earth, including Communist China in Tibet, Israel in Palestine, Americans in Baghdad, or Russians in Chechnya
In 1947, India and Pakistan were being formed from the shambles of the British Empire. Each state of that region was supposed to choose which of the two countries to join.
When Kashmir’s ruler was slow to decide who to join, India attacked Kashmir, invading and occupying their land, robbing the 80% Muslim population from what was an almost inevitable decision to join Pakistan, or else declare independence.
When India persisted in occupying this region, preventing its union with Pakistan, the United Nations declared that it Kashmir should have an election, referred to as a “plebiscite”, in order to determine whether it joined India or Pakistan.
Since Kashmir is 80% Muslim, there was never any doubt which way the election would go…so “democratic” India has not, in the 60 years since, EVER allowed that election, continuing to illegitimately occupy Kashmir.
This was part of India’s very aggressive, violet habit at that time. For example, they also invaded and forcibly annexed the states of Junagadh and Hyderabad, one of which wanted to become Pakistani, the other wanting independence. India’s excuse was that both were majority Hindu…yet it ignores the fact that Kashmir is overwhelmingly Muslim.
People in Kashmir resist their country’s occupation, as any patriots should be expected to do.
When they do this against India’s troops, not only is it not “terrorism”, but it’s actually legal and legitimate, under international law, international humanitarian law, and Article 51 of the United Nations Charter. All people have a right to fight foreign occupation forces, not only a natural right, but even a legal one.
The repression and violence brought on by the extreme Indian military occupation, killing thousands of Kashmiri, ends up driving them to ever greater desperation. The Pakistani government takes advantage of this distress, funding militant movements because it wants the benefit of Kashmir as a territory, as illustrated by its opposition to Kashmir simply voting for its own independence.
Terrorism, in this situation, is almost inevitable. The war spills over from the Indian troops terrorizing the people of Kashmir, to Kashmiri terrorizing people in India. It’s not right, but it’s a natural result of the Indian government’s evil.
The same happened when Russia occupied Chechnya, the Soviets occupied Afghanistan…when you wrongfully occupy a people’s homeland, bringing them terror and suffering, eventually they bring it back to you.
Thanksgiving: Happy Conservatism Day!
Thanksgiving, as it exists in America, is very special, right up there with Independence Day, as a celebration of true Conservative principles, and a repudiation of what we now know as Liberalism.
Against Collectivism
For example, what the Pilgrims were celebrating was an abandonment of the collectivist/socialist ideals they’d adopted when they first tried to form their colony.
The first colonists had starved, suffering the inefficiency and laziness bred by a “share the wealth” philosophy, where everything went into a common pool, and everyone got an equal share, much like Europe and the Clintons of the world embrace today.
When they finally started requiring people to take responsibility for themselves, adopting what amounted to a precursor of Reagan/Paul Conservatism, with community property being replaced by private property, and central planning by liberty, they found prosperity, and stopped dying out.
We’ll be in pretty much the same situation, a few years from now, after yet more years of the “share the wealth” philosophy of big government, ultimately not much of a departure from Bush’s stealth Liberalism of the past eight.
Pro-Christian
Not only were the Pilgrims celebrating the abandonment of socialism, and resulting prosperity, but the tradition of having a feast to give thanks was theirs because it was a Christian tradition to do so. Thanksgiving was not a “harvest festival”, as the politically correct in the Establishment media and government schools would have you believe.
It was, in this case, celebrating a bountiful harvest, but the “thanks giving” part was a standard Christian tradition in England, who would do this at any time of year, to celebrate whatever blessing they felt God had given them, or even to remind themselves of what they still had, when things were bad.
Puritans and other devout Christians in England, any time in the previous century or more, might have a thanksgiving feast any time a baby was born, or loved one died, for example.
And, as we all know, Liberalism is very anti-Christian, however loudly they object to that being pointed out, in between rounds of banning voluntary religious expression in public places, unless it’s Jewish, Islamic, or something else not-Christian. In fact, even the Christian nature of Thanksgiving, as well as Christmas, has been stripped by Liberal media, schools, and government, or else I wouldn’t need to be writing this in clarification. 
Why Oil and Gas Prices Are Falling
We all know that high gas/energy prices, driven by high oil prices, are a large part of what has crippled the US economy.
But what has caused that?
Oil prices are not set by oil companies, but by futures and commodities speculators, who bid on the oil at auctions. The companies have no more control over the price than someone selling with a regular auction on EBay.
The speculators decide what they are willing to pay, based on what they believe the future of oil to be.
How Prices Rose
In 1999, the monopolistic oil cartel OPEC started cutting production, specifically to help themselves and their allies get rich by driving up the price of oil. Speculators, naturally, started bidding more for oil, expecting there to be a shortage. It went from well under $20 per barrel to over $30.
Then George W Bush got elected.
People assumed, because wealthy oil barons in Texas and Saudi Arabia were largely responsible for financing him, that plentiful oil was in their future. This ignored history, of course, because plentiful oil is cheap, and cheap oil is bad for oil barons. The more expensive oil is, the better. It would have made more sense to expect Bush to do things that would drive up the price of oil.
Bush holds hands with a member of the Saudi tyranny, top state sponsor of terrorism, and leader of the push to keep oil prices high
But they assumed it’d be plentiful, so they bid lower on it, and the price fell. It got almost back down to its natural, under-$20 price range.
But that was bad for Bush’s financiers.
In fact, there was a lot of loud public worry, among oil barons, about how the price of oil was returning to normal.
Then came September 11th, 2001.
Afghanistan
After 9-11, there were many ways America could go.
The way Bush chose to lead, was to first attack Afghanistan. He said this was because they were harboring bin Laden. He promised, though, that he was going to exhaust all diplomatic means, and only attack them as a last resort.
But before he attacked, the government of Afghanistan, a long-time US ally whom Bush had just recently sent, openly and on record, a great deal of grant money for their help, offered to turn over bin Laden for war crimes trial.
Bush ignored the offer, refusing even to discuss it with them. When they offered a second time, the US attacked the very next day.
Speculators saw this as a very bad sign for oil, because Afghanistan was closely aligned with many oil-producing countries, and they bid more for it, driving the price into the high $20 range, fifty percent higher than its natural price.
Iraq
Then Bush began threatening to attack Iraq. Now Afghanistan had at least some association with Al Qaeda…but Iraq, of course, was ruled by Al Qaeda’s #2 enemy after the US: Saddam Hussein.
Oil speculators found this pretty scary, and confusing. The price of oil rose to close to $40, more than twice its natural range.
Gradually, it declined, on the promise of cheap oil from Iraq, even though every government projection of conquering Iraq anticipated years of quagmire and turmoil, jeopardizing oil supplies for a long time to come. This is why his father had not done it.
(more after this K-rad graphic)
Oil Prices, Real and Adjusted, from 1990 to mid 2008
Sure enough, as time war on, the war got worse, and the speculators responded by bidding ever-higher for oil.
General Belligerence
What’s more, whenever the price was finally stabilizing a bit, the Bush administration would do something else that threatened the oil supply, like picking fights with Hugo Chavez, or threatening to attack Iran. Each time, investors were frightened, and the oil price climbed.
Eventually, this kind of belligerent foreign policy pattern pushed it up to $140 per barrel, over 700% above its natural price of just a few years earlier.
Sane Foreign Policy?
Then, in early 2008, it began to grow increasingly likely that Barak Obama would be the Democratic nominee. Unlike Hillary, he had always opposed this kind of foreign policy. Speculators began to weigh the possibility of a different foreign policy into their price bids.
As Obama's election grew more likely, oil buyers became reassured that oil supplies might be secure, and bid less, driving down prices.
As he clinched the nomination, and then began to dominate the polls versus McCain, the amount speculators were willing to pay steadily declined.
By the time he was elected, which had been seen as a probable for some time, they had built a peaceful foreign policy into the price, so that it was half its peak.
The day after he was elected, the price fell dramatically.
Now it remains in a holding pattern, a fraction of its peak just a year ago…waiting to see if Barak Obama is going to keep his promise of sane foreign policy. If he does, we could see oil falling down to its natural price, which by now is probably little more than $30 a barrel.
Ironically, sane foreign policy has an even greater impact on what the investors in oil are willing to pay, than Obama’s own position as a Liberal enemy of the energy needs of Americans.
Why Nobody Wants to Bail Out Automakers (except bureaucrats)
One thing you’ll notice about the debate over bailing out the automakers is that, even more than in general, everyone’s against it except corrupt politicians, panhandling automakers, and monopolistic union officials.
That’s because it’s a lose/lose situation if we do, but things might actually get better if we don’t.
First, let’s consider the big, fat lie that three million people would be put out of work.
We’ll ignore (for a moment) that bankrupcy will actually keep them in business and let them become more efficient.
Let’s pretend, instead that the automakers would actually [poof] ceased to exist. Only a couple hundred thousand workers, not three million, actually are employed by those car companies.
If the companies vanished, then all other 2,800,000 workers would not only continue to have jobs…
(continued after the spiffy pic)
They claim three million jobs are at stake, but the bailout would actually cost jobs, and make a few union management types rich
…but probably end up with better versions of their jobs. Why? Because people wouldn’t stop buying cars, they just would be buying DIFFERENT cars. Cars that need dealers, mechanics, parts sellers, and all the other jobs that the car companies are dishonestly counting as “three million jobs”. If you don’t buy a car from the Big Three oligopoly of panhandlers, you’ll buy one from someone else, instead.
Of course foreign cars often don’t need repairs and parts as often as American cars, but THAT would represent a savings for americans in general, that would create more jobs.
But, of course, the Big Three are in ZERO danger of magically vanishing.
Instead, they’d have to file for bankrupcy “restructuring”, which would be a way to allow them to fix a lot of the stupid inefficiency that laws and bureaucracy have trapped them with, WITHOUT them having to steal twenty five billion dollars (a number that will grow) from you and me, and then have Big Brother socialize them with mandatory “changes” that don’t represent what we consumers want, anyway.
And…well, really, that’s it. There are no other excuses for squandering $500 from the pocket of every middle-class family on yet another socialist bailout. Just “three million jobs” that is really only a couple hundred thousand jobs that would not go away, anyhow.
Sure, I could point out how restructuring, instead of a bailout, would break the back of the UAW monopoly, which forces American car companies to pay nine times as much for labor as foreign car companies. And how the UAW is therefore bribing the Democrats the way the Big Three automakers are bribing the fake-Republican neocons…which might just happen to be why they are all for the bailout, when everyone else is against it.
But, really, it boils down to “three million jobs is a lie”.
In fact, it boils down to the fact that americans would probably GAIN jobs from letting GM file for restructuring, while we will LOSE jobs by squandering more money on the bailout, which will ultimately come out of YOUR pocket, and mine. When the government wastes money, we lose the opportunity to spend the money on actual, productive things that employ people.
We need more economic freedom, to regain true American prosperity, not more handouts lifted from our own pockets.
Republican Leadership, Chosen via Affirmative Action?
I’ve been puzzled by the sudden, ridiculous, forced fascination the Liberal Republican/neocon leadership suddenly developed for Bobby Jindal. 
It reminds me of the invention of prefab heir apparent Barak Obama in 2004.
And, in that sense, it’s obvious that this is what they were trying to do, “create” a winner the way the Democrats did with Barak.
But why pick this guy? He’s really something of the worst of both worlds…from the most corrupt state government in the country, “moderate” in more or less the opposite way of actual Conservatism, for example a gross mismatch vs a Reagan or Paul. At the same time, definitely not neocon enough to be their dream guy to pimp. So why him?
Then it occurred to me…it has NOTHING to do with his politics, his (scant) supposed leadership in Louisiana, or any of that irrelevant stuff that only people who actually care would be concerned (approving or disapproving) with.
No, it’s when I was thinking about his real name, Piyush Jindal, and his status as the first “person of color” elected governor in Louisiana’s history, that it suddenly hit me:
He is Barak Obama Junior, just executed Hollywood-style.
The Liberal Republican leadership are attempting to learn a lesson from this past election…but they’re far too foolish and petty to learn any lesson that was actually present.
So they learned faux-lessons, focusing on trivial, collectivist things.
It reminds me of:
Hollywood’s Response to a Blockbuster Movie
In reality, the lesson of the blockbuster is usually something like “This movie came up with an idea that hadn’t been beaten to death, and/or presented it in an original way” or “it actually stuck to the book, didn’t talk down to the audience, nor follow the normal Hollywood formula”.
But Hollywood doesn’t EVER learn those particular lessons. Instead, they pick some obvious cosmetic detail, like “this movie had two cops in it, who are buddies”, and for the next few years every second movie out of Hollywood is a Cop Buddy Movie.
Likewise, there were two sets of lessons to learn from Obama’s win…the substantial, and the superficial:
SUBSTANCE
- He appeared honest (compared to McCain and Bush)
- As an extension of that, he appeared open, not secretive. The biggest impact on his lead, outside of Palin, came from the neocon pretense that they knew of dangerous Obama secrets
- He opposed our self-destructive, hypocritical foreign policies
- He appears to oppose the neocon police state
- He ran a Reaganesque campaign (not platform) of communicating clearly to people, not talking down to them or playing stupid
- Related to that, he has charisma/personality and communication skills that allowed him to be fast-tracked, a-la Kennedy or (against the Liberal Republicans’ own efforts) Reagan
- He appeared, if only because he is new and therefore lacked opportunity to mess up or get caught, to lack the baggage and corruption of 99% of the leadership of either party
- As an extension of that, he lacked “political experience”, which rational Americans recognize to be a bonus. Political experience plus success equals corruption
- As an extension of THAT, he is not a 500 year old, corrupt bureaucrat with no understanding of real human beings
- He really did appear to represent change, insofar as (on the two-dimensional Establishment spectrum) he was the antithesis of the neocons
- The Republican challenger was Liberal, unable to attack Obama on his real weakness; the issues, without it simply being turned back around on him as “but you used to say the same thing”, so he was limited to negative, personal attacks against Obama, discrediting himself.
PETTY
- He was a Person of Color
- He had a bizarre foreign-sounding name
- He is young(er)
- He was politically inexperienced, presumably easy to handle by the people behind the scenes and in the smoke-filled rooms
- He was fast-tracked to the forefront by people who “created” his success, a One-man Political Boy Band[TM]
- He appealed to his base
So, what is Jindal?
- He is a person of color
- He has a (half-concealed) bizarre foreign-sounding name
- He is young(er)
- He is politically backwoods, presumably easy to handle by the people behind the scenes and in the smoke-filled rooms
- He is being fast-tracked to the forefront, by people who are trying to force his success.
- He is adamantly pro-life, which supposedly is all that’s required to appeal to the Republican base
Jindal, in fact, has NONE of Barak’s winning traits, but all of his superficial ones.
They took away the Hollywood lessons, not the real ones.
Not a surprise, considering that Hollywood, too, is superficial and Liberal.
In fact, really, this could be anticipated by their choice of VP.
Palin was:
- A woman
- She was from somewhere exotic
- She was young(ish)
- She was VERY politically backward and inexperienced, almost as much as Barak himself, presumably easy to handle
- She was teleported to the forefront by people who anointed her with instant success
- She was quite folksy, and unlike McCain, was clearly pro-life
Ultimately, this seems to be the new trend among the Nixonian leadership of the Republican party:
Ignore all of the things they’ve done wrong so far, but try to imitate even more of the Liberal Democrats’ formula, without even understanding that.
Their failure to “get it”, even after McCain lost because he and Bush were too Liberal, is hardly surprising. I mean, McCain said he wanted “more affirmative action”.
Examining Barak Obama’s Economic Agenda
The Federal government has actually set up a website for “The President Elect”, at http://www.change.gov/ It contains an “Economic Agenda”, that is very specific and detailed. Below is a cursory analysis of parts of that document. http://www.change.gov/agenda/economy_agenda/
Barack Obama and Joe Biden’s Plan
Jumpstart the Economy
- Enact a Windfall Profits Tax to Provide a $1,000 Emergency Energy Rebate to American Families:Barack Obama and Joe Biden will enact a windfall profits tax on excessive oil company profits to give American families an immediate $1,000 emergency energy rebate to help families pay rising bills. This relief would be a down payment on the Obama-Biden long-term plan to provide middle-class families with at least $1,000 per year in permanent tax relief.
- Provide $50 billion to Jumpstart the Economy and Prevent 1 Million Americans from Losing Their Jobs: This relief would include a $25 billion State Growth Fund to prevent state and local cuts in health, education, housing, and heating assistance or counterproductive increases in property taxes, tolls or fees. The Obama-Biden relief plan will also include $25 billion in a Jobs and Growth Fund to prevent cutbacks in road and bridge maintenance and fund school re pair – all to save more than 1 million jobs in danger of being cut.
- Eliminate Income Taxes for Seniors Making Less than $50,000: Barack Obama will eliminate all income taxation of seniors making less than $50,000 per year. This proposal will eliminate income taxes for 7 million seniors and provide these seniors with an average savings of $1,400 each year. Under the Obama-Biden plan, 27 million American seniors will also not need to file an income tax return.
- Improve Transition Assistance: To help all workers adapt to a rapidly changing economy, Obama and Biden will update the existing system of Trade Adjustment Assistance by extending it to service industries, creating flexible education accounts to help workers retrain, and providing retraining assistance for workers in sectors of the economy vulnerable to dislocation before they lose their jobs.
- Reward Companies that Support American Workers: Barack Obama introduced the Patriot Employer Act of 2007 with Senators Richard Durbin (D-IL) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) to reward companies that create good jobs with good benefits for American workers. The legislation would provide a tax credit to companies that maintain or increase the number of full-time workers in America relative to those outside the US; maintain their corporate headquarters in America if it has ever been in America; pay decent wages; prepare workers for retirement; provide health insurance; and support employees who serve in the military.
Invest in the Manufacturing Sector and Create 5 Million New Green Jobs
- Invest in our Next Generation Innovators and Job Creators: Obama and Biden will create an Advanced Manufacturing Fund to identify and invest in the most compelling advanced manufacturing strategies. The Fund will have a peer-review selection and award process based on the Michigan 21st Century Jobs Fund, a state-level initiative that has awarded over $125 million to Michigan businesses with the most innovative proposals to create new products and new jobs in the state.
- Invest In A Clean Energy Economy And Create 5 Million New Green Jobs: Obama and Biden will invest $150 billion over 10 years to advance the next generation of biofuels and fuel infrastructure, accelerate the commercialization of plug-in hybrids, promote development of commercial scale renewable energy, invest in low emissions coal plants, and begin transition to a new digital electricity grid. The plan will also invest in America’s highly-skilled manufacturing workforce and manufacturing centers to ensure that American workers have the skills and tools they need to pioneer the first wave of green technologies that will be in high demand throughout the world.
Support Small Business
- Provide Tax Relief for Small Businesses and Start Up Companies: Barack Obama and Joe Biden will eliminate all capital gains taxes on start-up and small businesses to encourage innovation and job creation. Obama and Biden will also support small business owners by providing a $500 “Making Work Pay” tax credit to almost every worker in America. Self-employed small business owners pay both the employee and the employer side of the payroll tax, and this measure will reduce the burdens of this double taxation.
- Protect Striking Workers: Obama and Biden support the right of workers to bargain collectively and strike if necessary. They will work to ban the permanent replacement of striking workers, so workers can stand up for themselves without worrying about losing their livelihoods.
- Raise the Minimum Wage: Barack Obama and Joe Biden will raise the minimum wage, index it to inflation and increase the Earned Income Tax Credit to make sure that full-time workers earn a living wage that allows them to raise their families and pay for basic needs.
Establish a Credit Card Bill of Rights to Protect Consumers: Obama and Biden will create a Credit Card Bill of Rights to protect consumers. The Obama-Biden plan will:
- Ban Unilateral Changes
- Apply Interest Rate Increases Only to Future Debt
- Prohibit Interest on Fees
- Prohibit “Universal Defaults”
- Require Prompt and Fair Crediting of Cardholder Payments
Obama and Biden will reform our bankruptcy laws to protect working people, ban executive bonuses for bankrupt companies, and require disclosure of all pension investments.
[Bonuses for CEOs of bankrupt companies SAVE companies from bankrupcy. The best CEOs will refuse to work for a struggling company…the kind of company that needs them most…unless there is some guarantee that, if it fails anyway, the damage to their reputation is paid for. The best executives will cease to be willing to rescue struggling companies, resulting in MORE failures, and more job loss.]
About
This site has its origins before the word “Blog” existed. Back then its owner, Kaz, was simply thought of as having a website that published socio-political articles with regularity…But the only real difference was that the RSS/XML protocals were not yet used this way.
The website was known as Site of the Sentient, a reference to the famous Words of the Sentient, that Kaz had been editing for years previously.
When some random portal site hijacked the domain siteofthesentient.com, it was a dark time for the human knowledge quest. Fortunately, But Now You Know is striving to take up the slack, and even has some revamped versions of the original articles, for example Conscription, is it Slavery, and How to Get Out of Jury Duty, and be a hero instead of a bad citizen.
Kaz is a writer, graphic artist, and supplements his income by being a hardcore senior web developer.
Along with this blog, you can track his efforts with the dedicated facebook page here.
Speaking of tracking:
You can follow But Now You Know here, on Twitter
And you can follow But Now You Know, via our Facebook Page, here.
Share This Article
Words of the Sentient- Tolkien, on Government
- Criminals Are Never Disarmed — Robert Heinlein
- Power Attracts the Corrupt — Frank Herbert
- Under Democracy — H.L. Mencken
- Guard Your Enemies from Oppression —> Thomas Paine
- Your Right to Not Support Evil
- Global Warming Shamanism
- The Squeaky Wheel…May Be Foolish
- Disarming the Victims
- The Inconvenience of Too Much Liberty
Recent Comments
- Pithy Pontifications
- An error has occurred; the feed is probably down. Try again later.
But Now You Know 