Well, well, well. The Russian Menace has now come out in favor of a world gold standard in order to “uphold discipline in the world financial system.” Sound like any elderly third-party presidential candidates from Texas you know of?
What’s more, the Great Enemy of the East, China, seems open to the idea as well. Need I say more?
Two conclusions necessarily follow from these disturbing developments.
Ron Paul and his followers are fascist sympathizers and possibly traitors. They should be watched closely at the very least.
On Thursday, the House of Representatives voted 328-93 to impose a 90% tax on recipients of bonuses from taxpayer-supplied bailout monies. It is nice to see Congress suddenly concerned about taxpayer money for a change, or even that they recognize the money as coming from the taxpayer and not belonging to the government.
I suppose before I jump off into my rant, it is required that I offer the obligatory distancing speech from AIG. Here goes: What AIG did was reprehensible and there are plenty of bad actors among the leadership of that company that paying bonuses was questionable at best. Many of them don’t deserve bonuses for the harm their actions have wrought. However, I would stop short of suggesting that these execs fall on their swords.
Having said that, what in the hell was the House thinking? Sen. Christopher Dodd inserted a provision in the bailout contractually obligating AIG to pay bonuses to its executives (although Dodd is now pointing at Geithner as the guilty party, either way…). As a result, AIG paid out $165 milllion worth of the $173 billion it received in the bailout. (For those who don’t have a calculator handy, that’s less than 1/10th of 1%). The company was contractually obligated to make the payments and the Senate Banking Committee and Treasury Department were well aware of the fact. But, when folks like Barney Frank heard that AIG was paying out bonuses to its execs, the spittle began to fly and politicians across this great land began to grandstand and demogogue. They so whipped themselves into a frenzy, that they thought nothing of passing a bill of attainder in the House to recoup 90% of the bonuses. After all, let us not forget who that money really belongs to (and the right answer is not taxpayers). If AIG is going to try to give that money to people who are politically toxic, Congress has an obligation to reassert its authority over those funds – no matter how unconstitutional the measure it has to adopt.
The one comforting thing I think we can all take from this is the certainty that we can trust that this is limited to the bailout money. We should not worry that contracts have been imperiled by Congress’ act. We should go about our daily business entering into contracts freely, secure in the knowledge that, at least as long as the politicians approve of both parties to a particular contract and don’t perceive that any politically disfavored person is being enriched by the contract, that your contracts are perfectly safe from government interference.
Did you guess correctly? Turns out the paleo conservatives in this country have a lot in common with the fascist Russians. They both think that America, as she stands today, is rotten; they truly believe America is irretrievably broken. Paleos have harped for years that America is lost, its citizens delusional. Russia seems to think that the American people are ready to throw off the ties that bind them to their democratically elected leaders in Washington. Both agree that the situation is dire and both camps couldn’t be happier about it.
The Russians see the destruction of our union as a opportunity for them to spread their influence. After all, America is the prime reason they failed on their first attempt under the Central Committee of the Communist Party. Many Paleos see the end of the Union as the only way to preserve the God granted rights of the several states (including the right to subjugation, discrimination, and taxation of interstate commerce). While both agree that the end is near (and a good thing it is too) they do so for very different reasons. Hmmm, a mutual enemy does tend to make strange bedfellows.
I contend that America is and always will be strong; that our Union shall not perish from this Earth, to borrow a phrase. Sure, we experience hiccups and heart breaks. Good times, bad times and everything in between. I see strength in numbers, compacts and mutual devotion. It is easy to drift into the sea of despair the Paleos envision and the Russians encourage but it is short sighted and patently un-American. Our existence as a nation is based on progress, liberty and hard work. When times, as they are, get tough the tough do not break up and quit, they buckle down and fix the problems. Do not lose hope, do not write our nation’s obituary. Be part of the solution: Return conservatism to Washington and help Washington return to her foundations. Taking a sledge hammer to it results in total destruction, not preservation or progress. What is conservative about that?
If you think way back to late January, you may remember that the administration was touting its economic stimulus plan as the only means to “save or create” three to four million jobs. They warned that, with passage of the economic stimulus, the economy would still suffer with unemployment rising to between 8 and 9 percent; but without the stimulus, we were looking at 12% unemployment. Well, luckily, we passed the stimulus because, don’t look now, but the unemployment rate just hit 8.1%. If they weren’t shining us on, then we are at or near the bottom of this crisis. It appears we can all take a deep breath because Washington has saved us. We should expect the next report on housing will show that prices are recovering.
The 2009 Geneva Motor Show is underway, and if the pictures are any indication, there was much to tantalize the eyes of car enthusiasts. Meanwhile, General Motors released a statement today that without further infusions of cash from the federal government, it is doubtful whether they will remain viable as a going concern.
I might suggest that they look at what some of their competitors are doing and ask themselves if they are anywhere close to providing the same sort of a product to their customers. Take for example this concept unveiled by Italian car designer Italdesign-Giugiaro who has teamed up with the venerable Frazer-Nash.
You probably wouldn’t guess it from looking at the photo, but the Namir (Arabic for Tiger) is a hybrid car. It gets 39km per liter of fuel or about 91.7 miles per gallon. It has a 50-liter tank (13.2 gallon) that gives the vehicle a range of 1950km on a tank of fuel or an astounding 1200 miles per fill up. You will have to stop to pee before you have to stop for gas. Along the way, you will enjoy the thrill that comes from commanding a 370hp powerplant with a top speed of around 187 mph while emitting less than 96.5 grams (0.213 pounds) of carbon dioxide per mile.
General Motors, on the other hand, offers this.
The Chevy Volt is a hybrid car designed to run up to 40 miles on a single charge of its batteries without using any gasoline or emitting any CO2. Once the batteries are exhausted, the Volt can be driven on E85 fuel from which it extracts 50 mpg for a combined maximum range of 640 miles. The Volt boasts a top speed of 120mph (for a limited time) and will arrive at 60mph from a standstill in an achingly slow 8.5 to 9 seconds. That, my friends, is not exactly sprightly. I’m not sure what that translates to in terms of horsepower, but I wager to say that it is significantly less than the Namir’s 370hp. Given the complete dearth of power, the most surprising thing about this vehicle is that it is not a Chrysler product.
When one sees what GM’s competitors are doing, it can hardly be described as mysterious why General Motors is struggling to maintain its hold on the automotive market and why it stands before the taxpayers with its hand outthrust asking “Brother, can you spare a dime?” Or $30 billion.
If one were to take the Sunday shows as any indication, there must have been a memo that went out amongst Republican Party stalwarts to do anything possible to put distance between the Party and Rush Limbaugh. And yet, when Rush showed up at the CPAC conference to make a speech, he elicited eight standing ovations and clearly energized the crowd. What is going on here?
Let us set aside for one moment the question of whether Rush espouses a doctrinally pure conservatism. I promise, for those of you who are frothing at the mouth to denounce his conservative heresies, we will talk about that at the end of this post.
At the outset, any fair minded person would have to acknowledge that the controversy with Rush was created by comments made by President Obama that the Republican Party needs to stop listening to Rush. From that moment, Republicans have scampered for cover, assuring anyone who would listen that Rush doesn’t speak for them. In the current vernacular, they are throwing Rush under the bus.
Sure, one could argue that Rush brought this upon himself by saying that he hoped President Obama would fail in his attempt at adoption of his economic (“socialist,” as Rush pronounced them) policies. If one would concede that, then one would have to concede that the Bush administration was the epitome of open-mindedness and tolerance given the fact that “comedians” like Bill Maher and Keith Olberman slandered the president’s character on a nightly basis. Does anyone remember George W. Bush or anyone in his administration warning Democrats that if they hoped to get along (read: pass any legislation) with the administration, they should denounce Maher et. al.? I don’t either. The phenomenon seems to be peculiar to the Obama administration – this penchant for attacking one’s critics in the media.
What is really puzzling is not that Obama and his minions would attack the administration’s detractors, the Left has a long history of these sorts of tactics. The real surprise is the Republicans’ willingness to follow Obama’s lead and cast off one of its most effective spokesmen. You may hate Limbaugh. But you cannot deny that he captures the attention of millions of Americans every day. In addition, on balance, I think even the most ardent detractors on the Right would acknowledge that Rush does more to promote conservative values than he does to destroy them. And they would easily acknowledge that Rush is less of a threat than Obama himself.
On this issue, that Republicans (or conservatives, if one has abandoned the party) should denounce Rush for his statement that he hopes Obama’s socialistic goals fail, I wonder what the right position is. Does Ron Paul hope that Barack Obama succeeds in pushing his Socialist agenda down Americans’ throats? Why would anyone denounce Rush for that stance? Because he has the temerity to say that he hopes a black man fails? I want to know what is at the root of this reaction. Why shouldn’t the masses support Rush on this issue? Why shouldn’t that sort of rhetoric propel butts out of auditorium seats in fits of wild applause? How can anyone defend as sane this late Republican impulse to distance oneself from such a stance? What does that say about the Republican Party that when Rush says he hopes Obama fails to turn this country into a Socialist Paradise that the Party feels compelled to denounce him?
To clean up a few other items: Did Rahm Emanual really just say that Obama is going to make the economy contract – for the good of America? At around 6:15, Rahm states:
The Republicans will have the opportunity not just to criticize, but to propose. And the question is: Will they continue the path of the seven years that got us to the point of – basically a culture of rising deficits and more and more consumer spending? This budget deficit – for this budget and economic program fundamentally changes the culture in this way – it rejects the past and says we are going to be a culture and a society that invests and saves.
Those comments appear to me to be a clear message from the Obama administration, that it is not at all concerned about growing the economy. If it were, consumer spending is one of the mainstay signs of a confident and expanding economy. Emanuel has stated that this administration is more interested in promoting saving and investment. It should probably be noted that when this administration says “investment,” it means that people should send their money to Washington and allow Washington to spend it on programs and projects which it deems worthy.
In the last week, the Dow Jones Industrials have been in a nosedive. And yet, it does not appear that the Obama administration is concerned in any way. Indeed, the nosedive is directly related to his policies. One way to look at the stock market is to see it as the “experts” opinion as to what the economy will look like in 9 months or a year. And yet, even after Obama passed his stimulus plan and witnessed a minor crash of the market in its wake, he has now proposed an unprecedented expansion in spending and sent the market once again into retreat. One can only conclude that Obama is not concerned about the market or about business, but rather is more interested in advancing his own agenda where the government assumes a larger and larger role in people’s lives. One clear example of this attitude can be seen in the fact that it appears that America will have the largest corporate tax rate on earth when all is said and done. The message is being sent: We do not want business in America. Let us all hope the Obama presidency is less than “successful.”
Don’t look south, but things are getting a little parlous on the border. It seems that the two major drug cartels in Mexico have been talking about calling a truce and joining forces. Their combined numbers are apparently in the range of 100,000 foot soldiers. Meanwhile, the Mexican Army itself boasts around 130,000 men under arms. Federal Mexican forces have been streaming into the border town of Cuidad Juarez in order to quell an upsurge of violence in that region. In the past year, more than 7,000 people have been killed in the conflict that rages just South of the United States. To place that in context, over the entire course the War in Iraq since March 19, 2003 (which has been labeled by foes on both the Right and Left as an unwinnable quagmire) the United States has lost 4,254 persons; 3422 of those were killed in combat. In terms of numbers killed, the conflict on our border is ten times as hot as the conflict in Iraq has been.
The fact that the Mexican armed forces are on a numerical parity with the drug cartels should be a cause for grave concern in Washington, but it is unclear what, if anything, the current administration proposes to do to protect its citizens living near the border. Mexico is now counted as one of the top three threats to America’s national security along with Pakistan and Iran. Presumably that means we will send envoys to the cartels and try to make them like us by giving them things, saying nice things about them, and ignoring the fact that they have a tendency to leave headless corpses in their wakes in a style redolent of al Qaeda.
It has been nice (although suicidal) that the United States heretofore has been able to maintain a largely open and unguarded border with Mexico, but it is abundantly clear that those days have passed. With 230,000 armed soldiers likely to be engaged in open war on our border shortly, it behooves Obama to tend to his southern border with a large military presence. If not only to protect against an overspill of the conflict which looms, but also to protect against the wave of refugees that is likely to use the opportunity to make the border run that, for whatever reason, they have been putting off. The one good thing that might have come from the United States’ complete financial meltdown is that the U.S. might have looked a little less attractive to potential skulkers across our borders. However, with the upsurge in violence and political instability across the Rio Grande, that silver lining is tarnishing fast.
Perhaps Obama, Pelosi and Reid should rethink their plans to gut the military budget as it appears the military may be needed in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California.
Obama has nominated a fourth tax dodger to his administration. Ron Kirk, former mayor of Dallas, failed to included a series of speaking fees in his income and he later claimed deduction for the cost of his season tickets to Dallas Maverick games! Kirk has since agreed to pay $10,000 in back taxes.
Change we can believe in? Nah, just the same old thieves and crooks Washington has always known. But what did you expect, an ethical politician from Chicago?
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