Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Friday, January 27, 2012
Ron Paul's Ronald Reagan Moment at the Debate When Answering a Question About His Age
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Fed News Friday: We Are WINNING
Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner, the last member of the Obama administration’s original economic team, said he doesn’t expect to remain in office if the president is re-elected.
“He’s not going to ask me to stay on, I’m pretty confident,” Geithner said in an interview with Bloomberg Television yesterday in Charlotte, North Carolina. “I’m confident he’ll be president. But I’m also confident he’s going to have the privilege of having another secretary of the Treasury.”
Awesome. The Fed’s people are becoming a big liability to politicians, especially ones like Tim Geithner who was heavily involved in orchestrating the financial bailouts, and has had some issues with paying his taxes as well, exemplifying the culture of privilege and corruption in finance, as well as the “revolving door” between big finance and big government, Wall Street and Washington. The Federal Reserve and its puppet masters are finally the target of public outrage. Even the fact that they’re the target of public awareness is a sea change for monetary policy in America.
Now back to the good news:
Read the rest of my article at The Silver Underground.
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Ron Paul's Best GOP Debate Performance Yet??? Ron Paul Highlights From The 1/26/2012 GOP Debate Hosted by CNN in Jacksonville
Ron Paul Highlights From The 1/26/2012 Republican Presidential Primary Debate Hosted by CNN in Jacksonville:(my commentary follows)
Ron Paul's best debate performance yet???
Even Ron Paul's critics were impressed by his performance at last night's debate. As a Daily Paul blogger notes, Red State's Erick Erickson had some surprisingly kind words for the good doctor:
"Then there was Ron Paul. Many of us quickly dismiss Ron Paul, but his performance was stellar. He offered extremely sound responses on healthcare, education, border security, and more. Very few of the questions were on foreign policy, which is where he tends to go off the reservation. Last night he came off as warm, funny, and right on the mark. It was his best debate performance. Santorum and Paul benefited from Romney and Gingrich’s constant bickering."
Who's the isolationist?
Watch from 2:00 - 7:00 where Ron Paul and Rick Santorum skirmish over foreign policy and tell me which one sounds like the isolationist to you.
The Age Issue and Ron Paul's perfect answer
At 9:35 the moderator says Ron Paul would be the oldest U.S. president and asks if he'd be willing to release his medical records so voters would know what his heath is. The audience actually lightly groans and boos the question, then laughs when Ron Paul says "Obviously because it's about one page if even that long," without blinking.
Then the audience roars their approval when Ron Paul challenges any of the other candidates on stage to a 25 mile bike ride in the Texas heat. But Paul wasn't finished. The audience roared even louder when Ron Paul jokingly quipped that there are laws against age discrimination so CNN had better be careful about pushing the question of his age too much. Who's idea was it to badger Paul about being too old at a debate in Florida of all states? Someone fire that guy.
Ron Paul pulled a total Ronald Reagan at the debate in Florida. Here's a flashback to Reagan's magically witty response when asked about his own age during a presidential debate:
Ron Paul on the space program
At 10:30 the moderator asks about the space program, and Ron Paul answers: "Well I don't think we should go to the moon. I think we maybe should send some politicians up there." Cue applause.
Ron Paul calls Newt Gingrich out on the budget
At 12:00 Ron Paul calls Newt out on being misleading when he says that he helped balance the budget in Congress. The audience applauded Paul, then booed and groaned at Newt's response.
I'm loving it. Then at 14:40 Ron Paul really lays the smack down on all of them for not seriously opposing the unrestrained and growing size, role, and influence of the federal government in Washington and it's insane budgets. Paul concludes his remarks here with: "How many of the other candidates are willing to cut anything? I'm willing to cut $1 trillion in the first year." *applause*
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You can read Carl Wicklander's take on the debate at The RevoluTimes.
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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LOL: Ron Paul trolling Newt Gingrich
Click here for some more serious commentary on the debate including a full video of all of Ron Paul's answers and exchanges.
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
Articles | Author's Page
Bain Capital Owns Talk Radio
Wouldn’t it be great if a Republican presidential candidate could just buy the support of just about every major conservative talk show host in America? Well, it may not be as far-fetched as you may think.
Clear Channel owns more radio stations (850) than anyone else in the United States. They also own Premiere Radio Networks, the company that syndicates the radio shows of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Glenn Beck, among others. Needless to say, Clear Channel basically owns conservative talk radio in the United States. So who owns Clear Channel? Well, it turns out that Bain Capital is one of the primary owners of Clear Channel. Yes, you read that correctly. The company that Mitt Romney ran for so long is one of the “big bosses” over virtually all conservative talk radio in America. Of course Mitt Romney is not running Bain Capital anymore. He is a “retired partner”, but he still has a huge financial stake in Bain Capital. We’re talking about millions upon millions of dollars. If you doubt this, just check out page 34 of this public financial disclosure report. So if you have been wondering why so many conservative talk show hosts are being so incredibly kind to Mitt Romney, this just might be the answer.
In the media world, there is a clear understanding that you simply do not bite the hand that feeds you. Some of the most prominent conservative talk radio hosts are earning tens of millions of dollars a year.
If you were making tens of millions of dollars a year, wouldn’t you be very careful to avoid offending your boss?
The deal in which Bain Capital became one of the owners of Clear Channel was initiated just a short time before Mitt Romney’s first run for president. The following comes from Wikipedia….
On November 16, 2006, Clear Channel announced plans to go private, being bought out by two private-equity firms,Thomas H. Lee Partners and Bain Capital Partners for $18.7 billion, which is just under a 10 percent premium above its closing price of $35.36 a share on November 16 (the deal values Clear Channel at $37.60 per share).The deal was finalized in 2008. Today, Bain Capital is still one of the primary owners of Clear Channel.
One of the subsidiaries of Clear Channel is Premiere Radio Networks.
Premiere Radio Networks distributes a whole host of conservative talk radio shows. Everyone in the conservative world knows names such as Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck. Clear Channel also controls some other conservative talk radio hosts (such as Michael Savage and Mark Levin) that are not part of the Premiere Radio family.
The power that Premiere Radio Networks has is absolutely staggering. The following is directly from the official Clear Channel website….
Premiere Radio Networks Inc., a subsidiary of Clear Channel Communications, syndicates 90 radio programs and services to more than 5,000 radio affiliations and reaches over 190 million listeners weekly. Premiere Radio is the number one radio network in the country and features the following personalities: Rush Limbaugh, Jim Rome, Casey Kasem, Ryan Seacrest, Glenn Beck, Bob (Kevoian) & Tom (Griswold), Delilah, Steve Harvey, Blair Garner, George Noory, John Boy and Billy, Big Tigger, Dr. Dean Edell, Bob Costas, Sean Hannity and others. Premiere is based in Sherman Oaks, California, with 13 offices nationwide.So do you think that any of those hosts is going to risk viciously attacking Mitt Romney and Bain Capital during this election season?
Not likely.
One of the controversies that has plagued Premiere Radio Networks in recent years has been the uproar over their use of paid actors to call in to their radio shows.
The following comes from Wikipedia….
Clear Channel, through its subsidiary, Premiere Radio Networks, auditions and hires actors to call in to talk radio shows and pose as listeners in order to provide shows, carried by Clear Channel and other broadcasters, with planned content in the form of stories and opinions. The custom caller service provided by Premiere Radio ensures its clients they won’t hear the same actor’s voice for at least two months in order to appear authentic to listeners who might otherwise catch on.So perhaps that explains where some of the “Romney callers” come from.
There is nothing illegal about what Romney and Bain Capital have done, but it sure does not pass the “smell test”.
Conservative talk radio has the potential to sway millions of conservative voters in one direction or another, and it is just not proper for Bain Capital and Romney to have such an overpowering financial interest in conservative talk radio.
Someone was actually in the room with me while I was reading the article above and seeing the expression on my face, they quickly snapped a photo of my reaction to this article, which I have published below:
But, no seriously. This is like so evil-sounding it can't be real. It's like something out of a movie. Some powerful Wall Street executive who made a killing lobbying for taxpayer dollars also owns the radio programs that shape public opinion in his political party, and now he's running for president? Could Mitt Romney possibly be a bigger caricature? Could it be more blindingly obvious that this guy is a crony? Would it help if he tattooed "Wall Street Crony" to his forehead? Would that help?
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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LAPD and the Pentagon Conducted Military Drills In Downtown LA Wednesday
The Los Angeles Police Department teamed with military special operation forces Wednesday evening to conduct multi-agency tactical exercises in the skies above downtown LA.
Many questioned what was going on Wednesday night as a Black Hawk helicopter and four OH-6 choppers – or “Little Birds” – flew over the city, at one point hovering just above the US Bank building downtown and later flying low over the Staples Center as the Lakers played inside.
Someone could be seen sitting inside an open chopper with his legs hanging off the side.
Sky9 spotted the Black Hawk in the dark, making what appeared to be a drop off at a park before quickly ascending back into the air.
Throughout the exercise, the five rotorcrafts were staged at Dodgers Stadium.
The LAPD said the purpose of the training was in part to ensure the military’s ability to operate in urban environments.
...
Similar exercises have been seen in Miami and Boston.
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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There Was Voter Fraud in South Carolina Elections, Attorney General Says
This is something we need to start taking more and more seriously. Looks like South Carolina's Attorney General is:COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - South Carolina's attorney general has notified the U.S. Justice Department of potential voter fraud.
Attorney General Alan Wilson sent details of an analysis by the Department of Motor Vehicles to U.S. Attorney Bill Nettles.
In a letter dated Thursday, Wilson says the analysis found 953 ballots cast by voters listed as dead. In 71 percent of those cases, ballots were cast between two months and 76 months after the people died. That means they "voted" up to 6 1/3 years after their death.
The letter doesn't say in which elections the ballots were cast.
The analysis came out of research for the state's new voter identification law. The U.S. Justice Department denied clearance of that law.
Wilson told Nettles he asked the State Law Enforcement Division to investigate.
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Liberty Pulse: Out to Get Ron Paul – CBS Blowback, FCC Complaints, and Jan Crawford’s Facebook Shutdown
Recently media types who blatantly attack Ron Paul have received spontaneous reactions from his supporters in what is being termed as Blowback Slammed. Bill O’Reilly knows this well, during his show he discussed the attacks on his new book Killing Lincoln where he received over 900 one star Amazon reviews after excluding Ron Paul from his Presidential forum debate poll. Paul supporters shut down Bill O’Reilly’s Facebook page and the same has just happened to Jan Crawford of CBS. You can now go to her Facebook page but posting privileges for the ‘everyone’ can post portion is no longer available after hundreds of posts were made condemning her for lack of integrity in reporting.
Saturday January 7th 2012, we exposed a story about CBS reporter Jan Crawford completely dismissing Ron Paul from her New Hampshire 2012 Campaign News Report and the reaction after. This Paul supporter blowback story went viral and many sites picked up the article including two financial news sites IBT and TheDailyCrux. An interesting layer to this ongoing story is the financial websites helping to expose CBS media bias against a free market Austrian economist, champion of limited government and Presidential candidate serious about cutting government spending back to 2006 levels.
Paul supporters are also fighting back by filing FCC complaints against Jan Crawford and CBS.
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Veterans to march on White House for Ron Paul
From the facebook event page:
Public Event · By Nathan Cox and Adam Kokesh- Monday, February 20, 2012
- Time 12:00pm until 3:00pm Washington Monument to White House
Then, at 1pm, line up in formation on 15th St NW facing North towards Constitution Ave NW, march in formation to the White House, about face, then “present arms” (hold a hand salute) to a folded flag for as many seconds as service members have died since Obama took office, then march silently back to the Washington monument and fall out.
Visit the facebook event page for more information and to indicate your participation.
Hat tip: RunRonPaul.com
More information from Adam Kokesh:
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Thursday, January 26, 2012
Ron Paul is Electable (Video Op Ed Version!)
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Anonymous Threatens To Hit CNN With Distributed Denial of Service Attack During CNN Debate Thursday Night
"In response to the establishment media blackout of Ron Paul, and specifically to the lack of equal time given to him during the debates, we the people will be blacking out the responses of all candidates except Ron Paul in the upcoming CNN debate in Jacksonville, Florida on Thursday January 26th at 8 PM Eastern Standard Time."
You can watch the entire video below:
Great background music, btw.
Unfortunately if this ends up happening at CNN's debate tonight, it won't bring positive press coverage to Ron Paul's campaign. It'll just feed into the media narrative about the extreme, fringe, "kookiness" of Ron Paul and his supporters.
Related - DDOS Attack: crime or virtual sit-in?
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Libertarian Party To Hold Presidential Debate In Orlando Early February
January 22, 2012
Libertarians To Hold Presidential Debate In Orlando
ORLANDO – The Libertarian Party of Florida (LPF) will host a Presidential Debate at their annual convention on Saturday, February 11, 2012 at the Embassy Suites in Orlando during the weekend-long 2012 LPF Convention.
The Libertarian Presidential candidates featured in the debate are two-term New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson, LP stalwart Lee Wrights, Kiowa Nation member and Afghan war veteran R.J. Harris, renowned author and documentary filmmaker Bill Still, former Texas LP chair Roger Gary, private Attorney General Carl Person, and entrepreneur Leroy Saunders. The debate will be televised live nationwide, and is open to the public.
Having achieved ballot access in nearly all 50 states, the Libertarian Presidential nominee will likely have a major impact on the outcome of the 2012 general Presidential election. In a three-way contest between Democrat Barack Obama, Republican Mitt Romney, and Libertarian Gary Johnson, the current LP frontrunner Gary Johnson would receive 7% of the vote according to a national poll released Thursday by Public Policy Polling.
The Libertarian Party is the third largest and fastest growing political party in the US, and is influential in both the Tea Party and Occupy movements due to their strong fiscal conservative positions and socially liberal views. Polling data indicates that as many as 60% of independent voters consider themselves, “fiscally conservative and socially liberal.”
“This could very well be the breakout year for the Libertarian Party. Nearly all Americans have been personally affected by the government's failed policies of market manipulation, deficit spending, taxation, entitlements, global wars, and the police state," said LPF chairman Adrian Wyllie. "Voters are starting to realize that a libertarian approach is the answer.”
The Libertarian Party Presidential nominee will be chosen by delegates to the 2012 Libertarian National Convention, which will be held in Las Vegas, Nevada on May 4-6, 2012.
The 2012 Libertarian Party of Florida state convention will also feature the annual business meeting, and elections will be held for secretary, treasurer, at-large representative, and all regional representatives. For more information, visit http://www.lpf.org.
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Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Why On Earth Did the GOP Pick Mitch Daniels To Deliver Their Response to Obama's SOTU?
Why does the Republican Party have such a self-destructive, self-defeating, spineless, squishy mindset? Why does it seem pathologically bent on finding the very worst representatives it can from its ranks to represent, lead, and speak for it?Former Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, whom we've never had anything nice to say about, was chosen to deliver the Republican Party's response to the President's State of the Union Address, but what were they thinking:
Why the Republicans chose Mitch Daniels—the Indiana governor who once thrilled right-wing pundits as a 2012 hopeful—to deliver a rebuttal to President Obama’s State of the Union address is puzzling. His uninspiring remarks surely killed the Daniels fad, revived lately as Republicans fret over the unappetizing choices available in their primaries.
By shining the spotlight on Daniels, the Republicans risked losing much more than a political rescue fantasy. He isn’t merely a politician who looks like an accountant; he actually was an accountant—or at least he played one during the Bush years, when he served as director of the Office of Management and Budget. Listening to him drone on about fiscal rectitude just might have reminded voters of the true source of our national problems.
“Mitch Daniels ... Isn’t he the former Bush budget director who said the Iraq War would cost $50 billion when it ended up costing $3 trillion? The bureaucrat who promoted the Bush tax cuts when we were fighting two wars? The one whose budget projections were so fraudulent that he predicted federal surpluses in 2004 and 2005? Why the hell should we listen to him criticize Obama?”
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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64 Year Old Woman Holds Suspected Car Thief At Gunpoint Until Police Arrive
An ordinary citizen with a gun:A 22-year-old car theft suspect tried to elude police Tuesday morning, but was stopped in his tracks when he was confronted by a gun-toting 64-year-old woman.
"I was not going to let him go," said Karen Granville, who lives on Redwood Street. "I just held my gun in my right hand until the police arrested him."
Granville helped authorities nab Roderick Willis after he led them on a short chase. He was suspected of driving a stolen vehicle, authorities said.
Daytona Beach police were looking for a stolen vehicle about 3 a.m. Tuesday when a Volusia County sheriff's deputy spotted an orange Dodge Charger traveling west on Sixth Street. The deputy tried to stop the vehicle, but a chase quickly ensued, according to a report from the Volusia County Sheriff's Office.
A sheriff's helicopter tracked the suspect to Redwood Street, where deputies say Willis ditched the vehicle in the driveway in front of Granville's home.
Granville said she was up late because her cat had rousted her. She was watching the Bravo channel when she heard a sheriff's helicopter hovering above her house.
Moments later, she said she saw Willis run into her backyard and try to scale her fence. Granville grabbed her .38 Special revolver and followed him.
"My adrenaline was just flowing at 100 mph," she said. "I just said, 'Stop right there (expletive), or you're going to be dead where you stand."
Granville held the man at gunpoint until police arrived.
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Senator Rand Paul Fights Back Against UN International Small Arms Treaty
Dear fellow American,
If we’re going to defeat the UN’s Small Arms Treaty gun owners have to turn the heat up on the U.S. Senate now before it’s too late!
Please sign your Firearms Sovereignty Survey and put yourself squarely on the record AGAINST ratification of the UN’s Small Arms Treaty.
For Freedom,
Rand Paul
U.S. Senator (R-KY)
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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TSA Releases Video Suggesting Nashville Airport Police Lied About Senator Rand Paul's Response to TSA Encounter
Meanwhile the TSA released footage of Sen. Rand Paul at Nashville International Airport. Rand Paul showed no visible signs of being “irate” as Nashville International Airport police asserted in an incident report, according to newly released video of a run-in with airport security:
A security video of U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kentucky, at a Nashville International Airport checkpoint doesn’t show him being “irate,” as police asserted.
The Kentucky Republican ran afoul of a millimeter-wave screening machine Tuesday morning that went off as he tried to enter the airport terminal. Airport officials asked him to undergo a pat-down, but he refused.
An incident report describes the police response as being to “a passenger being irate.” But videos released by the Metro Airport Authority late Wednesday show Paul entering the security line at 7:57 a.m. and then alternately sitting and standing in a glass cubicle while being watched by airport officials. Paul appears to make a few phone calls as well.
Paul is shown being escorted by an airport official at 9:04 a.m. Paul rebooked his flight and later went through security without incident.
Oh no! The government lied? No way!
If you're having trouble viewing the video at the link above (like I was) try the video at The Tennessean.
Honestly, the most interesting part of the video to me was this part, which I've saved for you in an official HumbleLibertarian.com screen grab:
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Wednesday, January 25, 2012
State of the Union: Ten Economic Graphs That Should Scare The Hell Out Of You
“Crisis takes a much longer time coming than you think, and then it happens much faster than you would have thought.” -MIT economist Rudiger DornbuschAt President Obama’s State of the Union Address this year, which was heavy on recycled platitudes and light on substance, the president did more to prepare for the upcoming general election than actually give a genuine assessment of the state of the union, but that’s pretty par for the course. A sincere state of the union by the President of the United States may be more than most Americans are ready for yet– the horror of listening to the president describe the true economic realities we face might be more than many people could handle. I hope I’m wrong and most Americans would welcome an honest word from a major politician as a breath of fresh air.
What would a sincere state of the union address look like? The president could just show us graphs of economic data and leave it at that. It would be the most radical truth-telling we have heard from the White House in a long time. If you really want to know the state of union and you have the stomach for it, here are ten economic graphs that show just how precarious the state of the union really is and just how long our current economic troubles are likely to last:
Read the rest of my article at The Silver Underground
...but only if you have a strong stomach!
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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Obama State of the Union 2012 Address: News and Commentary Roundup
Here's this year's Obama State of the Union 2012 News and Commentary roundup. If you missed Obama's 2012 State of the Union Address Tuesday night, don't worry.
Looks like you didn't miss anything new:
Familiar Rhetoric, Failed Record
The "dumbing down" of America-- Obama's 2012 State of the Union Address was written at an 8th grade reading level for the third straight year:
Obama's SOTU addresses have the lowest average Flesch-Kincaid score of any modern president; Obama owns three of the six lowest-scoring addresses since FDR.
For the third consecutive State of the Union Address, Barack Obama spoke in clear, plain terms. And for the third straight Address, the President's speech was written at an eighth-grade level.
In Obama's own words: "My message is simple."
But was it too simplistic?
A Smart Politics study of the 70 orally delivered State of the Union Addresses since 1934 finds the text of Obama's 2012 speech to have tallied the third lowest score on the Flesch-Kincaid readability test, at an 8.4 grade level.
Obama also delivered the second lowest scoring address in 2011 (at an 8.1 grade level) and the sixth lowest in 2010 (at an 8.8 grade level).
The Flesch-Kincaid test is designed to assess the readability level of written text, with a formula that translates the score to a U.S. grade level. Longer sentences and sentences utilizing words with more syllables produce higher scores. Shorter sentences and sentences incorporating more monosyllabic words yield lower scores.
Barack Obama is betting that the American people are dumb. He's betting it and he's banking on it.
Ron Paul responds to Obama State of the Union:
2012 Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul is betting that the American people are smart. In Ron Paul's response to Obama's 2012 State of the Union Address, he says:“Tonight, President Obama once again showed that he does not represent the fundamental change this country needs. Instead of offering solutions to the problems our country faces, the President was intent on delivering a campaign speech, further dealing in the typical Washington political gamesmanship that has gotten us exactly nowhere close to improving the lives of the American people.
“In a speech where much of the rhetoric was devoted to job creation, it was strange that President Obama would brag about his job-destroying national health care plan, Obamacare, and the Dodd-Frank bill, which, contrary to the President’s claims, guarantees future taxpayer bailouts of large institutions. Unfortunately, President Obama’s ‘job creation’ policies amount to little more than continuing to allow government bureaucrats to pick winners and losers, which is a recipe for continued economic stagnation.
“President Obama claims to want an economy where everyone gets a fair shot, everyone does their fair share, and everyone plays by the same set of rules. Yet he remains committed to the same old system of debt, deficits, bailouts, and cronyism that created our economic problems. The President speaks of giving us energy independence from unstable nations, yet he refuses to allow the type of development needed to achieve this goal, while at the same time his administration hands out favors to the politically connected – those given to the likes of Solyndra, who fail to produce jobs or energy but succeed in ripping off the taxpayers.
“Of course, President Obama refuses to even mention the role the Federal Reserve plays in creating an economic system where some are denied a fair shot or even to support my efforts at bringing transparency to the Federal Reserve. Also not mentioned by President Obama is the very crucial need for reining in spending and balancing the federal budget. What is called by some ‘the greatest threat to our national security’ seems not to be of great importance to this President, although I, like many Americans, believe it to be cause for immediate measures, like the $1 trillion in spending cuts that would take place in my first year as President under my Plan to Restore America.
“In the area of foreign policy and civil liberties, President Obama’s rhetoric may be different, but the substance of his polices – as shown by his administration’s defense of the TSA’s treatment of my son, Senator Rand Paul, is hardly ‘change we can believe in.’ No wonder more and more Americans, especially young people, are rejecting the phony alternatives of Obama and establishment Republicans and embracing my campaign to Restore America Now.”
Gary Johnson responds to Obama State of the Union:
“If the idea tonight was that the President would fulfill his constitutional duty to give us ‘information of the State of the Union’, we should be able to expect some truth. I didn’t hear much truth. Truth is that the real unemployment rate is probably still above 10%. Truth is that after all the hand-wringing and deals of the past couple of years, instead of cutting spending, the President and Congress are going back to the well for another $1.2 Trillion debt limit increase. And the truth is we are seeing nothing from either the President or the Republicans that will really change any of those unacceptable realities.
“Only in the twilight zone that is Washington could a President who has bailed out and stimulated our economy to death stand in the Capitol and declare there should be ‘no bailouts, no handouts, and no cop-outs’. Can anyone spell GM or TARP or Solyndra?
“The President said we deserve a government that plays by the same rules as millions of hard-working Americans. Perhaps that should begin with the government not borrowing and printing 43 cents of every dollar it spends – something hard-working Americans can’t and don’t do.
“Until we see a real plan – not a Washington smoke and mirrors plan – that puts a stop to deficit spending and really puts America back to work, all of this rhetoric is just wasted breath.”
Rand Paul responds to Obama's State of the Union
Cato responds to Obama's State of the Union
Cato Institute scholars Malou Innocent, Chris Edwards, Neal McCluskey, Ilya Shapiro, Jerry Taylor, Dan Mitchell and Dan Ikenson respond to President Obama's 2012 State of the Union Address:
Obama's redistributive "fairness"
While Obama focused on economic "fairness" in his 2012 State of the Union Address, Michael D. Tanner of the Cato Institute notes that his version of fairness is based on a false view of of economics:The president’s vision of the state of the union is a zero-sum one in which, if some people get rich, it must make other people poor. If Warren Buffett makes money, then Peggy Joseph won’t have gas for her car. The only alternative is for the government to step in and make Mr. Buffett pay for Ms. Joseph’s gas.
Of course there is another option.
We all seek a society in which every American can reach his or her full potential, in which as few people as possible live in poverty, and in which no one must go without the basic necessities of life. More important, we want a society in which every person can live a fulfilling life. But the evidence is now inescapable that the best way to achieve that goal is not through welfare-state redistribution of wealth, but through the creation of more wealth. We should judge the success of our efforts not by how much charity we provide to the poor, but by how few people need such charity.
Full video of Obama's State of the Union:
Full video of Republican response:
Wes Messamore,
Editor in Chief, THL
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The Need For More Undertakers
About a month ago I was fortunate enough to attend a book signing luncheon in downtown Chicago, sponsored by the Heartland Institute, where I had the opportunity to hear Tom Palmer make a presentation on the topic of a new book that he edited, titled The Morality of Capitalism. A small book full of big ideas, it's very readable and I recommend it highly.
During that speech*, Palmer (who, because I was a few moments late, was lucky enough to be seated next to me for lunch) referred to a term that I immediately knew would, at some point, be used when I got around to writing about what I consider to be a huge, but often ignored, problem. Even though I'm a know-it-all, somehow I always learn something fun and useful at these luncheons.
The term was "undertaker" and the etymology was explained as; "an old English phrase meaning; one who undertakes some activity or task", or as it might be expanded, a risk or a business. The more modern term is entrepreneur.
A reflection on my personal experience as a successful "undertaker" has led me to conclude that in today's environment, the seed of that undertaking could never have been planted, much less come to fruition. The barriers to starting a business as a floor broker on the trading floor of the exchange were so small as to be almost non-existent. You simply qualified for exchange membership (a minimal and relatively inexpensive task) and hung up your shingle.
Success or failure was in your hands, not the result of being able to comply with myriad regulations and large capital requirements. Government hacks were not allowed to divine how many brokers were "too many" or if a person was clever enough to get a good execution of the stock orders for their clients instead of just "filling and billing" them. The clients themselves, or lack thereof, would decide that. Today, sadly, it's a novel concept to many.
It was 1981 when I hung up our shingle and it was a simpler time in a much freer America. I was from an extremely modest financial background, barely escaped high school and was scholastically unprepared for a formal college education. In other words, I was unintentionally perfect to test the theory that hard work and the drive to succeed were all that was necessary to achieve the American dream.
There was nothing particularly compelling about my story back then. I personally knew tons of people who did better than we did with even less going for them than I began with. If it wasn't the norm, it certainly wasn't unique. And back then, it never occurred to me that someday I would mourn the loss of such an expected environment.
But this isn't a piece about the past, it's about turning things around for the future. And hoping it's not too late for others to reach for the dream themselves. It's about our kids and our neighbors. It's about poor people not being poor anymore. It's not about hitting the target, it's about having a shot at it.
So let's not waste time talking about government job programs that never work. Instead, let's examine how we can get back to what does work and always has. Identifying the problem is always the first step in fixing it.
Barack Obama recently read a speech in Kansas that made the same points as I just did when he referred to his grandparents' generation by saying;
"They believed in an America where hard work paid off, responsibility was rewarded and anyone could make it if they tried - no matter who you were, where you came from, or how you started out. These values gave rise to the largest middle class and the strongest economy the world has ever known."
Unfortunately the writer then descended into a predictable diatribe about corporate greed and the mythical notion that the government doesn't have sufficient regulatory power to keep those values alive today. As usual, and probably on purpose, they missed the whole point. In fact, they got it precisely backwards.
When it comes to job creation, over-regulation at all levels of government is the wrench in the works. And worse than that, it is the most harmful to our economic liberties. The loss of those liberties is the most under-reported story in the history of a news media that should be the target of a reverse class action suit for malpractice. (A suit I just made up where there are many defendants and only a few complainants.)
Luckily, there is a group of lawyers at a place called The Institute for Justice who not only understand the gravity of the situation, but have been suing various governments on behalf of ordinary citizens for decades in an effort to re-secure our rights. It's good to know that people with legal expertise are there to back us up in a world where we don't stand a chance on our own against a cabal of crony capitalists and power hungry politicians.
You and I can rely on our common sense to inform us that when two parties agree to engage in a legal activity for mutual benefit, no one - least of all the very government who is supposed to be defending our rights - should be allowed to interfere. But common sense alone won't prevail against governments who spend our own money to beat us back in court. Governments exist to defend rights, not to usurp them. It's more than a legal question, it's a moral imperative.
What are some of these cases, you ask? There are more than can be tallied that we will never know about, but the "merry band of litigators" (as George Will has dubbed them) are working on a few right now that I think will help highlight how deep the country has become mired in the muck of lost dreams and jobs that never got created.
One such case will make your hair stand on edge, but only because a state government is preventing a citizen from braiding it for you. It's Clayton v. Steinagel, a case about a lady who wants to braid hair for people who want her to do it for them.
The Institute describes the situation:
"Jestina Clayton, a college graduate, wife, mother of two and refugee from Sierra Leone’s civil war has been braiding hair for most of her life. Now she wants to use her considerable skills to help provide for her family while her husband finishes his education. But the state of Utah says she may not be paid to braid unless she first spends thousands of dollars on 2,000 hours of government-mandated cosmetology training—not one hour of which actually teaches her how to braid hair. In the same number of class hours, a person also could qualify to be an armed security guard, mortgage loan originator, real estate sales agent, EMT and lawyer—combined. Such arbitrary and excessive government-imposed licensing on such an ordinary, safe and uncomplicated practice as hairbraiding is not only outrageous, it is unconstitutional."
So ask yourself; why the hell do we need permission from anyone to engage in a business anyway? And why doesn't Barack Obama, the first black President, stand with black people who want to work instead of receive government assistance? Politically it's a no brainer. But then again, maybe he doesn't have a brain... oh never mind. I digress and this isn't a bash fest. Plenty of time for that in the next eleven months.
Then there is the case of Courtney v Goltz. The Institute describes the case of government granted monopoly:
"Jim and Cliff Courtney have a plan to bring economic prosperity to their small community of Stehekin, located on the north shore of Lake Chelan in the center of the state. Because Stehekin is accessible only by boat or plane, the Courtney brothers want to provide convenient ferry service across Lake Chelan so more people can enjoy the natural beauty and outdoor activities in the community their family has called home for four generations."
"Unfortunately, the state of Washington has sunk their plan. A nearly century-old state law requires Jim and Cliff to obtain a certificate of “public convenience and necessity” from the state in order to pick up and drop off passengers along Lake Chelan. This requirement, which was implemented to protect existing ferry providers from competition, has resulted in a government-imposed monopoly on Lake Chelan ferry service since the 1920s." Read more..
All of us have our rights trampled upon when these laws are allowed to stand. Not to mention the jobs that never got created.
And then there are the cases of making a people get a license to speak to others about sightseeing in Washington DC (and elsewhere) and the case of the dangerous Interior Designers. You might enjoy the videos concerning those cases I have added below.
So the point is that in all times and places our economic rights are just as important as our other rights if we are to remain a free country. But it's especially disconcerting to see the President talking about how greed caused lost jobs and how taxing the rich during a class war or borrowing more money to finance failed solar companies and the like will create new ones when a large part of the problem is that government is the biggest impediment to fixing the problem. And despite all the attention presidential wannabes give to them, it's not just big companies that are over-regulated, it's everyday folks like you and I too.
Mr. President, and all you other geniuses who are trying to get his job, try getting the hell out of the way. The country needs more undertakers, not fewer. We have to get back to leaving them alone or the only thing we will need an undertaker for is to arrange a cremation for the economy. From the looks of it, it's halfway to cinders already.
*A presentation almost exactly like the one I attended can be found here. It's an hour long, but if you watch it, it's quite likely to be the best hour you spend this month.
This article was originally published at WhatWeThinkandWhy on 1/10/12.
By Grant Davies,
Regular Columnist, THL
Articles | Author's Page | Website
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Editor in Chief, THL
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