Morning Joe 2/4/2013 -- Two Republican Parties

On Morning Joe, Scarborough used a good portion of the first segment to continue the conversation regarding short-term government spending, long term entitlement cuts, picking Republican candidates who can win, Karl Rove's role in electing Republican's going foward and what type of Republican Party should emerge as dominant among the factions.

Centrists like Scarborough are all over the place as they try to answer all criticisms and present themselves as giving everything needed to everyone who needs. When the Centrists are confronted with the problem of national debt and deficits, they say they're as concerned as anyone about spending, but they want to cut spending when we can afford to cut spending, down the road. Presently, the Centrists want to follow the Democratic Party by supporting government spending on education,  infrastructure and R&D. Centrists believe, like Democrats believe, that this type of government spending will create economic growth sufficient enough for investors to invest and businesses to expand and hire, but there's no evidence of this.

Scarborough and John Heilemann both snarked about the stock market being high, thus this disproves Obama is anti-Wall Street and that investors won't invest if taxes are raised. Actually, the informed criticism of Obama and the Progressive agenda is that it's killing small business growth. Yes, Obama and Co. are cronies/protectors of large corporations, but how does that create sustainable economic growth that generates good jobs? Yes, large corporations will make money if taxes are raised, but small business are hurt and they fire workers. So, the joking by Scarborough and Heilleman is not so funny when you look at who's hurt by Progressive policies. A few rich Wall Streeters are getting richer and sitting on their wealth or investing it overseas, and this is good for the nation? This says something positive about higher txes and Obama's policies? I don't get it.

Scarborough said he wants candidates who can win. So this seems to be the main point made by the Centrist/Establishment types -- they want to win and possess power over our statist system. Scarborough says Harry Reid is running the Senate because Republicans have given into the most extreme people in the GOP. Yes, the very moderate, balanced and reasonable Harry Reid won because Republicans are extreme. Got it.

John Podhoretz was on the show, and Pohoretz presented a distinction from the basic Centrist. Podhoretz brought up the fact that Centrists, who Scarborough considers the winners, did not run in the last election because they were afraid of the Obama money machine. This made way for the Herman Cain and Donald Trump show. The Scarborough types sat on the sidelines and made fun of those who ran. Yes, Republicans need to present smart propositions for governance, but the pretend balanced approach of government spending now with promised cuts in the future is the Democrats plan. Podhoretz laid out a good direction -- economic growth through economic freedom, deregulation, and leadership regarding peace and prosperity. Economic growth will answer a lot of our problems -- innovation, productivity, creativity, discovery. As new avenues of economic growth open up, the private sector breaks its dependence on government and moves toward private sector solutions. This is the way out. Centrists seem to believe they can offer Democratic Party lite and this will create wins in the GOP column -- I don't think so.

Morning Joe 10/12/2012 -- Moderate nonsense

The Morning Joe crew talked about the VP debate, and, of course, they gave Biden more credit for doing well than he deserved. Mika believes that Biden mopped the floor with Ryan and chewed him up into a shriveled something or other, and Mika wasn't laughing, although she thought Biden's goofy laughter was appropriate because it showed his disdain for the nothingness of Ryan's and Romney's ideas. Damn straight!

Scarborough and Sam McKinnon felt like it was some sort of partisan draw with both sides thinking their side won, but the real question is how independents reacted. The political pundits like Howard Dean, Chuck Todd, David Gregory and Tom Brokaw all know Biden because Biden is a political professional who's been in DC forever, and Biden is a handshaker and backslapper and big smiler, so they overlook his weird side and his condescending side -- they all pretty much admitted they like Biden, so they see him differently. The country as a whole, no doubt, mostly saw Biden as arrogant and disrepectful, and, yes, goofy.

Scarborough led the stupid analyses on Morning Joe, with the consensus being that Romney/Ryan have not explained how they will pay for their "5 trillion dollar tax cut" and Obama/Biden will not consider entitlement reform, so the moderate solution, according to Scarborough and a few others is to do all of it -- the salmagundi strategy -- raise taxes, cut spending, reform entitlements, a little of all of it.

As I wrote yesterday, I'm tired of this attack on Romney's tax plan. Romney has placed limits on his plan, and this is what Scarborough and the rest of media are intentionally leaving out. I understand the Democrats spinning Romney's plan and lying about it, but why is Scarborough and Mckinnon doing the same? Romney has limited his plan by saying he will not add a penny to the debt. The study by Harvey Rosen that the Democrats are using to claim that Romney's tax plan will be a 5 trillion dollar tax cut and that closing loopholes and ending deductions won't pay for it, so the middle class will have to cough up 2000 extra dollars a year, doesn't claim what Democrats and centrists like Scarborough say it does. Rosen himself said that Democrats are misrepresenting his plan, that the reduction in the tax rate planned by Romney can be paid for by eliminating loopholes and deductions. Romney and Ryan have said more than once that they want the eliminated deductions to fall mainly on the wealthy, so Democrats should welcome such a plan to end corporate welfare. The other criticism is that Romney has not given specifics regarding the loopholes and eductions, but Romney and Ryan have explained that if they give specifics now before the elections, each elimination will be demagogued by Obama and the media. Romney is right when he says the best way to get this passed is to offer a bipartisan effort to identify and agree on the specifics. But back to the limits. If Romney has now cornered himself by saying he will not allow the reduction in the tax rate to add a penny to the debt, then even if it's impossible to pay for the 20% reduction in the tx rate completely, then Romney would have to accept something less than 20%. This is a dishonest attack on Romney and continuing to call it a 5 trillion dollar tax cut, like Scarborough did this morning four or five times is simply a smear tactic, sloppy analysis, and it's unfair.

This moderate, salmagundi strategy is malarkey. Scarborough and company, expecially his No Label pals like McKinnon, sit on the sidelines and make false equivalencies regarding the wrong positions of both parties -- of course, they have the centrist answer, the combination answer to solve the nation's problems. They like to say that both parties are equally wrong because one party wants to cut without taxing, and the other wants to tax without cutting. The truth is that neither side has cut up until now, and,  even now, no one is talking about serious cuts. Rhetorically, the Republicans are correct, but, practically, statists on both sides have grown government so big, and the spending is so great that it's crowding out the private sector, and it's shut down the economy.

Rhetorically, Romney/Ryan are talking about growing the economy and creating new wealth, while Democrats are talking about government spending to prop up the economy. Democrats want to take more money from the private sector through taxing the rich -- this will only crowd out the private sector even more and pour more money down a black hole. Government is now borrowing 4 billion dollars a day to pay for our broken system, yet Democrats and moderates like Scarborough want to throw more money into this system.

First, the system has to be dismantled and the expansion of power has to be rolled back. We have to limit the power of government and allow economic freedom to grow the economy. We have to have real cuts in government, not just taking a little off planned spending increases. Whole government programs and departments have to be cut. We have to allow free market energy production, and government has to remove all economy killing regulations.

What the Republican moderates and Democrats are fighting over is control of a broken system, and no matter who controls it, the spending is automatic, and there aren't enough sources to tax, nor enough entitlement reform plans to fix the problems caused by the system. All plans will be watered down and thwarted with the present statist system. America needs revolutionary change, but I'm afraid no one is ready to call for what actually needs to be done. So, instead, they play the political game and pretend they're serious.

Morning Joe 8/13/2012 -- Romney's bold move

On Morning Joe today, the subject, of course, was Romney's VP pick -- Paul Ryan. Everyone said it's a bold move. It can energize the campaign. It can clarify the issues. It can hurt Romney in Florida because Medicare issue. On and on. The guests were basically regulars, Andrea Mitchell, Chuck Todd, Mark Halperin, John Meacham, blah, blah, and blah.

The main subject was the potential for Romney to be tarred by Ryan's budget proposal which attempts to reform Medicare through a voucher system.Obama had already thrown the Ryan budget tar on Romney, so that's not really a concern. One guest said that most people believe Medicare is fine. Scarborough said it doesn't matter what people think, Medicare and other middle class entitlements are going to consume all revenues in the near future unless there is reform. The way these pundits talk about the problem gives the impression that the middle class has demanded and received goodies from government and now the goodies are too expensive.

No one full-throatedly said that government created the entitlements, took money from American workers to pay for the entitlements, invested the money stupidly, mismanaged the money, spent the money and screwed up their own creation. Romney and Ryan should make it perfectly clear that it's not the fault of greedy middle class welfare recipients -- it's the fault of government money managers -- if a private insurance company did what government has done with customers' money and policies, they'd go bankrupt and be prosecuted for fraud and theft. Romney should reiterate that anyone who's already paid into the system substantially is fine, but that younger people should go for something better -- private plans. Since there has been so much government/corporate enmeshment, some coordination with private industry is necessary to unravel the entanglements. Government should ask private insurance companies to develope comprehensive policies so that younger people can see what they could have. Private insurance companies should be asked to present the policies based on a free market approach, sans the regulatory obstacles. A comprehensive policy that a parent could purchase for a child at birth, and that would go with the person throughout their life, unless the person chooses to change companies, or go it alone without any coverage or promises from government that the person will be given assistance if they need it, would be 100 times better than government entitlements. The returns on such a policy would be tremendous over a 60 year period, and retirement would be comfortable. There are many kinks in such a plan that have to be worked out, but with tens of thousands of smart people designing plans, free from government chains, the kinks would be worked out.

Romney and Ryan will not likely go this far, but it's where we'll have to go at some point, because the Morning Joe crew is right about one thing -- entitlements are devouring the nation.

Morning Joe 8/6/2012 -- Centrism is not a Third Way

On Morning Joe today, there was the usual conversation about how Romney can't communicate to voters the problems we face or why he should be elected. I've watched some of Romney's speeches, so it's amazing to me to hear Scarborough say that Romney should hammer the economic problems and  show how Obama has spent record amounts to no avail. Romney has said these things over and over, but MSNBC has an agenda to frame Romney as a stiff rich guy who's out of touch and doesn't have the insight necessary to deal with important problems facing our nation. Obama? Well, if the Republicans had not presented so many obstacles, then things would be different, and Obama has to convince the country that things would be much different if Obama had not done the things he could achieve. It'll be tough, but look at how bad Romney is -- that's the strategy.

But, this Romney smearing is standard fare -- what I want to write about is Scarborough's comments regarding the division between Republicans and Democrats and the Centrist solution. Scarborough described the division as Republicans wanting spending cuts and lower taxes while Democrats want tax hikes and infrastructure spending. Scarborough says that the Centrist solution calls for a plan to cut entitlements long term, so that we satisfy our creditors, then "invest" short term on infrastructure projects. This is not a Centrist Third Way Plan -- this is normal practice for the establishment in DC. The Establishment gets together and devises a symptomatic solution to a symptomatic problem and never touches the fundamental problem. Government spending is out of control, and the Fed is in the center of the fundamental problem. Tweaking Social Security and Medicare doesn't deal with the efficacy of these programs in the 21st century, especially in light of the broken economy which is primarily the fault of Fed manipulation of money and interest rates. With myriad government/Fed interventions, American enterprise can no longer rationally plan for the future. 

A few tweaks to entitlements will not create certainty, especially when PPACA and Dodd-Frank are just coming online with regulations and changes and costs to businesses which can't be calculated. If you take away the ability of businesses to calculate, then businesses can't do business, and no one will take a big chance on new innovations and ideas -- no one will expand exising businesses, and jobs will dry up. What about Medicaid? Where will the money come from to pay for the "short-term" spending? Why will these stimulus projects be any different than the previous stimulus projects? Why will people on unemployment take a temporary construction job on the highway when there's no evidence of long term economic growth and sustainability? How many times does government have to intervene in the economy before Americans finally say No, this is not working and it's destroying our freedom and independence?

No, the Third Way is not a compromise between taxing/stimulus and spending cuts/tax breaks. The Third Way is the separation of government and economy. The Third Way is to get government out of the money creation business, the stimulus/economic planning business, the overseas intervention business, and the healthcare/retirement business. Government has built an empire for itself, but now they can't pay for it, and people are beginning to see they've been had. The game doesn't work any longer, and the Third Way is through the private sector and free choices of free people. Government does have an important role to play -- providing real certainty through equal protection under the law, so that everyone has an opportunity to accomplish all they desire to accomplish and are capable of accomplishing. We're a smart people, and if left to peaceful trade and competition amongst ourselves, we'll figure out how to deal with the problems. This Big Government/Big Business Centralized Planning Strategy is killing America, although it's making a few people at the top very rich and powerful.

Later on Morning Joe, they showed an NBC reporter in Syria talking to the "freedom" fighters who said they will gladly welcome Al Qaeda's help and fight under their flag if they have to. If the US will not send weapons then they will go to Al Qaeda. Yeah, they sound like freedom fighters. When will we learn to leave the internal civil wars alone in other countries, especially countries in which the people fight for freedom by giving themselves to terrorist organizations like al Qaeda? 

Morning Joe 6/12/2012 -- Just shut up, he says

Congratulations to Joe Scarborough for coming out of the closet once and for all. Thank goodness -- now, maybe, we won't hear anymore nonsense about how he's a "small" government conservative who can roll with the libertarians if need be. This blowhard has no idea why calling himself a "small" government conservative was a tip-off, anyway.

Morning Joe held their show in Chicago to do their part supporting the Obama campaign (it's where it all started), although they are fair in their coverage -- why, they even criticize Obama every once in awhile. Just because Obama is so awesome and Romney is so out-of-touch rich and so beholden to the goobers in the Tea Party is not the fault of the Morning Joe gang, so no one can say they favor Obama -- it's just that Romney is such an awful candidate. Yes, Obama has his faults, but he's on track now with his new ad attacking Romney's record as governor of Massachusetts. Although Obama was mostly correct when he attacked Romney regarding his Bain Captial record, Scarborough felt like this was the wrong tactic because people like success (and something about how his father voted), and Romney was mostly successful. But, as governor of a majority Democratic state with a majority Democratic congress that had become a basket case, Romney was able to make some major, positive changes and the unemployment rate fell to around 4%, but because Romney couldn't perform a miracle in this Democrat-infested money pit, Scarborough believes that attacking his record as governor is brilliant strategy -- Joe was really excited about this strategic change -- really excited.

Why, you ask, would a Republican be so excited about a Democratic President's new strategy to beat his GOP opponent? Because Scarborough is a status quo, Centrist Republican who believes the GOP has been hijacked by Tea Party radicals who want to limit government power and establish free market principles. Scarborough wants Obama to win so that Scarborough, Jeb Bush, Mitch Daniels, and the other Centrist, status quo, statist Republicans can say they told the nation so. Scarborough has political ambitions, and he told his viewers today that the GOP radicals are not the future, that Scarborough's GOP is the future (he really called it his GOP, really), then he told all the Cheeto-eating bloggers in their mothers' basement to shut up. This revelation by Scarborough must be liberating -- now he can be himself. I only suggest that if he's going to attack those who disagree with him, that he come up with something other than the cliched image of Cheeto-eating bloggers in their underwear typing in the basement. I understand that such smear-tactics have been effective in the political world to silence opposition, but this tactic is too trite to have much effect. It was an effective image about three years ago, but not now.

Joe could, instead of smearing those who disagree with him, address their ideas and then refute their ideas by showing how his ideas are much better for the nation. Joe appears to not understand what's going on, because he implies that had Jeb Bush run, the GOP would have a better chance of winning. It's five months until the election, Obama has the power of the State, media, Hollywood and universities behind him, yet Romney is winning is some polls. Jeb Bush would present no opposition to Obama. The Morning Joe gang started the program by reporting what Jeb Bush said yesterday about how his father and Reagan would not be accepted by today's GOP.  It boils down to whether the GOP should compromise with Democrats to raise taxes, spend money on infrastructure, education and research, then accept a promise to reform entitlements sometime in the future when the economy recovers, or not. Should the GOP be an opposition party or a partner party in advancement of statist solutions? Should the GOP once again accept empty promises of future cuts so that spending can continue in the present?

There's doubt that the problems suggested by Bush are even real problems. House Republicans have worked with Democrats in the House to produce bipartisan bills, but they are stalled in the Democrat-controlled Senate, so it appears that Reid and Obama want the image of GOP resistance to help them get re-elected, because if Obama admitted that the GOP had ideas for job growth and bills waiting on Senate consideration, then it would remove his biggest campaign strategy -- blame the GOP. So, Scarborough and Bush don't even understand the problem. I don't see any evidence that radicals are in control of the GOP -- actually, the GOP is going along with the normal statist growth in federal government, with a few exceptions holding their ground. It's not clear that Romney will not be the same Centrist pragmatist he's always been. What has Bush and Scarborough frightened is the possibility of true opposition -- if the Pauls, Ron and Rand, can influence the party, and if the limited government faction of the Tea Party can continue to put representatives in congress, Joe and Jeb are afraid of what might happen.

I know that Cheeto-eating bloggers like myself were told to shut up by Joe, but that won't happen. Let's look at what frightens Joe and Jeb. The limited government Tea Party faction wants to limit the power of the State and empower the private sector. Ironically, on the Morning Joe show this morning, Joe and the gang were praising efforts to empower the private sector in Chicago, but this is because their politically correct friends are involved, such as Warren Buffett, which makes me believe they are really praising more government intervention in the priavte sector through subsidies and picking winners and losers based on political affiliation. If, however, Joe and the gang really believe in small business proliferation and private sector empowerment, and not just patronizingly showcasing a minority business that some rich liberal has poured money into, then they will support Tea Party efforts to limit government power and to implement a free market. Statist intervention in the economy has benefitted the Buffetts and Goldman-Sachs of the world, so a free market would go a long way toward levelling the playing field, so that when the big and lazy behemoths fail, as they did in 2007, they will go under, and the more efficient and successful will take their place.

Yet Joe and Jeb say that the limited government Tea Party faction is not the future, that the Centrist, statist GOP, the Scarborough/Bush Party, is the future. Actually, the Joe&Jeb Party is the party of the past -- it's the party that caused the catastrophe of 2008. To go to the Joe&Jeb Party is to go backwards. Obama would destroy Jeb Bush if Bush had run and had won the nomination. It's why Bush didn't run, so that he and the likes of Scarborough could say, if, as they hope, Obama beats Romney, that the nation should listen to them and forget about this Tea Party/ Ron Paul nonsense and return to the Centrist Republicans who are sensible statist managers, not wild-eyed, irresponsible, ignorant revolutionaries. I won't tell Joe to shut up, because if he keeps on talking, the limited government faction has a better chance of really having some influence.