Morning Joe 10/10/11 -- Maybe it's a systemic problem

After many of us have been crying out loud, "It's the system, stupid!", Scarborough, Harold Ford and John Heilemann suspect this morning during the first part of Morning Joe that our problems in government might be systemic. There was no analysis beyond this recognition, though, except that stubborn Republicans have to talk to the Democrats and "get things done". Getting things done is big in the political class, as is talking to one another, but I would suggest that first they decide what  to talk about and what to get done. As long as Obama and Democrats are determined to raise taxes and manage the economy, there is little to talk about.

Scarborough was actually to the left of Harold Ford. Ford understands that regulations and central planning have created uncertainty in the market, even if Ford ultimately promotes clear intervention that doesn't cause consequences, whatever that is -- clear stimulus efforts to rebuild America, I suppose. Scarborough fell into a trap a long time ago, just like all Centrist Republicans, when he embraced the idea of working with Democrats to help shape a new economy. The Centrists made the same mistake that Republicans have made for decades -- they thought this time it will be different -- they thought Obama would reach across the aisle and bring everyone together in a smart government to "get things done." Scarborough and Centrists criticized the new breed of Republicans who held their ground regarding cutting spending and limiting government power, and now the Centrists can't criticize Obama and the Democrats fullthroatedly because they don't want to be associated with New Republicans, yet the Centrists are realizing just how politically vicious and statist the Democrats have become under Obama, Reid and Pelosi.

I will be the first to admit that both Republicans and Democrats are flawed, and the two party statist system is seriously flawed, but the degree to which Democrats are attempting to change the system to hardcare statism represents America's greatest systemic problem. Paul Ryan is not not the obstacle, as Scarborough suggested -- the problem is a statist system pushing a progressive agenda -- it has killed our economy, and until systemic changes are made to free up the economy, there will be no recovery.

I agreed totally with Scarborough and the Morning Joe gang later on when they called for an end to the Afghanistan War. Although the public is war weary and ready to bring the troops home, an alliance of neo-liberals and neo-cons remind us of the dangers of Pakistan and Iran and their nuclear efforts. So, what are we going to do, take over these countries and destroy their nuclear facilities? How is staying in Iraq and Afghansitan solving the nuclear problem as it relates to Pakistan and Iran? It would be like battling the Amish in Pennsylvania because Canada has nukes. Both Iran and Pakistan would likely collapse economically if we pulled out of the mideast, stopped all aid and started producing our own energy. Would this make them more dangerous? These countries aren't suicidal -- they are playing a dangerous Game -- one they've played for centuries -- but they are not suicidal. There are other countries close to Iran and Pakistan who are better suited to play the Game -- America needs to quit playing the Game and get serious about stopping our own government from destroying America, forget about Pakistan and Iran.

Morning Joe 10/7/2011 -- Jobs bill

On Morning Joe during the first segment, Mark Halperin, Pat Buchanan, David Gregory and Chuck Todd discussed with Scarborough and Mika the endlessly fascinating topic of Republican candidates for president, and then the need for Obama to continue beating the drum for the jobs bill. Also, Scarborough recommended that Obama continue his attack on obstructionist Republicans.

What was not analyzed is the fact that Harry Reid is blocking a vote on the jobs bill because not enough Democrats support the bill. Obama is travelling the country marketing a bogus jobs bill his own party can't through the Senate, and he's blaming Republicans for blocking a bill that hasn't even been presented for vote. This is politics 2011 and Scarborough thinks it's a brilliant political strategy. Do people in the political class think the public is not paying attention? It's incredible.

This is pure political theater just as the Wall Steet protest is pure political theater. Obama and the political class, including media, are losing control. No one believes anymore what comes out of DC. The majority of the country is waiting for 2012, while a handful of young people play revolutionaries on Wall Street, and Obama continues to give speeches that fall flat. In the meantime, the economy is producing a quarter of the jobs necessary for recovery, and media pundits on the Left are praising this meager growth in jobs.

As I've said over and over here each morning I report on the Morning Joe guests and their analyses of current issues, our main problems are being ignored, and, instead, media sources like Morning Joe report on the dog race for the 2012 elections. Fannie Mae, Solyndra, the European crisis, Fast and Furious, the mideast wars, the assassination of Awlaki, expansion of State power, the coming consequences of Obamacare and Dodd-Frank, the war against capitalism, the war on our Mexican border, our mounting debt, our over-crowded prisons bulging with non-violent drug users, the looming crisis of unfunded liabilities, all of these are major issues, yet, watching Morning Joe, you'd think all that's happening is an election in 2012 and a jobs bill that needs to be passed. There is also the probability that the Fed will start printing money to finance government spending and intervention/stimulus. There are no serious conversations on Morning Joe with experts on free markets and how free market principles are viable alternatives to government management of the economy.

It's amazing that all news media outlets are doing the same things, avoiding our most pressing issues. It's as if the political class  thinks that ignoring the problems will make them go away, but media has expanded in the Information Age, so alternative media sources are breaking through, and the public's becoming more aware of statism's flaws. Yes, things are going to change, but not like the political class and the protesters on Wall Street think they will change.

Morning Joe 10/5/2011 -- Systemic failure

On Morning Joe, Mika went solo as Joe Scarborough was out for the day. I have to say, Mika did a good job, and the absence of Scarborough's rodeo clown act was a welcomed relief. The guests were Howard Dean, Michael Steele, Harold Ford, Ezra Klein, David Gregory and Chuck Todd -- a real balanced panel. Counting Willie Geist, Barnicle and Mika, it was 9 to 1 Left to Right, and Steele is in the Center, so he doesn't really count. The topic lately has been the Republican campaign for the party's nomination in 2012, and the differences in ideology between the two parties. You'd think that in order to present a good analysis, Morning Joe producers would have someone on the program who represents opposition to the status quo, but, instead, they have political hacks like Howard Dean. You don't have to wonder what Dean said -- Go, Obama, Go -- Yay, Obama! Dean might be the worlds most obnoxious cheerleader.

When the discussion came around to deadlock in congress, Klein said it's not a lack of leadership, but rather a problem with the system. I agree, but not in the way Klein means it. Klein wants to do away with the filibuster and allow a 51% majority to reign supreme. I believe that we need limited government and a free market -- these are two very different visions of the role of government, yet it's not discussed, and that's because Morning Joe and other Laft-leaning media don't present the limited government view -- they reduce the idea to obstructionism with Republicans framed as a party that only wants low taxes and to defeat Obama even if it hurts the country.

Much was made by Klein and a few others about Ben Bernanke's warning the "recovery" could stall if action is not taken, and that this is not time to try to cut our way to recovery. This is another slam on Republicans -- that all they want to do is slash government when pople need government help the most. I can't speak for Republicans, and I'm not a Republican, but there are ideas contrary to the Democrats' stimulus/jobs plan. One idea is to get government out of the way and create an economic environment that is friendly to investment. The world is looking for a place to invest money -- that place could be America if government would stop blocking the way. The irony in all this is that government is the biggest obstructionist -- they got us into this economic mess through intervention and cronyism, and now they are blocking all attempts to get us out of the mess, and they're making the mess a bigger mess.

Of course, there was a lot of talk from the Morning Joe crew regarding Chris Christie. I've never understood the hoopla surrounding Christie, but he made a good decision by refusing to run for President. The Left would have destroyed him in no time, and the Right would have been dissatisfied with Christie's liberal leanings. We need a radical free marketer, someone who understands economics. I do like Christies' position that we need to get out of the mideast, but Christie is a government man, even though he's inexperienced in government work, and we don't need government men. We need a President who represents the private sector, the American people, not someone who "gets things done" in DC. DC has done enough, thank you. Christie is a natural for government work, and I can see why establishment types like him -- he's upfront and he'll work across the aisle to make things happen, but this isn't the time for that type of President. We need to change directions and go toward a free and vibrant private sector sans government shackles.

The Republican race is interesting, but the obssession with the presdiential race on Morning Joe is troublesome, especially when we have so many serious issues facing the nation, such as the European crisis, Solyndra and Fast and Furious, and even the Occupying Wall Street nonsense needs to be exposed. There are widespread efforts on the Left to release government from all limitations in order to destroy capitalism and production at the highest levels, which results in the destruction of small and medium size businesses. This effort to destroy capitalism should be exposed and analyzed with intelligence. Yes, crony capitalism and State capitalism are perversions of capitalism, but the Left would preserve these perversions when they are in power and destroy the capitalism of a free market which is our only hope for recovery and economic expansion.

Meet the Press 10/2/2011 - The American political game

On Meet the Press today the entire program centered on an election over a year away, despite all the serious issues facing the world. The political rhetoric tells the story -- is it Bush's economy or is it Obama's economy. There's no longer any subtlety regarding statism -- the political class talks in terms of what government will do to the economy. The guests this morning during the first segment were the governor of Mass. and the governor of Va. Both governors talked about how many jobs they created. Although the Republican governor gave lip service to the private sector as the creator of jobs, there was no passion nor was there any philosphical explanation of why the political class's statist-centered language reveals a mindset that's destroying America. To talk in these straight-forward terms would be to risk the label of "extremist".

In the second segment, the round table panel consisted of Peggy Noonan, Mike Murphy, E.J. Dionne and a hispanic representative on the Super Committee. To be honest, the discussion was boring, centered mainly on political strategy regarding the 2012 elections. Mike Murphy and Noonan are ostensibly representatives of the Right, but they really represent a Center that is highly political and has little understanding of the shift in the public's mindset regarding an over-reaching government. The media is doing its best to paint Obama as a moderate pragmatist and Republicans as obstructionists against weak denials from the likes of Noonan and Murphy. The spin on both sides has become tiresome. Republicans are not a monolithic group, and the faction which is attempting to limit government is thrown in with the establsihment Republicans, so the analysis is stunted. Just like Democrats are not monolithic, and there is no in-depth analysis of the far left and their radical progressive agenda.

The roundtable guests, like guests on other political shows, love to discuss the uncertainty of voters regarding the Republican candidates. One reason the public might lack passion regarding any given candidate is that there's not a viable opposition to statism. This is a larger subject, and I realize media prefer to keep the subject on political tactics and outcomes, but until there's a larger dicussion which speaks to the underlying concerns of the American people, this is just another contest to see which image-makers win. Intellectuals used to play an important role in that they had the ability to put in words what many people intuitively sense but can't articulate -- now everyone's a pundit, a political strategist, an imagemaker, a handler, an operative, a talking head with no intellectual depth.

Even when pundits superficially address the bigger ideas, they reduce them to the lowest common denominator, like all Republicans want lower taxes and for everyone to fend for themselves. Intellectuals in 2011 have chosen their political side, and they've sold out to statism, simply trying to maintain a status quo of comfort and job security.

The Center today is a combination of neo-conservatives and neo-liberals working together to decide who will compete for power. The consensus of a good-kill on Meet the Press surrounding the quickly discussed assassination of Awlaki tells us that there are very few brave, intelligent people left in the political class. Dionne said Awlaki's assassination deserves discussion, but he said it was a good kill. Well, at least he offered the possibility of doubt that the State is levelling with us. Under different political conditions, such as high approval numbers for Obama, I have a feeling Awlaki would be ignored as a blowhard nuisance, but that's just my suspicion. Almost every action emanating from DC is politically motivated, so it's not a hard call to make.

Morning Joe 9/29/2011 - For the best coverage of Republican politics

On Morning Joe today, Donnie Deutsche, Sam Stein, Pat Buchanan, Willie Geist and Joe Scarborough in the early part of the show talked about Republican politics and the campaign for president. Now, Romney has edged out Perry, so, of course, Perry is finished. I have a feeling this race is going to go up and down for months. Mika read part of an article from David Frum in which he asks why the hell not Romney. The Republican Establishment, the Center, has become impatient with Bachmann, Paul, Cain and Perry, and all the talk about Christie, and they are ready to get on with it -- Romney is the man. Romney is the automaton candidate of choice for the Republican pundits who want the right image to challenge the image of Obama. Remember -- crazy can't win, and anyone who talks about changing the statist system in DC is crazy. Perry came on strong, but he was soon turned into an automaton, or he was an automaton to start with and simply had a moment of passion -- Perry said things that the Center thinks is crazy. Perry strongly criticized the Fed and the Ponzi scheme which is SS. I like this type of crazy, but the Center says it can't win a general election, so Perry said something in the debate that the Center should love -- Perry said it's heartless not to pay for the children of illegal immigrants who have no choice about being in the US, but this is what caused him to lose ground against Romney.

This is all fascinating, but it's not news -- it's political nonsense. The Republican candidates, most of them, are discussing issues that have no relevance to our most pressing problems, and the media reports on political games which have no relevance. This is a good way to avoid more serious issues like our out-of-control government which has destroyed our economy and has us involved in useless wars in the mideast, steadily transferring money from the private sector to government spending and wasting the lives of young men and women in political wars. Plus, there is Solyndra, a case for why government intervention in the economy is grinding economic expansion to a halt. We still have real unemployment of about 20%.

The political system and the media are broken. Media avoids the tough issues, and the presidential race is the least of our concerns right now. Unless there is talk about serious systemic changes in government, all the hoopla right now on shows like Morning Joe are simply diversions which block real change.