2016 already?

The talk in pundit-town is that Jeb Bush and Chris Christie are the leading GOP contenders for 2016. The Republican Party is split between the Rand Paul faction and the Jeb Bush faction. Bush represents the Centrist narrative that voters rejected Tea Party/limited government Republicans in 2012. I don't know about the Tea Party -- it seems half of them were social conservatives, and social conservativism is the only faction which seems to be marginalized. Neocons are still influential, so I don't how Bush will talk about the Afghanistan War or interventionism in foreign affairs in general.

Rand Paul is the only bright light in the GOP these days, but it's far too early to talk about 2016. America's financial situation is so serious that immediate concerns are finally more important than the next election. Rand Paul is talking about what I've been pusing from my little internet cubby-hole for a long time, that all the talk about raising revenues should be focused on whether government needs anymore money -- it doesn't. More money doesn't need to be transferred from the private sector to the public sector. Spending should be cut and and the private sector should be allowed to grow the economy. Republicans should fight for the elimination of corporate subsidies and loopholes, but not to raise revenues for government. Tax rates should be lowered. Capital tax should be eliminated. You can see how far I believe government is from fundamental solutions.

The political class is talking about the 2016 election and how to get Republicans to reject the no-tax pledge and raise revenues. This is so counterintuitive to economic growth and fundamental solutions it's scary. Our government is trying its best to collapse the nation -- maybe this is what it will take for the phoenix to rise.

More on two American visions

Actually, it's not just visions related to America, but visions related to the global economy and all nations involved, many of them struggling with debt and economic stagnation or decline. I wrote earlier this morning about a couple of the Sunday talk shows which discussed austerity and government stimulus and debt and other current issues presently debated by the Right and Left. The debate is different in Europe because there really is no rightwing like there is in America -- in Europe it seems to go from socialists to social democrats to centrist-types to, now, nazis in Greece. Liberal biased media will surely associate the nazis in Greece with America's rightwing, but you know how dramatic the Left-wing media has become -- drama queens, all of them, especially when it comes to America's Rightwing.

I'm confused about Left and Right in America, because when the Left is confronted with failed or failing Letist policies, they claim to be centrists, and the Right in America is made up of either redneck/racist/extremists, or conservatives who want to limit government, or centrists who want to compromise and gradually bring about fiscal sanity, or neo-conservatives who want to kick international ass, or whatever the pundits say at the moment. What's becoming clear is that there are two directions  proposed, and whether or not each side is serious about their proposal, they are proposing the directions, and we'll go in one, willfully and cheerfully or not. 

Democrats, for the most part, are calling for government spending and higher taxes with plans to deal with the debt at a later date when the economy recovers. Republicans, for the most part, are calling for tax reform, lower tax rates and reduction in spending so that we move toward a balanced budget.

Democrats claim their approach promotes growth, while the GOP claims the same thing. Dems claim that growth will happen when government takes money from the welathy and invests that money in infrastructure and state services to hire more teachers, firemen, police, etc (it's the etc I'm worried about).

The GOP says that if we stop government interventions in the economy and lower tax rates for businesses, this will create confidence in the business community and investors will invest, thus creating more sustainable jobs that are productive.

Dems say that regulation is vital to ameliorate the unfair results from businesses acting selfishly without government oversight and control, and that government will not be limited in this regard, so another answer is called for in this stagnant economic environment -- they say government has to step in where the private sector has failed. Dems also say that lowering taxes will only benefit the wealthy and that they, the Dems, will fight for higher taxes on the rich.

Dems might win a majority in 2012, and they might go forward with their tax and spend policies, but at some point they'll realize that American companies need incentives and certainty in order to invest, unless Dems work out arrangements with the largest corporations for protection if they hire and invest in growth that is generated from government-approved industries like alternative energy and transportation. What will happen then is what always happens --capital misdirected and bubbles created, backed by nothing but government wishes, shaky cronyistic arrangements and schemes.

This time, though, we'll be in deeper debt, and the world will become doubly concerned about our ability to develope strong economic fundamentals, and the dollar will become threatened. If interest rates are forced higher and the debt, coupled with the higher interest rates, becomes a greater burden, and, if unemployment remains structurally high, and, if the rest of the world begins to distrust America's economic direction, we'll face collapse. At this point the painfully obvious will be that we have to allow American enterprise to operate freely without huge tax and regulatory burdens. We'll be forced to make drastic changes, and this huge shift will disrupt the market. Scepticism from foreign onlookers will increase. America will be forced to fully implement State Capitalism with centralized government management or allow a free market. Those concerned with economic reality will propose a free market, while those concerned with political power, base support and statist control will propose full centralized, economic management. 

2012 is the year we set the foundation for which direction we choose. Full State management and control can take two forms -- the totalitarian-type form or the authoritarian/fascist-type form, but it will take this type of domination to force whatever plans government officials develope. The free market approach would be an environment in which producers and consumers interact to allow an organic process to develope -- peaceful, free trade. There's no guarantee that a free market will produce sunshine, lollipops and a hitch-free get-along, but, I, for one, will promise that Americans will appreciate a free market much more than they will the State managed alternatives. Statism or anti-Statism -- two visions, and one must be chosen. Choose carefully, because if you choose Statism, it might one of the last significant free choices you make.

Suggested reading -- Ralph Raico, Thomas E. Woods, Tibor Machan (for starters). For serious reading, accomplish something important and read Ludwig von Mises. Even if you don't agree, you'll never just accept the modern liberal narrative without serious questions bugging the hell out of you.

Obama's Kansas speech - The free market doesn't, has never and won't ever work

Obama gave a populist, statist speech in Kansas today making the claim that free markets don't work, and he blamed the economic stagnation on, of all people, George Bush for his rabid free marketism. George Bush was a statist in the Center. Obama used another Republican statist to highlight his populist direction toward reelection -- Teddy Roosevelt. Oh my, Obama is adopting Roosevelt as a model? Obama said that curtailing regulations and reducing taxes lead to disparity and what we see today in the economy. This is the clearest speech Obama has given in a long while portraying his hardcare statist views. You don't need to call Obama a socialist, because being a statist is bad enough, especially since we see the failure of statism all around the world. Statism in Europe is threatening to throw the global economy into another recession, if we ever got out of the original recession.

There have been plenty of regulations for many decades, and the financial crisis of 2007 came about mainly from years of government incentives to push money into housing, creating a bubble and a crash that threatened the biggest banks. Government interference in the market has escalated through the years until now businesses are frozen by all the new regulations and the threat of much higher taxes.

Obama's solutions are to implement short-term gimmicks pandering to the middle class and to raise taxes on the rich -- taxing the rich will get us about 70 billion which is a drop in the bucket compared to what we're spending. His speech was called a landmark speech by pundits on the Left, yet his speech was a pathetic mish-mash of shifting blame, denigrating free market principles and holding up government as our only hope. Until we get Obama and the all the other statists from both parties out of government, we can't hope to recover economically.

If the voting public falls for this cynical, populist, political spin, then the American people are lost. It makes me sick to my stomach listening to Obama blame a few rich people when government has set up the government/corporate enmeshment, which favors the few, in an attempt to consolidate control over the economy. It's this decades long government control over the economy which has stagnated the economy and buried us in debt-- we've reached a tipping point where government interventions have placed us the edge of a cliff, and now Obama wants to push us over the cliff, and he wants your help.

It's the little things they say that make all the difference

You have to pay attention to what politicians and political animals of all stripes say, because they will give themselves away, even when they're spinning or double-talking.

First let me use the example of Joe Scarborough. I don't know why I bother with this guy, but I watch Morning Joe every morning because there's nothing else on that catches my interest, and I've always had a quirky interest in political animals like Scarborough, especially of the blowhard variety. Scarborough couldn't believe that Obama compromised and extended the tax breaks on "millionairesandbillionaires", but later Scarborough claimed he's not saying it would be a good thing to tax millionairesandbillionaires right now, although he claimed the day before that this is where republicans would have compromised. Scarborough would have compromised on this, I'm sure, because he's a compromiser -- but Scarborough said those who criticized him on blogs for appearing to support taxing millonairesanbillionaires are, to paraprase, "Cheeto-eating rightwing bloggers". Everything Scarborough said before this was just strategic jibber-jabber -- he even said his job is to analyze the political game like John Madden did in football -- Scarborough is the John Madden of political analysis, or so he says.

It's the little things they say -- in this case the comment about "Cheeto-eating rightwing bloggers".

This thin-skinned goober has an illusion that he's a top-notch political analyst. So let's analyze his analysis -- Scarborough believes that Obama should have held tough and demanded that millionairesandbillionaires be taxed, because he believes that the current crop of Republicans are as weak-spined as when he was in congress. Now, Scarborough states he believes that no taxes should be raised, at least that what he said to his conservative guest -- but, remember, Scarborough is the John Madden of political analysts, so what he's saying is that Obama would have achieved a political victory by standing tough and raising taxes on millionairesandbillionaires, taking 700 billion dollars out of the private sector over ten years so that government can spend this money. Scarborough must believe that this would be good for the economy therefore making Obama look good, in spite of Scarborough's claim that raising taxes is not a good thing. Which is it?

I will give Scarborough the benefit of the doubt and believe his claim to support no taxes -- then why would it be good politically for Obama to raise taxes? To please his base who might make up 15% of eligible voters? Even if independents would have been okay with raising taxes on the high-end wealth creators, they aren't demanding this, and the independents will be voting against Obama if the economy continues to get worse, which it surely will if taxes are raised on high-end earners who would probably think that more taxes are coming, leaving more uncertainty among the business community. So, how does this John Madden of political analysts figure that fighting to raise taxes on high-end wealth creators would have been politically advantageous for Obama? Creating an evironment in which the economy recovers more quickly will be advantageous for Obama, not fighting a silly battle to raise taxes just to please a handful of progressives on their way out. So much for expert political analysis -- score one for the Cheeto-eating rightwing bloggers. It's also interesting that his idea of a smear is to refer to someone as "rightwing". It's the little things they say that gve them away.

Speaking of Obama, the little thing he said was at the end of his press conference yesterday in which he referred to Republicans as "hostage takers". Obama is being forced to do what's best for the economy and he's hating every minute of it. But here's the quote that gave Obama away:

"And so the -- to my Democratic friends, what I’d suggest is, let’s make sure that we understand this is a long game.  This is not a short game.  And to my Republican friends, I would suggest -- I think this is a good agreement, because I know that they’re swallowing some things that they don’t like as well, and I’m looking forward to seeing them on the field of competition over the next two years."

We're back to football, and I don't know to whom Obama compares himself -- Brett Farve? But two things are revealed here -- Obama thinks of this as a game, and Obama is losing a set of downs, punting perhaps, to win the game. The game, he reminds his Democrat friends, is the progressive agenda -- that's the big victory. Obama has not forsaken his statist direction, has not learned anything, and he will be playing the "game" to win.

Update on Wednesday, December 8, 2010 at 12:50PM by M. Farmer

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1210/46035.html

Read this article by Scarborough and tell me if you believe Scarborough when he says he really is against raising taxes on anyone at this point. It sure doesn't seem like it. But maybe this is just more of the John Madden type analysis. Plus, there is another poll out disputing that the public wants to raise taxes on the top earners -- the White House is even using the poll to justify Obama's compromise. I know of John Madden, I watched John Madden for years, John Madden was and is a great analyst -- Mr. Scarborough, sir, you are no John Madden of political analysts.

Obama lacks qualities of greatness

It's a shame that the first black president happens to be an individual who lacks the qualities of greatness, unlike MLK, or even a Thomas Sowell. In his press talk today, Obama sealed it for me -- he's petty, myopic, two-faced and a less than a common politician. He's still blaming the prior administration, still insisting his stimulus saved the country from total collapse, justifying the current 9.8 unemployment rate by saying it could have been 20%, and calling the Republicans hostage takers for forcing him to compomise on the tax cuts. This old, worn out line of attack and spin is all Obama has left -- there's nothing deeper for him to pull up to take his presidency to the next level of statesmanship, much less anything approaching the level of greatness. If we're going to have a president, at least we should have one who can inspire people during hard times. Obama is no better than a mid-level manager in a failing company covering his ass, looking at only how the failure will affect his career.