Hillary's Newspeak

Hillary remembers something that never occurred, but something that very few media outlets have mentioned is that this past week's incident was at least the third such time that she "misspoke" about the very same event. If Mrs. Clinton is the foreign policy sage that she claims to be, there would be no need for her to exaggerate fabricate war stories.

My prediction: the public will soon forget it, as before.

Beware the apocalyptic red phone!

John McKeynes At It Again

Instead of referring to McCain's speech in Santa Ana this morning as a misdiagnosis, since it's obvious that he was simply reading the notes prepared for him by his advisers, I'll use a more critical term: misdirection. McCain, though he is an economics imbecile, wants the electorate to believe that "rampant speculation" and "complacent lenders" are solely responsible for the current housing 'crisis'. In other words it's the unregulated market that is to blame, and it's up to big government to demand accountability through increased regulation. We just can't regulate that darn economy enough, can we? It always stubbornly resists public action. The solution? More regulation. The American people have the memory of a goldfish which makes it rather convenient for opportunistic politcos to sweep the very cause under the rug. In the case of housing markets, and frankly all economic crises, the blame can be placed squarely on the shoulders of government. It was affirmative action policies that led mortgage lenders to make ill-fated loans, and government subsidies will again rescue them from the wrath of the market to make yet more bad decisions ad infinitum. Mortgage lenders would not be in the business for very long if they acted against the will of their borrowers; it is always the case that having to make economic decisions for non-economic reasons (government-enforced affirmative action) will lead to counterproductive allocation of capital. The Community Reinvestment Act is one such example; its revitalization in 1995 was accompanied by increased affirmative action mandates which included the extension of subprime mortgages.

"I will not play election-year politics with the housing crisis," said McCain. Yet he does just that within the same speech, resolving to "not reward people who were irresponsible at the expense of those who weren't," going on to distinguish homeowners as those who weren't irresponsible. That is precisely election-year politics: pinning the blame on those profit-hungry lenders and speculators and deflecting it from borrowers. The borrowers of course constitute a much larger voting bloc. So much for straight talk. And of course not so much as a wink at any government wrongdoing.

Do me a favor. Go to wikipedia and in the search tool type "Keating Five" to see how John McCain truly feels about transparency and accountability.

When Greenspan Had A Soul

Excerpt from Gold and Economic Freedom by Alan Greenspan (1967)

"When business in the United States underwent a mild contraction in 1927, the Federal Reserve created more paper reserves in the hope of forestalling any possible bank reserve shortage. More disastrous, however, was the Federal Reserve's attempt to assist Great Britain who had been losing gold to us because the Bank of England refused to allow interest rates to rise when market forces dictated (it was politically unpalatable). The reasoning of the authorities involved was as follows: if the Federal Reserve pumped excessive paper reserves into American banks, interest rates in the United States would fall to a level comparable with those in Great Britain; this would act to stop Britain's gold loss and avoid the political embarrassment of having to raise interest rates."

"The "Fed" succeeded; it stopped the gold loss, but it nearly destroyed the economies of the world in the process. The excess credit which the Fed pumped into the economy spilled over into the stock market -- triggering a fantastic speculative boom. Belatedly, Federal Reserve officials attempted to sop up the excess reserves and finally succeeded in braking the boom. But it was too late: by 1929 the speculative imbalances had become so overwhelming that the attempt precipitated a sharp retrenching and a consequent demoralizing of business confidence. As a result, the American economy collapsed. Great Britain fared even worse, and rather than absorb the full consequences of her previous folly, she abandoned the gold standard completely in 1931, tearing asunder what remained of the fabric of confidence and inducing a world-wide series of bank failures. The world economies plunged into the Great Depression of the 1930's."

Read the full article

Civility On The Fritz

"Fury" was Fritz Lang's first American film, and Spencer Tracy's breakthrough, and it is truly remarkable. When it comes to reenacting the audacity of mob violence, I can think of few other films that paint its horror in such vivid colors. However, avoid the butchery that is the colorized version.

Making Things Clear

There seems to be some pandemic confusion about the difference between the party primaries and the general election, so let's make sense of things.

#1 The U.S. Constitution makes no provision for the role of political parties.
#2 Political parties are private entities. They do not operate de jure; various party provisos and rules are not handed down by the force of law, and they are not binding in any legal sense.
#3 No citizen of the United States has a right to vote in a party primary. It is simply a privilege allowed by, again, a private entity.

Keep this in mind, folks. We are not at the general election yet. Presidential primaries are nothing more than opinion polls intended to give the parties an estimate of support so that they can best determine which candidate has the best chance of beating the other party's candidate in November. The results of these straw polls are not binding. Primaries are simply Presidential Preference Polls, and "votes" in these polls are not legally binding. Party policy is really determined at the local and state conventions.

For example: John McCain wins 90% of the popular vote in a state's presidential preference primary. Ron Paul takes down 10% of the popular vote. Of those who actually attend the precinct meetings and participate in the county conventions, 51% are people who voted for Ron Paul, and all of them become delegates to the State convention.

Which nominee won that state? Ron Paul did. It does not matter how many people turn out to vote in the primary for a particular candidate; if those same people fail to participate in the party process that candidate has won nothing but popular opinion. In this case, Paul's supporters will be shaping party policy for that State and ultimately deciding to whom their support will go at the national convention in September. Theoretically, Paulites could introduce a resolution to unbind all delegates who were previously bound to the winner of that State's primary. This very thing has already been introduced, in Missouri; and it can happen elsewhere.

Ignore what the party elite is trying to tell you. There is nothing ill-spirited or illegitimate about these measures. The GOP is not being "invaded" by Paul supporters. They are simply participating in the process as the party's own rules allow them to do. The fact is those who show up and participate are the ones who are going to make an impact, and McCain's people haven't been showing.

Lunacy In Chicago

When individual decision-making is no longer left up to individuals, and voluntary exchange between individuals in a free market becomes conspiracy, Orwellian nonsense like this results.

The same politicos who think mandating gun-free school zones will protect children from violent crime are the ones who think banning little plastic baggies will prevent the distribution and sale of illicit drugs. All we need is more prohibition, regulation, and government intervention and everything will be like mother's milk. That's always the solution. And what sort of problem are we even talking about here that requires such draconian solutions? That's right. The non-crime of acquiring drugs for one's own personal use, a practice that harms no one but potentially the user himself. And keep in mind we're talking about storage devices so small they could only be for personal use. This proposition isn't even aimed at the much larger issue of trafficking, not that that would be a more sensible endeavor. Thank heaven a few city councilmen had the sense to oppose this, otherwise how will clothiers safely store their beads?

The Apology

"You have just admitted that the good do their neighbors good, and the evil do them evil. Now is that a truth which your superior wisdom has recognized thus early in life, and am I, at my age, in such darkness and ignorance as not to know that if a man with whom I have to live is corrupted by me, I am very likely to be harmed by him, and yet I corrupt him, and intentionally, too?"

(Socrates, in response to Meletus, his accuser in Plato's Apology)

Though mob rule (democracy) and groupthink should now both be long and duly discredited modes of political rule, it is obvious that today's social climate suggests a long life for both. The Group, quite simply, is an abstraction or, as Kierkegaard would have it, the "untruth". Accountability dissolves the moment it is introduced into the Group. Take for example lynch mobs and urban riots and the utter incredulity that goes along with them. When Group feeling is married with violence, civil society breaks down and accountability becomes irretrievable. The riot almost always devolves from some noble cause to pure vandalism and physical violence. No individual ever had the courage to burn cars, break windows, spit on police officers and attack women and children were he held accountable for his actions (and he would be). Only within the incalculability and comfort of the mob would he get away with it. A jury cannot convict a mob (a group), only individuals acting on their own will within the Group. In reality everyone is acting on their own self-will, but in the most cowardly way imaginable.

This brings us to the virtue of selfishness, or self-interest. The above quote of Socrates should serve as a reminder that the good do indeed do their neighbors good, and they do them good not by laboring on their behalf or dictating their behavior, but by allowing them to live free and refusing to impede their self will. Socrates simply posed questions to the youth to show them the shortcomings in their logic and hopefully to spur them to refine that logic and gain wisdom. Ultimately it is up to the youth to decide whether he will heed this wisdom and humble himself, or yet become haughty and simply imitate Socrates' methods, thinking himself knowledgeable. Socrates in no way has forced the hand of those whom he has taught, and his more subtle point is that only the State would conceive of itself as so righteous as to be able to mold anyone's behavior by force. Were corruption his aim no one would know it for the youths themselves were there to testify on Socrates' behalf. Meletus is the true corrupter of the youth because he wishes to restrain them from questioning the State and its dogmas, and this includes respecting the authority of judges.

Self-interest applies to every self. It can not include interests that would do harm to others, for every action by the self must be restrained within its own sphere; actions that serve the self may serve others incidentally, but they can not in any way limit the will of other selves. This is a principle of negative liberty and one of the cornerstones of libertarian thought.

I think all will agree that it is good to serve others. It is also good for the self to serve other selves. Self-interest should not imply seclusion, or derision of the public, or a willingness to do by what ever means will bring one the greatest happiness. It simply implies sovereignty over the self for every self. It implies authority over one's own actions and never over the actions of others. It should never be said that service and selfishness are irreconcilable. I think history has demonstrated very clearly that the best way to serve others is to allow them to exercise their own self-will and judgment; any imposition of one will over another always results in friction and usually violence (or political assassination).

Children Love Recess

With economic instability and a looming recession at the forefront of the American conscience this election season, I feel compelled to address this issue honestly as the political rhetoric associated with it is often disingenuous and grossly ignorant. Case in point, the above article entitled "McCain Says Bernanke Should Have Reduced Interest Rates Faster," may just as accurately read: "McCain Says Bernanke Should Inflate Money Supply Faster." Inflating the currency, and thus reducing its value, is precisely what the Fed is doing in an attempt to soften the blow of a recession. Does any one bother to ask how the economy hit a recession in the first place?

Politicians, pundits, journalists, scholars, and the intellectual elites all seem to recognize that our economy is based on credit expansion. What they fail to recognize, or choose not to share with the public, is that we have to increase credit every year to keep the economy afloat. We borrow $600 billion from foreign governments and financial institutions every year and the Fed prints the money needed to cover the rest of the expenses brought on by war and welfare. Every cent that government borrows and spends will be paid for by taxes. The average American is in the dark because often it isn't a visible tax on our wealth. In fact, the money is borrowed in the first place instead of raising taxes because raising taxes always hurts a politician's poll numbers.

McCain just recently said there would be "no new taxes" under his administration. Oh, yeah? McCain has not addressed monetary policy (because, admittedly, he knows little about it) and there is no reason to believe that the "print and spend" philosophy of the past and present will be any different with him in the White House. Therefore, he will allow the invisible inflation tax to continue to debase our currency and devalue our savings. The dollar is falling every day on the international markets because our total economy is not based on production, but the expansion of credit. Finance, insurance, and real estate (FIRE) is all the US has to offer and, if you've read the paper lately, the real estate market isn't looking too good right now. It has already affected the real estate markets and central banking institutions in foreign countries like the United Kingdom and Germany.

The elites in Washington and Wall Street are very pleased with inflationary spending. They get to use the money first before it circulates and reduces the purchasing power of lower and middle class America. Empty suits like McCain seem compassionate when they talk of cutting taxes to relieve the burden on American taxpayers yet they never address the fundamental reasons why prices are rising, the dollar is falling, and savings rates are negative. Thomas Jefferson once said, "that government is best which governs least." When will Washington return what is rightfully ours? We have every right to control our own fiscal destiny. Not government or a private corporation operating secretly under the guise of government. Markets develop naturally through voluntary human interaction. They are not a gift from government, so why do we continue to allow them to manipulate our dollars ?

Will no one stand up for our currency and condemn this vile system? Ah, that's right. At least one man has done that, but we've ignored him and allowed the vacuous platitudes and empty promises of McCain and Obama to win our hearts and minds.

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