Conservative Values

Liberal States Worst for Business

Mark Noonan36 Comments

Another example of the results of applied liberalism – from the Chicago Tribune:

…Nearly one quarter of the survey’s 322 respondents said Illinois had one of the least favorable business climates, according to Development Counsellors International, which specializes in economic development and tourism marketing.

Taxes and high costs were among the factors that contributed to the state’s poor showing in the survey. California was deemed to have the worst business climate, followed by New York and Illinois…

…Texas, North Carolina and South Carolina were viewed as having the best business climates, according to the survey.

It is just a simple fact of life – the more taxes and regulations you throw on business, the harder it becomes for business to exist.  Liberals are steadily killing the goose which laws the golden eggs.  The only businesses which can do well are those who donate heavily to liberals…and in return such businesses get tax and regulatory breaks.  But, still, the overall effect on business is chilling…and the worst effect is not so much the actual taxes and regulations, but the fact that taxes and regulations can be increased or changed on a whim.  Some liberal State legislator gets a burr up his butt and all of a sudden a new tax is laid or another onerous regulation imposed.  Because of this, business either flees to friendlier jurisdictions or, at best, just stands pat and never expands.

We are getting a very useful course of instruction right now – our States are pretty much divided between Red and Blue.  Not too many States with a really divided government.  And, so, the experiment is proceeding…liberalism being applied here, conservatism being applied there.  In a few, short years the inescapable results will be in, and the people will be able to see, finally and for good, which set of policies actually works.  And not just in a purely business sense – the stunning turn around in Wisconsin following upon Walker’s reforms are showing that even in government action, applied conservatism provides better government at a lower cost.

We’re watching the process of liberalism killing itself off…it can no longer hide behind conservative forces coming to liberalism’s rescue.  No more can some like an uber-liberal Dukakis in Massachusetts claim a  liberal “economic miracle” which was actually brought about by Reagan policies nationally.  No longer can a liberal President take credit for welfare reform and a balanced budget brought forth by a Republican Congress.  Liberalism is out on its own…and it is failing, with no one to blame but liberalism.

We might be witnessing Liberalism’s last year…and it may come about that it will never trouble us again, at least through our life times.

HAT TIP:  Mish’s

At the GOP Debate: The Question for 2012

Mark Noonan89 Comments

From Ann Althouse, noted in tonight’s debate:

A young guys asks a classic question: “Out of every dollar that I earn, how much do you think I deserve to keep?”

That is the question to ask – and especially to ask of Obama and the Democrats.  What amount of liberty, at the end of the day, are you prepared to leave with the people?

No, not whether we’ll have the freedom to watch filth in popular culture.  Not whether we’ll have to freedom to suck up money on welfare of bogus disability.  What real liberty – if I work hard and play by the rules, how much of each dollar do you think I should keep?  99 cents?  75 cents?  50 cents?  What?  You tell us  – and then we’ll know who wants a nation of citizens, and who wants a nation of slaves.

Maybe Telling the Truth Works?

Mark Noonan18 Comments

According to this CNN poll (PDF), 52% of GOP voters over 65 years old back Perry for the GOP nomination.  Among those 50 and older, 41% back Perry (next in support among this group is Romney, with 22%).  With Pery being the candidate who is correctly identifying Social Security as a Ponzi scheme, this indicates that older voters are ok with the truth…and I wonder if the overall population will be?

It could start a whole, new trend in American politics…where politicians will actually say what needs to be done, regardless of MSM/DNC generated talking points, and the people with a clear eye and common sense just review what politicians say, and then make decisions accordingly.

Imagine what the country would be like?

HAT TIP:  Washington Examiner

Leaving the Cult?

Mark Noonan76 Comments

As we all discussed in the Labor Day Open Thread, Mike Lofgren over at Truth Out has written an article explaining why he left the increasingly lunatic GOP “cult” – but as I read it, the views Lofgren express indicate that even if he once upon a time had a GOP voter registration, his views are actually (and rather lock-step) in line with the leftwing extreme of American politics.  For example:

…Some liberal writers have opined that the different socio-economic perspectives separating the “business” wing of the GOP and the religious right make it an unstable coalition that could crack. I am not so sure. There is no fundamental disagreement on which direction the two factions want to take the country, merely how far in that direction they want to take it. The plutocrats would drag us back to the Gilded Age, the theocrats to the Salem witch trials. In any case, those consummate plutocrats, the Koch brothers, are pumping large sums of money into Michele Bachman’s presidential campaign, so one ought not make too much of a potential plutocrat-theocrat split…

The condemnation of liberals as weak-kneed combined with the accusation that the GOP wants to grind the poor and burn witches is classic leftist dogma…the sort of thing we’ve seen out of the left since Lenin asserted that only Bolsheviks have a right to be heard.  As I said, I can’t determine whether Lofgren is a former GOPer who switched – but his views as written are not those of someone dismayed at the direction of the GOP, but of someone who despises the entire GOP.  This is not like, say, Arlen Specter switching from Republican to Democrat and still holding 99% of the views he held as a Republican…this is a night and day difference.  Like Specter switching from the GOP to the Communist Party.  Lofgren isn’t so much leaving the GOP “cult” as proclaiming his adherence to the kook left cult.

And as a kook leftist, Lofgren gets it all wrong.  Even when he correctly identifies a problem (rapacious Big Corporation, eg) his proposed solution (more Big Government) fails to recognize that Big Corporation and Big Government are two sides of the same coin.  It staggers the mind to read Lofgren condemn GOPers as ignorant when he can’t even see that the whole system is corrupt – and only a break up of the system (Big Government and Big Corporation) will allow the people to recover their freedom and with it their prosperity.

The system we have today is the result of a century of giving people power over others.  We started out, as a nation, with a federal government which could barely interfere in the lives of Americans.  Over the last century we have continually increased the power of government and corporations until the initiative of the American people has been stifled.  Do you really think there was a popular demand to stop drilling for oil, mining for metal and growing food?  No – that took major, sustained action by government and corporations to accomplish.  Our ability to create wealth has been stifled because those in charge of government and the largest corporations prefer us to be dependent…bribed to peace with welfare and distracted by trivial  gadgets and disgusting popular culture.  It allows the Ruling Class to continue undisturbed.  We do need massive change…but it won’t and can’t come from the left…because all a leftist like Lofgren would do is strengthen the fetters on the people.

In the end, the people who will save this nation are those Lofgren most despises…those TEA Partiers and their notions of constitutional governance, and their adherence to what Lofgren clearly considers to be a worn-out Judeo-Christian morality.  It will be the bitter-clingers who will restore American greatness…while leftists of the Lofgren stripe ill be consigned, deservedly, to the ash heap of history.

The Romney Plan: Good, But…

Mark Noonan11 Comments

Mitt Romney lays out the broad outlines of his 59-point economic plan over at USA Today and I have to say that I am unimpressed.

To be sure, Romney’s plan does have a lot of really good things in it – but it always falls short of the revolution we need.  For instance, Romney calls for a tougher stance with China…but doesn’t lay out what that tougher stance would be (in my view, it should be a phased-in trade embargo).  Romney says he wants to review Obama’s regulatory record and then remove those which “unduly burden” job creation…why not just sign an executive order on January 20th, 2013 voiding all Obama-era regulations?  Does anyone seriously think that any regulation enacted since January 20th, 2009 has been vital to preserve the freedom and safety of the United States?

Given how lousy Obama is becoming, this 59 point plan of Romney’s may prove sufficient to get him in to the White House, but it simply does not go far enough…we need a revolution if we are to save our nation.  The left conducted its “long march” through our institutions and has created a Big Government/Big Corporation monster which is crushing the American spirit…morally, intellectually and economically we are being destroyed, and turning this around won’t be accomplished by tinkering with the tax code to stimulate job creation.

Before Romney can get my primary support, he’s going to have to show me that he’s not just running to be President because it would be a cool thing…I need to see a man who knows what we face and is willing to do whatever is necessary, including ensure a lost re-election bid in 2016, to get it done.

Bachmann: Why is There a Dept. of Education?

Mark Noonan35 Comments

From CNN Political Ticker:

Painting herself as a “constitutional conservative” Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann told Sen. Jim DeMint’s forum Monday that if elected president she would look to get rid of the Department of Education, among other things.

“Because the Constitution does not specifically enumerate nor does it give to the federal government the role and duty to superintend over education that historically has been held by the parents and by local communities and by state governments,” she said, responding to a question by DeMint, a popular figure among the tea party movement…

To be sure, the DNC/MSM will play this up as Bachmann being anti-education, but I don’t think that will fly here in 2011…we’ve been told for decades that in order to be “pro” anything, you had to be in favor of spending federal money on it…well, that is just about all played out.  Anyone who looks at education knows it is lousy…and any Democrat who tries to defend the lousy education system will come up the loser in the debate.

Now is the time to really press hard – I hope that Bachmann doesn’t get scared off this position.  Doesn’t try to “clarify” it away…yes, let’s abolish the Department of Education and use the money to actually help educate…by using the money for school vouchers.  Hit and hit and hit again…the Ruling Class and it’s Big Government are on the ropes…time to go in for the kill.

Postal Service Going Broke

Mark Noonan29 Comments

From the New York Times:

The United States Postal Service has long lived on the financial edge, but it has never been as close to the precipice as it is today: the agency is so low on cash that it will not be able to make a $5.5 billion payment due this month and may have to shut down entirely this winter unless Congress takes emergency action to stabilize its finances…

In 2010, the US Postal Service had revenues of $67 billion.  Even if we want to assume that revenues have fallen in 2011, there still has to be in the $65 billion-range of revenues…in other words, quite a lot of money.   Any company earning $65 billion a year can’t be worthless…other companies with that level of revenues are Apple, Microsoft, Boeing, Target, Walgreen and Johnson & Johnson. That puts the USPS in some pretty elite company on the revenue end – so, what gives?

Don’t know for certain without doing an audit, but it should be noted that the USPS employs about 574,000 people…far more than, say, McDonad’s, which is also a labor-intensive corporation.  My bet is that the USPS probably employs far more people than it needs to, probably at higher wages than needs be paid, and you can figure they probably get fat pensions and benefits.  The bottom line is that the USPS does not need to go out of business, nor does it need more taxpayer hand outs…but it does need to massively cut costs.

It is time for the USPS – which does enjoy a monopoly on first class mail delivery – to join the real world.  Sink or swim – either figure out how to make itself profitable off of $65 billion in revenue, or fold and let UPS and FedEx compete for shares of that $65 billion in revenue.  Not one thin dime of taxpayer money!

Applied Liberalism

Mark Noonan28 Comments

Liberal, Democrat governor; liberal, Democrat legislature; tax hikes…and what do you get?  From the Illinois Policy Institute:

In a trend that continues to worsen, more Illinoisans found themselves unemployed in the month of July.

Illinois lost more jobs during the month of July than any other state in the nation, according to the most recent Bureau of Labor Statistics report. After losing 7,200 jobs in June, Illinois lost an additional 24,900 non-farm payroll jobs in July. The report also said Illinois’s unemployment rate climbed to 9.5 percent. This marks the third consecutive month of increases in the unemployment rate.

Illinois started to create jobs as the national economy began to recover. But just when Illinois’s economy seemed to be turning around, lawmakers passed record tax increases in January of this year. Since then, Illinois’s employment numbers have done nothing but decline…

This is entirely unsurprising – in fact, it was predicted in many quarters.  Why on earth should business expand or even remain in Illinois if they are to be taxed higher than elsewhere?  Do you liberals out there really think that higher taxes are just so much water off the business duck’s back?  I mean, seriously – tell us:  did you really expect that things would get better after a tax hike?

Over in Wisconsin the conservative, Republican governor and legislature took the opposite course – and it is paying off in jobs growth.  Anyone want to bet that some of those new, Wisconsin jobs are old, Illinois jobs?  Not like its all that far to move.  This isn’t rocket science – make something more expensive and there will be less of it being used…Illinois made having employees more expensive, so less employees are being used.

As I’ve said before, the dichotomy between the States being governed by liberalism and those by conservatism will be immensely instructive for a generation of Americans.  In practical application, the people are seeing the results.  Those States with the most liberalism are doing worse than those States with the most conservatism…and as time goes on, this will merely become more pronounced…and when the next election rolls around, I think we’ll see some startling results in the liberal States.

HAT TIP:  Mish’s

Is Tolerance an End, or a Means?

Mark Noonan27 Comments

Lots of continuing commentary going on in the blogosphere, especially the Catholic part of it, regarding the Accepting Abundance “public morality” post we discussed here yesterday.  Over at Little Catholic Bubble, Leila posted an interesting quote:

We need to remember that tolerance is not a Christian virtue. Charity, justice, mercy, prudence, honesty — these are Christian virtues. And obviously, in a diverse community, tolerance is an important working principle. But it’s never an end itself. In fact, tolerating grave evil within a society is itself a form of serious evil. – Archbishop Chaput

The left long ago learned the trick of using a nice-sounding word to cover a wicked agenda.  The key is to find a word that is hard to argue against, claim that the word covers some desired, liberal goal and then say anyone who opposes this goal is opposed to the nice-sounding word.  “Tolerance” is one of those words being misused – like using “choice” for abortion; if you are opposed to abortion you are not opposed to murdering babies, you are opposed to people choosing, you see?  These days, the left uses the word “tolerance” as the nice-sounding word to cover the concept of homosexuality being morally the same as heterosexuality.

Just as the left would never get anywhere advocating for baby killing, so they wouldn’t get anywhere trying to convince common-sense people that gay and straight sex are morally the same…so, “choice” instead of “baby killing” and “tolerance” instead of “gay same as straight”.  And if you oppose the concept of homosexuality being morally the same as heterosexuality, then you are being intolerant…even though you’ve never said anything against gay people and, indeed, strongly advocate that every sign of unjust discrimination against them be removed (as all believing Catholics, for instance, hold).

We need to scrape away the lies which have grown up in our society -the various words and phrases the left has twisted to cover the bad and unpopular things they wish to impose on us.  Tolerance is a means, not an end – it is something we do because we wish to live in a peaceful, civil society…but it must not and cannot mean approval.  I am not being intolerant when I say that homosexual sex is inherently disordered…I am merely stating the truth as I understand it.  If the left wants to persist in using that word, then we have to force them to use it properly…and right now, if “tolerance” is the goal, then they’ve won…gay people are broadly tolerated in the American populace and none but a few kooks would dream of putting the slightest legal disability upon homosexuals (good to keep in mind, liberals, that I and plenty of other conservative Christians are, for instance, not opposed to openly gay people serving in the military…and until you went and tried to judicially impose gay marriage, most of us were in favor of some sort of civil union legislation). But that is as far as we can go – to go beyond that, especially for a Christian, is impossible.  We can’t say that what is wrong is right – we are, indeed, supposed to die rather than do any such thing.

Let us start having debates without lies – no more code words, twisted phrases or rhetorical misdirection.  Words mean what they mean, and we should use them as they were intended.  Truth is not subjective – what is right is not dependent upon the ideological viewpoint of the individual.  There is a truth to adhere to – to discover as best we can and then attempt to apply it as best we can in our lives.  To do otherwise is to sink in to a morass of dishonesty where reason cannot exist…and to play the liberals game of undermining us by the clever tricks of the propagandist.

The War Against Economic Freedom

Mark Noonan24 Comments

From Points and Figures:

Last night I went to see the documentary Farmageddon in Chicago. I also stayed for the full panel discussion…
…This documentary illustrates the plight of the organic farmer, specifically the organic dairy farmer. If a dairy farmer wants to sell raw milk, they will be run out of business and many times imprisoned by the federal bureaucracy. The USDA actively tries to run Raw Milk Producers out of the business. They work closely with agents from state agricultural agencies.

The documentary shows film of agents descending on various organic farms and outlets, guns drawn, SWAT teams present. It’s straight out of science fiction and something that you can’t believe happens in America. I can understand a huge police presence when going after a drug lord, but a family farmer? Sure, farmers keep guns but in my experience they aren’t violent people…

Why does this happen? Because we have built a corporate and government system which is forcefully opposed to a free market.  The market is where people go to buy – what is in the market is whatever people try to sell.  With reasonable regulations for genuine safety, people are supposed to broadly be able to decide what they will buy in the market and what they will sell.  The trouble with this rather common-sense ideal of the market is that it cuts in to the profits of the largest sellers and by giving people choice is annoys Big Government which prefers that you buy what the government wants you to buy.

Its not just organic milk producers.  Time and time again over my life I’ve seen the heavy club of government working in tandem with established business interests to crush market place upstarts.  If you ever wondered why we’ve only got 3 US auto makers – instead of 30, as the size of the American auto market would indicate – it is because Big Government and Big Corporation have set things up so that no one else can enter the market…except, of course, for big, foreign outfits who can afford to grease the legislative and regulatory wheels.  What the final result of all this has been is a progressive constriction on entry in to the market place – ultimately, a restriction on the ability of average Americans to create new wealth.

All of this utter nonsense of safety regulations, lawsuits, warning labels, etc works out to be nothing more than restraint of trade – and a restraint of trade which ensures easy profits for Big Corporation and a steady stream of donations to politicians in favor of Big Government (Big Union is in there, too…a sort of hybrid of Big Government and Big Corporation, working both sides of the street, as it were).   For 100,000 years or so the human race managed to consume milk products and we never died out – some how or another with out a single regulation from the FDA, humanity survived milk consumption.  The bottom line is that milk is food…a sort of food human beings are very used to eating.  Of course, like all human activities, eating food does carry a risk.  But, then again, life is risk…and, in the end, you never get out of it alive, anyway.

Don’t get me wrong here – I’m no libertarian arguing for a completely unregulated market, but what regulation there is must be there to ensure honesty and dignity.  If it starts getting in to deciding what you will buy, then it is a negation of the market place.  If someone wants to buy raw milk, then as long as the seller is honest about his product, then government has no interest in the transaction.  So, too, with all other economic transactions…as long as no one is defrauded or degraded (a human being cannot sell a human being – even if that human being is himself), then government should, for the most part, keep hands-off.

When I speak of freeing up our economy, this is what I mean – getting rid of the government and the corporations who shackle the economy.  We are bound hand and foot…and thus our people are growing poor, our dependent class is growing and foreign competitors are starting to catch us up.  We can fix this – but to do so Big Government and Big Corporation must be brought to heel.