You expected something different?

..At town hall meetings across the country this past summer, the main topic was health care, but there was a strong undercurrent of anger over the way Congress rushed through passage of the stimulus, global warming and bank bailout bills without seeming to understand the consequences. The stimulus bill, for example, was 1,100 pages long and made available to Congress and the public just 13 hours before lawmakers voted on it. The bill has failed to provide the promised help to the job market, and there was outrage when it was discovered that the legislation included an amendment allowing American International Group, a bailout recipient, to give out millions in employee bonuses.

“If someone had a chance to look at the bill, they would have found that out,” said Lisa Rosenberg, who lobbies Congress on behalf of the Sunlight Foundation to bring more transparency to government.

The foundation has begun an effort to get Congress to post bills online, for all to see, 72 hours before lawmakers vote on them.

“It would give the public a chance to really digest and understand what is in the bill,” Rosenberg said, “and communicate whether that is a good or a bad thing while there is still time to fix it.”

A similar effort is under way in Congress. Reps. Brian Baird, D-Wash., and Greg Walden, R-Ore., are circulating a petition among House lawmakers that would force a vote on the 72-hour rule.

Nearly every Republican has signed on, but the Democratic leadership is unwilling to cede control over when bills are brought to the floor for votes and are discouraging their rank and file from signing the petition. Senate Democrats voted down a similar measure last week for the health care bill.

Has the GOP been pure as wind-driven snow on this issue from day one? No, not at all – to our shame. But we’re on the side of the people, now – the old ways of politics must stop. We need to have the government start working for us – and that means we need to know what they propose to do before they do it. In detail.

UPDATE: Sen. Durbin (D-IL) furious with a radio station for daring to state that Durbin was coming to town…

A bit hard for me to write as I burned my ring finger making the Mrs some fresh french fries (they came out good, though a bit “Mark” flavored, I guess). So, have at it…

Interesting:

The gubernatorial race in New Jersey has not changed fundamentally recently, no matter what you may read in poorly produced Associated Press stories distributed by the Democratic Governors Association, the Democratic National Committee or Gov. Jon Corzine’s (D) campaign.

I’ve become accustomed to crazy rumors and assertions at the end of campaigns, and most of them are baseless.

A couple of days before Election Day 2006, CBS executives planning the network’s coverage were in a frenzy about a possible Republican surge that challenged all of their assumptions about the election and disrupted their plans for election night. After checking around with reliable pollsters, I told them the sky wasn’t falling on Democrats.

In other years, when Republicans were headed for gains, I’ve heard late rumors about Democratic surges that were equally untrue.

This in response to a recent poll which showed Democrat Governor Corzine only 4 points back against Republican challenger Christie. It was a bit of a shocker, to be sure – here is Corzine, arguably the worst governor in the nation presiding over a collapsing New Jersey economy and a hopelessly corrupt New Jersey political system, and he’s only 4 points back? It was looking like proof that a Democrat in a safely “blue” area just couldn’t be defeated. One was forced to ask: what does it take to convince Democrats that their guy is a loser?

But, then, on thinking about it, there came the realization – people aren’t that stupid. I mean, it’d be different if Corzine had been a good governor mired in problems not of his own making…but its all him, and its all bad. Then when you look in to that recent poll, you’ll see what Rothenberg notes later in his piece – while the GOP support has slipped a little bit, Corzine’s support hasn’t risen at all. Its clear what is happening in NJ – given its a three way race, Corzine and his Democrats are hoping to pump up the Third Party in hopes of getting Corzine a win with 40% or less of the vote. Won’t work – while a lot of people are flirting with the Third Party, when it comes down to it people will want to be sure of getting Corzine out – and that means back to the GOP.

I expect that next month we’ll win NJ with about 45% of the vote – and that, along with what is shaping up as a landslide win in VA, will be the signal we need to really rip things up in 2010.

In the long run:

…says McLerran, “Global warming is only a theory. Declining fertility rates are fact that has already happened.” He cites the U.N. prediction on 2050 and adds, “Some demographers predict [population] will decline overall as soon as 2040.”

Demographic Bomb looks at Russia, for example, where the country could lose a third of its population within 40 years. And Moscow is concerned enough now to offer $9,000 to mothers for each child after her first.

Likewise, Portugal’s government is considering charging higher pension payments to those who have fewer than two children. Japan, which has the world’s lowest birth rate outside of Europe, 1.25, has a whole ministry devoted to reversing its decline.

In China, the government publicly defends its one-child-per-family rule, but the municipal administration of Shanghai is encouraging families to have two or more as it prepares to care for its aging population.

Germany is closing hundreds of schools a year, the film reports, and next door, one expert says in Demographic Bomb, it’s conceivable that some day in the near future there will not be a single person left in France of pure French descent.

As for the United States, its population continues to grow only because of immigration or the higher fertility of recent immigrants from Mexico. Native American fertility rates have been falling for decades and according to the film, the impact has already been felt economically.

The anti-religious already have a word for us concerned about this issue: We’re “natalists” who are fanning fears, trying to get women barefoot and pregnant and are, of course, racists worried there won’t be enough white babies. Actually, we’re worried there won’t be any babies, at all – well, that is an exaggeration…we know there will be Christian babies, Jewish babies and Moslem babies. Among those who are actually religious, babies continue to be made – because when you have faith in God, you welcome life with open arms. Its when you don’t believe that you start hunkering down and being worried you won’t have enough for your self. We are more than willing to re-inherit the earth and start all over again.

On the other hand, demographic catastrophe will set off wars and cause untold poverty. We’d rather avoid that, if possible…and this means we have to find ways to get unbelievers to believe. For a couple centuries now the left, in various guises, has tried to talk everyone in to thinking that religion is what makes life miserable…actually, its what makes life possible. Take it away and leave the human being naked in the public square, enslaved to the flesh, and he’ll start lavishing funds on a dog and taking swank vacations and wondering why he’s not happy…

Life is a wonderful thing – if only we can convince the unbelievers.

The first step in an attempt to suppress us, boys and girls:

The Federal Trade Commission will try to regulate blogging for the first time, requiring writers on the Web to clearly disclose any freebies or payments they get from companies for reviewing their products.

The FTC said Monday its commissioners voted 4-0 to approve the final Web guidelines, which had been expected. Violating the rules, which take effect Dec. 1, could bring fines up to $11,000 per violation. Bloggers or advertisers also could face injunctions and be ordered to reimburse consumers for financial losses stemming from inappropriate product reviews.

The commission stopped short of specifying how bloggers must disclose conflicts of interest. Rich Cleland, assistant director of the FTC’s advertising practices division, said the disclosure must be “clear and conspicuous,” no matter what form it will take.

Its always to protect us, right? Next they’ll be doing it “for the children”. The government just can’t stand this free marketplace of ideas. And so: we need a blogging amendment to the Constitution…some words to the effect of “hands off” to any government busy bodies who want to hamper us with regulations. You catch a blogger engaging in fraud, and I’ll be the first to demand his punishment…but if you haven’t got evidence, then go pound sand.

UPDATE: DanaLoesch nails it:

The blogosphere polices itself rather well and those who lack transparency in marketing lose their audiences and the community isn’t above cannibalizing one of their own for the sake of keeping the practice pure. We don’t need bureaucrats dictating our own content policies. Granted, there are some who aren’t as transparent as others, but they’re usually not skilled enough to disguise it. I myself receive free items regularly and it’s always been my own personal policy to disclose this, which I have. I’ve refused offers from companies who’ve suggested that I act otherwise. I created this self-policing policy because I, like most other bloggers, realize that our reputations are virtual currency.

We bloggers can’t make the slightest error without someone gleefully jumping all over it. This has made me cautious, careful of sources and, in addition, a much better writer than when I started. We don’t need the FTC to protect us – in the blogsphere, we are the most savvy, skeptical and mercilessly scrutinized group on earth.

…oh, there’s some words I want to use…

President Barack Obama will not meet the Dalai Lama during his five-day trip to the U.S. capital beginning on Monday, the first time in 18 years the exiled Tibetan leader has visited Washington without seeing the president.

For crying out loud, at least for once side with right and decency….

Then follow along with Obamunism…which is just warmed-over New Dealism:

If anyone in Washington were to be so wacky as to seek to extend the pain of a recession, what course would they follow? On Page 26 of “America’s Great Depression,” Rothbard presents that very catalog of idiocy.

“Here are the ways the adjustment process can be hobbled:” he writes.

“1) Prevent or delay liquidation. Lend money to shaky businesses, call on banks to lend further, etc.

“2) Inflate further. Further inflation blocks the necessary fall in prices, thus delaying adjustment and prolonging depression. Further credit expansion creates more malinvestments, which, in their turn, will have to be liquidated in some later depression. A government ‘easy money’ policy prevents the market’s return to the necessary higher interest rates.

“3) Keep wage rates up. Artificial maintenance of wage rates in a depression ensures permanent mass unemployment. Furthermore, in a deflation, when prices are falling, keeping the same rate of money wages means that real wage rates have been pushed higher. In the face of falling business demand, this greatly aggravates the unemployment problem.”

In addition to “minimum wage laws,” don’t we now have “living wage” ordinances, “project labor agreements,” and, for our unionized government employees, “automatic step and seniority raises” in addition to cost-of-living adjustments that boost the pay of government employees as well as welfare recipients … even when the cost of living is falling?

“4) Keep prices up,” Rothbard continues, cataloguing precisely the wrong things to do if you want a recession to end. “Keeping prices above their free-market levels will create unsalable surpluses, and prevent a return to prosperity.

“5) Stimulate consumption and discourage saving. We have seen that more saving and less consumption would speed recovery; more consumption and less saving aggravate the shortage of saved-capital even further. Government can encourage consumption by ‘food stamp plans’ and relief payments.”

Note that “America’s Great Depression” was published in 1963. How’s Rothbard doing at predicting Obamanomics, so far? (About the only thing he seems to have missed are “Cash for Clunkers” and the fledgling “green jobs” boondoggle.)

Government “can discourage savings and investment by higher taxes,” Rothbard continues, “particularly on the wealthy and on corporations and estates. As a matter of fact, any increase of taxes and government spending will discourage saving and investment and stimulate consumption, since government spending is all consumption. …

“6) Subsidize unemployment: Any subsidization of unemployment (via unemployment ‘insurance,’ relief, etc.) will prolong unemployment indefinitely, and delay the shift of workers to the fields where jobs are available.”

We got in to this mess because of massive government interference in the market – by direct subsidy of failure, or by setting up the regulatory system in favor of a few, large corporations with strong political connections. We can’t get out of this mess by the same means – in other words, what government corruptly created, government cannot corruptly cure.

There is, though, a government effort to be made, here: we can eliminate taxes and regulations which hamper new start ups or the expansion of existing firms…especially in mining, farming and manufacturing; we can provide credit for people who are willing to put their own sweat equity in to such start ups; we can allow the “too big to fail” concerns to fail, as they deserve; and if anyone really has a hankering after government spending, then we can use it to do things like finance the building of high speed rail, improvement of ports and other such hard infrastructure programs which are not bridges to nowhere of Congressional pork. Finally, and most importantly, the government can balance the budget – regardless of how much alleged pain it costs: we cannot afford any longer to steal from the future to buy votes in the present.

Our economy is not the failure of the free market – its the failure of a Big Government which has interfered in one stupid way after another…which has injected purely political considerations in to areas where economics and/or morality are supposed to rule. Government’s job is to protect us from invaders, defend us from domestic criminals and ensure that each American gets a fair shake – anything out side those areas is fraught with risk and should be avoided. If it is felt to be unavoidable, then when government does go in to matters of economics or morality, it should farm out the execution of the effort to private entities (so, government paid health care should be handled by charity hospitals; government aid to education should go directly to parents and students to spend as they see fit; etc, etc, etc).

We can keep at this, and continue to flounder, or we can change course – and become prosperous, again.

A word of warning about socialism:

Yet let no one think that all the socialist groups or factions that are not communist have, without exception, recovered their senses to this extent either in fact or in name. For the most part they do not reject the class struggle or the abolition of ownership, but only in some degree modify them. Now if these false principles are modified and to some extent erased from the program, the question arises, or rather is raised without warrant by some, whether the principles of Christian truth cannot perhaps be also modified to some degree and be tempered so as to meet Socialism half-way and, as it were, by a middle course, come to agreement with it. There are some allured by the foolish hope that socialists in this way will be drawn to us. A vain hope! Those who want to be apostles among socialists ought to profess Christian truth whole and entire, openly and sincerely, and not connive at error in any way. If they truly wish to be heralds of the Gospel, let them above all strive to show to socialists that socialist claims, so far as they are just, are far more strongly supported by the principles of Christian faith and much more effectively promoted through the power of Christian charity. – Pius XI, Quadragesimo Anno

But don’t get too cocky, Capitalists – while making money is fine, you have a moral obligation to (a) make it by licit actions (so, no, its not ok to invest in pornography and abortion mills) and (b) share your surplus with those who have less (for the super rich, this might mean a mere million dollar yacht, rather than the ten million dollar one..and you give the rest away; you get the picture).

After this battle:

It began before dawn — a devastating, well-planned attack. About 300 insurgents swarmed out of a village and mosque and attacked a pair of isolated American outposts in a remote mountainous area of eastern Afghanistan with machineguns, rockets and grenades.

They first stormed the Afghan police post at the foot of the hill in the province of Nuristan, a Taleban and al-Qaeda stronghold on the lawless Pakistan border. They then swept up to the Nato post. The battle lasted all day. American and Afghan soldiers finally repelled them, with the help of US helicopters and warplanes — but at heavy cost.

Eight American soldiers and two Afghan policemen were killed, with many injured. It was the worst attack on Nato forces in 14 months, and one of the deadliest battles of the eight-year war. The insurgents seized at least 20 Afghan policemen whose fate last night remained unclear.

In this type of warfare, it becomes a test of will. The enemy likely knows at least some of our hesitancy regarding the future of Afghanistan. Given that everyone on earth has learned the lesson of Vietnam – America can only be defeated in Congress and the White House – what the enemy is doing is upping the ante. They are expending lives and resources on a lavish scale in a strategy designed to make Obama unwilling to risk political capital on further escalation – and thus set the stage for our withdrawal.

The only way we can now win this war in Afghanistan is to send sufficient forces to demonstrate to the enemy that their current expenditure of blood and material has only resulted in more Americans to fight than before. There is nothing quite so disheartening than to fight your hardest and only come out worse off than when you went in. Additionally, a vigorous counter-offensive will show the Afghan people that we simply will not quit – and it is this conviction, once placed in them, which will lead to some Afghan version of the “Anbar Awakening” which crippled the terrorists in Iraq.

If we do something other than strongly reinforce, then we risk ultimate defeat – defeat in little driblets as more Americans and NATO forces die; more Afghans conclude that we’re the losers; more hedging and weakness by an Administration which fears to lose but lacks courage to win. The hardest part is the first part – making the decision to fight. I’m sure it tortured President Bush when he considered that after years in Iraq the only way out was to send more and have more people die in the short term…but, he did it; and victory was our reward. This will not be an easy decision for Obama – no decision which will result in certain death for some can be, and I pray I’m never in such a position – but it is a decision he must make. And he must make it now.

“Watch money. Money is the barometer of a society’s virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent but by compulsion, when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing, when you see that money is flowing to those who deal not in goods but in favors, when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you, when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice, you may know that your society is doomed.”

– Francisco d’Anconia
“Atlas Shrugged” 1957,
by Ayn Rand
via Capitalism