Conservatism Today

10 Things I Believe in As a Conservative

A good list from Brian of Liberty Pundit.

I agree whole-heartedly with each of them.

I'm Sorry, it Must be Said: Obama is a Moron

Recently, Dana Pico of Commonsense Political Thought and I traded posts on the subject of Obama's intelligence. Pico argued that ridiculing the intelligence of our political opponents is a bad idea. I agreed and added that intelligent people often lack the ability to apply logic, use poor judgment, lack honesty, are ignorant on the subjects they speak about or are out for power.

I was wrong. Barack Obama is actually a moron. I'm putting his IQ at about 70 after hearing Rush Limbaugh make fun of these remarks today: Obama Solves Energy Crisis: Inflate Your Tires

RUSH: You parents who have sent your kids or whose kids are at present in Ivy League schools, you might want to think about the education they're getting just by listening to Barack Obama, because he is a walking, talking example of the kind of education you come out of Harvard or any of these Ivy League schools.  This is Obama yesterday at a campaign event in Springfield, Missouri.

OBAMA: We could save all the oil that they're talking about getting off drilling, if everybody was just inflating their tires and -- and -- and getting regular tune-ups, you can actually save just as much.

RUSH: This is unbelievable.  My friends, it's laughable, of course.  But it's stupid!  It is stupid.  How many of you remember the seventies when we had these shortages, all through the Jimmy Carter years?  We had all these tips, all these tips on how to save gasoline.  Avoid jackrabbit starts, keep your tires properly inflated, and all that.  There's a list about ten or 12 of these things.  And I said, "If I follow each one of these things, I'll have to stop the car every five miles, siphon some fuel out for all the fuel I'm going to be saving here." Ridiculous.  This is a presidential candidate, and he's talking about keeping your tires inflated and getting regular tune-ups?  That would save as much oil as drilling would produce?  This guy is the Democrat presidential nominee.  Who has filled his head with this stuff? 

...By the way, contrast something.  President Bush at a recent press conference, a Drive-By reporter, a new castrati, stood up, "Mr. President, Mr. President, are you going to advise the people to drive their cars less and to get smaller cars?"  "No, I'm not going to do that, they're adults. They know what to do to save money. They know what to do to deal with this. I'm not going to tell people how to live their lives, they're adults."  Contrast that with Obama.  "Put the right amount of air in your tires and get tune-ups, and we will not have to drill for oil."  Black and white difference, ladies and gentlemen, between the Democrats and the Republicans, and that's not a racist comment when I say black and white difference.  Obama would think it is, you know, the Drive-Bys might.

Incidentally, tomorrow is Rush Limbaugh's 20th Anniversary Show, and I expect I'll be listening to it and blogging on it. If you are able to listen, this is one I wouldn't miss.

20 Years of Limbaugh: Rush Dominates Al Gore

This week conservatives across American celebrate the 20th anniversary of Rush Limbaugh's nationally-syndicated talk show. Today, Rush played a clip from his appearance against Algore on Ted Koppel's Nightline. If anyone wonders why Algore doesn't debate his theories in public anymore, one need only remember this smackdown delivered by El Rushbo.

Remember, this is 16 years ago. The issue then was the ozone hole, and like now with global warming, we only had 10 years to act to save the planet.

ALGORE: We now face a global ecological crisis that is more serious than anything human civilization has ever faced, and there's a problem of scale here.... Now we've got a whole new category of global or strategic problems, which include the hole in the ozone layer -- which now could appear above the United States.

RUSH 1992:  There is no ozone hole above the United States and if we want to get into a detailed discussion of ozone depletion we can, but I think, Ted, that there is not a crisis.  See, this is the problem I have.  I don't think the earth is fragile. I don't think the ecology is fragilely balanced and I think that the doomsday industry that is typified by members of the Hollywood acting community who say, "We've only got ten years left to save our planet, we've gotta act now," there's no way, if what these people say is true, that we could solve these problems in ten years anyway.  It's budget time in Washington; NASA is being cut, and I think that this fright and doom scenario is designed to frighten people.  Everything in this country today seems to be crisis.  I can't do anything without having to face it as a crisis. We don't have any time to think about it.  There are as many scientists, maybe even more on the opposite side of all of these doomsday predictions, and I think that --

Just like there are many scientists today who don't buy into man-made global warming.

RUSH: Next, Koppel said, "Rush Limbaugh, we've both run into politicians during our careers who know how to fake it on an issue.  I don't know anybody on Capitol Hill who is more knowledgeable on the subject of environment than Algore.  You have to take seriously what he says."

RUSH 1992:  The environmental movement as fueled by the militants who lead it, I think, is the new home of socialism.  I think it is. They've adopted a constituency here which can't speak -- that is trees and rocks and so forth -- and can't reject the so-called help and concern that the advocates are giving it, and gives them a stage from which to constantly launch attacks at capitalism.  If you listen to what Senator Gore said, it is manmade products which are causing the ozone completion. Yet Mt. Pinatubo has put 570 times the amount of chlorine into the atmospheric in one eruption than all of manmade chlorofluorocarbons in one year; and the ultraviolet radiation measured on this country's surface since 1974 has shown no increase whatsoever. And if there's ozone depletion going on, you're going to have UV radiation levels going way up, and they simply aren't.  The sun makes ozone, and there's an ozone hole in the Antarctic Circle and the Arctic Circle simply because the sun is below the horizon for a portion of the year.

And who proved to be correct on this one? Rush, of course.

ALGORE: Well, there's a classic experiment in science, Ted, about a frog that's dropped in a pot of boiling water and jumps right out.  When the same frog is put in a pot of lukewarm water that's slowly brought to a boil it just sits there until it's rescued.  A frog's nervous system needs a sudden jolt to get the connection.  We're like that frog!  We're getting the signals of ecological devastation around the world, but we're still dead in the water.  The ozone hole is threatening to open up above North America -- RUSH:  Never did. ALGORE:  -- above Kennebunkport -- RUSH:  It never did! ALGORE:  -- and still we're not reacting. RUSH: Kennebunkport! ALGORE: The American people want to see us take this problem seriously and do something about it.

KOPPEL:  All right, Senator Gore. I thank you very much, Rush, you'll have three hours -- RUSH 1992:  There's no ozone depletion, there's no crisis.  Thanks, Ted.

Does anyone else see a pattern here in Gore's shtick? How many times are Americans going to fall victim to the "Algore who Cried Global Catastrophe?"

Showdown Looms on Drilling

A new article by David Freddoso of National Review Online discusses a probable upcoming congressional battle between Democrats who oppose all efforts to increase America's oil production and Republicans who want to free our oil supplies.

On September 30 — two months from today — the ban on fossil-fuel drilling off America’s Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) and in the oil-shale fields of the West will expire. Democrats, who control both houses of Congress, must pass an appropriations bill extending the bans.

The onus, in other words, is on them. Democrats will likely propose a continuing resolution to extend funding for the government through the end of the calendar year without making major changes. This bill will certainly include a continuation of the drilling ban — Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.), a zealous opponent of offshore drilling since the 1980s, has resisted all attempts to change it.

Democrats are sufficiently committed to maintaining the ban that they could even be willing to force a government shutdown in September, or dare the Republicans to force one. But if Republicans are equally committed to increasing the domestic-energy supply, and President Bush is willing to use his veto pen, they have a golden opportunity.

This is the message of Sen. Jim DeMint (R., S.C.), who is urging the president and his congressional colleagues to take a risk and fight for drilling here at home. “If President Bush wants a domestic legacy, it has to be on this issue,” DeMint told National Review Online Tuesday. “This is the final few seconds of the game as far as his administration goes, and we’re down seven points. We can’t just keep running up the middle. It’s time to throw the Hail Mary.”

This issue is easily the biggest winner for Republicans this fall, if only they have the political guts to force a confrontation with the Dems. Americans now overwhelmingly see the light and favor drilling pretty much everywhere.

With gasoline prices hovering well above $4.00 in some parts of the U.S., a June poll from Zogby International found 74 percent of respondents in favor of drilling for more oil and gas in American waters. The argument is bolstered by the fact that drilling costs the U.S. government nothing — Uncle Sam would actually make billions of dollars from new leases. The environmental hazards of offshore drilling are negligible, accounting for one percent of the oil spilled in American waters, according to the National Academy for the Sciences.

Republican campaigners can legitimately argue this fall that Democrats, under the ideological control of an intransigent environmental lobby, are unwilling to address the issue of high gasoline prices in a meaningful way.

Democrats... are also pursuing environmental policies (such as carbon taxes and caps) that are designed to increase the price of gasoline beyond its current level, in order to force conservation by consumers, and so to decrease carbon emissions. Their leaders — most recently Rep. James Oberstar (D., Minn.), the powerful chairman of the House Transportation Committee — are also discussing an increase in the gasoline tax, a politically tone-deaf idea considering today’s high fuel prices.

Understandably, then, Republican officeholders and candidates are pushing the issue of energy as hard as possible. The question is whether the president and the GOP’s congressional leadership have the will to push the issue until Democrats make it a showdown over a government shutdown...

Many Republicans remember the disaster that befell the party after the 1995 spending fight with President Bill Clinton that led to a shutdown. But DeMint points out that this fight, unlike that one, would be over a high-profile issue on which Republicans are clearly supported by the American public. Drilling is popular, and the Democratic majority is not — and that is a recipe for success.

“The chances of us winning are much greater than the chances of us losing on this, because the American people are so tuned in on the issue.” DeMint said. “It’s not like the obscure issues of spending levels that predominated in the last government shutdown. And I think many voters will wonder: What good are the Republicans if they won’t even stand up on this?” And that is a perfectly legitimate question.

Indeed, it looks like we will find out shortly whether this group of Republicans is any good at all. Recent signs say that it just may be.

How Minimum Wage Laws Soak the Poor

Yes, I know, I wrote a piece recently entitled, "It's Time to Soak the Poor." But I was being satirical. The Democrat Congress is actually serious about doing so and its plans have been initiated. In case you weren't aware, last week the Federal Minimum Wage rose from $5.85 to $6.55 per hour. (Make sure to check out that link for a cool graphic on minimum wage earners from 1979 to now, by the way). While you're thanking the  Democrat-controlled Congress for $4-a-gallon gasoline, thank them for soaking the poor, too.

But wait, you say, I thought you said the minimum wage went up? How does that soak the poor? Let me count the ways. I have a great deal of real-world experience that I gained from working for minimum wage for a time and hiring and employing minimum wage earners as a manager at a number of McDonald's and Arby's restaurants over the span of nearly a decade. What I've seen has made me an expert on the real-world effects of minimum wages, and led me to even disagree with many free-market economists as to what exactly the effects are.

Failure to understand economic principles usually comes from failure to think about how different people react to changing situations. Let me tell you what happened when I was managing a McDonald's restaurant at a time when the minimum wage went up in Arizona and you will see that the increased minimum wage clearly hurt those who it was most supposed to help, people whose income was an important part of their families' financial success.

The owner of my restaurant talked to me before the increase in minimum wage went into effect. One thing that was sure was that his income would not be affected by the increase in minimum wage. No business owner is going to allow a government policy change to hurt his income if he can help it, and mine was adamant that he would not accept lost profits as a result. So how did we accomplish this?

First off, very few minimum wage recipients are poor heads of households. Poor heads of households have almost always learned sufficient skills to be paid somewhat above minimum wage. Almost all minimum wage workers are just starting out in their careers. They take minimum wage jobs because they expect to learn skills that will make them more profitable in the future, or because that kind of work is all that is available to them. I've found that very few people make the minimum for more than a few months. After that time they receive raises for their work, or they are terminated for their poor work habits.

At the time the minimum wage went up, our store had just two minimum wage workers. They were both high school students who had just recently started work. We had at least a dozen heads of households or secondary (but important) contributors to their family income working for us, all of whom made anywhere from $1 to $20 per hour more than the new minimum wage. The $20 per hour was our management team of three.

Here's the plan we came up with: We went to our files of more than 100 applicants that we hadn't hired but had saved their applications. We selected the ten most hopeful high school applicants and offered them jobs. We ended up hiring ten new employees at minimum wage. We gave these employees an average of 15 hours of work per week, and used them to decrease the hours we gave to higher paid employees (the heads of households or secondary incomes I talked about previously).

The result was that despite the increased minimum wage, we were paying our workers less per person. More importantly, the people who lost hours, and therefore lost income, were the people that depended on their jobs to support their family. The minimum wage increase took money from these people who struggled to provide for their families and gave it to high school kids so they could afford to buy a new X-Box. Good job government. You really soaked it to the poor with that one.

Our maintenance man was a hard-working Hispanic who previously worked 50 hours per week, earning about $2 above minimum wage. He was married, a father of four kids. When the minimum wage increased, we eliminated ten hours a week off his schedule, hours that were overtime and were worth 1.5 times his normal hours. He had to get another job, at minimum wage, working 20 hours a week to make what he was making before. Minimum wage laws forced him to work 60 hours per week to earn what he used to earn in 50.

We had three mothers who worked during the day. All earned $1-3 above minimum wage. We cut each of their hours by ten per week. They earned about $300 per month less than they did before. Meanwhile, little Johnny was able to upgrade his CD collection.

We also raised prices by about 5 cents an item, which had little effect on demand and was a net win. Therefore, the consumer was subsidizing our increased minimum wage.

Free market economists are insistent that minimum wage laws increase unemployment. Today, this may or may not be the case, depending on how employers react. As Henry Hazlitt writes in his great book Economics in One Lesson: The Shortest and Surest Way to Understand Basic Economics, minimum wage laws make it a crime to pay someone what they are worth.

You cannot make a man worth a given amount by making it illegal for anyone to offer him anything less. You merely deprive him of the right to earn the amount that his abilities and situation would earn, while you deprive the community of even the moderate services that he is capable of rendering. In brief, for a low wage you substitute unemployment. You do harm all around, with no comparable compensation.

The first line is classic and 100 percent true. The rest of it is true at times, but Hazlitt, because of America's changed economic situation from when he wrote the book in 1946, misses other alternative consequences. In Hazlitt's time there were very few potential minimum wage employees who could take or leave employment. Because of America's booming economy for much of the last 62 years, many people fit that bill today. They are the teenagers of middle-class and above families.

We burned through those kids like they were nothing. My opening day speech to them went like this:

"I know you aren't worth what we are paying you right now. Your job over the next two weeks is to serve our customers to the best of your ability and to prove to me that someday you will be worth what we are paying you. I will provide any help you need, but if you aren't worth the money, I will know it immediately and you will be gone."

I wasn't being mean. I was offering them an opportunity that they didn't deserve. Many of them became good employees, some became managers and jump-started their careers. And many were fired or quit within their first two weeks.

The people of this country need low-paying jobs. About a year after I moved to Phoenix, I went into a local McDonald's to apply for a job. The owner was there and he talked with me while I filled out my application and grabbed a burger. I made a proposal right then. I told him that if he hired me at minimum wage, I would work as many hours as he wanted doing whatever he wanted me to do. But he better be prepared to make me a manager in two months, or I would find someone else who recognized my ability.

He ate it up. I was an assistant manager in less than two months and would quickly be moved to his newest and busiest restaurant with a much higher salary.

That's what low-paying jobs are for, an opportunity to prove yourself. Thankfully, journalism has no minimum wage. I can work for free if I choose to, and often do, because it will allow me to become noticed and will allow me entry to an audience I would never receive if my employer were forced to pay me a minimum wage. It's all free or low-paying job training that will earn me more money in the future.

If the minimum wage is truly intended to help poor heads of households, it accomplishes exactly the opposite. Minimum wage laws will always result in either less employment, subsidizing low-skilled workers, or moving employment from those who are providing for their families to those that aren't.

I hope this leads to a healthy discussion in the comments. Please feel free to add to this.

My God, They're Openly Admitting They Have no Ideas

Hope. And pray. That these idiots don't win in November.

Communism Alive and Well in LA

Today the Los Angeles City Communists, er, council, officially passed a law that would ban fast food restaurants from opening for at least a year in South Los Angeles.

"I believe this is a victory for the people of south and southeast Los Angeles, for them to have greater food options," she said.

    

The ban covers a 32-square-mile area with about 500,000 residents for one year, with two possible six-month extensions.

    

A report released last year by the county's Department of Public Health found 30 percent of children in south Los Angeles were obese, compared with 25 percent of all children in the city.

    

Still, several fast-food workers argued that fast-food establishments provide residents with job opportunities and, in recent years, nutritious menu options.

Yes, closing markets always equals more choices. That was sarcasm, by the way. There are a couple reasons that fast food restaurants dominate LA's ghettos, like most cities' ghettos.

One is that they thrive there. The consumers like it. But screw the consumers, say the council, they don't know enough to choose for themselves what to eat. But we do, we're the government, and we know how to run your life better than you do. And you'll do it our way, like it or not.

The second reason is that sit-down restaurants are unprofitable in these areas. The high crime rates prevent establishments that may serve healthier choices from wanting to set up shop, as do the high insurance costs.

But Los Angeles has decided that freedom of choice is desirable only in choosing whether or not to kill your unborn child, or whether you would rather be a citizen of the US or Mexico, or whether or not you would prefer to marry someone of the same sex or of the opposite sex.

Interesting times we are living in.

Does you support these measures to take away individual and corporate freedom, or has the nanny state finally gone to far?

Starbucks: A Study in Liberal Failure, Part II

Earlier this month in Starbucks: A Study in Liberal Failure, I discussed how the liberal views of its ownership was causing Starbucks to begin to fail, despite the fact that it sells one of the most over-priced products the world has ever seen. Today we have an update from Business Day:

ALMOST 700 employees of the coffee chain Starbucks will lose their jobs on Sunday after the company yesterday announced the closure of 61 of its 84 Australian stores.

Starbucks employees were told of the closures during 28 meetings around the country. They were given little more than 24 hours' notice to attend and were not told the reason for the meetings.

The American company admitted it had struggled in Australia's "very sophisticated coffee culture" and said the announcement was unrelated to its closure of 600 stores in the US this month.

A friend of an employee who learned he had lost his job said: "It's just disgusting the way Starbucks have handled this. They were left in the dark until the last minute. And they won't say anything because they're worried they won't get the [redundancy] money."

The coffee giant admitted that, since arriving in Australia eight years ago, simply not enough people had walked into its stores.

Unrelated or not, it is a sign of further failure by the coffee giant.

Andrew Mackay, vice-president of the Australian Coffee Traders Association, said the milk and syrup-based stores - where customers had to line up to be served - were never going to thrive. "I just think the whole system, the way they serve, just didn't appeal to the culture we have here."

So Starbucks, the bastion of multiculturalism, couldn't adapt to the culture of the Australian people. How funny.

In its statement late yesterday, Starbucks said the decision to close 61 "underperforming" stores was made "to concentrate its attention and resources on profitable growth, operational efficiencies and an enhanced experience for customers and partners globally". Starbucks calls its employees "partners".

Mr Culver said: "Obviously a decision like this is a very difficult decision for any company to make and really more so from a Starbucks perspective because of the impact that we have on our people."

It had set up an "employee assistance line" offering counselling to "partners". Packages would be offered to all full-time and casual staff. He declined to say why they were given such short notice but they would receive payouts in lieu of the notice. Some would get up to 20 weeks' pay and all would get two weeks' severance pay.

20 weeks' pay or two weeks severance pay, from a job making coffee? I'm guessing Starbucks' real partners, its shareholders, are spewing java over that one.

Senator Ted Stevens (RINO-Alaska) Indicted

On charges of corruption.

U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens was indicted this morning by a federal grand jury in Washington, D.C., on seven counts of filing false financial disclosures.

With the felony indictment, Stevens, an icon in Alaska politics, becomes by far the most powerful politician charged in a broad investigation into corruption of Alaska public officials that began more than four years ago and that has so far led to convictions of three state legislators and charges against two others.

That the poster boy for how the Republican Party lost its way, the man who tried to bring you the "bridge to nowhere," the champion of earmark spending, that this man is corrupt comes as no surprise whatsoever. 

Stevens, 84, epitomizes all that has gone wrong with Republican senators in the last eight years. For years, Stevens has legally defrauded the taxpayers of the United States. Now it appears as if he has done it illegally as well. Hopefully, he will be forced to resign shortly. Good riddance, scumbag.

UPDATE: This brings up a post I had on a poll John Hawkins of Right Wing News took of right-of-center bloggers asking for our lists of the 10 best and worst elected Republicans. Ted Stevens was the sixth-worst on my list and overall. I imagine he would be a little higher after this.

Gallup Poll: McCain leads by Four Among Likely Voters

Barack Obama's Magical Mystery Tour doesn't seem to have been as successful among American voters as it was among Europeans who would like to remake America in their own failed image: Story.

Republican presidential candidate John McCain moved from being behind by 6 points among "likely" voters a month ago to a 4-point lead over Democrat Barack Obama among that group in the latest USA TODAY/Gallup Poll. McCain still trails slightly among the broader universe of "registered" voters. By both measures, the race is tight.

The Friday-Sunday poll, mostly conducted as Obama was returning from his much-publicized overseas trip and released just this hour, shows McCain now ahead 49%-45% among voters that Gallup believes are most likely to go to the polls in November. In late June, he was behind among likely voters, 50%-44%...

Who is a likely voter? In this poll, Frank says, that was determined by how much thought people have given to the election, how often they say they vote and whether they plan to vote in the election in November.

He says the number of likely GOP voters is up for now, probably in part because of Obama's trip and the "laudatory" media coverage of it. "At least in the short term it may have had the side effect of energizing Republicans," he says. Also, he says that McCain's sharp words about Obama and the media last week may have energized his faithful.

While this is just one poll, it is definitely good news and seems to indicate that some people are having a backlash against the media's fawning relationship with Obama. A large factor certainly includes the astounding drop in young voters and Democrats who say they are certain to vote in the election.

Looks like young voters are less excited about Obama since it's become apparent that he's just another politician. I would also speculate that the disenfranchisement of the Clinton voters is causing Democrat voters to be less certain that they will vote than in the past.

 

H/T to HotAir.

Meanwhile, I'm more likely to vote now than ever, although it was always a near certainty. How about you, are you more or less likely now than you were before to vote?

Obama Creeps Him Out

Rick Moran of Right Wing Nut House has a wonderful post entitled, "Top Ten Things That Creep Me Out About Obama." I'll highlight a couple of my favorites, and then let you go to his site to check out the rest:

10. It creeps me out that whenever Obama makes an appearance, the rain stops falling and the sun comes out. As a rationalist I am loathe to ascribe a direct cause and effect to this phenomenon except that it happens quite frequently and the rainbow created by the sun breaking through the clouds spells out “Yes We Can!”

Probably just a coincidence…

9. It creeps me out that there are about twice as many women at Obama rallies as there are men. Now I am not of the Melvin Udall School of anti-feminist thought (when asked how he writes women so well, Udall responds “I think of a man, and I take away reason and accountability”). But what is one to think when watching the reaction of females as Obama is speaking? I’m sorry, but it is hard to imagine a man covering their mouth, chest heaving, barely able to contain himself and then ooooohing and aaaaaahhing when the messiah says something particularly vapid and innocuous.

Elvis, I can understand. But a politician?

...

6. It creeps me out that with the exception of most conservatives, Obama’s radical associations and radical past – including his being on a first name basis with an unreconstructed terrorist – doesn’t seem to bother many people. What am I missing here? When Obama makes an actual political alliance with a radical Maoist organization like The New Party, going so far as to attending their meetings and recruiting their members to work on his state senate campaign, why is there no call for the candidate to explain himself? Nor has there been any effort – save a couple of scattered stories in the National Review and elsewhere that detail Obama’s association with the radical group ACORN.

It’s as if the entire “Obama movement,” made up mostly of good, mainstream Democrats, is so in thrall to the candidate that they can’t see the warning signs of this fellow’s true radicalism. They dismiss his past by simply pointing to the here and now and saying “See? He really is a moderate kind of guy after all.” We don’t know that because no one has ever – ever – asked him to explain why he sought the endorsement of a radical communist group when running for the state senate and why he associated himself with the radical group ACORN.

Beyond creepy. Truly scary…

It gets better from there. Check it out.

Democrats Against Democracy

John Fund of the Wall Street Journal has an excellent piece up entitled, "The Far Left's War on Direct Democracy."

A total of 24 states allow voters to change laws on their own by collecting signatures and putting initiatives on the ballot. It's healthy that the entrenched political class should face some real legislative competition from initiative-toting citizens. Unfortunately, some special interests have declared war on the initiative process, using tactics ranging from restrictive laws to outright thuggery.

One of the biggest thugs in the war against democracy is a group appropriately named By Any Means Necessary (BAMN). BAMN has show a willingness to use any means necessary to prevent the will of the people, or some people, from being heard, debated or voted upon.

But more power to ordinary people remains unpopular in some quarters, and nothing illustrates the war on the initiative more than the reaction to Ward Connerly's measures to ban racial quotas and preferences. The former University of California regent has convinced three liberal states -- California, Washington and Michigan -- to approve race-neutral government policies in public hiring, contracting and university admissions. He also prodded Florida lawmakers into passing such a law. This year his American Civil Rights Institute (ACRI) aimed to make the ballot in five more states. But thanks to strong-arm tactics, the initiative has only made the ballot in Arizona, Colorado and Nebraska.

"The key to defeating the initiative is to keep it off the ballot in the first place," says Donna Stern, Midwest director for the Detroit-based By Any Means Necessary (BAMN). "That's the only way we're going to win." Her group's name certainly describes the tactics that are being used to thwart Mr. Connerly.

Aggressive legal challenges have bordered on the absurd, going so far as to claim that a blank line on one petition was a "duplicate" of another blank line on another petition and thus evidence of fraud. In Missouri, Secretary of State Robin Carnahan completely rewrote the initiative's ballot summary to portray it in a negative light. By the time courts ruled she had overstepped her authority, there wasn't enough time to collect sufficient signatures.

Those who did circulate petitions faced bizarre obstacles. In Kansas City, a petitioner was arrested for collecting signatures outside of a public library. Officials finally allowed petitioners a table inside the library but forbade them to talk. In Nebraska, a group in favor of racial preferences ran a radio ad that warned that those who signed the "deceptive" petition "could be at risk for identity theft, robbery, and much worse."

Mr. Connerly says that it's ironic that those who claim to believe in "people power" want to keep people from voting on his proposal: "Their tactics challenge the legitimacy of our system."

The left has engaged in such tactics and worse in Michigan, further hurting a populace mired in a one-state recession.

This year in Michigan, taxpayer groups tried to recall House Speaker Andy Dillon after he pushed through a 12% increase in the state income tax. But petitioners collecting the necessary 8,724 signatures in his suburban Detroit district were set upon. In Redford, police union members held a rally backing Mr. Dillon and would alert blockers to the location of recall petitioners. Outsiders would then surround petitioners and potential signers, using threatening language.

Mr. Dillon denied organizing such activity. Then it was revealed two of the harassers were state employees working directly for him. Another "voter educator" hired by the state's Democratic Party had been convicted of armed robbery. After 2,000 signatures were thrown out on technical grounds, the recall effort fell 700 signatures short.

Ever since voters in virtually every state with direct democracy passed term limits in the 1990s, state legislators have been hostile to the process. Now Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska and Colorado have all passed legislation to prohibit people from out-of-state from circulating a petition, and also to ban payment to circulators on a per-signature basis.

Whether it's actions like these, or the Democratic Socialists in Congress who wish to legislate conservative talk radio out of existence, we see one side continually trying to stifle public debate and democratic action on the issues of the day. People who have legitimate solutions to public policy issues do not try to quell discussion, they seek opportunity to share their proposals. Yet all we see from the left today is a desire to avoid debate (see Barack Obama limiting his debates with John McCain.)

I guess we know who doesn't have any legitimate solutions, now, don't we?

Obama: Stupidity or Poor Judgment?

Dana Pico of Common Sense Political Thought has a good piece today on Barack Obama's recent statement where he claimed to be on the Committee of Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, when he never has been.

More interesting to me was Pico's discussion of intellect.

I absolutely loathe the idea of Mr Obama winning the presidency, for reasons I have given before:

• He will raise taxes on all of us, despite what he says;
• He will surrender to the Islamic fascists in Iraq and Afghanistan, regardless of what he says; and
• He will appoint federal judges who will try to impose a left-wing agenda rather than follow the laws as written by the legislatures.

But I’m not stupid enough to think that he is stupid. You don’t get into Harvard Law School, even if you are a beneficiary of Affirmative Action, by being stupid. And you certainly don’t get elected president of the Harvard Law Review by being a dummy.

Some of our friends on the left seem to think that John McCain is some big oaf dummy...  You don’t get into the United States Naval Academy, even as a legacy, if you are stupid. And while Mr McCain finished near the bottom of his class, much of that was due to something most college graduates can’t seem to imagine: he received demerits for excessive partying, something that most collegians seem to think is a collegiate requirement. The United States Navy does not put idiots in the cockpits of high-performance jets.

It seems to me that we overly-demonize the political candidates we oppose. It is one thing to criticize a politicians policies and his apparent attitudes and even his honesty; those things can be checked, and are important. But the strange notion that one’s political opponents are somehow just plain stupid strikes me as both self-delusional and self-defeating: few battles were won by underestimating the opposition! Our friends on the left “misunderestimated” George Bush all along; did it help them?

I commented on the post and thought I'd share and expand upon my thoughts there.

I agree that this idea of considering our opponents to be unintelligent is foolhardy. But intelligent people offer up solutions that are downright stupid all the time. So something other than intelligence must be at play here. In lieu of intelligence, what we can look at is a candidate’s ability to apply logic, his areas of ignorance, his honesty (as Pico mentioned) and his hunger for power.

There are only a handful of explanations for why an intelligent person would offer up stupid policies. The candidate must either be ignorant, be applying logic poorly, be trusting advisers who are wrong for any of these reasons, be paying back his special interests, be pandering to a special interest, be lying for personal gain or be willing to promote anything that he perceives will lead to more power.

High intelligence is not historically a harbinger of presidential success. I’d much rather have a moderately intelligent leader with a great strong-suit in applied logic and honesty, like Ronald Reagan, than almost any more intelligent leader the world has ever seen. Does anyone doubt that Jimmy Carter was much smarter than Ronald Reagan? Or Walter Mondale, or Michael Dukakis? Or Richard Nixon even?

I’ve found that intelligence, honesty and great ability in applied logic rarely coincide in one person. And those that do excel at all three are too smart, too logical and too honest to seek the office of President of the United States.

In my opinion, applied logic is the key component here. And it is very easy to make the case that Barack Obama is a complete idiot when it comes to applied logic. He makes logical leaps that make him look alternately naive or foolish in every speech I’ve ever heard him make. It must either be that, or his lust for power must be causing him to do so for the reasons I mentioned earlier.

So I concede that Pico is correct in saying we shouldn’t challenge his intellect. We should challenge his judgment. And we should challenge his honesty. There is more than enough material there.

GOP Senators Hold their Ground in First Drilling Battle

As I noted yesterday, Republican Senators have decided to stop any work in Congress until Democrats agree to allow increased drilling. Today they followed through.

Legislation to rein in excessive energy speculation failed a key procedural vote on Friday to move forward in the Senate, and now lawmakers will set aside the bill to consider other legislation.

Senate Republicans strongly opposed the bill because it focused only on speculation, and they argued the legislation should be modified to also boost U.S. oil production by allowing more offshore drilling and developing vast oil shale fields in the West.

Republicans said tight petroleum supplies that were unable to keep up with demand were the cause of high energy prices.

"Americans are insisting we do more. They want us to do something to cut the price of gas and lessen our dependence on Middle East oil," said Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell.

"And so I ask my friends (Democrats) on the other side the same simple question I asked them yesterday: If you won't act now, with dialysis patients cutting back on treatments because of high gas prices, when will you? What is it going to take?" McConnell said.

Only one "Republican" sided with the Dems on this one. Any guesses? You are correct. Olympia Snowe sided with the party that she should be representing.

The bill that was defeated today would have increased government bureaucracy and regulation of the free market, and served to stifle economic freedom. By the way, could anyone tell me what "excessive energy speculation" is? Who decides that? Who gave government that power? 

*CFTC must publish reports that provide the number of positions and total value of index funds, and other passive, long-only and short-only investors in energy and agriculture markets;

*Conditions will be set for granting hedge exemptions from position limits, mostly for commercial purposes;

*Authorizes 100 new CFTC employees to monitor markets;

*CFTC will report on impact on over-the-counter markets from position limits on exchanges;

*Reporting will become mandatory for over-the-counter trading of look-alike agricultural and energy contracts.

Score one point for freedom.

Another Intellectual Heavyweight Endorses Obama

From an Associated Press interview with Pamela Anderson.

"I love him. I think he's going to win. I like that he's opening up conversations all over the world. I think he's smart and charismatic. I think it's important to have a president that people actually like. I know my kids want to be like him. I think he has a great message. It'll be nice when people like America again."

"It'll be nice when people like America again?" What drivel. I'd prefer a healthy combination of respect, admiration and fear of pissing us off. Like under Ronald Reagan. Can anyone remember what her qualifications are?

Oh yeah. Those. I've already got the slogan: Obama or Bust.

Follow-up on Oil Speculation

Update: I just saw this graph that explains the true problem at QandO.

In a recent post entitled "Dick Morris' (and Democrat Leadership's) Economic Illiteracy," I bemoaned the fact that people with no understanding of economics are usually the ones that loudly yell out the exact opposite solution to any given problem. I attempted to explain the important role that futures markets play in the economy, but am not sure if I was totally clear.

Art Carden of the Ludwig von Mises Institute has a post today that explains it all much better than I attempted to do, in my opinion. Actually, I'm not sure - I think I'm okay at explaining complex issues simply. Let me know whether or not you found Carden's explanation easier to understand.

In a July 21, 2008 column in the Jewish World Review with a shouting headline of STOP OIL SPECULATION NOW!, Dick Morris and Eileen McGann argued that the government should take action to restrict trading in futures markets. They are mistaken, however, in their assessment of oil speculation. Speculation is an important part of the supply and demand process.

Futures markets are markets in which people trade the right to specified quantities of a specified commodity to be delivered at some point in the future. For example, one might be able to buy or sell a contract whereby the seller agrees to deliver a barrel of crude petroleum on December 1, 2016 at a price of $150. Traders who believe the price will be below $150 per barrel should sell such a contract. Traders who believe the price will be above $150 per barrel should buy such a contract.

This has important implications for how resources are allocated across time and space.  (Economic mumbo-jumbo follows... 

It is the fact that all other things do not remain equal that produces profitable opportunities for speculators. People with better information about market conditions can profit from their insight and perform the valuable public service of ensuring adequate oil supplies tomorrow.

Speculation does not interfere with supply and demand. Speculation is part the process by which supply and demand adjust. What Morris and McGann seek to restrict is exactly the kind of behavior that supply-and-demand analysis would predict.

What Morris and McGann deride as "unbridled gambling" is an essential part of the market process... The fact of the matter, however, is that speculators are not gambling in the pure sense of the word. They are acting on the basis of their best understanding of current market conditions and their expectations about future market conditions. They may be incorrect, but they are not "gambling."

Morris and McGann write "(i)f there is any doubt that it is speculation, not the supply and demand for oil, that is driving up the price, look at this week's history of oil prices." He then cites President Bush's executive order to permit offshore drilling and OPEC's statement that oil demand was falling and argues that these were responsible for a $15 price drop even though "(n)o new oil gushed through the system."

This is exactly what supply and demand would predict. (ED: A point I made in my post.) If offshore drilling is permitted, this will increase the future supply of oil and drive town the future price. People who were holding oil in anticipation of higher future prices will instead release some of that oil onto the market today, increasing the current supply of oil. Nothing untoward is going on: the supply of oil today is changing in response to traders' revised expectations about the supply of oil in the future. This is literally economics 101: what I have just described is what I teach in my econ 101 lectures on futures markets.

Morris and McGann conclude that "(o)il is just too important strategically and economically to allow that kind of speculation," but speculation is the market mechanism by which price volatility is reduced and future supplies are guaranteed. If oil really is that important, we should be loosening the restraints on futures market speculation rather than tightening them.

Did that help or hurt things?

Kudlow: "McCain at His Very Best" on Fannie/Freddie Boondoggle

From Kudlow's Money Politics:

“Americans should be outraged at the latest sweetheart deal in Washington,” writes McCain. “Congress will put U.S. taxpayers on the hook for potentially hundreds of billions of dollars to bail out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. It’s a tribute to what these two institutions — which most Americans have never heard of — have bought with more than $170-million worth of lobbyists in the past decade.”

This is right on the money. This is the straight-talk McCain as true Washington reformer. The senator goes right to the heart of what Wall Street Journal editor Paul Gigot describes as a bad mix of government power backing private profit.

McCain goes on to argue that Fannie employees manipulated financial reports to line the pockets of senior executives. Freddie did likewise. Big Mac calls them a danger to financial markets. He says if one dime of taxpayer money ends up in those institutions “the management and the board should immediately be replaced, multimillion dollar salaries should be cut, and bonuses and other compensation should be eliminated. They should cease all lobbying activities and drop all payments to outside lobbyists.”

He's right. McCain always has been at his best when he's fighting wasteful government programs and ridiculous spending of our money.

Unfortunately, the  people of this country, even most politically astute people couldn't care less about this issue, because they don't get it. I expect this to be one of my lowest-read posts ever, and I'll be stunned if you made it this far.

Republicans Finally Get Serious About Drilling

The party is showing some sings of regaining its sanity. This might not be a lost cause yet, if Republicans keep 'drilling' voters and the Democrat Congress on this issue. It is my belief that this issue alone can carry the Republican Party to the Presidency and to gains in Congress. It is, hands down, the single most important issue of this campaign, and if Republicans play their cards right that fact will only grow.

From The Hill:

Senate Republicans have threatened to block nearly all other bills pending before the August recess if Democrats refuse to vote with them on expanding offshore drilling.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said bills that do not pertain to energy can wait until after the August recess, with gas prices now surpassing $4 per gallon. McConnell and top Republicans indicated Wednesday they would oppose any procedural votes to take up other legislation, which require 60 votes to succeed.

“We think there is nothing more important that we can do right now than to deal with the Number One issue of the country,” McConnell said. “This is the biggest issue since terrorism right after 9/11. People are pounding on their desks, saying, Why don’t these people get together and do something about this problem?”

The hardball tactics reflect Republican confidence that they can pull off a major election-year victory with gas prices at record highs, after they have been battered at the polls and have lost on several recent high-profile legislative battles.

The other huge benefit to this strategy is that even if the Dems don't cave on drilling, nothing will get done in Congress. Now this would only be a small change from Congress' current fevered business of re-naming post offices, but it would prevent any attempt by Harry Reid to meddle in the free market, and that alone is a very good thing for the country.

Democrats say the GOP is intentionally prolonging the debate in order to score political points by insisting on more than two dozen amendments to the oil-speculation bill. Democrats, who say opening up new lands won’t affect prices for a decade and are concerned about its environmental impacts, have offered the GOP one amendment to the oil-speculation bill.

Of course the GOP is intentionally prolonging the debate in order to score political points. On the very few occasions that ever come up where the other side is totally wrong in its solution to a problem, and at the same time the people of this country actually recognize that fact, there is only one reasonable strategy: prolong the debate in order to score political points. It isn't the GOP's that Democrats in Congress are bitterly clinging to their irrational argument that increased oil production won't lower prices for ten years, and that even a knowledge among speculators that increased production is coming won't cause speculators to look to better bets.

“Our goal is to stay on the subject that the American people are demanding that we do something about and finish the job,” McConnell said...

Rodell Mollineau, a Reid spokesman, shot back at the Republican threat.

“Why would Sen. McConnell’s statement be any different than his posture on most every other bill to come through the Senate?” Mollineau said. “Bush-McCain Republicans have conducted 83 filibusters so far this year and have blocked six attempts this summer to address the energy crisis. Their feigned outrage would be laughable if it wasn’t at the expense of millions Americans suffering at the pump.”

No, Democrat attempts to "address the energy crisis" would be laughable, if they weren't so potentially dangerous to the future of the country.

Howard Stern: "I Will Never Vote Democrat Again"

I guess we take the support wherever it comes from.

Stern described a phone conversation he had with his agent, who he described as a “liberal Democrat kind of guy.”

“I go, ‘That’s it!’” Stern said. “[I] go, ‘You know what Don, I’ve voted Republican and I’ve voted Democrat. I have vowed I will never vote for a Democrat again. I don’t give a [expletive] – no matter who they are. I don’t care if God becomes a Democrat.’ I said, ‘I backed Hillary Clinton, I backed Al Gore, I backed John Kerry. I am done with them.’”

“The fact that these Democrats on the FCC are communists,” Stern said. “They’re for communism. They don’t want to see companies – this is gangsterism. I said, ‘This is crazy.’”

Given the size of his audience, I'd say this is a good thing. Any idea how much pull he has on these people? Or is he purely entertainment?

Sowell: Please, Government, Don't Try to Help

Thomas Sowell wrote a short but accurate appraisal of government efforts to solve economic problems.

We don’t look to arsonists to help put out fires but we do look to politicians to help solve financial crises that they played a major role in creating.

How did the government help create the current financial mess? Let me count the ways.

Which he does. If you're not up to speed, click above to read the full article.

Yet, when that limb began to crack, the first reaction in politics and in the media has been to look to government to solve this problem because — as always — it was called the market’s fault, the lenders’ fault, and everybody’s fault except those politicians who created this dicey situation in the first place.

Markets often get blamed for conveying a reality that was not created by the market...

Markets were also blamed for the Great Depression of the 1930s and New Deal politicians were credited with getting us out of it. But increasing numbers of economists and historians have concluded that it was government intervention which prolonged the Great Depression beyond that of other depressions where the government did nothing.

The stock market crash of 1987 was at least as big as the stock market crash in 1929. But, instead of being followed by a Great Depression, the 1987 crash was followed by 20 years of economic growth, with low inflation and low unemployment.

The Reagan administration did nothing in 1987, despite outrage in the media at the government’s failure to live up to its responsibility, as seen in liberal quarters. But nothing was apparently what needed to be done, so that markets could adjust.

The last thing politicians can do in an election year is nothing. So we can look for all sorts of “solutions” by politicians of both parties. Like most political solutions, these are likely to make matters worse.

So far, Congress has done little. Yet we've seen President Bush merely make a symbolic move in repealing the ban on offshore drilling, and the market has bounced back in a hurry as gas prices have had their biggest one-week drop in history. So it's not necessarily that government can't help, but the way that they can help is by allowing the free market to work properly without interference.

Cato Video: The Effects of Obama's Social Security Tax Increase

Good video by Dan Mitchell of the Cato Institute.

Hat tip to Kudlow's Money Politics. You can see Kudlow every weekday on CNBC's Kudlow and Company.

Obama's Lack of Judgment on the Surge

Bill Dupray has been putting up a lot of good stuff at the Patriot Room lately (and I'm not just saying that because he generously allowed me to post my "Soak the Poor" piece there). The latest shows what a number of prominent Democrats said about the surge, without the benefit of hindsight. Barack Obama's is the most damning:

I don’t think the president’s strategy is going to work. We went through two weeks of hearings on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; experts from across the spectrum–military and civilian, conservative and liberal–expressed great skepticism about it. My suggestion to the president has been that the only way we’re going to change the dynamic in Iraq and start seeing political commendation is actually if we create a system of phased redeployment. And, frankly, the president, I think, has not been willing to consider that option, not because it’s not militarily sound but because he continues to cling to the belief that somehow military solutions are going to lead to victory in Iraq.

Clinging to the belief that “somehow” military solutions would solve a military problem? Is that like bitterly clinging to our religion and our guns? We are seeing a disturbing pattern of commonsense Americans continually exercising better judgment than the presidential wanna-be.

Lesson of the Day: Economics is Simple

Earlier today I showed that economics is so simple that even ancient rocker Ted Nugent gets it. Next up, we learn about the economics of oil drilling from a guy who looks like Yakov Smirnoff, the Russian comedian who did the old Lite Beer from Miller commercials.

Actually, that may not be Smirnoff. On second look, it appears to be Ross Kaminsky, quite amusingly ripping liberal opposition to oil drilling. 

“It will make no difference today, it will make no difference tomorrow, it will make no difference ten years from now.” These were the words of Dan Weiss, a representative of the leftist Center for American Progress last Monday in an interview on CNBC, just one or two short hours after President Bush lifted the executive order banning oil and gas drilling in US waters on the Outer Continental Shelf.

Since liberal economic policy and mythology is incompatible with any objective understanding of free markets, Mr. Weiss may have been surprised to see the headline the very next day: “Oil Prices Post Biggest One-Day Drop in 17 Years” or just five days later: “Oil prices tumble in biggest weekly drop ever”, “Oil plunges faster than ever”.  Yes, in the four days after Mr. Weiss said that Bush’s announcement was irrelevant, oil fell more than $15 per barrel.

Now, I don’t blame Mr. Weiss. After all, it was CNBC’s fault for inviting someone to discuss markets whose resume makes it clear that he’s a lobbyist who managed the Sierra Club’s PAC and now is an advocate for “clean energy and climate”. It’s not his fault that CNBC gave him a platform to speak as if he had a clue about economics, commodities trading, or anything else relevant to the way the world really works.

Weiss tried to argue, as liberals do daily, that working toward increasing domestic oil supplies can’t possible impact current prices because it will take years for the oil to be available....

He then explains why the truth is the opposite. Check it out, it's good stuff.

Teach Your Kids About Congress With Uncle Jay

This is absolutely hilarious:

Tax Cuts: Even Ted Nugent Gets It, why Doesn't Obama?

One of the biggest problems facing this country is the general public's ignorance on economic issues. I have been saying repeatedly that understand economics in relation to politics is really quite simple, it's all about looking at proposals and using common sense to deduce what the results of any specific policy would be to every segment of society.

If ancient rocker Ted Nugent can get it, and write so eloquently about it, why can't so many of our people or the democrat nominee?

Economic newscaster Larry Kudlow refers to the last twenty-five years of economic prosperity as the “greatest story never told.” He’s dead-on right on this one.

America, and the entire world for that matter, have witnessed in the previous 25 years the greatest period of prosperity in human history. The result of this has been that more wealth and upgraded quality of life has been created during this period than at any time in recorded history. Where has this story been on the nightly news or on the editorial pages of our newspapers?

A major reason for this tremendous prosperity over the last 25 years is largely attributed to tax cuts, which Senator Obama wants to rescind and reverse. Instead of continuing with this historic growth by continuing President Bush’s tax cuts or even providing more economic stimulus by lowering taxes even further and reducing the size of the federal government (which I refer to as Fedzilla), Senator Obama wants to feed Fedzilla by raising taxes. This is simply weird and dangerous.

Nugent is great here, pointing out the great, mostly-untold story of the great prosperity we've seen for 25 years running. Now he turns his attention to those whose policies would end that prosperity.

---

The “evil” rich are the business owners, the people who employ and fuel America. If you want to discourage and kill entrepreneurship and future risk taking by business owners and thereby slow the economy and job growth, and potentially put jobs at risk, support the former Community Organizer, whatever that is.

The reason liberals believe in raising taxes is because they believe the government is the engine of America. Socialists like Obama are wrong. The free market is the engine that creates economic freedom, provides jobs and creates wealth. Period.

Cutting taxes has proved time and time again to create more tax revenue for the government while creating wealth in the private sector. Why liberals continue to ignore this most blatant economic reality speaks volumes about their disdain for the private sector. A cult of anti "we the people" right here in America. Great.

Other than maybe a paper route as a kid, can anyone tell me if Senator Obama has ever held a job in the private sector?

Unless you are an ignorant socialist stooge, punishing successful people by raising their taxes is never the right approach, but it is the foundation of the Democratic Party. They have never seen a tax increase they didn’t support or a government program that didn’t need to be expanded. Instead of throwing coal on our economic fire, Democrats toss buckets of water on it and call it progress.

Rock on, Mr. Nugent!