Elevator Manners

I think you can tell a lot about people from little things. Recently I moved to Seattle from Minneapolis and I originally hail from Michigan. I work in an eleven story office building and every day I ride the elevator up to the sixth floor. And every day not one person ever asks me which floor I am heading to, not one person volunteers to push the button for me, and not one person ever asks me to press the button for them.

It's freakin weird. In most places people routinely ask other people which floor they are going to, and they routinely hit the button because it's a nice and friendly thing to do. But here, they are not nice and they are not friendly and it's noticeable.

And I wonder why and I blame liberalism. It might be a stretch, but the way I see it, the reason people are so disconnected, the reason they don't acknowledge your existence inside and outside the elevator, is that it's not their responsibility. It's the responsibility of the state. They pay taxes not because they care, but so they don't have to.

It's not in anyones genes to ignore other people. It's a learned behavior. Liberalism teaches that society, not individuals, are responsible for others. Individuals gradually learn that it's not their job to engage, and it becomes the norm. Every day I ride six floors silently with people who have been taught to shut the world out because it's not their responsibility. Maybe not, but small acts of kindness make the world such a nice place. Let's not teach people to avoid them.

Artists wanted

If there are any artists out there interested in having their work posted here, please get in touch.

Food stamps, the road to recovery

Economic illiteracy is rampant and I heard a gem today listening to the Randy Rhodes show. In between lambasting Newt Gingrich for who knows what, she gave the audience a weapon to throw at those deranged conservatives. Apparently, some conservative wants to limit food stamp payments (the evil cold hearted bastard) and this is wrong not only morally, but economically. For you see it turns out that for every 5 dollars spent, 9 dollar in economic activity is generated. It's nonsense, but in case it isn't obvious here's a simple thought experiment to convince you.

Giving 1 person 5 dollars worth of food stamps and generating 9 dollars is a great deal. If I were a businessman I would do it all day, every day. Therefore it makes perfect sense that we should give everyone 5 dollars worth of food stamps! Just think of all the money generated for the economy! Brilliant liberal thinking.

P.S. Remember this when you hear how much each dollar of unemployment contributes to the economy. And when that time comes let your inner inquisitor ask, if 1 dollar of unemployment is good, shouldn't more dollars be better? How about a million dollars?

Basic Economics

Many of our largest and most significant industries still have business models that rely on the use of debt to purchase goods and services. Unless you’re a multimillionaire, it’s difficult to make significant purchases — college tuition, a Viking stove, a Toyota Prius, computers, jewelry, a house — out of savings or cash flow from wages. The renewed willingness and confidence to spend money we don’t have is vital to the continuing recovery.

John Maynard Keynes wrote of the paradox of thrift — if everyone saves, everyone becomes poorer, because demand for goods and services will fall. Here’s another paradox: Running up consumer debt may be a moral failure and a recipe for long-term damnation, but it also contains the roots of our short-term salvation.

Daniel Gross, author of “Dumb Money: How Our Greatest Financial Minds Bankrupted the Nation,” is the economics editor and columnist at Yahoo! Finance.

These concluding paragraphs from an op-ed in yesterday's NY Times struck me as interesting.

First, the author is wrong, regardless of whether you are a multimillionaire or not, you spend what you have or will have. There is never a free lunch. The only thing to remember is that you can spend today and save tomorrow (also known as paying back), or you can save today and spend tomorrow. Regardless, in order to consume, you MUST save. Any notion to the contrary is just nonsense.

The paradox of thrift is not really a paradox. It's true that if people decide to stop trading, there is less value in society, but it's vitally important to realize why. Is it because their is less stuff in society? The answer is no, the amount of stuff produced is exactly the same. Saving only means that you don't trade (spend), it does not make any statements with regards to production. So if the amount of stuff (consumer goods) out there is the same, how can I say we are actually poorer? I'll leave it to someone to comment on.

And a final, personal note. Just because the road to hell is paved with good intentions, doesn't mean we should travel down it for a while and see what great things we can achieve before the Inferno envelopes us.

Leave politics out of the movie theater

So there I was spending a nice, relaxing evening with my girlfriend watching a movie, "Julie and Julia". The movie was pretty good, not great, but enjoyable nonetheless. However, for some unknown reason the movie couldn't resist a constant undercurrent of Republican bashing. And near the middle of the movie, outright Republican bashing. The offending line from the movie (paraphrased)

If I were an evil Republican, I would have fired you.

Apparently, hollywood thinks it's brilliant to insult your potential audience (or maybe those rich Republicans don't see movies?). Regardless, thinly veiled insinuations and their unveiled cousins, ruin the movie. It would be one thing if the nature of the movie were political, but the movie had nothing to do with politics. The only reason I can think of why this dynamic was added to the movie is that these people are so hate filled, that in a fun, light hearted movie, they can't resist every opportunity to twist the knife.

Hollywood, I know most of you play on the wrong team (pun intended, and it's a joke, so relax everyone), but can't you stick to telling good stories about interesting people and leave politics at the door. All us evil conservatives would appreciate it and it might even make you more money to contribute to Al Franken.

The new financial plan

Politically, no one wants there programs cut. So if you want to win, you don't do so by suggesting cutting programs! Here's what should be the campaign pledge for spending. No new spending until the deficit is under control. That's it, keep spending levels constant, don't cut, but don't spend more. People understand that you can't continue to spend like a drunken sailor so they will be for it. They also see that you aren't cutting their precious entitlements so they have a harder time being against it. Finally, it builds on the fiscal responsibility story you are trying to create with your political brand.

How many jobs were "created" or "saved"?

Recently someone said that the CBO claimed that 1.3 million jobs were created due to the stimulus. I don't believe that number for a second. It all depends on comparing how many jobs would have been created without the stimulus. We don't know that, so we can't really say whether the stimulus helped at all.

Nonetheless, I am lazy, is there anyone out there who can better explain this?

Balanced Budget

This is one idea that is a winner and one that the Democrats have co-opted from conservatives. I think it's safe to say that everyone understands that you can't spend more than what you earn. If you do, you go bankrupt. The government is no different, and we should make the same argument.

It's irresponsible and reckless to run a country on borrowed money. Our party believes in fiscal responsibility and that's why we are for a balanced budget amendment. Bottom line is this: If you have to live on a budget, so do we.
- Paid for by The New Liberal Democrats

On the practical side a balanced budget accomplishes a bunch of things.

First, it forces the country to pay for the services it demands from government which imposes an immediate cost. "immediate" is important. Who will want to repeal a handout they have gotten for years? Who will remember why their taxes are being raised five years after the fact? No one. Transparency (another huge winning argument) dictates that we try as best as possible to tie cause and effect.

While I know that higher taxes lead to lower economic growth, higher taxes also change people's minds. Especially the minds of people who pay them. The sooner taxpayers feel the bite of higher taxes, the weightier the argument to lower them (by cutting spending) becomes. You take away the false promise of liberals that more and more government services are a free lunch. You make them defend having their cake and 10% unemployment.

Finally, your political brand is strengthened. You are fiscally responsible, like the head of a household who pays the bills when they come due. People understand this and they relate to it.

A Challenge

I constantly hear refrains from liberals that they actually believe in the free market, yet whenever there is a choice between the government and the free market, they always choose government. Can some liberal out there name one thing that the free market does better than the government?

Leftists gone crazy

I like to read the New York Times for entertainment value and to try to understand the other side. But sometimes you come across things that are just despicable. Case in point: this advertisement was run on the online version of their newspaper:




What person working at the Times thought this an appropriate ad? Liberals are the most racist, hate filled people on this earth. They cannot tolerate dissent because what they believe is essentially religious dogma and one cannot argue against "divine" truth. Non-believers, i.e. conservatives are therefore evil and you know who else was evil, Nazis! Thus in their warped mind the sick comparison makes perfect sense. Unbelievable!

OOO

I have been out of the office for a while and for anyone who actually likes reading these posts, my apologies.

There is no actual point of this blog other than to entertain me and hopefully some others out there. What I find entertaining is not only commenting on the buffoonery of liberals and their insane ideas, but offering what I believe are real policy proposals that can make a difference. Any proposals I make are based on assumptions as to how we have arrived at the present situation. I assume certain facts about human nature and how people behave and I do not believe that reason or logic or even those vaunted things called facts have any sway on your typical man.

My experience has led me to conclude that people generally act in their own self interest. They care more about their own well being more than that of others. They care more about their family than about strangers. They care about feeling good about themselves, not about actually being good, but feeling good - perception is reality. Every action has a payoff; charity esteems the giver. And every action has a cost; what's given is lost. People generally act to try to maximize their personal profit.

In order to have any effect, we must take these givens about people and construct systems which incentivize man to act a certain way. Our goal is for men to live peacefully in society with as much liberty as possible and enough security to make liberty valuable. Government is the device to accomplish this goal, and it's task is difficult because conceptually liberty and security are opposed. To be free means giving up some security and to be secure means giving up some freedom.

In the end, it's a balance we seek. And I think that in the end, a balance is what's always achieved. But within that balance, life can be better or worse. I believe that embracing a free market with a modest and simple social safety net is probably the best we will ever do. Lest men be angels.

A subtle enumeration

I went to this meeting for conservative enthusiasts. Essentially it was a meeting of the geriatric sort, they were mad as hell and ready for bed. The most interesting part of the night was near the end, the organizers set up a mock debate for new constitutional amendments in an attempt to impose constitutional limits on our government. Ironic when you think about it. Nonetheless, each amendment had good intentions, but in my opinion were busts. One astute octogenarian noted: what good are new amendments when no one pays attention to today's plain meaning. Good question.

Any honest (and even a dishonest one now and then) person knows that the constitution was a document limiting federal power. More precisely, the constitution is an enumeration of federal powers. What was written was what the government could do and everything else was off limits. Now some time ago that got flipped around and our government..er, constitution became a negative document, i.e. government can do anything except that forbidden by the constitution.

We conservative folks old and young alike prefer the original meaning of the constitution, limited federal government. The question is how to achieve it? I think we need to attack the flanks and in the end achieve our goal: to limit the federal government.

The amendment should be to limit federal tax revenues to 25% of Gross Domestic Product. My libertarian friends would be dismayed, but in the end the goal is to make peace, live in harmony, and put an end to the ever encroaching federal Leviathan. 25% is a lot of money, and it grows every year as the economy grows (nice incentive alignment eh?). That high percentage also has the effect of shaming our representatives (if that's possible). If you can't live within your means, when our means are substantial, then when can you?

I am not the first with this proposal, but I am adding my voice in support. Let's give Caesar more than enough to make him fat and happy, and slothful enough to leave the rest of us alone.

Get an ugly friend

I had a boss who from my estimation wasn't a very good boss. He wasn't a bad guy, in fact he cared a great deal about his employees, but from an objective standpoint I think he wasn't a strong organizer. He lacked the big picture perspective, preferring to put out fires rather than build a well functioning machine. Eventually, the shit hit the fan at my company and there was a house cleaning. The CEO got fired, some other folks were asked to leave, and my boss was one of them.

What's amazing to me is that it took so long for him (and the CEO) to get fired. Objectively they were doing a bad job. But the thing is that they were rated subjectively. At a certain level it's difficult to determine if someone is actually doing a good job. When you have fifty engineers doing the same task, it's easy to grade them against each other. But when you have one guy doing a unique job, how do you know if someone else could have done it better?

The only way we know socialism is a terrible system of government, is that we have capitalism to compare it to. When there is only one system, one way of doing things, no one can compare it to what doesn't exist. Capitalism is far superior to all other forms of social organization. If we want to promote capitalism and the free market, it's not enough to extol it's virtues. We must create an island where the benefits can be seen. America used to be that island, maybe we should start looking elsewhere.

People always adjust

Everywhere you turn you hear people, not just liberals, but well meaning conservatives and libertarians talking about economic disaster scenarios. If X happens, then Y will happen and that will in turn cause Z which will cause the world to end. Really? I didn't know the world was some sort of Rube-Goldberg machine, and the toppling of one little domino would send it all to pieces.

But apparently it is, especially if you are a keynesian (and if you aren't, you ought to be ashamed of yourself). Preventing a deflationary spiral is the justfication for all sorts of economic voodoo. Well, who cares about a deflationary spiral, how about some sanity. Here's the reality, if house prices go down, people (those atomic units who actually make up an economic system) will adjust. And at some point prices will stabilize, wealth will be lost, and we will start over again. Life will go on. What's killing us right now is not a lack of wealth, but uncertainty. And all this talk about home prices declining which causes consumer confidence to go down which tanks consumer spending which tanks...you get the point, is not productive.

Let's get to the bottom, lick our wounds, and rebuild. Yes, we will be poorer because we ARE poorer, government craziness cannot change that simple fact. And let's stop justifying craziness based on hypothetical scenarios which have no basis in reality.

You know it's bad when...

It's called a change over, the movie goes on and nobody in the audience has any idea.
- From the movie "Fight Club"

If you ever wanted to know just how crazy the left is in this country, ponder this: The bastion of socialism, Europe, is rebutting our calls for more deficit spending. They are advocating spending restraint in the face of the Greece bailout and record budget deficits. I have a new found respect for European (read: German) sanity and new found disgust with the American left. At what point will they realize that Keynesian econnomics is bunk? At what point will they actually care that their economic policies are causing hardship to millions of Americans? When will they concern themselves with the welfare of their subjects more than their ideology? It's truly a very different world when Europe gets it before us.