California:
The Governor of California is jogging with his dog along a nature trail. A coyote jumps out and attacks the Governor's dog, then bites theGovernor.
1. The Governor starts to intervene, but reflects upon the movie "Bambi" and then realizes he should stop because the coyote is only doing what is natural.
2. He calls animal control . Animal Control captures the coyote and bills the State $200 testing it for diseases and $500 for relocating it.
3. He calls a veterinarian. The vet collects the dead dog and
bills the State $200 testing it for diseases.
4. The Governor goes to hospital and spends $3,500 getting checked for diseases from the coyote and on getting his bite wound bandaged.
5. The running trail gets shut down for 6 months while Fish & Game conducts a $100,000 survey to make sure the area is now free ofdangerous animals.
6. The Governor spends $50,000 in state funds implementing a "coyote awareness program" for residents of the area.
7. The State Legislature spends $2 million to study how to better treat rabies and how to permanently eradicate the disease throughout theworld.
8. The Governor's security agent is fired for not stopping the
attack. The State spends $150,000 to hire and train a new agent with additional special training regarding the nature of coyotes.
9. PETA protests the coyote's relocation and files a $5 million suit against the State.
Tennessee:
The Governor of Tennessee is jogging with his dog along a nature trail. A Coyote jumps out and attacks his dog.
1. The Governor shoots the coyote with his concealed-carry pistol and keeps jogging. The Governor has spent $0.50 on a .45 ACP hollow point cartridge.
2. The Buzzards eat the dead coyote.
And that, my friends, is why California is broke and Tennessee is not.
Scarcity, Opportunity Cost and Competition impact our decision-making moment to moment. This makes economics the basis of life as we know it, after God. Nothing that people value is free, someone pays the cost. To gain that thing of value, scarce resources are given up and cannot be given up again for a different thing of value. And we all are competing to capture those scarce resources.
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Saturday, March 10, 2012
Our Glorious Leader sets another Great Record in History!
It was announced that our Glorious Leader has set another Great Record in History during His beneficent Reign.
Longest period of unemployment, real GDP hasn't been above pop growth, lost 10,000,000 jobs but have only added 2,000,000 back...nice.
http://news.investors.com/article/603791/201203090838/jobs-recession-is-longest-since-depression.htm?fb_ref=top&fb_source=home_multiline
Longest period of unemployment, real GDP hasn't been above pop growth, lost 10,000,000 jobs but have only added 2,000,000 back...nice.
http://news.investors.com/article/603791/201203090838/jobs-recession-is-longest-since-depression.htm?fb_ref=top&fb_source=home_multiline
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Pop quiz, hot shot.
Listen to Daniel Hannan's speech. Find three things 'wrong' with it.
Post them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=BujuEpGmKMg
Post them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=BujuEpGmKMg
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Questions for an elected representative...
If I could ask (and actually get honest replies) an elected politician these questions...whoa.
- Once upon a time (actually seems like a fairy tale) an individual could develop a good or service, go forth and sell it to those who were willing and able to buy it. It was effectively stream-lined, fast, uncomplicated. TODAY, an individual to do the same must apply for a license, or a permit at multiple levels of gov't, be worried about the EPA and any environmental issues (even if he is a sole proprietor house painter), has to worry about unfair labor practices and NLRB if he had to fire a lazy or absent employee, and state equivalent, has to worry about safety issues and fines from OSHA and MIOSHA even if it is only him up on the ladder expecting no one else to be responsible for him... WHY DO WE MAKE IT SO HARD TO DO ECONOMIC ACTIVITY? Study after study indicates these 'hurdles' of national, state and local gov'ts place before those who wish to buy and sell, limits this activity, and INCREASES structural unemployment. If the State of Michigan's gov't really wanted the employment rate to increase, for economic activity to swell, wouldn't it reduce these requirements all too many businesses are not even aware that they're in violation of?
- Why do you deny students a better education? How can you deny the fact that there is a vast surplus of teachers, implying that their salaries are way higher than what the market can bear? Isn't it true that the cost of education would be much less and students would have more choices of classes and courses? That class sizes would be smaller and there would be more teachers to teach?
- Why do you make children go to school, thereby absolving them of any responsibility for their own lives as it seems you are telling them what to do at every turn? (truancy)
- Why do you perpetuate an education system that squashes like a bug, any shred of curiosity about stuff (used to be that was what fueled 'science')?
- Why cannot parents choose for themselves what to study and for how long? If homeschooling is your answer, then why do families have to pay for schools they don't use? Every two cents on the dollar spent in Michigan goes to the sales tax supporting schools. Why do you make the childless widow next-door pay for schools?
- It used to be I could save $ and take out deposits without worry. Now the bank and I are required to report to several bureaucracies. Why?
- How can you deny the fact that an income tax violates the privacy and business of the individual? This tax makes for one's privacy to be forcefully exposed to any gov't auditor, and for the individual being audited to be assumed guilty and having to prove one's own innocence. Is this consistent with the freedoms fought for in the Revolutionary War and 'guaranteed' in the U.S. Constitution?
- Isn't it true that you are an elected representative, basically equivalent to one of us winning a vote to be homecoming king? How are you as an individual, more qualified to pass judgment and make laws that apply to us?
- Our election system does not bring the cream to the top, in that it doesn't provide that the representatives have an extra measure of wisdom or experience than any other individual lucky enough to use propaganda to persuade others to vote for him. How is it that you feel more qualified to govern me than an individual who believes he was placed in power by God (Divine Right of Kings) and is thereby responsible to Him for governing the people? Wouldn't a man responsible to God do a more compassionate job than a man beholden to simply getting the most votes every two years?
- Why can't people be allowed by our nanny-state to be more responsible for themselves, and make their own decisions? A man riding a snowmobile recently had an accident, but a very minor one. He refused any assistance, yet others called 911, and the cop determined that the person was drinking. He damaged nothing other than his own sled, so what crime has he actually committed against others?
- If one's potential to commit a crime is a crime, where is the end? What limits this incursion into freedom? Will we all be subjects in a "Minority Report" society?
- Why can't motorcyclists be allowed to ride without a helmet? Why cannot drivers and passengers be allowed not to wear seatbelts? Who said society is responsible for them? Can't they be responsible for themselves, and be allowed to pay for their own decisions, or reap the rewards of taking risks (entrepreneurship)?
- Who says you are my keeper? Will I ever be allowed to grow up and take care of myself? Who says the gov't knows best about me eating french fries or red meat? If I want to smoke, and the smoke doesn't bother anyone else, why does the gov't feel it necessary to insert itself telling me where I can, or have to pay a 'sin' tax?
- Will I be a Toys-r-Us kid all my life because of the cradle-to-grave nanny state? When do I get to grow up and be an adult? LEAVE ME ALONE!
Here are some 'vanilla' queries...
- Is it true that it is a great accomplishment to sponsor a bill that becomes a law?
- What is necessary (cutting deals with other reps, etc.) to get that sponsored bill moving along?
- Are committee chairs truly more powerful than most other reps?
- How do you 'reach across the aisle' to gain more support for your bill?
- How do you gather support for your bill in the other house/chamber?
- In your experience, how many bills with three or fewer sponsors do in the legislative process?
- Are you familiar with the State Constitution? When was the current Constitution made? (answer is 1963)
- Are you familiar with the U.S. Constitution? How applicable is it to Michigan or local gov'ts?
- Do the Bill of Rights apply to local and state gov'ts?
- If so, do all Bill of Rights apply equally? Why not? Which amendment is more important?
- Regarding the Constitution of the State of Michigan, why is it so detailed compared to the US Constitution?
- Does it imply a lack of trust on the part of the voter toward the legislature and governor's office?
- Then (because he'll deny it) why is it so detailed and limiting the power of the state gov't?
- Why does the Michigan Constitution allow for referenda? Isn't that a method for the citizen to bypass a tyrannical legislature, like the example of the implementation of the Concealed Carry Pistol law?
Fairness, 'fair share' and other myths...
Reading this article brings to mind Freidrich A. Hayek, wonder what he'd say about this push by the leader of the gov't on 'fairness'...
Stephen Moore does a nice job listing the way 'fairness' is defined by deeds, by actions, by 'doing'.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204369404577206980068367936.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Baseline Budgeting and YOU and the Feds and the Media and the...
Rush is right. In so many ways... http://download.premiereradio.net/guest/rushlimb/pdf/baselinebudgeting2.pdf
Baseline Services Budgeting process is a very slick manner of pulling the wool over well intentioned Americans. When the CBO has to 'score' a bill on an assumed increase of a given % every year, anytime the projected expenditures fall below that assumed %, it is called a CUT even though it is a REAL INCREASE in spending.
Example, say that the HHS baseline is an increase of 10% a year, regardless of how much is actually spent or how much is brought into the national gov't by taxes and such. Totally an arbitrary number. IF the 'wascawy wepubwicans' (we won't miss you much, Barney Frank!) were to propose a budget for HHS of an increase of 4%, it would be deemed a 6% cut. Spending would increase by 4% over what is spend THIS year, but the media, a certain political party and other liberal leaning types would scream about 'cuts'.
WHAT CAN WE DO?!? Guess what? The House of Representatives actually DID pass a bill to eliminate this monkey-business. Care to bet what will happen to it in the Senate with Harry Reid et al? http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/house/208527-house-passes-second-gop-budget-reform-bill
Baseline Services Budgeting process is a very slick manner of pulling the wool over well intentioned Americans. When the CBO has to 'score' a bill on an assumed increase of a given % every year, anytime the projected expenditures fall below that assumed %, it is called a CUT even though it is a REAL INCREASE in spending.
Example, say that the HHS baseline is an increase of 10% a year, regardless of how much is actually spent or how much is brought into the national gov't by taxes and such. Totally an arbitrary number. IF the 'wascawy wepubwicans' (we won't miss you much, Barney Frank!) were to propose a budget for HHS of an increase of 4%, it would be deemed a 6% cut. Spending would increase by 4% over what is spend THIS year, but the media, a certain political party and other liberal leaning types would scream about 'cuts'.
WHAT CAN WE DO?!? Guess what? The House of Representatives actually DID pass a bill to eliminate this monkey-business. Care to bet what will happen to it in the Senate with Harry Reid et al? http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/house/208527-house-passes-second-gop-budget-reform-bill
"Marriage, What is Ma..." Whoops, meant, "Unemployment, What is Unemployment?"
Everyone is crooning and swaying over the 'great' unemployment numbers released Friday by BLS. Apparently we had a net gain in jobs by 243,000. Wow, a quarter million more people are working than the month before!
Wait...whoa...hmmm... If one looks at the B-1 table, it would appear that we actually LOST over two and a half million jobs, that's 2,689,000 fewer people working. I guess to the gov't, they are just retail schlubs and get swept under the carpet of 'seasonally adjusted'. Wonder if they get unemployment checks when they're not unemployed?
So mathematically, Two Million, Nine Hundred and Thirty Two Thousand people are out of work from December to January. Nice. All Hail the Supreme Leader, Barack Hussein Obama!
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t17.htm
Wait...whoa...hmmm... If one looks at the B-1 table, it would appear that we actually LOST over two and a half million jobs, that's 2,689,000 fewer people working. I guess to the gov't, they are just retail schlubs and get swept under the carpet of 'seasonally adjusted'. Wonder if they get unemployment checks when they're not unemployed?
So mathematically, Two Million, Nine Hundred and Thirty Two Thousand people are out of work from December to January. Nice. All Hail the Supreme Leader, Barack Hussein Obama!
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t17.htm
Friday, February 3, 2012
The Genocide of Black/African-Americans continues unabashed...
When most of the babies aborted are 'black' or 'African-American' by %, what are we to conclude when the freakin' Mayor of New York City also contributes major buckage to the destruction of 'unwanted' black babies?!?
There will be a reckoning.
http://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-komen-backlash-20120203,0,693195.story
There will be a reckoning.
http://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-komen-backlash-20120203,0,693195.story
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Whattup when costs exceed benefits?
OK...the awesome, totally unbiased BLS has released the productivity v labor unit costs...(see below)
4th quarter productivity increased at an annualized 0.7%, while unit labor costs increased at 1.2% 4th quarter.
For the increases between 4th 2010 and 4th 2011, productivity increased only 0.5% (lower!) and costs 1.3% (higher).
So, the 4th quarter trended toward a smaller gap between a small increase in productivity (benefit) and unit labor costs (cost). So...MB is less than MC. Will that help or hurt the increase in real GDP? Will that hurt or help the increase in our real economy? Will employment increase faster than the rate of inflation?
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/prod2.nr0.htm
4th quarter productivity increased at an annualized 0.7%, while unit labor costs increased at 1.2% 4th quarter.
For the increases between 4th 2010 and 4th 2011, productivity increased only 0.5% (lower!) and costs 1.3% (higher).
So, the 4th quarter trended toward a smaller gap between a small increase in productivity (benefit) and unit labor costs (cost). So...MB is less than MC. Will that help or hurt the increase in real GDP? Will that hurt or help the increase in our real economy? Will employment increase faster than the rate of inflation?
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/prod2.nr0.htm
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Congressional Budget Office, more than a gaggle of pocket-protected, pointy-headed economists?
The CBO, the 'unbiased' pen of predictors, the corral of brainiacs that predict the future economy thereby allowing for the anticipation of tax revenues and fiscal expenditures of the National (excuse me, you likely know it as 'Federal') government, paint a rosy scenario. Economic troubles are past us. Hoorah! Huzzuh!
Wait...
This is only true based on the assumptions they make. When you dig deeper (as Tyler Durden and others listed below demonstrate) you discover that what the CBO foists upon us may be closer to the 'product' hauled out of corrals and pens with front-loading Bobcats than to the actual truth. "Unbiased" yet politically advantageous for a certain political party and its candidate seeking re-election? Hmmm...
In economic forecasting, as with meteorology (weather) forecasting, models are made based on past observations. The model 'crunches' the past data to see if the predicted result matches the actual weather experienced. Economic models also are 'vetted' in this manner. Guess what? Take predictions and the assumptions used by the CBO over the past decade on economic growth, and...dang. Not too good.
IF the CBO were bookies at the casinos in Vegas, they'd likely be 'disappeared' in the desert for being so wrong.
http://www.cbo.gov/ All the truth that's fit to print...not.
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/cbo-taxes-will-shoot-more-30-percent-over-next-2-years
http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2012/01/31/economic-projections-and-key-numbers-from-cbo-budget-report/?mod=google_news_blog
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/latest-congressional-budget-outlook-2012-2022-released
Wait...
This is only true based on the assumptions they make. When you dig deeper (as Tyler Durden and others listed below demonstrate) you discover that what the CBO foists upon us may be closer to the 'product' hauled out of corrals and pens with front-loading Bobcats than to the actual truth. "Unbiased" yet politically advantageous for a certain political party and its candidate seeking re-election? Hmmm...
In economic forecasting, as with meteorology (weather) forecasting, models are made based on past observations. The model 'crunches' the past data to see if the predicted result matches the actual weather experienced. Economic models also are 'vetted' in this manner. Guess what? Take predictions and the assumptions used by the CBO over the past decade on economic growth, and...dang. Not too good.
IF the CBO were bookies at the casinos in Vegas, they'd likely be 'disappeared' in the desert for being so wrong.
http://www.cbo.gov/ All the truth that's fit to print...not.
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/cbo-taxes-will-shoot-more-30-percent-over-next-2-years
http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2012/01/31/economic-projections-and-key-numbers-from-cbo-budget-report/?mod=google_news_blog
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/latest-congressional-budget-outlook-2012-2022-released
Saturday, January 28, 2012
LOOK OUT! TVs will be dropping like a rock...their prices anyway! WHY?!?
OK folks, supply and demand time. Why is there such a drop in HDTV prices this week?
http://www.tigerdirect.com/email/WEM2983.asp?SRCCODE=WEM2983BY&cm_mmc=email-_-Main-_-WEM2983-_-tigeremail2983&utm_source=EML&utm_medium=main&utm_campaign=WEM2983
http://www.tigerdirect.com/email/WEM2983.asp?SRCCODE=WEM2983BY&cm_mmc=email-_-Main-_-WEM2983-_-tigeremail2983&utm_source=EML&utm_medium=main&utm_campaign=WEM2983
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Hard Drives...GETTIN' PRICIER! Why?!?
Once again, the prices of those ever-so-desireable hard drives (in the 2TB range) refuse to not go up...why? International-trade-and-you is why. The floods in Bangkok, Thailand...
Anyone else feeling the crimp? Anyone else bumping up to max on storage, and wants MORE?
And then, there's NVIDIA and AMD who are ever so much more smacked by this flooding. How would they feel the crunch? Read the article!
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/print/9223696/Impact_of_Thailand_floods_continues_to_bite_tech_industry?taxonomyName=Hardware&taxonomyId=12
Can you say, "Price or availability of complementary goods"?
Anyone else feeling the crimp? Anyone else bumping up to max on storage, and wants MORE?
And then, there's NVIDIA and AMD who are ever so much more smacked by this flooding. How would they feel the crunch? Read the article!
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/print/9223696/Impact_of_Thailand_floods_continues_to_bite_tech_industry?taxonomyName=Hardware&taxonomyId=12
Can you say, "Price or availability of complementary goods"?
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
NY Times story reported, "How the U.S. Lost Out on iPhone Work"
So...WHY are jobs 'leaving' the U.S.? Answer? We force them to. Our society/gov't/culture has set up such an arcane rigmarole to go through to make things that people want, that businesses cannot compete with the additional costs and delays.
Steve Jobs himself provides a great example of this, APPLE itself, that liberal bastion of campaign $ donations, that his company could not make the iPhone in the U.S. (Some would now point out the amazing hypocrisy on the part of Steve Jobs, and by logical extension, the other billionaire libs...like Oprah, Zuckerberg, etc.)
From the article, "Not long ago, Apple boasted that its products were made in America. Today, few are. Almost all of the 70 million iPhones, 30 million iPads and 59 million other products Apple sold last year were manufactured overseas.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/business/apple-america-and-a-squeezed-middle-class.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all
Steve Jobs himself provides a great example of this, APPLE itself, that liberal bastion of campaign $ donations, that his company could not make the iPhone in the U.S. (Some would now point out the amazing hypocrisy on the part of Steve Jobs, and by logical extension, the other billionaire libs...like Oprah, Zuckerberg, etc.)
From the article, "Not long ago, Apple boasted that its products were made in America. Today, few are. Almost all of the 70 million iPhones, 30 million iPads and 59 million other products Apple sold last year were manufactured overseas.
Why can’t that work come home? Mr. Obama asked.
Mr. Jobs’s reply was unambiguous. “Those jobs aren’t coming back,” he said, according to another dinner guest.
The president’s question touched upon a central conviction at Apple. It isn’t just that workers are cheaper abroad. Rather, Apple’s executives believe the vast scale of overseas factories as well as the flexibility, diligence and industrial skills of foreign workers have so outpaced their American counterparts that “Made in the U.S.A.” is no longer a viable option for most Apple products."
Or, "Another critical advantage for Apple was that China provided engineers at a scale the United States could not match. Apple’s executives had estimated that about 8,700 industrial engineers were needed to oversee and guide the 200,000 assembly-line workers eventually involved in manufacturing iPhones. The company’s analysts had forecast it would take as long as nine months to find that many qualified engineers in the United States.
In China, it took 15 days."
Obviously that demonstrates a surplus of skilled, educated labor that the U.S. does not have. WHY? Some blame this or that, like the public school system...but it more likely is due to the choices students coming through our fine institutions are making for themselves. "Why take math when I can take a goofy movie class?"
Check it out. Gorilla glass and YOU (or Steve Job's car keys scratching the plastic iPhone's surface...) and CHINA.http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/business/apple-america-and-a-squeezed-middle-class.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all
Single parent of three, or family making $60,000 a year...which has more money to spend?
Wrong. According to Tyler Durden, those making $15,000 with three kids, has MORE disposable income than a family making $60,000.
WOW!
WOW!
In Entitlement America, The Head Of A Household Of Four Making Minimum Wage Has More Disposable Income Than A Family Making $60,000 A Year
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 11/22/2010 00:18 -0400
Tonight's stunning financial piece de resistance comes from Wyatt Emerich of The Cleveland Current. In what is sure to inspire some serious ire among all those who once believed Ronald Reagan that it was the USSR that was the "Evil Empire", Emmerich analyzes disposable income and economic benefits among several key income classes and comes to the stunning (and verifiable) conclusion that "a one-parent family of three making $14,500 a year (minimum wage) has more disposable income than a family making $60,000 a year." And that excludes benefits from Supplemental Security Income disability checks. America is now a country which punishes those middle-class people who not only try to work hard, but avoid scamming the system. Not surprisingly, it is not only the richest and most audacious thieves that prosper - it is also the penny scammers at the very bottom of the economic ladder that rip off the middle class each and every day, courtesy of the world's most generous entitlement system. Perhaps if Reagan were alive today, he would wish to modify the object of his once legendary remark.
Tonight's stunning financial piece de resistance comes from Wyatt Emerich of The Cleveland Current. In what is sure to inspire some serious ire among all those who once believed Ronald Reagan that it was the USSR that was the "Evil Empire", Emmerich analyzes disposable income and economic benefits among several key income classes and comes to the stunning (and verifiable) conclusion that "a one-parent family of three making $14,500 a year (minimum wage) has more disposable income than a family making $60,000 a year." And that excludes benefits from Supplemental Security Income disability checks. America is now a country which punishes those middle-class people who not only try to work hard, but avoid scamming the system. Not surprisingly, it is not only the richest and most audacious thieves that prosper - it is also the penny scammers at the very bottom of the economic ladder that rip off the middle class each and every day, courtesy of the world's most generous entitlement system. Perhaps if Reagan were alive today, he would wish to modify the object of his once legendary remark.
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
Cultural Winners and Losers, 2011
"Culture" is as much a social construct as law or economic activity. However, is it as 'democratic' as most believe? The old saw of 'playing to the lowest common denominator' is a winning formula for the player, but then one must ponder, "For how long?" We are familiar with diminishing marginal utility, and its impact on consumption, to include entertainment. Unfortunately, this phenomenon may lead us to places we really may not want to go...
AND...the real query, what is the actual opportunity cost?
Monday, December 26, 2011
A great book that makes one think great thoughts.
"When you accept money in payment for your
effort, you do so only on the conviction that you will exchange it for the
product of the effort of others. Not an
ocean of tears nor all the guns in the world can transform those pieces of paper in your
wallet into the bread you will need to survive tomorrow. Your wallet is your statement of hope that
somewhere in the world around you there are men who will not default on that
moral principle which is the root of money."
"Try to obtain your food my by means of nothing
but physical motions - and you'll learn
that man's mind is the root of all the goods and services produced and of all
the wealth that has ever existed on earth."
"To trade by means of money is the code of the
men of good will. Money rests on the
axiom that every man is the owner of his mind and his effort. Money allows no power to prescribe the value
of your effort except the voluntary choice of the man who is willing to trade
you his effort in return. Money permits
no deals except those who mutual benefit by the unforced judgment of the
individuals involved. Money demands you
recognize that men are not beasts of burden, born to carry the weight of your
misery - that you must offer them values, not wounds, that the common bond among men is not the exchange
of suffering, but the exchange of goods and services. Money demands that you sell, not your
weakness to men's stupidity, but your talent to their reason. It demands that you buy, not the shoddiest
they offer, but the best that your money can find. And when men live by trade - with reason, not
force as their final arbiter - it is the best product that wins, the best performance,
the man of best judgment and highest ability - and the degree of a man's
productiveness is the degree of his reward."
Money will not purchase happiness for the man who
has no concept of what he wants. Money
will not buy intelligence for the fool, or admiration for the coward, or
respect for the incompetent. The man who
attempts to purchase the brains of his superiors to serve him, with his money
replacing his judgment, ends up by becoming the victim of his inferiors. The men of intelligence desert him, but the
cheats and the frauds come flocking to him, drawn the law which he has not
discovered: That no man may be smaller
than his money."
"Be it a highwayman who confronts a traveler
with the ultimatum: "Your money or your life," or a politician who
confronts a country with the ultimatum: "Your children's education or your
life," the meaning of that ultimatum is: "Your mind or your
life" - and neither is possible to man without the other. I do not enter discussions with neighbors who
think they can forbid me to think. I do
not place my moral sanction upon a murderer's wish to kill me. When a man attempts to deal with me by force,
I answer him - by force. It is only as
retaliation that force may be used and only against the man who starts its use. No, I do not share his evil or sink to his
concept of morality: I merely grant him
his choice, destruction, the only destruction he had the right o choose: his own.
A holdup man seeks to gain wealth by killing me, I do not grow richer by
killing a holdup man. I seek no values by
means of evil, nor do I surrender my values to evil"
"If you wish to save the last of your dignity,
do not call your best actions a 'sacrifice': that term brands you as
immoral. If a mother buys food for her
hungry child rather than a hat for herself, it is NOT a sacrifice: she values the child higher than the hat; but
it is a sacrifice to the kind of mother whose higher value is the hat, who
would prefer her child to starve and feeds him only from a sense of duty. If a man dies fighting for his own freedom,
it is NOT a sacrifice: he is not willing
to live as a slave; but it IS a sacrifice to the kind of man who is willing. If a man refuses to sell his convictions, it
is NOT a sacrifice, unless he is the sort of man who has no convictions."
"Sacrifice could be proper only for those who
have nothing to sacrifice - no values, no standards, no judgment - those whose
desires are irrational whims, blindly conceived and lightly surrendered. For a man of moral stature, whose desires are
born of rational values, sacrifice is the surrender of the right to the wrong,
of the good to the evil."
"Do you wonder why you live without dignity,
love without fire and die without resistance?
Do you wonder why, wherever you look, you see nothing but unanswerable
questions, why your life is torn by impossible conflicts, why you spend it
straddling irrational fences to evade artificial choices, such as soul or body,
mind or heart, security or freedom, private profit or public good? Do you cry that you find no answers? By what means did you hope to find them? You reject your tool of perception - your
mind - then complain that the universe is a mystery. You discard your key, then wail that all
doors are locked against you. You start
out in pursuit of the irrationals, then damn existence for making no
sense."
"The fence you have been straddling is the
coward's formula contained in the sentence": "But we don't have to go
to extremes!" The extreme you have
always struggled to avoid is the recognition that reality is final that A is A
and that the truth is true. A moral code
impossible to dissolve all ideas in fog, to permit no firm definitions, to
regard any concept as approximate and any rule of conduct as elastic, to hedge
on any principle, to compromise on any value, to take the middle of any
road. By making moral judgments
impossible, it has made you incapable of rational judgment."
"The man who refuses to judge, who neither
agrees nor disagrees, who declares that there are no absolutes and believes
that he escapes responsibility, is the man responsible for all the blood that
is now spilled in the world. Reality is
an absolute, existence is an absolute, a speck of dust in an absolute and so is
a human life. Whether you live or die is
an absolute. Either you have a piece of
bread or not, is an absolute. Whether
you eat your bread or see it vanish in a tax collector's stomach is an
absolute."
"There are two sides to every issue: one side is right and the other is wrong, but
the middle is always evil. The man who
is wrong still retains some respect for the truth, if only by accepting the
responsibility of choice. But the man in
the middle is the knave who blanks out the truth in order to pretend that no
choice or values exist, who is willing to sit out the course of any battle,
willing to cash in on the blood of the innocent or to crawl on his belly to the
guilty, who dispenses justice by condemning both the robber and the robbed to
jail, who solves conflicts by ordering the thinker and the fool to meet each
other halfway. In any compromise between food and poison, it is only death that can
win. In any compromise between good and
evil, it is only evil that can profit.
In that transfusion of blood which drains the good to feed the evil the
compromiser is the transmitting rubber tube."
"You, who are half-rational, half-coward, have
been playing a con game with reality, but the victim you have conned is
yourself. When men reduce their virtues
to the approximate, then evil acquires the force of an absolute, when loyalty
to an unyielding purpose is dropped by the virtuous, it's picked up by
scoundrels - an you get the indecent spectacle of a cringing, bargaining,
traitorous good and a self-righteously uncompromising evil. When they yell that it is selfish to be
certain that you are right, you hasten to assure them that you're certain of
nothing. When they shout that it's
immoral to stand on your convictions, you assure them that you have no
convictions whatever. When the thugs of
the State snarl that you are guilty of intolerance, because you don't treat your
desire to live and their desire to kill you as a difference of opinion - you
cringe and hasten to assure them that you are not intolerant of any
horror. When some barefoot bum in some pesthole
yells at you: How dare you be rich - you apologize and beg him to be patient
and promise him you'll give it all away."
You have then reached the blind alley of the treason you committed when
you agreed that you had no right to exist.
Once you believed it was 'only a compromise' you conceded it was evil to
live for yourself, but moral to live for the sake of your children. Then you conceded that it was selfish to live
for your children, but moral to live for your community. Then you conceded that it was selfish to live
for your community, but moral to live for your country. Now you are letting this greatest of
countries be devoured by any scum from any corner of the earth, while you
concede that it is selfish to live for your country and that your moral duty is
to live for the globe. A man who has no
right to life, has no right to values and will not keep them."
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
The sacrosanct Bureau of Labor Statistics...not anymore.
So the governess of N.C. has bee getting the embargoed, Top Secret data before the public, a violation of federal law...
Is this another example of a nation of men versus a nation of laws? Is James Harrington rolling over in his grave, again? And...if the other political party were to have been caught in this activity, would there be a great sense of outrage in the main-stream media? (As appropriate as it should be now.)
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=48259
Is this another example of a nation of men versus a nation of laws? Is James Harrington rolling over in his grave, again? And...if the other political party were to have been caught in this activity, would there be a great sense of outrage in the main-stream media? (As appropriate as it should be now.)
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=48259
Are we to be Bush-whacked...again?
Can a tiger change its stripes? Can a Leopard change its spots? Can a Bush change its core values?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203893404577100330414585006.html
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203893404577100330414585006.html
Friday, November 25, 2011
First Families and the Secret Service
Here are snippets from a book of "In the President's Secret Service: Behind the Scenes with Agents in the Line of Fire and the Presidents They Protect" of Secret Service personnel assigned to guard U.S. Presidents/First Ladies, and Vice Presidents.
John and Jacqueline Kennedy:
A philanderer of the highest order...
She ordered the kitchen help to save all the left-over wine during State dinner, which mixed with fresh wine and served again during the next White House occasion.
Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson:
Another philanderer of the highest order... I
In addition, LBJ was as crude as the day is long.
Both JFK and LBJ kept a lot of women in the White House for extramarital affairs, and both had set up "early warning systems" to alert them if/when their wives were nearby. Both Kennedy & Johnson were promiscuous and oversexed men.
She was either naive or just pretended to "not know" about her husband's many liaisons.
Richard and Pat Nixon:
A "moral" man but very odd and weird, paranoid, etc. He had horrible relationship with his family, and in a way, was almost a recluse. She was quiet most of the time.
Spiro Agnew: Nice, decent man, everyone in the Secret Service was surprised about his downfall.
Gerald and Betty Ford:
A true gentlemen who treated the Secret Service with respect and dignity. He had a great sense of humor.
She drank a lot!
Jimmy & Rosalynn Carter:
A complete phony who would portray one picture of himself to public and very different in private, e.g., would be shown carrying his own luggage, but the suit cases were always empty; he kept empty ones just for photo op's. Wanted the people to see him as pious and a non-drinker, but he and his family drank alcohol a lot. He had disdain for the Secret Service, and was very irresponsible with the "football" nuclear codes. He didn't think it was a big deal and would keep military aides at a great distance. Often does not acknowledge the presence of Secret Service personnel assigned to serve him.
She mostly did her own thing.
Ronald and Nancy Reagan:
The real deal --- moral, honest, respectful, and dignified. They treated Secret Service and everyone else with respect and honor. Thanked everyone all the time. He took the time to know everyone on a personal level.
One "favorite" story which has circulated among the Secret Service personnel was an incident early in his Presidency, when he came out of his room with a pistol tucked on his hip. The agent in charge asked: "Why the pistol, Mr. President?" He replied, "In case you boys can't get the job done, I can help." It was common for him to carry a pistol. When he met with Gorbachev, he had a pistol in his briefcase. Upon learning that Gary Hart was caught with Donna Rice, Reagan said, "Boys will be boys, but boys will not be Presidents." [He obviously either did not know or forgot JFK's and LBJ's sexcapades!
She was very nice but very protective of the President; and the Secret Service was often caught in the middle. She tried hard to control what the President ate, and he would say to the agent "Come on, you gotta help me out." The Reagans drank wine during State dinners and special occasions only; otherwise, they shunned alcohol; the Secret Service could count on one hand the times they were served wine during their "family dinner". For all the fake bluster of the Carters, the Reagans were the ones who lived life as genuinely moral people.
George H. and Barbara Bush:
Extremely kind and considerate Always respectful. Took great care in making sure the agents' comforts were taken care of. They even brought them meals, etc.
One time Barbara Bush brought warm clothes to agents standing outside at Kennebunkport; one agent who was given a warm hat, and when he tried to nicely say "no thanks" even though he was obviously freezing, President Bush said "Son, don't argue with the First Lady, put the hat on.." He was the most prompt of the Presidents. He ran the White House like a well-oiled machine.
She ruled the house and spoke her mind.
Bill and Hillary Clinton: Presidency was one giant party. Not trustworthy --- he was nice because he wanted everyone to like him, but to him life is just one big game and party. Everyone knows of his sexuality.
She is another phony. Her personality would change the instant cameras were near. She hated with open disdain the military and Secret Service. She was another one who felt people are there to serve her. She was always trying to keep tabs on Bill Clinton.
Albert Gore: An egotistical ass, who was once overheard by his Secret Service detail lecturing his only son that he needed to do better in school or he "would end up like these guys" --- pointing to the agents.
George W. and Laura Bush: The Secret Service loved him and Laura Bush. He was also the most physically "in shape" who had a very strict workout regimen. The Bushes made sure their entire administrative and household staff understood to respect and be considerate of the Secret Service. Karl Rove was the one who was the most caring of the Secret Service in the administration. She was one of the nicest First Ladies, if not the nicest; she never had any harsh word to say about anyone.
Barack & Michelle Obama: " Clinton all over again" - hates the military and looks down on the Secret Service. He is egotistical and cunning; looks you in the eye and appears to agree with you, but turns around and does the opposite---untrustworthy. He has temper tantrums.
She is a complete bitch, who hates anybody who is not black; hates the military; and looks at the Secret Service as servants.
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Supply and Demand FOR LABOR! Yes, it applies in the Resource/Factor market also.
Who would have thunk it? Society actually WANTS scientists!
Notice the careers and the required education and skill level...scary? THAT'S why they're paid and employed so well. Take the easy road, and enjoy all the fellow travelers competing for the same job you want. OR...take the road less traveled and FIND A JOB! And...an enjoyable career.
Click on the URL below...
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/10-college-majors-lowest-unemployment-rates-163049193.html?fb_action_ids=276196369088593%2C276196372421926&fb_action_types=news.reads&fb_source=other_multiline&code=AQDwDvWyqEuhVc1na6YO3EioQ3EuSd3i6eQua_3pEja5gq_ohjS2Es2_Qsuz-AZ6lZD-SmeQAcUYDBnN7zEDFjLAje68fwRjb42m-zzF90CgiMeIn5HGdJPTGQPemtaxjprvMhsjonkLzPQk8ziIoSOyqfEojp6YWv5ju_Fq-gEHcvIk1tEikt18tccVARE-IaA#_=_
Notice the careers and the required education and skill level...scary? THAT'S why they're paid and employed so well. Take the easy road, and enjoy all the fellow travelers competing for the same job you want. OR...take the road less traveled and FIND A JOB! And...an enjoyable career.
Click on the URL below...
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/10-college-majors-lowest-unemployment-rates-163049193.html?fb_action_ids=276196369088593%2C276196372421926&fb_action_types=news.reads&fb_source=other_multiline&code=AQDwDvWyqEuhVc1na6YO3EioQ3EuSd3i6eQua_3pEja5gq_ohjS2Es2_Qsuz-AZ6lZD-SmeQAcUYDBnN7zEDFjLAje68fwRjb42m-zzF90CgiMeIn5HGdJPTGQPemtaxjprvMhsjonkLzPQk8ziIoSOyqfEojp6YWv5ju_Fq-gEHcvIk1tEikt18tccVARE-IaA#_=_
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Catvertising, could it..would it...can it?
I just want to know, did the insurance premiums increase for this office? What of the Americans with Disabilities Act's impact due to workers with allergies to cats? And (God forbid) what if CAT SCRATCH FEVER breaks out?!?
Why are colleges and universities buying .xxx domains? The .xxx is for porn...
With the advent of the new internet .xxx domain, colleges and universities are scrambling to purchase 'net addresses ending with .xxx. Why? Are they venturing into new marketing techniques? We all know that sex sells...
What are the opportunity costs? Any scarcity involved in this activity? And competition...whoa.
http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/education/washu-mizzou-aim-to-protect-names-from-porn-links/article_db0c808e-2665-59e8-a01f-05db778fe8cf.html
What are the opportunity costs? Any scarcity involved in this activity? And competition...whoa.
http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/education/washu-mizzou-aim-to-protect-names-from-porn-links/article_db0c808e-2665-59e8-a01f-05db778fe8cf.html
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Floods in South Eastern Asia, and YOU (you gamer you!)
What in the heck does a flood in Thailand have to do with the lack of computer equipment in the U.S? Well boys and girls, it is called "International Conglomerates". Business is in business to make a profit, which usually means getting the most bang for the buck, or marginal benefit at its greatest remove from marginal cost. If a business can find a semi-productive (or better) labor force that exceeds the costs of transpo, training and language barriers, shebang.
Then the floods were released...
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/thai-flooding-impact-tech-companies-suppliers-14865493#.TrJlmUP7j6o
Then the floods were released...
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/thai-flooding-impact-tech-companies-suppliers-14865493#.TrJlmUP7j6o
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