". . . a republic, if you can keep it."
. . . and more generally, of government spending helping the economy.
When government takes your money, then gives *some* of it back to you, it is not a stimulus.
The economist being interviewed is Robert Higgs who has devoted much of his career toward dispelling this destructive myth.
Notice his shout out to Rep. Spencer Bachus (R – AL).
See also:
I found this on californiagasprices.com. California is the highest. Alaska is the lowest.
“After crude oil costs, taxes are the second largest contributor to the price paid at the pump. Together Federal and State excise taxes on fuel account for an average cost of approximately 62 cents per gallon. Rates include Federal excise taxes 18.4 cpg for gasoline and 24.4 cpg for diesel. cpg = cents per gallon”
| State | Gasoline | Diesel |
| Alabama | 38.6 | 45.6 |
| Alaska | 26.4 | 32.4 |
| Arizona | 37.4 | 52.4 |
| Arkansas | 40.2 | 47.2 |
| California | 63.9 | 72.0 |
| Colorado | 40.4 | 44.9 |
| Connecticut | 62.5 | 61.4 |
| Delaware | 41.4 | 46.4 |
| Dist. of Columbia | 38.4 | 44.4 |
| Florida | 51.6 | 53.4 |
| Georgia | 44.4 | 52.6 |
| Hawaii | 51.0 | 71.1 |
| Idaho | 43.4 | 49.4 |
| Illinois | 57.9 | 65.7 |
| Indiana | 50.1 | 69.2 |
| Iowa | 40.1 | 47.9 |
| Kansas | 43.4 | 51.4 |
| Kentucky | 36.9 | 39.9 |
| Louisiana | 38.4 | 44.4 |
| Maine | 47.5 | 53.9 |
| Maryland | 41.9 | 48.7 |
| Massachusetts | 41.9 | 47.9 |
| Michigan | 54.4 | 60.3 |
| Minnesota | 40.4 | 46.4 |
| Mississippi | 37.2 | 43.2 |
| Missouri | 36.0 | 42.0 |
| Montana | 46.2 | 53.0 |
| Nebraska | 42.3 | 47.7 |
| Nevada | 50.9 | 53.0 |
| New Hampshire | 38.0 | 44.0 |
| New Jersey | 32.9 | 41.9 |
| New Mexico | 36.4 | 43.4 |
| New York | 59.6 | 64.7 |
| North Carolina | 48.6 | 54.6 |
| North Dakota | 41.4 | 47.4 |
| Ohio | 46.4 | 52.4 |
| Oklahoma | 35.4 | 38.4 |
| Oregon | 43.4 | 48.7 |
| Pennsylvania | 50.7 | 63.6 |
| Rhode Island | 49.4 | 55.4 |
| South Carolina | 35.2 | 41.2 |
| South Dakota | 42.4 | 48.4 |
| Tennessee | 39.8 | 42.8 |
| Texas | 38.4 | 44.4 |
| Utah | 42.9 | 48.9 |
| Vermont | 38.4 | 50.4 |
| Virginia | 38.0 | 44.0 |
| Washington | 54.4 | 60.4 |
| West Virginia | 49.9 | 55.9 |
| Wisconsin | 51.3 | 57.3 |
| Wyoming | 32.4 | 38.4 |
“If anybody needs a good reason to be skeptical of the government’s newfound commitment to efficiency when it comes to the hundreds of billions of dollars of ‘stimulus’ spending, the Chicago Main Post Office facility provides a very obvious example.
This massive, 14-story building spans several city blocks at 2.7 million square feet. Situated in an ultra-prime downtown location, the advertising potential alone is unparalleled: Tens of thousands of cars pass directly through it every day on the main highway heading into and out of town.
Yet this building has sat completely vacant since 1997 when the post office moved to a new facility across the street, meaning the USPS missed out on capitalizing on one of the biggest booms in commercial real estate in history. Worse off, it wasted a small fortune in the process — a 2006 report by the General Accountability Office found the facility costs the USPS $2 million a year simply to maintain.
Spending $2 million a year on an empty building? That sort of waste would never been tolerated in a profit-seeking firm. To believe somehow the new governmental bureaucracies being created will avoid such misuse is both hilarious and frightening.” (Read more from smartmoney.com)
See also:
Hidden History: Post Office sues Cub Scouts to maintain monopoly
pt. 1
pt. 2
Max Keiser has it right. Pay attention in particular to his attack on global financial institutions. World governance, world finance, etc., would only give the same banksters even more power.
Hopefully medical marijuana prescriptions will some day look as ridiculous as this prohibition-era prescription for medical alcohol.
I beat the first three levels. They never show what happens when you catch up to the “energy wasting criminal” in the SUV, whose crimes apparently include using old fashioned light bulbs instead of the energy saving sort. I had hoped to see to billy-clubbing meted out by these perfectly multi-cultural and absurdly righteous defenders of our planet.
I am not questioning the good intentions of the Pope, but I’d like to offer a very brief criticism of his recent encyclical.
From section 65: “Both the regulation of the financial sector, so as to safeguard weaker parties and discourage scandalous speculation, and experimentation with new forms of finance, designed to support development projects, are positive experiences that should be further explored and encouraged, highlighting the responsibility of the investor.”
The end of this statement is rock solid – “highlighting the responsibility of the investor” – but is it government regulation which did away with this responsibility. It is more liberty, not more government which would “highlight the responsibility of the investor.”
Missing from most narratives of our financial crisis is the fact that our government subsidized irresponsible behavior and allowed our financial kings to invest without responsibility. It allowed the reckless experimentation which the Pope criticizes and, like many others, seems to blame on the free market.
Example 1: The 1998 bailout of the Long Term Capital Management. Had the Federal Reserve not supervised a bailout of this irresponsible hedge fund in 1998, we would not have begun as severe a financial crisis in 2008. Instead, the message from our government was clear: Gamble away. We have your back.
Example 2: Freddie Mac. Fannie Mae. These were government sponsored enterprises. Government created a demand for loans, even bad ones. Had the government not subsidized the purchase of bad loans, many fewer would have been made.
Example 3: Community Reinvest Act. This politically expedient legislation required banks to hold a certain portion of bad loans, or else they couldn’t expand. Once again, government subsidized irresponsibility. Do you remember how both Presidents W. Bush and Clinton bragged about how more Americans than ever before owned homes?
From section 67: “In the face of the unrelenting growth of global interdependence, there is a strongly felt need, even in the midst of a global recession, for a reform of the United Nations Organization, and likewise of economic institutions and international finance, so that the concept of the family of nations can acquire real teeth. . . . To manage the global economy; to revive economies hit by the crisis; to avoid any deterioration of the present crisis and the greater imbalances that would result; to bring about integral and timely disarmament, food security and peace; to guarantee the protection of the environment and to regulate migration: for all this, there is urgent need of a true world political authority. . . . such an authority would need to be universally recognized and to be vested with the effective power to ensure security for all, regard for justice, and respect for rights[148]. Obviously it would have to have the authority to ensure compliance with its decisions from all parties. . .”
Though I believe his intentions are good, this section is very troubling. It is a call for the creation of an unelected institution subject to no nation’s constitution with massive control and massive authority. The Road to Serfdom is paved with good intention (and a mistrust of freedom).
Though I would choose liberty over prosperity, the best economies happen to also be the freest. This is true almost without exception. Look at West Germany vs East Germany, South Korea vs North Korea, Botswana vs the rest of Africa, Chile vs the rest of S. America, Estonia vs Latvia or Lithuania, Hong Kong in the 80s vs China in the 80s, Cuba before communism vs after. The call for a global authority is an invitation for further economic fascism, and there are many arguments against it. I’ll make two:
1: The IMF and World Bank are completely corrupt and ineffective. Here I posted a Jim Rogers interview in which he says “abolish the World Bank and the IMF. . . they do little more than take care of themselves, their own pensions, their own perks, their own salaries, if you work for the World Bank or the IMF you have a great life, but they’ve not done much for the rest of the world.”
2: As Ron Paul said (here): “We do not abdicate American sovereignty to global institutions. The purpose of the United States is to protect the liberty of the American people. We should never allow the WTO, NAFTA, the U.N. or the Law of the Sea Treaty to transfer power from America to an international body.”
“The business site Bloomberg is running a story today titled Yuan Deposes Dollar on China’s Border in Sign of Trade’s Future. [Interestingly, after being up for over an hour, this story suddenly went away between 1 and 2 am. Before coming back in what seemed like a slightly less hard hitting form.]
When Treasury Secretary Geithner spoke on June 1st to students at Peking University and claimed that America was in good shape and China’s dollar investments were safe. His assurances were greeted with loud hoots of laughter from the assembled students, many of them the sons and daughters of China’s elite. Geithner humiliation was barely reported in America, but it seemed to resonate much more strongly elsewhere around the globe. Spawning many stories similar to the story running today at Bloomberg.com about how people are digging up that jar full of dollars and replacing them with gold or border traders switch from dollars to other currencies. The disbelieving laughter of China’s students may well mark a sea change. The begin of the end for the dollar’s reign as the world’s reserve currency. With America’s politicos planning to spend approximately double what they expect to collect in taxes this year, it is easy to see why the students were amused by Geithner posturing. But the chaos that will ensue if a dollar crisis were to suddenly force America’s politicos to start living within America’s means won’t be funny.” (from humods.com)
“Last week I was very pleased that hearings were held on the independence of the Federal Reserve system. My bill HR 1207, known as the Federal Reserve Transparency Act, was discussed at length, as well as the general question of whether or not the Federal Reserve should continue to operate independently.
The public is demanding transparency in government like never before. A majority of the House has cosponsored HR 1207. Yet, Senator Jim DeMint’s heroic efforts to attach it to another piece of legislation elicited intense opposition by the Senate leadership.
The hearings on Capitol Hill provided us with a great deal of information about the types of arguments that will be levied against meaningful transparency and how the secretive central bankers will defend the status quo that is so beneficial to them.
Claims are made that auditing the Fed would compromise its independence. However, by independence, they really mean secrecy. The Fed clearly cherishes its vast power to create and spend trillions of dollars, diluting the value of every other dollar in circulation, making deals with other central banks, and bailing out cronies, all to the detriment of the taxpayer, and to the enrichment of themselves. I am happy to challenge this type of ‘independence’.
They claim the Fed is endowed with special intellectual abilities with which to control the market and that central bankers magically know what the market needs. We should just trust them. This is patently ridiculous. The market is a complex and intricate thing. No one knows what the market needs other than the market itself. It sends signals, such as prices, that should be reacted to and respected, not thwarted and controlled. Bankers are not all-knowing and cannot ignore the rules of supply and demand. They might act as if they are, but their manipulation of the market just ends up throwing it wildly off balance, which gives us the boom and bust cycles.
They claim the Fed must remain apolitical. No organization is apolitical that relies on the President to appoint the Chairman. In fact, it is subject to the worst sort of politics – power to create trillions of dollars and affect the value of every dollar in the country without the accountability of direct elections or meaningful oversight! The Fed typically enacts monetary policy that is favorable to particular administrations close to elections, to the detriment of long term considerations. They do this partly because of the political appointee process for the Chairmanship.
The only accountability the Federal Reserve has is ultimately to Congress, which granted its charter and can revoke it at any time. It is Congress’s constitutional duty to protect the value of the money, and they have abdicated this responsibility for far too long. This was the issue that got me involved in politics 35 years ago. It is very encouraging to finally see the issue getting some needed exposure and traction. It is regrettable that it took a crisis of this magnitude to get a serious debate on this issue.” (Read more from dailypaul.com)
This is dated news (from early June) but relevant for all my Iowa friends.
“Ron Paul’s Bill to audit the Fed continues to get more support from the Congress. Nancy Pelosi will be forced to put it to a vote and it will probably pass. That is the good news.
The bad news happened in the Senate at the hands of a Republican senator. The companion Senate bill to HR 1207 is S 604 which has been sponsored by Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont. Last week, Republican Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa pencilled in amendments to the bill in committee which would exempt the Fed from showing the public anything of importance. Senator Grassley thought to do this in such a way that his hand would not be identified in this cowardly act at the behest of the bankers, but the pencil marks are all over the Internet. You can see how Grassley gutted the Bill here.” (Read more from reasontraditionsandliberty.blogspot.com)
H.R. 1207, Ron Paul’s Federal Reserve Transparency of 2009, which would audit the Federal Reserve has over 260 co-sponsors (a majority of the house!), yet the house leadership ignores it.
S. 604, The Federal Reserve Sunshine Act of 2009, is the companion bill in the senate. Getting thirteen co-sponsors is encouraging.
It won’t be easy for our political leadership to continue ignoring this public mandate. On the other hand, the masters of the universe behind the federal reserve are very powerful, and usually get what they want from politicians and media.
Co-Sponsors so far:
BARRASSO, JOHN (R – WY)
BENNETT, ROBERT F. (R – UT)
BROWNBACK, SAM (R – KS)
BURR, RICHARD (R – NC)
CHAMBLISS, SAXBY (R – GA)
CRAPO, MIKE (R-ID)
DEMINT, JIM (R-SC)
FEINGOLD, RUSSELL D. (D – WI)
HOFE, JAMES M. (R – OK)
ISAKSON, JOHNNY (R – GA)
LINCOLN, BLANCHE L. (D – AR)
MCCAIN, JOHN (R. – AZ)
SANDERS, BERNARD (I – VT)
VITTER, DAVID (R – LA)
Have you written to your Senator?
Aide: Netanyahu told German FM West Bank can’t be ‘Judenrein’
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu used the Nazi term ‘Judenrein’ in a recent meeting with the German foreign minister to condemn the Palestinian demand that West Bank settlements be removed, a confidant of the premier has said.
‘Judea and Samaria cannot be Judenrein,’ the confidant quoted the prime minister as telling Frank-Walter Steinmeier earlier this week.
Asked how Germany’s top diplomat responded to hearing the term used by the Nazis to refer to areas ‘cleansed of Jews’, the confidant said, ‘What could he do? He basically just nodded.’
According to the confidant, Netanyahu had encouraged cabinet colleagues to deploy the term in their defense of the settlements and of Israel’s insistence that Palestinians recognize it as a Jewish state.” (Read more from freerepublic.com.)
This originally appeared on haaretz.com, though they’ve since sterilized the article’s title.
Invoking Nazi language is disgusting. Israel’s settler movement and their apologists steal land from Palestinians and anyone who suggests they give it back is called a Nazi.
See Representative Press‘s video about slandering Israel’s critics:
I think open criticism and honest debate would make Israel stronger. It is the squelching and slandering of Israel’s critics that causes true anti-semitism to fester.