There is Hope for America!

Browsing the Mises website, there was an brief article on Hayek’s Road to Serfdom. I have slowly been working my way through a mountain of Libertarian books, and just happen to currently be reading this classic work, so I took a look at the article.

Having lived nearly six decades, I admit to seldom being surprised, but by golly a single sentence in this piece astonished me.  After getting a plug on the Glenn Beck Show, The Road to Serfdom is currently the number one selling book on Amazon.com.

There is little doubt that this book is a very worthy read, but the fact that it is the highest selling book on Amazon was, well, shocking to me.  This one sentence gives me more hope for my country than I have had in years.

For those of you that don’t know, this book is perhaps the greatest defense for classical liberalism (the political philosophy of our founding fathers), and argument against socialism that has ever been written, and along with Glenn Beck, I encourage you to read it.

The  Road to Serfdom: Despotism Then and Now – Thomas J. DiLorenzo – Mises Daily.

What’s Wrong with a Free Lunch?

My father was one cranky old sob, but he certainly was no fool.  One thing he taught me was that “life ain’t fair and nothing in it is free.”

Apparently, the Greek government never met my father, or they would not be in the mess they are currently in.    The Greek Government thought that it could borrow to finance its own growth, and then borrow the money to pay that back.   The Greek government thought that it could finance its social welfare programs with borrowed money, and then borrow money to pay it back.   Sound familiar?

In 1920, an enterprising Italian immigrant by the name of Charles Ponzi (that’s him to the right.  Notice the numbers he’s holding up?) came up with an idea to put a few dollars in his pocket.   He would offer a high yielding investment (50% within 40 days, or 100% within 90 days).

I think the people who bought these “investments” never met my Father either, or they would have known that “If it sounds too good to be true… It probably is, but anyway,   people bought the product he offered, and as he brought in new investors, he would pay off the original investors with the new investors money.  Ponzi  took this idea and ran with it, and that’s why he has those numbers across his chest in the photo.  In the end, he bilked people out of over $2,000,000, and using the Coke Index (the price of a coke when I was a kid, versus the price of a coke today) that’s at least $40,000,000 in today’s dollars.   Ponzi is well remembered however…  they named a scheme after him.  Yep, you guessed it, “The Ponzi Scheme”.  He went to jail for it.

Well the Greeks are finding out that pyramid schemes, whether run by a little italian immigrant by the name of Ponzi, or a Government run amok,  are simply just that…  pyramid schemes.  Now,  just as my cranky old man told me, they’re about to find out that “life ain’t fair, and nothing in it is free.”  Just like in Hamelin, they are going to have to pay the piper, and they are angry, just as the burning policeman at the left suggests.

Livid pensioners,  wild haired socialists, students with a communist bent,  and government workers are very upset that the dole-ist policies of their government are going to have to be reined in.

Well, folks, it’s not just Greece that has involved itself in a Ponzi Scheme.   The federal government never spoke to my father either, and here at home, with our paternalistic government being all things to all people,  borrowing from Peter to pay Paul, one has to wonder what will happen here when the piper’s pay is due.

Americans  accustomed to the Free Lunch that is Our Government (FLTIOG) will certainly not behave like those nasty Greeks… right?….. Right.

Just Another Step on the Road to Perdition

It’s over…  Obamacare is here.

I give the man credit.  His clinkers are definitely more substantial than I had imagined… I truly believed that he would not risk his presidency on such monumental legislation.  Nor did I believe he had the political will nor power to succeed.   Well I was very, very, very wrong.

When A policeman confronts an armed criminal, when a fireman steps into a burning building, when a president is instrumental in enacting such legislation, there are risks involved.  I do not believe that the American citizenry wanted this bill.  Mid-term elections will tell the tale.  If republicans win big in November, Obama might be served up as a lame duck… just in time for thanksgiving.

News Analysis – Obama’s Health Care Victory Carries a Cost – NYTimes.com.

Politics Cannot Be Fixed

1913 was a watershed year for the United States of America.  Since 1813,  we had seen tremendous economic and social gain.  The average worker in the USA was living at a level that was simply inconceivable a mere 100 years before.  America was a beacon of freedom and possibilities for the entire world.  Life was good for most Americans, and there was hope always,  for a better future, but the ills were there, and well meaning folks of all stripes came to believe that government might be the vehicle to cure these ills.

Enter the progressive party.  Formed by Teddy Roosevelt in 1912, the wheels were set in motion for a line of  Presidents and political ideology that championed the use of government as a well meaning vehicle to effect social and economic change.  To do this, however requires money, and in 1913 the income tax was born, and the Federal Reserve Bank was created.  With the income tax, a revenue stream was created, and with the Federal Reserve Bank, and their ability to “provide liquidity” to the masters of a burgeoning economic powerhouse, the wheels were set in motion for a continued growth of government over the next century.

This article suggests that as government has grown, and has become more and more an arbiter in society of which businesses succeed and which businesses fail, so has grown special interest politics.  It also implies that political polarization is a natural outgrowth of  Big Government.

An interesting article from the Mises Institute, and a worthy read.

Politics Cannot Be Fixed – D.W. MacKenzie – Mises Institute.

Federal pay ahead of private industry – USATODAY.com

While Main Street continues to suffer, the government boys are doing OK.  The government is hiring  in order to fill its expansionary needs, and while salaries are stagnant in the private sector, government salaries are on the rise.  And its all on our dime, folks.

Government is by its very nature  parasitic.   It utilizes resources, and creates nothing.   A leech on the body politic, it will enlarge itself on the vitality of the public sector until that vitality is sapped.

Jefferson, Madison, Adams all knew this  and sought to create a government limited in scope, where with natural talent, and  in an environment of personal and economic liberty, a person might prosper.

We’ve come a long way baby.

Federal pay ahead of private industry – USATODAY.com.

Six Reasons Barack Obama is Still the Odds-on Favorite in 2012 — Politics Daily

Our nation has always been polarized… even in the era of “Good Feelings”, conflict over the institution of slavery was in its nascent beginnings, but times were good…  In good economic times, serious political issues can be swept under the rug…  I mean, everybody’s happy and well fed, right?

Today, the Tea Parties are the head of the boil that lies just under the surface of America’s skin.  The boil, I believe, is created by the proflgacies of the Republicrats in Washington, DC, by their inability to control the debt that has not only led to our current economic crisis, but threatens the the very economic, political, and social solvency of this nation

I don’t believe that President Obama is the man to lance that boil, yet neither do I see a republican contender with the hair or the principles to lance it either.

This article suggests that we may see Obama for another four years.  I hope not.

Six Reasons Barack Obama is Still the Odds-on Favorite in 2012 — Politics Daily.

Garet Garrett’s Invaluable Lesson – Jonathan M. Finegold Catalan – Mises Institute

The problem with socialism is that eventually, you run out of other people’s money.

Margaret Thatcher

The potential for sovereign default of debt is very concerning to each and every one of us… What would happen if the dollar was suddenly worth… ZERO?

Portugal, Italy, Spain and Greece (PIGS) are reaching a fiscal tipping point.  Could this happen to the US?

This article discusses debt, its relationship to the great depression, and its potential for harm in our current economic crisis.

Garet Garrett’s Invaluable Lesson – Jonathan M. Finegold Catalan – Mises Institute.

Big Government’s Big Shortfall / Our National Debt Crisis

Here in Vermont, the highest tax state in the nation, I am feeling the burn.  Yep, it’s that time of the year again… the big government boys want me to file my taxes.  This legalized plunder of theirs is starting to hurt.  Yeah, I know…  they take my money and do  good things with it.  I mean, somebody has to take care of those in need, right?  And of course, somebody has to protect South Korea, and Europe and Taiwan, and well…the rest of the whole damned world, right?  And of course, someone has to provide for Homeland Security, and pay for the total body scanners so leering security guards can probe my daughters without using their fingers…  Oh, yeah, I just love the gummint boys.

If I spent money like these fellas do, hell, I’d be out on the streets begging for food.  What are the people in the congress, the senate and the executive branch thinking?

Fact 1:  We have unfunded liabilities of over 100 TRILLION DOLLARS coming due in the next ten years!

Fact 2:  OUR  NATIONAL DEBT IS 14 TRILLION DOLLARS, AND SET TO DOUBLE IN THE NEXT FIVE YEARS.

Fact 3:  AND DOUBLE AGAIN THE FOLLOWING 5 YEARS.

We’re talking serious and very real money here, folks.  That many trillions works out to around $150 a second for the next 32,000 years.  Whoa!…  Now that is a sum that is downright mind boggling.

If the government boys managed their personal finances like they manage the public’s finances, they’d all be living in tents on the great lawn with their hands out. They just don’t seem to understand simple math.  You CANNOT SPEND MORE THAN YOU EARN!  I mean, I can’t.  Can you?  What has happened to fiscal conservatism?

These people are driving us into a hole that we may very well may not be able to dig ourselves out of.

RealClearPolitics – Big Government’s Big Shortfall.

The War on the Young – Brian Foglia – Mises Institute

Paying for our war machine and our social programs has  increased our National Debt to around 14 trillion dollars with  unfunded liabilites of over 100 trillion dollars, we have mortgaged our childrens’ future.

The War on the Young – Brian Foglia – Mises Institute.

How Hugo Chavez’s revolution crumbled

I have long been an non-fan of Hugo Chavez; his brand of populism, authoritarianism and socialism is antithetical to my deeply held convictions.  Oil money has propped up his chimerical socialism, at least until now.

I will be happy to see this man recede.  Unfortunately, the Venezuelan people are  paying  for his misdeeds.

Jackson Diehl – How Hugo Chavez’s revolution crumbled – washingtonpost.com.