The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Ron Paul Is Out To Flog Mitt Romney With The Hillary Stick

Posted on | January 2, 2012 | 34 Comments

by Smitty

Now there is a provocative read:

Ron Paul — poised to finish strong in the Iowa caucuses – has begun to implement a quiet, complex plan to force a long battle with Mitt Romney for delegates to the Republican National Convention in August. His advantages: Experience, organization, and the legacy of the 2010 Tea Party revival, which convinced Republicans that anti-government figures like Paul just aren’t as weird as they’d thought.
Paul is following the roadmap set by Barack Obama’s 2008 strategy: Start early, learn the rules, and use superior organization and devoted young supporters to dominate the arcane but crucial party procedures in states your rivals are ignoring — states where caucuses and conventions that elect the delegates who will ultimately choose the Republican candidate. The plan begins in places like Minnetonka, Minnesota, a Minneapolis suburb where Paul has based his state headquarters, and where staffers have already begun running “mock-auses” — practice runs for Minnesota’s February 7 caucuses.
Paul’s rivals dismiss his chances. “Ron Paul’s not going to be our nominee,” Mitt Romney said flatly in December.

This is really an argument against “Arcane Rules”. We all love to hate on professional politicians, but it is truly a full-time job just to understand the basics of how the sausage is made. Complexity favors the insiders. We love to hate the IRS, but no one is really talking about killing the 16th Amendment or offering a tax code other than one putting the ‘b’ in Byzantine.

The two things we have to do, going down the road, are: involve more people, and stamp out complexity. Systems need to be as simple as possible, but no simpler.

As for the Paul candidacy: irrespective of anyone’s personal opinion of the newsletter utterances, you have to know, with total clarity, that the MSM would utterly, endlessly pillory Paul over that issue, while simultaneously touting an unexpected new hip-hop release by Jeremiah Wright as some sort of cultural achievement, just for the recreational hypocrisy of it all. Also, Ron’s foreign policies are unworkable, and would cause a big fat war, into which we’d be dragged.

So, even though Virginia’s primary is going totally South Park, I’m left to pray for a Santorum triumph, as a way to avoid the centrism of Romney, and the left-libertarianism of Paul.

via Huffington Post

Category: Mitt Romney, Ron Paul

Santorum Attacked in Iowa With Same Smear Used Earlier Against Gingrich

Posted on | January 2, 2012 | 17 Comments

Steve Ertelt of Life News reports:

For the second time, people opposed to one of the Republican presidential candidates have misappropriated the name of a prominent Iowa pro-life organization attack the candidate in the state that holds the fist caucus tomorrow.
In December someone used the name of Iowans for Life on fliers distributed at events in the Hawkeye State to attack pro-life former House Speaker Newt Gingrich with claims that he is not prolife on abortion.
Now, Iowans for Life’s name has been falsely attached to fliers disparaging pro-life former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum — who has cruised to a third place standing in the state that leads off the campaign to replace pro-abortion President Barack Obama.
“Iowans for Life has once again been subject to fraudulent use of its name for the purpose of negative rhetoric targeting a candidate in the presidential campaign,” the group told LifeNews on Sunday. “This second deceitful usurping of Iowans for Life’s name was aimed at Senator Rick Santorum.”

First Newt, now Santorum? I suspect the Perry campaign was responsible for both of these cheap smears. As I remarked Saturday, if desperation was a cologne fragance, they’d reek of it.

Category: Abortion, Election 2012, Fear and Loathing in Iowa, Iowa, Rick Santorum

Is Paul Krugman Simply Immoral?

Posted on | January 2, 2012 | 24 Comments

by Smitty

From Nobody Understands Debt, emphasis mine:

Deficit-worriers portray a future in which we’re impoverished by the need to pay back money we’ve been borrowing. They see America as being like a family that took out too large a mortgage, and will have a hard time making the monthly payments.
This is, however, a really bad analogy in at least two ways.
First, families have to pay back their debt. Governments don’t — all they need to do is ensure that debt grows more slowly than their tax base. The debt from World War II was never repaid; it just became increasingly irrelevant as the U.S. economy grew, and with it the income subject to taxation.
Second — and this is the point almost nobody seems to get — an over-borrowed family owes money to someone else; U.S. debt is, to a large extent, money we owe to ourselves.

I grasp that Krugman is correct in the sense that he depicts accurately a mentality present in the bulk of our policy makers. I also gather that returning to a fundamentally valid fiscal approach is going to hurt, hurt, hurt. What Krugman and the rest of his ilk have absolutely never done is shown why citizens should quietly accept what amounts to an acceptance of theft. What is the moral basis for your argument, which appears to be pure pain avoidance?

I’m not saying our system is unethical, for it has been accepted for decades. My question in the title could be restated:

“How can those members of society who still cling to a notion of ‘right and wrong’ that is stronger than ‘Did Congress spew some legislation?’ be reconciled to your notion of debt?”.

If we agree that “debt” does not mean what, say, George Washington would have thought it means, then please publish the re-definition of the term. You, and our policy makers overall, are abusing the term “debt” in a manner similar to the way some would like to abuse the term “marriage”, which gets at your second point.

When the demographics start to go bad, as with Japan, the argument that we “owe it to ourselves” becomes as foolhardy as tampering with the word “debt”. While not totally out of the childbearing range, I’ll be blessed to hit the replacement rate, personally. Stacy is picking up the slack, but who will help his kids carry the “debt” load, Paul? Your cat? Debt is debt, marriage is marriage, and the Progressive attempts to freebase these symbols are ++ungood.

Americans are going to sober up about debt, Paul. The “or not” alternative is untenable. Also, your ideas.

via Memorandum

Related: neither #OccupyResoluteDesk nor the GOP look particularly great in this graph:

Update: Marginal Revolution, “Krugman v. Krugman”

Now to be fair, Krugman covered himself in 2003 in a credible way he said “unless we slide into Japanese-style deflation, there are much higher interest rates in our future.” Thus, I do not fault Krugman’s forecasting ability. What I do fault is that despite a 180 degree about-face, one thing remains constant in all of Krugman’s writings, anyone who disagrees with him is portrayed as a mendacious idiot. In truth, Heritage today and Krugman 2003 both have legitimate concerns about the long-term debt situation of the United States and it would have been to the credit of Krugman 2012 had he acknowledged that point more fairly.

Category: New York Times

That There’s Some Snark

Posted on | January 2, 2012 | 3 Comments

by Smitty

Did you catch Dilbert riffing on Congress today? Ouch. By the way, you can customize it to ‘honor’ your Congresstool.
Also nicely done:

Via Political Class Dismissed

Category: humor, Video

The Familiar Pattern Emerges Again

Posted on | January 2, 2012 | 66 Comments

JOHNSTON, Iowa
Today I published another column from the campaign trail here in Iowa:

Rick Santorum made a bold prediction here Friday night: The Pittsburgh Steelers will go all the way to the Super Bowl for a rematch with the Green Bay Packers.
The former Pennsylvania senator was enjoying a rare moment of relaxation on the campaign trail here in Iowa, where voters will gather Tuesday night to cast the first real votes that count toward the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. Santorum was wearing a University of Iowa Hawkeyes cap at the Okoboji Grille, where he gathered with supporters to watch the Hawkeyes play the Oklahoma Sooners in the Insight Bowl. When he arrived at the restaurant in Johnston, a suburb of Des Moines, Santorum was swarmed by reporters, photographers, and TV cameramen who have swooped down on his campaign in the past week as polls began indicating that he was surging ahead in the pack of GOP candidates.
Most of the reporters had left the restaurant (and the Hawkeyes were well on their way to a 31-14 loss to the Sooners) by the time I had the chance to ask Santorum about his beloved Steelers. “We will beat the Browns this week,” he said, sitting in front of a half-finished platter of nachos. “My prediction is, both the Patriots will lose to the Bills and the Ravens will lose to the Bengals and we will be the Number One seed in the AFC playoffs.”
But while the underdog-turned-contender was willing to risk prognosticating the NFL all the way to the Super Bowl, he has remained hesitant to predict how he’ll finish in Tuesday’s caucuses. Santorum obviously wants to exceed expectations, but the poll numbers and media buzz surrounding his campaign are making it hard to suppress those expectations. . . .

You can read the whole thing at The American Spectator, and I hope readers are not offended by my practice of linking my columns here, but I sometimes get the feeling that if I didn’t link and quote my own columns, no one would. Here, for the record, are my previous four columns from Iowa:

God knows that, having started reporting the “Santorum Surge” weeks before anyone else noticed it, I certainly don’t deserve any credit for my foresight now that the surge is headline news all across the country. In fact, conservative bloggers who ridiculed me for writing about Santorum a month ago are now linking and quoting MSM reports about the Iowa caucuses rather than quoting anything I’ve written. Read more

Category: American Spectator, Fear and Loathing in Iowa, Iowa, Legal Insurrection

Shorter Cuccinelli: Forget That I Was Trying To Re-jigger The Rules For 2012

Posted on | January 2, 2012 | 10 Comments

by Smitty

January 1, 2012

Dear Friends and Fellow Virginians,

As many of you read yesterday in the news (link here for the story) I was considering supporting an effort to change the rules to allow the full range of presidential candidates on Virginia’s ballot on March 6th.

I obviously feel very strongly that Virginia needs to change its ballot access requirements for our statewide elections. However, after working through different scenarios with Republican and Democratic leaders to attempt to make changes in time for the 2012 Presidential election, my concern grows that we cannot find a way to make such changes fair to the Romney and Paul campaigns that qualified even with Virginia’s burdensome system. A further critical factor that I must consider is that changing the rules midstream is inconsistent with respecting and preserving the rule of law – something I am particularly sensitive to as Virginia’s attorney general.

My intentions have never focused on which candidates would be benefited or harmed, rather I have focused on what is best for Virginia’s citizens, as hundreds of thousands of Virginians who should have been able to make their choices among the full field of presidential primary contenders have had their number of choices reduced significantly.

My primary responsibility is to the people of Virginia, and how best to fulfill that responsibility in these particular circumstances has been a very difficult question for me. I believe consistency on the part of public officials is an important attribute. And I believe that Virginians are best served by an attorney general who consistently supports the rule of law. That leads to my conclusion that while I will vigorously support efforts to reduce the hurdles to ballot access in Virginia for all candidates, I will not support efforts to apply such changes to the 2012 Presidential election.

I do not change position on issues of public policy often or lightly. But when convinced that my position is wrong, I think it necessary to concede as much and adjust accordingly.

Sincerely,
Ken Cuccinelli II
Attorney General of Virginia

The whole idea, while not without a certain appeal, sounded like a bridge too far, at least for 2012.

In a way, the situation as-is has some appeal as a litmus test. Understood, a Santorum campaign is under-funded. Yet the Tea Partiers, arguably, could have been leveraged more.

Category: Election 2012, Virginia

LIVE AT FIVE – 01.02.12

Posted on | January 2, 2012 | 8 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


TOP NEWS
Park Ranger Killed By Gunman At Mt. Rainier National Park

Suspect in killing: Benjamin Colton Barnes

Park closed while authorities search for suspected killer; body armor and weapons found in suspect Barnes’ car

Police Want To Question Man On Video In LA Car Arson Attacks
Eight fires on New Year’s Eve and early Sunday; LAPD looking for man in black clothes, receding hairline, ponytail

Arab League Wants To Pull Syria Monitors
Murderous repression by Assad regime continues despite observers



POLITICS
Romney Tests His Ability To Take The Lead

Mitt Romney hugs a supporter in Atlantic, Iowa

Mitt says he can go the distance against Obama while the others continue to pound at his lack of conservative credentials

Gingrich: I’m In The Race To Stay Regardless Of Iowa Results



Hawaii, Delaware Allow Civil Unions As Of January 1

Obama To Pose As Outsider, “Warrior For The Middle Class”

Embattled But Confident, Bachmann Says She’s “The Complete Package”



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
Euro Leaders Aim To Buy Time To Save Currency
Exxon Awarded $908 Million For Nationalized Venezuelan Assets
Hyundai, Kia Eye 6% Sales Increase For 2012
Uncertainty Looms On 2012 Gasoline Prices
Sweden’s Bankrupt Saab Draws Interest From India’s Mahindra & Mahindra
Ethanol Tax Credit Expires After Thirty Years
Sony Slashes Tablet S Price, Signaling Trend
GoDaddy Turns Against SOPA, Sees Spike In Domain Transfers
GM Recalls 4900 Sonics For Possible Missing Brakes
There’s no stopping the Sonic! 😛



SPORTS
Giants Trump Cowboys 31-14 To Win NFC East

Ahmad Bradshaw celebrates his second TD of the second quarter

9-7 Giants will face the Falcons next Sunday in first playoff game after a two-year absence

Flynn Sets Records, Leads Packers To 45-41 Victory Over Lions




Broncos Win AFL West Despite 7-3 Loss To Chiefs

Kings Send DeMarcus Cousins Home, Say He Demanded Trade

Timbermutts End 18-Game Skid, Top Mavericks 99-82

#1 Syracuse Whips DePaul 87-68 For 15-0 Start



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
Russell Brand Files For Divorce From Katy Perry

Russell & Katy

Filing cites irreconcilable differences, gives no date of separation

Wills & Kate Party With Pippa On New Year’s

Giuliana Rancic Says Double Mastectomy Was Hell

Kanye West Makes DJ Debut
Can’t be any worse than Skrillex

Amber Portwood Set To Quit “Teen Mom” As She Remains In Jail On Suicide Watch


Is A-Rod Dating Wrestler Torrie Wilson?

Kelly Clarkson’s Album Sales Surge 200% After She Endorses Ron Paul

LeBron James Gets Engaged, Preemptively Breaks His New Year’s Resolution To Stop  Being So Tacky



FOREIGNERS
Iran Claims Nuke Fuel Breakthrough, Test-Fires Radar-Evading Missile
Norks Call For Human Shields To Protect Great Successor
Egypt Defends Raids On NGOs
Fiji Leader Opens Door To Democracy, Suspends Emergency Regulations
Iraqi PM Al-Maliki Calls For Unity, Political Stability After U.S. Troop Withdrawal
Israeli Accused Of Starting Chilean Forest Fire Denies Blame
Pope Says Hope Of Future Lies With Youth In New Year’s Day Speech



BLOGS & STUFF
Weasel Zippers: Columbia U. To Offer “Occupy 101” Course; Students Required To Attend #OWS Protests
The Grumpy Economist: Krugman On Stimulus
Daily Pundit: Want To Push A Broom? That Requires A Master’s Degree
Atlas Shrugs: We Won’t Eat Halal Meat, Say MPs And Peers
Conservative Hideout: Occupod Roundup – Flag Burning And Death Threats, Oh My!
Jihad Watch: Hamas Cracks Down On “Fortune Tellers”, Mannequins
Gateway Pundit: Leader Of #Occupy Rose Parade Is Convicted Thief, 9-11 Truther, And Former Democratic Assemblyman
Fausta’s Blog: The New Year’s Must-Reads!
Zilla Of The Resistance: Free Speech Hating Peas In An Anti-Semitic Pod


SOTD: The Secret Life Of Arabia

Category: Live at Five

The Elephant In The Fail Room

Posted on | January 1, 2012 | 35 Comments

by Smitty

From Has the conservative elite really failed?

Alan Greenspan, a free-market hero, blundered horribly in failing to regulate shadow banking, followed by another Republican appointee, Ben Bernanke. They forgot the old adage that the job of a central banker is to take away the punch-bowl just as the party is getting good. If they had acted to pop the housing price bubble earlier, they probably would have been lynched–it’s easy to beat them up with hindsight–but they still deserve a lot of blame.
These were mistakes, to be sure, but do they imply that America has suffered an “unprecedented failure” of its conservative elite? Just what sort of conservative elite did Ross Douthat have in mind? The victors of the Cold War and the authors of the Reagan economic boom set the tone for an enormous expansion of conservative intellectual life. How could we have done it better?
More disturbing, I think, is the extent to which America has suffered not a failure of the elites, but a failure of the people. Do we measure up to the founders of this country? The fact that Americans fought a revolution against Britain in the first place continues to astonish me. When in all of history have prosperous men with property–farms and businesses–risked their lives and fortunes to establish a better political order? Only a spiritual grandeur of a depth we barely can imagine today can explain it. When in all of history has a country gone to war and sacrificed a 5% of its total population to suppress slavery? The evangelical zeal that sent the North to war, singing of the grapes of wrath in the apocalyptic vision of Isaiah 63, surpasses our understanding today.
Some of that sense of American purpose awakened after 9/11, and the conservative elite misspent the spiritual energy of Americans in the Quixotic pursuit of nation-building in Iraq and Afghanistan. But Ron Paul is not the only candidate to state this plainly. Newt Gingrich has said the same thing.
What sets Mullah Ron Paul apart is something malicious, in my judgment: the assertion that a conspiracy of malefactors is responsible for the economic pain of the American people, and if these malefactors (for example the Federal Reserve) were to go away, the pain would disappear. That is demagoguery of the most insidious kind.
There is no truth-telling here: to absolve Americans of their greed, indolence, and cupidity in the great home price bubble of 2008-2006 is the biggest lie of all. Americans caught a ride on a $6 trillion wave of foreign capital inflows, and thought the free money would be there forever. The smartest kids got MBA’s and law degrees instead of learning engineering.

Why are we bashing Greenspan and Bernanke? The Federal Reserve is, to quote Thomas Sowell, “A cancer” The best those blokes can do is coax the tumor into growing more slowly. The unfortunate thing is that the ugliness of Ron Paul’s remarks is going to get blended with the idea of curbing the Federal Reserve, and thus it will be OK for our conservative elite to continue their failing ways, and protect the Fed.
The Federal Reserve is the crossroads of the Iron Law of Bureaucracy and moral hazard, he said, easing himself quantitatively. Ahhhh!

Do you have a reference for this claim? It would be very interesting to see where Ron Paul offered:

the assertion that a conspiracy of malefactors is responsible for the economic pain of the American people, and if these malefactors (for example the Federal Reserve) were to go away, the pain would disappear

Again, I’m no apologist for the fellow, but I don’t think he offered any magic wand in “End the Fed”. The conspiracy has been the tacit one of the Iron Law mentioned above. Significantly curbing the Federal Reserve isn’t going to reduce the net pain of fiscal policy, but, removing power from un-elected, opaque officials would at least be in keeping with the spirit of representative government for which we claim to clamor.

And what’s this noise?

There is no truth-telling here: to absolve Americans of their greed, indolence, and cupidity in the great home price bubble of 2008-2006 is the biggest lie of all.

Mister, I have not been late on my mortgage these 12.5 years. That a group of folks, along with Fannie/Freddie, Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, the Federal Reserve, and some bad banks, engineered a vast wealth transfer since the Community Reinvestment Act was signed is not an indictment of “Americans”. Conservatives who were in office and want to claim anything like the title “conservative” are not exactly at fault, either; but neither are they blameless, having been in office as the crime went down. The conservative elite is so afraid to scare the horses that you’re a kook if you talk about chopping a trillion out of the budget. Say Social Security is a Ponzi scheme? Yeah, you’re out of consideration.

Our conservative elite is so interested in playing ball-control offense that it is in jeopardy of repeating 2008.

via Instapundit

Category: Instapundit, PJTV, Republicans, Ron Paul, Uncategorized
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