The Other McCain

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

VIDEO: ‘Herman Cain Stands With Us’

Posted on | August 24, 2011 | 4 Comments

A pretty effective 90-second video:

Cain recently released his “Vision for Economic Growth” (PDF), which is a lot more than we’ve gotten from Barack Obama.

Category: Election 2012, Herman Cain, Video

The Economics of Wishful Thinking

Posted on | August 24, 2011 | 18 Comments

The frustrating thing about Ezra Klein is that, just when you think the Boy Genius of the Juicebox Mafia has gotten the scent of a clue, he goes running off on another liberal wild-goose chase:

When the financial markets collapsed [in 2008], household debt was nearly 100 percent of GDP. It’s now down to 90 percent. In 1982, which was the last time we had a big recession, the household-debt-to-GDP ratio was about 45 percent.

So far, so good: Ezra appears to have realized that the current recession reflects an underlying economic reality, rather than being a mere political construct. But then . . .

That means that in this crisis, indebted households can’t spend, which means businesses can’t spend, which means that unless government steps into the breach in a massive way or until households work through their debt burden, we can’t recover.

Sigh. How can we even begin to explain what’s wrong with Klein’s longing for interventionism? He could have been content, after all, to use the household-debt figures as an argument that the recession is not Obama’s fault. Yet his fanatical commitment to Keynesianism leads him inexorably to endorse “massive” intervention. I had hoped Ezra might be making progress a year ago, when he noticed that the stimulus was under-performing in terms of job creation, but now he’s backsliding.

Robert Barro today attacks one aspect of the Keynesian fallacy, the alleged “magic multiplier” of government spending. But make-believe math is evidently all the rage these days, including at the CBO. Ed Morrissey scoffs at their rosy scenario:

The CBO estimates that the US economy will finish this year at a 2.3% GDP growth rate for 2011, a neat trick for an economy that has grown at 0.8% in its first two quarters, and at 2.7% in 2012.  JP Morgan estimates that it will finish at 1.5% this year and 1.3% next year, and the difference is significant in terms of revenues and deficit projections.

What seems to be taking hold is the Economics of Wishful Thinking, where people insert some gigantic absurd hypothetical “if” into their equations — “If the Federal Reserve were to buy $10,000 worth of Powerball tickets next week . . .” — and then present this as a feasible alternative to sound, practical policy. But fiscal rainbows and monetary unicorns won’t fix the problem and these delusional what-ifs serve only as a political distraction from the grim reality.

We have somehow managed to take a round-trip to 1979, the Waterloo of Keynesianism, and yet it is as if liberals learned nothing from that experience. Ezra Klein wasn’t even born then, so he can perhaps be forgiven for not understanding the error that has been repeated. (How’s that hopey-changey stuff workin’ out for ya, Ezra?) But if history is any guide, last year’ historic mid-term Republican landslide was merely the harbinger of an even more savage drubbing of Democrats next year.

BTW, the price of gold fell to $1,757.30 an ounce today, about $150 off its record high Monday, so if you’ve been wishing you’d bought in earlier, this might be a good chance to join the gold rush before it surges past $2,000. If you had bought at $1,200 an ounce in May 2010 and sold at $1,800 earlier this month, you would have cleared a 50% profit in 15 months. But even if you waited and were to buy in at today’s price, then get an opportunity to sell at $2,100 any time in the next six months, that would still be a sweet 20% profit.

Going a bit further into “what if” speculation: On Feb. 17, 2009 — the day Obama signed into law his $787 billion stimulus bill — gold was selling at $970 an ounce. For a mere $600 billion, we could have bought two ounces of gold for every man, woman and child in America, and the value of that investment would today be more than $1 trillion, or $3,514 per capita, a net gain of 81 percent.

Just a hypothetical, but at least it doesn’t involve rainbows and unicorns.

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers!


Category: Economics, Ezra Klein, Gold

Not All Feminists Are Ugly and Humorless

Posted on | August 24, 2011 | 26 Comments

There are exceptions that prove the rule, including members of the Ukrainian feminist group “Femen,” who staged a topless protest in front of the Saudi embassy in Kiev last month. How do you say “Not Safe for Work” in Ukrainian? Read more

Category: Feminism, Rule 5, Saudi Arabia, Ukraine, Video

Let’s Cut The Superstition Out Right Now

Posted on | August 24, 2011 | 6 Comments

Guest post by Friedman Walsh Kleinkrugman

The mere hint of a 6.0 earthquake in Virginia, and the Washington Monument cracks and suddenly every bitter bitter clinger out there goes wild connecting dots between the natural event and current political events.

No one is saying that this is an act of God, that this represents a symbol of judgement upon the current Administration. Silence that Mene, Mene, Tekel u-Pharsin talk. No one understands your ancient allusions anyway, Bible geeks.

Running around spouting that the ghost of George Washington himself was sighted, astride the winged spirit of Nelson, buzzing the monument with a mattock in his mitt, and striking a blow of defiance over the shambles the 44th President has made of the office into which he breathed life, is not helping anything.

Nor does saying that the seated effigy of Lincoln, keeping eternal watch on the monument from his seat, did nod approval for this symbolic gesture. These rumors do not improve the country’s economic/spiritual/constitutional crisis in any way.

We can also be reasonably sure that the statue of Jefferson in the monument by the 14th Street Bridge did not touch a fist to its mouth and say ‘*cough*Jackass*cough*’ in derision at either the President or that prevaricating boob cluttering the office of Vice President. That YouTube clip was just a clever stunt.

The rabid over-reaction from the Tea Parties is a national disgrace. We must tackle the problems besetting the country with a keen eye, a clear mind, and steady bowels. Giving place to the dribblings of drunkards brings shame on us all. Like Representative Maxine Waters said: “Go to help”.

That’s what she said, isn’t it?

(via Memeorandum)

Category: Virginia

Is Alec Baldwin a Dangerous Lunatic?

Posted on | August 24, 2011 | 21 Comments

Ace of Spades calls Alec Baldwin a “Polite Company Truther” — just askin’ questions about 9/11 — but I think that’s far too mild considering the gravity of Baldwin’s vile insinuations against the U.S. military.

It’s said that Baldwin is eyeing a run for Mayor of New York, but he seems far more likely to end up in the psych ward at Bellevue than in Gracie Mansion.

Let us remember that Tucson massacre gunman Jared Loughner was also into 9/11 conspiracy theories and, given Baldwin’s notorious temper, it’s probably fair to say that these obvious symptoms of Baldwin’s incipient paranoia indicate that he could soon become a danger to himself and others. (John Wilkes Booth was a professional actor, you know.)

Something else: When you scratch a 9/11 Truther, nine times out of 10, an anti-Semite bleeds. Conspiracy theories about 9/11 are almost always advanced by people who talk a lot about “neocons” (nudge, nudge) and “Zionists” (wink, wink), and if it turned out that Alec Baldwin is a secret Jew-hater, I certainly would not be surprised.

So while I have no specific reason to believe that Alec Baldwin is furtively stockpiling weapons or plotting to assassinate anyone, nor do I credit those ugly rumors that he is a crypto-Nazi whose bedroom closet conceals his personal shrine to Martin Bormann . . .

Well, I’m just askin’ questions . . .

Category: Celebrities

Chuck Norris And The NRA Vs. The DOJ: One Nearly Feels Sympathy For Holder

Posted on | August 24, 2011 | 9 Comments

by Smitty (via Paco)

Chuck Norris at Town Hall:

Obama’s Department of Justice essentially is amending the Second Amendment by changing the rules for gun sales in border states. While working under the guise of stopping illegal contraband and fighting drug cartels, the White House in reality is further imposing its gun control agenda on the American public through back-door rule-making. This is just one more example of the feds exceeding their powers and avoiding congressional permission. It is also another showing of complete disregard for the Constitution.
Based upon those illegalities, Wayne LaPierre — my friend and the CEO of the National Rifle Association — disclosed on Fox News recently that the NRA filed a lawsuit against the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to issue an injunction barring enforcement of the rule. And with NRA support, the U.S. House has voted to withhold funding for the enforcement of the new regulation.
As LaPierre wrote in his weekly commentary last week, “the cartels run a $40 billion enterprise … but the (Obama) administration wants the public to believe that it’s going to disarm cartels with a form? Who is the president kidding?”
Doesn’t Obama know that restricting the right to bear arms primarily ties the hands of good guys while the bad guys purchase them from a host of illegal sources? And what part of “shall not be infringed” in the Second Amendment do the feds not understand?
Attorney General Eric Holder said the Justice Department will “vigorously oppose” the NRA lawsuit.

The title overstates my position: I don’t feel a shred of sympathy for the Attorney General. He is a national disgrace, on Fast & Furious, and pretty much every other issue that has come up on his watch. In a realistic Administration, he (and likely his boss) should have been long since scuttled.

This is the case that can link Administration malfeasance to American deaths. The House should investigate vigorously, and follow where the facts lead.

Related, via Insty:

Bottom line: there are three main reasons the CIA couldn’t simply hand out guns to their BFFs the Sinaloa soldiers. First, they could get caught. With the ATF scheme, the Agency maintained plausible deniability. Who doesn’t love a patsy?
Second, all new guns come with a paper trail. (See reason one.) The feds must be having a hard enough time keeping the fact that the majority of the guns (and grenades and ammo) sitting in the Mexican government’s crime scene vaults are U.S. military-spec weapons.
And third, why not use the ATF? The Bureau wanted some gun recovery stats to make themselves look important. The CIA wanted to arm the Sinaloas against Los Zetas. Call it mutual self-interest.
Again, none of this excuses anyone from anything. Operation Fast and Furious was an illegal government program. It violated Mexican sovereignty. It aided and abetted the illegal purchase of firearms (a federal crime) and provided weapons to known criminals, who used them to commit felony murder on a federal law enforcement official.
Congressional investigators and the media need to stop acting like Operation Fast and Furious was a good op gone bad. It was a bad op gone worse. To stop this from happening again, we need to uncover and report the truth (and yes, we can handle it.) Remember that bogus “90 percent of drug cartel guns come from the U.S.” stat? In the aftermath of this debacle, it’s time we heard the full truth about Mexican cartels’ guns. I think Agent Terry’s family would agree: we owe it to the memory of his service.

A thorough investigation is called for.

Category: Constitution, Crime, Eric Holder, Mexico

Virginia Feud: Radtke vs. Red State UPDATE: Palin/Perry ‘Proxy War’?

Posted on | August 24, 2011 | 55 Comments

My co-blogger Smitty is a Virginian who first blogged here about Jamie Radtke, the Tea Party candidate in next year’s Republican primary to replace retiring one-term Democrat Sen. Jim Webb. In July, I added my own two cents in support of Radtke, writing:

Her biggest obstacle is overcoming the GOP Establishment’s support for former Sen. George Allen. While many conservatives know and admire Allen personally, Radtke’s grassroots campaign offers an opportunity to carry forward into 2012 the Tea Party momentum that helped Republicans retake the House in 2010.

The blog is therefore clearly in the Radtke camp. However, we harbor no hostility toward Allen or his supporters — whose ranks we will happily join if the former senator should prevail in the primary. Our forthright support for Radtke is a luxury afforded by our independence, a luxury that some others might envy:

Ben Smith at Politico today reports that Erick Erickson of Red State backed off his early endorsement of Jamie Radtke — a Tea Party-backed candidate in the Republican primary for next year’s Senate race in Virginia — because of what Erickson called “the long term relationship” between former Sen. George Allen and Red State’s corporate owner, Eagle Publishing.

You can read the Politico story — based in part on e-mails obtained from Radtke’s campaign — and feel Erick’s pain. He was caught in a conflict between what he wanted to do (back Radtke against the GOP Establishment) and what his bosses wanted to do (support their long-time friend Senator Allen). Now, however, Erickson has doubled down against Radtke — and against Radtke’s campaign manager, Carter Wrenn, a veteran conservative who is legendarily known as a take-no-prisoners operative. There’s already a Memeorandum thread, so it’s time to pop some popcorn if you enjoy a bloody internecine knife-fight.

Erickson obviously isn’t happy that Radtke went public with this controversy, but as I say at The American Spectator, “there is nothing wrong with corporate publishers exercising editorial oversight.”

My bosses at the Spectator are friends with Erickson’s bosses at Eagle Publishing and, for all I know, share their enthusiasm for Allen’s GOP primary campaign. That would not pose a conflict of interest, though, because my bosses have never demanded that I take sides in the race or told me to back off my support for Radtke. They pay me to report the facts, and my opinions here are entirely my own.

JAMIE RADTKE FOR U.S. SENATE

UPDATE: Things are getting incredibly weird now. Erickson is blaming Dan Riehl for the Politico story. Among the several non-combatants who have called me about this escalating weirdness — comments running the gamut from “WTF?” to “Uh, oh — he’s going after Carter Wrenn” — one caller just suggested that this is actually a “proxy war” involving Sarah Palin’s supporters (who are hoping she will endorse Radtke) vs. Erickson’s faction who have swung their support behind Rick Perry.

UPDATE II: Dave Weigel dogpiles, but doesn’t seem to get the nuance and backstory, especially the seriousness of Erickson more or less calling Carter Wrenn’s candidate a drunk.

For evidence of the “proxy war” theory, see Palin’s famous fan Tammy Bruce on Twitter — here, here, here and here, for example.

UPDATE III: “This is about as ugly an event as you could imagine,” writes Tom White at Virginia Right.

Category: Election 2012, Jamie Radtke, Red State, Senate, Tea Party, Virginia

Spitzer: I Thought You Said ‘Buy-Sexual’

Posted on | August 24, 2011 | 1 Comment

by Smitty

Althouse links another soft-core porn piece disguised as news at the Gray, Room-temperature Lady. Not that I have the slightest interest in the topic, mind you: merely an opportunity to ridicule the behavior of the un-repentant Client #9.

The NYT doesn’t understand that Rule 5 should be a positive, fruitful appreciation of the beauty of Creation, and not an exhaustive combing of every cranny in the carnal canal.

Category: Uncategorized
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