Thursday, February 26, 2009

A Poll

Go here to participate in my one-question poll.

Thanks.

True Things versus Truth -- the Whole Truth

Most people do not make the proper distinction between TRUE THINGS and THE TRUTH. When you appear in court, for example, you do not swear to tell the court "true things." You swear to tell the court "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth."

Here's the distinction by way of example: If I have a flat tire on my way to work and I am late, I might tell my boss, "Sorry, I'm late, but I had a flat tire on my way." That would be a "true thing." What I might NOT have told my boss is, I shut off my alarm and went back to sleep. When I woke up, I only had ten minutes to get to work. So, even if I hadn't had a flat tire on the way to work, I would have been late anyway! That would have been "the truth, the whole truth."

How does this apply to our discussion?

Many people know a true thing: That a free market economy is harsh. They know that without governmental interference that businesses -- even large businesses like the automakers -- will likely fail. That such failure will lead to large scale unemployment. That such unemployment will cause hardships on many families.

Knowing this "true thing," they assume it to be "the truth" -- that it encompasses all the facts and all time.

What they do NOT take into account is that business failure is GOOD and ESSENTIAL for a free market economy. They do NOT consider that economies generally recover rapidly from such failures and soon the workers and the capital are put back to work in "profitable" rather than "unprofitable" businesses. This, in the long run, will provide increasing capital to the system and increasing opportunity for everyone. This is "the truth, the whole truth."

There is, of course, much more to this, but I think you get the general concept.

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

It's Not Just the Main Stream Media

Unfortunately, it's not just the main stream media that are to blame for our current situation. Government-run schools do NOT, by and large, instruct the next generation to have a keen understanding of the proper role of LIMITED GOVERNMENT, the value and workings of FREE MARKETS, or the need for a sound MONETARY SYSTEM.

Instead, the average 20-something or 30-something today actually BELIEVES that government IS the real and proper solution to the problems they face, that free markets do NOT work, and they know absolutely nothing (other than the denominations of bills and coins in their wallets) about monetary policy and its impact on their day-to-day lives.

On Good Government

There is ONE and ONLY ONE good government: That is the kingdom of God -- for only God is omniscient, omnipotent AND beneficent. Since every human government lacks omniscience and omnipotence it, therefore, cannot be fully beneficent. The human government's limited knowledge is a de facto cause of its inability to know what is truly "good" under ALL circumstances for ALL people for both now and the future its actions will bring about.

That being said, the BEST HUMAN GOVERNMENT is self-governance. That is, that every human being would always do what is proper and just and good. In such a case, no other human governance would be required.

Since human beings, unfortunately, do NOT always do what is proper and just and good, therefore, we rely upon a just government to enforce rules of law that we deem to be proper and just and good. We also rely upon governments to defend us from external attacks from other nations that would do us harm.

Working from these underlying matters, we may conclude that the BEST HUMAN GOVERNMENT is the government that GOVERNS LEAST -- that ONLY interferes when human beings do not perform that which is proper and just and good upon their own will. All other matters should be left to the individuals.

Problems arise in democratic societies when the elected assemblies become unrestrained by either their own integrity (to know and understand what is proper and just and good) or the rule of law. In our case, we have such an imperious assembly (Congress) that has, for the most part, abandoned the rule of law (in the U.S. Constitution) and is no longer impeded by either a sound judicial branch or an administrative branch that heeds the Constitution.

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

A Reminder to Some Democrats in the House

Here's a letter I just sent to several Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives:

Wasn't it Barack Obama that told us that any stimulus plan should be "TIMELY, TARGETED AND TEMPORARY"? Which parts of "targeted" and "temporary" does the Democrat party NOT understand?

Wasn't it Barack Obama that said, "I'm cutting more than I'm spending, so that it will be a net spending cut." Would you please respond by telling me how that math works with what the Democrats have just done?

And wasn't it Nancy Pelosi that said (three years ago): "[W]e'll go forward with civility, with honesty, with integrity and with fiscal discipline. No new deficit spending, no new bridges to nowhere, heaping mountains of debt on our children..." Please check with Speaker Pelosi to see which parts of this statement she intends to actually perform -- or was it ALL LIES?

The same kind of TRICKERY on the American citizenry that leads the DEMOCRAT PARTY to "move as quickly as possible and write as vaguely as possible" (Tom Daschle) so that Congress may foist upon Americans whatever it chooses -- without having to actually face the citizens or the opposing party in public debate on the issues. Have you NO CONSCIENCE? Have you NO HONOR? Have you NO CONCERN FOR THE CONSTITUTION of the United States of America?

How can you, by any stretch of the imagination, call yourselves PUBLIC SERVANTS?

What are YOU going to tell them?

Friday, February 13, 2009

My Message to Minnesota DFL Legislators

Here's what I wrote today to DFL members of the Minnesota legislature:

To DFL Members of the Minnesota Legislature:

I wanted to take time to personally thank you for the DFL's willingness to take a stand AGAINST voters actually having to PROVE who they are when they go to the polls here in Minnesota. I wanted you to know that you have made another contribution to the DEGRADATION of CONSTITUTIONAL DEMOCRACY in this state and in the U.S. at large.

In my parent's day, when one wished to register to vote, one had to PERSONALLY APPEAR before a county official (typically), present EVIDENCE OF U.S. CITIZENSHIP and (in some jurisdictions) SWEAR ALLEGIANCE to the United States of America. Now, thanks to the DEMOCRAT PARTY it is possible in some jurisdictions for one to cast a vote having registered by mail and never have to appear anywhere. How can we be assured that some of these voters even EXIST, let alone whether they are CITIZENS of the United States? Voting is a right of CITIZENSHIP, not of "existence" -- but we can't even prove EXISTENCE!

It is NO SECRET that the DEMOCRAT PARTY supports such a DEGRADATION of our VOTING SYSTEMS in the U.S. because they NEED ongoing VOTER FRAUD to stay in Office in many cases. I just wish you'd think about how you are DEGRADING and DESTROYING the very things that have made the United States a great nation.

What do YOU think?

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Why Make Our Machines Competitors for Our Food Supply?

Here's a letter I just sent to Governor Pawlenty of Minnesota:

Dear Governor Pawlenty:

While I have appreciated many of the stands you have taken over your term as governor of Minnesota, I have been disturbed by others -- especially those that I believe to be concessions to political expediency at the expense of principle. Chief among those matters that confound me is your support for ethanol.

With the email version of this letter, I am attaching a PDF study regarding ethanol. Below I am passing along some of the misconceptions regarding ethanol.

However, if you cannot answer any other detail, please reply to this ONE matter: Why would any sensible civilization make their MACHINES competitors for their FOOD SUPPLY? The ideal fuel for machines would be one that is not of value as a consumable in the food chain.

Untruths and misconceptions about ethanol include:

Ethanol will lead to energy independence. If all the corn produced in America last year were dedicated to ethanol production (14.3 percent of it was), U.S. gasoline consumption would drop by 12 percent. For corn ethanol to completely displace gasoline consumption in this country, we would need to appropriate all U.S. cropland, turn it completely over to corn-ethanol production, and then find 20 percent more land for cultivation on top of that.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration believes that the practical limit for domestic ethanol production is about 700,000 barrels per day, a figure they don't think is realistic until 2030. That translates to about 6 percent of the U.S. transportation fuels market in 2030.

Ethanol is economically competitive now. According to a 2005 report issued by the Agriculture Department, corn ethanol costs an average of $2.53 to produce, or several times what it costs to produce a gallon of gasoline. Without the subsidies, costs would be higher still. A study last fall from the International Institute for Sustainable Development found that ethanol subsidies amount to $1.05-$1.38 per gallon, or 42 percent to 55 percent of ethanol's wholesale market price.

Ethanol reduces gasoline prices. If you lived in California and other areas that used reformulated gasoline last summer – that's the environmentally "clean" gasoline required for areas with air pollution problems, and that's where most of that ethanol went – you might have paid up to 60 cents a gallon more for gasoline than you would have otherwise. That's because the federal government required oil refineries to use 4 billion gallons of ethanol in 2006 regardless of price, and gasoline pump prices last summer reflected the fact that ethanol was twice as expensive as wholesale conventional gasoline.

Ethanol is a renewable fuel. According to a group of academics from UC Berkeley who published in Science magazine last year, 5 percent to 26 percent of the energy content of ethanol is "renewable." The balance of ethanol's energy actually comes from the staggering amount of coal, natural gas and nuclear power necessary to produce corn and process it into ethanol.

Ethanol reduces air pollution. A review of the literature by Australian academic Robert Niven found that, when evaporative emissions are taken into account, E10 (fuel that's 10 percent ethanol and 90 percent gasoline, the standard mix) increases emissions of total hydrocarbons, nonmethane organic compounds, and air toxics compared to conventional gasoline. The result is greater concentrations of photochemical smog and toxic compounds.

Ethanol reduces greenhouse gas emissions. At best, E10 reduces greenhouse gas emissions by from zero to 5 percent; pure ethanol by 12 percent. The International Energy Agency, however, estimates that it costs about $250 to reduce a ton of greenhouse gases this way, or more than 10 times what Yale economist William Nordhaus thinks is economically sensible given the economics of climate change. Ethanol as an anti-warming policy is what academics refer to as "crazy talk."

Ethanol subsidies are necessary to "level the playing field." Petroleum subsidies are something less than $1 billion a year – six to eight times less than ethanol subsidies – and work out to about 0.3 cents per gallon.

Switchgrass (aka, "cellulosic ethanol") will set us free. Guy Caruso, the head of the EIA, noted in a speech last December that the capital costs associated with cellulosic ethanol production were five times greater than those associated with conventional corn ethanol production. Estimates like that are a bit soft, however, because there is no cellulosic ethanol industry in existence at present, so data is hard to come by. Betting the farm on an industry that doesn't yet exist to produce a product that is known to be staggeringly expensive isn't the best use of tax dollars.

IF ETHANOL HAS COMMERCIAL MERIT, THEN IT DOESN'T NEED A SUBSIDY OR OTHER GOVERNMENT PROPS. If it has NOT, no amount of subsidy will make commercially viable in the end. And that's the truth.

I await your response. Thank you.



What do you think?

A New Kind of Politics

Here's what I wrote to dozens of Senators and Representatives in Congress just today:

President Obama promised U.S. citizens a new kind of politics. Of course, most of us assumed that meant a "NEW AND IMPROVED" kind, NOT A MORE DEGRADED KIND of politics. Therefore, I am calling upon you to help construct this "new and improved" kind of politics by providing TRANSPARENCY to the U.S. TAXPAYER.

Taxpayers deserve better than being forced to shoulder a package that has been hastily crafted in secret with little opportunity for input from the Congressional minority, let alone the public. Consequently, any compromise emerging from a conference committee should be posted on the Internet in a searchable form for ideally TEN, BUT NO LESS THAN FIVE FULL BUSINESS DAYS before a vote on the conference report can occur.

TAXPAYERS DESERVE NO LESS FROM A CONGRESS THAT, ACCORDING TO ITS OWN LEADERSHIP, ASPIRES TO BE THE MOST HONEST, ETHICAL AND OPEN CONGRESS IN HISTORY.

After a failure to provide accountability and transparency with regard to the “Troubled Asset Relief Program,” and with the passage of this massive spending package becoming more and more likely, Congress and the Administration must work to finally make good on their promises to deliver transparency and accountability when it comes to the implementation of this spending package.

THE TAXPAYER SHOULD BE ABLE TO TRACK - DOLLAR-FOR-DOLLAR - HOW THE GOVERNMENT SPENDS ALL THE APPROPRIATED FUNDS, through grants, contracts and sub-awards through detailed line-item information on expenditures made under these agreements, including access to the actual expenditure documents and all relating documents (the bids, and the terms) in a form that is searchable and downloadable.

Thanks to the passage of the FEDERAL FUNDING AND ACCOUNTABILITY ACT OF 2006, the Federal government already has a website that provides information on federal grants and contracts in the form of USASpending.gov. That website could provide the general framework for housing data on expenditures made under the “stimulus” package.

All data on expenditures made under this package should be provided in a form that allows users to programmatically search and access all data in a serialized machine readable format via a web-services application programming interface, and users should be able to sort data by categories as well as search and find data by single keyword While both the House and Senate bills currently negotiated in conference committee require “data on relevant economic, financial, grant and contract information” be provided online, the language falls short in several areas:

  1. Currently available bill language is lacking clear deadlines by which the required expenditure information needs to be made available. Given the implications of this massive spending package for taxpayers, only real-time posting, or at a minimum making the information available within 24 hours, would do them justice.

  2. Providing information on “jobs created or maintained” can only be an estimate and fails to take into account any jobs that are destroyed as money is taken out of one part of the economy to inject it into another. The expenditure information provided online should be spin-free, so that taxpayers can draw their own conclusions rather than being inundated by propaganda.

  3. Along the same lines, the establishment of an “Accountability and Transparency Board” with oversight functions is not helpful unless the board consists of a diverse group of members, representing the administration, Congress and the private sector as well as different political backgrounds. Reports compiled by a partisan board are of little value to taxpayers.

  4. There is concern that organizations engaging in legally questionable activities may receive funds from the package, so recipients should be required to certify that no funds are being used to directly or indirectly fund illegal activities or the election or defeat of a candidate for political office.

Given that any massive government spending package will burden not only current but future generations of taxpayers, they deserve - at a minimum - full transparency, accountability and taxpayer protections in the process.


What are YOU going to tell them?

P.S. Much of this language came from a petition that you may read here.

Wednesday, February 11, 2009

Message to the Sell-Out Senators

Here's a message I just sent to Senators Specter, Snowe and Collins:
I just wanted to THANK YOU personally for SELLING OUT your 38 GOP colleagues and EVERY REPUBLICAN MEMBER of the House by cutting a deal and giving Harry Reid the 60 votes he needed for the 'TRILLION DOLLAR TURKEY' to pass. I trust you got something really worthwhile in TRADE for your vote, as you have also SOLD OUT the U.S. economy for generations to come -- for some of the damage done will NEVER be able to be reversed by future legislation.

You have HELPED ASSURE that SOCIALIST-DEMOCRATS now running the country will enjoy an EXPENSIVE POLITICAL and LEGISLATIVE VICTORY. You have also STOPPED the momentum REAL REPUBLICANS were successfully building with the American people AGAINST this horrendous proposal.


What will YOU tell them?

What About the U.S. Constitution?

Here's what I told more than 50 members of Congress in a letter sent today:

"Until the 1930s, the Constitution served as a major constraint on federal economic interventionism. The government's powers were understood to be just as the framers intended: few and explicitly enumerated in our founding document and its amendments. Search the Constitution as long as you like, and you will find no specific authority conveyed for the government to spend money on global-warming research, urban mass transit, food stamps, unemployment insurance, Medicaid, or countless other items in the stimulus package and, even without it, in the regular federal budget." -- Independent Institute senior fellow Dr. Robert Higgs

"Americans have long ago abandoned respect for the constitutional limitations placed on the federal government. Our elected representatives represent that disrespect." -- economist Walter E. Williams

"[W]hat could possibly be more reckless than spending a trillion dollars you don't have on a plan that you have no evidence will work? What could be more irresponsible than doubling the generational debt for your partisan pet projects in a time of crisis? And what could be more selfish than stifling debate by deploying fear to induce voters into supporting it all?" -- columnist David Harsanyi


PLEASE THINK ABOUT OUR CONSTITUTION -- WHICH YOU ARE SWORN TO UPHOLD -- WHEN YOU DO WHAT YOU DO!

What are YOU going to tell them?

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Obama Thinks the New Deal Worked

But actually, federal policies prolonged the depression by an estimated seven years according to this UCLA study.

Check it out.

Monday, February 9, 2009

My Latest Message to Congress and the U.S. Senate

Here's a message I sent to House and Senate members today:

Please stick to your principles on the stimulus package and EVERY OTHER ISSUE you address this year no matter what the cost. Perhaps it would be encouraging for you to go back to look at what the political map looked like the morning after a TRUE CONSERVATIVE -- Ronald Reagan -- ran for U.S. President.

He did NOT cave in to the LEFT. Instead, he carried the message to Americans that what they REALLY believe in and WANT is an America that lives by CONSERVATIVE PRINCIPLES.

Make citizens aware of the DANGERS of the LEFT-WING IDEOLOGIES and the majority WILL stand behind you.

P.S.: Don't cave into the Republican governors either -- including Governors Palen and Pawlenty. Let them face their own music. You are NOT responsible for their plight. They signed the legislation in their own states and spent the money through their own administrations. They can get their own houses in order.

What are YOU going to tell them?

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Obama moves to sieze control of the U.S. census

Obama shifts Census oversight, triggering angry protest by Republicans

President Obama has decided to bring the U.S. Census Bureau under White House jurisdiction, a move that incensed House Republicans, who fired off a blistering letter to him Thursday, calling it "outrageous and unprecedented" and a "blatant partisan and political maneuver."

The move would shift the chain of command with the bureau and the Commerce Department, where the bureau currently resides. It comes after the Congressional Black Caucus, National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials and other groups expressed displeasure with Obama's nominee for Commerce secretary, Republican Sen. Judd Gregg of New Hampshire.

Gregg, the groups said this week, opposed efforts to secure emergency funding for the 2000 Census, which they asserted exposes a potential lack of commitment to ensuring that hard-to-reach minority populations are properly accounted for in the 2010 census.

A White House spokesman confirmed Thursday that Obama plans to work closely with the bureau, which will remain within the Commerce Department.

"From the first days of the transition the census has been a priority for the president, and a process he wanted to re-evaluate," the spokesman said in a prepared statement.

"There is historic precedent for the director of the census, who works for the Commerce secretary and the president, to work closely with White House senior management -- given the number of decisions that will have to be put before the president," he said. "We plan to return to that model in this administration."

House Republicans reacted quickly. House Oversight and Government Reform ranking member Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and Oversight and Government Reform Census Subcommittee ranking member Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., seized on speculation that the move would place the yet-unnamed Census Bureau director under the watchful eye of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, instead of leaving Gregg in charge.

They suggested the move could improperly influence legislative redistricting, which is shaped by Census counts.

"By circumventing the secretary of Commerce's oversight of the Census Bureau and handing it directly to a political operative such as Mr. Emanuel, you are severely jeopardizing the fairness and accuracy of the 2010 Census," Issa and McHenry wrote Obama.

Details of the day-to-day relationship between the White House and the Census Bureau seem hazy.

Aides speculated Thursday that the bureau's budget and public-affairs functions may be routed through OMB, an arrangement that would assuage the fears expressed by advocates concerned that the Census director's public statements and congressional testimony would be subject to censorship by less-than-supportive leadership at Commerce.

Sources on both sides of the issue said black lawmakers and others interested in securing more funding for the 2010 Census had been hoping for assurances of support from Obama as soon as they learned about Gregg's possible selection to Commerce post.

One Democratic aide close to the matter called the administration's decision a direct response to the grievances of minority groups upset with Gregg's appointment.

"People started yelling at them," said the aide, who added that the details of how the White House's interactions with the Census director remain woefully undefined.

"Their answer was 'OK, fine, [Gregg] won't be in charge,'" the aide said. "It wasn't a plan. It was a reaction."

The administration's idea to shift jurisdiction over the Census Bureau was not entirely new.

In September, congressional Democrats, led by Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., proposed legislation to make the bureau an independent federal agency. Such agencies report directly to the president, as the Federal Emergency Management Agency did before it became part of the Homeland Security Department.

A Census Bureau spokeswoman declined to comment on any organizational changes until a director is in place.

-------------------------------

Here's what I wrote to many leaders and others in the U.S. House of Representatives:

Please stand up in public and take a strong stand against President Obama's unprecedented move to give the White House direct control over the upcoming 2010 census in the U.S. This is dangerous! Please inform the public at large how radical this action is and the danger it portends for any remaining fairness or equity in our two-party political system.

These are the actions of a political schemer that heretofore would be considered anathema to the American way. The public must be informed that this is not just an innocuous "administrative" move.

I urge you to also take a stand. Here is a link to contacts in Congress.

Thursday, February 5, 2009

A Porn Lawyer for Deputy Attorney General?

Here's a letter I sent to many Senate leaders today:

Mr. Ogden has built a career on representing views and companies that most Americans find repulsive. In his career he has argued AGAINST parents being notified that their 14-year old girl had an abortion, saying that "there is no qualitative . . . difference between minors . . . and adults." Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, Mr. Ogden has argued that women who have had abortions suffer no detrimental consequences and instead feel "relief and happiness" after aborting their children.

Mr. Ogden has also PROFITED FROM REPRESENTING PORNOGRAPHERS and IN ATTACKING LEGISLATION INTENDED TO BAN CHILD PORNOGRAPHY. The Department of Justice should not have A PORN LAWYER as its Deputy Attorney General, a position tasked with making the most important decisions of the department.

WHAT HOPE HAVE WE THAT OGDEN WILL NOW HELP ENFORCE THE LAWS HE HAS SPENT HIS CAREER ATTACKING?

IT WOULD BE A SHAME TO THE INTEGRITY OF THE SENATE AND THE HONOR OF THE UNITED STATES TO CONFIRM THIS MAN TO SUCH A POSITION.


What are YOU going to tell them?

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

The Current State of "Honesty" in Our Congress!

Here's an open letter I sent to many in the Senate today:

"And when [Tom Daschle] ended up losing an election, he didn't cash in and leave. He lost an election ending his public career. His net worth was less than a million dollars at that point. And here he went out in the private sector, and now he's found himself having made a mistake and admitted to it. He took the steps necessary to start paying the taxes, make sure they're paid. Now, that's the right thing to do. I believe Tom Daschle's one of the most honest people I've ever known or worked with in public life." --Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL)

If Tom Daschle "one of the most honest people [Senator Durbin has] ever known or worked with in public life," that does not bode well for the condition of our Senate and House of Representatives. Here's why:

TOM DASCHLE IS AN OPEN ADVOCATE OF DEFRAUDING THE U.S. CITIZENRY BY SUGGESTING THAT THE WAY TO GET QUESTIONABLE LEGISLATION -- LEGISLATION TO WHICH THE GENERAL POPULOUS MAY OBJECT -- THROUGH CONGRESS IS TO "ACT FAST" (IN ORDER TO AVOID PUBLIC COMMENT AND DISSENT) AND "WRITE AS VAGUELY AS POSSIBLE" (IN ORDER TO OBSCURE FROM THE CITIZENS THE TRUE INTENT OF THE LEGISLATION).

NO WONDER THERE IS SO GREAT A DISTRUST OF CONGRESS IN THESE DAYS! AS A GROUP, THE ENTIRE CONGRESS OUGHT TO BE ASHAMED OF SUCH A POSITION AND INTENTION.


What will YOU tell them?

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

False Hopes of Economic Stimulus


From Mises.org

Open Letter to Senators

Message I sent to a bunch of Senators today:

From the latest news:

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama's choice to oversee budget and spending reform, Nancy Killefer, withdrew her nomination on Tuesday because of tax reasons, according to a letter released by the White House.

"I recognize that your agenda and the duties facing your Chief Performance Officer are urgent," Killefer wrote in the letter to the president, asking for her nomination to be withdrawn.

"I have also come to realize in the current environment that my personal tax issue of D.C. Unemployment tax could be used to create exactly the kind of distraction and delay those duties must avoid."


APPARENTLY, THE REASON THE DEMOCRATS DON'T MIND RAISING TAXES ON THE REST OF US IS BECAUSE THEY DON'T PAY THEM THEMSELVES. HOW MANY DEMOCRATS PRESENTLY IN CONGRESS OR OTHER APPOINTED POSITIONS ARE IN THIS SAME CLASS OF 'TAX CHEATS'?

THIS DESERVES AN INVESTIGATION AND I HOPE YOU WILL PUSH FOR ONE!

What are YOU going to say to them?

Austrians Have A Better Idea

After a good Austrian bashing of the latest call to steal taxpayer money and waste it on something that will make a given problem worse, the stumped critics will often shout, "Oh yeah? Well do you guys have a better idea?" Even though "nothing" would be much, much better than all of the alleged remedies being bandied about, the Austrians actually do have concrete proposals for President Obama.

Read the whole article here.