Why the sudden increase in Income Inequality ??

If I see one more Rent Seeker trying to get more money for the Democrat Party Vote Farm by pointing out income inequality, unequal growth, and comparisons of The Golden Age Of Disco to now, I'm going to lose my damn mind. 

Yes.  The bottom 10% of the lowest quartile has not done as exponentially well as the upper quintile of the top 1%.  Or something.  

This disparity will only increase with globalization, and I'm glad of it.  Bill Gates has done far more for me than I've done for him.  This also applies to office personnel in Korea and Shanghai who use Bill Gates' software. 
Gates make money in ways that Henry Ford couldn't touch.  Very few Fords made it to Korea and Shanghai in Henry Ford's lifetime. 

Justin Bieber sells well in Russia and in Jerusalem.  Jenny Lind, the "Swedish Nightingale" who died in 1887, did not. 

But I digress.....

Here's one of the only charts that matter.  Male earnings are in red, female in blue.  Bachelor's degrees are at the top, less than a high school diploma is at the bottom. 

Look upon this, and despair. 

Let's take it a notch higher, shall we? 

Paul Krugman had a column in today's issue of Pravda about "The Undeserving Rich".  (Paul Krugman's net worth is now around $2.5 million.  And unless worth is generated by flip-flopping around like a catfish on a riverbank, Krugman is truly undeserving of his millions.) 

The column linked to this gem by Lawrence Mishel and Colin Gordon. 

Disregard that people generally don't wake up in one income percentile and stay there for their entire lives. 
Disregard that there is a 20% chance that you will, for one year of your life, be part of the Top 2%. 
Disregard that America's poor have higher incomes than the average European. 

Here's the income change from 1979 to 2012, according to Mishel and Gordon.  This is on the front page of the piece linked to by Krugman. 

But, thanks be to God, you can hit the little button on the right and take a look at what has happened since "The Greatest Government Orgy Of Recovery And Jobs Spending In History" took place. 

Despair some more, O Ye Keynesians. 

That's all I've got. 

Hope you finish school.  Don't get pregnant to someone you're not married to, and don't get married until you're about 25.  Don't become an alcoholic or a drug addict.

Abide by that, and you have a 98% chance of escaping poverty. 

Unless, of course, Barack Obama decides to help us some more.  The Porkulus Package, Cash For Clunkers, the Green Scams, and most all legislation of the last 5 years were for the rich, and not for you. 

If Washington keeps helping, then all bets are off.  Go ahead and start your drug habit now. 

North and South Korea - a perfect control group situation

North Korea and South Korea GDP. No further commentary necessary.

Food For The Machine - Anger Management Edition

We worked last Saturday (yesterday) .
One of my temp employees asked if he could leave at 9:30 in the morning.  It seems that he has to go to a series of  court-ordered "Anger Management" sessions on Saturday mornings.

Any time the government mandates that someone do something for his own good, I'm automatically skeptical, so I asked the kid if the meetings were worthwhile.  Here's what he said:

Well, you have to pay this lady $15.00, and then we sit around and smoke for about the first 30 minutes because it never starts on time.  Then this dude comes in and we sit in a circle and bullshit for a while, then somebody tells about how he was in this bar a few days ago and somebody bumped him, and how before the meetings he woulda kicked that dude's ass, but now that he's going to the meetings he didn't.
And we'll all start clappin' and shit, and some other dudes will start crying, and the counselor dude says that's really good and how we all need to keep it up.
You don't have to talk or even be awake.  The main thing is giving that lady $15.00.  

This kid could've spent most of his morning building displays for grocery stores.  Instead, he had to give his time and money to a couple of government lifers.

The more I learn about our government, the greater the likelihood that I'll be going to the Anger-Management sessions.  Sheesh.

Government Cheese

"They'll turn us into beggars, cause they're easier to please...."



Give a man a free house and he'll bust out the windows
Put his family on food stamps, now he's a big spender
no food on the table and the bills ain't paid
'Cause he spent it on cigarettes and P.G.A.
They'll turn us all into beggars 'cause they're easier to please
They're feeding our people that Government Cheese

Give a man a free lunch and he'll figure out a way
To steal more than he can eat 'cause he doesn't have to pay
Give a woman free kids and you'll find them in the dirt
Learning how to carry on the family line of work
It's the man in the White House, the man under the steeple
Passing out drugs to the American people
I don't believe in anything, nothing is free
They're feeding our people the Government Cheese

Decline and fall, fall down baby
Decline and fall, said fall way down now
Decline and fall, fall down little mama
Decline and fall, decline and fall
Give a man a free ticket on a dead end ride
And he'll climb in the back even though nobody's driving
Too ******* lazy to crawl out of the wreck
And he'll rot there while he waits for the welfare check
Going to hell in a handbag, can't you see
I ain't gonna eat no Government Cheese

Hit this link before criticizing a single sentiment in this song.  Lord have mercy, what a mess. 

A Modest Proposal to end long gasoline lines

Because of Hurricane Sandy, many New Yorkers and New Jerseyites are having to wait in long, long lines for gasoline. 

If your license plate has an odd number, you can only purchase gasoline on odd numbered calendar days.  Ditto for even.  Anyone thinking about this for more than two minutes can see that it's nothing but "Performance Art" from government.  Demand is demand, regardless of which arbitrary day the demand is called for.  People with time to do so are waiting in line to buy gas whether they really need it or not.  Sheesh....

Here's the biggest obstacle.  New York and New Jersey both have "anti-gouging" laws.  If there's a disaster of some sort, merchants can only increase prices by 10%, unless they can prove that an even higher markup is required to turn a minimal profit.  That should make it more fair for everyone, right? 

But because of infrastructure problems, there's not enough fuel coming into New York and New Jersey.  The world that those old prices were based upon doesn't exist any more.  Every load of dinosaur juice coming into NY/NJ is worth 3 times its former value.  People are purchasing tanks of gas that they don't need, siphoning it from their cars into 5-gallon cans, and selling it for 3-4 times what they paid for it (which is exactly what its worth, BTW.)   They're illegally selling generators on Craigslist.  This Republican idiot is hauling 65 New Jersey business owners into court for "price gouging" - i.e., selling things for what they're worth. 

So how is the government determining the best use for this fuel?  Odd day/Even day purchasing. 

That's bullshit. 

According to Russ Roberts' book "The Price Of Everything", here's the best way to restore fuel supplies to NY/NJ. 

Let merchants sell gasoline for whatever price they want.  If you really need gasoline, you'll buy it.  If you just wanted gasoline for running out for lunch or road trips, or because you're paranoid, you won't buy it.  This is the only reason that Texans and Floridians and Californians have gasoline today.  The price is allowed to fluctuate, all day every day, based on demand. 

But that's not fair.....

Bullshit.  This is why you can buy lettuce in the wintertime.  It's why there are always shoes for sale at the mall, and you don't have to wait in line for them the way they did in Commie Eastern Europe.  It's why the U.S. has a higher standard of living than Cuba.  Companies are waiting in line to sell us lettuce and shoes, at whatever price we're willing to pay, and not vice-versa. 

But how would this help lower fuel prices???

Someone might make a fortune selling gasoline for $20.00 per gallon for a few days.  If other gas stations see this guy cleaning up on gasoline, they will move heaven and earth to re-open their stores.  They'll risk life and limb to serve you.   A couple of days later, gasoline would probably be selling for $16.00 per gallon.  More and more businesses would want in on it.  Gasoline would drop to $12.00 per gallon.  And on and on, until there were enough people selling gasoline to get it down to the ridiculously high prices that NY/NJ residents were already willing to pay before the hurricane.  Competition doesn't cure everything, but it's way ahead of whatever solution is in 2nd place. 

But how much hassle would YOU go through to sell gasoline today, in NY/NJ for only 10% more than it sold for before the hurricane? 

You might just stay home and watch "Dancing With The Stars" and wait on someone else to clean up the mess.  (That's what's going on now, BTW.)   

Here's something from an old post I wrote about Russ Roberts' "The Price Of Everything".  The book deals with a Big Box store that was marking up generators and flashlights after an emergency, BTW. 

Do you every wonder why the shelves in our supermarkets are full? Ever wonder why countries afflicted with the blessings of communism had supermarket shelves that were mostly empty? Ever wonder why we don't have to wait in long lines for gasoline, or endure rationing like we did in the early 1970's? Ever wonder why the minimum wage in Cuba is somewhere near $14.00 (PER MONTH !!) ??


Do you want to know how to ensure that more people will die during a famine? Legislate artificially low prices. Want to keep people from delivering water to drought stricken areas? Put anti-gouging laws into place.

Do you ever wonder why we can simply go out and buy our basic necessities?

It's because our (somewhat) Free Market Economy allows prices to go up when there's a shortage, and decline when there's a glut. We don't have an idiotic Flashlight Czar (yet), setting flashlight prices all over the country based on hours of darkness, hurricanes, or electrical problems. People can charge whatever they want to for flashlights. Therefore, when you really, really need see in the dark, somebody out there is probably willing to sell you a flashlight.

So, according to Professor Roberts, not only was the Big Store doing the right thing economically when it doubled its prices after the hurricane, it was doing the right thing logically, socially, and morally.

Yeah, Chris Christie can put anti-gouging laws into place, and this will help guarantee that merchants won't be able to rip off people who want to purchase a generator.  It also guarantees that there won't be any generators on the shelves. 

Which store selling power generators would you want to shop in?  The one that has 'em, or the one that doesn't? 

What Obama Could Do

Long-time readers of these pages and my Facebook rants often assume that I have a deep and abiding hatred of Barack Obama. 
It ain't so. 
Obama promised to "spread the wealth around", and he's done his best to fulfill that promise, even though it has been disastrous for the economy overall.  The Porkulus bill was insane, but it hasn't cost any more than our recent wars against people who didn't attack us. 
I can quibble over Obama's broken promises to shut down Gitmo, his failure to bring home all the troops, and his general squishiness on gay marriage (until recently).

Compared to the Republicans, though, Obama has been a George Washington of honesty.  How the GOP can call itself "small government" after one Reagan and two Bushes remains a mystery.  In 2010, for the offices where we didn't have a Libertarian candidate on the ballot, I voted Democrat.  I'm sick, sick, sick of Republicans giving "small government" a bad name, especially the Republicans who are affiliated with the Religious Right. 

So let me know what you think of these suggestions for next week's Democrat Convention at Bank Of America Arena.  These are listed only as a public service. 

1) Ron Paul supporters are pissed.  I mean they are royally pissed.  They've been kicked out, shown the door and dumped on. 
Ron Paul is anti-war, pro-gay/lesbian marriage, anti-drug war, and anti-Federal Reserve.  It wouldn't hurt Obama to come out swinging against any more overseas adventures, and he could pledge to bring Hillary back to the house.  He could promise to legalize weed.  He could personally invite Ron Paul to speak at the Democrat convention !!  Who knows what would happen??
It would be difficult for Obama to speak out against Bernanke's counterfeiting operation at the Fed, but he could let Biden do it, since nobody takes Biden seriously anyway. 
All of this would be total B.S., but how many pledges and promises made at conventions and State Of The Union events are anything else? 

2) Trot out Bill Clinton as much as possible.  Clinton (and Gingrich) turned in a few years of balanced budgets.  He semi-reformed welfare.  He introduced NAFTA.  Yeah, he made a few failed stabs at an early version of ObamneyCare, but that was just to keep Hillary out of his hair so he could mess around with interns. 
Al Gore banished Clinton during his presidential run.  But the man has now been reformed and rehabilitated.  We did well while Bill was in office.  Obama should simply pretend that Clinton is the candidate. 

3) Keep Elizabeth ! Warren !! out of the convention hall.  Disinvite the woman from her current prime-time slot.  Obama was channeling Warren when he uttered his disastrous "You Didn't Build That" line.  That stuff probably plays well wherever Warren teaches, but it doesn't resonate with the folks who are having to pay ridiculous taxes to pay government contractors too much money for substandard services.  Have her call in with diarrhea. 

4) IMHO, Joe Biden is now officially stark, raving mad.  Paul Ryan is a bailout loving and TARP loving and stimulus loving Republican who has repeatedly voted for disaster while campaigning for sanity.  All that having been said, nobody cares about those votes except Libertarians. 
Despite his inconsistencies, Paul Ryan is also going to rip Joe Biden's head off. 
It's going to be brutal.  There is no point in it, no reason to broadcast this massacre during prime time when some of our children might still be awake. 
Biden couldn't even put away Sarah Palin. 
The Democrats don't want Biden going up against Ryan.  It's gonna be ugly, ugly, ugly. 

For a while, there was a "Draft Hillary" movement floating around, but she's even more polarizing than Biden. 

What to do, what to do.....

How about this:  Barack Obama should have Biden appear on Day One of the convention, and have him make his standard, goofy speech.  Then Biden should claim that he's been diagnosed with Alzheimer's.  Express regret that he can't continue to carry on the fight against the other side.  The press won't demand a medical diagnosis from anyone; Hell, they print every word that Obama/Biden say without skepticism.  

Day Three: Obama comes out, makes his speech, and declares that ________ __________ is now his choice for Veep. 

I think these four proposals would work for him. 
He'll never do any of this. 
There's no money in it for his supporters/owners. 

So in the meantime, I hope you'll support a candidate who has pledged to give us the small government that Republicans have failed to provide, and the civil liberties that Democrats have failed to provide......

If only we weren't so compassionate....

Here's the way things are:

My employer, Jukt Micronics, is willing to pay $16.00 per hour for some very basic labor. 
It's too bad that the laborers only get about $8.50 per hour. 

The $16.00 rate is for a short-term project that should be over by the first full weekend in July.  We don't want to own these workers in the master/servant or the plantation/slave model.  We don't want to pay their taxes, child support, unemployment insurance, healthcare, or alimony.  If we don't feel that we're getting our money's worth from these employees, we want to replace them without a legal battle. 

We are willing to pay $16.00 per hour to avoid that burden.  And like I said, the workers only get $8.50 per hour. 

We go through a temp service. 

You know why? 

Because it's worth it.  If an employee isn't working out, I can make ONE call at quitting time and ask the temp service to send a replacement.  No pain.  No sweat.  No documentation.  No lawyers.  No progressive documentation of verbal warnings, written warnings, 3-day suspensions.  No lawsuits. 

Obama, Mitt Romney, the National Labor Relations Board, Nancy Pelosi, Rick Perry, and Jimmy Carter are not involved.  $16.00 is worth the blessing of avoiding an entanglement with that insane pack of Nanny State Messiahs. 

The evil capitalists at the temp service are making $7.50 per hour (minus expenses) on the labor of these temp employees.  What value does the temp service add to the transaction? 

They keep the government off my back.  These employees don't work for me.  They work for the temp service. 

The temp service concept arose as a logical response to the United States government's labor laws.  Workers would be making more money if it weren't for the U.S. government's labor laws. 

We've had 55-year-olds THANK us for giving them a chance by hiring them.  They know the risk we're taking by hiring someone who could sue us if we have to fire them. 

Here's the way things ought to be:

If all discrimination, unemployment, minimum wage, hostile workplace and Nanny State legislation were to end tomorrow, I suspect that we'd be paying these guys somewhere between $10.00 and $12.00 per hour.  Older people could be hired without risk of a lawsuit.  Racial minorities could be given more chances for promotion without risk of a lawsuit. 

The Czar/Serf relationship we're accustomed to would end.  There would be some pissed off lawyers, some parasites at the Texas Employment Commission would be out on their asses, but workers would make more money, the products you purchase would cost less, and we'd have a more efficient system. 

Employers would pay people for the labor and smarts they wanted to purchase from them, and that's all. 

Once again, here's the way things are....

We're paying a temp service $16.00, and the workers are getting $8.50. 

We could all lobby to change that system, but we're just too compassionate. 

John Bryson doesn't need to have seizures to do harm

Authorities are investigating a series of traffic collisions in the San Gabriel Valley involving U.S. Secretary of Commerce John Bryson, authorities said Saturday.

Republicans are offering silent prayers to the ghost of Ronald Reagan, asking that he please, please, please give them a way to prove that Bryson was drunk. 
Democrats are getting indignant because someone at a Karl Rove SuperPac tweeted something snarky about "how do you have 3 crashes in 5 minutes without alcohol not being involved?"

Look, the man had some car wrecks on Saturday.  But he's been known to have seizures.  Four years ago, he apparently passed out in a board meeting and had to be hospitalized. 

It looks he was only in two car wrecks this weekend and chances are the total damage was $15,000.00 or less. 

But drunk or not drunk, stable or having seizures, stoned or straight, car wrecks aren't why John Bryson should be making the news.  Check out Bryson's requests for spending increases from the Department Of Commerce website:

•Advanced Manufacturing: Advanced Manufacturing: $156 million to expand NIST research in areas such as smart manufacturing, nanomanufacturing, advanced materials, and biomanufacturing, including $21 million for the Advanced Manufacturing Technology Consortia program, which will provide grants to industry consortia to tackle common technological barriers to the innovation and manufacturing of new products.

•Increasing U.S. Exports: $517 million for the International Trade Administration (ITA), including several key initiatives. The Administration requests $30 million for critical investments in trade promotion to help more U.S. businesses reach the 95 percent of consumers who live outside our borders. This proposal also includes $30 million to send Foreign Commercial Service Officers and locally engaged staff to high-growth markets to help support the National Export Initiative to meet the President’s goal of doubling U.S. exports by the end of 2014. The budget also supports a new trade enforcement unit-- the Interagency Trade Enforcement Center (ITEC), which will significantly enhance the Administration’s capabilities to aggressively challenge unfair trade practices around the world (details below).

•Attracting Investment to the U.S.: The $517M for ITA includes $13 million for SelectUSA to encourage, facilitate, and accelerate foreign direct investment in the U.S. to create jobs and spur growth.

God help us all.  I work for a manufacturing company, and Obama's Commerce Secretary wants more funding so he can help manufacturers.  Oh sweet baby Jesus help us all.  Please keep my family in your prayers.  Those folks have a worse financial record than Ed McMahon.

Here's more:

*Additionally, as part of the Administration’s efforts to revitalize manufacturing, the President’s budget proposes $1 billion in mandatory funding to establish a National Network for Manufacturing Innovation (NNMI). Through collaboration between NIST, the Department of Defense, the Department of Energy, and the National Science Foundation, the NNMI aims to promote the development of manufacturing technologies with broad applications.

*When it comes to trade enforcement, as part of the President’s plan to level the playing field for American workers and businesses, the President’s budget will invest $26 million in ITA ($24M) and the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative ($2M) to support a new trade enforcement unit-- the Interagency Trade Enforcement Center (ITEC), which will significantly enhance the Administration’s capabilities to aggressively challenge unfair trade practices around the world, including in China. The ITEC will represent a more aggressive “whole-of-government” approach to addressing unfair trade practices, and will serve as the primary forum within the federal government for executive departments and agencies to coordinate enforcement of international and domestic trade rules.

They pay people to write that drivel.  With your money.  Taken by force.  I know you don't have time to read thast stuff, but they're asking for more money so they can help you get more money to give to them. 
Here's Assistant Commerce Secretary Michael Camunez, writing about a border boondoggle that ate up a couple of his action-filled weeks: 

At each stop, stakeholders repeated the theme that we—government and business—must work together to change the narrative about the border. The goal is not to diminish awareness of the fact that real security challenges exist; rather, we need to increase awareness that there is more to the border story. Both countries are critical to the economy of the other, and one of our goals for this trip was to highlight the fact that new commercial opportunities exist and that the border serves a critical role in facilitating the essential flow of goods and people between Mexico and the U.S.


Our delegation consisted of U.S. and Mexico government officials and members of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. We conducted stakeholder outreach events related to the border trade facilitation efforts under the U.S.-Mexico 21st Century Border Management initiative, which was established by Presidents Obama and Calderon in May 2010 as a vehicle to develop and promote a more secure and seamless border between our two countries. These events provided us with an opportunity to share information with stakeholders about the ongoing work and accomplishments of the initiative and to receive important, on-the-ground feedback from them, which can be incorporated into the 21st Century Border Management work streams.

Facilitating initiatives for stakeholder feedback within work streams outreach for increased awareness of changing narratives for an overview of the critical role of the infrastructure's ability to provide feedback for an increased level of dialogue for....

Hell, if you can read two consecutive sentences of that theft-funded drivel without throwing up in your mouth just a little bit, you're a better man than me. 

What's more offensive?  That John Bryson's assistant, Michael C. Camunez,  was paid to write that stuff, or that he's probably next in line to spend the Commerce Department's loot if John Bryson keeps running into cars? 

Let's keep this incident in perspective, folks.  Bryson may have done $15,000 damage on Saturday.  That's nothing compared to the damage he's done since 2008. 

Shut down the Department Of Commerce.  Fold the weather forecasting functions into the Air Force.  Knock down their headquarters building.  Hell, turn John Bryson loose, and let him knock down the building. 

Why Libertarians Oppose The Death Penalty

Here's something from the Coyotote Blog, taking a Tampa Bay Times writer named Robyn Blumner to task for opposing the death penalty and government intervention in lifestyle choices, while advocating for government intervention in economic matters. 

Robyn Blumner’s column highlighting the wrongful executions of Carlos DeLuna and Cameron Todd Willingham was a very compelling argument against the death penalty. I am a Republican who rarely agrees with Blumner, but in this case she was spot on. While I believe that there are individuals who certainly deserve to lose their lives for the crimes they commit (John Couey comes to mind), I simply do not trust the government to administer such a process fairly or accurately. This is because the government is run by human beings, who like the rest of us are motivated by narrow self-interest and restrained by limited knowledge. Because those in government rarely face the consequences of their decisions, they often make the wrong ones, even if their intent is pure.

Do you trust the government's mail system to deliver important documents, or do you trust FedEx or UPS?  What about hospitals?  I know that during a recent emergency, I was glad to be in St. Joseph's rather than a VA facility. 
The only thing that government does better than the private sector is blowing up strange-looking people overseas. 

What I find puzzling is how Blumner can so effectively articulate these failings of government when it comes to civil liberties in one column, and in the next champion its abilities and competence in economic matters. A criminal trial is a grueling and exacting process that seeks to administer justice in a very narrow, specific instance. If government doesn’t deserve our faith in doing that correctly, how can we trust it to control and coordinate the countless decisions that hundreds of millions of Americans make each day in our economic lives?

All of those questions are legit, but here's an even better one for Matt Curran, the guy who wrote this little gem.  In the first paragraph, Mr. Curran says . "I am a Republican who rarely agrees with Blumner..."

But Republicans voted for TARP.  They promote subsidies, bailouts, quotas, tariffs, set-asides, corporate welfare and crony capitalism of the worst possible sort.  All of that, and they want to interfere with what you can smoke, who you can sleep with, where you can gamble, and whether or not you should have to listen to some redneck witch doctor pray before a football game or city council meeting. 

Matt, why are you still a Republican? 

The Libertarian Party awaits!!!

For Henry and Patricia

Will Campbell is the author of "Brother To A Dragonfly", which won the National Book Award in 1978. 

He was the inspiration for Reverend Will B. Dunn in the Kudzu comic strip. 

He earned a Doctorate from the Yale Divinity School. 

Any of those three things would be enough to earn some serious respect.  Campbell was also a civil rights worker in the Deep South during the 60's.  He spoke out against the Viet Nam war when almost everyone around him disagreed.  This was back in the day when "liberals" were against any war, not just Republican wars.  They didn't trust the government, no matter which team was running it. 

Heck of a guy, that Will Campbell. 

My friends Henry and Patricia are getting married this weekend in New Orleans.  I was planning to be there.  They even asked me to get ordained so I could perform the marriage ceremony.  (I got 'er done through the Universal Life Church.)  Because of some personal complications, I'm going to have to think about Henry and Patricia from afar during their wedding. 

Had I been able to be there, my part of the service would've been along these lines, boiled down and condensed considerably.....

Here's Will Campbell, writing about marriage in "Brother To A Dragonfly".  The italics are mine:

If there is a body, a community, which is truly Church, or even claims to be Church, why should it be the executor of Caesar’s documents? What is a marriage license but a legal contract? And what does any legal contract promise and offer except the right to sue one another at another time and place before another of Caesar’s agents? Perhaps such contracts are socially necessary but what does that have to do with us? And even if we are not Church now but want to become Church, free from the demands and legality of Caesar, why not start by returning all of his documents and refusing ever to do it again? “No, Mr. Caesar, that is not our understanding of what marriage is all about. If you must protect yourself and your citizenry in this fashion you may continue to do so. But not with our help and blessing. Let the faithful come before the altar of the One we must serve rather than, and before, you. And acting on His, and only His, authority we will pronounce them man and woman, husband and wife.”

Too Libertarian?  Probably.  Did Henry and Patricia know that's what they'd get if they asked me to do their wedding?  Probably. 

Back to Will Campbell:

I was never again to say, “By the authority vested in me by the State of Tennessee.” If my authority as a priest comes from the State, then I have no authority at all. From that time on, I began all weddings by saying, “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s. If you have a license, we will sign it at this time.” And then saying to the couple, “Now what we have just done is to endow you with a legal contract. It has nothing to do with Christian marriage. It is nothing more than a contract between you and this state which gives you the right to sue one another if you should ever desire to do so.” And the document is tossed casually, and sometimes contemptuously aside. “Now, the passage which begins ‘Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s continues. ‘And render unto God the things that are God’s.’ And the wedding begins at this point.”

Lord have mercy, I would have enjoyed contemptuously casting that document aside.  Especially during Jazzfest in New Orleans.  Oh well.  Back to Will Campbell:

Maybe one day I will yet follow my conscience and refuse to sign that document at all, ask the couple to have a Justice of the Peace sign the Contract of Caesar. And on a number of occasions there have been no such documents. And by the authority vested in me by Almighty God I have pronounced them man and woman, husband and wife. And I defy Caesar to question that they are married. But those without the document are required to spend an extended amount of time with me and with one another in making sure they are ready for such radical trust and commitment. For they do not have the protection that the legal contract would afford them. They cannot sue one another. They have only themselves, the community if there be one, and the source of the authority which so joins them. Those who have come with no license have not come flaunting liberation but bearing witness to servanthood. They are not products of a new morality but an anachronism of an old morality, a testimony to “Jesus Christ is Lord. Hallelujah!” (from Brother to a Dragonfly, 213-214)

You get the idea. 

Henry Farrish, my friend since the 4th grade, and Patricia Starnes, my friend since freakin' kindertgarten, would've come away from the ceremony knowing that they were by-God married.  I would've tied that knot and yanked on it in front of the entire Ninth Ward to make sure it was going to hold. 

Henry and Patricia have spent 40 to 45 years with me, and I am assured that they are ready for this type of radical trust and commitment. 

They don't need the protection of a legal contract.  Anyone who hangs out with them needs diabetes medication to keep from going into insulin shock. 

They will not sue each other. 

They have something that so many people do not have.
 
I do so wish them all the best. 

God Help Us All ! Obama is now promoting manufacturing jobs !

Barack Obama is now promoting manufacturing jobs.  Hit this link. 

I work for a manufacturing company as their shipping manager.  This is terrifying.  Doesn't he care about my child?  Our investments in our companies?  Our very way of life ????? 

This is the man who won the Nobel Peace Prize, then kept all the current wars going and got us into a few others.  Now he's going to promote manufacturing?  I can already imagine the Manufacturing Shop Bankruptcy Auction notices I'll be getting in the mail. 

We need Barack Obama promoting manufacturing jobs about like we need his Surgeon General and his wife stomping around the country trying to stamp out obesity. 

Barack Obama is the man who has achieved a teen minority unemployment of 48%. 

This is the man who has had to replace 3/4 of his totally failed economic team, but hasn't changed any of their policies !!!  (You can go ahead and cross out Larry Summers on the far left.  Long gone.)  Geithner is supposedly wanting out also, but he knows that Congress wouldn't dream of letting Obama nominate someone else for the job.  Hell, who would he nominate now that Marx is dead and Castro and Hugo Chavez are both ill? 

In an effort to kick-start Detroit, Barack H. Obama destroyed 650,000 cars with his stark raving mad Cash For Clunkers program.  That's the same economic philosophy of the old Soviet factories that made things, melted them down, and then made them some more.  It guaranteed full employment, it destroyed valuable resources, and was stark, raving mad. 

Barack Obama decided to invest your money in Green Energy.  His pet investment, Solyndra, went bankrupt a while back, and they just pulled the plug on LightSquared. 

Did Barack Obama inherit a bad economy?  Yeah, but at this point, most of us are sick and tired of Obama talking about what he inherited.  There are entire families of Rockefellers and Hiltons and Vanderbilts who don't talk about what they inherited as much as Obama has. 

Barack Obama tried to help the economy by ladling out pork to donors at unprecedented levels, $650 billion worth.  Call it the stimulus plan, the porkulus plan, whatever.  It didn't work.  Hell, he could have mailed out $6,500.00 checks to the 100 million households in America and at least gotten a political bounce out of it.  But no, it went to cronies and pet projects that Democrats had wanted to get under the Christmas tree for a long, long time.  I challenge you to name a half-dozen of those projects that an impartial jury would declare successful.  No fair Googling.  If someone spent $650 billion for your benefit, you should be able to remember something to brag about. 

Barack Obama presided over our downgrade from AAA to AA+.  Most presidents would spend the rest of their term hiding out in the Rose Garden, but Obama is out there trying to help manufacturing !!!!!

Do I need to mention "Recovery Summer"?  Way back there in 2010?  Do you feel better now?  Recovered? 

Please, Barack, stay at the house.  I apologize for dragging your wife into this at the top, but hell, she doesn't know what she's talking about.  You don't either.  Admit it.  Please stay home.  You've got two beautiful daughters who need you, just like I need my job.  I like manufacturing. 

We have a lot of competition from overseas, and but we don't need any protectionist legislation or goofy new tax schemes coming from Washington during your administration.  The last thing we need right now is your help. 

There's an old handyman/manufacturing/contracting poster that goes something like this....

Our rates are....

$50.00 per hour


$75.00 per hour if you watch


$100.00 per hour if you help


$150.00 per hour if you did the job, then called us to fix it

Our great-grandchildren will be fixing your "job" for a long time. 

Please, please, please, don't promote manufacturing.  I'm begging. 

On the care and feeding of recessions

Congratulations on your new recession ! 
Here's how to care for and feed your new economic downturn.  Just think....  By applying the right policies, you may be one of the lucky few to turn your baby downturn into a full-blown depression. 
Maybe, just maybe, you can follow in the footsteps of FDR and grow A Great Depression !   But for now, let's start small. 

1) The best way to grow a recession is to try to kill it.  Get Congress, the President, the Unions and the courts involved in killing the recession.  These are the people who couldn't run a profitable whorehouse, so your recession is bound to thrive and prosper. 

2) Take money from one group and give it to another group.  Claim that it is for our own good, and that this will help kill the baby recession.  If this doesn't scare away economic growth, nothing will.  Then sit back and watch your baby recession grow to maturity. 

3) Apply various Keynesian stimulus measures, and apply them deeply and throroughly.  Stimulus, stimulus, stimulus.  Prevent consumers from spending their own money as they see fit.  YOU are the one who is trying to save a recession.  Those selfish Tea Party Bastards are trying to reward vendors and suppliers who fill consumers' needs.  The State wants to reward donors and unions.  Which group do you want spending the money ?  Doh!!  You have an infant recession to take care of. 

4) Take a bunch of people who have never had to hire anybody, fire anybody, or produce a profit, and give them the responsibility for "creating jobs".

5) Let governors get away with bragging about how many jobs that they created.  This confuses the electorate, and continues the illusion that a larger, more active government helps an economy.  In reality, this just helps your baby recession grow.  

6) Like many other living things, recessions grow best in mounds of bullshit.  Apply it liberally.   

This chart showing ideal recession growth came from Reason magazine.  Anyone wanting to grow a recession should avoid this magazine at all costs. 

Just when I think I've created the dumbest analogy ever....

For the last few years, I've used the following analogy when trying to get people to understand how regulations and government involvement can discourage businesses from hiring employees:

When you hire a babysitter, do you look forward to withholding and paying her taxes? Do you feel obligated to provide for her health insurance? Do you believe that babysitters should be unionized, without benefit of a secret ballot election, and that you should then be forced to hire ONLY union babysitters? Would collecting taxes, providing healthcare, and paying more for union babysitters cause you to hire more or less of them?

What I try to do is convince people that if they had to provide babysitter healthcare, rest breaks, retirement plans, 401K's, tax withholding, and the like, they would simply hire fewer babysitters.  People probably wouldn't hire any babysitters. 

I use this example because in my mind, providing babysitter benefits is the most unlikely, stupidest proposal that I can think of. 

But I forgot about California. 

How will parents react when they find out they will be expected to provide workers' compensation benefits, rest and meal breaks and paid vacation time for…babysitters? Dinner and a movie night may soon become much more complicated.


Assembly Bill 889 (authored by Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, will require these protections for all “domestic employees,” including nannies, housekeepers and caregivers.


The bill has already passed the Assembly and is quickly moving through the Senate with blanket support from the Democrat members that control both houses of the Legislature – and without the support of a single Republican member. Assuming the bill will easily clear its last couple of legislative hurdles, AB 889 will soon be on its way to the Governor's desk.


Under AB 889, household “employers” (aka “parents”) who hire a babysitter on a Friday night will be legally obligated to pay at least minimum wage to any sitter over the age of 18 (unless it is a family member), provide a substitute caregiver every two hours to cover rest and meal breaks, in addition to workers' compensation coverage, overtime pay, and a meticulously calculated timecard/paycheck.


Failure to abide by any of these provisions may result in a legal cause of action against the employer including cumulative penalties, attorneys' fees, legal costs and expenses associated with hiring expert witnesses, an unprecedented measure of legal recourse provided no other class of workers – from agricultural laborers to garment manufacturers. (On the bright side, language requiring an hour of paid vacation time for every 30 hours worked was amended out of the bill in the Senate.)

Unfortunately, the unreasonable costs and risks contained in this bill will discourage folks from hiring housekeepers, nannies and babysitters and increase the use of institutionalized care rather than allowing children, the sick or elderly to be cared for in their homes. I can't help but wonder if that is the goal of AB 889 – a terrible bill that needs to be stopped.

No matter how far I try to stretch reality, no matter what dumbassed imaginary example I create, they always find a way to outdo me.  Unbelievable. 

Go here to read the entire bill. 

You now have the right to eat Roach Coach food in San Antonio

The Institute For Justice has triumphed over evil. 

Practiced since ancient times, street vending is more popular than ever. The Economist magazine predicted that in 2011 “some of the best food Americans eat may come from a food truck.” Vendors are the darlings of many food critics, and they even have their own reality show on the Food Network.

But El Paso, Texas, has recently made it illegal for mobile food vendors to operate within 1,000-feet of any restaurant, convenience store, or grocer. The city even prohibits vendors from parking to await customers, which forces vendors to constantly drive around town until a customer successfully flags them down–and then be on the move again as soon as the customer walks away.

Thus, while people across the country embrace mobile vendors for the vitality and creativity they bring to a local restaurant scene, El Paso has decided to threaten vendors with thousands of dollars in fines and effectively run them out of town. El Paso’s No-Vending Zone scheme is in place for one reason: to protect brick-and-mortar restaurants from honest competition. But economic protectionism is not a valid use of government power.




Someday soon, I'm going to throw out a Bon Apetit/Gourmet magazine parody post that ranks all of the Fort Worth Roach Coaches, since I'm somewhat of a fan of the concept. 
The people who operate them have to endure lots of crap from government pygmies. 
Go here if you've got time to read some old rants about other municipalities trying to shut down street vendors.  Or licensing tamale ladies. 

A public service announcement on CFL bulbs

From The Telegraph (UK):

Energy saving light bulbs 'contain cancer causing chemicals'

Fears have been reignited about the safety of energy saving light bulbs after a group of scientists warned that they contain cancer causing chemicals.
Their report advises that the bulbs should not be left on for extended periods, particularly near someone’s head, as they emit poisonous materials when switched on.

Peter Braun, who carried out the tests at the Berlin's Alab Laboratory, said: “For such carcinogenic substances it is important they are kept as far away as possible from the human environment.”
The bulbs are already widely used in the UK following EU direction to phase out traditional incandescent lighting by the end of this year.

But the German scientists claimed that several carcinogenic chemicals and toxins were released when the environmentally-friendly compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) were switched on, including phenol, naphthalene and styrene.
Andreas Kirchner, of the Federation of German Engineers, said: “Electrical smog develops around these lamps.

“I, therefore, use them only very economically. They should not be used in unventilated areas and definitely not in the proximity of the head.”

British experts insisted that more research was needed and urged consumers not to panic.

Dr Michelle Bloor, senior lecturer in Environmental Science at Portsmouth University, told the Daily Express: “Further independent studies would need to be undertaken to back up the presented German research.”

The Department for the Environment insists the bulbs are safe, despite the fact that they contain small amounts of mercury which would leak out if the glass was broken.
Advice on its website states: “Energy efficient light bulbs are not a danger to the public.
“Although they contain mercury, limited at 5mg per lamp, it cannot escape from a lamp that is intact.
“In any case, the very small amount contained in an energy efficient bulb is unlikely to cause harm even if the lamp should be broken.”
The latest report follows claims by Abraham Haim, a professor of biology at Haifa University in Israel, that the bulbs could result in higher breast cancer rates if used late at night.
He said that the bluer light that CFLs emitted closely mimicked daylight, disrupting the body's production of the hormone melatonin more than older-style filament bulbs, which cast a yellower light.
The Migraine Action Association has warned that they could trigger migraines and skin care specialists have claimed that their intense light could exacerbate a range of existing skin problems.

The EPA has banned numerous beneficial substances and processes for much, much less than this.  But the Obamabulbs are "green".  All is forgiven....
Pics came from here and here. 

Keep Food Legal, The Department Of Agriculture, and Sherpas For Subsidies

There is a new political organization and website in town, and it is dedicated to something that I love dearly....Groceries. 
The Keep Food Legal group is dedicated to getting the government out of our farms, our pantries and our kitchens. 
We have one employee in the Department Of Agriculture for every eleven farmers.  The ratio of other leeches, parasites and regulators is even higher if you count the guards at our borders who make sure the prescribed quotas and amounts per nation (but no more) of food can cross the border into our cage. 

Here are some details from the Keep Food Legal site.  

We Love Food
Do you love food? If you’re like us, you do. Maybe you love particular foods. Do your tastes skew toward artisan cheeses, wines, and meats? Do you live for flavorful organic vegetables sold by small farmers and producers? Or do you prefer street foods—tacos, barbecue, and the like? How about fast food? Or maybe fine dining? Or, like us, do you love some or all of the whole range of food options available across America today?

We Hate Food Bans
If you’re like us, you’ve probably also noticed that there are too many restrictions on our right to procure the foods we love, and that these restrictions are growing. At the local, state, and federal levels, elected officials have banned or are working to ban or severely restrict everything from traditional farm products (like raw milk and cheeses) and locavore-friendly farm practices (like on-farm animal slaughter and meat packaging), are seeking to prevent chefs from using common food ingredients (like salt and trans fats), and are looking to ban others from selling a variety of foods (including soda, energy drinks, bacon-wrapped hot dogs, and giant pizza slices).

Our Mission
Does all this regulation make your stomach growl, leave your palate dull, and make your blood boil? Us too. That’s why we founded Keep Food Legal (KFL).
KFL is the first nationwide membership organization devoted to culinary freedom—the right of every American to grow, raise, produce, buy, sell, cook, and eat the foods of their own choosing. KFL’s mission is to promote goodwill, fellowship, and a sense of common purpose among those who grow, raise, cook, and sell food—and those who buy and eat it. We want to unite people in the middle of the food chain (like grocers and restaurateurs) with people at both ends of the food chain (like producers, farmers, and consumers), and to use the power of this union to create a meaningful and lasting partnership between all links in the chain. KFL will thrive and be a non-partisan force for culinary choice and freedom by coalescing the food community—food producers, farmers, food sellers, chefs, home cooks, diners, foodies, grocers, bar owners, and restaurateurs. The diversity and number of our members—people like you—will be our strength.

KFL on the Issues
What are some of the issue KFL take on? The list is too long to print here, but these are some of our most important targets:

• KFL will advocate in favor of abolishing all food-related subsidies. Government subsidies distort prices and demand, cause environmental problems, and have played a large role in creating America’s obesity problem.
• KFL will work to defeat food regulations and bans which limit our freedom to produce, cook, buy, and sell the foods we want. The government has no right to tell people what we can and can’t eat.
• KFL will advocate at the federal, state, and local levels in favor of more food choices. It is not enough to oppose bad new laws. We will work—in legislatures and in the courts—to roll back bad ones already on the books.

One thing KFL will never do is advocate in favor of (or against) any particular foods or dietary choices. We believe strongly that adults should eat what they want (or what they and their doctor think is best for them). And we also believe that children should eat what they and their parents think is best for them. Government shouldn’t tell you what to eat, and neither should KFL.

Go here for some reasonably entertaining rants about what happens to your waistline if you adhere to the Department Of Agriculture's food pyramid. 

My God, ELEVEN servings of bread, cereal, rice and pasta.  No wonder the USDA is, you know, ummm, bloated. 
Those jokers don't know any more about health, growing methods, crop rotation, or erosion than anyone who actually farms.  They are Sherpas for subsidies and quotas.  That is all.  Hit the "sugar" label below. 
Let's see if the Republicans shut 'em down.  Anybody think it's going to happen? 
I didn't think so. 

My Congresswoman got shot in the head - And all I got was this lousy T-Shirt.

Ok, we've got the flags at half-mast, Barry and Michelle have stood outside the White House for their moments of silence, we've had a memorial/rally/cometogether moment in Arizona, complete with T-shirts, and I can only imagine the levels of fake emotion we're going to be exposed to at this weekend's NFL playoff games. 
For the love of God....The stadium opened the concession stands for this memorial service....

How in the hell are they tying this to violent political rhetoric?  Is the goal to get people to shut up while this Chicago con artist and his goons continue to loot the Treasury?  Do we need to be polite and civil while pointing it out? 

These people will soon control your healthcare

From Moonbattery comes this video of snow removal in New York City. 
Warning: this video features the extreme language typically associated with citizens witnessing a government project taking place. 



Just a reminder....ALWAYS look for The Union Label !

Japan's Nanny State Gone Wild - A license is required to administer coffee enemas

From WeirdAsiaNews, with a fresh coat of Whitening to the International Liberty blog:

Police in Chiba Prefecture arrested three men this month on suspicion of violating Japan’s Medical Practitioners Law by providing coffee enemas without the proper medical qualifications, according to local media reports.

Chikayoshi Hishiki (55) and two associates offered coffee-based enemas as a beauty treatment at their now-defunct alternative medicine clinics, according to leading daily Sankei Shimbun.

The three suspects denied any wrongdoing, claiming they only provided the equipment and cleaned up afterwards, while the clients themselves administered the procedure, the report said.

Some Japanese have become interested in filling their bums with java, believing they have discovered a secret dieting technique used by celebrities in the US and Europe.
George & Oliver Co., a Tokyo-based online marketer of health and beauty products, has jumped on this movement, offering do-it-yourself coffee rectal infusion kits for 9,240 yen (approx. $110).

The kit includes an enema bag, a tube of gel and six cans of “Café COLON” coffee, which is unlikely to become a Starbucks coffee-of-the day anytime soon.

Here's the International Liberty take on this crisis:

Too bad the gift-giving season is already over....

I’m sure these Japanese rules exist to unfairly enrich that nation’s medical profession. I can’t help but wonder, though, whether Japan’s bureaucrats have covered all the bases. Are tea enemas also covered by the regulations? What about if you use “fair trade certified” coffee from Starbucks? Are people allowed to buy toilets with built-in enemas? And what about bidets? Surely regular people can’t be trusted to operate such equipments without some sort of government involvement!

And now for a series of sentences I never thought I would type.  Never, ever, never....  The picture of the coffee enema T-shirt came from here.  The picture of the coffee enema kit and equipment came from here.  To read some stuff on a Soldier Of Fortune/Mercenary discussion board about the British Army pioneering a rectal infusion technique during the Falkland Islands war, go here.  The vintage coffee ad came from Flickr.  This post was written in, and therefore sponsored by, Starbucks. 

South Africa's minimum wage laws are working.

From The New York Holy Times:

....16 years after Nelson Mandela led the country to black majority rule, more than half of blacks ages 15 to 34 are without work — triple the level for whites.

....The sheriff arrived at the factory here to shut it down, part of a national enforcement drive against clothing manufacturers who violate the minimum wage. But women working on the factory floor — the supposed beneficiaries of the crackdown — clambered atop cutting tables and ironing boards to raise anguished cries against it.

Go here to read more about the racist origins of the U.S. minimum wage laws.  The authors of this legislation wanted to guarantee full white employment at the expense of blacks.  The issue was debated along those lines in Congress, and is one of the most successful pieces of legislation ever written, IF you look at it from the point of view of a Klansman.  
 
The cartoon above came from Carpe Diem, Professor Mark J. Perry's blog about economics and finance.  This next cartoon is somewhat off-topic, but I think it illustrates the same mindset. 

It's not about helping you.  It's about how I feel while I pretend to help you.