On the danger to the U.S. from cheap foreign.....robots

Pardon me while I geek out for a moment. 

Here's the BMW F30 3-Series production video.  Truly amazing. 

Because of spending about a quarter million dollars with Peterbilt a few months ago, I got to tour their mega-factory about 45 miles north of Fort Worth in Denton, TX. 

What this video doesn't properly show is how little inventory of parts there likely is on the BMW factory floor.  Nobody wants to pay for a 3-month supply of parts.  You have to pay for the space that the parts require, money that could be invested elsewhere is tied up in the parts, etc etc etc.  Auto and truck makers save themselves (and therefore you) a staggering amount of money by getting the parts just in time.   The Peterbilt factory, for instance, seemed to have no more than an hour's worth of tires at any given moment. 

Another thing the video doesn't reveal: there are probably different models going down that assembly line.  The robots don't care.  The suppliers all have their parts and components arriving in the correct order.  God, I love this stuff!!! 

But there are always Luddites who don't appreciate the glory of something like this, that the time and money saved by these robots can be applied to other purchases and desires.  Saving the last BetaMax factory (to save the jobs there) doesn't make sense.  Wait a couple of years, and saving the last VHS factory (to save the jobs there) doesn't make sense either.

Here's one idjit Youtube commenter, typical of the tribe:

james alphajet 1 month ago

this robotisation is a shame to the face of human future. thousands of people lost their jobs and millions were spent to fit machines into these transformers factories.
At the end the consumer pays the same and his neighbour lost his job!!

James doesn't understand that what was once the toy of the top .0001% is now available to even the lowest-paid American worker.  Yes, in America, even commoners drive these "horseless carriages". 

Here's Don Boudreaux, chiming in on the video:

Oh, to any of you who watch this video and lament the fact that so very much of the work that was once done by humans is now done by robots, I’ve a question for you: if a bizarre meteorological event occurs that causes millions of brand-new automobiles – indistinguishable in quality, comfort, and performance from the 2014 models now rolling off of the assembly lines at BMW, Toyota, Hyundai, Ford, etc. – to rain down safely into everyone’s driveways and parking spaces, would people, as a result, be made richer or poorer?

Here's The Whited Sepulchre, kicking it up to the next level:

Oh, to any of you who watch a random video of South Korean laborers manufacturing your pants and shoes and water hoses, work that was once done by Americans, I've a question for you: if a bizarre meterological event occurs that causes millions of brand-new pants and shoes and water hoses (all of excellent quality) to rain down safely into everyone's homes, would people in the USA, as a result, be made richer or poorer? 

Spank. 
It's called the Law Of Comparative Advantage.  Nations (but not many consumers who are given a choice) ignore it regularly. 

"Like Shooting Fish In A Barrel" - Let's interview the anti-Koch protesters

Oh Lord help us all.

There are rumors that the evil Koch brothers, Charles and David, might buy the L.A. Times.  Just having one libertarian-ish print rag on the west coast was enough to send The Great Herd Of Independent Minds into a frenzy. 

David Koch ran for Vice-President on the Libertarian Party ticket in 1980.  The platform he advocated included ending the Drug War (a war which the L.A. Times supports, BTW), recognizing marriage equality, eliminating business kickbacks subsidies, and all the other planks of the Libertarian platform that have been solidly in place since about 1971. 

The evil Koch brothers donated something like $20 million dollars to the ACLU to fight George Bush's Patriot Act.  I have a deep admiration for activist Radley Balko, who is partly funded by the Koch bro's.  Balko spends his days getting wrongly convicted death-row inmates released from Barack's jails, and fighting the Random Conviction Generator that is my home state of Mississippi's "criminal justice" system. 

Remember that.  Now, get up.  Make some popcorn.  Come back.  Hit play.  The folks from :40 through :59 are absolutely priceless. 

And when you're finished, help me promote the idea of the Koch brothers purchasing the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.  I promise to re-subscribe. 

Australia - #1 in happiness, #3 in freedom

CNN reports that Australia is the happiest country in the industrialized world. 

Paris (CNN) -- Australia has been named the world's happiest industrialized nation for the third year running, based on criteria including satisfaction, work-life balance, income and housing, a survey released Tuesday has found.


The so-called "lucky country" beat Sweden and Canada to take the top spot in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development's (OECD) Better Life Index.

Good for them. 
Any time a nations are ranked in anything that's good, happy, fun, or awesome in general, I compare those rankings to The Heritage Foundation's Freedom Index.  It turns out that Australia is ranked #3 in overall freedom. 

So what about all the other happy-happy fun-fun nations?  Any chance that Cuba or North Korea or Iran made the cut?  No. 

Here are the Top Ten Happy Nations, along with their rankings in the Freedom Index.  Needless to say, this is a reassuring comparison for liberty-lovers. 

#1 Australia - #3 in freedom
#2 Sweden - #18 in freedom
#3 Canada - #6 in freedom
#4 Norway - #31 in freedom
#5 Switzerland - #5 in freedom
#6 U.S. - #10 in freedom
#7 Denmark - #9 in freedom
#8 Netherlands - #17 in freedom
#9 Iceland - #23 in freedom
#10 United Kingdom - #14 in freedom

The correlation is slightly askew because of the absence of happiness in the Asian Tiger economies - Hong Kong, Singapore, and Taiwan.  I suspect it's a reporting error.  (I've spent about 6 months over there, for what it's worth.)  Claiming to be "happy" in some Asian cultures is almost like claiming to be "rich" or "handsome".

Anyway, the survey shows that if you want people to be happy, leave them alone. 

LIbertarian VP Candidate Judge Jim Gray at Texas Regional NORML Conference

My friend Shaun McAlister and the DFW/NORML tribe have put together a great lineup for their Texas conference.  Documentaries, speakers, How-To workshops and, of course, some rants.  Hit this link. 

My rant is scheduled for 10:30 a.m. June 8th, AND I GET TO INTRODUCE JUDGE JIM GRAY!!!  Yes, that Jim Gray.  The 2012 Libertarian Party VP nominee.    Norris Conference Center.  Downtown Fort Worth.  Hope to meet some of you good folks there.

Also, check out the 2:30 Saturday afternoon speaker.  Adrian Murray, Fort Worth Tea Party and 9-12 Activist.  If Adrian Murray is on board with ending prohibition then we've won half the battle.

******************************

Conference Agenda

This is the current agenda for the Texas Regional NORML Conference. All speakers are confirmed unless otherwise noted. Times are subject to change so check this page for the most up to date version.

Day 1 – Friday June 7, 2013
4:00 pm	Live Art and Music Reception at Froggy’s Boat House4400 White Settlement RoadFort Worth, Texas 76114$5 Cover or Free with 3 Day Pass. 18+ Welcome.

Day 2 – Saturday June 8, 2013
9:00 am	Introductions by Shaun McAlister, Executive Director of DFW NORML
9:15 am	Cheyanne Weldon of Texas NORML
9:30 am	Keith Stroup, Legal Counsel and Founder of NORML
10:00 am	Russ Belville, Executive Director of 420Radio.org
10:15 am	Terry Nelson, Executive Board Member at Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP), former Border Patrol agent and Homeland Security Supervisor
10:30 am	Allen Patterson, Chairman of the Tarrant County Libertarian Party
10:45 am	Why Our Drug Laws Have Failed and What We Can Do About It: Judge Jim Gray - 2012 Libertarian Vice Presidential Candidate and Retired Superior Court Judge
11:15 am	Meet and Greet with Judge Jim Gray, Keith Stroup and Russ Belville
11:30 am	Break for Lunch
12:30 pm	Film Screening: American Drug War 2: Cannabis Destiny
2:00 pm	Mike Hyde, father of Cash Hyde and Founder of the Cash Hyde Foundation
2:30 pm	Adrian Murray, Founding member of the 912 Project Fort Worth
2:45 pm	Joy Strickland, Founder of Mothers Against Teen Violence
3:00 pm	Using Drugs Religiously: Dr. Russell Elleven, Unitarian Minister
3:30 pm	Family Law Attorney Leslie Burgoyne
3:45 pm	Workshop: Cultivating Quality Medicine Forest Scott and Nicole Pisut of Tinctura Coltivare
4:20 pm	Closing
5:00 pm	After Party #1 at Red Goose Saloon 306 Houston Street Fort Worth, Texas 76102 $5 Cover or Free with 3 Day Pass. 18+ Welcome.

Day 3 – Sunday June 9, 2013
9:00 am	Introductions by Erik Altieri, Communications Director for National NORML
9:15 am	Stephen Betzen, Founder of the Texas Coalition for Compassionate Care
9:30 am	Workshop: Medicinal Alternatives to Smoking Marijuana Toni Ann Haskett-Mills, Patient Advocate for Medical Cannabis Patients with 28 yrs experience in Direct Patient Care
10:00 am	Larry Talley, Strategist for DFW NORML, speaker for Law Enforcement Against Prohibition and retired US Navy
10:15 am	Clif Deuvall, Co-chair of Texas at US Marijuana Party of Texas, Chairman at Texas Cannabis Party and Founder Norml of Waco Inc. at NORML
10:30 am	Jamie Balagia, Public Information Officer and Attorney at San Antonio NORML
10:45 am	Russ Belville, Executive Director of 420Radio.org
11:00 am	Hemp Fashion Show
11:45 am	Break for Lunch
1:30 pm	Workshop: Creating Concentrates Forest Scott and Nicole Pisut of Tinctura Coltivare
2:00 pm	Derek Cross, Author of Hemp Healthy Today
2:15 pm	Workshop: Cooking with Hemp Derek Cross, Author of Hemp Healthy Today
2:30 pm	Rob Kampia, Executive Director of the Marijuana Policy Project (UNCONFIRMED)
3:00 pm	Margarita McAuliffe, Students for Sensible Drug Policy and Texas Moms United
3:30 pm	Russ Buss Belville, Executive Director of 420Radio.org
3:45 pm	Tristan Tucker, Executive Director of UNT NORML
4:00 pm	Shaun McAlister, Executive Director of DFW NORML
4:20 pm	Closing
5:00 pm	After Party #2 at the Whiskey Girl Saloon2413 Ellis Ave.Fort Worth, Texas 76164$5 Cover or Free with 3 Day Pass. 18+ Welcome.

CSA 2010 - Large Carriers vs. Small Carriers

The trucking industry has recently been plagued by a new set of government regulations called CSA 2010.  (Compliance, Safety, and Accountability)

The purpose of CSA 2010 is to give large carriers an advantage over small carriers, to act as a classic "barrier to entry" for any start-ups that might consider getting into trucking, and to create jobs in the Democrat Party. 
The paperwork requirements are astounding. 
Go here to get an idea of what is involved.  Any time they use the word "stakeholder", what they generally mean is "victim". 

The chart below was put out by Commercial Carrier Journal.  Good stuff, good stuff. 

The scores you see are achieved by maintaining perfect paperwork, perfect (new) vehicles and trailers, and perfect driver logs.  It's going to force any older rigs off the road.  I've not had time to research who all lobbied for this mess, but I suspect my friends at Peterbilt, Mack, and International are in there. 

Heck, if I didn't know better, I'd think that large carriers make huge contributions to politicians and that small carriers don't. 

Fort Worth - March Against Monsanto, May 25, 2013

Here's the rant that I delivered at the "March Against Monsanto" in downtown Fort Worth yesterday.  Good times, good times. 

My name is Allen Patterson, and I’m Chair of the Tarrant County Libertarian Party.

Check us out at the Tarrant County Libertarian Meetup, The Tarrant County Libertarian Website, and remember to come to the NORML State Leadership Conference, Norris Conference Center, about 8 blocks north of here, June 7th 8th and 9th.

If you can’t remember all of that, Google Fort Worth March Against Monsanto sometime tomorrow. My website’ll be in the top 5 search results. Come see me over here any time this afternoon. I’ve got flyers, bumperstickers, and other info, and I’d love to talk to you about freedom and the Libertarian Party.

Why would the Tarrant County Libertarian Party participate in a "March Against Monsanto"? We’re supposed to be the small-government party, right?

Here’s why…. Monsanto developed some hybrid life forms. That's not problem for many of us.

Monsanto wanted a monopoly on these plants and started suing people who used "their" seeds without their permission. One of Monsanto's former lawyers, Clarence Thomas, was appointed to the Supreme Court, where he eventually wrote a majority opinion in a 2001 lawsuit, stating that "newly developed plant breeds are patentable under the general utility patent laws of the United States".

Sorry, Clarence, but if someone purchases a John Grisham novel and then re-sells it to Half-Price Books, that individual can't be sued because he didn't mail John Grisham a check. The same thing goes for purchasing, and then re-selling a car, a stapler, "Beyonce's Greatest Hits", or "Milli Vanilli - Unplugged". It's called the "First Sale Doctrine".

I own me. You own you. And if you grow some soybeans, you have a right to do what you want with the seeds. It really is that simple. Farmers have been growing plants and re-using the seeds for thousands of years, and should be allowed to continue doing so, Clarence Thomas, Elena Kegan, and Barack Obama’s FDA be damned!

But if you want Big Government, what you’re seeing today is exactly and precisely what it looks like.

Government puts a monitor in place (the FDA, the EPA) and within 25 years, the inmates are running the asylum. When you get a chance, Google the phrase “Regulatory Capture”.

Now....we’re going to play a game called “Name That President”.

I’m going to give you the name of a Monsanto employee, and you’re going to guess the name of the president who appointed him or her to regulate organizations like…..Monsanto.

It’ll be fun.

Which president appointed Monsanto director William Rucklehouse as acting head of the FBI? – Richard Nixon

Who was president when Monsanto’s VP of Government and Public Affiars was appointed as Deputy Administrator of the EPA? Clinton and Bush

Who appointed Michael Taylor, Monsanto’s Vice President of Public Policy, as Senior Advisor to the Commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration? Obama

This is what Big Government Looks Like!!!


Which president appointed former Monsanto attorney Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court? Bush

William Ruckleshaus is a retired Monsanto Board member. Which president appointed him as the very first head of the Environmental Protection Agency? Nixon

Earle H. Harbison, Jr. was once President of Monsanto. Who was president when Mr. Harbison was working his way up to Deputy Director of the CIA? (It looks like Ford, Carter, Reagand and Bush)

Who elected Monsanto lobbyist Toby Moffett to the U.S. Congress? You did, if you voted for him. 

Who elected Monsanto legal Counsel Dennis DeConcini to the U.S. Senate? You did, if you voted for him.

Who was president of the USA when Monsanto’s Chemical Lab Supervisor Margaret Miller was Deputy Director of the Food and Drug Administration? Daddy Bush and Clinton

This is what Big Government Looks Like!!!

Which president appointed Marcia Hale, Monsanto’s International Government Affairs Director to his White House Senior Staff? Clinton

Which President appointed Mickey Kantor, a Monsanto Board Member, as Secretary Of Commerce? Clinton

Which Presidents appointed Linda Fisher, Monsanto’s Vice President of Government and Public Affairs, as Deputy Administrator of the EPA? Bush, Clinton

Which President appointed Roger Beachy, the Director of Monsanto’s Danforth Center, as Director of the National Institute of Food and Agriculture? Barack Obama

Folks, I could go on and on and on. There are about a dozen others on the list.

I often wonder if you move back and forth from Monsanto to Government, does it even count as a job change?

This is what Big Government looks like.

I’m Allen Patterson, Chair Of the Tarrant County Libertarian Party.

Check us out at the Tarrant County Libertarian Meetup, The Tarrant County Libertarian Website, and remember to come to the NORML State Leadership Conference, Norris Conference Center, about 8 blocks north of here, June 7th 8th and 9th.

If you can’t remember all of that, Google Fort Worth March Against Monsanto sometime tomorrow. My website’ll be in the top 5 search results.

Come see me over here. I’ve got flyers, and I’d love to talk to you about Liberty and the Libertarian Party.

We’re the party that is pro-choice about EVERYTHING, including what you can do with your own damn soybeans.

Congressman Stephen Fincher (R-Sugar Tit)

Back in 2010, an Agriculture Subsidies Welfare Queen named Stephen Fincher ran for Congress and won.

Here's a campaign pic of the smiling Fincher family, content in the knowledge that no one will ever legislate that they be Drug Tested prior to receiving their corporate welfare check.  CPS will never show up at their home to ensure that the parents of these kids aren't blowing the money (that you sent them) on crack.   You donated to the Fincher family on April 15, tax day, whether you wanted to or not. 

Here's some of the rant I posted about his campaign a couple of years ago:

Stephen Fincher, a Republican candidate for congress in Tennessee's 8th district, favors small-government, lower taxes, and he has an appropriate disdain for Obamacare.

Good for him.
He's also a gospel singer.
He's a succesful cotton farmer.

And in one eleven-year period, from 1995 - to 2006, Fincher and his wife received 2.5 million dollars in crop subsidies from government you.

Now, just for the sheer joy of it, imagine if the Democrats dared to nominate a traditional welfare queen for Congress. Someone who sits around the house all day, collecting welfare and producing little babies who will reliably vote for Democrats. Do you think there might be an uproar?

So what is there about this form of welfare that bathes Stephen Fincher in such down-home, cottony goodness?

When our government subsidizes a particular crop, it confuses the price signals. In a truly free market, if too much cotton was produced, the price would drop. Fewer people would grow cotton. The price would then reflect what people were willing to pay for it, and what farmers would willingly be paid to grow it.

If not enough cotton was on the market, the price would rise. More and more people would grow cotton until the price dropped again.

Are Obama and Pelosi and Reid paying too many people to grow cotton? We'll never know.

But are you having to pay too much for cotton T-shirts, shirts, socks and sheets because of farm subsidies and prohibitive tariffs on cotton imports? Hell yes.

The rant continues for a few more paragraphs, explaining how Brazil was going to retaliate with tariffs on our exported cotton because of Uncle Sam giving handouts to Welfare Queens like Fincher.  We compromised by buying most of the Brazilian Cotton crop.  I swear to God, that's how we solved the problem. 
I hope you'll read the whole thing. 
Go here for it. 
I grinned several times, having forgotten most of the thing.   

Congressman Fincher is back in the news, this time because he wants to cut food stamps while maintaining his own place at the public trough. 
Hell, I'm all for feeding people, but we could easily make a lot of progress on lowering the price of food by ending the Fincher Subsidy, and then ending all the quotas, tariffs, and limitations related to what Mr. Obama allows to come through the bars of our national cage.  The Institute for International Economics estimates the annual cost of U.S. foreign protectionism at $6,027 per household.   

I think that $6,000.00 per family would make up for a lot of food stamps, don't you?  But then Mr. Fincher's farm has to be protected.  Here's what was in today's Huffington Post:

Fincher has said his farm would have shut down without the subsidies, which he argued protect American farmers from more heavily subsidized foreign competition. "We would be all for not having government in our business," Fincher told the Washington Post in 2010, "but we need a fair system."

The federal government's complex system of farm subsidies is supposed to shield farmers from some of the uncertainties inherent to the industry, but critics like the Environmental Working Group say the safety net unfairly benefits the biggest farms at the expense of smaller ones.

You think that farming has "some uncertainties inherent to the industry"???  Try building fruitstands.  Open a restaurant.  Start a used bookstore.  Open a clothing store.  Go into the carwash business.  Drive a semi-truck.  Those businesses open and struggle and crash and burn every day.
There's risk everywhere. 
But the risk in farming is just more....wholesome, right? 

And that's how Welfare Queens like Congressman Stephen Fincher (R-Sugar Tit) wind up getting $70,000 a year from the government  from you. 

I hope everyone has a great Memorial Day weekend, and that everyone pause for a few minutes to think of those who fought and died to support Stephen Fincher in the style to which he has grown accustomed. 

Too harsh.  Have a GREAT Memorial Day weekend!!!  Be safe!!  

"Coming Home" - by Sabrina Brady

This morning's Google logo features a heartwarming drawing by Sabrina Brady called "Coming Home". 
I can't imagine what this feels like for a kid - being reunited with a parent who has been in harm's way for months and months. 

But it's getting to the point where you can't go to a football or baseball game without seeing an orchestrated surprise reunion between a soldier/sailor/airman and his family.  These things are great.  But they distract us from the bigger issue. 

We have enough Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine and Coast Guard personnel on active duty to put a soldier, sailor, pilot, marine or coast-guarder at every 20 feet of the U.S.'s borders.  I figured it out the other day.  Every 20 feet. 

On the other hand, we have Secretary's Of State like John Kerry, She Whose Name Is Not Spoke, Condi Rice and Colin Powell wandering the earth, sticking our noses into other people's bidness, drumming up more and more business for Lockheed and General Dynamics.   

Do you think that maybe, just maybe, fewer soldiers would experience tearful reunions if we kept John Kerry at his house for a couple of years? 

Our employees just found out "what's in the bill"

Joy.  Bliss. 

About 500 employees at my workplace, Jukt Micronics, recently found out "what's in the bill" (to quote Nancy Pelosi).
 


This questionnaire went out to each shop, just to kinda get a feel for how the employees felt about things. 

Here's how the thing was worded:

**************************

Starting in 2014, the US government is enacting a law which requires every person to have health insurance or be charged an additional tax.  As a requirement of this law, Jukt Micronics will be providing a plan that you may join.  We need to get an idea of how many employees might be interested in this coverage.  there will be a cost to us as employees with these options. 

* Option 1:  Pay approximately $1,800.00 per year (this breaks down to $150.00 per month or $34.00 per week) for company-provided health care coverage with an estimated deductible of $3,000.00 per individual.

* Option 2: Pay a government fine or tax of $95.00 for the first year or 1% of your annual income, whichever is greater.  (If you made $18,000.00 in box 2 of your W-2 last year, 1% of $180 - just move the decimal point over two places.) 

*Option 3: Obtain insurance coverage through the individual market, i.e. Blue Cross, Aetna, or some other "family plan". 

**************************

Work kinda ground to a halt as everyone digested this. 

But let's say you're a low-income worker, making $8.50 per hour.  You're going to pay the fine.  Every time.  They can't turn away pre-existing conditions.  If you get cancer or if you accidentally saw your leg off, you can sign up for insurance in the ambulance (or in my case, the helicopter) on the way to the hospital.  The damn fools wrote it where insurance companies can't turn away anyone with a pre-existing condition. 

Ok, how about high-income workers? 

Same thing.  The only people who will pay $1,800.00 per year with a $3,000.00 deductible are those with incomes higher than $180,000.00
Otherwise, they're better off paying the fine.  (Yeah, the fines go up each year after 2014, but there's no penalty for getting a good deal the first year!!)
They can't turn anyone away from insurance coverage, so signing up for it after you've gotten sick seems to be the only rational response to the law.
As I wrote multiple times during the debates about this madness, no one will stay in the business of insuring the houses that have already caught on fire, but that's what The Teleprompter Jesus has asked insurance companies to do.

As our cleaning guy said, "This thing kinda sounds like slavery." 

I'll be writing more (with some input from our H.R. department) as the questionnaires come in. 

The March Against Monsanto - Fort Worth, Texas Edition

Why would the Tarrant County Libertarian Party participate in a "March Against Monsanto"? (Saturday, May 25th at 1:00 p.m., General Worth Square, Downtown Fort Worth)


Because that's where a crowd is going to be !!! We'll be handing out flyers and spreading the word about the Libertarian movement.

And seriously.... Monsanto developed some hybrid life forms. That's not problem for many of us.

Monsanto wanted a monopoly on these plants and started suing people who used "their" seeds without their permission.

One of Monsanto's former lawyers, Clarence Thomas, was appointed to the Supreme Court, where he eventually wrote a majority opinion in a 2001 lawsuit, stating that "newly developed plant breeds are patentable under the general utility patent laws of the United States".

Sorry, Clarence, but if someone purchases a John Grisham novel and then re-sells it to Half-Price Books, that individual can't be sued because he didn't mail John Grisham a check.

The same thing goes for purchasing, and then re-selling a car, a stapler, or Beyonce's Greatest Hits. It's called the "First Sale Doctrine".

The Tarrant County Libertarian Party Executive Committee believes that corporations shouldn't "own" life forms. Where would it end? Farmers have been planting, growing, and then re-using their seeds for ten thousand years. Clarence Thomas and Monsanto should not be allowed to interfere in that process.

Hope to see you there, Saturday May 25th, General Worth Square, 900 Main Street. It starts at 1:00 p.m. Go to the open area north of the Fort Worth Convention Center. Look for the old hippies and passionate Gen-X'ers.

I own me. You own you. And if you grow some soybeans, you have a right to do what you want with the seeds. It really is that simple.

I'm 103

Despite having no budget, no staff, no foundation, no board of directors, and (often) no sobriety, this website is still hanging in at #103 on the list of Top Libertarian Websites.  Go here. 

Google started steering traffic away from their Blogspot line about a year or so ago.  I'm not griping.  People who are worth a crap can create their own audience, right?  Anyway, traffic is waaaaaaay down on this thing as compared to two years ago. 

I'll take it.  Thanks for reading, and thanks for hitting the ads.  The money from that pays for a Starbucks double-espresso every morning of my life. 

(And I can't believe I'm outdrawing Hammer Of Truth, Cato-At-Liberty, and the freakin' Goldwater Institute! Stephan Kinsella and Walter Block better watch their backs.  I bet they can already smell the dachshunds....) 

On Liberals, Progressives, and using a name until you've defiled it

Here's something from one of George Will's latest rants:

Liberalism’s agenda has been constant since long before liberals, having given their name a bad name, stopped calling themselves liberals and resumed calling themselves progressives, which they will call themselves until they finish giving that name a bad name.

 I think of myself as a "Classical Liberal".  Hit this link for the reason why.  Here's a partial definition:

Classical liberalism is a political philosophy and ideology that emerged as a response to the Industrial Revolution and urbanization in the 19th century in Europe and the United States.  It shares a number of beliefs with other belief systems belonging to liberalism, advocating civil liberties and political freedom, limited government, rule of law, and belief in free marke.  Classical liberalism is built on ideas that had already arisen by the end of the 18th century, such as selected ideas of Adam Smith, John Locke, Jean-Baptiste Say, Thomas Malthus, and David Ricardo, stressing the belief in free market and natural law, utilitarianism, and progress. Classical liberals were more suspicious than conservatives of all but the most minimal government....

When David Nolan started my political party in 1973, he had to call it "Libertarian", because the group already calling themselves "Liberals" had squatters' rights on the name.  Unfortunately, these phony Liberals advocated higher taxes, bigger government, prohibition, protectionism, quotas, tariffs, and a host of other plagues. 

Prior to that, this (mostly Democrat) group had called itself "Progressive".  Hit this link.  The history of the Progressives (eugenics, prohibition, creating the Federal Reserve, etc.) is too depressing to copy and paste.  Anyway, the Progressives had started calling themselves Liberals sometime in the 1930's when FDR started screwing up the world. 

I'm betting that the Statists will stop calling themselves "Progressives" sometime in the next ten years.  By that time the stench of failure should've left the word "Liberal", and libertarians will be able to refer to themselves by that term.  Heck, look at the Latin words "Liber," "Libera," and "Liberum" from the root meaning, "to pour." From these we get the word "Liberty", from the freedom we feel when we get drunk.  (Seriously.  Hit the link.  Liberty comes from the latin root for getting plastered.)  We also get "Liberation".  "Libertarian."  "Liberate."  And of course, "Liberal". 

Liberals need to either change their name, or change their ways.  The good guys want the word back. 

Go here to read more about the Classical Liberal tradition. 

Where would you prefer to live?

The DFW NORML April Meeting Video

Here's the DFW NORML April Meeting video, from the Whiskey Girl Saloon in the Fort Worth stockyards.  (Yes, they really do have a mock police car with a marijuana leaf on the hood.) 
Shaun McAlister has done one heck of a job building this organization. 
For anyone wondering what I look and sound like, go to the 12:00 mark. 
My observations on form, not content, below the video:



1) I need to lose 40 pounds.  Quick.  None of my old suits fit me, and I wanted one for our gun rights debate that was held earlier the same day.  Got this lovely ensemble, the jacket and pants, for just $104.00 at Sears (after saving $15.00 by getting a Sears credit card).  If those clothes were to catch on fire, they would melt back to their original state as a sheet of plastic. 

2) I need to smile more.  I mean really overdo it. 

3) Lord have mercy, I speak like someone from Mississippi. 

Shaun has also asked me to speak on the topic of my choice at the upcoming Texas Regional NORML Conference, June 7th-9th, in downtown Fort Worth's Norris Conference Center.  Hit the link.  I can't wait!!!

BTW, if you've ever wondered whether or not Broadway Baptist Church is the coolest religious institution on the planet, wonder no more.  Broadway has TWO members speaking at a weed legalization conference. The great Dr. Alan Bean is the other one.  Go figure. 

Herb's the word !!!

Why free markets are better than quotas for achieving "diversity"

I have a co-worker/friend at Jukt Micronics that I'm going to call "Jim". 
Jim is gay. 
He's not political about it, he doesn't go to the bars, and he doesn't crusade. It doesn't matter either way, and long-time readers of this site know that I don't care.
 
Jim just got one heck of a promotion.  He's been elevated into the stratosphere of the Jukt Micronics sales department where he'll be taking care of what'll soon be Canada's #1 retailer, if it isn't already.

Jim wasn't given this job to fill a quota, or to show off how "diverse" we are.  Jim did a heck of a job when he was running Customer Service, and if we hadn't hired and promoted him, someone else would've hired him and possibly made a lot of money with him selling to Canada's #1 retailer.

Our #1 salesperson is usually a woman named....  Well, I dare not speak it.   We all fear her.  Competitors won't hire her, because they're afraid she'd take over.  One doesn't achieve the highest sales total every year by merely being quota-filler.  She has the highest sales by making heroic personal sacrifices, taking care of bidness, and squashing everyone else like a bug.   

Our plastic, wood and metal shop Production Managers are Black, Hispanic, and Black, respectively.  Dig down a little deeper and you'll find a Cambodian clear plastic supervisor, a Cambodian design supervisor, a Serbian wire shop supervisor, and another gaggle of bosses who all seem to be from the same neighborhood in Mexico.  My boss, the Operations V.P., is from Juarez. 

Our meetings sometimes look like the United Nations' break room.  Nobody planned it, nobody even wanted it.  The owners just started going for the best people they could afford, and that's what happened.

Compare my workplace to this....  It's from an article in City Journal by Heather MacDonald called "Multiculti U", about the insane expenses associated with "diversity" programs in the California college system.  Hit this link to read the whole thing. 

In September 2012, for instance, as the university system faced the threat of another $250 million in state funding cuts on top of the $1 billion lost since 2007, UC San Diego hired its first vice chancellor for equity, diversity, and inclusion. This new diversocrat would pull in a starting salary of $250,000, plus a relocation allowance of $60,000, a temporary housing allowance of $13,500, and the reimbursement of all moving expenses. (A pricey but appropriately “diverse” female-owned executive search firm had found this latest diversity accretion.) In May 2011, UCLA named a professional bureaucrat with a master’s degree in student-affairs administration as its first assistant dean for “campus climate,” tasked with “maintaining the campus as a safe, welcoming, respectful place,” in the words of UCLA’s assistant vice chancellor and dean of students. In December 2010, UC San Francisco appointed its first vice chancellor of diversity and outreach—with a starting salary of $270,000—to create a “diverse and inclusive environment,” announced UC San Francisco chancellor Susan Desmond-Hellmann. Each of these new posts is wildly redundant with the armies of diversity functionaries already larding UC’s bloated bureaucracy.

Good God in heaven, what a mess. 

Full disclosure:  Jukt Micronics isn't remotely "normal".  It's an insane place to work.  Hours are long.  It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter.  The first time I went to lunch with a plant manager, he warned me that "we are a screaming company".  And yet we've accidentally achieved a level of diversity that other places can't even dream of, and it didn't cost us a dime.  We made money doing it!!!   

Competition for employees, for raw materials, and for ideas has a way of cleansing and purifying things.  What if we had decided early on to not hire any ethnic or social minorities?  Who would it have hurt more, Jukt Micronics or the potential employees that we would've unwisely declined to hire?  I think it would've killed us. 

Read the entire Heather MacDonald piece if you get a chance.  And then try to decide which organization has the best approach to achieving diversity: California's college system, or a bunch of Texans who wanted to make the best display fixtures for the best price.

And congratulations, Jim!   

The Odious Chinese Nachos Story

I’m not a picky eater. My father was a big advocate of “Eat what they set before you”, and my mother likes to try different recipes, mostly Southern Living Magazine’s fried salad/fried watermelon offerings. Good stuff.

When I cook, recipes are nothing but points of departure – a suggestion on how the other person once did it. If you’ve never run short on ingredients and hollowed out a Pop-Tart and used the crust in place of bread crumbs, you have no business calling yourself a cook.

But creativity has limits….

One of my China trips was supposed to last only 3 weeks (typically I’m gone for 5). Problems had erupted, solutions were rejected, and the bosses asked me to stay for another week. I failed in that week’s missions, so they asked me to stay yet another week.

After week four in the land of Mandarin Chinese, I was ready to speak some English. I can usually entertain myself with the contents of my head (one of the many, many advantages of an old-school Liberal Arts education) but I found myself bothering Texas co-workers on Skype more than necessary, and called home too many times at odd hours only to learn that the grass was still growing and that no dachshunds had died.

I started lurking in the lobby of the Xiamen Princess Hotel, hoping to catch other manufacturing exiles who could talk football, food, politics or even American Idol. After several nights of reading downstairs, advertising my availability like a Shanghai harbor whore, I saw someone going through the buffet line, a guy that looked like an American. He had on a John Deere Tractor T-shirt!

I ran over and introduced myself. (I may have offered to buy him a drink, given him my phone number, my room number, and told him how fit and manly he looked in his John Deer T-shirt.) He sensed my desperation level, and asked if I wanted to hang out with him and a buddy the next night. I’ve forgotten the guy’s name (Jason?), but he turned out to be from Memphis, Tennessee, and he and I had actually deer hunted on the same land in Tallahatchie County, Mississippi. His family had a successful business manufacturing high-end dresses in a factory two hours from Xiamen.

One night later, I met Jason and his friend Jeremy (?) in the lobby. We were going to go to Xiamen, China’s first Mexican restaurant. Let me be clear: we were going to go to Xiamen, China’s first Mexican restaurant.

I’m an optimist. Having already experienced Cleveland, Mississippi’s first Chinese restaurant, Jackson, Mississippi’s first Thai restaurant, and Merigold, Mississippi’s first ever restaurant, I didn’t think things could go too wrong in Xiamen’s first Mexican restaurant.

Jeremy, who was somewhat fluent in Mandarin, explained the sign over the front door – “Xiamen’s House Of Mexico”. The place had a ragged tourist-trap sombrero hung on one wall, and a map of Texas and Mexico painted on another. (Chinese people generally don’t know the shape of Mexico, but everyone knows the shape of Texas, and perhaps the Lone Star State was included as a point of reference. You are about to eat food from the little country south of the nation of Texas. Canadian singer/songwriter Fred Eaglsmith likes to talk about how proud Texas is of its shape. We’ll put that shape on anything.) If not for the mariachi hat and the Texican wall map, the place could’ve been any other noodle shop.

Well, except for the menu….

Veteran China travelers often collect examples of bad “Chinglish”. The menus at this place were in Spanese. Or Chinish. Whatever you call it when you cross Manchu Wok with Taco Bell. After we ordered our beers, Jeremy determined that the menu item “Chips Beef Medley Layer Family” was probably nachos. You can’t go wrong with nachos.

Here’s how they went wrong with nachos:

These restauranteurs had never seen, smelled, tasted, eaten, chewed or shat Mexican food in their lives.

My theory was that everything on the menu was created from photographs, with no other guidance.

Let’s start at the bottom of the “Chips Beef Medley Layer Family”, shall we? Where god-fearing Mexicans would put some corn tortilla chips as a foundation, Xiamen’s House Of Mexico had a layer of rice chips. Not a problem. They don’t grow much corn in China. When in Rome, etc., etc., etc.

Most nachos continue upward with a layer of sliced and spiced chicken or beef. The Chips Beef Medley Layer Family nachos got by with a thin layer of shaved pork. I’ve never seen this stuff outside of Asia, but it’s pretty good. Take some pig meat and repeatedly run it across a cheese grater for a couple of years. It has a good taste with almost no texture. Dust it on the rice chips of your Chips Beef Medley Layer Family, shortly before adding your….cheese.

Asians (stereotype alert!) generally don’t like cheese or dairy. They think that cheese tastes and smells like baby vomit, which, when you come to think of it….it does. That’s why one cheese is as good as another to them. Take some leftover Limburger and Munster, or any combo that smells worse, throw them in your Crock Pot and melt it until it can be smelled throughout the Middle Kingdom, from Beijing to Hong Kong. Apply liberally to the pulverized pork, and you have the stinky middle child of your Medley Layer Family in place.

I know for a fact that the Master Chef at Xiamen’s House Of Mexico had never been exposed to salsa. Or Picante, Pico De Gallo, Ranchero, Guacamole, Chimichurri Sauce, Habaneros, or Chipotle. This guy had never even seen a bottle of Wal-Mart’s Old El Paso Picante Sauce from New Jersey. So he improvised. The upper stuff in his nacho photos was red. Tomatoes are red. He needed red stuff.  So he took a large can of Campbell’s Tomato Paste and put three thick slices of it on top of the Limburgermunster cheese. We could still see the ring marks from the Campbell’s can.

Remember my Chinese stereotype, the one where they don’t like cheese or dairy? The chef's photo of nachos probably showed a dollop of sour cream on top of the Chips Beef Medley Layer Family. Native Chinese can’t imagine eating sour cream.

What to do, what to do?

Instead of sour cream, they topped off the rice chips, the shaved pork, the Dr. Scholl’s Shoe Insert Cheese, and the slices of tomato paste with…. A big ol’ scoop of Kool Whip.

I’ve probably spent six months in China, and have had only four or five bad meals. Of the bad meals, this was the one I enjoyed the most. Jason, Jeremy and I didn’t act like The Ugly Americans. We were polite. We used the rice chips to dig out the shredded pork. We drank. We bonded. We drank some more. 

Having learned our lesson, we decided to stop experimenting with Asian/Mexican Fusion Food. We vowed to eat the next night where the Chinese eat, to experience what the locals were eating. The next night, we ate at Kentucky Fried Chicken.

The Greatest Possible Accomplishment Of Any Politician

Congratulations, Mary Kelleher !!!

Let me tell you a story.

About two months ago, I got an email from my friend Layla Caraway.  She invited me to a meeting about the Tarrant Regional Water District board elections.  It was the most politcally diverse room I've ever been in. 

There were Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, 9-12'ers, Greens, and environmental activists.  We had one thing in common.  We were all sick of Fort Worth taking land and money from the little guy and giving it to the big guy. 

We'd tried and failed before to get candidates onto this board.  This time we had some money and a consultant. 

We had a trio of three candidates - John Basham, an experienced candidate, Tim Nold, a surveyor, and Mary Kelleher, an Arlington landowner and rancher/farmer who had gotten sick of her property falling into the river.  And black helicopters landing in her ranch without permission in the middle of the night.  You know, the usual. 

Mary was painfully shy in that first meeting. 

Mary turned into a monster candidate. 

Mary Kelleher went out and won the son of a bitch!!!  She did it. 

Go here.  Most of the article is the usual Star-Telegram blather supporting anything City Hall wants to do.  But here are the money quotes:

In recent years, the district has also been a key player in the $909 million Trinity Uptown project, a flood control and economic development effort that stretches from an industrial area on Fort Worth’s near north side to the green spaces of Gateway Park on the east side. Its plans include a bypass channel and a Town Lake north of downtown.


District officials worried that if Basham’s slate prevailed, a number of projects would be in jeopardy.

They said that if the pipeline project were stopped, it would mean dire consequences, including water shortages.

Oh yes.  There would have been "dire consequences".  Our guys woulda stopped that boondoggle faster than you can say "Crony Capitalism".  That thing has more to do with The Manichean Heresy than it has to do with flood control. 

But the people now have a voice on the water board.  We have access to the file cabinets (if they've bothered to keep any records).  No more Freedom Of Information Act requests will be necessary. 

Note to the Star-Telegram - Let us know if you want to learn anything about how Fort Worth's money is being spent by your downstairs neighbors on the water board.  Maybe one day you'll want to stop cheerleading and start doing your freakin' job. 

Why are journalists so liberal?

Why are journalists so liberal?

(For readers in the UK and elsewhere, I'm using the word "liberal" in the American sense, meaning that they generally support turning over the economy, education, healthcare and self-protection over to charismatic social-climbers who can win elections.) 

Why are journalists so liberal? 

They aren't.  Governments are. 

I've had a glorious time for the last couple of months supporting a trio of candidates for our local River/Water Development Board.  In my mind, the opposing sides couldn't be more starkly divided.  Our opponents are planning to take over a lot of land via Eminent Domain and make sweetheart deals with developers.  If past history is any guide, there will be plenty of no-bid contracts.  There will be restaurants and apartment buildings built INSIDE the flood plain.  There's a project we call "Lake Granger" that is so far over budget that....hell, I give up.  Go here to read about the condition of the project three years ago.  No idea how much they've blown so far, but it's huge.  The project manager, JD Granger, is the son of congresswoman Kay Granger.  He's a former Assistant D.A. and his previous project management experience was a science project in the 9th grade.   

In the meantime, the river water isn't fit for recreation, much less drinking, and the government won't allow you to eat any fish caught in the river. 

The candidates that I've been supporting just want to provide plenty of drinkable water, populated with fish that won't kill you.  They want to honor property rights.  That's it. 

The local journalists at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram overwhelmingly support the land thefts and the bloated make-work projects.  Go figure. 

But think about it....  Governments get themselves elected by giving out gifts.  It's what they do.  And sometimes, that's exciting.  The group of Barking Seals currently on the water board have already opened up a Flood Control BBQ joint, and there are plans for a Flood Control Drive-In Movie Theatre.  Fun, fun, fun.  Their supporters include most of the major engineering firms that will be involved in the boondoggle. 

Which group would you prefer to write about?  The happy-happy party crowd, slipping their Bar Tabs into the diapers of the infants?  Or the puritans who just want a clean river? 

Hey, guys, I'm trying to write a story.  Can you tell me anything about your big plans? 
Nope.  We're not going to do much.  Just keep human feces out of the Trinity River. 
Oh.... Never mind. 

Plus, the big-spending incumbents are already on speed-dial. 

And that is why journalists are generally liberal. 

What happens when you ignore the Libertarian Party's Economic Platform?

Here's part of the preamble to the Libertarian Party's Economic Platform. 

The only proper role of government in the economic realm is to protect property rights, adjudicate disputes, and provide a legal framework in which voluntary trade is protected. All efforts by government to redistribute wealth, or to control or manage trade, are improper in a free society. 

 Back in 2008, the voters put in a president and a congress who didn't believe in those simple principles.  Or, to put it more accurately, Obama and congress wanted to back a few trailers up to The Treasury and start hauling off some loot.

They used Keynesian economic theories to justify their spending, wasting, thieving and stimulating.  They would have been just as happy to use the hidden messages in the inspirational poetry of Helen Steiner Rice.  (Seriously.... I don't believe anyone in government truly believes in Keynesian economics.  It's a convenient moral cover for giveaways to supporters.) 

We were supposedly on the edge of a cliff back in 2008. 
Certain institutions were declared "too big to fail" and got massive bailouts. 
Quasi-government entities like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which had been pumping billions into the housing market because (hell, who knows?) suddenly had no more chips to cash in. 
We received a massive, record-setting stimulus package.  It was the largest experiment in Keynesian Pork ever attempted. 
We paid people to destroy their cars and gave them credit for new ones. 
Ben Bernanke and Timmy "Tax Dodger" Geithner started pumping another $63,000,000,000.00 per month into the cash supply, and The Fed is still doing it. 
They had to do this because of "what we inherited". 
Hell, what we inherited looks pretty good compared to where we are now. 
Here you go.  This is from the notorious Tea Party rag, The Washington Post. 

Since Obama’s first full month in office in February 2009, the unemployment rate has gone from terrible (8.3 percent) to very bad (7.5 percent). But a true picture of just how bad the unemployment situation is in our country is revealed by the fact that more than 9.5 million people have dropped out of the labor force since the president took office in 2009. Undoubtedly, the impact of this number is reflected in some of the other indices and statistics that we can use to objectively measure the success of the Obama presidency.

In the past five years, 9.5 million people have quit working and the current labor force participation rate is just 63.6 percent, the lowest it’s been since May 1979. More than 15.2 million more people are on food stamps today than were in February 2009, and during the same time frame, the poverty rate has increased by 0.7 percent.

Gasoline prices have almost doubled under Obama, and there’s nothing more corrosive for the middle class than when more cash comes out of everyone’s pockets at the pump. This is especially true given that the median household income has dropped more than $3,000 during the Obama presidency.

All the while we have experienced the biggest jump in our national debt in history under Obama, with the debt exploding from $11 trillion at the end of 2008 to almost $17 trillion today. And I’ll point out once again that if we look at this huge number in more relatable terms, our current national debt translates to a cost of more than $148,000 per taxpayer, up from just over $90,000 per taxpayer in 2008.

Even the infamous “Misery Index,” created by Jimmy Carter, has gotten worse under the Obama presidency. Remember, the Misery Index is the unemployment rate plus the inflation rate. In January 2009, the index was 7.83, but as of March 2013, it increased to 9.07.

It’s safe to say that the above statistics are key benchmarks of the U.S. economy. You can pick through other available figures and try to find some small pieces of good news, but by any measure, what these data show is that things have gotten worse rather than better for many Americans during Obama’s tenure.

 Well, the Washington Post should've mentioned who has done well under The Coming Of The Obamassiah, just to be fair.  Here's Investor's Business Daily: 

Using Census data on net worth, the Pew report found that from 2009 to 2011, the richest 7% of Americans saw their net worth climb an average $697,651 — equal to a 28% gain.

The rest of the country saw their net worth drop an average $6,079 — equal to a 4% loss.

As a result, far from making the country more equal, Obama's policies have produced a greater concentration of wealth, with the share of wealth held by the top 7% rising to 63% in 2011, up from 56% in 2009, Pew found.

As I've noted before on these pages, if you look at the top 1% of wealthy counties in the U.S., half of them are the 13 or so surrounding Washington D.C.  The government spend more than $60,000.00 per poor family on anti-poverty programs.  Somehow, I think a lot of money gets sent to D.C. and stays in D.C.   

So, in summary....

The only proper role of government in the economic realm is to protect property rights, adjudicate disputes, and provide a legal framework in which voluntary trade is protected. All efforts by government to redistribute wealth, or to control or manage trade, are improper in a free society.