Happy Earth Day - We'll Leave The Lights Off For You !!

I'll never tire of posting this satellite picture contrasting free-market, hog-stomping capitalist South Korea with its more "enlightened" big-government, top-down, control-freak, regulatory hell, benevolent Big Brother worshipping neighbor, North Korea. 

North Korea - Where Every Day Is Earth Day

Is it remotely possible that shortages are caused by price controls?

Don Boudreaux has read an article in the New York Holy Times, an article that speculates that maybe, perhaps, possibly, there is a potential theoretical smidgen of a chance that Bolivia's shortages are caused by price controls. You know, kinda like our current high minority unemployment rate is caused by price controls. Here's what Boudreaux wrote to the Times....

Regarding your report on the chronic shortages of consumer goods in Venezuela (“With Venezuelan Cupboards Bare, Some Blame Price Controls,” April 21): of course these shortages are caused by price controls. By preventing prices from telling the truth about underlying conditions of supply and demand, such controls spread economic lies. Producers and consumers are thus misled into acting destructively rather than productively.


Price controls, though, are only the most ham-fisted maneuver used by politicians to distort prices in order to mislead the public about market realities. Another favorite ploy is to condemn and threaten “speculators.” Consider Chavez himself. He irresponsibly increases the supply of the Venezuelan bolivar and then, when the inevitable inflation begins, combines overt price controls with a bellicose vow to punish what he sneeringly calls “bourgeoisie speculation.”

Such blame-shifting is very near a constant with politicians.

It’s worth noting that, although the President of the United States hasn’t the power of Generalisimo Chavez, Pres. Obama’s attacks on speculators are just as politically opportunistic and economically ignorant – and potentially as destructive – as are any such attacks issued by Latin American dictators.

Sincerely,

Donald J. Boudreaux
Professor of Economics
George Mason University
Fairfax, VA 22030

Ouch.  And his attempt at reducing the price of healthcare hasn't even kicked in yet. 

The Obamabanana poster came from The People's Cube.    The George Mason University coffee mug shwon below was a gift from Dr. Ralph. 

Che Poster

I've spent a pleasant weekend (so far) with The Aggie at Chilifest, the two-day country music event in College Station.
Haven't seen a single Che Fashion Victim in two days.

Kim Jong-Il is dead !

I've been swamped at work for about two weeks, and have gotten behind. 

So....

KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD !  KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD !  KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD !  KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD !  KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD !  KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD !

Ah..., that felt good.  I don't believe in any of the various Hells, but in the words of my friend Denny, I kinda hope they invent one just for that Totalitarian bastard. 

How bad a dictator was Kim?  He was so bad that even our State Department wouldn't give him any support, training, or money, despite their willingness to hand out money to every other despot who asked.  Now that's a bad dictator. 

Let us all hope that Kim is closely followed by Fidel Castro. 

I'm not the only person to post this bit o' greatness from "Team America: World Police" in honor of this occasion:



The Kim goes to hell cartoon came from here. 

Two videos that will make you flinch

Here's a horrific video of ex-Libyan dictator Colonel Muammar Gaddafi being sodomized by his captors with a sharp stick. 



Here's a horrific video of U.S. President Barack Obama claiming that we're better off than we would've been without him. 



I don't know why, but both of these videos make me flinch in the same way. 

The State Department wasn't the only one playing Footsie with Gaddafi

Muammar Kaddafi was "Dictator Du Jour" on this site a few days ago.  It's a new program I've started to honor the murderous dictators that our State Department blesses with lots of free stuff - training, military hardware, etc. 

(Note: I'm no longer even trying to spell this guy's name consistently from link to link.)

It gets better and better.  This is from The Business Insider:

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) promised to help former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi obtain U.S. military hardware, as one of the United States' partners in the war on terror," according to a U.S. diplomatic cable released Wednesday by anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks.

If the Nobel Peace Prize committee wants to atone for giving the prize to The Teleprompter Jesus, they oughta give it to Julian Assange, the founder and publisher of Wikileaks. 

The meeting, which took place just over a year ago on Aug. 14, 2009, included other influential Americans, such as Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Sen. Susan Collins (R-SC) and Senate Armed Services Committee staffer Richard Fontaine, the document explains.

McCain opened the meeting by characterizing Libya's relationship with the U.S. as "excellent," to which Liebermann added: "We never would have guessed ten years ago that we would be sitting in Tripoli, being welcomed by a son of Muammar al-Qadhafi."

"Lieberman called Libya an important ally in the war on terrorism, noting that common enemies sometimes make better friends," the cable continues. "The Senators recognized Libya's cooperation on counterterrorism and conveyed that it was in the interest of both countries to make the relationship stronger."

Part and parcel to that relationship: military hardware, including helicopters and non-lethal weaponry, meant to ensure the security of Tripoli. In exchange for this and assisting the nation in rehabilitating its image with other lawmakers, Gaddafi pledged to send Libya's highly enriched uranium supplies to Russia for proper disposal.

Note that the article doesn't say "in exchange for this, Gaddafi gave us money".  It just says that "in exchange for this, Gaddafi pledged"....to do something or other. 

The cable does not mention anything about the senators pressing Gaddafi for democratic reforms. 

Muammar al-Qaddafi - Our Dictator Du Jour (we were for him before we were against him)

Ron Paul has a reputation amongst The Statists as being totally naive on foreign policy. 

This means he is always right. 

Not just kinda right, but gloriously validated and vindicated.   You don't earn a bad reputation in Big Government circles by being wrong. 

Here's a little dustup that Paul had with our Secretary Of State, also known as She Whose Name Is Not Spoken:

“A lot of people in this country have come to the conclusion that our policy overhaul has been inconsistent; that sometimes we support the bad guys and the bad guys become our enemies,” Paul told Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during a hearing of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.

Rep. Paul pointed to America’s support for Osama bin Laden when he was fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan, its collaboration with Saddam Hussein against Iran in the 1980s, and its propping up the Shah in Iran for decades before that.

“But we keep supporting Algeria, Morocco, Yemen, all these dictators, and yet we pretend that as soon as, well, it looks like the dictator might fall, we're all for democracy and we're for freedom and we're against these dictators,” he said.

To which The Hildabeast responded:

“Congressman, you make a very passionate argument, and my response is that, you know, the United States, over the course of its entire diplomatic history, has had to make some very difficult decisions,” she said.

“We try to balance what we believe to be in our interests. Sometimes, and I would argue most times, we get it right. Sometimes we don't,” America’s top diplomat conceded.

You can go here for a partial list of dictators that we've supported, and that most sane and sober people would examine and say "Dang, Hillary.  You sure got that one wrong.  What possessed you folks to give that dictator a bunch of money?"  

So here's today's update:  Libyan dictator Muammar al-Qaddafi is now on the run.  Rebels have almost taken Tripoli, and our State Department will soon be able to claim that our military involvement in Libya was justified.  But what about this, from 2009 ??

The State Department has designated $400,000 in international aid funds for two foundations run by the children of Libyan dictator Muammar Kaddafi, a move that two Republican members of Congress today called a misuse of taxpayer funds that should be immediately cut off by President Obama.

The Congress members’ complaints on Thursday came just a day after Kaddafi delivered a bizarre speech to the United Nations in which he suggested the Israelis may have been behind the Kennedy assassination and the swine-flu virus was cooked up in a corporate lab. It also comes amid mounting international criticism of Kaddafi’s regime after it provided a hero’s welcome to Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, the former Libyan intelligence officer convicted of the 1988 bombing of Pan Am 103 that killed 270 people.

Ironically, one of the groups designated for $200,000 in State Department funds is the Kaddafi Development Foundation, headed by Saif al-Islam al-Gaddafi, the Libyan leader’s son who personally arranged for Megrahi’s flight back to Tripoli last month after the convicted terrorist was released on “humanitarian” grounds from a Scottish jail. Another $200,000—part of $2.5 million in State Department economic-support funds for Libya—is slated to go to an organization headed by Kaddafi’s daughter Aisha, to promote “women’s economic opportunities.”

“This waste of taxpayer dollars is particularly outrageous following the hero’s welcome given to the Lockerbie bomber,” said Florida Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the ranking Republican on the House Foreign Relations Committee. Ros-Lehtinen wrote Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asking her to cut off the entire $2.5 million designation for Libya, noting that it was provided by Congress in order to “promote democracy and human rights” in Libya. “How could this assistance effectively promote democracy when entrusted to the dictator’s family?” she asked.

Yeah.  Good question.  I think that funding got blocked, but I don't have time this morning to research it properly.  But how about this later attempt to give Qaddafi some money?  Not just some money but an increase in his allowance?  This was going on in March of this year !!!!

While President Obama calls Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi a threat to his own people, just one month before attacking Libya the president asked Congress to increase U.S. aid for Qaddafi's military to $1.7 million.

According to State Department figures, the money was earmarked to train Libyan military officers, improve its air force, secure its borders and to counter terrorism.

If this seems contradictory, welcome to the world of U.S. foreign aid, where billions of tax dollars go to people we don't like and nations some say don't need the help. The latest unrest has drawn renewed scrutiny to these policies. 

Hell, by the way they keep trying to throw money at him, you would think that Qaddafi worked for SEIU or ACORN or maybe the Wisconsin Teachers' Union.  If time permitted, I'd check to see if he got any stimulus funds. 

If you have time and don't mind getting depressed, you can go here and see that, through various aid organizations, we've given Libya $176 million since Qaddafi took over as dictator. 

Good job, Hillary. 

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

I think my next Dictator Du Jour will be Spain's Francisco Franco or Cambodia's Pol Pot.  We supported both of them until we were against them.  Or I can take nominations for other dicatators from you folks.  The floor is open, and there are plenty of candidates. 

The pic of our man in Libya came from here.  The Aid Trap picture came from here, and that entire article should be tattooed on Hillary's thighs. 

Ron Paul mops a floor with Hillary Clinton. Bonus !!! A list of U.S. supported dictators

Here's a video of Ron Paul cleaning a floor.  The person impersonating a mop is our Secretary Of State, also known as She Whose Name Is Not Spoken. 

Here's the accompanying article from ABC News:

Rep. Ron Paul, R-Tex, has made a career out of being the contrarian in Congress, and with uprisings sweeping across the Middle East he took the opportunity today to point out one of the inconvenient truths of American foreign policy: its support across successive administrations for key Middle East leaders who ally themselves with the United States in a difficult region, yet do not respect basic human rights and democracy in their own countries.

“A lot of people in this country have come to the conclusion that our policy overhaul has been inconsistent; that sometimes we support the bad guys and the bad guys become our enemies,” Paul told Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during a hearing of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.

Rep. Paul pointed to America’s support for Osama bin Laden when he was fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan, its collaboration with Saddam Hussein against Iran in the 1980s, and its propping up the Shah in Iran for decades before that.

“But we keep supporting Algeria, Morocco, Yemen, all these dictators, and yet we pretend that as soon as, well, it looks like the dictator might fall, we're all for democracy and we're for freedom and we're against these dictators,” he said.

Here's the money quote from She Whose Name Is Not Spoken:

“Congressman, you make a very passionate argument, and my response is that, you know, the United States, over the course of its entire diplomatic history, has had to make some very difficult decisions,” she said.

“We try to balance what we believe to be in our interests. Sometimes, and I would argue most times, we get it right. Sometimes we don't,” America’s top diplomat conceded.

Precisely.  That's why James Monroe came up with something eventually known as The Monroe Doctrine.  We're going to stay out of everyone else's business, because we "sometimes don't" get it right. 
In fact, I'm going through a mental list of dictators, trying to think of one we've supported and got it right by doing so. 


Can anyone out there help me out?  How many of these guys were instances where we got it right? 
I've swiped a list of dictators supported by the U.S. from this dude.  Lord have mercy, I wish that the Congressman had done a roll call through the list, asking when we "got it right".   

{Update from 3-3-2011, to eliminate any confusion....If you follow all of the links back to the originator of this list, his basis for inclusion is "rulers who received aid (economic/military), training of military/intelligence/security forces, and/or political support from the US".  It's freakin' terrifying.  See the comment field below about Pol Pot.}

Please respond with the names that give you that warm, fuzzy feeling of supporting a great cause.

Africa
MOBUTU SESE SEKO
Dictator of Zaire 1965-1997
MOHAMMED SIAD BARRE
President/Dictator of Somalia 1969-1991
GEN. IBRAHIM BABANGIDA
Military Dictator/President of Nigeria 1985-1993
GEN. SANI ABACHA
Dictator of Nigeria 1993-1998
HASTINGS KAMUZU BANDA
Dictator of Malawi 1966-1994
LAURENT-DÉSIRÉ KABILA
President/Dictator of the Democratic Republic of the Congo 1997-2001
GNASSINGBE ETIENNE EYADEMA
Dictator of Togo 1967-2005
FELIX HOUPHOUET-BOIGNY
Dictator/President of the Ivory Coast 1960-1993
HASSAN II
King of Morocco 1961-1999
TEODORO OBIANG NGUEMA MBASOGO
President/Dictator of Equatorial Guinea 1979-present
ZINE EL ABIDINE BEN ALI
President-Prime Minister/Dictator of Tunisia 1987-2011
ANWAR EL-SADAT
President/Dictator of Egypt 1970-1981
HOSNI MUBARAK
President/Dictator of Egypt 1981-present
IAN SMITH
Prime Minister of Rhodesia (white minority regime) 1965-1979
PIETER WILLEM BOTHA
Prime Minister of South Africa (white minority regime) 1978-1984, President 1984-1989
DANIEL ARAP MOI
President/Dictator of Kenya 1978-2002
HAILE SELASSIE (RAS TAFARI)
Emperor of Ethiopia 1928-1974
WILLIAM J. S. TUBMAN
President/Dictator of Liberia 1944-1971
SAMUEL KANYON DOE
Dictator of Liberia 1980-1990

Asia
MOHAMED SUHARTO
Dictator of Indonesia 1966-1998
NGO DINH DIEM
President/Dictator of South Vietnam 1955-1963
GEN. NGUYEN KHANH
Dictator of South Vietnam 1964-1965
NGUYEN CAO KY
Dictator of South Vietnam 1965-1967
GEN. NGUYEN VAN THIEU
President/Dictator of South Vietnam 1967-1975
TRAN THIEM KHIEM
Prime Minister of South Vietnam 1969-75
BAO DAI
Emperor of Vietnam 1926-1945, chief of state 1949-1955
LEE KUAN YEW
Prime Minister/Dictator of Singapore 1959-1990; behind-the scenes ruler since then.
EMOMALI RAHMONOV
President/Dictator of Tajikistan 1992-present
NURSULTAN NAZARBAYEV
President of Kazakhstan 1990-present
ISLAM A. KARIMOV
President/Dictator of Uzbekistan 1990-present
SAPARMURAD ATAYEVICH NIYAZOV
President/Dictator of Turkmenistan 1990-2006
MARSHAL LUANG PIBUL SONGGRAM
Dictator of Thailand 1948-1957
FIELD MARSHAL THANOM KITTIKACHORN
Prime Minister/Dictator of Thailand 1957-58, 1963-1973
CHIANG KAI-SHEK
President/Dictator (Nationalist) of China 1928-1949
President/Dictator of Taiwan 1949-1975
CHIANG CHING-KUO
President/Dicator of Taiwan 1978-1988; Prime Minister 1972-1978
DENG XIAOPING
De facto ruler of China from circa 1978 to the early 1990s
FERDINAND MARCOS
President/Dictator of the Philippines 1965-1986
SYNGMAN RHEE
President/Dictator of South Korea 1948-1960
GEN. PARK CHUNG HEE
President/Dictator of South Korea 1962-1979
GEN. CHUN DOO HWAN
President/Dictator of South Korea 1980-1988
SIR MUDA HASSANAL BOLKIAH
Sultan of Brunei 1967-present
GEN. LON NOL
Prime Minister/Dictator of Cambodia 1970-1975
POL POT
Dictator of Cambodia 1975-1979
MAJ. GEN. SITIVENI RABUKA
Dictator of Fiji 1987-1999
ASKAR AKAYEV
President of Kyrgyzstan 10/27/1990-2005

Europe
FRANCISCO FRANCO
Dictator of Spain 1939-1975
ANTONIO SALAZAR DE OLIVEIRA
Dictator of Portugal 1928-1968
COL. GEORGIOS PAPADOPOULOS
Prime Minister/President/Dictator of Greece 1967-1973

Latin America
ANASTASIO SOMOZA GARCIA
Dictator of Nicaragua 1937-1947, 1950-1956
ANASTASIO "TACHITO" SOMOZA DEBAYLE
Dictator of Nicaragua 1967-1972, 1974-1979
MANUEL ESTRADA CABRERA
Dictator of Guatemala 1898-1920
GEN. JORGE UBICO CASTANEDA
Dictator of Guatemala 1931-1944
COL. CARLOS ENRIQUE CASTILLO ARMAS
Dictator of Guatemala 1954-1957
GEN. JOSE MIGUEL YDIGORAS FUENTES
President/Dictator of Guatemala 1958-1963
COL. ENRIQUE PERALTA AZURDIA
Military Junta, Guatemala 1963-1966
COL.CARLOS ARANA OSORIO
Dictator of Guatemala 1970-1974
GEN. FERNANDO ROMEO LUCAS GARCIA
Dictator of Guatemala 1978-1982
GEN. JOSE EFRAIN RIOS MONTT
Dictator of Guatemala 1982-1983
MARCO VINICIO CEREZO ARÉVALO
President/Dictator of Guatemala 1986-1991
MAXIMILIANO HERNANDEZ MARTINEZ
Dictator of El Salvador 1931-1944
COL. OSMIN AGUIRRE Y SALINAS
Dictator of El Salvador 1944-1945
CIVILIAN-MILITARY JUNTA, EL SALVADOR
1961-1962
COL. ARTURO ARMANDO MOLINA BARRAZA
Dictator of El Salvador 1972-1977
JUNTA, EL SALVADOR
1979-1982
ALFREDO FÉLIX CRISTIANI BUKARD
President/Dictator of El Salvador 1989-1994
TIBURCIO CARIAS ANDINO
Dictator of Honduras 1932-1948
COL. OSWALDO LOPEZ ARELLANO
Dictator of Honduras 1963-1975
ROBERTO SUAZO CORDOVA
President/Dictator of Honduras 1982-1986
GEN. OMAR HERRERA-TORRIJOS
Dictator of Panama 1969-1981
GEN. MANUEL ANTONIO MORENA NORIEGA
Dictator of Panama 1982-1989
AUGUSTO PINOCHET UGARTE
Dictator of Chile 1973-1990
GEN. JORGE RAFAEL VIDELA
Dictator of Argentina 1976-1981
COL. MARCOS PEREZ JIMENEZ
Dictator of Venezuela 1950-1958
GEN. ALFREDO STROESSNER
Dictator of Paraguay 1954-1989
ALBERTO FUJIMORI
Dictator of Peru 1990-2000
FRANCOIS "PAPA DOC" DUVALIER
Dictator of Haiti 1957-1971
JEAN-CLAUDE "BABY DOC" DUVALIER
Dictator of Haiti 1971-1986
MILITARY JUNTA / LT. GEN. RAOUL CEDRAS, GEN. PHILIPPE BIAMBY and LT. COL. MICHEL-JOSEPH FRANCO
Haiti 1991-1994
GEN. RENE BARRIENTOS ORTUNO
President/Dictator of Bolivia 1964-1969
GEN. HUGO BANZER SUAREZ
Dictator of Bolivia 1971-1978
DR. GETULIO VARGAS
Dictator of Brazil 1930-1945, 1951-1954
GEN. HUMBERTO DE ALENCAR CASTELLO BRANCO
Dictator of Brazil 1964-1967
CARLOS PRIO SOCARRAS
Dictator of Cuba 1948-1952
FULGENCIO BATISTA
Dictator of Cuba 1933-44, 1952-1959
GERARDO MACHADO MORALES
Dictator of Cuba 1925-1933
RAFAEL LEONIDAS TRUJILLO
Dictator of the Dominican Republic 1930-1961

Middle East
MOHAMMED REZA PAHLAVI
Shah of Iran 1941-1979
SADDAM HUSSEIN
Dictator of Iraq 1969 (1979)-2003
GEN. MOHAMMED AYUB KHAN
President/Dictator of Pakistan 1958-1969
GEN. AGHA MUHAMMAD YAHYA KHAN
President/Dictator of Pakistan 1969-1971
GEN. MOHAMMAD ZIA UL-HAQ
President/Dictator of Pakistan 1977-1988
PERVEZ MUSHARRAF
Dictator of Pakistan 1999-2008
ABDUL IBN HUSSEIN I
King of Jordan 1952-1999
TURGUT ÖZAL
Prime Minister of Turkey 1983-1989, President 1989-1993
SHEIK JABIR AL-AHMAD AL SABAH
Emir of Kuwait 1977-2006
Prime Minister of Kuwait 1962-1963, 1965-1978
FAHD IBN ABDUL-AZIZ AL SAUD
King and Prime Minister of Saudi Arabia 1982-2005

The solution to high gas prices? Let's put in a 62 mpg mandate !!!

Derrick Z. Jackson is a typist for the Boston Globe.  He is deeply and profoundly wrong so often that I've "liked" him on Facebook just to keep in touch. 

Here's an excerpt from his latest, called "United States Must Break The Addiction To Foreign Oil". 

Unrest continues to spread, from the Middle East to the Middle West to . . . the gas pump.


The democracy uprisings against repressive regimes, many of which America propped up, has also fanned fears for the flow of oil. In response, Big Oil has jacked up its prices and gasoline is back up to $3.20 a gallon for unleaded in Massachusetts and is reportedly headed to $3.50 nationally. As the Obama administration tiptoes between popular protests and potentates who turn on our oil spigot, Americans are concerned about prices at the gas pump.

As well they should be.  What should we do?  OMG, what can we do? 

If only we had oil of our own, oil of our very own somewhere off the coasts of California, Oregon, Washington, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, D.C., Maryland, Maine, New Hampshire, New Jersey, and all those other little Yankee states in the middle where my geography is fuzzy? 

If only, if only.  

Seriously.  That part of Jackson's rant is so profoundly screwed up that it doesn't even rise to the level of being wrong.  The Middle East is in the middle of a huge upheaval, and that's going to jack with fuel prices for a while.  Everyone, and I mean everyone, has huge reserves.  Gasoline costs what it does at any given moment because that's what people are willing to pay at that moment, all other factors taken into account.

 

Competitors, especially small ones, have huge barriers to entry, all put in place by the people who stand in front of each other once a year for the SOTU speech, and rant about our addiction to foreign oil   Otherwise people would be out there drilling near the states listed above. 

One other thing....trade is a funny thing.  Both sides need each other.  Whose economy do you think can last longer without the other?  U.S. Consumers or Evil Foreign People?  That's the question our politicians never ask.  Citizens of other countries now rely on American Dollars.  They can't eat, build houses, or educate their children without them.  Have you ever had a 25% drop in sales?  It's tough, isn't it? 

And when we give our dollars to those foreigners with funny names who worship funny gods, do you know what they have to do with them?  There's only one place where they accept green pieces of paper with pictures of dead presidents on 'em. 

Back to Derrick Z. 

....Instead of whining about gas prices, Americans should be demanding that the Democrats and the Republicans make oil independence a top priority. Less than a year after the BP oil spill, energy has disappeared as a top issue of the day in current polling of Americans. This is even though energy affects everything from jobs to the environment to what wars we wage to how many blind eyes we offer to dictators who sit on fossil-fuel resources.

Like almost all other Statists, Derrick Z. can throw down an eloquent rant about how many billions of dollars we idiotically pay dictators, all in the name of "stability".  Derrick slams The Teleprompter Jesus for his response to the BP spill.  And after griping about our government's ineffectiveness, what does he want? 
What does he want? 
Derrick Z. wants more government involvement. 

Last month, the new Republican House majority, which has declared war on the Environmental Protection Agency, inspired infantile behavior from the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers. The organization wrote Darrell Issa, the new House oversight chairman, to protest the potential cost of fuel-efficiency standards as high as 62 miles per gallon being considered by the Obama administration.

Yeah, 62 miles per gallon.  Declare it, make it so, get pro-active. That's all it takes.  Ask King Canute.   

Derrick, mandates and Congressional Performance Art won't get us anywhere. 
Building a "Fortress America", taking us back to a trading system like Feudal China's, won't get us anywhere.   We need the Evil Foreigners and they need us. 
We need for our government to leave everyone the hell alone.  Build some roads.  Referee in some disputes.  Defend the borders.  That's all. 

Please let me know if I've gotten this wrong

Ok, lemme get this straight....

In the Middle East, groups of unemployed citizens are protesting against the decisions of their governments and government employees. 

In Wisconsin, government employees with above-average pay, cadillac benefits, tenure, and employment in a near-monopoly are protesting against the decisions of the citizens who employ them.   

Are people forgetting who is the employer and who is the employee? 

Would you agree to this kind of negotiation if you wanted to hire a new lawn service?  Plumber?  Babysitter? 

When a Statist union leader sits down at the table to "negotiate" with some state government employee over salaries and benefits, which side do you think represents your interests? 

How Milton Friedman Saved Chile

From the Wall Street Journal: How Milton Friedman saved Chile.

....It's not by chance that Chileans were living in houses of brick—and Haitians in houses of straw—when the wolf arrived to try to blow them down. In 1973, the year the proto-Chavista government of Salvador Allende was overthrown by Gen. Augusto Pinochet, Chile was an economic shambles. Inflation topped out at an annual rate of 1000%, foreign-currency reserves were totally depleted, and per capita GDP was roughly that of Peru and well below Argentina's....

....For his trouble, Friedman would spend the rest of his life being defamed as an accomplice to evil: at his Nobel Prize ceremony the following year, he was met by protests and hecklers. Friedman himself couldn't decide whether to be amused or annoyed by the obloquies; he later wryly noted that he had given communist dictatorships the same advice he gave Pinochet, without raising leftist hackles.

Hit the link at the top to read the whole thing.  Well worth it.