Rick Warren, Barack Obama, and John McCain (but not Bob Barr) at the Saddleback Church Civil Forum

A few things about the Civil Forum at Saddleback Church....

1) I thought Barack Obama did a good job. He's going to get some heat over listing his wife, grandmother, and Ted Kennedy as people he thought of as "wise" and that he would listen to as President. McCain, on the same question, instantly came up with General David Petraeus, Georgia Congressman John Lewis, and EBay founder Meg Whitman. But Obama has now demonstrated that he can speak fluent Evangelical.

2) John McCain did a good job. He's going to get some heat for joking that you're rich if you make upwards of five million. McCain's answers came so quickly that he appeared incredibly decisive. (Addition from Monday August 18th....Rick Warren joked that during Obama's question and answer session, John McCain was backstage in a "Get Smart"-style Cone Of Silence. People are starting to question the integrity of Warren's precautions.)

3) I grew up in churches that didn't clap, applaud, or cheer. The idea is that you're there to bring glory to God, not man, so I get squirmy when people are applauded in a church sanctuary. (I'm going somewhere with this....) I believe that McCain came out ahead in this format, but McCain was getting most of the applause from the Saddleback congregation and that could've swayed me. It would be interesting to have some creative recording engineers reverse the applause between the two candidates on the soundtrack, and then play it back to a group that didn't see the original broadcast. Perhaps the perception of that viewing audience would be dramatically different.

4) Rick Warren (an alumni of Fort Worth's Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary) came across well. Did he seem to be spoon-feeding McCain some of the questions? It seemed like Warren's queries to McCain went on a little longer before they finally got to the question mark.

5) Libertarian candidate Bob Barr was not invited to participate in this program. This is from the email that went out yesterday from the Barr campaign:

This Saturday, Senators Barack Obama and John McCain will take the national stage for their first combined national event. It will take place at Saddleback Church in Orange County, California. For the past several weeks, we have put in requests and phone calls to the church's pastor, Rick Warren, who was quoted this week in Time Magazine as saying, "I want what's good for everybody, not just what's good for me. Who's the best for the nation right now?"

Unfortunately, Pastor Rick Warren doesn't care to know the true answer to that question as he has willingly excluded Bob Barr and other candidates from his forum on Saturday. After weeks of negotiations and calls to Saddleback Church from leaders from every corner of the political spectrum supporting Bob Bar's inclusion, we've been left out in the cold. The only people getting into the event are Obama, McCain and those who reportedly paid $500 to $2,000 to the church to sit in the audience.

Yesterday, I reported to former Congressman Barr that we've exhausted every avenue. I told him, "We've had calls placed to Pastor Warren from very powerful leaders from the left and the right, we sent in our personal request, and placed numerous phone calls that have not been returned. You are not going to be included. "Our only option left is to threaten to file an temporary injunction as our attorney's believe they are in violation of the law."

Bob responded by saying, "No, don't threaten to do that . . . Just do it."

As you read this, our attorneys are filing an injunction against Saddleback Church to include Bob Barr in their forum this Saturday. You are the first to hear about this. The complaint is based upon a violation of McCain/Feingold campaign finance legislation. While we're no fans of that legislation. However, we don't write the rules, we're just forced to play by them.

In this case, we're using McCain/Feingold to our advantage.The reason I am disclosing so much to you is because this is just the beginning.At every way you look at it, we're at a disadvantage.

- We are being blocked from the national stage by the media, debate commissions and now evengroups like Saddleback Church.

- Both the campaign and our party have put most of its manpower and money into getting on the ballot in every state.

- And we have our hands tied behind our backs by laws like McCain Feingold that benefit the two major parties.We are being blocked from the national stage by the media, debate commissions and now even.

6) I hope people don't think they saw a debate tonight. I hope they don't confuse any of this with sharing varying points of view.

What we saw tonight was a discussion between The Daddy Party and The Mommy Party about who is going to drive the family car down the highway for the next four years. Unless 3rd parties are given access to these "debates", Daddy or Mommy might slide the seats back, change the radio stations, or turn down the air conditioner. The winner might stop for lunch at McDonald's instead of Burger King. The winner might speed up or slow down.

But neither one of them is going to change the direction of the car. The Daddy and Mommy Parties have already shown that they share the same map.

This is your brain. This is your brain on audio files designed to induce drug-like effects. Any questions?

Our "Weekly Radley", the name I've given to the best post each week from ultra-libertarian Radley Balko, is about digital drugs.

Yes, digital drugs. Those mind-numbing, perception-altering, hallucination-inducing tracks your kid downloads into his iPod. Those who produce these "special" recordings claim that by subtly manipulating the beat patterns in the MP3's, they can help you reduce anxiety, overcome addictions, or help you lose weight.

Here is where it gets interesting, says tech radio host Kim Komando.

However, most sites are more sinister. They sell audio files ("doses") that supposedly mimic the effects of alcohol and marijuana.
But it doesn’t end there. You’ll find doses that purportedly mimic the effects of LSD, crack, heroin and other hard drugs. There are also doses of a sexual nature. I even found ones that supposedly simulate heaven and hell.

I worked in the Literary Retail industry during the beginning, peak, and end of the New Age boom. We used to sell New Age subliminal message music cassettes that would supposedly help you lose weight, be more assertive, stop smoking, stay out of the passing lane, and overcome a great host of other maladies. Customers would ask me if they really worked. If I was feeling particularly bold, I would respond with "Do you believe they work? That's 90% of their usefulness."

Most customers would laugh, and say something about a sucker being born every minute. But the True Believers would always look disappointed with that answer. So I would then sell them an expensive bag of special crystals and a book about where to bury the crystals around their house in order to improve their overall sense of optimism and well-being.

(I don't need to buy an audio file to simulate Hell, since I'm probably going there....)

Anyway, these digital drugs are something different and evil. We're talking about sounds that can replicate the experience and sensations of LSD, crack cocaine, and heroin ! ! ! !

It's just a matter of time before a politician decides we need government intervention.

I'm betting that the first one to do so will be a Democrat. Anyone think otherwise?

Free Association Friday, belated Saturday edition

Way back in October, I went out on a limb and predicted this.  The current presidential election will probably cost $1,000,000,000.00

If these hunches keep paying off, someone is going to make a fortune during football season.

Thanks to Robert Love for for the link. He's got a great general economics blog, and I wish he would post more often. 

Robert has also posted a link to an interactive graphic that ran on the New York Times site that shows how they calculate the consumer price index. If you go there and spend less than five minutes clicking on the various pieces of the pie, then you have the soul of a ditch-digger. Almost any category of stuff you could purchase for a household is inside that pie, growing and shrinking every day.  Mr. Love notes that "consumers spend the same amount (about 1% of total) on cable service as on doctor visits. The portion of consumer spending allotted to "computers" has declined 12% year-on-year."   Possibly because most of us now own one. 

Speaking of how some costs decline while others go through the roof.... Wal-Mart never gets enough credit for holding down inflation. Yes, the squeeze their suppliers. Yes, they don't pay their employees a penny more than they have to. And yes, especially for those at lower income levels, a lot of people are better off because of it. Not all of us can afford to shop at places with 600 kinds of cheese.

I've held onto this next link for a few months, waiting on a place to use it. Wal-Mart has been accused of a lot of things, but this one is a first: Someone named Peter Flaherty has accused Wal-Mart of being too liberal and politically correct. Let me try typing that again, just to be sure my fingers won't explode. Wal-Mart is too liberal and politically correct. Wal-Mart is too liberal and politically correct. Wow.

Speaking of Political Correctness, Dr. Rowan Williams - the Archbishop of Canterbury - recently declared that Christian doctrine is offensive to Muslims.  Here's Andrew Ian Dodge at Dodgeblogium:

Dr Rowan Williams also criticised Christianity’s history for its violence, its use of harsh punishments and its betrayal of its peaceful principles.

Muslims would probably get worked up over that.  The Spanish Inquisition and The Crusades are a major distraction from Allah's work of hijacking airliners, hand amputations, clitoridectomies, stoning adulterers, executing apostates, and all-around jihad.   

As a Baptist, I'm often offended by the Methodist practice of "sprinkling" converts, instead of total immersion.  If someone blows up a Wesleyan Student Center anytime soon, well, that means they finally pushed me too far. 

But getting back to Dr. Rowan Williams.... Perry de Havilland of Samizdata had this brilliant quote about the Anglican Archbishop last year.
Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams is like a compass-that-faces-south... always wrong but useful nevertheless because as long as he is dependably wrong, he can still be used when plotting a course.

I used to send emails copies of any of my Ultra-Libertarian posts, in hopes that they'd add me to their blogroll.  I never succeeded.  I eventually started groveling and wrote an epic poem entitled "Whoring For Links":

But before I posted it, without warning, Perry linked to something I wrote about the new trend for locally grown food.  So I put this online anyway:

When I began this little blog
To dissipate the Statist fog,
And fight against Bill Clinton’s bride,
My other goal was to provide
A Libertarian Intifada,
So I could be on Samizdata.

I said Thomas Sowell’s great!!
And criticized the Nanny State !!
I said Hayek’s pretty cool !!
And called Lou Dobbs a freakin’ fool !!
Yet all’s in vain because there’s not a
Single link from Samizdata.

I’m on Carnivals Galore,
Plus Satan’s Ho and Soobdujore.
Texas papers let me shine,
And so did Baptist friends of mine.
But there’s just one Big Enchilada,
That Limey blogroll - Samizdata.

I quoted Popper and Von Mises,
Laughed at those who think they’re Jesus,
I quoted Friedman (who’s now dead),
Plus, “Atlas Shrugged” and “Fountainhead”.
I get hits, but links? No, Nada.
Still no links from Samizdata..

But now I lay me down for sleeping,
And pray the Lord my soul is keeping,
‘Cause if I die before I’m waking
The Lord can have my soul for taking
To Heaven, Hell, or other strata,
My Blog is now on Samizdata !

But they still haven't added me to their blogroll.  What a bunch of ungrateful British pigs.  If it weren't for FDR and the Lend-Lease act, they'd all be speaking German.  And what kind of self-respecting nation still has Kings and Queens, anyway????  They should evolve into a pure democracy like us, so they can vote for their head of state.  What happens in their system if the next monarch turns out to be a total idjit? 

Which gets us back around to the beginning. 

Boy, I'm glad we'll have a chance to spend $1,000,000,000.00 to narrow our choice down to....Barack Obama or John McCain. 

The Real Minimum Wage And Its Beneficiaries

The phrase "minimum wage law" contains an inherent contradiction. You can't raise the minimum wage. The minimum wage has always been zero, and it always will be zero. Wrap your head around the implications of that, and, as Jesus said, you're getting very close to the kingdom of God.

I was looking for a chart to show what I meant. The simplest one I could find, thanks to Robert Love, contained a cat.

Here's an excerpt from Voters Mandate That More Teenagers Remain Unemployed, posted at The Libertarian Party of Colorado blog.

The Denver-area inflation rate for the first half of the year was 3.7 percent, propelled by rising energy costs.
It’s not just another economic statistic: Thanks to a 2006 ballot issue, Colorado uses the measure to set the state’s minimum wage.
Now $7.02, the minimum wage will increase Jan. 1 to $7.28, the Rocky Mountain News calculates, based on the Colorado Department of Labor’s rules.

Combine that with fun fact #2. Many long term union contracts are tied to a specific multiple of the minimum wage. That's why they lobby so hard for increased minimums.

Fun fact #3. Many government contracts specify that all workers must be paid the "prevailing wage" for each profession in that area. This wage is often expressed as a multiple of the minimum. (This is another way of stating that no government project manager will ever have to spend any significant time looking for a good deal.)

Fun fact #4. Cost Of Government Day (how long the nation has to work each year to pay for all government spending) was on July 16th in 2008.

So what does all this mean?

It means that the comedy team of Reid and Pelosi are doing as much as they can to devalue the dollar. Yes, everyone gets more dollars, but they're only worth fifty cents.

Milton Friedman liked to talk about the four types of spending.

1) When you spend your money on yourself. What you do with the after-tax remains of your money.

2) When you spend your money on other people. What you do when you purchase a birthday present.

3) When you spend other people's money on yourself. What you do with a yearly budget in a "use it or lose it" situation (sorta). What you do when you find a $50 gift certificate on the street. What you do with a government subsidy.

4) When you spend other people's money on other people. Also known as government spending.

These are ranked in order of efficiency, BTW. People make their best money decisions with category #1 decisions. They make their worst decisions in category #4.

The Colorado voters who passed this minimum wage legislation thought they were creating a new category:

5) Forcing other people to spend more money on other people.

They were mistaken. Once inflation is taken into account, they've merely given more power to the people in category #4. And guess which people wind up with most of this money?

Hint: it's not minimum wage earners.

Back to The Libertarian Party of Colorado blog (and I think they might have been inspired by the closing line of this rant at another source....)

Next year the headlines will read "unemployment rises", and the people will never put 2 and 2 together.

She's Gone

Just a few days ago, we brought our baby daughter home from the hospital. It couldn't have been more than a couple of weeks ago.

I looked up, and she's turned eighteen.

She left for Texas A&M University's orientation/indoctrination/brainwashing "fish camp" around 5:30 this morning.

Reverend Charles Johnson, the interim minister at Broadway Baptist Church, recently told us that grief is another way of saying "something ended too soon". I didn't fully agree with that statement until now.

I think we've done a good job with her. She's polite to her elders, loves animals, has a great sense of humor, knows what she's doing on a guitar, and if you ask her about politics, she consistently says she's a libertarian. People like being around her.

When I went away to college, all of my friends from my hometown drove back home at the first weekend opportunity. They were visibly homesick. Not me.

At that time, I'd had enough of Mississippi rice fields, tractors, and the flat landscape between Drew and Merigold Mississippi. When all of my friends were leaving school to go back home, I gave a friend of mine two bags of dirty laundry and a flat tire to drop off at our farm, and asked him to pick it up on the return trip.

I recognized the same look in my baby girl's eyes this morning. She was ready to be gone. Ready to fly.

Reason TV - The Ethanol Scam

Reason TV has put together a video explaining the ethanol scam.



Thanks to GW at Wolf Howling for posting it first. His commentary is helpful, as usual, so I'm scraping all of it to post here:

This is a good, short video from Reason TV discussing the utter boondoggle of ethanol. It is not a viable alternative to gas. It is driving the cost of food prices through the roof. It is hurting the environment and takes nearly as much energy to produce as it produces in energy when mixed with gasoline. In short, it is hurting America and the world.

That said, the opening scene is a real cheap shot of John McCain of the type I would expect from the NYT. They use old video of him when he supported the idea of ethanol. He long ago changed his position on ethanol, voting against the Farm Bill discussed in the video above and telling the people of Iowa that ethanol subsidies had to end. Mandates need to also.

McCain, unlike many other members of The Party Of Small Government, has since spoken out against the ethanol mandate and subsidy and oughta get some credit in the video.

Click here to read a New York Times piece written when oil was only $50 per barrel and there were not yet any 3rd world food riots. People were starting to figure it out.

I need an OK caption for this picture

I need a Presidential caption for this picture:

Congratulations to Sandersonmom for submitting the best caption last week. In the words of the evaluation committee, "we're just relieved that she can finally get something right". A two dollar donation has been made in her name to The Whited Sepulchre Outreach Ministry And Social Club For Shipping Personnel.

What Is A Libertarian?

One of this blog's Serial Commenters recently asked me "What is a Libertarian?"

My off-the-cuff answer was something like this: "You know all the personal freedom issues that the Democrats seem to support, like Gay and Lesbian rights, reform of drug laws, and abortion rights, but never do much about? Libertarians support your right to personal freedom. And all the economic freedom issues that Republicans seem to support, like limited government, free markets, and free trade, but never do much about? Libertarians support your right to economic freedom."

I thought it was an OK answer. There are hundreds of sites out there trying to define libertarianism. This is my shot at doing it. The other question that I get is "Why can't you people ever get elected?"

The difficulty with getting Libertarians elected in the U.S. lies in the very nature of Libertarian beliefs. Imagine every state, county, city, town, and individual in America pouring hog slop into a large communal trough. Let's call this feeding trough "The Treasury".

Various people campaign for the right to stir the swill, and spoon it back out to the states, counties, cities, towns and individuals that contributed it to the trough. Let's call these people "Politicians".

Politicians are considered effective when they can give your hogs more swill than they contributed. They are considered ineffective and corrupt when more of your swill goes to other hogs than back to you.

For instance, Fort Worth TX doesn't need a huge air force base. There is no eminent threat from, say, Oklahoma. But when it came time to downsize the military at the end of The Cold War, politicians from both of the major parties fought the closure of Carswell Air Force Base. It was the leading conduit of hog slop back into the city.

Another good example would be Alaska's infamous Bridge To Nowhere. There was no real need, but that's irrelevant. Ted Stevens, The Alaskan Swineherd (R), was doing his job, and doing it well.

So any group like The Libertarian Party that wants to shrink the hog trough by 90% is going to have a hard time raising funds. Libertarians don't want to throw any graft your way. No lucrative contracts, no subsidies, no quotas, no set-asides. Very few people understand that the savings would be massive, the economy would boom, the displaced government workers would have a relatively easy time finding employment, but perhaps have a difficult time finding employment that's as easy.

Here's the Wikipedia entry on Libertarianism. Note that it's synonymous with "Classical Liberal", a fact that I had a good time with on this post. Liberal is a good, honorable word, and we need to reclaim it from the Big Statists.

Here's some attempts at a definition from The Cato Institute. Good folks.

Here's The World's Shortest Political Quiz - a chart that lets you see where you fit on two different political continuums. It's also one of The World's Most Biased Political Quizzes, since most of the people who take it test out as libertarian, but they don't vote that way.

Here's a link to a better than average sampling of libertarian vs. collectivist quotes. Here are a few contrasting examples, provided as a public service:

"Among other grand achievements, F. A. Hayek had a remarkable career pointing out the flaws in collectivism. One of his keenest insights was that, paradoxically, any collectivist system necessarily depends on one individual (or small group) to make key social and economic decisions. In contrast, a system based on individualism takes advantage of the aggregate, or 'collective,' information of the whole society; through his actions each participant contributes his own particular, if incomplete, knowledge—information that could never be tapped by the individual at the head of a collectivist state." -- Sheldon Richman

"A man's admiration for absolute government is proportionate to the contempt he feels for those around him"-- Alexis de Tocqueville

"The unity of a nation's spirit and will are worth far more than the freedom of the spirit and will of an individual; and that the higher interests involved in the life of the whole must here set the limits and lay down the duties of the interests of the individual." -- Adolph Hitler

"We need to stop worrying about the rights of the individual and start worrying about what is best for society." -- Hillary Clinton

"...we understand only the individual's capacity to make sacrifices for the community, for his fellow men." -- Adolf Hitler, 10-7-33

"We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good." -- Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, June 28, 2004.

"To be a socialist is to submit the I to the thou; socialism is sacrificing the individual to the whole." -- Joseph Goebbels, Minister of Propaganda, National Socialist German Workers' ("Nazi") Party

Thanks to the Middle Class Myth blog for the photo of piggies at the trough. Thanks to Sheldon Richman and de Tocqueville for the great Libertarian quotes. Deeply heartfelt thanks to Hillary and various Nazis for the excellent Collectivist quotes.

Doctors Against Sharp Pieces Of Metal That Don't Have A Blunt Round Nose, Part 2

A few weeks ago, I posted something about British doctors lobbying to eliminate kitchen knives.

Here's an excerpt from the BBC article:

One idea, first proposed in 2005, is a response to a grisly mundane truth expressed by Met chief Ian Blair this week - that "the most common knife involved in these deaths is a knife from a kitchen".
The proposal came from three emergency medicine specialists, and it's a simple one: getting rid of the points on the ends of longer kitchen knives.

Now, since the grisly beheading of a Greyhound bus passenger, the Canadians are making similar proposals. (Even if you know all about the beheading, go ahead and hit that link. I bet you didn't know that God allowed the beheading to take place because Canada has legalized same-sex marriage, did you?)

According to The Toronto Sun....

Some of our parliamentarians have been getting a bit too much sun during their summer holidays.
That's the only explanation for the discussion by some opposition MPs about the possible introduction of a knife registry, following the gruesome, fatal attack on a Greyhound bus passenger late last month.

You've got to ask yourself this question: What the hell are they thinking? There are millions and millions of knives in Canada. Canadians go hunting. Canadians cook things. Canadians cut ropes. Canadians are ready and able to cut just about anything but their ties to England. (Sometimes I think they would've done that years ago, if it wouldn't mean a victory for the French-Canadians.)

Here's Kerry Thompson again, writing for the Toronto Sun:

A knife registry? Really? What would I have to declare, paring knives, a bread knife, the plastic knife I used to put tuna on crackers while I was having lunch at work the other day?
Most knives are sharp. That helps them serve their purpose, you know, to cut things. There would be no way to single out knives that are used for hunting and ones used to cut chicken for that stir-fry you're making for dinner. Or ones used to, say, kill people?

Now we get to the good part. Doesn't Canada already have a gun registry? Here's Thompson again:

I'm not going to say the gun registry has turned out well, but I think there's a need to register firearms. But knives? In terms of dollars, if you think the gun registry went over budget (ballooning to $1 billion from an estimated $2 million), try to imagine the cost to register millions of knives (how many come in each new set of flatware from Ikea alone?) in this country.

The freakin' gun registry budget went from $2,000,000 all the way up to $1,000,000,000 ? How often do people get budgets wrong by that many orders of magnitude? Have you ever taken your car to in for repairs, gotten a $200 dollar estimate, and then gotten a bill for $10,000 ? (I think I got those ratios right.)

Here's more Kerry Thompson, who stated above that there's a need to register firearms, even if "the gun registry has not turned out well". This is the second thing that Thompson gets wrong:

This is clearly a problem of some politicians failing to think before they speak, something they're known to do from time to time. In this case, the summer sun obviously got to them.

No, Mr. or Ms. Thompson, your politicians knew exactly what they were doing. They once sold you a two million dollar gun registry, and charged you a billion dollars for it. You, for one, obviously bent over and took it. You're a journalist who can't find a way to speak out against your country's Victim Disarmament Laws.

Now, they're coming back for another billion. Yes, billion. And we're talking about valuable Canadian currency, not the USA play dollars that are already devalued from being overcommitted to political schemes like this one.

This is about expanded government control and expanded government revenue, nothing more.

And if you need to have something cut, mail it to me.

The Beijing 2008 Olympic Games Opening Ceremony

The Beijing 2008 Olympic Games Opening Ceremony was incredible, wasn't it? I've searched in vain for some decent YouTube clips, but none are available yet. Lord have mercy, what a show.




I love China, and I want wonderful things to happen for those people. Yeah, they're acting like idjits over Taiwan and Tibet. I keep hoping they'll make so much money that they'll stop caring. (Hit the "China" label at the bottom of this post if you want to read some of my bizarre travelogues from over there.) They've been through so much crap with horrific political systems, imperialist humiliations from the west, the opium wars, Marxist lunacy, Chairman Mao, The Great Leap Forward, and The Cultural Revolution. And now they're coming out of it. If you ever get a chance to go over there, jump on it.

About 30 years ago, their Commie government got sick and tired of watching people starve to death on fertile land while Tibet and Hong Kong, with virtually no natural resources, prospered. The Chinese government opened four "Free Market Zones": Shenzhen, Shantou, Hainan, and Xiamen. (I've made five trips to Xiamen. It's now the Cleveland, Ohio, of China.) Of course, everyone who could do so tried to get into these special economic zones. They might claim to be Socialists, but they're not stupid. Those places prospered.

Early this morning, I started wondering.... Could any other nation done anything comparable to this opening ceremony? Let's start with, for lack of a better term, the "anglo" nations. The U.S., Canada, Great Britain, or Australia?
Nope.
We could never get that many people to cooperate. The unified, thematically cohesive event we saw last night happened because the government was willing to underwrite and enforce the artistic will of one person. Heck, we couldn't have gotten that performance out of the committee/planning stage.
I think it's safe to include Japan in that category.

Other countries in Western Europe? Germany? Forget it. France? The unions would never cooperate, and you can't pull off something like that with a 32-hour work week.

Eastern Europe? Latin America? South America? Any of the nations in Central or Southern Africa? Nope. This would've bankrupted their treasuries.

Numerous Middle Eastern nations have enough money. Saudi Arabia, maybe. But imagine all of the Imams and ayatollahs raising hell because doing such and such is against Islam. They would never allow female athletes to compete in immodest sports like beach volleyball within their nations either. So scratch them.




Russia? No way. They've taken some wrong turns and lapsed into a Mafia state. The whole ceremony would be about Putin. North Korea, ditto, and the ceremony would have to be about Kim.

So correct me if I'm wrong, but I only came up with one other nation that is in that triangular area at the interstection of 1) creativity, 2) wealth, and 3) the ability to somehow enforce its will among its subjects.

Think about it, and then click here to see if you agree.

Free Association Friday

A guy named Don runs a blog called 2008 China Olympics, and he asked to be blogrolled here.

He found out about this site through this unflattering post about China.

For a while, you couldn't access this site from China, a situation brought about shortly after I posted this thing about the China Olympics logo.

My boss, Marvel Variants, was in China last week, and they had loosened controls enough for him to be able to log on. (The hits had already cranked back up about a month ago.)

If you're wondering about the name "Marvel Variants", it refers to obscure price variations in Marvel comic books. Mr. Variants is trying to do with those things what the Hunt brothers tried to do with silver.

If you're wondering what the Hunt brothers tried to do with silver....they tried to corner the market. At one point, they owned half of the silver known to exist in "commodity" form. Once people figured out what they were up to, the Feds intervened, and everybody involved went bankrupt.

Believe it or not, the Hunts were motivated to do this because at the time it was illegal for private U.S. citizens to own gold - a situation that existed from 1934 till sometime in the 1970's. (The government saw gold as a competitor to cash, and they wanted to monopolize the means of exchange.)

The only major political figure to make a big deal about this government monopoly in the last 30 years: Ron Paul. He wants us back on the gold standard. Don't read his book "The Revolution: A Manifesto" if you don't want to be bothered about why we have so much faith in the little pictures of dead presidents called "cash".

If we keep printing the stuff to cover our debts, it's going to be worth less and less against the euro, the peso, the pound, and especially the renminbi. It's also helpful to think of it being worth less and less against the loaf of bread, the hour of electricty, the haircut, the gallon of gas, or anything else you swap for cash. It's worth only what people will give for it since it is no longer tied to a rare commodity.

I mention the renminbi because it's the official currency of China, the nation that now holds a lot of our national debt. China and Japan hold about 20% of our IOU's. Some people think China is buying up U.S. debt to prevent us from intervening if they go nuts in Taiwan or Tibet.

Which is what most of the protests at the China Olympics are about.

And I guess that gets us back to the 2008 China Olympics blog. Check it out if you get a chance.

Just think. Getting through all that took up five minutes of your life. Five minutes that you can never, ever get back....

Does John McCain Know THIS About Joe Lieberman?

I don't even remember how I found this abomination.
A Memphis, Tennessee, pastor named Reverend George Books is actively campaigning against Congressman Steve Cohen.

Cohen's shortcomings are described in a letter from Reverend Brooks, which is duplicated in italics below. All of the bold text is his. You can hit this link and read it without my editorializing, but I hope you won't. I want to spoon it out to you in delicious bite-sized morsels. Here's the first chunk of what apparently went out in the mail to a Cohen supporter.

'Anti-Christ Congressman Steve Cohen of Memphis, TN., who, to the detriment of many, legalized gambling in the form of the Tennessee Lottery awhile back. And is also attempting to legalize MARIJUANA FOR THE SICK.

This guy likes unnecessary commas and capital letters even more than I do.
Next are some pictures of Congressman Cohen and openly gay Congressman Barney Frank.

However, he and pal Barney Frank, the gay congressman from Massachusetts, were unsuccessful in passing their last "pot bill". So maybe now they'll go to work on a national "same sex marriage bill", given the recent victory of California gays. For, who knows, these two may one day decide that they want to "tie the knot".

Or, in their tradition, break a glass and have everyone shout "Mazel Tov" ! Please allow the Reverend Brooks to explain:

Also, both are Jewish, and therefore absolutely refuse to believe in Jesus as the Messiah or the Son of God.

They don't merely refuse it, they absolutely refuse it. Whew.
Then Reverend Brooks decides his audience has reached the teachable moment....

Just in case some Memphis Christian voters are not aware that Jews are against Jesus.

So that explains why I never got invited to any Christmas parties at the Rothsteins. I had wondered. But does everyone know this? Or does it only get taught in seminaries at the doctoral level? Should we start spreading the word? (Full Disclosure: I've had three Bud Lites, and I'm having a great time writing this.) Is this Jewish belief system ever discussed at the highest levels of government? ? ? Reverend Brooks wants to know also:

Is John McCain aware that his advisor, pal, and possible VP candidate Joe Lieberman DOES NOT BELIEVE IN JESUS ?

Is John McCain aware? Who knows? Here's some more doctrine:

Jews do not believe in Jesus as the Messiah or the Son of God. And say that people who believe in the Trinity are actually worshipping three Gods.

Can you imagine the Republican V.P. vetting committee sitting down with Lieberman, and digging around about former drug use, speeding tickets, shady contributors, Clarence Thomas moments, and then getting to the big question: "Joe, I'm sorry, but there's one more question we've got to ask. Do you believe that God exists as three persons but is still one being?And that God has but a single divine nature but God's son Jesus assumed human nature, and therefore had two natures, and is really and fully both God and human? I'm sorry, Congressman, but there are preachers in Memphis who are going to want to know...."

Back to the letter:

Now what does McCain have to say about this? And what about the Southern Baptist Convention, John Hagee, Mike Huckabee, Pat Robertson, Rod Parsley....

Just typing that unholy list of groups and names was almost enough to make me give up pork and put on a yarmulke.

....and other Christian leaders? As well as the Jews of America and Israel, who owe America an explanation as to why Christians should be fighting and dying in wars for them? A people that played a role in the death of Jesus Christ, and believe in him not.

I think it was the Italians who played the biggest role in the death of Jesus Christ. But that's a minor quibble.
We now get to Reverend Brooks' final point:

Which actually makes them anti-Christ.

There's some other stuff in the cover letter about Jesus actually being a black man, blah blah blah.
Reverend Brooks is probably black.
Reverend Brooks is probably the product of a 99% Christian, relatively non-diverse, homogeneous environment.
Reverend Brooks has the right to say whatever he wants to say, under the banner of free speech.
But Reverend Brooks is also an anti-Semitic idiot.

Caption This Kitten

It's late Wednesday night, and I need a caption for this photo:

There was no winner of last week's caption challenge, since the dreaded Fembuttx had the best caption, and I'm not letting her win anything. That brings this week's prize money up to four dollars instead of the usual two.

Thanks to these folks for the picture.

I.O.U.S.A. - The Movie

Here's a trailer for the new documentary I.O.U.S.A.
Looks like the scariest thing ever filmed about the national debt.

Keep watching that national debt clock to your right. It doesn't appear to be slowing down.
Here's the intermission blurb that they've been showing about I.O.U.S.A. on the Sundance channel:

There.
I've done it.
I probably won't need to write another post about Accountant Documentaries for the rest of the year.

Global Dimming. Yes, Global Dimming.

Prepare to be inundated with information about Global Dimming.

Yes, Global Dimming. It has absolutely nothing to do with the high reproductive rates among Lou Dobbs fans.

As usual, Wikipedia has the most concise summary of the concept:

Global dimming is the gradual reduction in the amount of global direct irradiance at the Earth's surface that was observed for several decades after the start of systematic measurements in 1950s. The effect varies by location, but worldwide it has been estimated to be of the order of a 4% reduction over the three decades from 1960–1990. However, since 1990, the trend has reversed.

In other words, less sunlight is making its way to earth. And what causes Global Dimming? Could there be any beneficial side effects? Here's Popsci.com:

Wait, now pollution is preventing global warming? That’s the conclusion of a recent study in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, which says rising temperatures seen in Europe over the last few years result as much from the reduction of air pollution as from the creation of it.....

(The authors of the study) realized the temperature rise was assisted by more sunlight penetrating the newly pollution free skies. It seems that the stricter pollution standards, adopted in part to slow global warming, may have sped it up.....

The idea that pollution may be reflecting some of the sun’s energy is not new. The term global dimming is decades old, and some believed that the reduction in pollution was the cause global warming. But now, with the link between greenhouse gas pollution and global warming firmly established, papers like this one highlight how complex the situation is, and how solutions like simply cutting air pollution may have a range of unintended and counterintuitive consequences.

The link between greenhouse gas pollution and Global Warming is firmly established? I think the jury is still out on that one. (What caused our earlier ice ages to end?) Anyway, get ready to hear a lot about Global Dimming, which may or may not turn out to be a bad thing. We're still waiting on Nancy Pelosi to send out a memo before we develop any firm opinions, aren't we?

In the meantime, assuming that pollution increases Global Dimming, which slows the process of Global Warming, and assuming that Global Warming is the great evil of the age, here are some suggestions for helping decrease the amount of sunlight that hits the earth:

- Bring back Right Guard aerosol deodorant.
- Purchase a Ford F-150 STX. Drive it a lot.
- Drill for oil in the Alaskan National Wildlife Reserve. To counteract the harmful effects of these wells on the environment, start a well fire once a month. Wait a couple of days before putting it out.
- Stop worrying about your carbon footprint. Build a house that makes Al Gore's look like Snoopy's. Heat it with coal.
-Discontinue emails. Send smoke signals.
- Do the right thing, and insist on products and food produced on the other side of the world. Lobby Congress to have these items transported to your city by coal-burning locomotives, steamships, and 1940's Soviet tractors.
- Move Senator Harry Reid to the top of Mount Everest, so his emissions will reach the upper atmosphere faster.

The Obama Tire Pressure Gauge

The Republicans and John McCain are hammering Obama's suggestion that Americans keep their tires properly inflated, and are passing out Obama air pressure gauges like the one shown above. Obama claims that this would save more oil than would be produced by additional wells.
Perhaps that's true. Perhaps it isn't.
But I already keep my tires properly inflated.
Granted, if everyone else did so, it would decrease the demand for oil.

I continue to be amazed at the groups who are anti-globalization except when it comes to oil.
I get a kick out of the politicians who slam the oil industry for excess profits (which are less than those of the finance or technology industries), but continue to give tax breaks and subsidies to oil companies.
Why not eliminate all this posturing, stop grandstanding, cease the bribing and lobbying, end the Sale Of Indulgences, and let people drill if they think they can make some money drilling?

Two Dead Dogs and a 32-Pound Package of Marijuana

Radley Balko at Reason magazine points the world to so much great stuff, I'm thinking of doing something called "The Weekly Radley".

Anyway, since dogs in jeopardy seem to be a popular topic around here, Mr. Balko says that two dogs belonging to the mayor of Berwyn Heights were shot during a SWAT team drug raid.

Here's The Washington Post, with just the facts:

A police SWAT team raided the home of the mayor in the Prince George's County town of Berwyn Heights on Tuesday, shooting and killing his two dogs, after he brought in a 32-pound package of marijuana that had been delivered to his doorstep, police said.....

The package was addressed to Calvo's wife, Trinity Tomsic, said law enforcement officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the case is ongoing.
Tippett said police are working to determine for whom the drugs were meant....

"My government blew through my doors and killed my dogs," Calvo said. "They thought we were drug dealers, and we were treated as such. I don't think they really ever considered that we weren't."
Calvo described a chaotic scene, in which he -- wearing only underwear and socks -- and his mother-in-law were handcuffed and interrogated for hours. They were surrounded by the dogs' carcasses and pools of the dogs' blood, Calvo said.

And here's Mr. Radley Balko again:

So far there have been no arrests, and the police seem to be backing down from the idea that the mayor and his wife are drug dealers. If it’s true that they aren’t, I’m sure we’ll soon hear lots of apologies to the mayor for not being more careful and thorough, given his esteemed position.

The real question is whether there will be any discussion over the appropriateness of sending a SWAT team into any private home, handcuffing the occupants at gunpoint, and slaughtering the family pets—all over the mere receipt of a mailed package of weed. I doubt it.

Even if hizzoner turns out to be guilty, it’s always worth contextualizing these cases: We’ve reached the point where it’s commonplace for the government to wage violent, confrontational invasions of private homes over the suspicion of possession of the dried leaves of a plant.

And here's Mr. Whited Sepulchre:

I haven't posted much about the need to reform drug laws, other than a couple of posts about the near impossibility of completing a long parole or probation sentence. But jails are becoming a growth industry. We've passed China and Russia in the number of inmates and per capita percentage of inmates. Our drug prohibitions are the biggest problem in Bolivia and Colombia, and the situation along the Texas/Mexico border makes the Prohibition era 1920's look like a Sunday School class.
My friend Dr. Liz once told me that she sees marijuana laws as the Police Department's buffalo. (i.e. - Native Americans couldn't prosper and grow without a healthy supply of buffalo. That's a great line, when you think about it.)

Mrs. Whited Sepulchre works as a Youth Minister, so lobbying for relaxed marijuana possession laws gets awkward. Still, we're using the lives of a lot of casual marijuana users as fodder for a government growth industry. The number of social workers, lawyers, job counselors, parole officers, drug testers, police officers, and prison employees who rely on this particular "buffalo" is astounding.

Couldn't their time be better spent doing something else?

One other thing.....I was googling about for pictures of Cheye Calvo, or even better, his dogs. Instead, I came up with this site, where he was a speaker at "National ID at the Crossroads: The Future of Privacy in America".
National ID cards and privacy issues are a big time libertarian issue.
Libertarians generally speak out in favor of relaxed marijuana laws.
The libertarians who speak out loudest in favor of relaxed marijuana laws are generally those who occasionally ....
Aw, never mind.
They still didn't need to shoot his dogs.

The Top 30 Libertarian Blogs and the Top 13 Libertarian Websites

Brian Holtz has posted a list of the top 30 Libertarian blogs. I've copied it here for ease of reference on my part more than anything else. Hit the link to see his ranking criteria. It's a combination of traffic and inbound Technorati links. All commentary below is his.

Glenn Reynolds: Instapundit - "The Blogfather" is a liberventionist who ignores the LP as "trivial" and "a net negative"
Raimondo & Garris: antiwar.com 2 Rothbardians have flitted among 4 parties, backing Buchanan 2000 & Nader 2004
Andrew Sullivan: The Daily Dish Time hired the gay Catholic New Republic ex-editor who coined "South Park Republican"
Lew Rockwell Culturally conservative anarcho-capitalist paleolibertarians who disdain the LP
Reason 60K-circulation techno-optimistic libertarian magazine bemused by the LP
Neil Boortz The libertarian-leaning conservative talk radio personality
Volokh Conspiracy Law school profs who say the LP makes major parties less libertarian at the margin
Marginal Revolution Brilliant GMU economists/philosophers/aesthetes ignore the LP
Homeland Stupidity A libertarian look at technology and privacy
Hammer of Truth Most important LP-friendly blog; Stephen Gordon is now LP Comm Director
Jane Galt: Asymmetrical Information Libertarianish economics-literate journalism; McArdle hired away by The Economist
Daniel Drezner Tufts PoliSci prof gets 58/160 on the libertarian purity test
Radley Balko: The Agitator Cato Institute policy analyst says "the LP is bad for libertarianism"
Vodkapundit Liberventionist who criticizes "doctrinaire libertarianism"
Samizdata Broad US/UK/Australian perspective from liberventionists who call the LP "turgid"
Jon Henke et al: QandO Interventionist neolibertarian Republicans who have given up on the LP
Strike the Root "A libertarian / market anarchist perspective" that says the LP isn't radical enough
EconLog 2 brilliant economists, including anarcho-capitalist theorist Bryan Caplan
Becker-Posner Blog Chicago's economics Nobel laureate and brilliant federal appellate judge
Catallarchy Founding liberventionist Brian Doss says the LP's job is to discipline the GOP
Virginia Postrel: Dynamist Former Reason editor, NY Times columnist, and Future And Its Enemies author
Cato At Liberty Official Cato Institute blog
Cafe Hayek 2 more brilliant GMU economists who focus on ideas, not politics
Vox Populi "the Christian Libertarian commentator from WorldNetDaily"
Technology Liberation Front Libertarian perspectives on technology
Rational Review Tom Knapp's web journal seeks a radical LP for this "revolutionary era"
Cato Unbound Monthly big-idea essay and reaction essays by big thinkers
Positive Liberty Intelligent libertarians embarrassed by the LP's anarchist silliness
Kn@ppster ZAPsolutist anarchist Knapp is hedging his LP bet with a new protest party
Coyote Blog Capitalist libertarian thinks the LP is too kooky
Will Wilkinson: Fly Bottle Ex-GMU Cato Institute policy analyst
Free Liberal "non-partisan left-libertarian journal of politics and economics"
David Friedman: Ideas Milton Friedman's son is the world's leading utilitarian anarcho-capitalist theorist

He's also done a list of the top 13 Libertarian websites:

Ludwig von Mises Institute The leading American institute for Austrian economics
Cato Institute Arguably the most important force for freedom since its 1983 schism with the LP
Libertarian Party The only American political party advocating personal and economic liberty
Library of Economics and Liberty No bricks or mortar, but a potent academic-oriented web presence
Future of Freedom Foundation Advocates the "free markets and limited government that made our nation great"
Advocates For Self-Government Pushes its Nolan Chart quiz and lists libertarian celebrities
Ayn Rand Institute Official institute for Rand's Objectivist philosophy
Independent Institute Second only to Cato as a libertarian think tank; GMU's Tabarrok directs research
Reason Foundation Libertarian think tank specializing in privatization, environment, and California
Adam Smith Institute
Institute for Humane Studies Founded 1961, moved from Menlo Park to GMU in 1985, focuses on scholarships
International Society For Individual Liberty Students for Individual Liberty (1969) merged with Libertarian International in 1989
Downsize DC The late Harry Browne's group for petitioning Washington

Bob Barr: Karl Rove Is In Contempt

I don't know which I like more about this YouTube Clip - Bob Barr saying that Karl Rove is in contempt of Congress? Or the opening and closing guitar licks from Ted Nugent's "Stranglehold"?



I believe that, for better or worse, Bush had the right to fire the eight AG's in question. Heck, Clinton replaced them all. That's the way the law is written.

By the same token, if Congress asks you questions, or asks for evidence, you have to answer. That's the way the law is written.

Go Bob.

This is from an email I got today from the Barr campaign:
A candidate running for president as an Independent in 2008 would have to collect 867,134 signatures from voters in all 50 states in order to have their name printed on the ballot on November 4th.
In comparison, Republican and Democrat nominees must collect zero signatures to have their name printed on the ballot in all 50 states on November 4th.That's right, to get their name printed on the ballot, John McCain and Barack Obama will need to collect no signatures - zip - zero - nada.
Had it not been for the three decades of work done by the Libertarian Party, the Barr Campaign would not be in such fine shape right now in regards to Ballot Access. But the job is not done just yet.

Do you think that's just a little bit screwed up? Democrats and Republicans AREN'T the government. They are social clubs who nominate candidates. Just like Libertarians, Greens, Whigs, or The Bull Moose Party. Why do the Yin and Yang of Tax and Spend get freebie ballot access?

Throw 'em out.

Go Bob.

Barack Obama and William Ayers

There have been a lot of posts the last few days about William Ayers and The Weather Underground.

The Weather Underground took their name from the lyrics of Bob Dylan's "Subterranean Homesick Blues": You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows. They were an early 1970's radical group that ran around plotting to blow up things they didn't like - The Pentagon, Nation Guard Armories, their parents, etc etc etc.

The group could have used a safety consultant, as three members accidentally blew up themselves in a Greenwich Village safe house.

Chicago magazine once published an excellent profile on Ayers. The funniest part is how the guy rants against globalization, but saw no problem with supporting Starbucks. I believe that he'd never thought about the contradictions until this interview:

What are you doing in a Starbucks? I ask the man who professes to hate globalization.
"Oh," he says. "I have an addiction to caffeine."

There you have the complexity of Ayers: a man who once tried to overthrow his country's government and now works for a state university; an opponent of the bourgeoisie who has been married for 20 years; a left-wing radical who loves a good cup of imperialist coffee. Maybe he's always known how to choose his battles. Once one of his sons wanted to hear about how Ayers had been a draft card burner. "Tell me again how you burned your credit card, Pop," his son confusedly asked.

Here's a video that gives you something to contrast with the frumpy academic in that interview:


Here's a YouTube of Hillary mentioning Ayers in a debate:

If I remember correctly, Obama immediately slammed Hillary for mentioning the guy, since Bill Clinton either pardoned or commuted the prison sentences of two convicted Weather Underground members near the end of his second term. Obama and Hillary shouldn't air dirty Democrat laundry during debates.

Ayers and Obama both live in the same high-toned Hyde Park suburb of Chicago. (Yeah, lots of the anti-capitalists seek out those places. But Ayers has the unique distinction of having said "Kill the rich". They've served on boards together, and Obama had one of his early state senate fundraiser/exploratory committee meetings at Ayers' home.)

I've been waiting on the Republicans to make a bigger deal out of this guy, but so far not much has happened. They've created a mock FaceBook page, showing Obama and Ayers as "friends". Kind of funny, but not enough to justify the trouble they went through to create it. If the Republican National Committee thinks this will save them from the horrors of one-party government, they're mistaken.

Republicans need to get kicked out of office nationwide so they can get back to their small government roots. But I've worked in manufacturing for a long time, and I just hate to see an underutilized resource like Bill Ayers. They could do so much more than FaceBook silliness.

William Ayers is god's gift to Republicans, but they're too timid to do anything with him. Or maybe McCain is too much the military gentleman to get down in the mud.

If that's the case, McCain is doomed.

You don't need a Weatherman to see which way the wind blows.