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| Socialism Presented as Rational Public Policy Proposals | ||
| 2006-11-17 | ||
| (EFMIP)Edited for the more insane parts Note to mods: I like the accordian lady!
• Create a National Oil Trust to oversee our still-undeveloped and hugely significant energy resources. Translation: No more oil leases on federal lands, Ever. • Clamp down on oil-industry royalty and depreciation practices that shortchange American taxpayer, fatten oil company profits and deprive the nation of a clear and significant revenue stream that could be dedicated to programs reducing our dependence on fossil fuels. This suggestion is a hoot. The writer is an expert in leftist polemics writing as if oil companies, their investors and emoplyees aren't taxpayers, thereby suggesting that anyone who agrees with the writer is exclusively a taxpayer. I'll take a pass on this. If "alternative fuel" sources can't come into the market by market rules, then they aren't an alternative, now are they? More proof that liberalism is based on contradictions and lies. • High oil prices transfer enormous wealth to malign regimes, funds terrorism and insurgencies around the world placing our nation at great geo-political risk. Efforts must be made to bring down the price of oil starting with far greater transparency and oversight to energy trading markets to prevent price manipulation. I got an idea on how to bring down the price of fuel Elimnate/cut federal taxes from the wellhead to the fuel pump. That way not only will be price of gas plummet but it would be good for the economy as well. Of course what's good for the economy isn't good for the socialst scheme this fella proposes. • Make transparent the oil industry's monetary contributions and lobbying initiatives that are designed to influence government energy policy. The monetary contributions which fund the left's pet projects which also influence government energy policy will be exempt, of course. • Restructure the Interior Department to eliminate deep seated oil-industry favoritism. Translation: more environMENTALists. • Assure that the Energy Department end its acquiescence of OPEC and begins to take a more cogent and pro-active policy when they and other suppliers insist on playing monopoly games by colluding to cut supplies to drive up their prices and profits. Allow me to render that sentance. When ever the left has a bald faced socialist scheme they can't define it in anything less than 25 word, it usually translates into: Raise taxes and write targeted regulations. • Revoke the sovereign immunity of OPEC suppliers, thus opening them to antitrust charges. The law is a crappy instrument for dealing with monopolies. The market is much more efficient.
Raise taxes, spend money on money losing non market viable "alternatives." After **==>Forty years<==** of this mantra you'd think we'd get by now that alternatives don't work and they won't work in the marketplace. • Consider introducing consumer vouchers for gasoline, diesel and other oil related products as a way to reduce their usage by establishing a national cap on their consumption. With a voucher program in place we would have the added benefit of a system extant to quickly and fairly allocate energy resources were a major oil shock ever to occur. Translation: Rationing. That means the writer just contradicted himself, by first advocating policies to lower prices and then later in the same article advocating policies that will raise prices. Proof yet again that liberalism/socialism is based on a contradiction, any contradiction, and its basic premises cannot be realized without expressing such contradictions in some form. I will sketch out the thinking behind each of these propositions in the days ahead. Do stay tuned.I'll be on pins and needles waiting for the next one! | ||
| Posted by:badanov |
| #31 erm... Mr. Wife's vehicle is seven years old. PIMF! |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-11-17 23:56 |
| #30 Wait a minute -- poor people have Mercedes in Atlanta? Darn it, I want to be poor -- I'm driving a beat up, six year old minivan, and his vehicle is seven years old. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-11-17 23:55 |
| #29 To further phil_b's arugument, when liberals "worry" about people not having health insurance, it's only to pick your pocket. PG9578 lives in a country with "free" health care. Problem is, PG, if you were to need an emergency appendectomy or something how long would it take you to get it? A lot longer than a US citizen. We cover "emergency" situations already, so it doesn't matter whether or not you have insurance, they HAVE to treat you, assuming you're a citizen (and in some cases, even if you're not). Also, all those stats on the "uninsured" in America all count adults (18 years old & up) who have health insurance themselves. How many 18-22 year olds have their OWN insurance (not many, if any)? But, most of them are covered under their parent's insurance, but they appear to be uninsured in these stats. I won't even get into my numerous dealings with the poor here in America. I can't tell you how many times I've been to my local grocery store (I live in a decent middle class suburb of Atlanta), only to see some youngsters (usually black or Hispanic) who are dressed to the T, flip out their welfare check or their WIC Program check (that's "food stamps") to pay for their groceries and then I follow them to the parking lot to see them hop in a brand new BMW or Mercedes or Escalade or Chevy pickup. THAT's what TW is getting at. Our (America's) poor are NOT poor compared to the rest of the world. |
| Posted by: BA 2006-11-17 22:32 |
| #28 If US-style anti-socialism is the answer, why are there so many poor people in the US? (Compared to Germany, for instance) This assertion is false. Go to nationmaster.com and poke around in the income and income distribution statistics. You will find that the poorest Americans are better off than the poorest of any other country, except Norway and a couple of other small states. And as far as health coverage is concerned. As a practical matter everyone in America has access to healthcare through public hospitals and clinics. This includes illegal aliens. In contrast in the UK and Australia (examples of socialized medicine), you would definitely be refused healthcare if you can not prove you are a legal resident. |
| Posted by: phil_b 2006-11-17 20:48 |
| #27 I thought it was the other way around. Bush abandoned the faith-based initiatives, and in turn they turned against him at the polls. |
| Posted by: Pholing Glineque9578 2006-11-17 20:25 |
| #26 FOX > DICK MORRIS > the Dems won 2006 by fielding GOP/Rightist or Right-leaning or "Centrist" Conservative candidates, ERGO POST-ELEX ARE GIVING OR OFFERING KEY GUBMINT + LEADERSHIP POSITIONS TO FAR LEFTIES, ANARCHISTS + SOCIALISTS. IOW, DEMOLEFT > "MODER/CENTRIST", RIGHTIST SOCIALISTS NOW, ULTRA-LEFT TOTALITARIAN COMMUNISM -GUBMINT-IST LATER. Minister POTEMKIN would be proud. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2006-11-17 20:23 |
| #25 They decided to pander to the social conservatives and lost big time. Spot on, Seafarious! The GOP's unholy alliance with the religious right has dragged it down into a pit of distorted messages and moral preening that is total anathema to conservatism. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2006-11-17 20:06 |
| #24 Our conservative party stopped being conservative and immediately lost its support from the voters. Fiscally conservative, that is. They decided to pander to the social conservatives and lost big time. |
| Posted by: Seafarious 2006-11-17 19:49 |
| #23 when one posts from the maternalistic arms of Canada, one is apt to have a different view. That is so true, Pappy!!! ...but not for the reason you think. Our Conservative government is enjoying considerable popularity here in Canada. How is your conservative party doing? |
| Posted by: Pholing Glineque9578 2006-11-17 19:44 |
| #22 When uncontrolled speculation was the rule of the day? And that is not the case today? Gasoline prices are affected by speculators, with the result being immediate. I agree with Lou Dobbs on one thing: NAFTA isn't working the way it was sold to us. In particular, it didn't work for Mexico, as evidenced by the number of illegals streaming into the US. Now, if it's true that there's a problem with NAFTA, then perhaps there's a problem with Milton Friedman's vision of a laissez-faire system. After all, he did formulate most of his ideas before NAFTA came into being. I wonder what Friedman thought of the illegals. Actually, I like what Milton Friedman had to say more generally: "The fact that these arguments against the so-called Capitalist ethic are inavlid does not of course demonstrate that the Capitalist ethic is an acceptable one. I find it difficult to justify either accepting or rejecting it, or to justify any alternative principle. I am led to the view that it cannot in and of itself be regarded as an ethical principle; that it must be regarded as instrumental or a corollary of some other principle such as freedom." |
| Posted by: Pholing Glineque9578 2006-11-17 19:39 |
| #21 Too bad Milton Friedman has passed away before having a chance to enlighten PG9578. |
| Posted by: Phineter Thraviger1073 2006-11-17 19:20 |
| #20 My dear tw, when one posts from the maternalistic arms of Canada, one is apt to have a different view. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2006-11-17 19:02 |
| #19 Lou dobbs is many kinds of pompoous idiot, and the particular whine you quoted is a perfect example, Pholing Glineque9578. "Now more than ever"? More than when the Rockefellers, the Carnegies, and the other Robber Barrons controlled things? When uncontrolled speculation was the rule of the day? When the boom and bust cycles were so bad that families had to send their 5-year olds to work in the coal mines and the powered looms to keep a leaky roof over their heads? Do get a sense of perspective, my dear Pholing Glineque9578, please! |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-11-17 18:35 |
| #18 There may be a dichotomy I have inadvertantly advanced. As I wrote, all government is a tyranny. The difference is the degree. In the US we have decided that government should play a small and hopefully smaller role in American society. The idea that increasing the power of government by raising taxes, which all tyrants do, is somehow an improvement in society is a contradiction, and thus a deliberate deception. |
| Posted by: badanov 2006-11-17 18:34 |
| #17 And please don't say the US government is a tyranny. |
| Posted by: Pholing Glineque9578 2006-11-17 18:28 |
| #16 small group of powerful American interests." said interests being government... |
| Posted by: badanov 2006-11-17 18:27 |
| #15 Ok, let me asky my question in another way: What the hell is Lou Dobbs complaining about in his book The War on the Middle Class? "The government, big business, and special interest groups are enriching themselves at our expense. Now more than ever, we're finding ourselves at the mercy of those individuals and organizations that control jobs, provide goods and services, and wield power... The middle class is being picked apart and its future mortgaged for the benefit of a small group of powerful American interests." Is Lou nuts? (I kinda think he is, but for different reasons. Here, I agree with him,) |
| Posted by: Pholing Glineque9578 2006-11-17 18:26 |
| #14 All governments are tryannies. The difference is the degree. |
| Posted by: badanov 2006-11-17 18:24 |
| #13 Government is inescapable. All tyrannies are inescapable. True. Doesn't follow that all governments are tyrannical, however. |
| Posted by: Pholing Glineque9578 2006-11-17 18:18 |
| #12 Government is inescapable. All tyrannies are inescapable. |
| Posted by: badanov 2006-11-17 18:03 |
| #11 I compared to Germany because I lived there. But the fact of the matter is that most poor people in America are actually only poor by comparison to those who have more; by comparison to the rest of the world, even prosperous Germany, almost all of our poor people are extremely well off. By my perspective real poverty means ongoing hunger and cold, and no possiblity of changing the situation; not many of America's "poor" are anywhere near poverty-stricken by that definition. Shipman defined beautiifully the question you are trying so hard not to ask openly. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-11-17 17:54 |
| #10 Because we define poverty differently Even then, my question still stands, why are there so many poor people in the US? Your answer only dealt with the "compared to Germany" part. Or are you saying that there are no poor people in the US? |
| Posted by: Pholing Glineque9578 2006-11-17 17:44 |
| #9 What Pholing Glineque9578 is trying to ask is why are 25% of American citizens doomed to be found in the lowest quartile? We need EUmetrics. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2006-11-17 17:39 |
| #8 Where is the economic logic that states transferring value from one entity ( evil oil companies) to government is a good idea. That is a normative aspect and best left for policy makers rather than economics. Hence, there's no such economic logic, unless you ask the question in a slightly different way, mainly "Is the transfer of value from one entity to the government an effective means"? (But even then you run into problems, "means of what?" etc) Government is inescapable. If you wish to maintain the rules of the game (liberal markets), you need a government. |
| Posted by: Pholing Glineque9578 2006-11-17 17:33 |
| #7 Because we define poverty differently, Pholing Glineque9578. The following are facts about persons defined as "poor" by the Census Bureau, taken from various government reports: - Forty-six percent of all poor households own their own homes. The average home owned by persons classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house with one-and-a-half baths, a garage, and porch or patio. - Seventy-six percent of poor households have air conditioning. By contrast, 30 years ago, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning. - Only 6 percent of poor households are overcrowded. More than two-thirds have more than two rooms per person. - The average poor American has more living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, Athens and other European cities. (These comparisons are to the average citizens in foreign countries, not to those classified as poor.) - Nearly three-quarters of poor households own a car; 30 percent own two or more cars. - Ninety-seven percent of poor households have a color television. Over half own two or more color televisions. - Seventy-eight percent have a VCR or DVD player; 62 percent have cable or satellite TV reception. - Seventy-three percent own a microwave oven, more than half have a stereo, and a third have an automatic dishwasher. Overall, the typical American defined as poor by the government has a car, air conditioning, a refrigerator, a stove, a clothes washer and dryer, and a microwave. He has two color televisions, cable or satellite TV reception, a VCR or DVD player, and a stereo. He is able to obtain medical care. His home is in good repair and is not overcrowded. By his own report, his family isn't hungry, and he had sufficient funds in the past year to meet his family's essential needs. While this individual's life is not opulent, it is equally far from the popular images of dire poverty conveyed by the press, activists and politicians. http://www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_story/0,3566,132956,00.html The Specter of Poverty in America Tuesday, September 21, 2004 By Robert Rector, a senior research fellow at The Heritage Foundation. Or, to make it more personal, my darling sister-in-law, whose husband owns a successful small business, has two children at university, and goes on one or more sea cruises every year, has only catastrophic health insurance, because that is a choice they made; they are all frighteningly healthy, and don't need more. When Mr. Wife's job took us to Germany, we lived in a lovely little 150 square meter house in Bad Soden am Taunus alongside German bank vice presidents and Grafs (a German title of nobility, possibly the equivalent of a count?) and such. Trailing daughter #1's German Kindergarten playmates would look at our house and ask which flat we lived in, because that was their experience. And yet at the time my husband was only a lower level manager, and we were living a lifestyle equivalent to what we were accustomed to Stateside. I do hope that helps. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-11-17 17:14 |
| #6 How many folks in the US have health coverage (insurance) as a percentage of the total population? If US-style anti-socialism is the answer, why are there so many poor people in the US? (Compared to Germany, for instance) Government is a recursive entity. Where is the economic logic that states transferring value from one entity ( evil oil companies) to government is a good idea. Which sector benefits? Government. Even when money derived from increased taxes is used for programs to encourage conservation ( which oil and gas companies do anyway ) which sector benfits? Government. Whether you refuse to accept it or not face the facts: government is by definition a tyranny, the degreee of which is determined by how much it wants to tax its citizens. The moke who wants to use then power of the federal government to attack a critical sector of our growing economy uses the language of the tyrant by splitting citizens and setting them one against the other all because of his personal socialist agenda. It sounds good: believing you are achieving "economic justice" through the power of government against a sector of the eocnomy, but how it comes out is just another charletan trying to sell the public on his personal brand of tyranny. |
| Posted by: badanov 2006-11-17 15:54 |
| #5 How many folks in the US have health coverage (insurance) as a percentage of the total population? If US-style anti-socialism is the answer, why are there so many poor people in the US? (Compared to Germany, for instance) |
| Posted by: Pholing Glineque9578 2006-11-17 15:23 |
| #4 Sea is right. Just because Socialism doesn't work doesn't mean there is something fundamentally wrong with it. |
| Posted by: SteveS 2006-11-17 14:14 |
| #3 It's all about the oil... |
| Posted by: Raj 2006-11-17 13:32 |
| #2 Well it just wasn't done *properly* the other umpty billion times. By the moustache of Karl Marx, this time we'll get it right. Swear! |
| Posted by: Seafarious 2006-11-17 13:25 |
| #1 Socalism failed 34 times and you still want to bring that crap here. How uneducated the author truely is. |
| Posted by: closedanger@hotmail.com 2006-11-17 12:28 |