Search

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

New Cyber-security bill grants Obama extraordinary power over the internet

The Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs has approved the Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act (PCNAA), a cyber-security bill, sponsored by Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT), Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) and Senator Tom Carper (D-DE).

The bill would lead to the creation of a brand new government agency, the National Center for Cyber-security and Communications (NCCC), within the Department of Homeland Security. The bill will face opposition for the fact that there are very few restrictions to the emergency powers granted to the president.

The intuitively offensive part of the bill, for the true libertarian at least, is the power granted to the president to shut down private sector internet use. One can accept that the government areas of the internet presumably should be under governmental control, and subject to operate however the government sees fit (as long as such operations are lawful). There is, however, no clear reason why the government should have control over private sections of the internet and therefore control over content owned and operated by private citizens.

As usual, the government says the justification for the extraordinary powers granted to the president is a threat to our national security. According to Senator Lieberman, due to the imminent threat to our national security that could come in the form of some kind of digital online attack, it is reasonable to give the president the power to seize control or shut down portions of the internet (this is what the bill allows, according to CNET).

There are several ethical issues involved in such granting the executive such a huge power. The emergency powers given to the president in the bill are a de facto means to shut down free speech should the president choose to do so. Senator Lieberman, talking on CNN about the bill, implicitly acknowledges the danger of the power handed to the president by giving us the fickle assurance that “it’s not like the president would do this [shut down the internet] every day.”

What must be balanced here is the nature of the threat, the ways to contain the threat, and the size of governmental response. We must also look at the powers given to the president and frame them as the actual power that the Obama administration would have over the internet and not simply accept the administration’s stated intentions behind the expansion in governmental power as a means to combat cyber terrorism. Government stated intentions behind an incremental increase in state power rarely hold true once the government is actually given the power it originally sought.

Senator Lieberman went on, rather alarmingly, to suggest that the Chinese government has the kind of power that will be granted to Obama from this bill, and that such state power is desirable here in the United States. The other states that have the kind of state power akin to the Chinese government are Burma, Cuba, Egypt, Iran, North Korea, Syria, Tunisia and others. These countries have autocratic or semi-autocratic governments in power: do we want to be a part of this select group of countries?

Nobody is arguing that we shouldn’t take cyber-security seriously. The government, however, cannot attempt to slip this by the people, create government agencies as they wish, and give the president extraordinary powers without even making the case for their actions. Furthermore, with regard to the private sector of the internet, there are companies that can effectively perform the task that the government needs done at a fair market price; this would mean the administration need not be given the de facto power to shut down free speech. 










 


Share/Save/Bookmark

Monday, June 28, 2010

G20 finally adopting austerity measures but Obama still doesn’t get it

The G20 Summit, being held in Toronto this year, finally came to the conclusion that they will adopt policy initiatives that libertarians and thoughtful conservatives have been demanding for quite a while now: they pledged to halve their budget deficits by 2012. Shocking, isn’t it?

What is really shocking, however, is where our president stood on the issue. Even after the Europeans (yes, those fiscally irresponsible Europeans!) pledged to cut deficits, he was still urging that governments should spend. Obama continued, 

"A number of our European partners are making difficult decisions. But we must recognize that our fiscal health tomorrow will rest in no small measure on our ability to create jobs and growth today."

It seems that Obama means job creation in the public sector (aka more government jobs) when he says “our ability to create jobs”; the problem is the inference that job growth in the public sector will translate to real valuable economic growth that is sustainable and will be able to lead to a full economic recovery.

History has shown that job growth in the public sector leads to inflated benefit systems for governmental workers and endless bureaucracies which have no real market value (perhaps because they do not do anything valuable). Where does job growth in the public sector leave the nation a few years down the line? Let’s see… oh, in the same position that say, Greece, are in now: the verge of bankruptcy. 

In addition to this, increased government growth crowds out opportunities for sustainable private sector growth giving job seekers less of an opportunity to find meaningful employment. With record unemployment levels this could not only be an economic disaster, but could also lead to an infringement of our very civil liberties. Friedrich Hayek, prominent economist, warned of the dangers accompanied by reduction of employers within the market place,

“That the freedom of the employed depends upon the existence of a great number and variety of employers is clear when we consider the situation that would exist if there were only one employer – namely, the state – and if taking employment were the only permitted means of livelihood. And a consistent application of socialist principles, however much it might be disguised by the delegation of the power of employment to the nominally independent public corporations and the like, would necessarily lead to the presence of a single employer. Whether this employer acted directly or indirectly, he would clearly possess unlimited power to coerce the individual.” (Hayek, The Constitution of Liberty, Chapter 7)

Are we not heading down this road already, America?
Share/Save/Bookmark

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Some Obama jokes

Some funny Obama one-liners!

Q: What was the most positive result of the "Cash for clunkers" program?
A: It took 95% of the Obama bumper stickers off the road.

***

Q: What's the difference between Obama and his dog, Bo?
A: Bo has papers.

***

Q: If Nancy Pelosi and Obama were on a boat in the middle of the ocean and it started to sink, who would be saved?
A: America!

***

Q: What's the difference between Obama's cabinet and a penitentiary?
A: One is filled with tax evaders, blackmailers and threats to society. The other is for housing prisoners.

***

Q: What does Barack Obama call lunch with a convicted felon?
A: A fund raiser.

***

Q: Have you heard about McDonald's' new Obama Value Meal?
A: Order anything you like and the guy behind you has to pay for it.

***

America needs Obama-care like Nancy Pelosi needs a Halloween mask.

***

The liberals are asking us to give Obama time. We agree...and think 25 to life would be appropriate.

***

There's nothing wrong with the people who voted for Obama that becoming taxpayers won't cure.
Military expert Barack Obama thinks that an Offensive Nuke is a dirty microwave oven.

***

President Obama decided to do one of his public addresses against the backdrop of an American farm, but the ceremony couldn't get started because of all the flies buzzing around his head. Obama demanded to know why the flies wouldn't leave, so the farmer explained to him, "Well, those are called circle flies. They always circle around the back end of horses." Obama angrily replied, "Hey, are you saying that I'm a horse's ass?" The farmer answered, "No Sir, Mister President. I would never call someone a horse's ass. It's hard to fool them flies though."

***

Share/Save/Bookmark

Monday, June 21, 2010

Obamanomics


It would be funny... if it wasn't so terrifying!

Share/Save/Bookmark

Sunday, June 20, 2010

What Obama Doesn't Understand

I wrote a blog post earlier titled “can somebody please tell Obama that this isn’t Europe”; it seems nobody took me up on my offer. The reaction of the American people – when faced with economic disasters – should show Obama that we, as a nation, are distinct in culture and attitude toward what we think the state should do for us.

One of the world’s largest recessions hit in 2007, and is continuing to ravage markets and the general economy, even today. Huge banking firms have been close to collapse or actually collapsed; the recent BP oil disaster will ravage the Gulf of Mexico for years to come; even General Motors and Chrysler were going under.

A people with socialist leanings – such as many European countries – would have cried “state intervention!” They would have deplored the “crass greed” of “unregulated and unrepentant capitalism” that caused such destruction. This is also what the Marxists would argue.

But what did the American people demand? We didn’t turn to the state; there were no cries of “state intervention”; quite the contrary, our response was “less state intervention”. Why was our response so different to the responses of the people in Europe?

I argue that the answer lies in our history as a nation. Entrepreneurship is a part of American society, indeed, a part of American culture. Communism gave you the dull concrete tower blocks of Eastern Europe and Russia; free-market capitalism gives you the modern American city.

We are now at a crossroads in our history. The Obama administration has spent $1 trillion on an economic stimulus, propped up failing companies and banks, as well as introduced forced-purchase health care reform. He has also recently appropriated $20 billion dollars, without decree of law, from a private company.

Obama – whether he is a socialist or not – is definitely increasing the role of government in our lives. What he doesn’t seem to understand is that we accept entrepreneurship, competition, and free market economics as a part of our heritage and culture: this necessarily means that we prefer a small sized government that only helps maintain a framework where the private sector can work; not where the government is the main player.

Either we say no to Obamanomics, or we go down the road where all the European countries are headed: bankruptcy and then serfdom.
Share/Save/Bookmark

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

The Tea Party Movement is Here to Stay!

There have been many attacks on the Tea Party coalition as of late – particularly from the left leaning media – as the movement continues to gather momentum and forge itself into a well-defined political union. Recently, Judge Andrew Napolitano had a “Tea Party Summit” where he invited Ron Paul and Sarah Palin on as guests to discuss the future of the Tea Party movement.

Ron Paul and Sarah Palin presumably characterize the two seemingly opposing factions within the Tea Party movement: the libertarians verses the social conservatives. The libertarians are for a more non-interventionist foreign policy whilst also supporting the repeal of various government laws infringing on peoples’ right to do as they wish (which includes activities such as recreational drug use). The social conservatives, however, are typically in favor of an interventionist foreign policy (particularly with regard to lending a hand to Israel and other key allies) and may not be in favor of the repeal of certain laws (such as those that illegalize marijuana use).

What we saw at the Tea Party Summit, however, is that these are largely family feuds as opposed to real barriers for political unity. This is largely because all the factions in the Tea Party – indeed, this may be the essential characteristic that deems them a part of the Tea Party movement – are united on the single most important major issue of today: national debt.

The amicable exchanges between Ron Paul and Sarah Palin made it clear that despite the media’s attempts to – rather egregiously – categorize the movement as a “bunch of racist, bigoted, angry white people,” the Tea Party Movement is a legitimate political association constituted by different groups who all agree that government is too big, the country has too much debt, and the way Obama is running the country is unsustainable. This political alliance is strong because the Tea Party movement realizes what is at stake – not political power, but our ideals, people’s very livelihoods, and the future of the United States.


Share/Save/Bookmark

Monday, June 14, 2010

Sarah Palin says it how it should be



Heck yeah!

Share/Save/Bookmark

Friday, June 11, 2010

What's right with America's Right

The Economist recently published an article arguing that the right has too much anger and “too few ideas” – implying that the ‘Tea Party’ movement is an entirely reactionary movement with no substance except to discredit President Obama and cause political agitation. To this I say that the Tea Party movement doesn’t need to do much to discredit President Obama – he does that enough all by himself.

The statement that the Tea Party movement is reactionary is also largely mistaken. The Tea Party movements that have sprung up since early 2009 all have longer histories than when they got together – and further – share a common longer history which the movement’s namesake refers to – the Boston Tea Party. 
 
The philosophical underpinnings of the movement are also strong and largely libertarian; small government, low taxes, fiscal responsibility, maximized freedom, and a vehement dislike of any form of nanny state. The reason why the movement may be deemed – albeit mistakenly – as reactionary is because the Obama administration provides the exactly antithetical form of government to the kind of political arrangement that the Tea Partyers (along with the Founding Fathers) would like to see.

Obama plans to raise taxes (even if he didn’t plan to he’d have to just to finance the huge government deficit). The Obama administration wants to get involved in private businesses and thus introduce distortions into the market. The Obama administration has planned great government projects that will cost hundreds of billions of dollars that future generations will have to pay for (and pay back to China no less). These are all hostile to the kind of America that we want to see.

Of course we are angry – we have every right to be. This is beyond a political feud or an attempt to cause agitation for the Obama administration. This is beyond politicians playing the politics game and trying to win another term in office. Our vision is long term and right now we are afraid – afraid for how big the government is going to get, afraid for our future, afraid for our kids’ future, and indeed, afraid for the future of this great nation. This is about people’s livelihoods and our freedoms – we are not going to give these up without a fight. 

Share/Save/Bookmark

Tuesday, June 8, 2010

Hilary Clinton Says High Tax-to-GDP Ratio is Healthy? Since When is Cuba Healthy?!

Hilary Clinton today amazingly argued that countries with the highest tax-to-GDP ratio are healthy. Responding to a question, she remarked,
Brazil has the highest tax-to-GDP rate in the Western Hemisphere and guess what — it's growing like crazy. And the rich are getting richer, but they're pulling people out of poverty. There is a certain formula there that used to work for us until we abandoned it, to our regret in my opinion.
With all due respect, Secretary Clinton, your opinion is just plain wrong.


Let’s talk economics. It is unclear how Clinton could infer anything from tax-to-GDP ratio because the amount of revenue a government has is entirely contingent on a particular countries resources, ideology, historical forces, social forces, and so on. For this reason, different governments have vastly different constituent revenue components and therefore to make a generalization about the relationship between tax and GDP is simply not possible. For example, if one country counts sales of oil as tax revenue and another does not, then no clear comparison can be made between the two with regard to a tax-to-GDP ratio.


There are other reasons why Secretary Clinton cannot make the judgment she is making but they all boil down to the same thing: economics says nothing about tax-to-GDP ratio. However, economics does say something about taxes in general. When a government taxes heavily, it stifles economic growth because why would entrepreneurs risk their livelihoods if their fruits are going to be appropriated by a central bureaucrat? This is one well-established economic relationship, Secretary Clinton. Try opening an economics 101 textbook sometime.


What is really implicit in Clinton’s remark is her ideological fixation on the idea of redistribution by the government. Economic science has repeatedly affirmed that meddling by the government simply introduces distortions into the market and leads to a less efficient distribution of resources.


By the way, Secretary Clinton, Brazil doesn’t have the highest tax-to-GDP ratio in the western hemisphere. Guess who does? Cuba.

Share/Save/Bookmark

Monday, June 7, 2010

Can Someone Tell Obama This is America, NOT Europe!


The European countries – with their exceptionally large governments and social welfare programs – have finally acknowledged that their amount of spending is unsustainable. The new conservative British PM David Cameron today announced “painful” measures that will mean cutting back on fiscal spending: this means reductions in pay, benefits and pensions.

The German cabinet also backed austerity measures which plan to cut $96 billion by 2014. This is projected to cut Germany’s budget deficit by 3% of GDP.

European countries have traditionally had fiscally irresponsible national health programs, extensive welfare programs, and big benefits for government bureaucrats. The appropriation of funding from their entrepreneurs and private businesses has allowed their governments to swell beyond their size and has allowed a systemic risk to spread across all markets in the form of national debt. Is this fair?

This is not the American way. The American way is that the money you earn is yours – you do not owe anybody else the fruits of your labor. By spending money they don’t have, and taxing us and our kids to finance the deficit, the Obama administration is implicitly operating on the principle that they own our labor and own us. That isn’t right.

Our spending is out of control, much like theirs. Does this mean our country will be heading toward the same road to destruction as the Europeans, like almost bankrupt Greece? And if so, who do you think will come to our rescue? China? Do we want to be in China’s pocket?  

Bureaucrats are bureaucrats for a reason: if they had any business savvy, they would not end up working for the government. It makes no sense to trust someone as stupid as a bureaucrat with OUR money. What’s happening right now is that the government is printing money (and the more money they print the less valuable the dollar in your pocket becomes) and banking on future generations to pay for the deficit.

Any sane president would look to Europe and see that we should not be making the same mistakes they have made. Instead, Obama passes a fiscally irresponsible healthcare bill in the middle of a recession. Is our great nation heading toward bankruptcy because of the fiscal irresponsibility of those in Washington?

Share/Save/Bookmark

Sunday, June 6, 2010

Obama and Big Government


Yup... that sums it up!

Share/Save/Bookmark

Rand Paul is Not Racist OR Radical – It’s About Property Rights

Many people have accused Rand Paul of being racist for arguing that the government does not have the right (and should not have the right) to tell private businesses how to do business with regard to the kinds of customers they serve. This would include the government not being able to force a restaurant to serve black clientele if it chose not to serve clientele from that particular community.

Rand Paul repeatedly argues that this kind of restaurant policy would be despicable but he goes onto argue that it doesn’t mean that the government should have a right to tell businesses how to operate. The real issue here is the difference in the conception of property rights Rand Paul has compared to those who think a government is perfectly entitled in telling a business how to operate.

For Rand Paul, and libertarians in general, a person’s liberty is of utmost importance. Furthermore, libertarians do not differentiate between private property and the property you own that you use to make money. That is, you have the same rights with regard to your home that you have with regard to your place of business. Just as it would be unreasonable to suggest that the government should force a racist white person to allow a black person into his or her home, it is as foolish to suggest that the government should be allowed to force a restaurant to serve a particular group of people the private ownership doesn’t wish to serve.

Rand Paul isn’t racist or radical: he is simply consistent. A set of property rights remains the same whether it is your home or your business. Furthermore, it would be entirely irrational for a business to set up shop and not serve to people – this just doesn’t make economic sense! In addition to this, a business that refused to serve people because of arbitrary properties such as black skin would lose reasonable patrons very quickly and go out of business. Remember what happens when governments get involved in the way businesses operate: the financial crisis of 2007. 

Share/Save/Bookmark

Saturday, June 5, 2010

The Correct Response to the BP Oil Spill

Many on the left have criticized those who were pro-drilling and pro-business because of the recent catastrophic oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. They use this tragedy as evidence that America shouldn’t be exploiting its offshore resources and instead should be looking toward other energy sources to provide for our needs in the future.

This kind of argument is nonsense. It’s like saying that we shouldn’t drive cars because they crash. This kind of oil spill – of course disastrous – does not happen frequently enough for the market to say it is inefficient for oil to be extracted for commercial use. The left wants to use an extreme disaster to provide evidence for a point that simply cannot be supported by such a tragedy. A more nuanced and long term view shows us that companies that find it economically viable – within the means of the law – to drill offshore should be allowed to do so. 

The problem with the Gulf of Mexico’s oil spill is that BP simply did not take the necessary precautions or have a decent contingency plan to deal with such a disaster. The problem is not that oil companies are drilling off the shore of the United States and therefore it is not viable to use this unfortunate incident as an example of why we shouldn’t drill offshore.

The fact – even President Obama has acknowledged this – is that offshore drilling is relatively safe when done properly. The market will punish BP for its lack of readiness with regard to the disaster; they will be charged for the cleanup operation and their reputation has taken a big hit around the world. Furthermore, other companies will learn from BP’s mistake and ensure that their oil rigs are not as vulnerable to the kind of disaster that happened in the Gulf.

We shouldn’t let the left use this tragedy for political gain. Offshore drilling is economically viable and relatively safe: we refuse to be held hostage to the leftist green agenda because of a tragedy and a mishandling of the tragedy.

Share/Save/Bookmark

Friday, June 4, 2010

Why It Is Immoral to be a Bureaucrat

Many of us have recently grown concerned at the response of the US government to the ongoing financial crisis which took hold in 2007. Instead of cutting back spending, the Obama administration has decided to increase spending to unprecedented levels and balloon our already over bloated budget deficit. Who is going to pay for this? Right now, it’s China; but eventually, it will be us, or our children, or our children’s children, and so on.

I argue it is morally reprehensible for the government to tax my labor so that it can sustain its overpaid bureaucrats in unnecessarily large departments.

It is generally immoral to work for the US government in such a state of affairs. This is for two reasons. Firstly, the way the US government generally appropriates the funds to pay for its bureaucrats is through unfair taxation. Using this money appropriated through unfair taxation, it overpays its bureaucrats in Washington DC so that they can live comfortably with excellent benefits whilst hardworking Americans around the country are forced to live off cents because the government has stifled economic growth with out of control spending.

Why should I subsidize the benefits for a government employee when I do not agree with most of what the government spends its money on? Furthermore, how can any thoughtful person honestly take a check from the government knowing that the money has been appropriated from hard working people who have their necks on the line if their specific industry doesn’t turn over a profit?

This is especially true if you work for some of the government departments that simply do not serve a relevant purpose. Economists say all the time that government bureaucracy is not efficient because the incentives that entrepreneurs face in the private sector are not there in the public sector. There are serious consequences to an entrepreneur who makes a serious - let’s say budgeting – mistake; if you vastly underestimate how much a project will cost, and your funding dries up, the likelihood is that your project will be scrapped. This can be devastating to a small business.

What happens when the government underestimates its costs? Nothing; just print more money! Who cares, we’re not paying for it right? China is! This kind of short-term thinking is bankrupting the country and unfairly putting us and our children in a subordinate position in a global marketplace.

Nothing great comes from the government bureaucrat – on the whole – you people should be ashamed of yourselves.

Share/Save/Bookmark