Why it's important to understand economics

Two EXCELLENT articles--back-to-back--on National Review Online underscore the imporatance of having an understanding of economics before spouting off on some hair-brained government sponsorted social intervention plan, whether it be minimum wage hikes or government sponsored support of unions.

Here's an excellent article by a BLACK, AFRICAN-AMERICAN ECONOMIST, Thomas Sowell, that rightly criticizes the economic stupidity of Barack Obama: Barack Obama, Control Freak

Excerpt:

Senator Barack Obama recently said, “let’s allow our unions and their organizers to lift up this country’s middle class again.”

Ironically, he said it at a time when Detroit automakers have been laying off unionized workers by the tens of thousands, while Toyota has been hiring tens of thousands of non-union American automobile workers.

Labor unions, like the government, can change prices — in this case, the price of labor — but without changing the underlying reality that prices convey.

Neither unions nor minimum-wage laws change the productivity of workers. All they can do is forbid the employer from paying less than what the government or the unions want the employer to pay.

When that is more than the labor in question produces, some workers who are perfectly capable become “unemployable” only because of wages set above the level of their productivity.

Source: National Review Online: Barack Obama, Control Freak: Feb 22, 2007

The point of Sowell's critique is this: government intervention in terms of subsidies and minimum wage laws and other such garbage all have the exact same net effect: they raise prices, and sometimes raise prices quite substantially.

Why are higher prices a bad thing? Well, the more something costs (in general) the less people buy, hence less is produced, hence the resouces needed for producing it are not longer needed...and often these "resources" are human beings--the American worker.

Here's another article from National Review Online that proves the point: The Corn Threat:

Excerpt:

Economic forecasters of all stripes should be impressed by the accuracy of Governors’ Ethanol Coalition study. It was virtually spot-on. In August of 2006, the sum of actual ethanol production-capacity in place, plus the planned capacity of those ethanol facilities that were already under construction passed the eight billion gallon mark as ethanol plants overshot the 7.5 billion gallon mandate. The average corn price in August 2006, at the end of the last crop year, was $2.09, but when current and prospective ethanol capacity hit the eight billion gallon level, corn prices started a bull trend, still in place. On January 23, the day of the State of the Union speech, corn was $4.09 per bushel. Many analysts expect $5.00 per bushel before this is over.

Some context on corn prices. For the past ten years, the average price has been $2.05 per bushel; in only three years have corn prices ever topped $3.00 per bushel. The all-time record-high season-average corn price is $3.24 per bushel in 1995/96 — a year that saw many ethanol mills shut down because of too high corn prices. But now, the use of ethanol is mandated by law, and as such price does not necessarily impact demand. Instead, the burden of record corn prices falls on the livestock and meat sector — typically the economic engine of the rural and farm economy.

In early December, the Nebraska Cattlemen’s Association — the group of cattle ranchers and farmers from Secretary Johanns’ home state — passed a resolution at their convention calling for ethanol to “transition to a market based approach,” and opposing “any additional federal or state mandates for ethanol usage and/or production.” The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association passed a similar resolution at their convention in February calling for an end to ethanol subsidies. The National Turkey Federation and the National Chicken Council — producers of turkey and chicken meat — had both testified before congressional panels as early as the summer of 2006 that ethanol mandates posed a threat to their industries’ economic viability.

Source: National Review Online: The Corn Threat: Feb 22, 2007

The New Criterion — D’Souza goes native

FYI: There is an excellent, well written critique of Dinesh D'souza's book The Enemy at Home at the New Criterion web site: The New Criterion — D’Souza goes native

EU to US: We’ll Shoot Ourselves in the Foot if You Shoot Yourselves in the Foot

Oops, it seems the Europeans will only destroy their ecomony to implement the Kyoto greenhouse gas emmission targets if the USA is willing to do so. (Note to readers: if for no other reason, it is best NOT to elect a Democrat for president, since those idiots actually think the Kyoto treaty is a good thing...) An excellent little post on the NRO "planet gore" blog: EU to US: We’ll Shoot Ourselves in the Foot if You Shoot Yourselves in the Foot

Excerpt:

As the European Union prepares to overshoot its Kyoto greenhouse gas (GHG) emission targets by a substantial margin (joined by Japan, Canada, and other countries that promised to reduce their emissions under Kyoto), Europe is gearing up for international negotiations on post-Kyoto GHG reduction commitments.

Since significant GHG reductions are likely to cause serious hardship, the EU doesn’t want to kick its economy too hard unless other countries, particularly the United States, agree to hobble themselves as well. Yesterday’s New York Times headline “Europeans Agree to Cut Emissions Sharply if U.S. and Others Follow Suit” tells the story: “European officials want other parts of the world, including the United States, to adopt European-style restrictions on emissions to fight climate change, thus helping European businesses compete globally at a time when the European Union is toughening regulation in sectors like air travel, car manufacturing and construction.”

Source: National Review Online - Planet Gore: 22 FEBRUARY 2007: EU to US: We’ll Shoot Ourselves in the Foot if You Shoot Yourselves in the Foot

The "Moderate" Mosque

An excellent article from Mark Steyn that is a MUST read: The Moderate Mosque.

Excerpt:

“Mosque” is a term that covers a multitude of architectural sins these days, but the one at Regents Park in London is the real deal. Big golden dome above the tree tops, 140-foot minaret. I used to live nearby and I must have strolled past it hundreds of times and, if I ever did give it a second glance in those days, it was only to marvel: “Wow! That Hindu temple is totally awesome.”"

Source: SteynOnline: The Moderate Mosque: Jan 29, 2007

Why pacificism equals more bloodshed

From Victor Davis Hanson's excellent blog Works and Days, More of the Same:

U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton announced to the world that she wants a 90-day deadline to start pulling American troops from Iraq. Other Democrats in Congress, according to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, will soon declare their intentions to cut-off of US funding for all military deployments in Iraq.

Well aside from the paradox that the Congress had just approved unanimously the appointment of Gen. David Petraeus (the hero in the recent spate of anti-Bush books on Iraq) to take command of coalition forces in Iraq—the planner of a surge over 20,000 American troops into Baghdad—it is always a mistake in war to assure enemies of our intention not to fight any longer (unless of course you are indifferent to losing).

Do We remember all that?

The most famous example was the 1974 Foreign Relations Act. Passed in the wake of Watergate scandal, the congressional resolution cut off all military assistance to the South Vietnamese government. But that pubic stand-down only encouraged the North Vietnamese communists to violate the Paris peace accords and renew the war—without any more worries of U.S arms shipments or air strikes.

The Neutrality Acts of the 1930s, passed by an isolationist Congress, forbade U.S. military assistance to, or trade in war material with, any belligerent, regardless of whether they were aggressors or victims. Such actions of “conscious” only emboldened Nazi Germany, Italy, and Japan to attack democracies and other neutral states. Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo were convinced that whatever their provocations, the United States had no stomach to stand up to any of them, or even to join Britain and France in a united front of resistance. World War II with its 50 million dead followed.

Source: Works and Days: More of the Same, Feb 19, 2007

Friend of Western Civ: John Bolton

Is the diplomatic solution that has succeeded in "disarming" North Korea a good idea? Will it even work? Listen to what John Bolton has to say, and take notes:



(Hat Tip, and the one who put it on YouTube: Atlas Shrugs)

National Geographic Video Shorts on ZENcast.com

Just a little public service announcement...

If you haven't seen these already, an entertaining and educational way to spend a few minutes is looking at some cool video podcasts from National Geographic on Creative's "Zencast" web site. The videos are only a couple minutes long, perfect for someone with a short attention span, like me...

I personally liked the "Bottlenose Dolphins are Mean" video, but they're all interesting.

The site can be a bit slow, so be patient.

Friend of Western Civ: The New York Sun

Considering the previous post, I had to put something on the blog that would cleanse the pallet, and help us to bring things back into perspective. I was able to find something to accomplish this through that blessed publication The New York Sun: Global Warming Turns Ugly

Excerpt:

"When the left is out to smear an opponent, any brand of tar will do. Consider Vice President Gore's mantra, which has been picked up by much of the press, that global warming skeptics are 'deniers' — as in Holocaust deniers. You might expect that liberals would be leery of attempts to liken an opponent to the nuts who deny that Hitler murdered 6 million Jews. 'Are you now or have you ever been a denier?' But no, the moral paragons of Beverly Hills appear set to deliver an Oscar to Mr. Gore for his bravery in telling supposedly inconvenient truths.

Mr. Gore has been caught at this sort of thing before. In 1994, Ted Koppel disclosed on 'Nightline' that Mr. Gore had called to suggest he investigate various global warming skeptics for their ties to the coal industry and other interests. Mr. Koppel said he had refused. He went on to chastise Mr. Gore publicly for 'resorting to political means to achieve what should ultimately be resolved on a purely scientific basis.'

Just so. But Mr. Gore and others still seem unable to restrain their bile. The Washington Post recently quoted Mr. Gore as referring to a prominent Republican senator as a 'denier.' All of which makes one wonder: Do these people have as much confidence as they pretend to have in their theories about why the globe may be heating up?"

Source: Global Warming Turns Ugly - February 12, 2007 - The New York Sun:

Enemy of Western Civ: The Boston Globe

Well, most of us have known that the Boston Globe is one of the more dangerous forces working to undermine and ultimately destroy Western Civilization. This ridiculous column by Ellen Badman is a perfect example: No change in political climate. (Hat tip: Drudge Report)

Excerpt:

"By every measure, the U N 's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change raises the level of alarm. The fact of global warming is 'unequivocal.' The certainty of the human role is now somewhere over 90 percent. Which is about as certain as scientists ever get.

I would like to say we're at a point where global warming is impossible to deny. Let's just say that global warming deniers are now on a par with Holocaust deniers, though one denies the past and the other denies the present and future.

But light bulbs aside -- I now have three and counting -- I don't expect that this report will set off some vast political uprising. The sorry fact is that the rising world thermometer hasn't translated into political climate change in America."

Source: Boston.com - No Change in Political Climate - Feb 9, 2007

I don't normally comment on excerpts, but the idiot who wrote this column is just begging for the Right Hand of Rationality to slap her across the face, maybe several times.

Equating the denial of global warming with the denial of the holocaust is what you would call 'overheated rhetoric.' As a matter of fact, a column like this could melt all the worlds glaciers all by itself.

But to compound the stupidity, the columnist wonders why politicians aren't taking it more SERIOUSLY! Why isn't GLOBAL WARMING the most important single issue in the ENTIRE UNIVERSE??? What's wrong with these people?

Maybe, it's just because there is no evidence for global warming...none what so ever. Maybe it's just because JUNK science is not the same thing as empirical science, where things have to be observed and measured before they are accepted as truth. Maybe it's because only the most loony left-wing politician (paging Al Gore...) would want to DESTROY the American economy so as to reduce our "carbon footprint" in order to avoid a catastrophe which only exists in highly questionable computer simulations.

How can they even allow this stuff to be printed? What sort of Kool-Aid drinking lemmings do they have running the editorial board of the Boston Globe? Must be the same crowd that works for Mother Jones.

Quote of the Week

This is a quote from Mark Steyn on Hugh Hewitt's blog

"I’ve mentioned before that Saddam Hussein liked Sinatra. He liked to play Sinatra CD’s. He liked Quality Street Toffees from England, which happen to be my favorite kind of toffees, too. So if I was dating Saddam Hussein, we’d sit there listening to Songs for Swinging Lovers, and eating our Quality Street Toffees, and we’d have a grand old date. But it doesn’t change the fact that he’s a mass murderer."

Parallel Universe

Wow! There is an excellent commentary by Steve Schippert at ThreatsWatch.Org which cleverly shows the stupidity of pretending that Iran has nothing to do with the troubles in neighboring Iraq (let alone Syria!) This commentary is a MUST READ! (Hat tip: Michael Leeden)

Parallel Universe
Insulated By Criticism, Iran Is Killing Americans ...And Everybody Knows It
By Steve Schippert

Some in the US Intelligence Community seem to operate in another realm and in a world with significantly different realities, dangers and potential outcomes. How else can it be explained that United States political leadership has been persuaded to withhold releasing intelligence regarding Iranian actions in Iraq, including arming, funding and training both Sunni and Shi’a groups killing US soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines, let alone the mind-boggling toll upon Iraq’s civilian population?

In question is the same Iran that even Hassan Nasrallah openly ceded feeds the Hizballah terrorist organization responsible for the deaths of hundreds of Americans, Israelis and Lebanese through its terrorist attacks, “And the help is funneled through Syria, and everybody knows it.”

“Everybody knows” a lot of things. One of them is an American fear of international and internal criticism that prevents her from doing what is necessary – or anything much beyond rhetoric, for that matter - to openly confront the Iranian regime that has been at war with the United States since its 1979 Islamic revolution."

Source: Threatwatch.org: Parallel Universe: Feb 5, 2007

Friend of Western Civ: Chuck Norris

Yes, that CHUCK NORRIS. He's been writing some excellent columns for World Net Daily, and has an excellent one about the founding father's criteria for picking political leaders. The column is entitled: Our Founders' recommendations for president. Using the criteria of the founding fathers, Chuck believes the best choice for president of the USA would be Newt Gingrich.

''Select and prefer Christians''

For Foster and our Founders, government is a ''divine appointment,'' an ordained institution of God, and ''an important mean of delivering us from the evils of the apostasy; and designed to prepare us for the more encouraging restraints the gospel enjoins.'' As such, it too has Jesus Christ, not some nebulous and neutered god, as its head.

He being commissioned by the Father to manage the great affairs of Empire, as well as of Zion. "Yet have I set my King upon my holy Hill of Zion." – "The government shall be upon his shoulders."

Subsequently, governmental leaders are to be regarded as ministers or servants of God, unless they refrain from obeying and executing his laws.

And as magistrates are honored by Christ, and act under his banner, they should be careful to be his glory, and support his religion in the world. ... If they rule for God, and for good to the people, they are to be subjected to, otherwise, "we ought to obey God, rather than men.''

Foster warned, ''If religion is not honored and supported by men in places of public trust, the glory of the Lord will soon depart, and the fire of God be scattered over the city.''

Though the Framers opposed the reign of kings or priests, they advocated and intermingled their Christian faith and politics. As John Jay, the first Chief Justice of the United States, wrote to Jedidiah Morse on Feb. 28, 1797, "Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers. And it is the duty as well as the privilege and interest, of a Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers."

Source: World Net Daily: Our Founders' recommendations for president: Feb 5, 2007

Enemy of Western Civ: The U.S. Government

Yes, even our own precious, "Republican" government is far more concerned with the feelings and honor of Muslims than it is taking seriously the Islamic threat to Western Civilization. I understand that they don't want to get the entire Islamic world angry with us, but still, a lot of terrorists, are, in fact, MUSLIMS!!!! who are, in fact, acting out their faithful interpretations of the Koran.

Why don't we give truth a chance? This sort of stuff makes me ashamed to be an American...

From World Net Daily:Chertoff's 'Islam PC' rankles fed officials:

"Citing recent internal memos, Department of Homeland Security employees complain their boss Michael Chertoff is hamstringing counter-terror operations with pro-Islamic political correctness.

They say headquarters has cautioned officials not to describe Islamic terrorism as Islamic and to respect Islam as a 'religion of peace.'

'It's constantly drilled into us that Islam is not the enemy, and that the terrorists are merely a minority of 'extremists' distorting Islam,' said one official who wished to go unnamed."

Source: World Net Daily: Chertoff's 'Islam PC' rankles fed officials (Feb 10, 2007)

Friend of Western Civ: The editors of Canada's National Post

So why do the editors at Canada's National Post get to be deemed the coveted "Friends of Western Civ?" Becuase they clearly seen the hoax and the sham that is the Kyoto Protocols, designed to decrease carbon emmitions in an effort to stop the dreaded GLOBAL WARMING!!! (***Run for your lives!!!)

Here is an excerpt of their editorial:

Pablo Rodriguez, a Liberal MP from Quebec, has a private member's bill proceeding through the House of Commons that has the backing of all three opposition parties. If it passes, as appears likely, the resultant Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act would require Ottawa to honour Canada's Kyoto commitments and reduce the country's greenhouse gas emissions by more than a third over just the next five years.

Working Canadians and taxpayers had better hope Mr. Rodriguez's legislation fails, because there are only two ways to achieve his goal by 2012, both unpalatable. Either the federal government could force a radical change in Canadians' lifestyles -- restricting automobile use, limiting electrical consumption and shutting down industries employing hundreds of thousands of workers, thereby sending our economy into a tailspin -- or it could send tens of billions of tax dollars abroad to buy "carbon credits" from developing and underdeveloped nations.

Source: National Post: The Folly of Kyoto (Feb 10, 2007)

Is environmentalism the new religion?

From Canada's National Post:

In his new book Apollo’s Arrow, ambitiously subtitled The Science of Prediction and the Future of Everything, Vancouver-based author and mathematician David Orrell set out to explain why the mathematical models scientists use to predict the weather, the climate and the economy are not getting any better, just more refined in their uncertainty.

What he discovered, in trying to sketch the first principles of prophecy, was the religious nature of modern environ-mentalism.

This is not to say that fearing for the future of the planet is irrational in the way supernatural belief arguably is, just that — in its myths of the Fall and the Apocalypse, its saints and heretics, its iconography and tithing, its reliance on prophecy, even its schisms — the green movement now exhibits the same psychology of compliance as religion.

source: National Post: The Green Fervour

Also check out the comments on Free Republic

A Good Review

An outstanding review of Mark Steyn's book "America Alone can be found at the The Cornell Society for a Good Time blog. Make sure to read the comment section as well.

Highly recommended.

Global stupidity

When I woke up this morning, it was -10 F outside, cold enough to kill, and cold enough to shut down 300 schools in the area. So with horrendous low temperatures like that, it's obviously time to poke fun at that bastion of left-liberal lunacy: global warming.

Check out this column by the greatest living white-Eurpean male on planet earth (next to Brad Pitt, of course...), Mark Steyn.

Excerpt:

From the "Environmental News Network": "Science Is Solid on Climate Change, Congress Told." "The science is solid," says Louise Frechette, deputy secretary-general of the United Nations.

"The science is solid," says Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

"The science is really solid," says TV meteorologist Heidi Cullen. "The science is very solid."

And at that point, on "Larry King Live" last week, Richard Lindzen, professor of atmospheric science at MIT, remarked: "Heidi says the science is solid and I can't criticize her because she never says what science she's talking about."

Indeed. If the science is so solid, maybe they could drag it out to the Arctic for the poor polar bears to live on now that the ice is melting faster than a coed's heart at an Al Gore lecture.

Source: http://www.suntimes.com/news/steyn/241518,CST-EDT-STEYN04.article

The New Yorker: The Lorax

A good piece from The New Yorker:

"Hillary Rodham Clinton, like many capable politicians, has the ability to arrange her face in such a way as to convey nothing but placidity and benign pity when confronted by a hostile or unpleasant comment. On occasion, though, when her benevolence or, worse, her honor is questioned, her facial muscles tighten, her lips purse, and her eyes seem to darken. Such was the case at a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee in late January, when Senator Joseph Lieberman, of Connecticut, the committee’s army of one—he is the last self-identified Democrat in Congress, and perhaps in America, to express admiration for George W. Bush’s course in Iraq—accused his colleagues (and not only Democrats but those Republicans who are irresolute in their support for the President) of providing encouragement to America’s enemies."

Source: http://www.newyorker.com/printables/fact/070212fa_fact_goldberg

"I knew I Liked Joe Lieberman.."

From The Corner on National Review Online: "I Knew I Liked Joe Lieberman:"

He reads Mark Steyn:

Lieberman says that he does, at times, feel isolated. He is a liberal on social policy and a conservative on defense, in the bygone style of the late Senator Henry (Scoop) Jackson. 'I'm the Lorax,' he said. 'I'm saving that one tree.'

In another conversation, he told me that he was reading 'America Alone,' a book by the conservative commentator Mark Steyn, which argues that Europe is succumbing, demographically and culturally, to an onslaught by Islam, leaving America friendless in its confrontation with Islamic extremism.

'The thing I quote most from it is the power of demographics, in Europe particularly,' Lieberman said. 'That's what struck me the most. But the other part is a kind of confirmation of what I know and what I've read elsewhere, which is that Islamist extremism has an ideology, and it's expansionist, it's an aggressive ideology. And the title I took to mean that we Americans will have ultimate responsibility for stopping this expansionism.'"