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Conservatives Don't Hate Government
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Mamblog Section - Politics
Written by Sheldon Richman   
Friday, 19 August 2011
Conservatives Don't Hate Government
by Sheldon Richman
 
Sometimes I wonder whether the mainstream pundits listen to themselves. It’s hard to believe they would say the silly things they say if they did.
 
For example, the talking heads on MSNBC, which works 24/7 for President Obama’s reelection, like to say that conservative Republicans “hate government.” “If you hate government,” Chris Matthews, host of Hardball, asks, “why would you want to be the government?”
 
Matthews’s evidence for this hatred is the conservatives’ harping on the large national debt, which is about equal to the GDP, and deficit spending, which is close to half of total federal spending, and their opposition to higher taxes to shrink the deficit. To Matthews, expressing concern about those numbers and opposing further spending, borrowing, and taxing is proof of hatred for government. A devastating piece of evidence was Republican votes against raising the debt ceiling even though the package contained future spending cuts. (Of course, they were not real cuts, but merely small decreases in the rate of spending growth.) The symbol of conservative hatred for government, Matthews said, came during the last Republican presidential debate, when all the candidates raised their hands to indicate they would oppose a deficit-reduction package that contained $10 in spending “cuts” for every $1 in increased revenues.
 
Leaving aside the question of how sincere most Republican conservatives are when they rail against deficit spending, I would like Matthews and his ilk to answer a simple question:
 
How can a group of politicians and political activists be said to hate government, or “Washington,” when they enthusiastically support: the U.S. government’s global bullying; invasions, occupations, and endless wars; secret CIA prisons; torture as an interrogation technique; extraordinary rendition in which suspects are sent to foreign countries for torture by brutal dictatorships; support for “friendly” foreign autocrats and other oppressive regimes; the USA PATRIOT Act, including warrantless surveillance; national-security letters; the military-industrial complex; the war on drug users/sellers/makers; energy independence; intellectual-property enforcement; restrictions on immigrants and employer sanctions; consumption taxes; federal marriage regulation; and corporate welfare? I’m sure I’ve left some things out.
 
No one who embraces these liberty-killing actions can claim to be for small government, much less against government altogether. Most conservatives are as much for overpowering government as so-called liberals are. They just want the government to be overpowering in different matters, although that is less true than it once was. Conservatives have a cultural animosity to a welfare state that seems to cater to low-income people; apparently for them nothing is worse than an immigrant’s going on the dole. On the other hand, they have little problem with middle-class welfare, such as Social Security and Medicare. One of their arguments against Obamacare was that it includes a half-trillion-dollar cut in Medicare. True, they sometimes talk about giving a role in these programs to private companies, but that’s driven more by a pro-business orientation and a desire for efficiency than by any desire to end the programs.
 
So-called liberals, on the other hand, would expand all welfare- state programs while keeping the power “in-house” rather than farming it out to business — they prefer government bureaucrats to corporate bureaucrats. There might have been a time when “liberals” could be said to oppose the global military establishment, but those days are long gone. When did you last hear a member of President Obama’s party criticize his war program, which is virtually indistinguishable from George W. Bush’s?
 
So the two dominant forces in American politics favor domineering government and, necessarily, a smaller sphere for individual freedom and free markets. Why, then, do Matthews & Co. insist that conservatives hate government? A reasonable explanation is that this strategy is intended to scare people into thinking there is no enlightened alternative to big-government pro-empire Progressivism. They can’t hit conservatives on foreign policy and civil liberties — because they hold the same views! So they have to convince Americans that conservatives would tear down everything they know and love. It’s false, but it may be effective.
What’s lacking is a true pro-liberty, anti-power alternative. Actually, it’s not lacking. There are plenty of people promoting the libertarian vision. But the conservative and “liberal” intelligentsia have little interest in letting the American people in on it.
 
Sheldon Richman is senior fellow at The Future of Freedom Foundation (www.fff.org) and editor of The Freeman magazine.

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Politicians in a Panic
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Mamblog Section - Economics and Financial Services
Written by Sheldon Richman   
Monday, 15 August 2011
Politicians in a Panic
by Sheldon Richman
 
You can almost see the panic on their faces. The politicians, central bankers, and court economists seem to be thrashing around like bad swimmers caught in a riptide. Despite all attempts — stimulus spending, increased borrowing, the Fed Reserve’s low-interest-rate policy, presidential jaw-boning — the economy refuses to recover. Unemployment remains over 9 percent, investment is stagnant, and even the previous paltry growth is fading. People increasingly see the government as impotent.
 
If it weren’t for the innocent victims, this would be satisfyingly entertaining. After all, these are the reputed best and brightest, who assured us they know how to fix and run an economy. Now they are at wits’ end, and they’re running out of time. The election is next year.
 
Had they heeded those who said no government can run an economy but it can run one into the ground if it tries, neither they nor we would be in this mess.
 
Of course the policy elite try to maintain a façade of confidence. If government stimulus spending hasn’t worked, the “experts” say, it’s only because government hasn’t spent enough. If you believe that, you’ll believe anything. The government already owes about as much as the economy can produce in a year.
 
Political-economic faith resists evidence. There’s always a reason — other than government itself — for its policy failures. Those of us who believe that markets (when allowed to work) are morally and economically superior to bureaucracies are called “market fundamentalists.” It is true that when markets seem to fail, we point to the government intervention responsible. If that is market fundamentalism, what should we call those who believe government never fails and prescribe more government whenever it appears to do so?
 
President Obama’s most ardent government-fundamentalist supporters say that focusing on the deficit and debt is a mistake. The only thing the president should be thinking about, they say, is jobs. That means more government spending, along with a few tweaks of the tax code. Debt and deficit be damned.
 
But haven’t our overlords already done that, with nothing good to show for it? The ruling elite don’t appreciate such skepticism. Leave them alone. They’ll get it right next time. They promise.
 
Despite what Obama, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke, and the rest of the ruling elite say, their policies are the poison not the antidote. Monetary, financial, and housing policies created an unsustainable boom and set the stage for the bust we continue to suffer. Since the bust, the Bush-Obama policies have worked against the emergence of a vibrant economy. Instead of getting out of the way and permitting the liquidation of policy-induced bad investments, government has piled intervention on intervention in a foolhardy attempt to recreate the pre-bust world. That is idiocy: The boom was a politically generated series of economic distortions. Restoring that situation makes no sense. Rather, the mistakes must be revealed through market revaluation of assets, insolvent firms must be allowed to fail, and we all must adjust to reality. Then the economy will grow. To date, the government’s policies have been aimed at denying reality. No wonder they have failed.
 
“What should be done?” is the wrong question The right question is: What should be undone? The answer is: Lots of things. A good start would be for the government to stop sucking scarce resources out of the private economy. Every penny government spends — whether taxed or borrowed — is a penny taken from potential private investment. Government spending — particularly welfare and warfare — must be zeroed out and its borrowing must stop. That should be accompanied by an end to all subsidies, privileges, and barriers to competitive entry. The tax code, which aims to manipulate our economic activities as well as raise money, must be repealed.
 
But, the policy elite say, if no one is investing their money now, why would they invest if they could keep more? Investors are afraid to move because of uncertainty about what government will do next. The policy unknowns — sources of which include rules yet to be written for Obamacare and Dodd-Frank — make waiting on the sidelines the smart bet. Credibly ending the threat of government intervention would do wonders for the economy.
 
Sheldon Richman is senior fellow at The Future of Freedom Foundation (www.fff.org) and editor of The Freeman magazine.

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Please, Feminists, Can We Stop With the "Dudes" Already?!
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Mamblog Section - Civil Liberties and Advocacy Efforts
Written by James Landrith   
Friday, 05 August 2011
The always awesome Vas Littlecrow on Feminism 101: Helpful Hints for Feminists Who Refer To Men as Dudes:
Finally, just as “babe” and “chick” are semi-derogatory terms that potentially minimize women, so are “dude” and “boy.” While these terms are fun for casual use, they aren’t always appropriate. When you try to explain feminist ideology to a man, address him with the same respect that you’d expect to be treated with as a woman. Don’t minimize him. Don’t grant him privileges or power that you don’t want him to have. Treat him as your equal and honor what feminism is supposed to be all about — a path towards egalitarianism.

I find this "dude" business extremely annoying.  I'm not talking about people who call EVERYONE dude.  I'm specifically referring to feminists who refer to any man they are speaking with as "dude".  It exposes both a maturity problem and general lack of respect for men on the part of those feminists who use it regularly.  When a feminist calls me "dude", I know immediately that they do not see me as an equal, an adult or even a human being worthy of respect.  They are not interested in talking with me, but rather in talking at or down to me.  At that point, I lose all respect for said feminist and I could care less about what she has to say going forward.  Where she may have been able to foster another ally, she has instead slammed a door shut in her own face.

I have plenty of respectful, mature and worthwhile feminists in the ranks of my friends. I have no need for condescending, bigoted feminists who cannot even muster enough maturity to talk to men like they are human beings.

Is it really so hard?  Or are we just plain unworthy of being treated with the same respect they righfully demand for themselves?

Someone really needs to get a fucking clue already. Just. Stop. It.

 

Relevant Links:

http://vaslittlecrow.com/blog/2011/08/03/feminism-101-helpful-hints-for-feminists-who-refer-to-men-as-dudes/

 

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Last Updated ( Friday, 05 August 2011 )
 
Immigration Chaos
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Mamblog Section - Immigration
Written by Fergus Hodgson   
Monday, 01 August 2011
Immigration Chaos
by Fergus Hodgson
 
The presence of illegal immigrants in the United States continues to generate ineffectual political initiatives, from employment verification mandates to referendums against in-state tuition access.
 
These fail to resolve the underlying causes for the presence of illegals, such as the arbitrary (see the immigration lottery), expensive, and humiliating immigration process (and I speak from experience). They also tend to ignore what happens to the individuals caught in the bind — the supposed deportation process — as though they’ll just disappear from America.
 
Last week, however, the Center for Immigration Studies released a lengthy report, “Deportation Basics: How Immigration Enforcement Works (Or Doesn’t) in Real Life.” This report is particularly revealing because CIS scholars tend to oppose “current, high levels of immigration,” in favor of a “low-immigration, pro-immigrant” vision.
 
Despite the apparent low-immigration, pro-immigrant contradiction, CIS scholars deserve credit for at least addressing the touchy deportation subject. In doing so, they present the thinking of those who sincerely believe stricter enforcement of the prevailing laws is the way to go, and they are perhaps the most prominent organization with that perspective.
 
That perspective, though, is fraught with confusion and prejudices, and it begs for a rebuttal.
 
The author uses a pseudonym, “W.D. Reasoner,” which seems unnecessary, but he notes that he is a retired government employee with many years of experience in immigration administration. Presumably, that allowed him to observe what he admits is a cumbersome and dysfunctional process of deportation.
 
That description leads to his and CIS’s most important confusion. Despite the abject failure of federal officials to curb illegal immigration — about 11 million live here — even with multiple agencies on the job, he wants to divert more Justice Department resources to them. The call for expanded budgets goes to show how these agencies have an incentive to maintain the problem, not end it.
 
Reasoner notes at least 20 required forms to initiate an immigration charge, greater than one-year backlogs for hearings (which only 41 percent of defendants attend), and a scarcity of detention space. This fecklessness matches that of the E-Verify program, where even U.S. Customs and Immigration admits 54 percent of unauthorized workers receive approval for employment. Yet, he does not call for legislative changes, nor does he acknowledge that they are fighting a futile battle.
 
Reasoner also points to a “significant review and restructuring” of another agency, Immigration and Customs Enforcement. This has been going on for nearly two years, and its claim to success is the cancellation of many contracts, but total spending has continued to climb.
 
Reflective of the entire report, the term “alien,” which legally refers to any non-citizen, appears throughout. Even jargon such as “alienage” arises — whatever that means. Offensive to many, “alien” dehumanizes immigrants and promotes a fallacious us-versus-them mentality that undergirds the report.
 
This collectivist mentality manifests itself with repeated calls for the dismissal of due process “trappings” in immigration disputes. Apparently, benefit of the doubt and presumption of innocence are less relevant when someone may be born outside of the country.
 
Additionally, the supposed adverse impacts of illegal immigrants on health and social service systems merit mention, while their cultural and economic contributions do not. Contrary to popular perception, illegal immigrants are not heavy users of welfare, and the majority pay income taxes. Cato Institute research also suggests that legal status would enable higher wages and greater tax contributions.
 
The irony is that what Reasoner describes as “thousands of productive hours” toward deportation are a waste of time, and they divert our attention from real problems. Already Puerto Ricans immigrate to and work in the United States without impediment. And any Cuban that arrives here receives permanent residence status within one year. Do we lose sleep at night over that reality?
 
Of course not; nor should we — just as we would not seek to impede someone moving from Massachusetts to New Hampshire. Far from being a plague, migration elevates human prosperity and helps to hold governments in check.
 
I remember a visit to Ellis Island, the place where so many people without documentation once found welcome in the United States. Sadly, millions of people now assume grave risks to immigrate illegally, and they testify to a legal route that no longer greets immigrants with open arms.
 
Fergus Hodgson is a policy advisor with The Future of Freedom Foundation (www.fff.org).

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"Shared Sacrifice": Obama's Demagoguery
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Mamblog Section - Economics and Financial Services
Written by Sheldon Richman   
Friday, 29 July 2011
"Shared Sacrifice": Obama's Demagoguery
by Sheldon Richman
 
The most offensive claim made during the debt-ceiling controversy is that there’s a moral equivalence between cutting government spending and raising taxes. President Obama asks for “shared sacrifice” to reduce the budget deficit. In his view, if the government spends more than it takes in — it currently borrows more than 40 cents of every dollar spent — the “balanced” approach is to “cut” spending and raise taxes.
 
There are quotation marks around “cut” for a good reason. No one — Republican House Speaker John Boehner included — wants to cut spending in the commonsense meaning of the term: namely, reducing government spending from today’s level ($3.8 trillion). No, in Washington-talk, to cut a budget is merely to reduce the rate of increase that would have occurred in the future if current law were left unchanged.
 
If the politicians were honest — and reporters committed to telling the public the truth — they would talk about smaller increases in spending, not “cuts,” but even that wouldn’t be entirely truthful, because in many cases the reduction in future increases itself is an illusion. It involves merely canceling the authority to spend money that no one expects to actually be spent.
 
As noted, the so-called balanced approach to deficit reduction sees a moral equivalence between any reduction in spending (even from future increases) and raising taxes. Some people go further and treat government’s abstention from taxation as spending in itself. Think about that: If the government, in its mercy, decides not to take $10 from you, that is an expenditure. By that logic, if the politicians change the law and take the $10, that’s a spending cut! Only in Washington ...
 
Bluntly put, there can be no moral equivalence between government’s spending people’s money and abstaining from taxing that money. To believe otherwise is to believe that the government owns all income and wealth — which would be equivalent to believing that the government owns us!
 
In a fully free society — which the United States more assuredly is not — people would be at liberty to earn income through voluntary exchange (without anti-competitive privilege or subsidy) and to keep what they legitimately acquire. Taking someone’s belongings without consent would be regarded as theft. That would go for politicians as well as anyone else. All transfers of wealth and income would have to be accomplished through persuasion and consent. Physical force and fraud would be forbidden. Taxation, in the words of a great libertarian, Frank Chodorov, is robbery.
 
Thus the government’s decision not to tax cannot be a form of spending, and it cannot be equated with a refusal to sacrifice in behalf of fiscal integrity.
 
That is not to deny that in our corporate state, large incomes can be acquired through government-granted privilege and other political machinations. But the way to deal with that is to end all privileges. Politicians are hypocritical when they call for higher taxes on all people making more than $200,000 a year — even those who earned it without political favor — while leaving the system of privilege essentially intact.
 
Part of the political game now being played is assigning blame for the growing debt and deficit. The Democrats, the more openly big-government side (Republicans are for big government too but are more covert about it), say that the deficit is attributable as much to the failure to tax — through the tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 — as to the propensity to spend. Even a former Reagan and George H.W. Bush official, Bruce Bartlett, agrees. They claim that the government’s fiscal condition would have been far better had those cuts not been enacted, particularly considering that George W. Bush launched two wars and enacted a Medicare drug program. It’s certainly true that big expenditures without revenues to cover them created the deficit — but the moral course would not have been to abstain from cutting taxes or to raise them. It would have been to not spend the money. The wars were immoral (though profitable for the well-connected), and the drug program was an expansion of the welfare state, which forcibly distributes other people’s money.
 
A humane society does not require robbery and political corruption. It requires freedom for people to earn, to keep what they earn, and to help each other through mutual aid.
 
Sheldon Richman is senior fellow at The Future of Freedom Foundation (www.fff.org) and editor of The Freeman magazine.

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