The Peace Freedom & Prosperity Movement

http://shanklinmike.blogspot.com/

by Michael Shanklin

Public choice, also known as rent-seeking, can be defined as the application of economic theory and methodology to the study of politics and political institutions (DiLorenzo 59). The concept of rent seeking refers to legal or illegal activities to obtain special privilege such as seeking monopoly status, special zoning, quantitative restrictions on imports, protective tariffs, bribes, threats, and smuggling. Public choice theorists focus on how policy choices are shaped or constrained by incentives built into the routines of public and private organizations (Britannica). The debate between public monopolized, state-run production versus free enterprise, competitive private production has persisted for centuries with public choice theory serving as the battleground between the different perceived levels of efficiencies, or inefficiencies, inherent in both systems. Those that condemn laissez-faire capitalism vision it as an economic system built on greed in which the lower classes of society get left out. They correlate their voice in centralized coercive monopolies with a strong locus of control in their attempt to fix the system. They view greed as reserved to the people in the market place versus the persistent state-of-nature that encompasses all of humanity. Centralizers place faith in the bureaucrats and politicians, through central economic planning, to fix the problems that arise from capitalism, or at least what they believe is the fault of capitalism. They believe that a central authority alone should direct all production activities.

Pro-public sector champions rally behind a system that no longer allows the consumer, through their purchasing decisions or non-purchasing decisions, to determine what should be produced, and in what quantity and quality (Von Mises 4). Free market laissez-faire capitalism focuses on property rights protection where consumers, through their freely determined choices, are able to determine the goods and services demanded in the economy through no cognitive process of their own. It’s based around private ownership in a competing market where barriers to entry in an industry are low to none and where government is refrained to a negative role, that is, a role where they determine justice and restitution as well as protecting against fraud, force, or theft.
Those that are not for complete state control but not for full free markets are ‘middle-of-the-road’ voters, also known as interventionists (Von Mises 4). This mixed economic system tries to combine the positives of both free market systems and socialist systems while minimizing the negatives of each. With this mixed economy arises a conflict due to the fact that it does not allow for any compromise, control is indivisible. Either the consumers’ demand as manifested on the market decides for what purposes and how the factors of production should be employed, or the government takes care of these matters. There is nothing that could mitigate the opposition between these two contradictory principles, they preclude each other (Von Mises 4).

The career politician in a democratic society makes a living by winning elections. When considering all the factors that go into individual behavioral patterns, most people assume that the politician acts in a self-interested way. After all, he or she is trying to win an election for themselves, regardless of the cause. With hindsight, most people can rightfully assume that personal gain is a part of the job (Tullock 7). Regardless of external personal incentives, no politician or bureaucrat has perfect information, just like no individual market participant has perfect information. One stark difference between the private and public systems of production is that private production, in a free market, sends signs of growth or decline in a certain industry through price signals which can help lead to a more efficient allocation of resources with a scarcity benchmark. This spontaneous order through voluntary exchange in a market economy helps set equilibrium wages, prices, and costs without the force of government. When profits increase, that is a signal that more production is required in that industry and vice versa when profits decrease.
In central planned economies, production is not based upon the consumer’s wants or needs, it is focused on bureaucratic goals such as employment or price setting negative externalities. This lack of consumer equilibrium heavily distorts market signals such as profit and price, making it much harder for the central planners to gather information, let alone perfect information. Public choice analysts have developed many insights into the economic motives of politicians and economic consequences of their political power such as through laws, rules, regulations, taxes, and changes to direct or influence individual lives (Tullock 129). “People are people,” subject to the same motivation in public-life as in their private-life. This economic view of human motivation contrasts with the flawed view of political science that presents human beings as behaving very differently. Political scientists and sociologists view politicians as acting selflessly in public life and selfishly in private life (Tullock 129). The question then arises, where do the politicians get the money to do all these selfless acts?
In much of public-choice theory, interest groups are viewed as entities that coalesce to express a demand for wealth transfers. In seeking political profit, politicians respond by supplying the transfers through legislation and regulation. Thus, just as a perfectly competitive, profit-maximizing firm would cater to consumer demands, politicians passively respond to the wishes of interest groups. But the price theory analogy is not entirely accurate, for in a world of uncertainty, producers are constantly searching for and creating profit opportunities by advertising, offering new or different products, and other activities aimed at stimulating the demand for their goods or services. They do not merely respond to changing consumer demands. Similarly, political entrepreneurs do not just passively respond to interest-group pressures; they also try to stimulate the demand for their perceived services (DiLorenzo 62).
Many times, those who support these groups have little idea what they are stating until further translated. They fail to see the further implications that will arise from current policy. When they say that the way to national wealth is to pay out governmental subsidies, they are in effect saying that the way to national wealth is to increase taxes. When they say that the way to recovery is to increase wage rates, they have found only another way of saying that the way to recovery is to increase costs of production (Hazlitt). Many times, policies are not considered and lobbyists with the biggest clout can pressure a candidate to sign-on in addition to donations and future voters. Bureaucracies have strong incentives to promote and stimulate a perceived need for their activities—every bureaucracy is a vigorous lobbyist (DiLorenzo 60). In 1984, the Department of Agriculture hired 144 full time lobbyists with a budget of over $6.5 million, now the DOA employs over 700 lobbyists to help gain support in Congress and the grassroots (DiLorenzo 62). These bureaucracies continue to grow in scope and the system of growth perpetuates itself. More money means you can hire more lobbyists and advertisers who can then recruit more people which will drive in more money which will hire more lobbyists, and the cycle continues. It is important to remember that this process is not creating new wealth, only spending current wealth while decreasing capital accumulation which leads to future economic growth.
Every year hundreds of millions of dollars are spent subsidizing special interest groups such as consumer groups, environmentalists, welfare rights lobbyists, civil rights organizations, labor unions, senior citizen organizations (DiLorenzo 63). Subsidies also extend to agriculture, ethanol, military industrial complex, the medical industrial complex, obesity programs, NASA lobbyists, FEMA, DHS, and various other governmental alphabet soup programs. It is once again important to remember that none of these programs create efficient long-run sustainable products. That being true, most of these functions would be defunded by the people if the threat and coercive force of government power from taxation had been lifted but only if the marginal social benefit value is less than the input.

Very few people are educated on true individualism, and there is a logical explanation. In the public realm, a voter’s ballot is only 1 out of 60 million, at least on a National level. The vote has practically no weight politically and each voter understands that little time and effort is needed to qualify to vote. Many voters feel there time is wasted spent researching as they feel they cannot make a difference. Conversely, politicians will select policies that attract voters knowing that voters put much less time into researching theories such as the Paradox of Thrift, the Laffer Curve, and equilibrium wage rates then they would if they were out purchasing a new car (Tullock 27).
Ludwig von Mises believed that interventionism such as price controls are all a part of the public choice cycle that inevitably leads to socialism. When government tries to lower prices on commodities such as milk so that it is more available to the poor, it has done nothing more than create a price ceiling which sets the price of milk at a price lower than that of the efficient free market equilibrium. Milk producers, especially marginal producers with high fixed costs, will now be operating at a loss and must close down leading to deadweight social loss. Maybe some of these producers will go into the cheese or butter industry where profits signal for investment but for now all that matters is that the government, by trying to increase milk intake to the poor, has actually created a reduction of overall milk in the economy while placing a once efficient producer out of business or sent overseas (Von Mises 7).
The cycle is rewarded when voters who supported this policy re-elect the same person to ‘contribute’ next term. There are incentives from every side, from the voters on specific issues, to the politicians who adopt anti-liberty positions to appease voters, to the bureaucracies that are rewarded for failure (at least coming from a true individualism perspective). It is now at this crucial point that government can either step back, admit its mistakes about reducing milk production while deviating price signals in the market or it can try to fix the problems that were created by this fluctuation of prices. The government, knowing it is political suicide to admit fault and take responsibility, must chase all other affected consumer goods with new policies, create new policies to stabilize wages that were affected along with complementary materials. No branch of industry is exempt outside of the bureaucracies and if a couple luxury or non-vital goods were left out capital would flow into them resulting in a drop in the supply of the vital commodities, the exact prices government fixed precisely because they were viewed as indispensable for the satisfaction of the needs of the masses (Von Mises 8).
We have now witnessed a politician taking his majority policy incentive, the short-run supporters of the bill who stand to profit off it, the bureaucracies that helped push the legislation through, and the negative externalities on the rest of the market as a result of the flow of capital out of milk investment due to the inability for to competitors to make a profit. Why invest in something that is a losing cause? Quantity is lost forever, or at least until the price ceiling is removed when equilibrium market pressures decrease long-run expected output. As government tries to correct its mistakes, it often makes them much worse.
Government intervention created the Great Depression through the Federal Reserve’s Boom and Bust policies that saw inflation and a contraction of the money supply. Had the government truly wanted to see an end to the depression the best course of action would have been inactivity by the bureaucrats. Instead, Hoover and FDR both interfered with the market adjustment process creating more government negative externalities that would need more time for the mal-investment to drain. (Rothbard 19). Rothbard listed six government actions that would delay the adjustment process. First was the prevention or delay of liquidation. This could come in the form of lending money to shaky businesses while calling on banks to lend further. The second government action to extend a depression is to inflate further. Further inflation blocks the necessary fall in prices, thus delaying adjustment and prolonging depression. Further credit expansion creates more mal-investments, which, in their turn, will have to be liquidated in some later depression.
A government “easy money” policy prevents the market’s return to the necessary higher interest rates. The third way for government action to extend a depression is to keep wage rates up. Artificial maintenance of wage rates in a depression insures permanent mass unemployment. Furthermore, in deflation, when prices are falling, keeping the same rate of money wages means that real wage rates have been pushed higher. In the face of falling business demand, this greatly aggravates the unemployment problem. The fourth way for government intervention to extend a depression is to keep prices up. Keeping prices above their free-market levels will create unsalable surpluses, and prevent a return to prosperity.

The fifth way for government interventionism to extend a depression is to stimulate consumption and discourage savings. We have seen that more saving and less consumption would speed recovery; more consumption and less saving aggravate the shortage of saved capital even further. Government can encourage consumption by “food stamp plans” and relief payments. It can discourage savings and investment by higher taxes, particularly on the wealthy and on corporations and estates. As a matter of fact, any increase of taxes and government spending will discourage saving and investment and stimulate consumption, since government spending is all consumption. Some of the private funds would have been saved and invested; all of the government funds are consumed. Any increase in the relative size of government in the economy, therefore, shifts the societal consumption–investment ratio in favor of consumption, and prolongs the depression. The last way Rothbard mentions in which government interventionism could prolong a depression is to subsidize unemployment. Any subsidization of unemployment will prolong unemployment indefinitely, and delay the shift of workers to the fields where jobs are available (Rothbard 20). Government jobs that are subsidized are usually less efficient than the private sector resulting in inefficient production for employment as well as a delay in real employment creation. Rothbard’s work focuses around the bad policy decisions pursued by government and the Federal Reserve helping us prove that perfect information is not available to the central planners, even after decades of attempts.
Many public choice scholars do not think that government is systematically engaged in maximizing the public interest, but they assume that government officials are attempting to maximize their own private interests (Tullock). In the market, institutions, through maximizing their own interests, at least to some extent provide goods and services for other people as a byproduct. In government bureaucracies, although there is a byproduct put off by any action, they usually do not have the same amount of social marginal benefit as a competitive equilibrium market could supply. Looking at the automobile industry and agricultural industry, it is easy to see why these producers would want tariffs and quotas on imported goods and services (their competitors).
The group is small in number and the cost of the import protectionist effort is small when spanned out across millions of customers who don’t understand the price of the car already includes these hidden government fees. Although free trade could lead to long-run efficiency and end the war on consumerism, the interest groups must continue to raise the price to satisfy his or her constituent (Tullock 87). Tullock states, “Once protectionist measures are established by government, they assume a life of their own.” Once these policies are put into effect, special interests will move in to secure their special privileges. The rent seeking element of protection explains the activities of special interests seeking benefits at the expense of the general public.
Logrolling, also known as vote trading, takes place when opponents combine bills together to vote for both at the same time. If the republicans want intervention A,B,C and the democrats want intervention 1,2,3, then together they can vote for their big programs and both of them will have passed. This case scenario is bad for true individualists who would more likely than not want see an expansion of liberty ideals. Logrolling is illegal in some areas and can lead to social losses. The United States used to have a tariff on import chin rests for violins to protect the producers here at home. The only makers of the small chin rest had only 4 or 5 employees. Because the costs equated to only a few cents per customer, nobody showed up to Congress to defend the people against this tariff. The investment paid off for the producer as they not only created a tax that is hidden for the bureaucracies special interest groups but also helped monopolize their product.
The same could be said about other types of interventionism into the market. Minimum wage rates help reinforce mass unemployment for years down the road, regardless if done by labor union force or government (Von Mises 9). The booms and busts of the business cycle have created not only huge recessions but also the Great Depression through credit expansion while most of the voting public remains clueless to the true cause of our bubbles. Day after day, we hear of government policies that have brought us more inefficiency because prices are not fixed to supply and demand. In the market, when people want more of an item, they offer more for it. As the price goes up, profits increase as well. This new incentive structure makes the industry more profitable sending more investors into that field. Economic expansion can now happen where additional jobs are opened up due to the increase in owner’s equity or capital. Competing firms take what price the market gives them since in a competitive market, industries are price takers, not price setters. This increase in supply lowers the price and reduces the profit margin up until profit margin is equal to the general profit levels (Hazlitt 106). This helps conclude that prices are determined by costs of production, or does it? Prices are actually determined by supply and demand, not cost of production. The cost of creating something yesterday cannot determine its value today, prices must be set on supply and demand in a market economy
Rent-seeking and public choice theory can help open the eyes of many people who do not understand the economic and political system that they live under. Rent-seeking, a nonproductive activity, has numerous negative externalities that can send shock waves through the economy, especially when politicians and bureaucrats take counteractive measures for their previous mistakes. The battle between capitalism, a competitive/free enterprise system, and socialism, centralized bureaucratic monopolies, relates directly to public choice theory and understanding the lobbyist groups and special interests that pull the greatest clout. Interventionism, the transition from capitalism to socialism, according to Mises, is an ongoing state of nature that has yet to be stopped by reason. Protectionism, tariffs, barriers, price setting, subsidies and other various forms of rent-seeking only perpetuate the cycle of bureaucracy growth in a cycle of political advertisement, reward for failure, and growth.
Education is what is needed to overcome the poor practices of public choice theory. Compared to federalism and capitalism, socialism oligopolizes all production at a national level where bureaucrats are uneducated on all topics and often don’t realize the war on consumerism they support in the short-run. Government’s often do too much and don’t allow the adjustment period to take full effect, calling for more action, often for political gain. Who controls these bureaucracies is what determines the outcome for each session. It is not that many of the politicians are bad people and they like enacting plans that lead to social deadweight loss, many just don’t understand economics or public choice theory. Those that condemn laissez-faire capitalism are confusing slavery for freedom.

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by Mara MacSeoinin, UK

Michael Jackson’s death was received with a surprising - and to many, a disproportionate - outpouring of grief on the streets of England. It was not only those of us who had grown up with his music and astonishing dance routines, who remembered him as the first black singer to appear on MTV and guiltily enjoyed the film 13 Going On 30 because of its homage to “Thriller”, but those who were rarely – if ever – exposed to his genius too. Those who were more accustomed to reports of near-insanity and behaviour that almost bordered on paedophilia. Small boys sleeping in his bed. Dangling his baby son over the edge of a balcony; forcing his children to wear masks on excursions. Watching E.T. every day for twenty years without fail. His failing career; his Neverland ranch which was, at the end, less amusement park and more car crash. Yet thousands held candlelit vigils for his memory and lamented his loss with a display of grief a Greek chorus would have envied. For the Boy Who Never Grew Up, like Princess Diana, held a psychological key to the attitudes that underpin contemporary England’s entire modus operandi: intense vulnerability.

Today’s England is like the new girl who was intensely popular (if a little notorious) at her old school but who is now standing at the front of the class, awaiting judgment. Distant rumours of her past have preceded her, encouraging the envious to eye her with disfavour; she apologises to all and sundry for perceived wrongs and historical offences, desperate to make new friends so that she can gain an identity. The rebellious part of her that clings to her former popularity is ruthlessly shunned. She ends up unable to open her mouth to voice an opinion lest she offend someone; this, the Labour government calls ‘equality and diversity’. (This we call brutal self-censorship: ‘re-education’.) She has been forced to put off those so-offensive badges, emblems, merits and ties of her Old School – nation, history, pride; class, patriotism, imperialism – because her new school sees such things as unenlightened and ‘undemocratic’, though their ideas of democracy are closer to the gulag than anything else. (Anyone who has returned to London via the Heathrow Express after visiting a country without mass surveillance will be forcibly reminded of the Beatles’ “Back In The USSR”.) Now she is being taught that her history, her upbringing if you will, is shameful; that deference, etiquette and good breeding are outmoded bourgeois conventions; that education and academic aspiration are ignoble and classist; that it is easier to better yourself by going on Big Brother than to Oxbridge; that modesty, decency and restraint have been abandoned for ‘if you can’t be good, be careful’— whatever your age.

Our intense cultural vulnerability, as we stand at a crossroads in history (whatever Fukayama may say we have not quite reached the end of history based on post-Enlightenment principles just yet, though we are perilously close to the edge) has communicated itself to our children. If we don’t know who we are, collectively or individually, how can they? And our own crisis of confidence is emphasised by a recent report that a quarter of all primary-school aged children — some as young as four — have been suspended for inappropriate sexual conduct. Sexual misconduct in pre-sexual beings. But it is not entirely surprising in a nation that has been trained to view everything – people and institutions alike – as commodities. The aptly named Ed Balls even referred to Education as a ‘brand’. Stripped of everything that once gave it meaning, pandering to its yen for instantaneous physical gratification rather than cool, calm and above all measured reflection, it has become a nation of barbarous infants who work out their aggression through sex and violence. The savage and feral is celebrated and accorded a perverse kind of nobility.

In centuries gone by, the churches told the average citizen what he wanted – and needed –  to believe. The state, in taking on the role of church and indeed of thinking altogether (to the extent that it feels it necessary to spend taxpayers’ money on designing a webpage telling us how to ‘keep cool’ during a heat wave), has taken on mass marketing ideologies with fiendish enthusiasm. It decides upon our morals (or lack of them); and the advertising world makes our ‘lifestyle choices’ for us whilst pushing the illusion that we are ‘free’. We are not. We have crossed over the line between having a product sold to us and selling ourselves, following the shifting whims of external forces with blind obedience. The marriage between consumerism and overt socialism is pushing us further and further away from freedom and identity. And today’s children are the offspring of this unholy union: targeted from birth by Labour and advertising giants like Saatchi, they are not being taught to think, let alone develop a version of self, that is separate from the corporate identity decided for them in the boardroom. Babies are earmarked as tomorrow’s consumer. Little girls’ role models are not Michelle Obama and Jackie O but the despicably trashy and unglamorous Katie Price and the prefab mime-group Girls Aloud. A career in pornography is deemed desirable. Mothers let the television and internet educate their children whilst they delve into self-help books to ‘find themselves’. The biology syllabus fails students who add an ethical dimension to genetic modification or IVF. Only 11.5% of history undergraduates could name three C19th British Prime Ministers – despite being awarded top marks in their A-Level exams.

The developmental years are the most important in a child’s life; the way in which they see the world will inform their relationships, their ambitions and their ethical and moral codes. As a new and vulnerable nation in which our background has been gleefully smashed up and made derelict by the Labour machine, we are entirely at their mercy: what ambitions? What ethical and moral codes? “Right” and “wrong” are relative, right?… And yet. And yet. We need not be doomed to decline and fall. We do not have to vote in Caligula’s horse; we do not need to be at the mercy of 646 of our peers. All — all we have to do is affirm our history honestly. Roots go deep, and there is no victory to be gained in abandoning them: we are, in the words of the tired adage, merely doomed to repeat our mistakes.  In the Age of Innocence, Newland Archer yearns for a country in which he can simply be with the object of his affection, free from the trappings of the past and the social structures in which he grew up; but the Countess Ellen Olenska is more realistic. Losing one’s history causes a diminution of the world, rather than its expansion:

“Oh, my dear - where is that country? Have you ever been there? . . . I know so many who’ve tried to find it; and, believe me, they all got out by mistake at wayside stations: at places like Boulogne, or Pisa, or Monte Carlo - and it wasn’t at all different from the old world they’d left, but only rather smaller and dingier and more promiscuous.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aBX5jC9CuOC4

Reposted by Michael Shanklin

By Bob Chen and David Yong

July 2 (Bloomberg) — China will allow companies to use the yuan to settle cross-border trade and let them keep their entitlement to export tax rebates, seeking to reduce the reliance of importers and exporters on the U.S. dollar.

The People’s Bank of China will encourage banks to offer yuan settlement services from today, the bank said in the regulations published on its Web site. Transactions inside China will take place in Shanghai and four cities in southern Guangdong province, including Guangzhou and Shenzhen, while those outside China will occur in Hong Kong, Macau and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, it said.

“It’s China’s first step to make the yuan global,” said Shi Lei, an analyst in Beijing at Bank of China Ltd., the nation’s largest foreign-currency trader. “It will protect exporters from swings in exchange rates and boost the yuan’s role in the world currency system.”

China is promoting greater use of the yuan in international trade and finance after Premier Wen Jiabao in March expressed concern that a weakening dollar will cause losses on the country’s holdings of U.S. assets. A Chinese Foreign Ministry official said today he hoped the U.S. currency would remain stable, while reiterating a call for diversification of the international monetary system.

“Companies in China and neighboring countries are facing relatively huge risks of exchange-rate fluctuations because of big swings in the U.S. dollar, the euro and other major settlement currencies,” today’s central bank statement said.

First Settlement

Asean comprises Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

Hong Kong Monetary Authority Chief Executive Joseph Yam said on June 29 he hopes the first yuan settlement transactions will start this month after signing an agreement with People’s Bank Governor Zhou Xiaochuan. Companies currently have to convert yuan into dollars or other currencies to settle international trade.

“Hong Kong will be the natural place for arranging these transactions,” Yam said in a statement today. “This is the key to the maintenance of the status of Hong Kong as an international finance centre.”

Tax authorities are working on the proposed rebates for exports settled in yuan, the central bank said. Bank of China Ltd. will be the clearing bank in Hong Kong and Macau.

Stability, Convenience

About 50 percent of Hong Kong’s trade with China may be settled in yuan after the program starts, Stanley Wong, deputy general manager at Industrial & Commercial Bank of China (Asia) Ltd., the Hong Kong unit of China’s biggest bank, said in an interview on May 5. Hong Kong companies want to use yuan in trade because it will probably appreciate against the U.S. dollar more than 3 percent every year, he said.

“We hope companies will like to use yuan because of its stable value and convenience,” People’s Bank of China Deputy Governor Su Ning said in an interview with state-owned China National Radio today.

The yuan has strengthened 21 percent against the U.S. currency since a dollar peg was scrapped in 2005. China has limited the yuan’s advance in the past year as a stronger currency makes its goods less competitive overseas at a time when economic growth this year could slow to 7.2 percent from 9 percent in 2008, according to World Bank forecasts.

Currency Swaps

The People’s Bank of China has agreed to provide a total of 650 billion yuan ($95 billion) to Argentina, Belarus, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia and South Korea through so-called currency- swaps to expand the yuan’s usage. China and Brazil in May began studying a proposal to move away from the dollar for trade settlement and use yuan and reais instead.

Malaysia’s government has been calling for reduced dependence on the dollar for “some years” and now that China is supporting yuan settlement it is worth considering, said Tan King Tai, an executive director at Pensonic Holdings Bhd., a manufacturer of household electrical appliances in the northern Malaysian state of Penang that sources parts from China.

“The dollar has become quite volatile and speculative in some ways,” he said. “If the yuan can be stable, it will help companies with their financial budgeting.”

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by Michael Shanklin

Ron Paul explaining the economic situation America is currently in.

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by Todd Andrew Barnett

http://www.reason.com/news/show/134506.html

Reposted by David P Shirk

By David Harsanyi

Facts. Costs. Consequences.

Who cares?
We’re in the middle of pretending to save the planet, baby.
If it’s about helping “the environment,” suspend reason and salvation is yours. As I’m sure you’ve heard a lot of smart and compassionate folks tell you lately, doing something—anything!—is better than doing nothing.
So the House did something. It passed a “cap and trade” bill that would ration energy, destroy productive jobs, levy the largest tax increase in United States history and, for kicks, penalize foreign trade partners who fail to engage in comparable economic suicide.

Now, assuming there are no speed-reading clairvoyants in the House, no one who voted for the 1,200-page bill—plus the 300-page amendment dropped the morning of the vote—possibly could have read it.
And any scum-sucking scoundrel who points out that “doing nothing” already includes spending billions on renewable energies and living under thousands of regulations is, as New York Times columnist Paul Krugman shrewdly noted, a traitor to humankind.
Speaking of doing nothing: Though it has the potential to stagnate the economy, the American Clean Energy and Security Act, according to the Environmental Protection Agency itself, would not create any reductions in emissions by 2020. The piddling impact of the bill is documented across the ideological spectrum.
So after the House passed the bill, I, curious about the particulars, sent a query to Rep. Betsy Markey (D-Colo.), because hers was one of the votes that put the bill over the top. Markey had been on the fence regarding cap and trade, so surely, she gave the bill a thorough once-over before voting. Not surprisingly, I received no reply.
When I later caught Markey swinging at softballs on television, I realized that she probably had been too busy boning up on her talking points to take the time to slog through 1,500 pages of a radical and generational shift in energy policy.
As terrible as this bill is—and America’s only hope is that a more reasonable Senate will kill it—Markey and others have mastered the art of passing environmental legislation. Throw in “green jobs” or a “new energy economy” and you are golden. What kind of insensitive monster is going to stand in the way of a windmill?

If you’re really in a fighting mood, drop a line about “energy independence”—and don’t we love to hear that one? But do not under any circumstances, as Markey did, stray from your script to offer this remarkably ill-informed myth: “We are now beholden,” Markey claimed, “to unstable governments in the Middle East for the majority of our oil.”
That’s scary stuff. And it brings up an important point: Cap and trade schemes do nothing to foster energy independence, though they hold the distinct possibility of making us more “dependent” on foreign oil imports.
Having to pay for expensive carbon credits will be an incentive for many American companies to close their carbon-emitting businesses and move abroad to places less devoted to destroying themselves.
The House’s cap and trade also means that any energy that does not rely on windmills or solar panels—so, nearly all energy—could become cheaper to import rather than refine here.
It is also distressing, but not surprising, to hear a politician assert that trading with foreign nations means we are beholden to them rather than explain how trade makes partners more peaceful, makes us competitive, and makes everyone more prosperous.
But even if you measure trade as Markey does, we do not import the “majority” of our oil from “unstable” “Middle Eastern” countries.
According to the Energy Information Administration, the top sources for U.S. crude oil for many years have been Canada and Mexico—with Saudi Arabia third.
Saudi Arabia is a terrible place ruled by religious fascists (whom no American president ever should hold hands with or bow to), but it is rather stable, considering.
Not that it makes any difference, mind you. Something, after all, needs to be done.

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By David Shirk

It has been said that those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it. This is not a platitude or cliché, but rather a statement of fact. While the end result may be slightly different, the bottom line remains the same.
Welcome to America, 2009. It is diverse in its population and beliefs, can elect those placed in charge, and remains the only super power on the face of this planet today. A nation founded by strong people who were tired of bowing to an authority remote from them in every way, we have been through wars, depressions, environmental disasters, and foreign conflict. It is commonly thought that because we are still standing and considered better off then the rest of the world, that nothing is wrong. As such, most people will complain about issues, but still bow to the solutions provided by their elected officials. If it’s not broken, why fix it?
The answer is simple, yet disturbing at the same time. It is because things have gotten so bad, that there is no way out that people see as a viable solution. Worse yet, no matter what the government does, it will be looked on in a most unfavorable light.
You see, most people conservative in nature complain about taxes in all forms, yet still pay them. They are upset about having to pay into programs that they will never be allowed to use, yet they pay anyway. They complain about gas prices, but fail to see that instability in the Middle East has little to do with it. They complain about the threats to their right to free speech and right to bear arms, yet obey the laws in place anyway. They complain about the high cost of healthcare, and are forced to either pay high premiums, or go Medicare. Unfortunately, most of them are ineligible to receive Medicare because they ‘make too much’, and are stuck footing the bill themselves. Last of all, they complain about illegal immigrants taking their jobs and refusing to adapt the American language.
Most people on the liberal side do not mind paying taxes as long as it goes to a program they think is necessary such as energy, environment, healthcare, immigration reform, and education. They say that the environment is crumbling and needs to be protected. They blame capitalism and lack of regulation for this, so they lobby for government intervention. They think everyone should have the same healthcare regardless of class status, and that the free market insurance is too expensive. So they lobby the government for universal healthcare to take the reigns. They think that illegal’s come here trying to make a better life for themselves, so they ask the government to grant them amnesty. They think that their children aren’t getting enough education, or feel bad for the inner city kids who they believe do not have the same benefits as the suburb ones. So they lobby the government to increase funding for public education.

These are the two different points of view that dominate the voting majority in America today. Now let’s examine what they have in common.
They both glean much of their information from the news. FOX, CNN – it doesn’t matter. They both are subject to the influence of their environment. Neither group is stupid, but they read without understanding. By this I mean that due to a preconceived notion or ideal, they read more books and articles that would support their line of thought. They then use the knowledge gleaned from their readings as an opposition to each other. For instance, a more liberal minded person will see the slight increase in the stock market since the TARP and other Stimulus packages passed as a sign that the government is doing right. Meanwhile a conservative will watch the same rise in the market as a sign of a weak dollar, and over inflation.
As such they will both vote for whomever their party tells them to vote for. The majority on both sides do not read the candidates voting records. Both sides will demonize you if challenge their chosen candidate based off of their voting record, and the near disastrous results of said record on a historical basis. Worst off all, they both say that the guys on TV are experts, and that you’re just Joe Schmoe from across the street. Why should they listen to you instead of the guys on TV?
Well, we have had TV common in every household since they 70’s. Heck, we even have the internet now. Yet has anything improved? Our military occupies over 20 countries, our national debt has skyrocketed, we have a people that believe the steaming load fed to them on a daily basis by the flapping heads on TV, and failing health end education programs. So I ask you, what exactly has improved since the ‘TV experts’ started telling us what to believe?

The first part of the solution is to educate. Turn off the TV, grab a book, read the book, then discuss it with others. Know what you’re voting for, and the history behind those decisions. Know who your voting for, and check their voting record. Once you do that, you can write your representative or senator in a sensible manner, which will have much more influence then a chaotic rant. When the next election cycle comes, you will be able to pick and choose better, and if necessary, nominate a candidate that will do the right thing, even if it is the harsh thing. The next step is to educate anyone who is willing to listen in a calm confidant manner. Do not be discouraged if you lose a debate with them - that just leads to more study which gives you more backing the next time you present your case. If what you learn disturbs you (and it might), use that to drive you into action such as writing your representative, or blogging about your findings.
That America, is what makes us the greatest nation on earth - the ability to seek out the truth, without being impeded, and to use history lessons as a teacher to correct our mistakes so that we can finally move on to bigger and better things. Every developed country has public news that tells them what to think. What has made us different, is that we are (or at least used to be) a nation of free thinkers. Many countries do not have this. It is the key to keeping your freedom, so I suggest you use it. If we don’t, then we have truly lost.

To visit David Shirks website, please go to http://www.myspace.com/dirtyhampster

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By Jake

Presidential Signing Statement has taken the power away from the People

A “Signing Statement” is a pronouncements (written comment) given by the President upon signing legislation into law. The practice of these statement have many purposes and go far back into or history. The most common use till President Reagan was merely comments on the bill being signed. Signing Statements seem to go as far back as Andrew Jackson.

Today, “Signing Statements” still include comments on bills, but they have become a way for the President to resist certain passed statutes, perimeters or restrictions that a bill may put on him. George W. Bush used these statements to bypass 750 statues between 125 bills. The asserted statements or phrases are often dealing with “supervise the unitary executive branch”, “my constitutional authority” or the “unitary executive”.

Bush’s practices were so in the face of Congress in prompted an ABA or The American Bar Association to do an investigation on the matter. The ABA came to the following conclusion:

· “oppose, as contrary to the rule of law and our constitutional system of separation of powers, a President’s issuance of signing statements to claim the authority or state the intention to disregard or decline to enforce all or part of a law he has signed, or to interpret such a law in a manner inconsistent with the clear intent of Congress;”

· “urge the President, if he believes that any provision of a bill pending before Congress would be unconstitutional if enacted, to communicate such concerns to Congress prior to passage;”

· “urge the President to confine any signing statements to his views regarding the meaning, purpose, and significance of bills, and to use his veto power if he believes that all or part of a bill is unconstitutional;”

· “urge Congress to enact legislation requiring the President promptly to submit to Congress an official copy of all signing statements, and to report to Congress the reasons and legal basis for any instance in which he claims the authority, or states the intention, to disregard or decline to enforce all or part of a law he has signed, or to interpret such a law in a manner inconsistent with the clear intent of Congress, and to make all such submissions be available in a publicly accessible database.”

· “urge Congress to enact legislation enabling the President, Congress, or other entities or individuals, to seek judicial review of such signing statements to the extent constitutionally permissible, and urge Congress and the President to support a judicial resolution of the President’s claim or interpretation.“

This conclusion came from a bipartisan commission. I highly recommend you to read the complete document and it can be found here: http://www.abanet.org/media/docs/signstatereport.pdf

During the campaign Obama was asked, “When Congress offers you a bill, do you promise not to use presidential signage to get your way. He responded, “YES” and continued into a detailed answer that included, “I taught the constitution for ten years. I believe in the constitution and I will obey the constitution of the United States and we are not going to use signing statements as a way of doing an enrun around congress, alright.” Watch the video at the following: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seAR1S1Mjkc

President Obama has relaxed the definite Yes he gave to the question during the campaign. On March 9, 2009 the Press Secretary released a Memorandum from President Obama that provides his principles on this matter. He states the following:

1. “The executive branch will take appropriate and timely steps, whenever practicable, to inform the Congress of its constitutional concerns about pending legislation. Such communication should facilitate the efforts of the executive branch and the Congress to work together to address these concerns during the legislative process, thus minimizing the number of occasions on which I am presented with an enrolled bill that may require a signing statement.
2. Because legislation enacted by the Congress comes with a presumption of constitutionality, I will strive to avoid the conclusion that any part of an enrolled bill is unconstitutional. In exercising my responsibility to determine whether a provision of an enrolled bill is unconstitutional, I will act with caution and restraint, based only on interpretations of the Constitution that are well-founded.
3. To promote transparency and accountability, I will ensure that signing statements identify my constitutional concerns about a statutory provision with sufficient specificity to make clear the nature and basis of the constitutional objection.
4. I will announce in signing statements that I will construe a statutory provision in a manner that avoids a constitutional problem only if that construction is a legitimate one.”

The Memorandum can be found at the following: http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Memorandum-on-Presidential-Signing-Statements/

It is a far cry from President Obama saying, “I will absolutely not use signing statements to change a bill passed from congress”, but on the surface it sounds better than Bush’s in your face policies.

So, how well will he hold back the desire for power? The answer is not very well. We will bring to light what seems to be a well written Memorandum to prepare the public for a list of “constitutional differences” of the “Omnibus Appropriations Act, 2009” and others. We have read through opinions on both sides of the isle and the argument that Obama is continuing the practice of “Signing Statement” to bypass the Legislative Branch seems to be the consensuses. We will follow all the bills he signs and report them to you quickly. This is a LIBERTY issue. It is a direct threat to the balance of powers and is a power not given to the President in the constitution. We challenge you to do some of your own research and some of the material we used is provided here:

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/signingstatements.php

http://www.coherentbabble.com/latest.htm

http://www.abanet.org/media/docs/signstatereport.pdf

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/04/30/bush_challenges_hundreds_of_laws/

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/04/30/statutes_challenged/

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2006/04/30/examples_of_the_presidents_signing_statements/

http://www.abanet.org/media/releases/news060506.html

http://www.acslaw.org/files/Kinkopf-Signing%20Statements-Jun%202006-Advance%20Vol%201.pdf

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by Michael Shanklin

Walter Block discusses the government’s role in the environment, from a libertarian perspective.

To visit Michael Shanklin’s Youtube Channel please click here

PFP Freedom Hour TV Saturdays 9-10pm:

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Don’t forget to check out our Radio shows:

PFP Movement Radio Fridays 6-8pm http://www.blogtalkradio.com/pfpmovementradio

Mike Shanklin Radio Tuesdays 6:30-7pm http://www.blogtalkradio.com/michael-shanklin

Todd Andrew Barnett LCL Radio Fridays 11pm-1am. http://www.blogtalkradio.com/LCTL-SpecialEdition