tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-296618232012-01-28T11:01:40.365-05:00A conservative view of coastal Carolina and the worldElliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.comBlogger15371100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-83331688336254819102012-01-28T11:01:00.001-05:002012-01-28T11:01:40.371-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.city-journal.org/2012/22_1_otbie-european-debt-crisis.html">http://www.city-journal.org/2012/22_1_otbie-european-debt-crisis.html</a> <p /> > In short, the incontinent spending of many European governments, which awarded whole populations unearned benefits at the expense of generations to come, has—along with a megalomaniacal currency union—produced a crisis not merely economic but social, political, and even civilizational. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-european-crack-up-by-theodore-dalrymple">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-8333168833625481910?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-23450907709765264372012-01-28T08:49:00.001-05:002012-01-28T08:49:31.511-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/289402/obama-s-vision-spartan-america-jonah-goldberg">http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/289402/obama-s-vision-spartan-america-...</a> <p /> > [Obama quote:] “This nation is great because we worked as a team. This nation is great because we get each other’s backs.” <br />>> No. Wrong. It is not so with America. This nation isn’t great because we work as a team with the president as our captain. America is great because America is free. It is great not because we put our self-interest aside, but because we have the right to pursue happiness. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/obamas-vision-for-a-spartan-america-jonah-gol">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2345090770976526437?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-28964984897150045012012-01-27T15:58:00.001-05:002012-01-27T15:58:16.907-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204301404577171531838421366.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop">http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204301404577171531838421366.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; line-height: 10px;"><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 8px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; display: block;">A candidate for public office in any contemporary democracy may have to consider what, if anything, to do about "global warming." Candidates should understand that the oft-repeated claim that nearly all scientists demand that something dramatic be done to stop global warming is not true. In fact, a large and growing number of distinguished scientists and engineers do not agree that drastic actions on global warming are needed.</p></div></blockquote><p /></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/sixteen-concerned-scientists-no-need-to-panic">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2896498489715004501?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-61586248247903479342012-01-25T13:35:00.001-05:002012-01-25T13:35:36.320-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-23/buffett-s-burlington-northern-among-winners-in-obama-rejection-of-pipeline.html">http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-23/buffett-s-burlington-northern-among-winners-in-obama-rejection-of-pipeline.html</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px;"><a href="http://topics.bloomberg.com/warren-buffett/" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 51, 204); text-decoration: none;">Warren Buffett</a>’s Burlington Northern Santa Fe LLC is among U.S. and Canadian railroads that stand to benefit from the Obama administration’s decision to reject&nbsp;<a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=TRP:CN" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 51, 204); text-decoration: none;">TransCanada Corp. (TRP)</a>’s Keystone XL oil pipeline permit.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/buffetts-burlington-northern-among-pipeline-w">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6158624824790347934?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-18145054438619543322012-01-25T13:31:00.001-05:002012-01-25T13:31:41.899-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><iframe src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/UDDRiGIUYQo?wmode=transparent" allowfullscreen frameborder="0" height="417" width="500"></iframe> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/familiar-rhetoric-failed-record">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1814505443861954332?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-67294400229266319822012-01-13T14:33:00.001-05:002012-01-13T14:33:43.555-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2012/01/12/head-start-a-50-year-flop-say-it-aint-so-joe/">http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2012/01/12/head-start-a-50-year-flop-say-it-aint-so-joe/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><p style="margin-top: 12px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 4px; margin-left: 0px;">But a long-suppressed government report finally released by the Obama administration report is shaking the foundations of Head Start, and the news isn’t coming from right wing conservatives but from&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Klein" style="color: rgb(54, 104, 186); text-decoration: none;">Joe Klein</a>&nbsp;at&nbsp;<em>Time</em>&nbsp;magazine.&nbsp;<a href="http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2081778,00.html" style="color: rgb(54, 104, 186); text-decoration: none;">As Klein reports</a>,</p><blockquote style="border-left-width: 2px; border-left-style: solid; border-left-color: rgb(192, 205, 217); color: rgb(68, 68, 68); margin-top: 12px; margin-right: 12px; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: 12px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 14px;"><p style="margin-top: 12px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 4px; margin-left: 0px;">We spend more than $7 billion providing Head Start to nearly 1 million children each year. And finally there is indisputable evidence about the program’s effectiveness, provided by the Department of Health and Human Services: Head Start simply does not work.</p></blockquote><p style="margin-top: 12px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 4px; margin-left: 0px;">These days, defenders of Head Start say less about what it does for kids (essentially nothing) but about the jobs it creates in poor neighborhoods.&nbsp; This is blue liberal thinking at its most self-parodic: we can’t develop social programs that will accomplish something worthwhile, but we can at least use the illusion that such programs work to create jobs for people who will then vote for the politicians who give them make work jobs.</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/head-start-a-50-year-flop">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6729440022926631982?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-46215666482504880652012-01-10T14:58:00.001-05:002012-01-10T14:58:03.775-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/confirmation-bias-shameless-flip-flop-recess-appointments_616561.html">http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/confirmation-bias-shameless-flip-flop-recess-appointments_616561.html</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="">But in the course of his analysis, Tribe neglects to mention an important point: in 2004, he co-wrote&nbsp;<a href="http://balkin.blogspot.com/Stephens.Reply.FINAL.corrected.pdf" rel="nofollow" style="color: rgb(72, 95, 114) !important; text-decoration: underline;">a legal brief</a>&nbsp;on behalf of Senator Ted Kennedy, in opposition to President Bush's recess appointments—a strongly-worded brief that contradicted (indeed, belittled) the very position he now stakes out in favor of President Obama's power grab.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/confirmation-bias-a-shameless-flip-flop-on-re">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-4621566648250488065?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-89062410334815429872012-01-10T11:45:00.001-05:002012-01-10T11:45:04.669-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203462304577134722056867022.html?mod=googlenews_wsj">http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203462304577134722056867022.html?mod=googlenews_wsj</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; line-height: 10px;"><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 8px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; display: block;">Germany could create a parallel currency—a new D-Mark, pegged at 1.0 to the euro. The German government would guarantee that holders of German government bonds could convert euro securities to new-D-mark instruments on a one-to-one basis up to some designated date, perhaps two years in the future. Private German contracts expressed in euros would switch to new-D-mark claims over the same period. The transition would likely feature a period in which the euro and new D-mark circulate as parallel currencies.</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 8px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; display: block;">Other countries could follow a path toward reintroduction of their own currencies over a two-year period. For example, Italy could have a new lira at 1.0 to the euro. If all the euro-zone countries followed this course, the vanishing of the euro currency in 2014 would come to resemble the disappearance of the 11 separate European moneys in 2001.</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/robert-barro-an-exit-strategy-from-the-euro-w">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-8906241033481542987?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-7007853125614022382012-01-07T09:32:00.001-05:002012-01-07T09:32:08.689-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'>John Yoo responds to Lawrence Tribe's article defending Obama's sham-recess appointments. <p /> <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/287439/cordrays-tribe-john-yoo">http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/287439/cordrays-tribe-john-yoo</a> <p /> > First, on the history: All of the precedents cited by Tribe occurred when the Senate was adjourned. The question was when does an adjournment of the Senate become long enough to qualify as a “recess” under Article II, Section 2 of the Constitution. As far as I know, and Tribe cannot claim to the contrary, no president has ever made a recess appointment when the Senate was formally in session. This is not a question of when does an adjournment become a recess — here, there has been no adjournment. <p /> Tribe's original article: <p /> <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/06/opinion/games-and-gimmicks-in-the-senate.html?_r=2">http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/06/opinion/games-and-gimmicks-in-the-senate.ht...</a> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/cordrays-tribe-by-john-yoo">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-700785312561402238?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-39042828462385462162012-01-05T09:36:00.001-05:002012-01-05T09:36:34.713-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://blog.heritage.org/2012/01/04/a-tyrannical-abuse-of-power-obama-attempts-to-appoint-cordray-to-cfpb/">http://blog.heritage.org/2012/01/04/a-tyrannical-abuse-of-power-obama-attempts-to-appoint-cordray-to-cfpb/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(68, 68, 68); font-family: Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 20px;"><div style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 25px; padding-left: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; font-size: 12px; line-height: 19px; color: rgb(85, 85, 85);">The Constitution, in Article I, section 5, plainly states that neither house of Congress can recess for more than three days without the consent of the other house. The House of Representatives did not consent to a Senate recess of more than three days at the end of last year, and so the Senate—consistent with the requirements of the Constitution—is having pro forma sessions every few days. In short, Congress is still in session, and no one in Congress is saying (or can reasonably say) otherwise. It does not matter a wit that most Members of Congress are not in town voting on legislation, because ending a session of Congress requires the passage of a formal resolution, which never occurred.</div><div style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 25px; padding-left: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; font-size: 12px; line-height: 19px; color: rgb(85, 85, 85);">Under Article II, section 2, clause 2 of the Constitution, the President has the power to fill vacancies that may happen during Senate recesses. That power has been interpreted by scores of attorneys general and their designees in the Department of Justice (DOJ) Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) for over 100 years to require an official, legal Senate recess of at least 10–25 days of duration. (There are a few outlier opinions, never sanctioned by the courts, that suggest a recess of six to seven days might be enough—but never less than that.)</div></div></blockquote></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="color: rgb(85, 85, 85); font-family: Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 19px;">The President’s purported recess appointment of Cordray would render the Senate’s advice and consent role to normal appointments almost meaningless.&nbsp;</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/a-tyrannical-abuse-of-power-obama-attempts-to">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3904282846238546216?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-31868139773842222972012-01-04T16:18:00.001-05:002012-01-04T16:18:57.555-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=48541">http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=48541</a> <br />> Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell Wednesday condemned President Obama’s decision to make a recess appointment of Richard Cordray as the first director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, even as the Senate is not in recess. <br />>> “This recess appointment represents a sharp departure from a long-standing precedent that has limited the President to recess appointments only when the Senate is in a recess of 10 days or longer,” said Sen. McConnell, who in a speech on the Senate floor December 17 pleaded with the White House for cooperation on the stalled confirmation of presidential appointments. <br />>> <br /><a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/jan/4/obama-unprecedented-recess-appointment/?page=1">http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/jan/4/obama-unprecedented-recess-app...</a> <p /> > The Constitution gives the president the power to make appointments when the Senate is not in session and able to confirm them. Traditionally, that has been understood to mean when the Senate has adjourned for a recess longer than 10 days, and a Clinton administration legal opinion said a recess must be at least three days. <br />>> Mr. Obama’s own top constitutional lawyers affirmed that view in 2010 in another case involving recess appointments. Asked what the standard was for making recess appointments, then-Deputy Solicitor General Neal Katyal told the justices the administration agreed with the three-day rule. <br />>> “The recess appointment power can work in a recess. I think our office has opined the recess has to be longer than 3 days,” Mr. Katyal said. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/recess-appointment-for-cordray-unconstitution">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3186813977384222297?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-60283711307689791942012-01-02T14:25:00.001-05:002012-01-02T14:25:45.021-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://biggovernment.com/whall/2011/12/27/its-the-math-stupid-seven-devastating-facts-about-2012/">http://biggovernment.com/whall/2011/12/27/its-the-math-stupid-seven-devastating-facts-about-2012/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Every day, the U.S. government takes in $6 billion and spends $10 billion.&nbsp; This means that every day the federal government spends&nbsp;<a href="http://www.politifact.com/rhode-island/statements/2011/may/04/national-republican-congressional-committee/gop-congressional-committee-says-us-borrows-4-bill/" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; color: rgb(0, 72, 144);">$4 billion more dollars</a>&nbsp;than it has.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/seven-devastating-facts-about-2012-big-govern">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6028371130768979194?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-55848985883904536902012-01-02T10:34:00.001-05:002012-01-02T10:34:31.212-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ringing-in-a-conservative-year/2011/12/30/gIQAGWZNRP_story.html">http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ringing-in-a-conservative-year/2011/12/30/gIQAGWZNRP_story.html</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px;">In 2011, for the first time in 62 years, America was a&nbsp;<a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203441704577068670488306242.html" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">net exporter of petroleum</a>&nbsp;products. For the indefinite future, a specter is haunting progressivism, the specter of abundance. Because progressivism exists to justify a few people bossing around most people and because progressives believe that only government’s energy should flow unimpeded, they crave energy scarcities as an excuse for rationing — by them — that produces ever-more-minute government supervision of Americans’ behavior.</span></blockquote><br /></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/george-will-ringing-in-a-conservative-year">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5584898588390453690?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-17830706585225280602011-12-31T08:33:00.001-05:002011-12-31T08:33:51.407-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.ocregister.com/opinion/trillion-333653-debt-government.html">http://www.ocregister.com/opinion/trillion-333653-debt-government.html</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At the end of 2011, America, like much of the rest of the Western world, has dug deeper into a cocoon of denial. Tens of millions of Americans remain unaware that this nation is broke – broker than any nation has ever been. A few days before Christmas, we sailed across the psychological Rubicon and joined the club of nations whose government debt now exceeds their total GDP. It barely raised a murmur – and those who took the trouble to address the issue noted complacently that our 100 percent debt-to-GDP ratio is a mere two-thirds of Greece's. That's true, but at a certain point per capita comparisons are less relevant than the sheer hard dollar sums: Greece owes a few rinky-dink billions; America owes more money than anyone has ever owed anybody ever.</span></blockquote><br /></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The total combined wealth of the Forbes 400 richest Americans is $1.5 trillion. So, if you confiscated the lot, it would barely cover one Obama debt-ceiling increase. Nevertheless, America's student princes' main demand was that someone else should pick up the six-figure tab for their leisurely half-decade varsity of Social Justice studies.</span></blockquote><br /></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/mark-steyn-puncture-the-cocoon-of-denial">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1783070658522528060?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-47225441049582382472011-12-30T17:05:00.001-05:002011-12-30T17:05:14.072-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">A funny review of the past year's top stories by Jed Babbin.</div><p /><a href="http://spectator.org/archives/2011/12/30/2011-the-year-the-wheels-fell">http://spectator.org/archives/2011/12/30/2011-the-year-the-wheels-fell</a> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-american-spectator-2011-the-year-the-whee">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-4722544104958238247?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-15629608192055514202011-12-29T12:51:00.001-05:002011-12-29T12:51:40.804-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-News/2011/1229/Samoa-to-skip-Friday-lose-December-30th-2011-forever">http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-News/2011/1229/Samoa-to-skip-Friday-lose-December-30th-2011-forever</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;">So Samoans, who currently live 20 miles east of the dateline, will go to sleep on Thursday night, skip Friday, and wake up on Saturday morning on the Asian side of the imaginary line. (<a href="http://www.csmonitor.com/tags/topic/American+Samoa" class="inform_link" target="_self" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; text-decoration: none; color: rgb(32, 93, 135);">American Samoa</a>&nbsp;will stay where it is, timewise.)<p />&nbsp;The 24 hour leap into the future will make trade with<a href="http://www.csmonitor.com/tags/topic/East+Asia" class="inform_link" target="_self" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; text-decoration: none; color: rgb(32, 93, 135);">East Asia</a>&nbsp;“far, far easier,” Mr. Tuilaepa said.<br /></span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/samoa-to-skip-friday-lose-december-30th-2011">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1562960819205551420?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-25131056270347541862011-12-23T09:05:00.001-05:002011-12-23T09:05:10.403-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'>StackOverflow.com will change their domain registrar: <p /> <a href="http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/116891/will-stack-overflow-boycott-godaddy-because-of-their-support-for-sopa">http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/116891/will-stack-overflow-boycott-go...</a> <p /> <br />Paul Graham will not invite SOPA supporters to Y Combinator Demo Days. <p /> <a href="http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/22/paul-graham-sopa-supporting-companies-no-longer-allowed-at-yc-demo-day/">http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/22/paul-graham-sopa-supporting-companies-no-lon...</a> <p /> > When asked if that boycott extended to investors in those companies, Graham responded, “Several of the companies on the SOPA list have venture arms. I encourage startups to boycott them. We’ll certainly encourage all the startups we’ve funded to.” <br />>> The rationale? “If these companies are so clueless about technology that they think SOPA is a good idea, how could they be good investors?” <p /> <br />How to transfer out of GoDaddy: <p /> <a href="http://blog.jeffepstein.me/post/14629857835/a-step-by-step-guide-to-transfer-domains-out-of-godaddy">http://blog.jeffepstein.me/post/14629857835/a-step-by-step-guide-to-transfer-...</a> <p /> > Follow these step-by-step directions to transfer all of your domains from GoDaddy to NameCheap. <br />>> I’m Boycotting GoDaddy because they are pro-SOPA. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/anti-sopa-boycott-of-godaddy">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2513105627034754186?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-34946579907842817312011-12-21T14:11:00.001-05:002011-12-21T14:11:39.013-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204791104577110152436029914.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop">http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204791104577110152436029914.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; line-height: 10px;"><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 8px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; display: block;">Rather than stimulate the economy, they hold the economy back by creating policy unpredictability and by distracting Washington from crucial long-term reforms that are key to restoring economic growth and creating jobs.</p><a name="U603330111419XZB"></a><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 8px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; display: block;">Indeed, this type of temporary tax change is making the entire tax system unpredictable. According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, the payroll tax cut is only one of 84 tax provisions expiring this year, about the same as in 2009 and in 2010. This is 10 times greater than the number of provisions that expired in 1999. As shown in a paper presented this October by economists Scott Baker and Nicholas Bloom of Stanford University and Steven Davis of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, this increase in policy uncertainty is one of the factors slowing economic growth.</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/john-taylor-want-growth-try-stable-tax-policy">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3494657990784281731?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-83940630955370580772011-12-16T15:09:00.001-05:002011-12-16T15:09:22.709-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://thehill.com/video/campaign/199879-gov-nikki-haley-endorses-mitt-romney">http://thehill.com/video/campaign/199879-gov-nikki-haley-endorses-mitt-romney</a> <p /> > South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) endorsed Mitt Romney for president on Friday. <p /> Follow the link for video. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/south-carolina-gov-nikki-haley-endorses-romne">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-8394063095537058077?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-14609331071292444762011-12-15T15:05:00.001-05:002011-12-15T15:05:14.854-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Christopher C. Horner reports:</div><p /><a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/op-eds/2011/12/obamas-justice-department-joins-britains-climategate-leaker-manhunt/2006206">http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/op-eds/2011/12/obamas-justice-department-joins-britains-climategate-leaker-manhunt/2006206</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 19px;">To review: The UK police and the US DOJ, Criminal Division,&nbsp;are pursuing a leaker of public records subject to one or more FOIA, records that were unlawfully withheld under those laws, which leaks indicate apparent civil violations (tortious interference by seeking dismissal of certain “skeptics”), and raising reasonable questions of fraud against taxpayers.</p><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 19px;">And they are pursuing the leaker.</p></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/obamas-justice-department-joins-britains-clim">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1460933107129244476?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-77235642657307961212011-12-06T16:29:00.001-05:002011-12-06T16:29:50.225-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-28/secret-fed-loans-undisclosed-to-congress-gave-banks-13-billion-in-income.html">http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-28/secret-fed-loans-undisclosed-to-congress-gave-banks-13-billion-in-income.html</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 10px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.6em;">The&nbsp;<a href="http://topics.bloomberg.com/federal-reserve/" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 102, 204); text-decoration: none;">Federal Reserve</a>&nbsp;and the big banks fought for more than two years to keep details of the largest bailout in U.S. history a secret. Now, the rest of the world can see what it was missing.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 10px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.6em;">The Fed didn’t tell anyone which banks were in trouble so deep they required a combined $1.2 trillion on Dec. 5, 2008, their single neediest day. Bankers didn’t mention that they took tens of billions of dollars in emergency&nbsp;<a href="http://bloom.bg/n69kTY" title="Open Web Site" rel="external" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 102, 204); text-decoration: none;">loans</a>&nbsp;at the same time they were assuring investors their firms were healthy. And no one calculated until now that banks reaped an estimated $13 billion of income by taking advantage of the Fed’s below-market rates, Bloomberg Markets magazine reports in its January issue.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 10px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.6em;">Saved by the bailout, bankers lobbied against government regulations, a job made easier by the Fed, which never disclosed the details of the rescue to lawmakers even as Congress doled out more money and debated new rules aimed at preventing the next collapse.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 10px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.6em;">A fresh narrative of the financial crisis of 2007 to 2009 emerges from 29,000 pages of Fed documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act and central bank records of more than 21,000 transactions. While Fed officials say that almost all of the loans were repaid and there have been no losses, details suggest taxpayers paid a price beyond dollars as the secret funding helped preserve a broken status quo and enabled the biggest banks to grow even bigger.</div></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/secret-fed-loans-gave-banks-13-billion-undisc">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-7723564265730796121?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-14558241131078246652011-11-28T15:34:00.001-05:002011-11-28T15:34:15.465-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/284137/scientists-behaving-badly-jim-lacey">http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/284137/scientists-behaving-badly-jim-l...</a> <p /> > Unfortunately, from the very beginning, the core group at the heart of Climategate had no interest in “scientific truth.” As one states: “The trick may be to decide on the main message and use that to guide what’s included and what is left out.” In other words, let’s decide on a conclusion and then use only evidence that proves that point, discarding everything else. One scientist who seems to have been slightly troubled by these methods wrote: “I also think the science is being manipulated to put a political spin on it, which for all our sakes might not be too clever in the long run.” In another note to Phil Jones, this same scientist complained: “Observations do not show rising temperatures throughout the tropical troposphere unless you accept one single study and approach and discount a wealth of others. This is just downright dangerous. We need to communicate the uncertainty and be honest.” <br />>> Of course, nothing of the sort was done. As one e-mail states: “The figure you sent is very deceptive . . . there have been a number of dishonest presentations of model results by individual authors and by IPCC [the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change].” Too bad these so-called scientists felt they could tell the truth only to one another and not the public at large. Some of the other truths they shared only with one another are astounding. For instance, one writes: “I find myself in the strange position of being very skeptical of the quality of all present reconstructions, yet sounding like a pro greenhouse zealot here!” So, despite having no confidence in any of the models the IPCC was using in its reports, this scientist was ready to support the IPCC findings to the hilt. And why didn’t he believe the models? Easy: They were designed to tell the big lie. For example, when confronted with the problem that if all the data were included, the warming disappeared, Phil Jones turned to a novel method: He used only “[time] periods that showed warming.” <br />>> At one point, Jones admits that the “basic problem is that all of the models are wrong.” Of course, there is a simple reason for this. When the models do not show what the warmists want them to show, they simply apply “some tuning.” One scientist was worried enough about this “tuning” to write that he “doubt[ed] the modeling world will be able to get away with this much longer.” In this case, “tuning” means changing the model until it tells you what you want it to. When it became impossible to torture the models any further without making their uselessness apparent to all, the warmists resorted to changing the data. <br />> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/scientists-behaving-badly-jim-lacey">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1455824113107824665?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-89325035819818928292011-11-28T12:44:00.001-05:002011-11-28T12:44:25.157-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/print/284064">http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/print/284064</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;"><p>If the OWS campus campers really wanted to understand California’s growing tuition costs, they might also check out the University of California, San Francisco, which created a Vice Chancellor for Diversity and Outreach earlier this year at the height of the state’s budget crisis. Naturally, this new sinecure was redundant with UCSF’s existing&nbsp;<a href="http://aaeod.ucsf.edu/aaeod/2404-DSY.html" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Office of Affirmative Action, Equal Opportunity and Diversity</a>, the&nbsp;<a href="http://aaeod.ucsf.edu/aaeod/D/2442-DSY.html" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Diversity Learning Center</a>&nbsp;(where you can learn how to “Become A Diversity Change Agent”), the&nbsp;<a href="http://lgbt.ucsf.edu/" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Center for LGBT Health &amp; Equity</a>, the&nbsp;<a href="http://shpr.ucsf.edu/" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Office of Sexual Harassment Prevention &amp; Resolution</a>, the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on Diversity, the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on Disability Issues, the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Issues, and the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on the Status of Women.</p><p>The OWS-ers should also look into UC San Diego, which announced the creation of a Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in May 2011, even as the campus was losing three prestigious cancer researchers to Rice University and was cutting academic programs. Needless to say, UCSD’s Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion replicated an equally fearsome mountain of diversity functions.</p><p>Do not think that the exploding diversity bureaucracy is confined to public universities. In 2005, Harvard created a new&nbsp;<a href="http://www.city-journal.org/html/eon_06_03_05hm.html" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Senior Vice Provost for Diversity and Faculty Development</a>, responsible for $50 million in diversity funding, and six new diversity deanships. Whereas Harvard’s previous diversity bureaucrats collected mere diversity data about faculty hiring and promotions, the new SVP for D and FD would be collecting “diversity metrics.” Yale already has 14 Title IX coordinators (not enough to stave off a&nbsp;<a href="http://www.city-journal.org/2011/eon0526hm.html" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">specious Title IX investigation</a>&nbsp;by the Office of Civil Rights in the federal Education Department), but it nevertheless recently put a Deputy Provost in charge of assessing the “campus climate” with respect to gender and overseeing the 14 Title IX coordinators. All these new bureaucrats in campuses across the country — nearly 72,000 non-teaching positions added from 2006 to 2009 — cost $3.6 billion, estimated Harvey Silverglate in&nbsp;<em><a href="http://www.mindingthecampus.com/originals/2011/03/_by_harvey_a_silverglate.html" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Minding the Campus</a></em>&nbsp;earlier this year.</p><p>Just where do the OWS-ish student protesters think that their tuition money is going? In the vast majority of colleges and universities, there are no greedy shareholders sucking their profits from the livelihoods of workers or other “community stakeholders.” Rather, rising tuitions funnel straight into the preposterously unnecessary diversity bureaucracy and the rest of the burgeoning student-services infrastructure, as well as into the salaries of professors who&nbsp;<a href="http://chronicle.com/article/Colleges-Are-Calling/129429/" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">teach one course a semester</a>, the arms race of ever more sybaritic dorms and social centers, and the absolute monarchies of the football and basketball programs.</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/pepper-spraying-taxpayers-by-heather-mac-dona">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-8932503581981892829?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-81988364738943429202011-11-21T18:39:00.001-05:002011-11-21T18:39:15.813-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2011/11/james-hansen-and-the-corruption-of-science.php">http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2011/11/james-hansen-and-the-corruption-of-science.php</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Georgia, Bitstream Charter, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;">It recently came out that James Hansen, one of the two or three most prominent global warming alarmists on whose work the IPCC reports rest, “forgot” to report $1.6 million in outside income, as required by his government contracts. Is that significant? Well, yes: A handful of scientists, including Hansen, have gotten wealthy on climate alarmism. They have an enormous financial interest in the&nbsp;<i style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; font-style: italic;">faux</i>&nbsp;science they have done so much to perpetrate.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/james-hansen-and-the-corruption-of-science-po">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-8198836473894342920?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-4439330213671443282011-11-18T16:29:00.001-05:002011-11-18T16:29:31.730-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">If it saved one job...</div><p /><a href="http://reason.com/blog/2011/11/17/treasury-admits-what-everybody-already-k">http://reason.com/blog/2011/11/17/treasury-admits-what-everybody-already-k</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Georgia, georgia; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px;"><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-left: 1px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-family: Georgia, georgia; vertical-align: baseline; line-height: 1.5em;">The Treasury Department yesterday&nbsp;<a href="http://www.detnews.com/article/20111114/AUTO01/111140434/1361/U.S.-boosts-estimate-of-auto-bailout-losses-to-$23.6B" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; color: rgb(255, 86, 0); text-decoration: none;">revised</a>&nbsp;its loss estimate for the Government Motors bailout from $14.33 billion to $23.6 billion, thanks to the company’s sinking stock price. GM’s Sept. 30 closing price, on which the new estimate is based, was $20.18, about $13 less than its December IPO price and $35 less than what is needed for taxpayers to break even.</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-left: 1px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-family: Georgia, georgia; vertical-align: baseline; line-height: 1.5em;">The $23.6 billion represents a 25 percent loss on the feds $60 billion direct “investment” in GM. But that’s not all that taxpayers are on the hook for. As I explained&nbsp;<a href="http://reason.com/archives/2011/05/24/general-motors-will-never-repa" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; color: rgb(255, 86, 0); text-decoration: none;">previously</a>, Uncle Sam’s special GM bankruptcy package allowed the company to write off $45 billion in previous losses going forward. This could work out to as much as $15 billion in tax savings that GM wouldn’t have had had it gone through a normal bankruptcy. Why? Because after bankruptcy, the tax liabilities of companies increase since they have no more losses to write off.</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-left: 1px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-family: Georgia, georgia; vertical-align: baseline; line-height: 1.5em;">This means that the total hit to taxpayers, who still own about a quarter of the company, could add up to $38.6 billion. That’s even more that the $34 billion on the outside I had predicted in May.</p></div></blockquote><p /></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/taxpayer-losses-on-gm-bailout-are-going-to-be">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-443933021367144328?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-85974979557291535212011-11-18T16:18:00.001-05:002011-11-18T16:18:21.743-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">The Democrats have a lot of Wall Street connections that they don't want to talk about...</div><p /><a href="http://news.investors.com/Article.aspx?id=592044&amp;p=1">http://news.investors.com/Article.aspx?id=592044&amp;p=1</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 24px;">As Democrats demonize Wall Street CEOs as the "greedy" fiends of the financial crisis, they've lined their own pockets — both before and after the crisis. Nancy Pelosi's just the latest example.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/pelosi-leads-list-of-conflict-of-interest-dem">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-8597497955729153521?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-10928850820536566862011-11-08T16:31:00.001-05:002011-11-08T16:31:39.546-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.hoover.org/publications/defining-ideas/article/99241">http://www.hoover.org/publications/defining-ideas/article/99241</a> <p /> > A mistake, therefore, in setting tax rate increases could easily wreck the entire system. Indeed, the worst possible outcome would be for high taxation to lower top incomes drastically. Right now, for better or worse, the entire transfer system of the United States is dependent on the continued success of high-income earners whom the egalitarians would like to punish. <br />>> Put otherwise, if a person at the middle of the income distribution loses a dollar in income, the federal government loses nothing in income tax revenues. Let a rich person suffer that decline and the revenue loss at the federal level is close to 40 percent, with more losses at the state level. The slow growth policies of the last three years have cost far more in revenue from the top one percent than any increase in progressive taxation could possibly hope to achieve. The more we move toward an equal income policy, the more we shall need tax increases on the middle class to offset the huge revenue losses at the top. Our current political economy makes the bottom 99 percent hostage to the continued success of the rich. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/epstein-three-cheers-for-income-inequality">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1092885082053656686?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-60447426567298829502011-11-08T12:12:00.001-05:002011-11-08T12:12:03.270-05:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">This is going to get ugly, but they took the first shot...</div><p /><a href="http://legalinsurrection.com/2011/11/the-pushback-against-sharon-bialek-begins/">http://legalinsurrection.com/2011/11/the-pushback-against-sharon-bialek-begins/</a> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-pushback-against-sharon-bialek-begins">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6044742656729882950?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-12955484347248341872011-11-04T08:33:00.001-04:002011-11-04T08:33:27.559-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/130927/">http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/130927/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 18px;"><p style="text-align: justify;">ISLAMISTS:&nbsp;<a href="http://volokh.com/2011/11/02/french-magazine-publishing-cartoon-of-mohammed-firebombed/" style="color: rgb(0, 51, 204); text-decoration: none; font-weight: 600;">French Magazine Publishes Cartoon Of Mohammed, Gets Firebombed.</a></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Here’s the cartoon. It’s important that such actions lead to the “offending” speech being seen by more people, rather than fewer. Incentives matter.</p></div></blockquote></div><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><div style=""><div class='p_embed p_image_embed'> <img alt="Charliehebdo" height="550" src="http://getfile3.posterous.com/getfile/files.posterous.com/bluepelican/zM89kMWrwrf9BeD2VDH7ROX8hHTvxJfrMlxFdVrtMxcjFuTXs37ABDaWrQhA/charliehebdo.jpg" width="422" /> </div> </div></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/instapundit-french-magazine-publishes-cartoon">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1295548434724834187?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-12080340360945890112011-10-24T18:37:00.001-04:002011-10-24T18:37:35.077-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/that_top_1_thing/">http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/that_top_1_thing/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Arial; line-height: 14px;">One problem with the top 1% simplification is that people who have college degrees aren't experiencing high unemployment. So it would be equally fair - and by that I mean equally illogical - to conclude that highly educated people are stealing the nation's wealth from less educated people. That's a bumper sticker you won't see.<p />I would also be willing to bet that the average math skills of the people who are doing well in this economy are better than the average math skills of the people who are suffering. In other words, the Occupy Wall Street protesters are probably comprised of more psychology majors than engineering majors. But no one is suggesting that people who are good at math are stealing the nation's wealth from people who are not. That's not a catchy slogan.<br /></span></blockquote><br /></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/scott-adams-that-top-1-thing">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1208034036094589011?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-42640008356171418472011-10-24T17:46:00.001-04:002011-10-24T17:46:03.918-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://danieljmitchell.wordpress.com/2011/10/24/the-vatican-should-try-to-save-souls-not-ruin-economies/">http://danieljmitchell.wordpress.com/2011/10/24/the-vatican-should-try-to-save-souls-not-ruin-economies/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: verdana, tahoma, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 19px;">For all intents and purposes, they want to double down on the cross-subsidization policies that have undermined markets and crippled the global economy.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-vatican-should-try-to-save-souls-not-ruin">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-4264000835617141847?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-62697135589427351822011-10-20T10:40:00.001-04:002011-10-20T10:40:50.007-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204346104576637310315367804.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop">http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204346104576637310315367804.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; line-height: 10px;"><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 8px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; display: block;">The whole purpose of a flat tax, à la 9-9-9, is to lower marginal tax rates and simplify the tax code. With lower marginal tax rates (and boy will marginal tax rates be lower with the 9-9-9 plan), both the demand for and the supply of labor and capital will increase. Output will soar, as will jobs. Tax revenues will also increase enormously—not because tax rates have increased, but because marginal tax rates have decreased.</p><a name="U503023955366GNH"></a><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 8px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; display: block;">By making the tax codes a lot simpler, we'd allow individuals and businesses to spend a lot less on maintaining tax records; filing taxes; hiring lawyers, accountants and tax-deferral experts; and lobbying Congress. As I wrote on this page earlier this year ("The 30-Cent Tax Premium," April 18), for every dollar of business and personal income taxes paid, some 30 cents in out-of-pocket expenses also were paid to comply with the tax code. Under 9-9-9, these expenses would plummet without a penny being lost to the U.S. Treasury. It's a win-win.</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/arthur-b-laffer-cains-stimulating-9-9-9-tax-r">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6269713558942735182?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-56874320383999041452011-10-15T10:59:00.001-04:002011-10-15T10:59:19.531-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/2011/10/government-biggest-job-killer">http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/2011/10/government-biggest-job-killer</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(25, 25, 25); font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;" /><div class="BodyCopy" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">I guess Obama doesn't know that the Transcontinental Railroad was a Solyndra-like Big Government scandal. The railroad didn't make economic sense at the time, so the government subsidized construction and gave the companies huge quantities of the best land on the continent.</div><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;"><span class="BodyCopy" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">As we should expect, without market discipline -- profit and loss -- contractors ripped off the taxpayers. After all, if you get paid by the amount of track you lay, you'll lay more track than necessary.</span></p></div></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(25, 25, 25); font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;" /><div class="BodyCopy" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">The Union Pacific and Northern Pacific -- all those rail lines we learned about in history class -- milked the taxpayer and then went broke.</div><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;"><span class="BodyCopy" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">One line worked. The Great Northern never went bankrupt. It was the railroad that got no subsidies.</span></p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/government-is-the-biggest-job-killer-john-sto">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5687432038399904145?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-54587750357119267052011-10-10T11:59:00.001-04:002011-10-10T11:59:24.157-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/richardsalsman/2011/10/09/tarp-after-three-years-it-made-things-worse-not-better/2/">http://www.forbes.com/sites/richardsalsman/2011/10/09/tarp-after-three-years-it-made-things-worse-not-better/2/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(60, 60, 60); font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 13px;"><p style="margin-top: 15px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 18px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">In short, markets in the five months after TARP’s adoption were much worse off than in the previous five months, and they performed worst of all precisely in the sector (banks) that TARP was supposed to “help.” These empirics are irrefutable. Those who claim TARP was good policy have to believe bank stocks would have plunged 90-95%, except for TARP capping the loss at 72%. Such a claim would be absurd.</p><p style="margin-top: 15px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 18px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Plain logic explains the empirics: investors are right to view political control of banks as bearish, not bullish. Just as this principle applied to U.S. banks amid TARP’s enactment in 2008-2009, it applies this year to European banks amid the EFSF, since they too are being compelled to accept politicized capital injections (and controls) from European states that refuse to fix their own failed finances or buttress their own shoddy bonds.</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/tarp-after-three-years-it-made-things-worse-n">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5458775035711926705?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-28700150329237530132011-10-10T11:51:00.001-04:002011-10-10T11:51:51.573-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/cain_gift_to_the_gop_tn8kUyZi9sBvz1C3wJ1itK#ixzz1aLx4KNM6">http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/cain_gift_to_the_gop_tn8k...</a> <p /> > Cain’s strengths? His simple “9-9-9” economic platform (a 9 percent business tax, income tax and national sales tax), an affability that coats an unmistakable inner strength and a sunny disposition that projects self-confidence without arrogance. <br />>> Plus, in a year when voters are heartily sick of professional politicians, he’s an outsider with both a record of accomplishment in business and a compelling personal story. This includes his upbringing in the segregated South, his service as a Navy systems analyst, a successful term as the head of Godfather’s Pizza and a stint as Federal Reserve Bank chief in Kansas City. He’s even a Baptist preacher. <br />>> There’s not a whiff of the grievance industry about Cain, a throwback to the up-by-your-bootstraps philosophy of Booker T. Washington. His parents were working class (chauffeur, maid) and he graduated from historically black Morehouse College in Atlanta -- the first member of his family to get a college degree. He’s solidly tied to the African-American experience, yet he’s not running as a “black candidate,” but as an American. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/how-herman-cain-can-help-gop-field">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2870015032923753013?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-19777653714800402952011-10-05T10:24:00.001-04:002011-10-05T10:24:33.494-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/279141/rep-wolf-slams-grover-norquist-house-floor-andrew-stiles">http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/279141/rep-wolf-slams-grover-norquist-ho...</a> <p /> > Rep. Frank Wolf (R., Va.) took to the House floor this morning to deliver a blistering critique of American for Tax Reform president Grover Norquist. <p /> > “I want to be perfectly clear: I do not support raising taxes on the American people,” Wolf said. “My concern is with the other individuals, groups, and causes with whom Mr. Norquist is associated that have nothing to do with keeping taxes low.” <br />>> Wolf listed the following as concerns about Norquist’s personal associations: <br />>> • His relationship with disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff <br />> • His ties to known terrorist financiers Abdurahman Alamoudi and Sami Al-Arian <br />> • His support for the Ground Zero Mosque <br />> • His advocacy for transferring Guantanamo detainees to U.S. soil <br />> • His lobbying on behalf of Fannie Mae <br />> • Hi representation of the Internet gambling industry <br />>> “Simply put, I believe Mr. Norquist is connected with or has profited from a number of unsavory people and groups out of the mainstream,” Wolf said. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/rep-wolf-slams-grover-norquist-on-house-floor">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1977765371480040295?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-78375873444661475532011-10-04T17:45:00.001-04:002011-10-04T17:45:41.394-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'>Background: <br /><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/amanda-knox-heads-home-after-appeals-court-acquits-her-of-murder-charge/2011/10/04/gIQA80xXLL_print.html">http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/amanda-knox-heads-home-after-appeals-cour...</a> <p /> > Amanda Knox was freed from prison in Italy after an appeals court on Monday overturned her conviction for the sexual assault and murder of Meredith Kercher and the judge ordered her immediate release. <p /> <br />Power Line comments: <br /><a href="http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2011/10/my-thoughts-on-amanda-knox.php">http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2011/10/my-thoughts-on-amanda-knox.php</a> <p /> > I think the conviction of Knox and Sollecito was an outrageous miscarriage of justice, driven by preoccupations on the part of the prosecutor, and maybe some policemen, that can only be described as medieval. There was no meaningful evidence against them. None. And–this is a fact that is often lost sight of–we actually know who killed Meredith Kercher. It was Rudy Guede. <br />>> Let me amend that. We know for sure that Guede raped Kercher, based on DNA evidence that, as far as I know, is undisputed. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/power-line-posting-on-amanda-knox">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-7837587344466147553?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-66866912778867732862011-09-30T17:14:00.001-04:002011-09-30T17:14:32.659-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/278751/land-without-peace-charles-krauthammer">http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/278751/land-without-peace-charles-krau...</a> <p /> > After all, why did Abbas go to the U.N. last week? For nearly half a century, the United States has pursued a Middle East settlement on the basis of the formula of land for peace. Land for peace produced the Israel-Egypt peace of 1979 and the Israel-Jordan peace of 1994. Israel has offered the Palestinians land for peace three times since. And been refused every time. <br />>> Why? For exactly the same reason Abbas went to the U.N. last week: to get land without peace. Sovereignty with no reciprocal recognition of a Jewish state. Statehood without negotiations. An independent Palestine in a continued state of war with Israel. <br />>> This is the reason that, regardless of who is governing Israel, there has never been peace. Territorial disputes are solvable; existential conflicts are not. <br />>> Land for peace, yes. Land without peace is nothing but an invitation to suicide. <br />> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/land-without-peace-charles-krauthammer">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6686691277886773286?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-68178048372665219122011-09-29T17:39:00.001-04:002011-09-29T17:39:44.167-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://thetruthaboutguns.com/2011/09/brad-kozak/freedom-of-speech-evidently-has-no-place-in-a-university/">http://thetruthaboutguns.com/2011/09/brad-kozak/freedom-of-speech-evidently-has-no-place-in-a-university/</a><p /><div><br /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><div style=""><div class='p_embed p_image_embed'> <a href="http://posterous.com/getfile/files.posterous.com/bluepelican/xFAHBEkLJGuJW155JCl8wACHRma5Eg27QtrTeAUeDz05VUFg9u5QiTnTzrxv/firefly-poster.jpg"><img alt="Firefly-poster" height="867" src="http://posterous.com/getfile/files.posterous.com/bluepelican/awCCCBuIfzWw1nKaVyd26bnDS0wv8NoPPWZ8iZkzlW7fLQwpXiWddBgCUm4u/firefly-poster.jpg.scaled.500.jpg" width="500" /></a> </div> </div><p /><div style=""><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Georgia, Bitstream Charter, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;"><p style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 24px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The poster you see above refers to a short-lived show on Fox,&nbsp;<em style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; font-style: italic;">Firefly,&nbsp;</em>which has since gone on to become a cult hit. Apparently the poster was deemed offensive by someone(s) at the school. (For the record, I don’t think anybody has a problem with actor Nathan Fillion, who’s gone on to star in the ABC hit&nbsp;<em style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; font-style: italic;">Castle.</em>) Evidently, the text was the problem. Specifically the mention of killing, and the implication that weapons (ie: GUNS) would be used in the crime. If you’re having a little problem with your browser reading the text, here’s what you’re missing:</p><blockquote style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 3em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 3em; vertical-align: baseline; font-style: italic;"><p style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 24px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">You don’t know me son, so let me explain this to you once: If I ever kill you, you’ll be awake. You’ll be facing me. And you’ll be armed.</p></blockquote></div></blockquote></div></div></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/firefly-poster-deemed-unacceptable-by-univers">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6817804837266521912?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-60160111582094021992011-09-25T16:37:00.001-04:002011-09-25T16:37:03.355-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://nikcub-static.appspot.com/logging-out-of-facebook-is-not-enough">http://nikcub-static.appspot.com/logging-out-of-facebook-is-not-enough</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="color: rgb(128, 128, 128); font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><b>Even if you are logged out, Facebook still knows and can track every page you visit</b>. The only solution is to delete every Facebook cookie in your browser, or to use a separate browser for Facebook interactions.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/logging-out-of-facebook-is-not-enough">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6016011158209402199?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-617653948310781662011-09-21T15:41:00.001-04:002011-09-21T15:41:32.704-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/sep/20/crushing-americas-inventors/">http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/sep/20/crushing-americas-inventors/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px;">On Sept. 16, at a ceremony involving some fanfare, President&nbsp;<a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/topics/barack-obama/" style="color: rgb(22, 74, 110); text-decoration: none; padding-top: 2px; padding-right: 2px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px;">Obama</a>signed the ironically-styled America Invents Act into law. While posed as an effort to “modernize” U.S. patent law by “harmonizing it with the rest of the world,” the bill actually represents an effort by multinational and foreign corporations to crush America’s vital culture of independent inventors.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/zurbin-crushing-americas-inventors">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-61765394831078166?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-46595448082056415542011-09-17T10:58:00.001-04:002011-09-17T10:58:16.567-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jjmnolte/2011/09/16/jon-stewart-rips-obama-on-solyndra-collapse-cronyism">http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jjmnolte/2011/09/16/jon-stewart-rips-obama-on-solyndra-collapse-cronyism</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Follow the link for video.</div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/jon-stewart-rips-obama-on-solyndra-collapse-c">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-4659544808205641554?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-30377039297135687582011-09-17T08:13:00.001-04:002011-09-17T08:13:17.588-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><iframe src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/SWV5-1LXvwg" allowfullscreen frameborder="0" height="417" width="500"></iframe> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-break-up">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3037703929713568758?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-14123425000355816752011-09-16T16:39:00.001-04:002011-09-16T16:39:56.385-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/277271/obama-s-solar-scandal-michael-barone">http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/277271/obama-s-solar-scandal-michael-b...</a> <br />>> One of the original investors in Solyndra was Oklahoma billionaire George Kaiser, who was also a major contributor to Obama’s 2008 campaign. In early 2011, Kaiser and other investors provided an additional $75 million in financing to Solyndra. They did so on condition, approved by the Energy Department, that they receive priority over previous creditors, including the government. <br />>> On August 31, while Obama was vacationing on Martha’s Vineyard, Solyndra filed for bankruptcy. On September 8, the day of Obama’s “American Jobs Act” speech to a joint session of Congress, FBI agents conducted searches of Solyndra’s headquarters and the homes of the firm’s CEO and founder. Newspaper accounts speculate that the government may wind up losing the whole $535 million. <br />>> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/obamas-solar-scandal-michael-barone">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1412342500035581675?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-56554489410198856802011-09-16T16:28:00.001-04:002011-09-16T16:28:19.468-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/277376/great-social-security-debate-charles-krauthammer">http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/277376/great-social-security-debate-ch...</a> <p /> > Social Security is a pay-as-you-go program. A current beneficiary isn’t receiving the money she paid in years ago. That money is gone. It went to her parents’ Social Security check. The money in her check is coming from her son’s FICA tax today — i.e., her “investment” was paid out years ago to earlier entrants in the system and her current benefits are coming from the “investment” of the new entrants into the system. Pay-as-you-go is the definition of a Ponzi scheme. <p /> > Now, the average senior receives in Social Security about a third of what the average worker makes. Applying that ratio retroactively, this means that in 1940, the average worker had to pay only 0.2 percent of his salary to sustain the older folks of his time; in 1950, 2 percent; today, 11 percent; in 20 years, 17 percent. This is a staggering sum, considering that it is apart from all the other taxes he pays to sustain other functions of government, such as Medicare, whose costs are exploding. <br />> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-great-social-security-debate-charles-krau">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5655448941019885680?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-77712207980492545932011-09-16T13:29:00.001-04:002011-09-16T13:29:21.439-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/our-floundering-federal-family/2011/09/13/gIQA9oaxSK_print.html?wprss=rss_opinions">http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/our-floundering-federal-family/2011/09...</a> <p /> > For two years, there has been one constant: As events have refuted the Obama administration’s certitudes, the administration has retained its insufferable knowingness. It knew that the stimulus would hold unemployment below 8 percent. Oops. Unemployment has been at least 9 percent in 26 of the 30 months since the stimulus was passed. Michael Boskin of Stanford says that, even if one charitably accepts the administration’s self-serving estimate of jobs “created or saved” by the stimulus, each job cost $280,000 — five times America’s median pay. <br />> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/george-will-our-floundering-federal-family">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-7771220798049254593?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-23374708015237458152011-09-15T14:49:00.001-04:002011-09-15T14:49:05.299-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/business/print/2011/09/solyndra-gets-more-scandalous/245130/">http://www.theatlantic.com/business/print/2011/09/solyndra-gets-more-scandalous/245130/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; line-height: 24px; font-size: 16px;">The problem with Solyndra is not George Kaiser. It's the whole concept behind a program that is supposed to enable politically favored technologies, using loan guarantees that look cheap when they're issued, and end up costing us half a billion dollars because we rushed the due diligence to make sure top officials got a good photo op. &nbsp;As I wrote the other day, "When banks engage in this sort of behavior, we call it a bubble, and try to figure out how to fix things so they won't do it again. When government agencies do this, we call it a weekday."</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/solyndra-gets-more-scandalous">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2337470801523745815?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-82404505375697029032011-09-15T14:15:00.001-04:002011-09-15T14:15:43.334-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://ricochet.com/main-feed/Paul-Ryan-Restoring-the-Rule-of-Law">http://ricochet.com/main-feed/Paul-Ryan-Restoring-the-Rule-of-Law</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; line-height: 19px;"><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); text-align: left;">Freedom is lost by degrees, and the deepest erosions usually take place during times of economic hardship, when those who favor expanding the sphere of government, abuse a crisis to persuade free citizens that they should trade in a little of their liberty for empty promises of greater economic security.</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); text-align: left;">We all remember what Benjamin Franklin said about that trade – that those who would make it deserve neither liberty nor security. But in such cases, when liberty is lost, it is&nbsp;<b><i>our</i></b><i>&nbsp;</i>fault as champions of the Constitution, for failing to mount a sufficiently persuasive and effective defense.&nbsp;</p></div></blockquote>Read the whole thing</div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/paul-ryan-restoring-the-rule-of-law">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-8240450537569702903?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-21239608036774850792011-09-13T18:01:00.001-04:002011-09-13T18:01:33.345-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/277040/strange-facts-about-america-s-poor-robert-rector">http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/277040/strange-facts-about-america-s-poo...</a> <p /> > Here are more surprising facts about Americans defined as “poor” by the Census Bureau, all taken from various government reports and included in my new paper from The Heritage Foundation called “Understanding Poverty in the United States”: <br />>> ● Eighty percent of poor households have air conditioning. By contrast, in 1970, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning. <br />>> ● Fully 92 percent of poor households have a microwave; two-thirds have at least one DVD player and 70 percent have a VCR. <br />>> ● Nearly 75 percent have a car or truck; 31 percent have two or more cars or trucks. <br />>> ● Four out of five poor adults assert they were never hungry at any time in the prior year due to lack of money for food. <br />>> ● Nearly two-thirds have cable or satellite television. <br />>> ● Half have a personal computer; one in seven have two or more computers. <br />>> ● More than half of poor families with children have a video game system such as Xbox or PlayStation. <br />>> ● Just under half — 43 percent — have Internet access. <br />>> ● A third have a widescreen plasma or LCD TV. <br />>> ● One in every four has a digital video recorder such as TiVo.> <p /> Read the whole thing. <p /> Link to paper: <a href="http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2011/09/Understanding-Poverty-in-the-United-States-Surprising-Facts-About-Americas-Poor">http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2011/09/Understanding-Poverty-in-the...</a> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/strange-facts-about-americas-poor-by-robert-r">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2123960803677485079?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-14754771809919505312011-09-12T17:13:00.001-04:002011-09-12T17:13:55.170-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://brain-terminal.com/posts/2011/09/09/a-video-memorial-for-september-11th-2001a-video-memorial-for-september-11th-2001">http://brain-terminal.com/posts/2011/09/09/a-video-memorial-for-september-11th-2001a-video-memorial-for-september-11th-2001</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><a href="http://media.brain-terminal.com/video/crystal-morning.m4v">http://media.brain-terminal.com/video/crystal-morning.m4v</a></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/bt-a-video-memorial-for-september-11th-2001">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1475477180991950531?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-44073681772584742252011-09-09T16:57:00.001-04:002011-09-09T16:57:19.939-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/unhappy-warrior">http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/unhappy-warrior</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;"><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 20px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; line-height: inherit; display: block;">When Barack Obama says, “This isn’t political grandstanding,” you have a pretty good clue that that is exactly what it is. Lest anyone doubt that, consider this from the third-to-last paragraph. “You should pass it. And I intend to take that message to every corner of the country.”</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 20px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; line-height: inherit; display: block;">In other words, this was a campaign speech.</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/barone-the-unhappy-warrior">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-4407368177258474225?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-21781950867677170912011-09-03T14:46:00.001-04:002011-09-03T14:46:18.492-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/276178/goodbye-ankara-daniel-pipes">http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/276178/goodbye-ankara-daniel-pipes</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px;"><p class="IndentParagraphD">Although I am disappointed and saddened by the shift taking place in Turkey — as recently as a decade ago, I saw it as a model of modernity and moderation for other Muslims to follow — I am quite content to see the Israeli emissary pack his bags and leave Ankara, for this small drama helps anyone still myopic about&nbsp;</p><div>Recep Tayyip Erdoğan</div>&nbsp;and the AKP to understand just how much they are repositioning Turkey as a state hostile to the West.<p class="IndentParagraphD">I have&nbsp;<a href="http://www.danielpipes.org/6269/does-turkey-still-belong-in-nato" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">argued before</a>&nbsp;and repeat here: The time has come to remove, or at least to suspend, the Turkish government from the NATO alliance.&nbsp;</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/goodbye-ankara-by-daniel-pipes">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2178195086767717091?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-28851256728608464592011-08-30T18:38:00.001-04:002011-08-30T18:38:38.742-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/275903/re-anti-science-smear-jonah-goldberg">http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/275903/re-anti-science-smear-jonah-goldberg</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px;">Why does the Left get to pick which issues are the benchmarks for “science”? Why can’t the measure of being pro-science be the question of&nbsp;<a href="http://blog.american.com/2011/08/the-debate-about-heritability-of-general-intelligence-radically-narrows/" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">heritability of intelligence</a>? Or the existence of fetal pain? Or the distribution of cognitive abilities among the sexes at the extreme right tail of the bell curve? Or if that’s too upsetting, how about dividing the line between those who are pro- and anti-science along the lines of support for&nbsp;<a href="http://www.aei.org/speech/28053" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">geoengineering</a>? Or — coming soon — the role cosmic rays play in cloud formation? Why not make it about support for nuclear power? Or Yucca Mountain? Why not deride the idiots who oppose genetically modified crops, even when they&nbsp;<a href="http://reason.com/archives/2000/12/06/wheres-the-golden-rice" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">might prevent blindness in children?</a></span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-anti-science-smear-by-jonah-goldberg">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2885125672860846459?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-56922854763662558882011-08-30T17:15:00.001-04:002011-08-30T17:15:58.339-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100102296/sun-causes-climate-change-shock/">http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100102296/sun-causes-climate-change-shock/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(40, 40, 40); font-family: georgia, times new roman, times, serif; font-size: 10px;"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.7em; padding-left: 0px; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.48em;">This is exactly what has happened with&nbsp;<a href="http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/08/25/some-reactions-to-the-cloud-experiment/<a name='more'></a>-45850" style="color: rgb(35, 75, 123); text-decoration: none;">the latest revelations from CERN</a>over its landmark&nbsp;<a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/07/18/cern_cosmic_ray_gag/" style="color: rgb(35, 75, 123); text-decoration: none;">CLOUD experiment</a>, whose significance&nbsp;<a href="http://opinion.financialpost.com/2011/08/26/lawrence-solomon-science-now-settled/" style="color: rgb(35, 75, 123); text-decoration: none;">Lawrence Solomon</a>&nbsp;explains here:</div></div></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(40, 40, 40); font-family: georgia, times new roman, times, serif; font-size: 10px;"><blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.7em; padding-left: 0px; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.48em;">The science is now all-but-settled on global warming, convincing new evidence demonstrates, but Al Gore, the IPCC and other global warming doomsayers won’t be celebrating. The new findings point to cosmic rays and the sun — not human activities — as the dominant controller of climate on Earth.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.7em; padding-left: 0px; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.48em;">The research, published with little fanfare this week in the prestigious journal Nature, comes from über-prestigious CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, one of the world’s largest centres for scientific research involving 60 countries and 8,000 scientists at more than 600 universities and national laboratories.</div></blockquote></blockquote></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/sun-causes-climate-change-shock">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5692285476366255888?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-58339184535030008452011-08-30T11:56:00.001-04:002011-08-30T11:56:17.189-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Academic publisher's charge outrageous fees to universities and effectively deprive the general public of access to knowledge. &nbsp;It's about time that the internet routed around them.</div><p /><a href="http://www.monbiot.com/2011/08/29/the-lairds-of-learning/">http://www.monbiot.com/2011/08/29/the-lairds-of-learning/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="line-height: 16px; font-family: Times; font-size: 16px;"><p style="">The publishers claim that they have to charge these fees as a result of the costs of production and distribution, and that they add value (in Springer’s words) because they “develop journal brands and maintain and improve the digital infrastructure which has revolutionized scientific communication in the past 15 years.”(10) But an analysis by Deutsche Bank reaches different conclusions. “We believe the publisher adds relatively little value to the publishing process … if the process really were as complex, costly and value-added as the publishers protest that it is, 40% margins wouldn’t be available.”(11) Far from assisting the dissemination of research, the big publishers impede it, as their long turnaround times can delay the release of findings by a year or more(12).</p><p style="">What we see here is pure rentier capitalism: monopolising a public resource then charging exorbitant fees to use it. Another term for it is economic parasitism. To obtain the knowledge for which we have already paid, we must surrender our feu to the lairds of learning.</p><p style="">It’s bad enough for academics, it’s worse for the laity. I refer readers to peer-reviewed papers, on the principle that claims should be followed to their sources. The readers tell me that they can’t afford to judge for themselves whether or not I have represented the research fairly. Independent researchers who try to inform themselves about important scientific issues have to fork out thousands(12). This is a tax on education, a stifling of the public mind. It appears to contravene the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which says that “everyone has the right freely to … share in scientific advancement and its benefits.”(13)</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/george-monbiot-the-lairds-of-learning">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5833918453503000845?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-32748099151088684542011-08-24T17:03:00.001-04:002011-08-24T17:03:37.947-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'>Marco Rubio gave a great speech at the Reagan Library. <p /> Watch the video at the link: <p /> <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/275415/free-enterprise-system-has-lifted-more-people-out-poverty-all-government-anti-poverty-#">http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/275415/free-enterprise-system-has-lifted...</a> <p /> > He said that “poverty does not create our social problems; our social problems create our poverty.” <p /> > "The free enterprise system has lifted more people out of poverty than all the government anti-poverty programs combined" <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/rubio-speech-at-reagan-library">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3274809915108868454?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-38594255611631720902011-08-23T13:15:00.001-04:002011-08-23T13:15:02.744-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="color: rgb(67, 74, 68); font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;">They are both dead wrong on economic policy.</span></blockquote></div><p /><a href="http://www.hoover.org/publications/defining-ideas/article/90261">http://www.hoover.org/publications/defining-ideas/article/90261</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="color: rgb(67, 74, 68); font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;">The great advantage of competition in markets is that it exhausts all gains from trade, which thus allows individuals to attain higher levels of welfare. These win/win propositions may not reach the perfect endpoint, but they will avoid the woes that are now consuming once prosperous economies. Understanding the win/win concept would have taken the Pope away from his false condemnation of markets. It might have led him to examine more closely Spain’s profligate policies, where high guaranteed public benefits and extensive workplace regulation have led to an unholy mix of soaring public debt and an unemployment rate of 20 percent. It is a tragic irony that papal economics mimic those of the Church’s socialist opponents. The Pope’s powerful but misdirected words will only complicate the task of meaningful fiscal and regulatory reform in Spain and the rest of Europe. False claims for social justice come at a very high price.</span></blockquote><br /></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(67, 74, 68); font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><p>On this logic, lower capital gains rates generate more tax revenue for the federal government. Yet Buffett doesn’t grasp the point when he writes:</p><blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote>In 1992, the top 400 had aggregate taxable income of $16.9 billion and paid federal taxes of 29.2 percent on that sum. In 2008, the aggregate income of the highest 400 had soared to $90.9 billion — a staggering $227.4 million on average — but the rate paid had fallen to 21.5 percent.</blockquote></blockquote><p>I’d take 2008 any day. In 1992, the country’s top 400 earners paid a total of $4.9 billion in taxes, which is a nifty sum to come from so few. But 16 years later, that amount rose to about $19.55 billion, leaving those most successful investors with an extra $71 billion in cash to invest in new ventures that could promise greater returns. This is win/win with a vengeance.</p><p /></div></blockquote><br /></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/epstein-how-is-warren-buffett-like-the-pope">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3859425561163172090?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-29010973491028872522011-08-19T15:02:00.001-04:002011-08-19T15:02:00.495-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-secret-language-code&offset=2">http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-secret-language-code&off...</a> <p /> > PENNEBAKER: Almost everything you think you know is probably wrong. Take this little test. Who uses the following words more, women or men? <br />>> > 1st person singular (I, me, my) <br />> > 1st person plural (we, us our) <br />> > articles (a, an, the) <br />> > emotion words (e.g., happy, sad, love, hate) <br />> > cognitive words (e.g., because, reason, think, believe) <br />> > social words (e.g., he, she, friend, cousin) <br />>> Most people assume that men use I-words and cognitive words more than women and that women use we-words, emotions, and social words more than men. Bad news. You were right if you guessed that women use social words more. However, women use I-words and cognitive words at far higher rates than men. There are no reliable differences between men and women for use of we-words or emotion words (OK, those were trick questions). And men use articles more than women, when you might guess there’d be no difference. <p /> > Men and women use language differently because they negotiate their worlds differently. Across dozens and dozens of studies, women tend to talk more about other human beings. Men, on the other hand, are more interested in concrete objects and things. To talk about human relationships requires social and cognitive words. To talk about concrete objects, you need concrete nouns which typically demand the use of articles. <p /> > One of the most interesting results was part of a study my students and I conducted dealing with status in email correspondence. Basically, we discovered that in any interaction, the person with the higher status uses I-words less (yes, less) than people who are low in status. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-secret-language-code-scientific-american">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2901097349102887252?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-24574480300124221942011-08-19T14:33:00.001-04:002011-08-19T14:33:44.428-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://techcrunch.com/2011/08/19/terrible-cost-patents/">http://techcrunch.com/2011/08/19/terrible-cost-patents/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: helvetica, arial, clean, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">Patents were originally conceived to protect inventors—people and companies who contribute to the advancement of society by creating new products. But in the past decade, something went&nbsp;<a href="http://techcrunch.com/2011/08/07/patents-and-unions-when-good-intentions-go-horribly-wrong/" style="font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; color: rgb(10, 150, 0);">horribly wrong</a>. Patents are increasingly became nothing more than financial and legal weapons, to be amassed in portfolios by “non-practicing entities” (i.e. patent trolls) and used to&nbsp;<a href="http://techcrunch.com/2008/09/17/nathan-myhrvolds-patent-extortion-fund-is-reaping-hundreds-of-millions-of-dollars/" style="font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; color: rgb(10, 150, 0);">extort</a>&nbsp;protection money from economically productive companies.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-terrible-cost-of-patents">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2457448030012422194?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-66764739698266905352011-08-17T16:26:00.001-04:002011-08-17T16:26:28.901-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903392904576509992605316426.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop">http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903392904576509992605316426.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; line-height: 10px;"><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 8px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.5em; display: block;">Michigan is an extreme example of what has afflicted the industrial Midwest. Big corporations were replaced by big government as the leading employer, and public-employee unions replaced industrial unions as the chief financiers of the Democratic Party. In effect, public-employee unions have been a mechanism by which taxpayer money, in the form of union dues, permanently finances a lobby with a vested interest in higher spending and less accountability. It's a lobby that's benefited from the Democratic Party loyalties of black voters, of Latinos in Chicago (the only large Hispanic presence in the Midwest) and of culturally liberal suburbanites.</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 8px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.5em; display: block;">This Midwestern model is unraveling before our eyes. The Midwest has not been hit as hard by foreclosures or unemployment as some other places, with Michigan an exception on both counts, but you have to look hard for green shoots of growth. They may be most evident in North Dakota, where low costs and light regulation have produced booms in energy and high tech.</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/michael-barone-the-fall-of-the-midwest-econom">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6676473969826690535?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-64261092346581021772011-08-06T16:25:00.001-04:002011-08-06T16:25:36.433-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://blogs.dailymail.com/donsurber/archives/39534">http://blogs.dailymail.com/donsurber/archives/39534</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Arial, Helvetica, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><p style="font-size: 1.05em; text-align: left;">A report from the Internal Revenue Service found that the rich — 8,274 people with incomes of $10 million per year or more — earned a total of $240 billion in 2009.</p><p style="font-size: 1.05em; text-align: left;">Even of you confiscated every dime they earned, you would barely have enough money to cover government spending for 24 days.</p><p style="font-size: 1.05em; text-align: left;">Of course, about a quarter of that money already goes to the federal government for federal income. So make that 18 days.</p><p /></div></blockquote>Read the whole thing.</div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/irs-not-enough-rich-to-cover-the-deficit-don">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6426109234658102177?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-30074763516198279692011-08-06T09:06:00.001-04:002011-08-06T09:06:23.255-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/2011/08/obama-partisans-ignore-facts-when-bashing-bush">http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/2011/08/obama-partisans-ignore-facts-when-bashing-bush</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(25, 25, 25); font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 19px;"><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;" /><div class="BodyCopy" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">The debt stood at $10.6 trillion when Barack Obama took office in January 2009. Now, it's about $14.4 trillion. The president has increased the national debt nearly $4 trillion in his first two and a half years in office. By the time Obama finishes his first term, he will have increased the national debt by somewhere in the $5 trillion-to-$6 trillion range -- more than Bush did in two terms.</div><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;"><span class="BodyCopy" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">None of this is to say that George W. Bush had a good record on spending. He didn't, and he's fair game for criticism. But is it honest to condemn reckless spending in "eight years of Republican rule" when Democrats controlled the Senate for four of those years and the House for two? Is it honest to talk about the "cost" of the Bush tax cuts when federal revenues increased significantly while they were in effect? And is it honest to refer to Bush's ballooning deficits when deficits actually trended down for much of his presidency -- at least before Democrats won control of Congress?</span></p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/obama-partisans-ignore-facts-when-bashing-bus">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3007476351619827969?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-72754184719630198342011-08-06T08:57:00.001-04:002011-08-06T08:57:00.505-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/downgrade-shows-demint-was-right">http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/downgrade-shows-demint-was-right</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;">DeMint predicted ahead of time that none of the debt deals on the table except for "Cut, Cap and Balance"<a href="http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/demint-both-debt-plans-lead-credit-downgrade" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; line-height: inherit; color: rgb(2, 76, 145); text-decoration: none;">would prevent a downgrade</a>. He has been vindicated.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/downgrade-shows-demint-was-right">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-7275418471963019834?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-74151071192785204762011-08-01T16:35:00.001-04:002011-08-01T16:35:57.433-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://keithhennessey.com/2011/08/01/bca-strategy/">http://keithhennessey.com/2011/08/01/bca-strategy/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px;"><p style="">$2 trillion of spending cuts is big for Congress but small relative to our underlying fiscal problems. If this bill becomes law and if the fall Joint Committee process is successful, the remaining spending problem will be more than an order of magnitude larger than this accomplishment. If you think this summer has been painful or dread the battle of this fall, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Wait until Congress wrestles with the big stuff.</p><p style="">Three times in the past year Congressional Republicans have played brinksmanship with the President and come out ahead:&nbsp; the December 2010 tax rate fight, the Spring 2011 CR fight, and now the Summer 2011 debt limit fight. They have a game plan that has delivered multiple incremental wins so far, and a playing field that favors them for the Fall 2011 Joint Committee fight. In a balanced Washington they have successfully leveraged a debt limit increase to cut spending and not raise taxes.</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/strategic-analysis-of-the-budget-control-act">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-7415107119278520476?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-36022567530357600032011-08-01T11:04:00.001-04:002011-08-01T11:04:42.632-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">An excellent speech by Macro Rubio. &nbsp;He could make a fine president some day.</div><p /><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/273203/we-either-save-country-or-we-do-not-and-save-it-we-must-seek-solutions-kathryn-jean-lo">http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/273203/we-either-save-country-or-we-do-not-and-save-it-we-must-seek-solutions-kathryn-jean-lo</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px;">“Compromise without solutions is a waste of time,”&nbsp;Marco Rubio said on the Senate floor today. Here is the video — be sure to catch his exchange with John Kerry:&nbsp;</span></blockquote><br /></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">video at the link.</div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/we-either-save-this-country-or-we-do-not-and">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3602256753035760003?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-38089387026245377392011-07-29T17:05:00.001-04:002011-07-29T17:05:00.647-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/273030/reagan-statesman-rich-lowry">http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/273030/reagan-statesman-rich-lowry</a> <p /> > As for raising taxes, Reagan acceded to a big tax increase in 1982 only after a historic, much larger cut in 1981. He gave a little back after finding a shift in the political climate on Capitol Hill too difficult to resist. (He later regretted surrendering, since the budget cuts promised in exchange for the tax hike never materialized.) With the Soviets, he negotiated only when he knew he had a position of strength. These moves were the zigs and the zags of Reagan pursuing his highest goals of fundamentally lower taxes, a freer economy, and the defeat of the Soviet Union. <br />>> Few on the left considered these goals reasonable at the time. They seem so commonsensical now because Reagan effected them, against the pitched resistance of his adversaries and the contempt of polite opinion. Reagan changed the definition of “reasonable.” <br />>> The liberals’ hankering for Reagan is only possible when they abstract him from the context of his times and focus on his pragmatic tactics to the exclusion of his fixed ideological goals. Some conservatives make the opposite mistake by ignoring Reagan’s adept maneuvering, as if the only ingredient to his success was maintaining the right convictions. <br />>> Both sides, then, tend to misunderstand the well-springs of Reagan’s achievement. Having grand goals is easy, if you don’t care much about reaching them. Cutting deals is easy, if you don’t care much about where they take you. Knowing how to accommodate reality, when to give way and when to stand firm, while never deviating from your ultimate purposes, is the stuff of statesmanship. <br />> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/reagan-the-statesman-rich-lowry">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3808938702624537739?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-38792904311643743612011-07-29T15:02:00.001-04:002011-07-29T15:02:15.383-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Both agree that it's all George Bush's fault!</div><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Video from Breitbart at the link:</div><p /><a href="http://www.breitbart.tv/the-great-debate-candidate-obama-vs-president-obama/">http://www.breitbart.tv/the-great-debate-candidate-obama-vs-president-obama/</a> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-great-debate-candidate-obama-vs-president">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3879290431164374361?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-10099530476069632462011-07-26T16:58:00.001-04:002011-07-26T16:58:29.848-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/272742/reagan-s-error-yuval-levin">http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/272742/reagan-s-error-yuval-levin</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px;">Well, yes, those words were spoken by Ronald Reagan (in August of 1982) in reference to TEFRA—the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act—which congressional Democrats promised would involve a ratio of $3 in spending cuts for every $1 in tax increases (which they said would consist only of closing loopholes). TEFRA passed later that year, and the tax increases certainly happened but, as Reagan later&nbsp;<a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=cYnFVI7PW1YC&amp;pg=PA314&amp;dq=%22the+Democrats+reneged+on+their+pledge+(to+cut+spending)+and+we+never%22&amp;hl=en&amp;ei=9NMuTv7UG-fg0QHly8nQAQ&amp;sa=X&amp;oi=book_result&amp;ct=result&amp;resnum=1&amp;ved=0CC0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&amp;q&amp;f=false" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">put it</a>&nbsp;in his autobiography, “the Democrats reneged on their pledge and we never got those cuts.”</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/reagans-error-by-yuval-levin">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1009953047606963246?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-51688758716228029512011-07-26T12:47:00.001-04:002011-07-26T12:47:29.244-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Richard Epstein writes:</div><p /><a href="http://www.hoover.org/publications/defining-ideas/article/86876">http://www.hoover.org/publications/defining-ideas/article/86876</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="color: rgb(67, 74, 68); font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;">A sound flat tax policy will benefit people on all portions of the income spectrum. Unfortunately, Democrats think that progressive taxation has desirable redistributive effects with few adverse economic effects. But today’s profound fiscal malaise should offer them a wake-up call: their views on taxation hurt the constituency that they most want to help. If Democrats could learn that income redistribution has real limitations as a social strategy, and if Republicans could work hard to make sensible reforms to tax policy, then we would be well on our way to a sound budget deal. Until then, the road to true reform remains rocky even if the United States manages to avoid default this time around.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/raise-taxes-on-the-poor">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5168875871622802951?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-3216500504330292962011-07-24T16:35:00.001-04:002011-07-24T16:35:54.144-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/exchequer/272257/democrat-downgrade-reality-and-repercussions">http://www.nationalreview.com/exchequer/272257/democrat-downgrade-reality-and-repercussions</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px;">The thing that has not been sufficiently understood, &nbsp;I think, is this: The United States is not on a downgrade watch because the markets fear we won’t raise the debt ceiling in time to avoid a default; the United States is on a downgrade watch because the markets believe the debt-ceiling debate presents the last real opportunity for the government to enact a meaningful fiscal-reform program before it is well and truly too late to avoid a national crisis. The credit agencies, wisely or not, aren’t worried about the short-term political fight leading to an immediate default, but about the near- to medium-term fiscal situation, which is plainly unsustainable.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-democrat-downgrade-reality-and-repercussi">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-321650050433029296?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-52134767474095878282011-07-24T15:39:00.001-04:002011-07-24T15:39:40.901-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Michael McConnell writes:</div><p /><a href="http://www.advancingafreesociety.org/2011/07/23/contrary-to-the-president-social-security-checks-are-not-at-risk/">http://www.advancingafreesociety.org/2011/07/23/contrary-to-the-president-social-security-checks-are-not-at-risk/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="color: rgb(35, 31, 32); font-family: Calibri, Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, San-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 18px;">The Social Security trust fund holds about $2.4 trillion in U.S. Treasury bonds, which its trustees are legally entitled to redeem whenever Social Security is running a current account deficit. Thus, if we reach the debt ceiling (which I continue to think is a remote prospect, even if less remote than it seemed a week ago), this is what will happen. The Social Security trust fund will go to Treasury and cash in some of its securities, using the proceeds to send checks to recipients. Each dollar of debt that is redeemed will lower the outstanding public debt by a dollar. That enables the Treasury to borrow another dollar, without violating the debt ceiling. The debt ceiling is not a prohibition on borrowing new money; it is a prohibition on increasing the total level of public indebtedness. If Social Security cashes in some of its bonds, the Treasury can borrow that same amount of money from someone else.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/contrary-to-the-president-social-security-che">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5213476747409587828?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-91157131123779277222011-07-22T11:49:00.001-04:002011-07-22T11:49:39.685-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2011/07/21/greece-defaults/">http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2011/07/21/greece-defaults/</a><p /><blockquote type="cite">The&nbsp;<a href="http://www.iif.com/press/press+198.php">official statement</a>&nbsp;from the IIF, which is representing private-sector creditors in this matter, is a little vague, but essentially if you’re a&nbsp;holder of Greek bonds right now, you have three [sic] choices.</blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br /><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style=""> </span>• You can do nothing, and hope that Greece pays you in full and on time.<br /></div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style=""> </span>• You can extend your maturities out to 30 years, and accept a modest coupon of 4.5%; in&nbsp;return, your principal will be guaranteed with an embedded zero-coupon bond from an&nbsp;impeccable triple-A-rated EU institution, probably the EFSF.<br /></div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style=""> </span>• You can extend your maturities out to 30 years, take a 20% haircut, and get a higher coupon&nbsp;of 6.42%; again, the principal is guaranteed with zero-coupon collateral.<br /></div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style=""> </span>• You can extend your maturities out to 15 years, take a 20% haircut, get a coupon of 5.9%,&nbsp;and have only a partial principal guarantee through funds held in an escrow account.<br /></div></blockquote><br /><blockquote type="cite">The first option is by far the most&nbsp;interesting. No one has come out and&nbsp;said that Greece is going to default on&nbsp;bondholders who don’t exchange their&nbsp;bonds; instead, there’s just a lot of arm-twisting of big banks to do all this&nbsp;“voluntarily.” But that won’t stop the credit&nbsp;rating agencies giving Greece’s bonds a&nbsp;default rating — this is a coercive deal,&nbsp;which clearly reduces the value of banks’&nbsp;Greek debt. (After all, just look at those haircuts.)</blockquote> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/greece-defaults">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-9115713112377927722?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-4157290683907521842011-07-19T13:46:00.001-04:002011-07-19T13:46:42.800-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'>Richard A. Epstein writes: <p /> <a href="http://www.hoover.org/publications/defining-ideas/article/86146">http://www.hoover.org/publications/defining-ideas/article/86146</a> <p /> > In grappling with these various government programs, we should not first ask how they should be to be funded—we should ask instead: what is the proper size of these programs? On this issue, it is clear that neither the Democrats nor the Republicans have kept faith with the key principle of sound government, which is the presumption that dollars used for ordinary goods and services go a lot further when the money is left in private hands. <br />>> The appalling waste of both the Bush and especially the Obama stimulus programs was based on the fatal Keynesian presumption that it makes sense for the government to make expenditures that everyone would deem wasteful, even farcical, if undertaken by private parties. It makes no sense for any private firm to hire workers first to dig holes and then to refill them. It makes no more sense to tax private firms an amount that allows government employees to undertake those same useless acts. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/a-debt-limit-compromise">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-415729068390752184?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-26480637997271417042011-07-18T18:16:00.001-04:002011-07-18T18:16:20.931-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/07/ff_khan/all/1">http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/07/ff_khan/all/1</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Arial, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 20px;">Khan Academy is an educational website that, as its tagline puts it, aims to let anyone “learn almost anything—for free.” Students, or anyone interested enough to surf by, can watch some 2,400 videos in which the site’s founder, Salman Khan, chattily discusses principles of math, science, and economics (with a smattering of social science topics thrown in). The videos are decidedly lo-fi, even crude: Generally seven to 14 minutes long, they consist of a voice-over by Khan describing a mathematical concept or explaining how to solve a problem while his hand-scribbled formulas and diagrams appear onscreen. Like the Wizard of Oz, Khan never steps from behind the curtain to appear in a video himself; it’s just Khan’s voice and some scrawly equations. In addition to these videos, the website offers software that generates practice problems and rewards good performance with videogame-like badges—for answering a “streak” of questions correctly, say, or mastering a series of algebra levels.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/how-khan-academy-is-changing-the-rules-of-edu">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2648063799727141704?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-75911335305999282642011-07-18T17:52:00.001-04:002011-07-18T17:52:03.092-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="text-align: left;">Keith Hennessey explains H.R. 2560:</div><p /><a href="http://keithhennessey.com/2011/07/18/understanding-cut-cap-and-balance/">http://keithhennessey.com/2011/07/18/understanding-cut-cap-and-balance/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><ol style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 30px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 21px;"><li style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;"><strong style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">Cut</strong>&nbsp;– The bill provides specific numbers to limit both discretionary and mandatory spending for FY12. These numbers would drive further Congressional action this year or else force a Presidential sequester. (I explain a sequester below.) The intent of this section is to force Congress and the President to cut spending immediately.</li><li style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;"><strong style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">Cap</strong>&nbsp;– The bill would establish a new enforceable limit on total federal spending as a share of the economy. The new caps are designed to phase federal spending down to just below 20% of GDP by FY17 and then hold it there through the end of a 10-year budget window in FY21. Put more simply, this is a new enforceable aggregate spending cap.</li><li style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;"><strong style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 14px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">Balance</strong>&nbsp;– The bill would increase the debt limit by $2.4 trillion after the House and Senate have passed a Balanced Budget Amendment (of a certain type).</li><li></li></ol></blockquote>Read the whole thing.</div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/understanding-cut-cap-and-balance">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-7591133530599928264?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-50799456486175949492011-07-11T16:20:00.001-04:002011-07-11T16:20:42.838-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/not-taking-other-people-s-money_576486.html?page=1">http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/not-taking-other-people-s-money_576486.html?page=1</a><p /><blockquote type="cite"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 14px;">The problem with socialists, according to Margaret Thatcher, is that “they always run out of other people’s money.”&nbsp;</span></blockquote><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span><div><blockquote type="cite"><span style=""><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 14px;">My colleagues Kevin Hassett, Andrew Biggs, and Matt Jensen studied 21 developed countries that have attempted fiscal consolidation over the last 37 years. Some succeeded and returned to economic health; -others failed.</span></span></blockquote><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div><div><blockquote type="cite"><span style=""><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 14px;">On average, failed attempts to close budget gaps relied 53 percent on tax increases and 47 percent on spending cuts. Successful consolidations averaged 85 percent spending cuts and 15 percent tax increases. Some of the most successful financial comebacks—like Finland’s in the late 1990s—involved more than 100 percent spending cuts, so that taxes could be lowered. The spending cuts by the successful countries centered on entitlements and government personnel.</span></span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/not-taking-other-peoples-money">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5079945648617594949?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-42259199565017925812011-07-10T17:13:00.001-04:002011-07-10T17:13:47.931-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/pulp/2011/07/tsa_agent_nelson_santiago_ipad_grand_theft.php">http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/pulp/2011/07/tsa_agent_nelson_santiago_ipad_grand_theft.php</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">While most Transportation Security Administration employees are busy groping people or taking naked pictures of them, the cops say one of those employees was putting fliers' electronics down his pants.<p />The Broward Sheriff's Office says 30-year-old Nelson Santiago stole around $50,000 worth of electronics over the past six months from Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport's Terminal 1.<p />Santiago -- a TSA officer since 2009 -- was caught earlier this week by a Continental Airlines employee taking an iPad out of someone's luggage and stuffing it into his pants, the cops say.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/tsa-agent-caught-with-passengers-ipad-in-his">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-4225919956501792581?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-81123499043351825232011-07-07T11:36:00.001-04:002011-07-07T11:36:26.821-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/271265/time-leadership-spending-ted-cruz">http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/271265/time-leadership-spending-ted-cruz</a><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 15px; border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 22px;"><p>If the debt ceiling is not increased, the Treasury can — and should — continue to honor our debt in perpetuity. Instead of a default, what will be required is a substantial decrease in government spending (akin to a government “shutdown”) until the issue is resolved.</p><p>President Obama’s scare tactics, warning of a debt default and a global economic meltdown, are not productive. Instead, the president should listen to the voice of the people — expressed overwhelmingly at the ballot box in 2010.</p><p>Voters, quite rightly, are fed up with politicians spending more than we can afford, constantly expanding the size and power of the federal government. Voters instead want a return to limited government that lives within our means, protects our liberty, and honors the Constitution.</p><p>As a candidate for Senate, I have signed Senator DeMint’s&nbsp;<a href="http://cutcapbalancepledge.com/" style="text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Cut-Cap-Balance pledge</a>, and I urge other candidates and current members of Congress to do the same.</p><p>The most important part of that pledge is the third element — not to raise the debt ceiling until Congress&nbsp;<i>passes</i>&nbsp;(not proposes, but actually passes) a strong balanced-budget amendment, which would include (1) a constitutional requirement that the budget be balanced, (2) a supermajority requirement to raise taxes, and (3) a spending cap, tied to a fixed percentage of GDP.</p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/a-time-for-leadership-on-spending-by-ted-cruz">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-8112349904335182523?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-6915973073597170132011-07-05T16:02:00.001-04:002011-07-05T16:02:41.622-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://pajamasmedia.com/tatler/2011/07/05/screw-reagan/">http://pajamasmedia.com/tatler/2011/07/05/screw-reagan/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 12px;"><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; font-size: 12px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); line-height: 1.5em; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px;">This weekend, as America celebrated Independence Day, a&nbsp;<a href="http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23967070-reagan-stands-tall-in-london-with-new-grosvenor-square-statue.do" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold;">statue of President Ronald Reagan was unveiled in London</a>. &nbsp;Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and others were on hand for the dedication. &nbsp;The bronze statue sits in the same park as a statue dedicated to the memory of Former President Dwight D. Eisenhower, which was dedicated in 1989 by&nbsp;<a href="http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/3677719/Iron-Lady-praises-a-bronze-Ronald-Reagan.html" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold;">the Iron Lady herself, Margaret Thatcher</a>. &nbsp;The Reagan statue is part of the world-wide celebrations celebrating the centennial of Reagan’s birth.</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; font-size: 12px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); line-height: 1.5em; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px;">That night, a dinner was held in honor of Reagan. &nbsp;It capped a day of events that celebrated the life and extraordinary achievements of the 40th President of the United States. &nbsp;Yet, missing from the dinner – clearly the biggest event of the day – was United States Ambassador Louis Susman. &nbsp;While he did host a VIP breakfast that morning, Susman was absent from the grandest event, where speeches were given and the memory of Reagan was put forth – reminding everyone of his impact, and his legacy.</p></div></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">[W]<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 18px;">hat could the Ambassador to England have on his schedule that is more important than attending a celebration and commemoration of a US president? &nbsp;Isn’t this, in part, part of the job?</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/us-ambassador-skips-reagan-celebration-in-lon">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-691597307359717013?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-54690782596829846592011-06-23T15:48:00.001-04:002011-06-23T15:48:59.865-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'>The Daily Caller reports: <p /> <a href="http://dailycaller.com/2011/06/22/private-emails-detail-obama-admin-involvement-in-cutting-non-union-worker-pensions-post-gm-bailout/">http://dailycaller.com/2011/06/22/private-emails-detail-obama-admin-involveme...</a> <p /> > New emails obtained by The Daily Caller contradict claims by the Obama administration that the Treasury Department would avoid “intervening in the day-to-day management” of General Motors post-auto bailout. <br />>> These messages reveal that Treasury officials were involved in decision-making that led to more than 20,000 non-union workers losing their pensions. <br />>> Republican Reps. Dan Burton and Mike Turner say that during the GM bailout, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner decided to cut pensions for salaried non-union employees at Delphi, a GM spinoff, to expedite GM’s emergence from bankruptcy. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/general-motors-bailout-pensions-cut-for-non-u">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5469078259682984659?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-35349121908476987972011-06-20T10:22:00.001-04:002011-06-20T10:22:53.647-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'>It sounds like the Obama administration was embarrassed by the need for Obamacare supporters to get waivers from the law they wanted to impose on the rest of the country. If you voted for Obama and want a waiver, you'd better hurry up and apply before September. After that, we'll be in the final run of a presidential campaign, and it would be too distracting for voters to hear about the latest Obamacare waivers. <p /> <a href="http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0611/57242.html">http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0611/57242.html</a> <p /> > HHS has come under intense scrutiny by Republican lawmakers and other critics of the year-old reform law for granting the waivers. Critics have called it a form of cronyism, and hinted that HHS played favorites with the waivers by awarding them to businesses and labor unions who supported the new law. <br />> <br />In the comments a reader provides a link to the current waiver list: <p /> <a href="http://www.hhs.gov/ociio/regulations/approved_applications_for_waiver.html">www.hhs.gov/ociio/regulations/approved_applications_for_waiver.html</a> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/health-and-human-services-deadline-to-disarm">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3534912190847698797?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-36158750032732976872011-06-14T17:12:00.001-04:002011-06-14T17:12:43.218-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Read the whole thing. &nbsp;Here are a couple of quotes:</div><p /><a href="http://www.newsweek.com/2011/06/12/bjorn-lomborg-explains-how-to-save-the-planet.html">http://www.newsweek.com/2011/06/12/bjorn-lomborg-explains-how-to-save-the-planet.html</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px;"><div class="text parbase section" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 20px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 22.5px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Although Westerners were once reliant on whale oil for lighting, we never actually ran out of whales. Why? High demand and rising prices for whale oil spurred a search for and investment in the 19th-century version of alternative energy. First, kerosene from petroleum replaced whale oil. We didn’t run out of kerosene, either: electricity supplanted it because it was a superior way to light our planet.</div></div><div class="text parbase section" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 20px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 22.5px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">For generations, we have consistently underestimated our capacity for innovation. There was a time when we worried that all of London would be covered with horse manure because of the increasing use of horse-drawn carriages. Thanks to the invention of the car, London has 7 million inhabitants today. Dung disaster averted.</div></div><div class="text parbase section" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; display: block;"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 20px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 22.5px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); display: block;">In fact, would-be catastrophes have regularly been pushed aside throughout human history, and so often because of innovation and technological development. We never just continue to do the same old thing. We innovate and avoid the anticipated problems.</div></div></div></blockquote><br /></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px;"><div class="text parbase section" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; display: block;"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 20px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 22.5px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">We know from experience that more prosperous countries are more able to respond to the challenges that climate change will pose. They are much more resilient to natural disasters while more able to invest in measures such as greener cities and flood protection. Yet instead of first making sure that everybody is better off and more resilient, our response to global warming has been to try to cut back carbon emissions too soon. In reality, this means reining in growth and making do with less than we could have otherwise.</div></div><div class="text parbase section" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; display: block;"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 20px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 22.5px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">But this approach flies in the face of history. The way we have made progress against disease, malnutrition, and environmental degradation in the past is by growing, by discovering, and by innovating. Naturally, it is a hard sell to tell the hundreds of millions of people lifted out of poverty in China and elsewhere that they ought to stop burning coal, roll back their prosperity, and go back to a life of poverty.</div></div></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/bjorn-lomborg-explains-how-to-save-the-planet">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3615875003273297687?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-71191796336166977792011-06-13T13:46:00.001-04:002011-06-13T13:46:53.641-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2011/06/sarah-palin-god-letter-trig-down-syndrome.html">http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2011/06/sarah-palin-god-letter-trig-down-syndrome.html</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><div class="entry-body" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px;"><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; line-height: 20px; text-align: left;">Among some 13,000 messages was an unexpected, revealing and touching email from Palin to friends and family.</p><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; line-height: 20px; text-align: left;">It was initially written, obviously not for publication, in April of 2008 just a few days before<strong style="font-style: normal; font-weight: bold;">....</strong></p></div><a name="more" style="font-weight: normal; color: rgb(34, 98, 204);"></a><div class="entry-more" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px;">...the arrival of her fifth child,&nbsp;<strong style="font-style: normal; font-weight: bold;">Trig,</strong>&nbsp;who was born with Down syndrome. In her email Palin imagines a letter from God to the family about to launch on its challenging child-rearing experience together.</div></div></blockquote><br /></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Follow the link for the text of Palin's letter. &nbsp;It's very touching.</div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/sarah-palins-letter-from-god">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-7119179633616697779?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-13081112755594010982011-06-13T11:39:00.001-04:002011-06-13T11:39:15.144-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://hotair.com/archives/2011/06/12/wheres-the-warming/">http://hotair.com/archives/2011/06/12/wheres-the-warming/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: georgia, times new roman, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Carbon emissions over the past decade actually exceeded predictions by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), no thanks to the global economic recession.&nbsp; According to their anthropogenic global-warming theories, global temperatures should have risen significantly as a result.</span></blockquote>[...]</div><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: georgia, times new roman, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Be sure to check out the links, which show charts over varying time sets, but which all show basically the same thing: no real change over longer periods of time. Not in the Arctic, which Taylor notes was supposed to be the canary in the coal mine, nor in the northern hemisphere, or the globe overall.&nbsp; That’s even true for just the last decade, but it’s especially true over the period of several decades.&nbsp; Periods of high amplitudes in warming are matched with low amplitudes.</span></blockquote><br /></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/wheres-the-warming-hot-air">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1308111275559401098?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-50731525399563251512011-06-13T09:39:00.001-04:002011-06-13T09:39:02.540-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/phi-beta-cons/269375/higher-ed-dilemma-matthew-shaffer">http://www.nationalreview.com/phi-beta-cons/269375/higher-ed-dilemma-matthew-shaffer</a><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 15px; border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 22px;"><p>To use one economic jargon just once more: If this view is correct, our higher-education system is a big prisoner’s dilemma. Every individual person — the high-school senior and the human-resources manager — has a rational incentive to pursue a BA, but the system as a whole is massively wasteful. There should be a way to prove high intelligence and cultivate diligence and refine social graces that doesn’t cost tens (or hundreds) of thousands of dollars and four to six years, and saddle would-be entrepreneurs with debt (and, dare I add, afflict young people with the grievances and resentments of the academic Left).</p><p>This is a roundabout way of saying that higher education as it exists today can simultaneously be&nbsp;<i>a good bet for each student</i>&nbsp;and a&nbsp;<i>bad and outdated model for society as a whole</i>.</p></div></blockquote><p /></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-higher-ed-dilemma-by-matthew-shaffer">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5073152539956325151?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-48682552213639210472011-06-10T11:01:00.001-04:002011-06-10T11:01:44.480-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/269257/simply-madness-jonah-goldberg">http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/269257/simply-madness-jonah-goldberg</a> <p /> > The idea behind the steady-state economy should be familiar to anyone who’s heard the lament that capitalism is bad for the environment because it rapaciously consumes resources faster than they can be replaced. <br />>> It’s an ancient idea, really, a kind of millenarian paranoia that keeps getting gussied up to fit the latest headlines. My favorite example is the 1968 book The Population Bomb by Paul R. Ehrlich. “The battle to feed all of humanity is over,” prophesized Ehrlich. “In the 1970s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now.” <br />>> It was a “certainty” that even in America, famine would claim millions. Ehrlich desperately claims that his predictions were mostly right and that hundreds of millions of people did indeed die of hunger over the ensuing decades. That’s not exactly true. Global population has doubled, and the amount of food available for humanity has grown as well. <br />>> But, yes, people have died of hunger since 1968. Why? It wasn’t because markets failed or resources ran out. It was because government planners failed. That’s why countries such as India and China have introduced markets: Their central planning was killing their own people. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/simply-madness-jonah-goldberg">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-4868255221363921047?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-33694131285317938052011-06-10T10:24:00.001-04:002011-06-10T10:24:28.042-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/gates-rebukes-european-allies-in-farewell-speech/2011/06/10/AG9tKeOH_story.html">http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/gates-rebukes-european-allies-in-farewell...</a> <p /> > In an unusually stinging speech, made on his valedictory visit to Europe before he retires at the end of the month, Gates condemned European defense cuts and said the United States is tired of engaging in combat missions for those who “don’t want to share the risks and the costs.” <br />>> “The blunt reality is that there will be dwindling appetite and patience in the U.S. Congress, and in the American body politic writ large, to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources . . . to be serious and capable partners in their own defense,” he said in an address to a think tank in Brussels. <p /> I'm starting to think that it's time to let the Europeans take care of the Fulda Gap on their own. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/gates-rebukes-european-allies-in-farewell-spe">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-3369413128531793805?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-23527357266407726072011-06-10T09:53:00.001-04:002011-06-10T09:53:27.454-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://edmonton.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20110610/germany-e-coli-outbreak-testing-new-results-110610/20110610/?hub=EdmontonHome">http://edmonton.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20110610/germany-e-coli-outbr...</a> <p /> > They've been blamed before, but this time, Germany's investigators feel quite certain that contaminated vegetable sprouts from a local farm caused Europe's current E. coli outbreak, the deadliest ever recorded. <br />>> "It is the sprouts," asserted Reinhard Burger, the head of the Robert Koch Institute, which is Germany's national disease control centre. <br />>> Burger said the outbreak, which has killed 29 and sickened nearly 3,000 -- including at least one Canadian -- is believed to have started on a small organic vegetable farm in Lower Saxony that first came under suspicion last weekend. <br />> <br /><a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/8567593/E.coli-Germany-admits-that-locally-grown-bean-sprouts-are-cause-of-outbreak.html">http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/8567593/E.coli-Germany-ad...</a> <p /> > Freshfel Europe, an agriculture industry group, published figures showing that sales of salad vegetables had stopped or plummeted across Europe after Germany wrongly blamed Spanish cucumbers for the deadly poisoning. <br />>> Cucumber sales either collapsed altogether or fell 80 per cent last week while trade in tomatoes dropped by 80 per cent and purchases of lettuce halved. <br />> During angry exchanges in the European Parliament, Francisco Sosa Wagner, a Spanish MEP, brandished a cucumber at Mr Dalli and demanded that the EU restore consumer confidence in salad vegetables. <br />>> “We need to restore the honour of the cucumber,” he said. <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/germany-says-sprouts-are-cause-of-e-coli-outb">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2352735726640772607?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-15752449801096064822011-06-10T08:50:00.001-04:002011-06-10T08:50:02.669-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Rush Limbaugh mentioned this book on yesterday's broadcast. &nbsp;Here's the review:</div><p /><a href="http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2011/06/07/fanniegate-gamechanger-for-the-gop/">http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2011/06/07/fanniegate-gamechanger-for-the-gop/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Reckless-Endangerment-Outsized-Corruption-Armageddon/dp/0805091203/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1307451201&amp;sr=1-1" style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; color: rgb(54, 104, 186); text-decoration: none;"><em style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Reckless Endangerment: How Outsized Ambition, Greed, and Corruption Led to Economic Armageddon</em></a>. By Gretchen Morgenson, one of America’s best business journalists who is currently at&nbsp;<em style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The New York Times</em>, and noted financial analyst Joshua Rosner,&nbsp;<em style="background-color: transparent; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Reckless Endangerment</em>&nbsp;gives the best available account of how the growing chaos in the mortgage and personal finance markets and the rampant bundling of dubious loans into exotically toxic securities plunged the world, and millions of American families, into the gravest financial crisis since World War Two. It is gripping reading as well, and its explanations are clear enough that readers without any background in finance will have no trouble following the plot.&nbsp; The villains?&nbsp; An unholy alliance between Wall Street, the Democratic establishment, community organizing groups like ACORN and La Raza, and politicians like Barney Frank, Nancy Pelosi and Henry Cisneros.&nbsp; (Frank got a cushy job for a lover, Pelosi got a job and layoff protection for a son, Cisneros apparently got a license to mint money bilking Mexican-Americans of their life savings in cheesy housing developments.)</span></blockquote><br /></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Read the whole thing.</div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/fanniegate-reckless-endangerment">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-1575244980109606482?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-64118226376380204852011-06-09T13:39:00.001-04:002011-06-09T13:39:58.206-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/2011/06/free-market-not-government-policies-drives-energy-boom">http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/2011/06/free-market-not-government-policies-drives-energy-boom</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(25, 25, 25); line-height: 19px;"><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;" /><div class="BodyCopy" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">There is a lesson here for public policy generally, including health care. No centralized government expert predicted the vast expansion in energy supply from hydraulic fracking. It was produced by decentralized specialists in firms subject to market competition.</div><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;"><span class="BodyCopy" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">Just as Friedrich Hayek taught, no central planner can know or foresee enough to produce the beneficial results regularly produced by competition in free markets regulated in accordance with the rule of law. And no central planner can accurately predict the course of innovation that can be achieved in decentralized markets. That's something you might want to keep in mind when someone tells you that Medicare costs can be controlled by 15 members of an unelected board created by Obamacare. Better results and lower costs can be expected with the kind of market competition set up by the 2003 Medicare prescription drug law.</span></p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/free-market-not-government-policies-drives-en">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6411822637638020485?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-62850133892894016292011-06-09T10:24:00.001-04:002011-06-09T10:24:40.899-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2011-06-08/anthony-weiners-ex-kirsten-powers-he-lied-to-me/">http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2011-06-08/anthony-weiners-ex-kirsten-powers-he-lied-to-me/</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">This has not been my previous position during the scandal, but as I have recovered from the shock of seeing&nbsp;<a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2011-06-06/anthony-weiner-press-conferences-six-most-awkward-moments/" target="_blank" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">an old friend’s life unravel</a>&nbsp;and have had time to get my mind around the extensive and sociopathic lying in which he engaged, there seems to be no other choice than for him to step aside and stop hurting his family, friends, and the Democratic Party. As&nbsp;<a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/cheat-sheet/item/weiner-offered-porn-star-pr-help-report/scandal/" target="_blank" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; text-decoration: underline; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">more information trickles out</a>&nbsp;about his online behavior with women, it has also become clear that he does not have the character to be in a position of leadership because of his misogynist view of women and predatory behavior.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/anthony-weiners-ex-kirsten-powers-he-lied-to">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6285013389289401629?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-21106109891538110932011-06-08T11:16:00.001-04:002011-06-08T11:16:44.147-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Follow the link for video of Breitbart talking to the press.</div><p /><a href="http://yidwithlid.blogspot.com/2011/06/revenge-of-nerds-breitbart-vindicated.html">http://yidwithlid.blogspot.com/2011/06/revenge-of-nerds-breitbart-vindicated.html</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Vollkorn; font-size: 16px; line-height: 25px;">In New York pimping his new book, Andrew Breitbart showed up at the presser and was immediately mobbed by reporters asking about today's exclusive pictures of Weiner on Big Journalism and Big Government which seems to have pushed Weiner into admitting the truth.<p />Watching Breitbart take Anthony Weiner's Stage and speak into the microphone Weiner rented not only showed how far Breitbart has come, but how far citizen journalism had come.<p />After ten days of being vilified by left wing media reporters, those same reporters were tripping all over their underwear trying to ask him questions about the story they had doubted until today.&nbsp; Not only that, but at the behest of the same reporters who trashed him personally and his stories, Breitbart stood where Weiner was about to stand and demanded an apology from the slanderers in the press,&nbsp; and from Congressman Weiner himself.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/breitbart-vindicated-again">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2110610989153811093?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-60951910855753721802011-06-04T09:31:00.001-04:002011-06-04T09:31:48.843-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_16026/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=YL2wi9S6">http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_16026/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=YL2wi9S6</a><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 20px;"><p>Prosecutors said $725,000 from Mellon and $200,000 from Baron was used to pay for Hunter's living and medical expenses and for chartered airfare, luxury hotels and rental of a house in Santa Barbara, Calif., to keep her hidden from the public.</p><p>Former campaign staffer Andrew Young, who initially claimed to be the father of Hunter's child to protect his boss, has said that Edwards was aware of the financial support and agreed to solicit money directly from Mellon.</p><p>Mellon sent her money through her decorator, sometimes hidden in boxes of chocolates. On the memo lines of her checks, she listed items of furniture such as "chairs," ''antique Charleston table" and "book case" to hide the true purpose, according to the indictment.</p><p /></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/feds-say-edwards-hid-mistress-to-aid-campaign">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-6095191085575372180?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-88455834521391990032011-06-03T15:46:00.001-04:002011-06-03T15:46:11.296-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">Iowahawk exposes the conspiracy...</div><p /><a href="http://iowahawk.typepad.com/iowahawk/2011/06/farewell-my-weiner.html">http://iowahawk.typepad.com/iowahawk/2011/06/farewell-my-weiner.html</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite" style="font-size: 15px;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 19px; font-size: 13px;">"It seems I am the subject of some sort of elaborate extortion ring," he explained, sliding a manila envelope across the desk. Inside was a 8x10 glossy of a grey pair of drawers, apparently packing a snubnosed Derringer.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/iowahawk-farewell-my-weiner">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-8845583452139199003?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-72301056772735609132011-06-01T10:48:00.001-04:002011-06-01T10:48:05.247-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/weiner_tweet_hearts_UTe6y5bwizh46ycTkIIkxH">http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/weiner_tweet_hearts_UTe6y5bwizh46ycTkIIkxH</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Arial;"><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px;">But reporters persisted, asking Weiner if he followed the co-ed on Twitter and whether he had other "young women followers" -- with one barking: "Answer the question!"</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px;">Instead, the famously temperamental Weiner looked annoyed, rolled his shoulders and argued -- but never said whether or not he sent the picture.</p><p /></div></blockquote>Follow the link for video of Weiner evading the hard questions.</div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/rep-anthony-weiner-linked-to-numerous-beautie">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-7230105677273560913?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-21465946770678536132011-05-31T17:59:00.001-04:002011-05-31T17:59:32.365-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">How does revolutionary France compare to modern America?</div><p /><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/267989/reflections-revolution-france-kevin-d-williamson?page=1">http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/267989/reflections-revolution-france-kevin-d-williamson?page=1</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">It was a new dawn, a day of hope and change, the&nbsp;<em>ancien régime</em>&nbsp;and the theocrats and the plutocracy having been supplanted by fresh new faces dedicated to Reason and promising to fundamentally change France. That turned out to be an expensive proposition, and the new government found itself in a bind: It was unwilling to cut spending or to raise taxes. The country, Mr. White writes, “found itself in deep financial embarrassment: There was a heavy debt and a serious deficit. . . . There was a general want of confidence in business circles; capital had shown its proverbial timidity by retiring out of sight as far as possible; throughout the land was stagnation.” A source of particular annoyance to the Jacobins and the rest of the Left was the fact that businesses and investors were sitting on a great deal of cash but refusing to spend or to invest, and many were sheltering their capital abroad.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/reflections-on-the-revolution-in-france-kevin">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2146594677067853613?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-42337561141719633062011-05-29T16:24:00.001-04:002011-05-29T16:24:07.691-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="http://biggovernment.com/jjmnolte/2011/05/29/weinergate-msm-ignores-trifecta-of-sex-politics-and-a-rising-political-star/<a name='more'></a>-275920">http://biggovernment.com/jjmnolte/2011/05/29/weinergate-msm-ignores-trifecta-of-sex-politics-and-a-rising-political-star/<!--more-->-275920</a></span></div><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><p /><blockquote type="cite"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px;">With the exception of Jonathan Allen and Ben Smith&nbsp;<a href="http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0511/55877.html" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; color: rgb(0, 72, 144);">of Politico</a>, who both deserve credit for covering the Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) story we broke here at the Bigs on Friday night, the mainstream media’s silence on this objectively important story has been deafening. And now that 24 hours have passed since the story originally broke, there’s simply no way to blame the MSM’s lack of interest on the holiday weekend.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px;">After all, this isn’t just any story. Regardless of how it all eventually breaks, what we have here is either the story of a high profile, recently married New York Congressman who’s seriously considering a Mayoral run in Manhattan, tweeting his “junk” to a young woman two decades his junior — and lying to the media about it. Or we have a story involving a high-profile Congressman’s Facebook and Twitter account being hacked with pornographic pictures.</div></blockquote><br /></div></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;">You can search on twitter for #weinergate if you really want to see the hard evidence. &nbsp;Now I know why everyone is talking about that special erection in NY. &nbsp;Weiner is often referred to as a rising star in the Democratic party. &nbsp;His twitter girlfriend lives in Seattle so they planned to meet up at the Space Needle.</div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/weinergate-msm-ignores-trifecta-of-sex-politi">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-4233756114171963306?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-24286309990028493692011-05-29T11:55:00.001-04:002011-05-29T11:55:33.464-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/11_23/b4231060885070.htm">http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/11_23/b4231060885070.htm</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 21px;">The USPS has historically placed the interests of its unions first. That hasn't changed. In March it reached a four-and-a-half-year agreement with the 250,000-member American Postal Workers Union, which represents mail clerks, drivers, mechanics, and custodians. The pact extends the no-layoff provision and provides a 3.5 percent raise for APWU members over the period of the contract, along with seven upcapped cost-of-living increases. The union is happy. "Despite the fact that the postal service is on the edge of insolvency, the union and management have reached an agreement that is a 'win-win' proposition," said APWU President Cliff Guffey on the union's website. A USPS spokeswoman said the agency agreed to the raise because it feared the decision would otherwise be made by an arbitrator who might be even more deferential to the union.</span></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/the-us-postal-service-nears-collapse-business">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-2428630999002849369?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-56613114669256580362011-05-26T16:49:00.001-04:002011-05-26T16:49:55.042-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/2011/05/obama-skirts-rule-law-reward-pals-punish-foes">http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/2011/05/obama-skirts-rule-law-reward-pals-punish-foes</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(25, 25, 25); line-height: 19px;"><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;" /><div class="BodyCopy" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">Punishing enemies and rewarding friends -- politics Chicago style -- seems to be the unifying principle that helps explain the Obamacare waivers, the NLRB action against Boeing and the IRS' gift-tax assault on 501(c)(4) donors.</div><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;" /><div class="BodyCopy" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">They look like examples of crony capitalism, bailout favoritism and gangster government.</div><p style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;"><span class="BodyCopy" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-color: initial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent;">One thing they don't look like is the rule of law.</span></p></div></blockquote></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/michael-barone-obama-skirts-rule-of-law-to-re">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5661311466925658036?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29661823.post-58159484742436008002011-05-26T16:48:00.001-04:002011-05-26T16:48:01.842-04:00<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703778104576287290266016016.html?mod=WSJ_article_onespot">http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703778104576287290266016016.html?mod=WSJ_article_onespot</a><p /><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; color: black; text-align: left;"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; line-height: 10px;"><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 8px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.5em; display: block;">South Carolina is a right-to-work state, and we're proud that within our borders workers cannot be required to join a labor union as a condition of employment. We don't need unions playing middlemen between our companies and our employees. We don't want them forcefully inserted into our promising business climate. And we will not stand for them intimidating South Carolinians.</p><a name="U4022314350125TG"></a><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 8px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.5em; display: block;">That is apparently too much for President Obama and his union-beholden appointees at the National Labor Relations Board, who have asked the courts to intervene and force Boeing to stop production in South Carolina. The NLRB wants Boeing to produce the planes only in Washington state, where its workers must belong to the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers.</p><a name="U402231435012FJH"></a></div></blockquote><p /></div> <p style="font-size: 10px;"> <a href="http://posterous.com">Posted via email</a> from <a href="http://bluepelican.posterous.com/nikki-haley-obamas-silence-on-boeing-is-unacc">The Blue Pelican</a> </p> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/29661823-5815948474243600800?l=bluepelican.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Elliott Steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15496686189023146425noreply@blogger.com0