Dear Mr. Hannity--I listen to your TV program as well as your radio broadcast and enjoy them both. I agree with you most of the time. I enjoyed your exchange with Robert Kuttner but want to take issue with a point with which I disagree--your support for President Bush's economic policies. I think that your position is a mistake from both "conservatives principles" and tactical viewpoints.
I disagree with Mr. Kuttner on many things but agree with him on this point. The Bush administration has permitted the Greenspan and Bernanke Fed to behave like a hyper-Democratic government agency. This was true antecedent to 2000, since the days of President Reagan and Chair Greenspan, and it has not gone away.
If you are a conservative then you probably believe in less government. Artificial stimulation of misdirected (or as von Mises put it malinvested) economic activity is one of the most wasteful and inefficient forms of government intervention. This has been the policy that the Republicans have pursued since the 1980s (and indeed, in the 1970s under President Nixon) and it is antithetical to conservatism if you are adhering to the small government, Jacksonian variant. Of course, it is also possible to be a big government Whig economic conservative, along the lines of Rockefeller and GW Bush, but that viewpoint has come to be viewed as a form of liberalism or left-wing Republicanism rather than the conservatism of Barry Goldwater, Milton Friedman and Friedrich von Hayek.
In any case, if you are an advocate of big government monetary expansion, support for big business, government intervention in the economy and Keynesian economics, which are the policies of George W. Bush, you should say so. I don't think that all Republicans or conservatives agree with you. I find this especially troubling because Fox has limited its exposure of conservatives to the Whig-American Enterprise Institute-Progressive conservatism, which is not what many of your viewers believe, and I think there is a sleight of hand going on. You should clarify your position on this issue.
I would hope that you reject big government, and therefore the monetary policies of the past 25 years. I do not believe that government should intervene on behalf of the rich, Bear Stearns, Fannie Mae, or Lehman Brothers. Nor do I believe in welfare. Many of the Fox pundits believe in welfare for the rich, and this is a serious weakness in your presentation.
In addition, I do not think the cause of John McCain and Sarah Palin is helped by association with the Whig-AEI-Progressive approach to the economy. Americans are by many measures worse off. The average hourly wage has been declining since 1971, when President Nixon took us off the gold standard. It is tragic if you allow the Democrats to steal this issue because of short-sighted fixation on big money donations from the board members of AEI. In the long run there is going to be backlash against the feudal, inflationary economy of post-1968 Republicanism, and if the Republicans don't start re-thinking their position on hard money they ultimately will be thrown out of office.
Friday, September 12, 2008
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Contrairimairi on the Obama-McCain Forum
I was raking the first of this years fallen leaves and missed the events in New York today, but Contrairimairi has sent me a an e-mail to fill us in about the campaign:
Dear Mitchell,
It is just a bit ironic to me, that tonight's forum was supposed to be a brief break from campaigning, and take a thoughtful look at service to the Country. It was supposed to be a sort of "win...win" situation for everyone. I just can't help thinking, that despite being on "home turf", his alma mater, BO lost.
I HOPE I am not the only one who noticed that BO made a point to say that he felt older Americans could offer much to schools by teaching Math and Science. Weren't those the very same programs that were attempting to be part of the CAC, and were turned down? Just saying.....who knows, maybe you can teach an old dog new tricks. Maybe BO finally realizes that Math and Science really are important.
I also believe he lost on the question of community organizer pitted against the experience of a small town mayor. Sen. McCain was quite gracious, I think, in handling that fiasco's reference, but BO twisted it to try to make Gov. Palin look like the villain yet again. I find it hard to believe he was "hurting" by making the choice to be an organizer in Chicago. Seems like he made many "allies" during that time.
The moderators stunk! I was also surprised that Sen. McCain came out so clearly against service to Country becoming yet another bureaucracy. I felt BO would start spending immediately, and we know how that "rolls down hill".
I would LOVE to know what BO actually "accomplished" in his time as CO. I feel in Chicago, a lot of that work is just voter registration in an attempt to gain an impassioned voter response in underprivileged neighborhoods, and then, an abandonment of the very people who were used to get a vote result. I believe this has happened often in Chicago, and it saddens me that those who employ that type of technique are very effective with it still. I don't know if the CAC records will relate directly to BO, but I would sure like to have a complete breakdown on where those funds went and exactly how they were used.
Mairi
Dear Mitchell,
It is just a bit ironic to me, that tonight's forum was supposed to be a brief break from campaigning, and take a thoughtful look at service to the Country. It was supposed to be a sort of "win...win" situation for everyone. I just can't help thinking, that despite being on "home turf", his alma mater, BO lost.
I HOPE I am not the only one who noticed that BO made a point to say that he felt older Americans could offer much to schools by teaching Math and Science. Weren't those the very same programs that were attempting to be part of the CAC, and were turned down? Just saying.....who knows, maybe you can teach an old dog new tricks. Maybe BO finally realizes that Math and Science really are important.
I also believe he lost on the question of community organizer pitted against the experience of a small town mayor. Sen. McCain was quite gracious, I think, in handling that fiasco's reference, but BO twisted it to try to make Gov. Palin look like the villain yet again. I find it hard to believe he was "hurting" by making the choice to be an organizer in Chicago. Seems like he made many "allies" during that time.
The moderators stunk! I was also surprised that Sen. McCain came out so clearly against service to Country becoming yet another bureaucracy. I felt BO would start spending immediately, and we know how that "rolls down hill".
I would LOVE to know what BO actually "accomplished" in his time as CO. I feel in Chicago, a lot of that work is just voter registration in an attempt to gain an impassioned voter response in underprivileged neighborhoods, and then, an abandonment of the very people who were used to get a vote result. I believe this has happened often in Chicago, and it saddens me that those who employ that type of technique are very effective with it still. I don't know if the CAC records will relate directly to BO, but I would sure like to have a complete breakdown on where those funds went and exactly how they were used.
Mairi
Economy Talk
Republican talk show pundits like Sean Hannity are wrong to defend George Bush. In pursuing an inflationary, interventionist policy President Bush and Ben Bernanke have behaved like Democrats, not Republicans.
Nancy and Contrairimairi have sent me e-mails recently about the economy. I agree with any and all tax cuts, and I disagree with the idea that the current problems in the economy are due to tax cuts (or taxes at all). Contrairimairi's brother is a Democrat, and I agree with him on a few points, but the ultimate prescription is NOT that a Democrat can solve the mess that George W. Bush's and Ben Bernanke's Federal Reserve Bank has created. From a historical perspective, President Bush has exaggerated policies that the Democrats established. The policies should be abolished.
Nor do I think the current problems in the economy have anything to do with Congress. Moreover, Obama would be worse than McCain. The reason he would be worse is that he is more closely linked to Wall Street than McCain is. The uncertainty and instability that we are facing are all due to manipulation by the Federal Reserve Bank. I've blogged on this alot (also see here, here, here, here, here, and here, here).
The Fed was aggressively increasing the money supply until about five years ago, when it started encouraging foreign governments to purchase Treasury Bonds, boosting the value of the dollar. Long term the dollar is going down, but short term it has been increasing.
The inflation rate has been low because the increased money supply encouraged lower interest rates for many years that made lending easier and this stimulated commodity production. The commodity firms increased production in the 1980s and 1990s and then when prices fell they reduced production. The result was they lost alot of money and they will resist new production. In response to the reduced production, prices started increasing about four or five years ago. What should happen is inflation followed by the Fed's reducing the money supply (raising interest rates) but they have not done that because the Republicans don't want a stock market crash while in office. Reducing interest rates will reduce the stock markets. Thus, the Fed has delayed the usual stock market cycle. Also, the low interest rates stimulated bad investment in real estate and the Fed has also been subsidizing the results. The effects of all the bad investment and subsidies to Wall Street ought to be a combination of rising interest rates and inflation like in the 1970s. But the Fed has performed a trick by getting foreign governments to inflate for us. This will not last forever.
But the pain can continue for a long time as the subsidization of bad investments by increasing the money supply can continue until actual inflation starts. Then the public will deamand action and the Fed will raise rates. This may happen after the election as McCain is envisioning himself as a one term president anyway, although Palin's nomination may change that. It could be delayed for 10 years or more depending on how much strength is in the world economy to keep subsidizing the US economy.
In short, there is a considerable amount of manipulation by central banks right now and the US central bank, the Federal Reserve, has been willing to subsidize incompetent firms. This will ultimately result in inflation. I would tell you to buy hard assets, i.e., platinum, gold and silver, but the trick that the Fed is playing with the foreign central banks is currently causing a steep drop in the gold price along with an increase in the dollar. At some point in the near future, possibly when gold hits around 700 or 670, then it will be a good time to buy gold and Euros.
I disagree that the Democrats can solve these problems. The problem in our economy is due to policies that were adopted in 1932 by Franklin D. Roosevelt and in 1971 by Richard Nixon. In 1932 FDR illegalized gold ownership and took the Fed off the gold standard. An international gold standard was reinstated in 1944, I think, but in 1971 Richard M. Nixon abolished that one. The cause of the Fed's unlmited power to create money was a three step process. Wilson, a Democrat, founded the Fed in 1913. Roosevelt, a Democrat, abolished the gold standard in 1932. Nixon, a Republican, abolished the international gold standard in 1971. The Democrats have never advocated reinstatment of a gold standard or a monetary rule, which was what Milton Friedman advocated. The end result has been the kind of policies we see today. They are the result of:
1. Partnership between government and business, a long standing policy that the Democrats have advocated
2. Abolition of the gold standard, a long standing Democratic Party policy
3. Keynesian economics, a long standing economic theory advocated by the Democratic Party.
The Republicans have copied the Democrats on this. Blaming the imitators in favor of the originators will not solve the problem. Nor is regulation or deregulation of FNMA relevant. The Democrats show that they do not grasp/do not want to solve the underlying problem by blaming speculators for inflation and bringing up irrelevant topics such as regulation and the income tax when the real problem is monetary policy and unlimited Federal Reserve power to create money. This is the Democrats' policy that the Republicans have adopted. It is decidedly pro-Wall Street, and Wall Street has chiefly contributed to Obama, not McCain.
Contraririmairi writes:
>I will assume you received the "just 2 years" e-mail from Nancy. I sent it off to my brother. He and I had just had a VERY lengthy discussion on many of these issues two nights before. He did, however, take the time to pick the e-mail apart, and I thought you would be interested in his response.
Contrairimairi's brother writes:
The "intertia" of the US economy averages about 5 years (despite this, Congress refuses to go onto 5 year budget cycles and corporations are even worse, with quarterly cycles). In other words, major changes take about 5 years before their full impact is felt.
- Regardless of program changes, the short term result is usually positive since the planning that goes into making such changes is usually focused no further than 12 months in advance, due in large part to a very broken Federal budgeting system and ZERO accountability.
- Due to deficit spending - a situation that occurs when taxes are too low to support the programs that greedy people demands (and compounded with graft and kickbacks to crooked politicians and their lobbyist buddies) - the government has been printing money without substantial basis in GDP valuation, resulting in inflation and radical drop in the value of the dollar - which leads to higher prices, greater control over our country by (hostile) foreign interests willing to cash in on our stupidity, and those two factors in turn lead to massive financial pressure on people - many of whom were not financially prepared for home ownership but were funded in the Fannie/Freddie Ponzi scheme.
- These cost pressures and devaluations/inflation are undeniably tied to Republican actions to cut taxes, mainly on the rich, in hopes the proven-broken "trickle" down theory will continue to hold. Corporations, having no conscience, see no advantage in attempting to radically expand in a stagnant market, while others - like oil companies - benefit from the price increases caused by a weak dollar, fabricated shortages and crooked futures dealers. The result? Higher profits - for a while - followed by sharp cutbacks, which increases unemployment and forces even more jobs offshore, leading to an increase in unemployment and a further drop in the value of the dollar. This situation is called "positive feedback" - the exact same mechanism that results in those painful speaker-system squeals during church or public events when somebody doesn't take proper care to make sure inputs and outputs are balanced. Works for money too.
- Privatization of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (and other government agencies) could result in one of the largest "dumps" ever on individuals, as we (as taxpayers) have to bail out the greedy, corrupt, and inept "management"...
And just to be clear - if Obama gets elected tomorrow NOTHING will change.
- Ask yourself: if taxes were cut to ZERO, how would the bills get paid? Yet the current path is to reduce taxes to ZERO for the rich (i.e., eliminating the Corporate Gains tax, the Estate Tax, etc.). Guess who gets to make up the difference, shoulder the load, and bail out the crooks?"
Nancy writes:
In just two years ..... Remember the election in 2006?
Thought you might like to read the following ~
A little over one year ago:
1) Consumer confidence stood at a 2 1/2 year high;
2) Regular gasoline sold for $2.19 a gallon;
3) The unemployment rate was 4.5%.
Since voting in a Democratic Congress in 2006 we have seen:
1) Consumer confidence plummet;
2) The cost of regular gasoline soar to over $3.50 a gallon;
3) Unemployment is up to 5% (a 10% increase);
4) American households have seen $2.3 trillion in equity value evaporate (stock and mutual fund losses);
5) Americans have seen their home equity drop by $1.2 trillion dollars;
6) 1% of American homes are in foreclosure.
America voted for change in 2006, and we got it!
Remember it's Congress that makes law not the President. He has to work with what's handed to him.
Nancy and Contrairimairi have sent me e-mails recently about the economy. I agree with any and all tax cuts, and I disagree with the idea that the current problems in the economy are due to tax cuts (or taxes at all). Contrairimairi's brother is a Democrat, and I agree with him on a few points, but the ultimate prescription is NOT that a Democrat can solve the mess that George W. Bush's and Ben Bernanke's Federal Reserve Bank has created. From a historical perspective, President Bush has exaggerated policies that the Democrats established. The policies should be abolished.
Nor do I think the current problems in the economy have anything to do with Congress. Moreover, Obama would be worse than McCain. The reason he would be worse is that he is more closely linked to Wall Street than McCain is. The uncertainty and instability that we are facing are all due to manipulation by the Federal Reserve Bank. I've blogged on this alot (also see here, here, here, here, here, and here, here).
The Fed was aggressively increasing the money supply until about five years ago, when it started encouraging foreign governments to purchase Treasury Bonds, boosting the value of the dollar. Long term the dollar is going down, but short term it has been increasing.
The inflation rate has been low because the increased money supply encouraged lower interest rates for many years that made lending easier and this stimulated commodity production. The commodity firms increased production in the 1980s and 1990s and then when prices fell they reduced production. The result was they lost alot of money and they will resist new production. In response to the reduced production, prices started increasing about four or five years ago. What should happen is inflation followed by the Fed's reducing the money supply (raising interest rates) but they have not done that because the Republicans don't want a stock market crash while in office. Reducing interest rates will reduce the stock markets. Thus, the Fed has delayed the usual stock market cycle. Also, the low interest rates stimulated bad investment in real estate and the Fed has also been subsidizing the results. The effects of all the bad investment and subsidies to Wall Street ought to be a combination of rising interest rates and inflation like in the 1970s. But the Fed has performed a trick by getting foreign governments to inflate for us. This will not last forever.
But the pain can continue for a long time as the subsidization of bad investments by increasing the money supply can continue until actual inflation starts. Then the public will deamand action and the Fed will raise rates. This may happen after the election as McCain is envisioning himself as a one term president anyway, although Palin's nomination may change that. It could be delayed for 10 years or more depending on how much strength is in the world economy to keep subsidizing the US economy.
In short, there is a considerable amount of manipulation by central banks right now and the US central bank, the Federal Reserve, has been willing to subsidize incompetent firms. This will ultimately result in inflation. I would tell you to buy hard assets, i.e., platinum, gold and silver, but the trick that the Fed is playing with the foreign central banks is currently causing a steep drop in the gold price along with an increase in the dollar. At some point in the near future, possibly when gold hits around 700 or 670, then it will be a good time to buy gold and Euros.
I disagree that the Democrats can solve these problems. The problem in our economy is due to policies that were adopted in 1932 by Franklin D. Roosevelt and in 1971 by Richard Nixon. In 1932 FDR illegalized gold ownership and took the Fed off the gold standard. An international gold standard was reinstated in 1944, I think, but in 1971 Richard M. Nixon abolished that one. The cause of the Fed's unlmited power to create money was a three step process. Wilson, a Democrat, founded the Fed in 1913. Roosevelt, a Democrat, abolished the gold standard in 1932. Nixon, a Republican, abolished the international gold standard in 1971. The Democrats have never advocated reinstatment of a gold standard or a monetary rule, which was what Milton Friedman advocated. The end result has been the kind of policies we see today. They are the result of:
1. Partnership between government and business, a long standing policy that the Democrats have advocated
2. Abolition of the gold standard, a long standing Democratic Party policy
3. Keynesian economics, a long standing economic theory advocated by the Democratic Party.
The Republicans have copied the Democrats on this. Blaming the imitators in favor of the originators will not solve the problem. Nor is regulation or deregulation of FNMA relevant. The Democrats show that they do not grasp/do not want to solve the underlying problem by blaming speculators for inflation and bringing up irrelevant topics such as regulation and the income tax when the real problem is monetary policy and unlimited Federal Reserve power to create money. This is the Democrats' policy that the Republicans have adopted. It is decidedly pro-Wall Street, and Wall Street has chiefly contributed to Obama, not McCain.
Contraririmairi writes:
>I will assume you received the "just 2 years" e-mail from Nancy. I sent it off to my brother. He and I had just had a VERY lengthy discussion on many of these issues two nights before. He did, however, take the time to pick the e-mail apart, and I thought you would be interested in his response.
Contrairimairi's brother writes:
The "intertia" of the US economy averages about 5 years (despite this, Congress refuses to go onto 5 year budget cycles and corporations are even worse, with quarterly cycles). In other words, major changes take about 5 years before their full impact is felt.
- Regardless of program changes, the short term result is usually positive since the planning that goes into making such changes is usually focused no further than 12 months in advance, due in large part to a very broken Federal budgeting system and ZERO accountability.
- Due to deficit spending - a situation that occurs when taxes are too low to support the programs that greedy people demands (and compounded with graft and kickbacks to crooked politicians and their lobbyist buddies) - the government has been printing money without substantial basis in GDP valuation, resulting in inflation and radical drop in the value of the dollar - which leads to higher prices, greater control over our country by (hostile) foreign interests willing to cash in on our stupidity, and those two factors in turn lead to massive financial pressure on people - many of whom were not financially prepared for home ownership but were funded in the Fannie/Freddie Ponzi scheme.
- These cost pressures and devaluations/inflation are undeniably tied to Republican actions to cut taxes, mainly on the rich, in hopes the proven-broken "trickle" down theory will continue to hold. Corporations, having no conscience, see no advantage in attempting to radically expand in a stagnant market, while others - like oil companies - benefit from the price increases caused by a weak dollar, fabricated shortages and crooked futures dealers. The result? Higher profits - for a while - followed by sharp cutbacks, which increases unemployment and forces even more jobs offshore, leading to an increase in unemployment and a further drop in the value of the dollar. This situation is called "positive feedback" - the exact same mechanism that results in those painful speaker-system squeals during church or public events when somebody doesn't take proper care to make sure inputs and outputs are balanced. Works for money too.
- Privatization of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (and other government agencies) could result in one of the largest "dumps" ever on individuals, as we (as taxpayers) have to bail out the greedy, corrupt, and inept "management"...
And just to be clear - if Obama gets elected tomorrow NOTHING will change.
- Ask yourself: if taxes were cut to ZERO, how would the bills get paid? Yet the current path is to reduce taxes to ZERO for the rich (i.e., eliminating the Corporate Gains tax, the Estate Tax, etc.). Guess who gets to make up the difference, shoulder the load, and bail out the crooks?"
Nancy writes:
In just two years ..... Remember the election in 2006?
Thought you might like to read the following ~
A little over one year ago:
1) Consumer confidence stood at a 2 1/2 year high;
2) Regular gasoline sold for $2.19 a gallon;
3) The unemployment rate was 4.5%.
Since voting in a Democratic Congress in 2006 we have seen:
1) Consumer confidence plummet;
2) The cost of regular gasoline soar to over $3.50 a gallon;
3) Unemployment is up to 5% (a 10% increase);
4) American households have seen $2.3 trillion in equity value evaporate (stock and mutual fund losses);
5) Americans have seen their home equity drop by $1.2 trillion dollars;
6) 1% of American homes are in foreclosure.
America voted for change in 2006, and we got it!
Remember it's Congress that makes law not the President. He has to work with what's handed to him.
In Remembrance, September 11, 2001
Seven years have passed since September 11. I was having breakfast in the Times Square area with my professor from my MBA days, Eric Flamholtz. Eric was in town from Los Angeles and I hadn't seen him since 1981, twenty years earlier. When I left the restaurant everyone at Times Square was staring at the electronic news ticker. I didn't pay attention and got onto the subway. The police were talking about a building that had been leveled, but I did not believe what they were saying. In Brooklyn, the train stopped and the passengers were told to take a bus down Flatbush Avenue. (Brooklyn College is located along Flatbush Ave.) While I was on the bus a woman sitting next to me told me that the Twin Towers had been destroyed. When I arrived at Brooklyn College my office-mate was conferring with a student and I told him about the destruction of the Towers. At first he did not believe me. My students asked to be dismissed early. I can't remember if I said yes, I believe I did. We had trouble getting home. I could not take my usual subway line because it went past what is now known as Ground Zero. I took a train that went over one of the bridges. You could see the smoke pouring out of the crushed towers, and the smell was strong. Desperation was everywhere. Upon learning of the full extent of the tragedy, I was heart broken.
Seeing and smelling this horror from a couple of miles away was horror enough. I pray for those who died and for those who lost family members in this terrible event.
If I examine my and others' response of incredulity at the time the attack occurred, the subsequent disrespectful denials, frivolous blaming of the US and Israeli governments, and on Zionists and Jews, make sense. A terrible event creates anxiety and anxiety creates denial. I have nothing but contempt for those who would allow childish fantasies to stain the memories of those whose lives were ended. I pray for the dead, sick and injured and hope that we can properly live up to their memories. I celebrate the courageous police, firemen and rescue workers who risked and lost their lives on that fateful day.
I sincerely hope that we do not give up the effort to capture Osama bin Laden.
Seeing and smelling this horror from a couple of miles away was horror enough. I pray for those who died and for those who lost family members in this terrible event.
If I examine my and others' response of incredulity at the time the attack occurred, the subsequent disrespectful denials, frivolous blaming of the US and Israeli governments, and on Zionists and Jews, make sense. A terrible event creates anxiety and anxiety creates denial. I have nothing but contempt for those who would allow childish fantasies to stain the memories of those whose lives were ended. I pray for the dead, sick and injured and hope that we can properly live up to their memories. I celebrate the courageous police, firemen and rescue workers who risked and lost their lives on that fateful day.
I sincerely hope that we do not give up the effort to capture Osama bin Laden.
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