Month: February 2008

Stability Isn’t Everything

Mark Perry (Carpe Diem) touts the stability of the U.S. economy:

The U.S. economy has become increasingly more stable over time…. Since 1985, real GDP growth has fluctuated in a range between 0 and 5%. Despite a slowdown, or even a recession, we are fortunate to be living in the most economically stable period in U.S. history.

Well, maybe not so fortunate. As I note here:

Had the economy continued to grow after 1907 at the 1790-1907 rate, real GDP in 2006 would have been $32 trillion, vice the actual value of $11 trillion [in year 2000 dollars].

The year 1907 marks the onset of the regulatory-welfare state (see this). The era of economic stability that we now “enjoy” has come at a very high price. It is the stability of imprisonment in a government-controlled economy. The result has been a diminishing rate of growth, accompanied by a rising rate of inflation:

Real GDP is nominal (current-dollar) GDP divided by the GDP deflator, a measure of changes in the overall level of prices for the goods and services that make up GDP. I derived five-year averages from the estimates of real GDP and the GDP deflator for 1790 through 2006, as provided by Louis D. Johnston and Samuel H. Williamson, “The Annual Real and Nominal GDP for the United States, 1790 – Present.” Economic History Services, July 27, 2007, URL : http://eh.net/hmit/gdp/. UPDATE (01/30/08): The averages for 2005 include estimates of real GDP and the GDP deflator for 2007, as issued by the Bureau of Economic Analysis on January 30, 2008. [From “Is Inflation Inevitable?” (18 Jan 2008)]

Ignore the artificially high rate of growth from the early 1930s to the end of World War II. It reflects the recovery from the government-caused-and prolonged Great Depression, followed by the war-fueled “boom.” Similarly, ignore the inflation spikes that coincide with the Civil War and World War I. The true story is told by the trend lines. Things were going quite well until the early 1900s. Then, thanks to “progressives” and their “reforms,” government got into the act, in a big way…

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

George Santayana, The Life of Reason

The Heritage Guide to the Constitution

I worked my way slowly through The Heritage Guide to the Constitution after receiving my copy more than two years ago. I finished the Guide two days ago. The exercise confirmed what I already knew, namely, that the original meaning of the Constitution (including its amendments) has been twisted badly.

I am now embarked on an effort to contrast the present, judicial interpretation of the Constitution with its original meaning, section by section and clause by clause.

My Dilemma

The thought of Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama as president appalls me. Both are “liberal fascists,” but Clinton is a personally despicable one.

So, I chortle (not cackle) every time Obama beats Clinton in a primary. But as Obama racks up those primary wins he becomes the more likely nominee of the Democrat Party.

Obama (so the polls say) is more electable than Clinton. Therefore, my delight in Obama’s success against Clinton may become my dismay if that success leads to an Obama presidency.

I resolve, therefore, to hope that Clinton becomes the Democrat nominee — much as I would enjoy seeing Clinton (and Clinton) rejected by their own party.

An Embarrassment of Ignoramuses

This reminds me of the multitude of lemming-like politicians and celebrities who have joined the “crusade” against global warming. (It would be a lot cooler if they would just close their mouths.)

Will those multitudes be embarrassed a few years from now when the scientific “consensus” turns against them? Not at all. They’ll have by then joined other ill-conceived “crusades” against other imaginary ills, or ones that cannot be cured by government. Why? For the sake of having government tell the rest of us how to live our lives.

And so it goes in the never-never land of the fashionable doom-sayer.

Related posts:
“The Worriers” (13 Jun 2004)
“More about the Worrying Classes” (17 Jun 2004)
“‘Warmism’: The Myth of Anthropogenic Global Warming” (23 Aug 2007)
“Re: Climate ‘Science’” (19 Sep 2007)
“More Evidence against Anthropogenic Global Warming” (25 Sep 2007)
“Yet More Evidence against Anthropogenic Global Warming” (04 Oct 2007)
“Global Warming, Close to Home” (22 Dec 2007)
“You Know…” (02 Jan 2008)
“Global Warming, Close to Home (II)” (06 Jan 2008)

Liberal Fascism

There’s an excellent post on the subject, here. (Inspired by Jonah Goldberg and his recently published book, Liberal Fascism.) [UPDATE (02/11/08): See also this, by Thomas Sowell.]

Related posts at Liberty Corner include:
“Calling a Nazi a Nazi” (12 Mar 2006)
“Things to Come” (27 Jun 2007)
“FDR and Fascism” (30 Sep 2007)
“A Political Compass: Locating the United States” (13 Nov 2007)
“The Modern Presidency: A Tour of American History since 1900” (01 Dec 2007)
“Intellectuals and Capitalism” (15 Jan 2008)
“Political Correctness” (29 Jan 2008)
“The People’s Romance” (30 Jan 2008)
“Fascism” (30 Jan 2008)

Election 2008: Fourth Forecast

My eighth forecast is here.

The Presidency – Method 1

Intrade posts State-by-State odds odds on the outcome of the presidential election in November. I assign all of a State’s electoral votes to the party whose nominee that is expected to win that State. Where the odds are 50-50, I split the State’s electoral votes between the two parties.

As of today, the odds point to this result:

Democrat, 300 electoral votes

Republican, 238 electoral votes

The Presidency – Method 2

I have devised a “secret formula” for estimating the share of electoral votes cast for the winner of the presidential election. (The formula’s historical accuracy is described in my second forecast.) The formula currently yields these estimates of the outcome this year’s presidential election [UPDATED 02/09/08 02/11/08]:

Democrat nominee — 261 to 302 EVs 228 to to 269 EVs 261 to 310 EVs

Republican nominee — 236 to 277 EVs 269 to 310 EVs 236 to 277 EVs

* * *

Both methods afford a better outlook for the GOP than the one given in my third forecast on December 12. [Today’s update of method 2, in fact, puts the GOP nominee in the lead.] The gain, I believe, is attributable mainly to John McCain’s success in the race for the GOP nomination; that is, McCain is perceived as the Republican most likely to beat the Democrat nominee. The gain is attributable, also, to the strong (if no longer overwhelming) possibility that Hillary Clinton will be the Democrat nominee. Clinton, in spite of her strength within her party, probably would be a weaker nominee than Obama. The update of 02/11/08 reflects Obama’s strong showing over the past weekend (sweeping four Dem primaries/caucuses) and the expectation that he will do well in tomorrow’s “Potomac primary” (i.e., the primaries in MD, DC, and VA).

I believe that future forecasts will become more favorable to the GOP nominee (i.e., McCain). The current forecast doesn’t take into account the damage that the acrimonious race between Clinton and Obama will do to both. If Obama sweeps tomorrow’s races and soon thereafter becomes the “presumptive” Democrat nominee, Democrats may quickly unite behind him. Moreover, [T]he ugly reality of a[n] Clinton or Obama presidency will should offset the present disaffection for McCain among some conservatives. As conservatives “return to the fold,” McCain’s chances will rise. But Obama is looming as the man to beat in November 2008.

* * *

Congress

UPDATED 02/09/08: Democrats will pick up four Senate seats, one each in Colorado, New Hampshire, New Mexico, and Virginia. The gain will change the balance from 51 Democrats (including Lieberman and Sanders, both nominally independent) and 49 Republicans to 55 Democrats and 45 Republicans.

The House? Later.

* * *
How did I do in 2004? See this and this.

Nonprofits and Charity

Guest post:

There are interesting items at the First Things blog (like a recent commentary by Robert Spencer on slavery in western and eastern cultures). The post that particularly piqued my interest was the one by Charles Chaput, the Catholic Archbishop of Denver, discussing Colorado HB 1080, a law promoted by the leftist Anti-Defamation League. Ostensibly an “anti-discriminatory” measure it is in fact aimed at preventing the

legitimate freedom of religiously affiliated nonprofits to hire employees of like faith to carry out their mission. In practice, HB 1080 would strike down the freedom of Catholic Charities to preferentially hire Catholics for its leadership jobs if it takes state funds.

Now one may ask why nonprofits would want to enter into that devil’s bargain in the first place. Chaput, speaking for his own church, says that

Catholic Charities can always decline public funds and continue its core mission with private money. In the Archdiocese of Denver, we’re ready to do exactly that. But the issues involved in HB 1080, and the troubling agenda behind it, are worth some hard reflection.

But the “big lesson” behind all this is that

Religious groups have been delivering services to the poor a great deal longer than the government. The government uses religious social service agencies precisely because they’re good at it and typically more cost-effective in their work than the government could be.

Chaput is well known for his outspokenness on moral issues. But perhaps even more surprising is this unambiguous endorsement of market economics.

Sadly, Catholics have bought heavily into statist/socialist economic schemes since the late 19th century. Just look at the northern urban trade union vote which caused many Catholics to support the New Deal and subsequent Democratic policies. No doubt much of this was well intentioned—unlike outright utopianism which is less interested in charity and more interested in arrogant social engineering. Still, the damage has been done (for background on this, see “The Rise of the Religious Left,” from The Wall Street Journal).

One might think that there is something analogous, after all, between the social gospel and socialism. Yet there can be no doubt that collectivism involves a very different set of assumptions from the Christian creed. While traditional Christianity is not an individualist creed (it can never endorse anarchism) it rests on the fundamental belief in individual responsibility, which is the antithesis of collective virtue/collective guilt ideologies. When, for example, clerics embraced “liberation theology” and similar theories in the 1960s and ’70s, the core issues fell by the wayside and one saw (at least until recently) prominent Catholic prelates endorsing Democratic leftist politicians.

These things will take a long time to sort out. Statism is really nothing new to western culture—though it has become more obnoxious over time. And for most religious traditionalists moral issues will still trump economic ones (either way), since even a good social order will fall part without ethical fortitude. Nevertheless, it’s about time that Christians recovered not only their spiritual but the best of their socio-political heritage.

For related comments, see “The Economic Divide on the Right: Distributists vs. Capitalists.”

Waterboarding, Torture, and Defense

I stipulate, only for the sake of argument, that waterboarding is torture.

Some argue that torture is unconscionable — even when done sparingly, as a defensive act, and not for its own sake — because it “lowers us to the enemy’s level.” This is non-torture for its own sake, regardless of the consequences of such a policy: the killing and maiming of innocents.

Others conjure the specter of rampant torture in their zeal to discredit the war in Iraq and the war on terrorism. I disregard such views because those who hold them are either dupes, or enemies themselves, if they are not simply pseudo-rational academics.

The question remains whether we should commit (or allow) isolated, controlled acts of self-defense that might be called torture. I say “yes,” for these reasons:

  • In spite of our national descent into statism, we (most of us) remain morally superior to our terrorist enemies.
  • I do not believe that our “national character” can be diminished by isolated, controlled acts of torture. (Just as I do not believe, for example, that our “national character” was diminished by our wise use of the A-bomb to end of World War II and avert millions of casualties, Japanese and American.)
  • It is folly to tell our enemies that we will not do what it takes to defend ourselves. [UPDATE, 02/13/08: Like this.]
  • If we fail to defend ourselves, we enable our enemies to harm us and gain more influence in the world. Those are not conditions in which we (most of us) would choose to live.

Related posts:
“Torture and Morality” (04 Dec 2005)
“A Rant about Torture” (16 Feb 2006)
“Taking on Torture” (15 Aug 2006)
“Torture, Revisited” (26 Dec 2007)

The Poor Get Richer

Mark Perry (Carpe Diem) points to some research about economic mobility, and concludes

that more than 2 out 3 Americans born a generation ago have already surpassed their parents’ income, and more than 4 of every 5 Americans born to parents in the bottom fifth during the late 1960s and early 1970s are better off than their parents.

I told you so:
“Why Class Warfare Is Bad for Everyone” (21 Sep 2004)
“Fighting Myths with Facts” (27 Sep 2004)
“Debunking More Myths of Income Inequality” (13 Oct 2004)
“Ten Commandments of Economics” (02 Dec 2005)
“More Commandments of Economics” (06 Dec 2005)
“Zero-Sum Thinking” (29 Dec 2005)
“On Income Inequality” (09 Mar 2006)
“The Causes of Economic Growth” (08 Apr 2006)
“The Last(?) Word about Income Inequality” (21 Jul 2006)
“Your Labor Day Reading” (04 Sep 2006)
“Status, Spite, Envy, and Income Redistribution” (04 Sep 2006)

Stay at Home in November?

It has been suggested that conservative voters should stay home in November if John McCain is the Republican nominee.

It’s true that McCain is not a conservative. He is, rather, an idiosyncratic statist who holds conservative and “liberal” views, as his fancy strikes him.

However…inasmuch as McCain would face either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama — both of whom are abysmally “liberal” — abstention would be akin to self-flagellation. It’s hard to see how McCain, abetted by a Democrat-controlled Congress, could do worse than Clinton or Obama, abetted by the same Congress. I know of no issue on which I prefer Clinton or Obama to McCain. McCain, at least, would not surrender to terrorists, would strive to maintain strong defenses, and would make better (if not ideal) judicial appointments.

It’s easy to say, as some do, that losing would be good for the GOP, because losing might cause the GOP to rethink its course and return to its limited-government philosophy. On the other hand, in its zeal to recapture the White House and Congress, the GOP might just become more “Democrat light” than it already is.

In any event, if McCain heads the Republican ticket, the choice for conservatives will be between a “bad” GOP nominee and a “terrible” Democrat nominee. “Bad” being better than “terrible,” I would hold my nose and vote for McCain.

P.S. Sensible bloggers agree with me.

P.P.S. Another sensible blogger who agrees (with links to others, as well).

P.P.P.S. And another two (make it three).

On the other hand: This is about as wrong-headed as it gets, not only with respect to withholding a vote from McCain but also with respect to the nature of an Obama presidency. Obama in the White House and Democrats in control of Congress: a prescription for economic ruin and defenselessness.

I’m for Romney…I Think

Answer the 10 questions here to compare the views of six presidential candidates (four Republicans and two Democrats) with your views on the issues covered. There are no questions about such issues as McCain-Feingold, judicial appointments, or defense spending in general, as opposed to the war in Iraq.

Given that caveat, here is how the candidates stack up against my views on 10 issues:

1. Ron Paul – 80% agreement
2. Mitt Romney – 80%
3. Mick Huckabee – 70%
4. John McCain – 60%
5. Hillary Clinton – 20%
6. Barack Obama – 10%

I had previously ruled out Ron Paul, who says the right things on most issues, but who also keeps bad company. That leaves me with Romney. I’m surprised.

Politics and Experience

Thomas Sowell deflates Hillary Clinton and John McCain’s claims of “experience”; for example:

Whether in Arkansas or in Washington, Hillary Clinton has spent decades parlaying her husband’s political clout into both money and power. How did that benefit anybody but the Clintons?

For those people whose memories are short, go on the Internet and look up Whitewater, the confidential raw FBI files on hundreds of Republican politicians that somehow — nobody apparently knows how — ended up in the Clinton White House illegally.

Look up the sale of technology to China that can enable them to more accurately hit American cities with nuclear missiles. Then look up the money that found its way to the Clintons through devious channels.

Look up Bill Clinton’s firing of every single U.S. Attorney in the country, which of course included those who were investigating him for corruption as governor of Arkansas.

It would be hard to find two people less trustworthy than the Clintons or with a longer trail of sleaze and slime.

Senator John McCain is also touting his “experience,” both in politics and in the military.

Senator McCain’s political record is full of zig-zags summarized in the word “maverick.” That is another way of saying that you don’t know what he is going to do next, except that it will be in the interests of John McCain.

While you are on the Internet looking up the record of the Clintons, look up John McCain’s record, including the Keating Five, the McCain-Feingold bill, and the McCain-Kennedy immigration bill.

John McCain’s military service was both honorable and heroic. But let’s not confuse that with experience relevant to being President of the United States.

John McCain was a naval aviator, an important and demanding job. But a naval aviator is not like Patton or Eisenhower.

Politics and experience have almost nothing in common these days. We have, on the one hand, professional politicians whose working lives are dedicated to feeding at the public trough for the power, glory, and graft it brings them. We have, on the other hand, a gullible public that mistakes politicians for “real people” and political experience for real experience.

Hillary Clinton was born and raised in comfortable circumstances. Most of her adult life has been spent as a lobbyist, political aide, political appointee (by which I include her partnership in the Rose Law firm), politician’s enabler, and then U.S. Senator.

In John McCain we have a son and grandson of admirals. (There is privilege in that, believe me.) McCain’s 54 years in the Naval Academy, Navy, and Congress was punctuated (almost 30 years ago) by a brief fling in the private sector (courtesy of his second wife’s father).

What “real people” need are politicians with real experience. The experience of having parents who sometimes struggled to make ends meet. The experience of having done the same for at least a few years of one’s adulthood. The experience of having owned and run a business without a public or private subsidy. The experience of having seen, close up, the inner workings of government bureaucracies, in all their cumbersome ineptitude.

Real experience isn’t enough to qualify anyone for political office, but it’s a start. It’s a necessary condition, if not a sufficient one.

Blogging Fodder

I’m working on a post titled “Is There Such a Thing as Society?” There is, but it certainly isn’t coterminous with the nation. In evidence of that point are the City Council of Berkeley, California, and lawyer-terrorist Lynne Stewart — sociopaths all. More later.

The Misunderstood Race Issue

Guest post:

Though the Democrats have tried to put a lid on the race issue in their campaign, it will work itself out again before too long. Obama may have better people skills. He doesn’t have that look of perpetual dyspepsia that Clinton evinces, which is a symptom of her ill-concealed arrogance. But Obama is black after all, and if you think that doesn’t matter to liberal Democrats then you’ve misunderstood the race issue. In fact, it’s been misunderstood for decades.

First lesson: Racialism is not ipso facto synonymous with conservatism. It is not based on principle but on irrational prejudice. If any group is really trying to look beyond the divisive race issue it is conservatives, particularly social conservatives. On the other hand, I’ve met many liberals who were bigots. As it turns out, most of their bigotry is directed at blacks, for unique reasons that seem to have to do with culture and history (see Sowell for more information). As such, Jews as well as other whites can hold prejudiced views against blacks. This point also belies long-standing stereotypes about Jews, race and anti-Semitism.

Second lesson: The mainstream has traditionally equated anti-Jewishness with racialism, yet there are plenty of people, including non-whites, who are anti-Jewish without harboring any other racial views. Hatred of Jews is motivated more by conspiratorial views of society than biological theories, hence the recurring tendency of the Left to indulge in anti-Semitism. By that same token there is a brand of white ethnocentrism which is inclusive towards Jews (e.g., Jared Taylor’s American Renaissance movement). Finally, a serious belief in equality means that blacks, possessing human nature like everyone else, are just as liable to bigotry as whites (see a good commentary on this point from a theologically conservative perspective).

Third lesson: As Liberty Corner has pointed out in the past, left-liberal views on race manifest themselves in the form of socialist paternalism. Maybe it should be called “compassionate racism.” According to this, what are seen as disruptive tendencies on the part of many blacks are deemed inevitable (which they are not) and must be pandered to (which they should not) for to sake of statist welfare policies. This is because what motivates liberal elitists is not concern for blacks, any more than Marxist leaders are concerned for the “plight of the worker.” It’s about the manipulation of people for the sake of political power. So if there is any difference between racists on the left and on the right, it is that the former are sanctimonious hypocrites who preach equality while covertly segregating themselves economically and socially from blacks.

Fourth lesson: But what about racism on the “right”? Does my model still hold? I maintain that it does. Again, racial bigotry is an irrational response to physical or social differences in other people. Ideologically it stems from the nationalism and materialism of the 19th century; views anathema to a traditional Christian outlook. This fact explains how someone like Karl Marx shared the same bigoted racial views as his ultra-nationalist contemporaries. I’ve found that right-wingers who back populist/nativist political movements are often social libertines. They may be against big government, gun-control, immigration, etc. but are to the left on issues like abortion, euthanasia, traditional marriage, and public morality. Their thinking is emotive rather than principled. This may explain why Hitler’s political appeal in 1930s Germany cut across traditional political boundaries, since he catered to the short-sighted, hedonistic sentiments of both socialists and radical nationalists.

In conclusion, it is clear that the race issue in politics has been long misunderstood… perhaps deliberately so.