Libertarians Coming Together to Fight it Out

On October 22, the Cato Institute will host a conference on the subject of “Lessons from the Iraq War: Reconciling Liberty and Security.” Much of it will be a re-hash of the war in Iraq. But Panel III — “The Principles Guiding Military Intervention” — might offer some useful libertarian insights for and against pre-emptive war.

For some of my neolibertarian views on the subject, try these posts:

Libertarian Nay-Saying on Foreign and Defense Policy

Libertarian Nay-Saying on Foreign and Defense Policy, Revisited

Libertarianism and Pre-emptive War: Part I

Right On! For Libertarian Hawks Only

Understanding Libertarian Hawks

More about Neolibertarianism

More about Libertarian Hawks and Doves

Defense, Anarcho-Capitalist Style

That Mythical, Magical Social Security Trust Fund

You know the trust fund that’s supposed to keep Social Security solvent until 2042, even though benefit payments will begin to exceed receipts in 2018? First, it’s phony, as explained by Olivia S. Mitchell and Thomas R. Saving in a July 31, 2001, Washington Post op-ed piece:

…When Social Security ran annual surpluses in the past, it enabled other parts of government to spend more. The trust fund measures how much the government has borrowed from Social Security over the years, just as your credit card balance indicates how much you have borrowed. The only way to get the money to pay off your credit balance is to earn more, spend less or take out a loan. Likewise, the only way for the government to redeem trust fund IOUs is to raise taxes, cut spending or borrow.

Politicians and independent analysts have recognized the past inability of government to “lock-box” the trust fund. In 1989, for example, the assistant comptroller of the General Accounting Office said, “We shouldn’t kid the American people into thinking extra savings is going on.” It wasn’t until 1999 that the non-Social Security portion of the government budget finally reached balance. Only then was the Social Security surplus actually used to retire government debt.

We are surprised that this perspective on the trust fund is controversial. The commission’s interim report quotes credible sources — the Congressional Budget Office, the General Accounting Office and the Congressional Research Service — supporting the view that the trust fund is an asset to Social Security but a liability to the rest of the government. The Clinton administration’s fiscal year 2000 budget indicated a similar perspective:

“These [trust fund] balances are available to finance future benefit payments and other Trust Fund expenditures — but only in a bookkeeping sense. . . . They do not consist of real economic assets that can be drawn down in the future to fund benefits. Instead, they are claims on the Treasury that, when redeemed, will have to be financed by raising taxes, borrowing from the public, or reducing benefits or other expenditures. The existence of large Trust Fund balances, therefore, does not, by itself, have any impact on the Government’s ability to pay benefits.”

Does this mean the government will not make good on those trust fund claims? Of course not, and the commission never suggested this. In fact, one principle guiding the commission’s work is that current and near-retirees must have their benefits preserved. Still, the nation has only three ways to redeem trust fund bonds: raising taxes, cutting spending or increasing government borrowing. If there is some alternative source of funds, no one has yet suggested it. And the annual amounts to be repaid are large and rising over time: $93 billion in 2020, $194 billion in 2025, and $271 billion in 2030 (in today’s dollars).

Some have suggested we could solve our Social Security problems simply by legislating a higher interest rate on trust fund bonds. This has superficial appeal, since it would be a simple bookkeeping matter for the Treasury. It would make the trust fund look bigger and extend the date when the trust fund is exhausted — on paper. But no increase in the amount we owe ourselves creates new saving. The same people will be retiring, expecting the same benefits and posing the same need for revenues irrespective of the size of the trust fund.

One way or another, promises of Social Security benefits made under the current system must be financed by taxpayers. These costs are slated to grow from 10.5 percent of taxable wages today to 13.3 percent in 2016, 17.8 percent in 2038 and 19.3 percent in 2075. That is why reform now is crucial, when time is still on our side. With each passing year of non-action, the day of reckoning draws nearer, leaving us with fewer options.

Olivia S. Mitchell, a Democrat, is a professor of insurance and risk management at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. Thomas R. Saving, a Republican, is a professor of economics at Texas A&M and a member of the Social Security Board of Trustees.

So much for the mythical trust fund. Now, about those magical interest rates. According to the Social Security Administration, bonds issued to the trust funds in 2003 had an interest rate of 3.5 percent, compared with an interest rate of 5.25 percent for bonds issued in 2002. That’s not too bad, considering that the average rate on 20-year Treasury bonds (the Treasury’s longest maturity) was 4.96 percent in 2003 and 5.43 percent in 2002. But it’s not nearly as good as, say, AAA and BAA rated corporate bonds and conventional mortgages, which had these average yields: AAA 2003, 5.66 percent; AAA 2002, 6.49 percent; BAA 2003, 6.76 percent; BAA 2002, 7.80 percent; conventional mortgage 2003, 6.54 percent; conventional mortgage 2002, 5.82 percent. In other words, high quality corporate bonds and conventional mortgages carry significantly higher interest rates than government bonds (because of the perception that corporate bonds and conventional mortgages are riskier than government debt).

These facts point to a way to ease the transition to private Social Security accounts. First, convert the mythical trust fund to a real one by creating an independent agency to invest the trust fund in high-quality corporate bonds and conventional mortgages. The agency would gradually sell off the trust fund’s portfolio of highly marketable government bonds and replace them with high-quality corporate bonds and conventional mortgages. In the end, the trust fund would comprise real assets, and those real assets would earn real income, at rates higher than those magically credited to the mythical trust fund upon which the future of Social Security now rests uneasily.

The additional revenue earned by the new trust fund wouldn’t wipe out the pending deficit in Social Security, nor would it prevent the eventual depletion of the trust fund. But the depletion of the trust fund could be held off long enough to enable a graceful transition to private social security accounts. The slower that transition, the less painful would be the temporary — but necessary — combination of tax increases and/or benefit reductions.

In the end, we’ll be better off because each worker will be investing for his or her own retirement — unlike the present system, which places an increasingly heavy burden on future generations. But we need more time to get there, and “privatizing” the trust fund is a good way to buy that time.

Billy Bob and the Bard

“Billy: Bard’s a load of bull.” That’s the headline on a piece at The Sun Newspaper Online. There’s more:

HOLLYWOOD star Billy Bob Thornton has created Much Ado in the acting world — by branding William Shakespeare “bulls**t”.

The heavily-tattooed American actor, 49 — whose films include Bad Santa and Armageddon — launched an astonishing attack on the Bard.

He compared the legendary English playwright’s work to corny soap operas.

He said: “I think Shakespeare’s overrated. It’s bulls**t. I’d never go and see a Shakespeare play. Who’d want to see me in Hamlet?…

“It’s not that I don’t understand it. But people think if you speak with an English accent it somehow makes you smarter.

“I don’t believe in all the flowery language — all of his plays are just a series of soap operas.”

Billy Bob — who plays a foul-mouthed Father Christmas in the Santa comedy — likened works such as Macbeth and Romeo and Juliet to US daytime drama Days Of Our Lives….

Well, Billy Bob, no one would want to see you in Hamlet, that’s for sure. If he thinks there’s nothing more to Shakespeare than “flowery language” he doesn’t understand it, in spite of his protestations. But what do you expect from someone who starred in Bad Santa, a vile piece of trash that I tolerated for about five minutes. If the DVD hadn’t been a rental I would have smashed it.

Actually, I think Billy Bob’s in a bad mood because he’s made so many stinkers lately. Not counting Bad Santa, six of his last seven movies have garnered fair-to-terrible ratings by viewers, according to Internet Movie Database.

Why I Don’t Hang Around with Economists

Sometimes economists who blog remind me why hanging around with economists is not good for the soul. Matthew Yglesias, a philosopher, started if off by saying, in connection with some controversy about Al-Zarqawi’s tied to bin Laden:

Maybe the Marginal Revolution guys can shed some light on whether it’s better to be fighting a consolidated jihadi monopoly or several competing terrorist firms.

Unfortunately, the economists rose to the bait. First, Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution goes through the usual, “if this, then that” routine before saying:

My guess: In Iraq you would prefer a smaller number of groups, since there is some chance of striking a deal with them. And there we are more worried about the suicide bombers than a loose nuclear device, so economies of scale do not overturn this conclusion. We are less likely to ever “trade” with al Qaeda and its offshoots, so in that case I would prefer splintering. Furthermore al Qaeda has a greater long-run nuclear potential, so it is more important to deny them potential economies of scale. I suspect we do not much mind if western Pakistan becomes a scene for terrorist infighting, whereas such conflicts could scuttle reconstruction in Iraq.

Then Glen Whitman at Agoraphilia gets into the act:

In reality, both models apply. Terrorists get money both from sales of other products and from donations, and they commit terrorist acts both for consumption and as a business venture. If it’s true that terrorist organizations are becoming more decentralized and independent, the net gain or loss to the victim-class will depend on which source of funding, sales of illicit services or donor contributions, is more important. My sinking suspicion is that it’s the latter.

For pity’s sake, fellas, it doesn’t matter because we can’t do anything about it, other than figure out where they are and what they’re up to, then stymie their plans and kill them.

Economists often lose sight of the ball. They’re so busy explaining what makes it curve that they’re not ready to swing at it.

All of which reminds me of going to lunch with economists, which I quit doing after a few outings. The idea of going to lunch with colleagues is to have some laughs, some good conversation (not about economics), and a few beers to help you coast through the afternoon. With economists, however, lunch always went something like this: Carping at the waiter about what’s not on the menu, followed by carping at the waiter about whether he brought the right orders to the table, followed by carefully dissecting the bill to ensure that everyone pays for precisely what he ordered, followed by computing the tip down to the last red cent instead of rounding up to the nearest dollar out of consideration for the beleaguered waiter. I’d rather have lunch with undertakers.

Does Capital Punishment Deter Homicide?

Ted Goertzel wants to believe that it doesn’t. In “Capital Punishment and Homicide: Sociological Realities and Econometric Illusions,” he asks and answers the question:

Does executing murderers cut the homicide rate or not? Comparative studies show there is no effect. Econometric models, in contrast, show a mixture of results. Why the difference? And which is the more reliable method?

His argument for comparative studies is simplistic, to say the least:

The first of the comparative studies of capital punishment was done by Thorsten Sellin in 1959. Sellin was a sociologist at the University of Pennsylvania and one of the pioneers of scientific criminology….

Sellin applied his combination of qualitative and quantitative methods in an exhaustive study of capital punishment in American states. He used every scrap of data that was available, together with his knowledge of the history, economy, and social structure of each state. He compared states to other states and examined changes in states over time. Every comparison he made led him to the “inevitable conclusion . . . that executions have no discernible effect on homicide rates”….

Sellin’s work has been replicated time and time again, as new data have become available, and all of the replications have confirmed his finding that capital punishment does not deter homicide (see Bailey and Peterson 1997, and Zimring and Hawkins 1986). These studies are an outstanding example of what statistician David Freedman (1991) calls “shoe leather” social research. The hard work is collecting the best available data, both quantitative and qualitative. Once the statistical data are collected, the analysis consists largely in displaying them in tables, graphs, and charts which are then interpreted in light of qualitative knowledge of the states in question. This research can be understood by people with only modest statistical background. This allows consumers of the research to make their own interpretations, drawing on their qualitative knowledge of the states in question.

This is laughable. You compile a bunch of data and display it in “tables, graphs, and charts which are then interpreted in light of qualitative knowledge of the states in question.” In other words, you see what you want to see, and scores of researchers who want to believe that capital punishment doesn’t deter homicide have simply squinted at their “tables, graphs, and charts” in just the right way, so that they could “prove” what they already believed. Qualitative, gut-feeling, ouija-board analysis — in Goertzel’s view — is superior to rigorous statistical analysis, which he pooh-poohs. Worse than that, he seems to pooh-pooh it without understanding it:

Econometricians inhabit the mythical land of Ceteris Paribus, a place where everything is constant except the variables they choose to write about. Ceteris Paribus has much in common with the mythical world of Flatland in Edwin Abbot’s (1884) classic fairy tale. In Flatland everything moves along straight lines, flat plains, or rectangular boxes. In Flatland, statistical averages become mathematical laws. For example, it is true that, on the average, tall people weigh more than short people. But, in the real world, not every tall person weighs more than a shorter one. In Flatland knowing someone’s height would be enough to tell you their precise weight, because both vary only on a straight line. In Flatland, if you plotted height and weight on a graph with height on one axis and weight on the other, all the points would fall on a straight line.

Of course, econometricians know that they don’t live in Flatland. But the mathematics works much better when they pretend they do. So they adjust the data in one way or another to make it straighter (often by converting it to logarithms). Then they qualify their remarks, saying “capital punishment deters homicide, ceteris paribus.” But when the real-world data diverge greatly from the straight lines of Flatland, this can lead to bizarre results.

They don’t adjust their data to make it “straighter,” they introduce relevant controlling variables, which cannot done in any way other than through econometric (multiple regression) analysis. Try looking at “tables, graphs, and charts” of comparative homicide data while mentally accounting for such factors as income, age, race, gender, and population density, and see what you come up with. Nothing at all, unless you choose to ignore those and other relevant factors. Goertzel is either stupid or he simply chooses to misrepresent multiple regression analysis.

Goertzel does acknowledge and discuss some econometric analyses, for the purpose of contrasting their results:

…Mocan and Gittings…concluded that each execution decreases the number of homicides by five or six while Dezhbaksh, Rubin, and Shepherd…argued that each execution deters eighteen murders. Cloninger and Marchesini…published a study finding that the Texas moratorium from March 1996 to April 1997 increased homicide rates, even though no increase can be seen in the graph….The moratorium simply increased homicide in comparison to what their econometric model said it would have otherwise been….[Exactly. That’s what econometric models do.]

Cloninger and Marchesini concede that “studies such as the present one that rely on inductive statistical analysis cannot prove a given hypothesis correct.” [That’s simply a standard scientific disclaimer, which Goertzel wouldn’t understand.] However, they argue that when a large number of such studies give the same result, this provides “robust evidence” which “causes any neutral observer pause.”…[But Goertzel isn’t a neutral observer, as you can tell.]

Econometricians often dismiss the kind of comparative research that Thorsten Sellin did as crude and unsophisticated when compared to their use of complex mathematical formulas. But mathematical complexity does not make for good social science. The goal of multiple regression is to convert messy sociological realities into math problems that can be resolved with the certainty of mathematical proof…[No, the goal is to take relevant factors into account.]

Enough of Goertzel. The econometric evidence is there, for those who are open to it: Capital punishment does deter homicide. See, for example, the careful analysis by Hashem Dezhbaksh, Paul Robin, and Joanna Shepherd, “Does capital punishment have a deterrent effect? New evidence from post-moratorium panel data,” American Law and Economics Review 5(2): 344–376 (available in PDF format here). Dezhbaksh, Rubin, and Shepherd argue that each execution deters eighteen murders. That number may be high, but the analysis is rigorous and it accounts for relevant variables, such as income, age, race, gender, population density, and use of the death penalty where it is legal. It’s hard to read that analysis and believe that capital punishment doesn’t deter homicide — unless you want to believe it. I certainly wouldn’t take “Ouija Board” Goertzel’s opinion over that of careful econometricians like Dezhbaksh, Rubin, and Shepherd.

Now, I must say that I don’t care whether or not capital punishment deters homicide. Capital punishment is the capstone of a system of justice that used to work quite well in this country because it was certain and harsh. There must be a hierarchy of certain penalties for crime, and that hierarchy must culminate in the ultimate penalty if criminals and potential criminals are to believe that crime will be punished. When punishment is made less severe and less certain — as it was for a long time after World War II — crime flourishes and law-abiding citizens become less secure in their lives and property.

Related posts:
Libertarian Twaddle about the Death Penalty
Crime and Punishment
Abortion and Crime
Saving the Innocent?
Saving the Innocent?: Part II
More on Abortion and Crime
More Punishment Means Less Crime
More About Crime and Punishment
More Punishment Means Less Crime: A Footnote
Clear Thinking about the Death Penalty
Let the Punishment Fit the Crime
Another Argument for the Death Penalty
Less Punishment Means More Crime
Crime, Explained

A Victory for Property Rights: The Do-No-Call Registry Lives

The U.S. Supreme Court has “let stand a lower-court ruling that telemarketers’ rights to free speech are not violated by the government’s nationwide do-not-call list,” according to a Reuters report at MSNBC. The report continues:

Without comment, the justices rejected an appeal by commercial telemarketers against the lower-court ruling, which upheld as constitutional the popular program in which consumers can put their names on a list if they do not want to be called by telemarketers.

“We hold that the do-not-call registry is a valid commercial speech regulation because it directly advances the government’s important interests in safeguarding personal privacy and reducing the danger of telemarketing abuse without burdening an excessive amount of speech,” the appeals court said.

It’s all too nuanced for me. Here was my take on the issue, back on June 29:

It’s my phone and my house, dammit. There’s no free speech issue. Does freedom of speech give anyone the right to burst into your house at dinner time and shout “Joe Schmoe for dogcatcher!”? I don’t think so.

Anyway, let’s celebrate a victory for property rights, even if the courts can’t bring themselves to call it that.

Driving, Austin-Style

Austin must be the stop-sign-running capital of the world. I don’t know why everyone here is in such a hurry. It’s worse than the D.C. area, where I lived for almost 40 years. I can understand why all those people in the D.C. area run stop signs (and traffic lights) with abandon — they’re in a hurry to do something “important” for the nation. But Austin is the mere capital of one State (granted, it’s a big State and it still has a lot of oil), and an Austinite, by definition, can’t be more important than a denizen of the D.C. area.

Maybe Austinites are propelled by the refried beans that come with Austin’s ubiquitous Tex-Mex food. (I will say that Austin’s version of Mexican food is about 1000-percent better than the D.C. version.) Whatever it is, Austinites have this truly annoying habit of zooming through stop signs and around corners to plant themselves in your lane of traffic. Once there, most of them slow to a crawl and start talking on their cell phones.

Oh well, I’m retired and I have all the time in the world. Don’t mind me — just don’t hit me.

Happy Belated Anniversary…

…to me. Yesterday, October 3, marked the Xth anniversary of my retirement from the defense think-tank where I had worked for 30 years. I won’t dwell on the reasons for my joy at retiring — but it was a joyous event. So, happy belated anniversary to me.

P.S. You will note that I wrote “Xth anniversary,” not “X-year anniversary” in the contemporary way. “Anniversary,” according to The Living Webster Encyclopedic Dictionary of the English Language (1975 edition), means a “stated day on which some event is annually celebrated.” The Latin roots of the word are annus, a year, and verto, versum, to turn. Thus, the literal meaning of “anniversary” is “returning with the year at a stated time.”

The construction “X-year anniversary” has arisen because it has become common to denote the passage of less than a year since an event as an “X-month anniversary.” Only a person who is completely ignorant of the meaning of “anniversary” — or a person who is unwilling to stand up to the forces of lexical barbarity — could say “X-month anniversary.” As for “X-year” anniversary, it’s wrong because it’s redundant; “anniversary” itself denotes the passage of years.

There’s only one way to say it correctly, and that’s my way: “Xth anniversary.”

More about Israel, and the Left

I wrote recently and approvingly about Israel’s Gaza offensive. Now, according to an AP story, Israel’s Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has pledged to escalate a broad Israeli offensive in northern Gaza, saying troops will remain until Palestinian rocket attacks are halted. Sharon’s resolve is sure to invoke more wrath and scorn from the left, which reflexively hates Israel.

Why does the left hate Israel? Richard Baehr of The American Thinker spells it out:

1. It is an easy way to express one’s hatred for America.

2. Israel is viewed as an outpost of colonialism, and an active practitioner of it.

3. Israel is a western nation, and hence can be judged by the left. Israel is not protected by cultural relativism, as the Arabs are.

4. Leftist Christian churches can escape any lingering guilt about the Holocaust, by turning Israel into a villain. Some leftist churches hate Israel because they think this will help protect their members in the holy land — in other words they feel threatened.

5. Ferocious Muslim hatred of Israel and the Jews reinforces the natural cowardice of many on the left who go along with the Muslims to stay out of their line of fire.

6. Jewish leftists are prominent in the anti-Israel movement. This opens the floodgates for everybody else.

7. Israel is attacked because the secular left is appalled by the influence of religious settlers and their biblical connections to the land of Israel, and by the support for Israel by evangelical Christians, and Christian Zionists.

I think there’s a lot of merit in what Baehr says. I’m especially persuaded by the first three points, and the rest seem more than plausible.

Here’s my take: Israel owes its existence and strength, in large part, to the United States, which is Israel’s longtime benefactor. Israel and the United States are natural — if tacit — allies in the war on terror. The left hates America because America isn’t what the left wants it to be. In fact, the left’s hatred for America is so strong and deep that it’s fair to say that the left regards America as its main enemy. Israel — a staunch friend of the left’s main enemy — is therefore the left’s enemy, as well.

The Splenetic Krugman Truth Squad

According to Jeff Salamon, writing in today’s Austin American-Statesman,

Paul Krugman, whose incendiary columns occasionally run on the op-ed pages of the American-Statesman…, made the leap from famous-within-his-profession Princeton economics professor to famous-period pundit when he accepted a twice-weekly column at the no-longer-quite-so-Gray Lady. Krugman has been so tough on the current administration that he has even inspired a self-styled Krugman Truth Squad, who are even angrier than he is. Even when they get him dead to rights — and they do, sometimes — their rhetoric is so over the top (typical KTS blog headline: “Krugman Hate Crimes”) that you notice their spleen, rather than their facts.

The spleen is understandable. Krugman is the Goebbels of the pseudo-academic left. It’s hard to react to out-and-out vicious, lying propaganda with pure reason, even though the Krugman Truth Squad has reason (and facts) on its side.

But I’m not indulging in reason tonight. Just call me a member of the splenetic Krugman Truth Squad. And proud of it.

One Baseball Tradition Ends, Another Continues

A few days ago I posted about the fact that all the teams then leading major league baseball’s six divisions were pre-expansion (pre-1961) franchises. So much for that piece of trivia. The Anaheim Angels, one of the first two expansion franchises (est. 1961) caught up with the Oakland Athletics (descended from the Philadelphia Athletics, est. 1901) and went on to win the American League West title by beating the A’s today.

For those few of you who might be interested: The other 1961 expansion team was the Washington Senators, a team that replaced the original American League Senators (1901-60), which moved to Minnesota for the 1961 season and has been there since, as the Twins. The expansion Senators lasted only 11 seasons (1961-71) and moved to Texas, as the Rangers. You may know all that, but did you know that there were two Washington Senators teams in the National League (1886-9 and 1892-9)? Which means that Washington is about to get its fifth baseball franchise.

How many chances do you get to show that you can support a baseball team? If your name is Washington, it seems that you get as many chances as you want.

Birds of a Feather

AP, via Yahoo News!, reports this:

Brokaw, Jennings Show Support for Rather

By DEEPTI HAJELA, Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK – While acknowledging mistakes in CBS anchor Dan Rather’s “60 Minutes” report that questioned President Bush’s service in the National Guard, competing news anchors Tom Brokaw and Peter Jennings offered support Saturday for the beleaguered newsman.

Brokaw blasted what he called an attempt to “demonize” CBS and Rather on the Internet, where complaints about the report first surfaced. He said the criticism “goes well beyond any factual information.”

“What I think is highly inappropriate is what going on across the Internet, a kind of political jihad … that is quite outrageous,” the NBC anchor said at a panel on which all three men spoke….

The Guard story, aired on Sept. 8, was discredited because it relied on documents impugning Bush’s service that apparently were fake.

“I don’t think you ever judge a man by only one event in his career,” said Jennings, anchor on ABC….

Political jihad. That’s cute, Brokaw. But Rather’s the one who’s been on a political jihad for most of his “journalistic” career.

I agree, Jennings, never judge a man by only one event in his career. Rather’s bias shows up nightly. That’s more than 4,000 events since he took over as the anchor of CBS Nightly News. Not enough evidence for you? Plenty for me.

We’ll Be Watching You

The U.S. Supreme Court is the “you” in this case. The 2004-5 term of the Court opens Monday. Cases to watch, according to an AP story at Yahoo! News:

The death penalty, free speech and prison sentences are back on the agenda, along with new topics such as medical marijuana and out-of-state wine purchases that are likely to produce significant disagreement….

Here’s the death penalty issue:

A case sure to elicit strong opinions will be argued this month when justices are asked to rule on the constitutionality of executing killers who committed their crimes when they were juveniles….

The juvenile case will decide the fate of about 70 people on death row who killed when they were teenagers, including a Missouri man who was 17 when he helped push a woman off a railroad bridge in 1993. The United States is among only a few countries that allow execution for crimes committed before age 18.

Let the punishment fit the crime, I say. Don’t gas the guy, throw him off a railrod bridge.

This year’s top free speech case asks if the government can force cattle producers to pay for programs such as the “Beef: It’s What’s for Dinner” ad campaign. The court’s ruling is significant because the government forces growers of many agricultural products, from eggs to alligators, to share expenses for marketing. The eventual ruling would affect nonagriculture government programs, too….

And farmers and ranchers, of course, are passing on the cost of those ad campaigns to consumers. So, by forcing farmers and ranchers to support the ad campaigns, the government is effectively forcing taxpayers to subsidize advertising. Why doesn’t the government just ship 10 percent to the ad agencies and drop the advertising? We’d all be better off.

As for medical marijuana, maybe it should be legalized, with a proviso that marijuana growers must join forces with the Miller Brewing Company for a “high time” advertising campaign.

Allowing inter-State shipment of wine to individual consumers should be an easy one. If a State allows the importation of alcoholic beverages pursuant to the 21st Amendment — and I guess all States do — then barring the shipment of wine to individual consumers within the State amounts to State regulation of interstate commerce, which is reserved to the federal government. Next case.

The Meaning of "Hate Speech"

The left is fond of saying that those who challenge the veracity and virtue of leftists, leftism, and leftism’s lapdogs are guilty of “hate speech.”

I wondered how it could be hateful to say, truthfully, that John Kerry consistently voted against programs that would help the armed forces of the United States deter and defeat our enemies. Yet, Democrats strove mightily to portray Sen. Zell Miller’s righteous anger about Kerry’s voting record as hatred.

Similarly, Democrats strive mightily to portray those who favor self-reliance, free markets, and property rights as “haters” because they don’t believe in the redistribution of income and wealth.

Thinking about all of that has led me to this insight: If the left hates what you say, it’s “hate speech.”

High Irony in the Cozy World of Government Contracting

Here’s a story from BBC News that won’t make even a small dent in the spin and counter-spin about the presidential debates:

US air force official imprisoned

The former number two buyer for the US air force has been sentenced to nine months in jail for corruption.

Darleen Druyun, 56, admitted to boosting the price of a tanker plane deal to win favour with Boeing, the company she was about to work for.

She also pleaded guilty to giving Boeing a competitor’s secret data.

The judge said the stain of her offence was very severe, and the case “must stand as an example”, given the high office she held….

There are two ironies here. First, Druyun was caught doing something blatantly that others manage to do more subtly in Washington. I couldn’t begin to count the number of retiring generals, admirals, and high-ranking bureaucrats who, shortly before they retire, start making nice to contractors to whom they’d like to sell their consulting services for, say, $150 an hour.

Second, I remember that when Druyun was still in her government job she was a panelist at a symposium on ethical practices for government contractors. Of course, she was all in favor of ethics. Isn’t everyone in Washington?

Well, maybe not Tom DeLay. Though DeLay’s real sin is being a “take no prisoners” Republican in the mold of Newt Gingrich. If you’re too nasty to the opposition, they stop giving you a free pass for behaving like everyone else on Capitol Hill. Then the opposition suddenly discovers ethics — not theirs, of course, just your lack of them.

Ha, Ha Funny Stuff from the Left

So Daily Kos comments about something or other that Fox News’s White House reporter Carl Cameron wrote about Kerry, apparently in jest, which Fox News quickly retracted and apologized for. Kos says this:

If a network calls itself “fair and balanced”, it shouldn’t have a blatant anti-Kerry reporter on the beat.

Okay, so how about if all the networks that don’t call themselves “fair and balanced” — because they know better — take all their blatant anti-Bush reporters off the White House beat? That would leave a lot of empty seats in the press briefing room, wouldn’t it?

Not to mention empty anchor desks. But, the anchors I have in mind are empty suits, anyway.

P.S. By Fox’s standards, CBS should have apologized for the fake National Guard memos about Bush’s service before airing them.

Whose Side Are They On, Anyway?

The American Thinker highlights more moral confusion on the left. First, Thomas Lifson:

…John F. Kerry pledged that he would end America’s program to develop miniature nuclear “bunker-buster” weapons, the type of weapon which would be suitable to remove the threat from underground nuclear weapons facilities belonging to rogue states. Yet in the very same debate, Kerry decried the progress made by North Korea and Iran toward nuclear weapons, weapons which are produced using underground facilities of the type which could only be destroyed by ultra-powerful bunker-busters.

How do we explain Kerry’s position that the United States should not possess weapons capable of stopping the proliferation of nuclear weapons to rogue states, a threat he identified as the most important one facing the United States? The answer to that question can be found in the writings of leftist theoreticians, critical of what they call American “dominance.”

They have openly expressed their fears that a world in which the United States is the most powerful actor will be unjust, and is undesirable. Of course, no candidate for president will go so far as to baldly state the thesis that the United States is not to be trusted with power, and that we need to be checked and balanced by the power of foreign states, comparably armed and able to project their power against us. But these intellectual doctrines seem to have been incorporated into the national security thinking of John F. Kerry, the would-be next Commander-in-Chief, because they explain his peculiar views on disabling America’s ability to address the threat of North korean and Iranian nukes….

Then, Justin Hart:

Al Gore’s now infamous MoveOn.org speech in May 2004 highlights a theme that has “dominated” left-leaning scholarship for last three years. Said Gore: “An American policy of dominance is as repugnant to the rest of the world as the ugly dominance of the helpless, naked Iraqi prisoners has been to the American people. Dominance is as dominance does.”…

This “dominance motif” is the bedrock of modern leftist thought, seeding a host of conspiracy theories and birthing a thriving industry of Bush-bashing tomes. Understanding the history, rhetoric and proponents behind these claims illustrates the flawed worldview of the left….

[There is] a vein of leftist scholarship and publications warning of the “imperial grand strategy” that the Bush administration has “embraced.” All of these writers allude to the 2002 policy document, The National Security Strategy of the United States of America….

In [leftists’] minds, there is…something inherently sinister about it. To summarize their fears: The birth of “neocons” during the first Gulf War gave rise to the “Bush Doctrine” of “forward deterrence.” Before the 2001 attacks, “preemption” was a rhetorical device employed by U.S. administrations since WWII, that has now become a declarative policy under Cheney-Rumsfeld-Powell and associates. Employing an “Arab façade”, the Bush Administration has struck a “Faustian bargain,” vying for U.S. hegemony while simultaneously “socializing” a military economy, driving huge deficits and creating “powerful pressures” to cut federal spending.

Bush is seen as a “born-again global crusader,” fixated on enriching his oil-rich peers. He advocates a Pax Americana, with a swagger of “open contempt” for international law, and displays an insatiable desire for global dominance. The common premise across these worldview conspiracies is that the Bush Administration has insidious designs to dominate and “run the planet by force to protect their privilege.”

Empire, where’s the empire? Where’s the global dominance? Where’s the international law? (Hint: It’s not to be found in the United Nations.)

Have these people died and gone to some magical kingdom where lions and lambs commingle in peace? Tell me how to find it. I’ll check my weapons at the gate.

Some Will Yell "Censorship"

George Mason University — a State university in northern Virginia — has cancelled a speaking engagement by Michael Moore, according to The Washington Post:

GMU Disinvites Moore

Speech, $35,000 Fee Drew Criticism

By Amy Argetsinger and Lisa Rein

Washington Post Staff Writers

Friday, October 1, 2004; Page A01

George Mason University canceled a scheduled speaking engagement by liberal filmmaker Michael Moore yesterday after two conservative state legislators and others complained that public money should not support an overtly political event.

Moore, the outspoken director of the movie “Fahrenheit 9/11,” was to have received about $35,000 for his Oct. 28 speech at the Patriot Center on the Fairfax campus — an event that university officials had arranged a week ago and had not begun to publicize.

Word spread quickly, and after complaints from the legislators and some members of the community reached the office of President Alan G. Merten this week, the school announced that the event, coming so close to the presidential election, would be “an inappropriate use of state resources.”….

It is the second time in recent weeks that a public university has canceled an appearance by Moore, currently on a 20-state “Slacker Uprising Tour” of college campuses that has drawn sellout crowds as well as heated criticism at almost every stop. The president of California State University-San Marcos, near San Diego, canceled a $37,000 campus appearance by Moore….

Del. Vincent F. Callahan Jr. (R-Fairfax), chairman of the House Appropriations Committee and considered a moderate on many issues, called Moore “a sleazebag of the first order.”

“They should have Democrats and Republicans speak, but not somebody whose living is libel and slander. . . . That’s not appropriate for a first-class university,” Callahan said….

The same goes for Rush Limbaugh, G. Gordon Liddy, James Carville, Paul Begala and any number of similarly vicious idiots out there — left and right — who have nothing to add to the sum of human knowledge. The citizens of Virginia (and I was one of them for most of 40 years) shouldn’t pay one red cent to support the gaseous emissions of the lunatic fringe.

Advice to GMU: Take the $35,000 and buy 7,000 pocket copies of the Declaration of Independence and Constitution of the United States from the Cato Institute. (Maybe Cato would throw in a few more thousand copies for such a large order.) Spread the copies all over campus. The contents would be an eye-opener for most students. They’d learn something about the wisdom of the system that Moore and company are busily trying to tear down.

You Say Slacks, I Say…

…trousers. Virginia Postrel writes about slacks:

Ed Haggar, who coined the term “slacks,” has died. From the Dallas Morning News obit:

Mr. Haggar teamed with legendary Dallas advertising pioneer Morris Hite to coin the term “slacks,” his son said. Pants were largely known as trousers until then.

“During the war years, people tried to get more casual during the weekends, during slack time or down time,” [his son] Eddie Haggar said. “Dad and Morris Hite…came up with the name slacks.”

….

Yeah, but, women wear slacks; men wear trousers. See:

Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, and James Stewart, on the set of The Philadelphia Story, 1940. Hepburn is wearing slacks. Grant and Stewart are wearing trousers. (And Grant is wearing white socks — with a pin-striped suit. Who’d ever believe it could happen?)

Doing What You Have to Do, Israeli Style

Arab terrorists and their sympathizers — from Manhattan to Paris and Bonn — will call it a crime against humanity. I call it doing what you have to do to protect your people from their enemies. What is it? This:

Armored Vehicles Mass at Gaza Border

By IBRAHIM BARZAK, Associated Press Writer

JEBALIYA REFUGEE CAMP, Gaza Strip – Armored vehicles massed on Gaza’s border Friday after Israel’s security Cabinet approved a large-scale military operation — dubbed “Days of Penitence” — to stop Palestinian rocket fire….

The Cabinet approved the offensive late Thursday, at the end of a day of heavy fighting between troops and Palestinian gunmen in the Jebaliya refugee camp, the Palestinians’ largest and most densely populated.

In bloodshed Friday, five Palestinians were killed and at least 22 were wounded in fighting in the camp. The army said troops fired at one group of militants planting explosives and another setting up a rocket launcher….

On Friday, fighting erupted in Jebaliya and nearby towns. In separate incidents, Israeli troops fired two tanks shells and a missile from an aircraft at a group of militants attempting to launch a rocket….

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon told the security Cabinet he was determined to stop the rocket fire. Israeli officials said the operation would be open-ended.

“What can we do,” a participant quoted Sharon as saying. “The Jews, too, have a right to live.”…

On Friday morning, some 200 tanks, armored personnel carriers and bulldozers assembled along Israel’s border north and east of Gaza. Troops were setting up makeshift camps, apparently in preparation for an extended operation. Some officers were going over maps….

Militants have been stepping up attacks on Israelis in recent months in hopes of portraying Israel’s planned withdrawal from Gaza in 2005 as a retreat under fire. The army has been pounding the militants in intensifying strikes to deny them such claims.

Mofaz, the defense minister, said that when Israel withdraws, it will not be under fire….

Palestinian militants have fired hundreds of rockets and mortar shells at Gaza settlements and Israeli border towns since 2000. Most attacks caused damage and minor injuries.

There have been two deadly strikes, including Wednesday’s hit on the border town of Sderot that killed two children playing on the sidewalk in a quiet neighborhood at the onset of the Jewish holiday of Sukkot….

“No government can tolerate the continuation of … missiles falling on the heads of the civilian population,” [Israeli government spokesman Gideon Meir] said.

Palestinian Cabinet minister Saeb Erekat denounced the Israeli raid as “a war crime and state terror,” and said he feared all of Gaza would soon be reoccupied.

Aha! We finally got to “war crime and state terror.” As for the reoccupation of Gaza: “Whatever it takes” is my bit of unnecessary advice to the Israelis.

Palestinians want their land to be recognized as a sovereign nation? Not as long as they persist in terror attacks on Israel.

Why not have a summit? That would be John Kerry’s solution, despite the fact that a summit would simply be a ploy on the part of Arab terrorists (1) to make themselves look legitimate in the gullible eyes of world opinion and (2) to buy time in which to rearm and regroup.