Bob Barr (R) blasts Republican criticism of Obama over the underwear bomber:
http://blogs.ajc.com/bob-barr-blog/2010/01/07/time-to-give-obama-a-break/
Rightly so, too. This is absurd. I seem to recall a certain shoe bomber and I don't remember everyone impugning Bush's efforts on terror because of it. We laid the blame at Al-Qaeda's feet, where it belonged (no pun intended, btw).
And what's with the sudden rush to profile based on physical characteristics, Republicans? First of all, how would that have helped in this case? The guy was African - Yemenise, NOT Arab! And we start looking for only arabs and persians, we'll completely miss the boat here. In fact, there's a chance we did miss this guy for that very reason ... that he was Black and not Arab.
Anyhow, I had to throw this out there. I'm tired of listening to the people on my side of the aisle salivating over this singular instance when we had nearly the exact same thing happen under Bush and we didn't get this kind of response.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Saturday, January 2, 2010
What a strange way to look at the world
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-reich/2009-the-year-wall-street_b_404889.html
I can't relate to this guy's way of thinking. It seems so detached from reality. Reich believes the problem with our economy is that the guys at the top are not sharing enough down below. Sure, I think the $25 million bonuses are undeserved too, but what would Reich have us do about it? Whatever his solution it would surely be government-driven, not market based.
But back to my original point: how odd is it to look at the current economy and blame a few million dollars being ill spent as the primary cause of our economic troubles? Hundreds of billions are misspent every year by the government that we don't even have - we just write IOU's to the Chinese. We have two unfunded wars being waged. Our borders are sivs for cheap labor to harvest our subsidized crops to make our fast food as cheap as it is which makes us as fat as we are which in turn drives up our health care costs that government insists on lowering for us... even though they are indirectly the cause of it. And all of this so that multi-billion dollar companies like GE and ADM can pay their executives $25 million bonuses ...
Does anyone else see the pattern of the government fixing a problem which then creates another and then they fix that one, which in turn creates more unintended consequences? Can they not see that whenever they insert themselves into an area the very nature of that area changes - the rules change, expectations change, and behavior of the populace follows in accordance. Sometimes this is a good thing - sometimes not so much. The NTSB is a good example. As is the USDA.
I just realized: conservatives don't always get this either. They are always harping on regulation as a great evil, when I would argue it's actually very helpful - usually. SOX is a great example of poor regulation. But it's notable because it is the exception that proves the rule: most regulation simply defines the terms of the game and the landscape of the playing field. And truth be told, that's all SOX does too. The real problem with SOX though is in its details - not in its existence. It just needs to be scaled back a bit. Some of the burdensome portions really don't need to be there, or could at least be made less burdensome.
Anyhow, the point I was making is simply that Reich is delusional. That he views executive compensation as the primary cause of our woes is just absurd. And I'm going to go out on a limb here too: I am willing to bet that one of the reasons the compensation is as high as it is due, in some small or not-so-small way to the government's invisible hand. I can't prove that and I may very well be wrong - but with so much evidence of government-inspired problems elsewhere, can one blame me for thinking it possible?
I can't relate to this guy's way of thinking. It seems so detached from reality. Reich believes the problem with our economy is that the guys at the top are not sharing enough down below. Sure, I think the $25 million bonuses are undeserved too, but what would Reich have us do about it? Whatever his solution it would surely be government-driven, not market based.
But back to my original point: how odd is it to look at the current economy and blame a few million dollars being ill spent as the primary cause of our economic troubles? Hundreds of billions are misspent every year by the government that we don't even have - we just write IOU's to the Chinese. We have two unfunded wars being waged. Our borders are sivs for cheap labor to harvest our subsidized crops to make our fast food as cheap as it is which makes us as fat as we are which in turn drives up our health care costs that government insists on lowering for us... even though they are indirectly the cause of it. And all of this so that multi-billion dollar companies like GE and ADM can pay their executives $25 million bonuses ...
Does anyone else see the pattern of the government fixing a problem which then creates another and then they fix that one, which in turn creates more unintended consequences? Can they not see that whenever they insert themselves into an area the very nature of that area changes - the rules change, expectations change, and behavior of the populace follows in accordance. Sometimes this is a good thing - sometimes not so much. The NTSB is a good example. As is the USDA.
I just realized: conservatives don't always get this either. They are always harping on regulation as a great evil, when I would argue it's actually very helpful - usually. SOX is a great example of poor regulation. But it's notable because it is the exception that proves the rule: most regulation simply defines the terms of the game and the landscape of the playing field. And truth be told, that's all SOX does too. The real problem with SOX though is in its details - not in its existence. It just needs to be scaled back a bit. Some of the burdensome portions really don't need to be there, or could at least be made less burdensome.
Anyhow, the point I was making is simply that Reich is delusional. That he views executive compensation as the primary cause of our woes is just absurd. And I'm going to go out on a limb here too: I am willing to bet that one of the reasons the compensation is as high as it is due, in some small or not-so-small way to the government's invisible hand. I can't prove that and I may very well be wrong - but with so much evidence of government-inspired problems elsewhere, can one blame me for thinking it possible?
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