Politicians, at our request, pretend that real spending cuts aren't necessary.
Read the full article here:
The Left continues to play games with unconstitutional words as long as they approve of the result.
Read the full article here:
Friday, November 23, 2012
Thursday, November 22, 2012
Argentina (and America) on the Brink
Now that Argentina is on the brink of economic and social collapse -- again -- this might be a good time to be reminded of what could have been for Argentina if only it had followed correct economic principles, and what will be in store for us in the US if we don't.
Little over a hundred years ago, Argentina was the eighth weathiest country in the world. Let that sink in for a minute; wealthier than Japan, Italy or Brazil.
In 1959, a visit was paid to Argentina by one of the world's greatest economists, Ludwig von Mises, dean of the Austrian school of economics and mentor of the Nobel laureate Friedrich Hayek. He gave a series of lectures, and those lectures were transcribed into a short book later published under the title 'Economic Policy: Thoughts for Today and for Tomorrow'. It is perhaps the best comprehensive exposition of Mises' economic philosophy in a small package easy to read and accessible to the comprehension of the common citizen. For those of us lacking the time and patience to wade through his 1949 magnum opus 'Human Action', with its 900 pages of almost German academic English, Economic Policy is a welcome plain-language and brief alternative. Next to Thomas Sowell's evolving editions of Basic Economics, Mises' Economic Policy is THE book for the person who has never read one on economics or has only read dismal mathematical, keynesian and/or college textbooks.
The history of Argentina for the past 50 years is one of tragedy followed by misery, repression and economic crisis, each episode ratcheting up the impoverishment of a once proud people. How much suffering could Argentina have avoided if only they had taken Mises' advice?
If the United States continues on its present crony-socialist course, we too will be remembered one day as a once-great nation. Putting a copy of Mises' book into the hands of every politician, student and citizen would be a good place to start reversing the decline.
Read Mary Anastasia O'Grady's analysis of the current mess here:
Sunday, November 18, 2012
ObamaCare Is Not a Done Deal
The majority of state governors are Republicans, and they have the power to disarm the health-care law.
Read the full story here:
Wall Street Journal: Capretta and Levin: Why ObamaCare Is Still No Sure Thing
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
Read the full story here:
Wall Street Journal: Capretta and Levin: Why ObamaCare Is Still No Sure Thing
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
Brett Stephens on Immigration and Latin American Culture
"If the argument is that illegal immigrants are overtaxing the welfare state, then that's an argument for paring back the welfare state, not deporting 12 million people. If the argument is that these immigrants "steal" jobs, then that's an argument by someone who either doesn't understand the free market or aspires for his children to become busboys and chambermaids."
"And if the argument is that these immigrants don't share our values, then religiosity, hard work, personal stoicism and the sense of family obligation expressed through billions of dollars in remittances aren't American values."
"By the way, what's so awful about Spanish? It's a fine European language with an outstanding literary tradition—Cervantes, Borges, Paz, Vargas Llosa—and it would do you no harm to learn it. Bilingualism is an intellectual virtue, not a deviant sexual practice. "
Read the full article at The Wall Street Journal.
"And if the argument is that these immigrants don't share our values, then religiosity, hard work, personal stoicism and the sense of family obligation expressed through billions of dollars in remittances aren't American values."
"By the way, what's so awful about Spanish? It's a fine European language with an outstanding literary tradition—Cervantes, Borges, Paz, Vargas Llosa—and it would do you no harm to learn it. Bilingualism is an intellectual virtue, not a deviant sexual practice. "
Read the full article at The Wall Street Journal.
Obamacare is still vulnerable
States can still resist being sucked into the sucker's game of doing the federal government's dirty work on Obamacare.
Read the full story by Michael F. Cannon at the Cato Institute.
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
Read the full story by Michael F. Cannon at the Cato Institute.
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
Friday, November 16, 2012
WSJ: Republican Success in the San Joaquin Valley
Republicans who think that reaching out to the Hispanic vote is futile need to study California's 21st District, which is 70% Hispanic and voted for Obama in 2008. They just elected a Rebublican to the US House of Representatives with 60% of the ballots.
Read the full story by Kimberly Strassel at The Wall Street Journal
Read the full story by Kimberly Strassel at The Wall Street Journal
Republicans and the 2014 Hispanic Vote
The Hispanic vote is receiving renewed attention following the 2012 election fiasco. Businessman Romney may be credited with the dubious achievement of a market share lower than John McCain’s: just 27%. Republicans, including Tea-partiers and talk show hosts like Sean Hannity are waking up to the fact that a demographic that is growing at more than 40 percent in a decade, with more than 20 million eligible to vote, cannot be ignored if the party intends to remain viable. The challenge is how to appeal to Hispanic citizen voters without compromising conservative, limited constitutional government principles. It would be futile to attempt to out-Santa Claus the Democrats; nevertheless Republicans must take a change of strategy, of policy priorities and perhaps most important, of attitude. Too paraphrase Peggy Noonan, some people don’t like Republicans because they perceive that Republicans don’t like them.
It has been observed enough times that the values and interests of Hispanics should make them naturally gravitate to the Republican party. Hispanic immigrants are hard-working, pro-family, pro-traditional marriage, pro-life and religious. A high percentage are small businesses owners and entrepreneurial capitalists and are grateful to the United States of America for the opportunities it has afforded them. Like all Americans they yearn for the American Dream, starting with good job prospects. Ronald Reagan once quipped that most Hispanics are Republicans, they just don’t know it yet. The Republican failure to convince more than a shrinking fraction of them speaks at least as poorly of Republicans as it does people who seem to contradict their own values and interests in the way they vote.
So what do we do? Permit me to propose a 3-pronged strategy:
1. Treat Hispanics/Latinos like everyone else. We are the party of, by and for Americans, not hyphenated-Americans, ethnic victim groups and single-issue special interests.
2. Educate Americans about constitutional, limited-government, and free-market economic principles, in Spanish as well as English. To set an example, this author gives lectures on the American Revolution, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution (no partisan political preaching required), together with American Revolution film screenings, in Spanish-language churches.
News Flash!: the Spanish-language news media leans Left. But the Spanish-speaking public is just as diverse as the English-speaking public. There is a huge ground-floor opportunity to build a conservative commentary industry on the Spanish-language radio and TV airwaves, cable, satellite and social media. The movers and shakers in the conservative media need to make it happen.
And 3: Take the high road with respect to immigration policy, not just with respect to illegals and low-skilled workers, but at the high end, the PhD in engineering end, as well.
The Republican party should be seen frequently and consistently proposing and promoting its own positive immigration reform, in simple, bite-sized pieces. Rather than inflicting a national root-canal of comprehensive omnibus corrupt pork legislation on the scale of ObamaCare, just propose one simple policy change at a time, say one per month, debate it, vote it up or down and then MoveOn.org to the next bite-sized piece.
Republicans can:
• Propose to relax immigration restrictions in exchange for a surcharge on immigrant’s payroll and income taxes.
• or charge a $1000 per head for the right to immigrate, which is a third less than the going rate for coyote fees to risk death to be smuggled across the desert.
• Propose an uncomplicated guest worker program and normalization, NOT CITIZENSHIP but some form of normalized guest status, for people already here who are not felons. We had a guest worker program in the 1950’s called Bracero, and in the main it worked.
• Allow people educated in America legally to work, produce, pay taxes and hire other Americans in America. Right now we educate people in America and then throw them out, which makes no sense. (By the way, just because some people aren’t in the US doesn’t mean we don’t have to compete with them; better to keep them where they do us the most good.) This includes children of illegals whose college education we have already paid for (whether we SHOULD have paid for it or not is beside the point after the fact).
Republicans can propose solutions that are market-based, more effective and more humane than enforcement-only; reforms that are consistent with limited government and free-market principles which the Democrats will be embarrassed to oppose. We can put Democrats on defense even as we interleave proposals for such things as repealing the 1975 amendment to the Voting Rights Act that required printing election materials in foreign languages. So we can include proposals that are dear to our conservative hearts along with olive branches to the Latino community. The list above is only intended to be a starting point.
But, Republicans absolutely need to purge from their brains the idea of deporting 11 million people. It ain’t gonna happen!
Taking the high road means refraining from foaming at the mouth in public over illegal immigration. I love Rush Limbaugh, I love Mark Levin and Michael Savage and Mike Galagher, Laura Ingraham, Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin etc, but I don’t think they have helped on net balance to win hearts and minds. The Hispanic community is very family-oriented, and many citizen voters have cousins whose legal status is less than perfect. If you appear hostile to someone’s cousin, whether you mean to or not, you alienate that person. In politics, perception is reality, and the perception is that the Republican party is anti-immigrant in general and anti-Latino, possibly with racist motives, in particular. Our challenge is at the very least not to provide cheap ammunition to the Democrat machine to shoot us with.
This does not mean we have to surrender principle. But it does mean changing the rhetoric and yes, compromising with some people and policies that we might not like so much.
Resistance to change is often based on limited information, therefore permit me to present a few facts and stats about immigration in America today:
• Immigration as a proportion of population today is about half of what it was in the peak years a century ago.
• Net immigration from Mexico for the past two years has been approximately zero.
• Immigrants complement the native population with higher numbers at the low and high end of the skills and education spectrum, while natives are concentrated in the middle.
• New immigrants are more concentrated than are natives in the youthful labor-force ages when people contribute more to the public coffer than they draw from it. The average age is 28.
• In spite of the drug cartel wars, the Mexican economy has improved under President Felipe Calderón, with a rising tide of opportunity for Mexicans at home. I wish our economy were growing half as fast as Mexico’s.
• Putting aside the Great Recession and non-recovery, our economy still creates hundreds of thousands of jobs each year that only require minimal training. The supply of native-born workers without a high school diploma is shrinking by about 300,000 per year. All of Obama’s unemployed college graduates are not pining to pick lettuce. Any immigration policy built on the premise that we won’t need any additional foreign workers in the future is doomed.
• At least one quarter of illegal aliens enter the country legally and overstay their visas and permits. Therefore sealing the border will not solve the whole problem; in fact it may be counter-productive as it discourages people who wish to return home on their own from doing so.
• Cities with high immigrant populations have lower prices for child care, house cleaning, gardening, dry cleaning and other services essential to permitting college-educated women with children to pursue their professional careers.
• Social Security and Medicare are by far the most expensive transfer payments made by the government, and these payments go almost entirely to natives. This is because immigrants typically arrive when they are young and healthy, and also because older recent immigrants do not qualify for Social Security for many years after their arrival.
Now if all of that paints too rosy a picture, let’s talk about problems commonly associated with immigration:
• Crime: While immigration rates have been on the rise in the last two decades, until Obama the violent crime rates had been decreasing. The crime rate is higher for native-born Americans than it is for immigrants. More immigration does not lead to more crime overall, even if a few exceptionally bad cases make the headlines. Offering and accepting employment at mutually agreeable wages is not fundamentally immoral.
• Infectious disease: A more open immigration policy that permitted workers to enter through the front door without fear would provide the opportunity for health screening.
• Terrorism: We need a policy that makes it more difficult for bad people to hide among the masses of honest immigrants who come for work and opportunity. More openness and transparency is the terrorist’s enemy.
• Assimilation: 88% of 2nd-generation immigrants are fluent in English. Immigrants know they can double their income by learning English. The single most formidable obstacle to assimilation is the leftist indoctrination that pupils receive in our public employee union-dominated schools, and that is not the fault of immigrants.
• Similarly regarding Communist infiltration and agitation: This also is a homegrown issue, not an immigration problem. The battleground of radical leftism is in the public schools and universities and in labor union legislation and policy; not the border.
• Narcotraffic is not an ‘immigration’ issue. Putting aside ‘Fast and Furious’, it is American drug consumers that provide the guns for the gangs with their dollars.
Speaking of compromise, it may be time to sit down with the long-haired, maggot-infested, dope-smoking commie pinko hippies like…Pat Robertson, George Schultz, the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal -- freaks like that -- who will tell you that drugs are bad, no doubt about it, but that drug wars don’t get a free pass on their track record. Agree or disagree with prohibition vs. legalization, the illicit drug industry is distinct from immigration and we must not be so clumsy as to allow the Democrat party to spin it as a racial issue with Republicans wearing the white sheets.
• Welfare and public service abuse: the problems of the nanny state are inherent to socialism. Government social welfare programs are prone to corruption and abuse. We can’t scapegoat housecleaners and migrant farm workers for the natural consequences of our own socialistic policies. Fight socialism, not immigration.
I believe these facts justify a high-road strategy mostly in favor of immigrants and immigration. I would like to persuade Republicans that the Dream Act, or similar reform, is not the worst thing ever proposed, not the greatest threat we face, but something we can live with. We say that we want illegals to get in line with everyone else, but we haven’t provided any line at all for most of them. Dogmatic opposition to this and any reform like it is costing us far more than we are getting in return.
Many of my friends on the right will find some of these recommendations too liberal to stomach, too much slouching toward amnesty, too offensive to the letter of the law and to the sovereignty of America. To those especially I would ask to consider their priorities. Is sealing the border more important than combating Obamacare? Is it more important that holding the line on tax rates on small businesses? Does punishing illegal immigrants take precedence over reforming Medicare and Social Security, reducing the size and scope of the federal government, and re-launching job creation and economic growth? What constitutes a greater threat to our freedom and prosperity: Cap and Trade, unfunded defined-benefit pensions for government employees, dependence on foreign oil and domestic windmills, expanding entitlement programs, Iran’s nuclear ambitions, China’s rapidly-growing Pacific navy, North Korea, radical Islamic Shariah law -- or Jose Gonzales, minimum wage-earning illegal food-processing worker, with a fake social security number by which he pays taxes to the treasury which he will never be able to collect as benefits?
Republicans need all the help they can get, and high priority goals are worth compromising for.
Permit me to quote a couple of liberals on this issue:
“The problem has to be solved. Because as we’ve made illegal some kinds of labor that I’d like to see legal, we’re doing two things: We’re creating a whole society of really honorable, decent family-loving people that are in violation of the law, and secondly we’re exacerbating relations with Mexico.”
That ‘liberal’ was George Herbert Walker Bush.
“Rather than talking about putting up a fence, why don’t we work out some recognition of our mutual problems? Make it possible for them to come here legally with a work permit--and then while they’re working and earning here, they pay taxes here. And when they want to go back, they can go back. And open the border both ways by understanding their problems.”
That ‘liberal’ was Ronald Reagan.
Let us not forget that the single most effective means of reducing illegal immigration would be to so destroy our economy that no one would want to come here anymore. In other words, it’s a good problem to have, and we have it a lot better here than in socialist countries like France where the immigrant male youth unemployment rate is somewhere between 40 and 50%. That is a social catastrophe we won’t face as long as remain true to our limited government principles.
America’s ideals are universal, not ethnic or limited to the direct descendants of the Mayflower. Regardless of color, accent, flavor or spices, we can still have an America we recognize in 100 years if it is based on the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. To achieve this we must fight FOR good policy, not against good people.
It has been observed enough times that the values and interests of Hispanics should make them naturally gravitate to the Republican party. Hispanic immigrants are hard-working, pro-family, pro-traditional marriage, pro-life and religious. A high percentage are small businesses owners and entrepreneurial capitalists and are grateful to the United States of America for the opportunities it has afforded them. Like all Americans they yearn for the American Dream, starting with good job prospects. Ronald Reagan once quipped that most Hispanics are Republicans, they just don’t know it yet. The Republican failure to convince more than a shrinking fraction of them speaks at least as poorly of Republicans as it does people who seem to contradict their own values and interests in the way they vote.
So what do we do? Permit me to propose a 3-pronged strategy:
1. Treat Hispanics/Latinos like everyone else. We are the party of, by and for Americans, not hyphenated-Americans, ethnic victim groups and single-issue special interests.
2. Educate Americans about constitutional, limited-government, and free-market economic principles, in Spanish as well as English. To set an example, this author gives lectures on the American Revolution, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution (no partisan political preaching required), together with American Revolution film screenings, in Spanish-language churches.
News Flash!: the Spanish-language news media leans Left. But the Spanish-speaking public is just as diverse as the English-speaking public. There is a huge ground-floor opportunity to build a conservative commentary industry on the Spanish-language radio and TV airwaves, cable, satellite and social media. The movers and shakers in the conservative media need to make it happen.
And 3: Take the high road with respect to immigration policy, not just with respect to illegals and low-skilled workers, but at the high end, the PhD in engineering end, as well.
The Republican party should be seen frequently and consistently proposing and promoting its own positive immigration reform, in simple, bite-sized pieces. Rather than inflicting a national root-canal of comprehensive omnibus corrupt pork legislation on the scale of ObamaCare, just propose one simple policy change at a time, say one per month, debate it, vote it up or down and then MoveOn.org to the next bite-sized piece.
Republicans can:
• Propose to relax immigration restrictions in exchange for a surcharge on immigrant’s payroll and income taxes.
• or charge a $1000 per head for the right to immigrate, which is a third less than the going rate for coyote fees to risk death to be smuggled across the desert.
• Propose an uncomplicated guest worker program and normalization, NOT CITIZENSHIP but some form of normalized guest status, for people already here who are not felons. We had a guest worker program in the 1950’s called Bracero, and in the main it worked.
• Allow people educated in America legally to work, produce, pay taxes and hire other Americans in America. Right now we educate people in America and then throw them out, which makes no sense. (By the way, just because some people aren’t in the US doesn’t mean we don’t have to compete with them; better to keep them where they do us the most good.) This includes children of illegals whose college education we have already paid for (whether we SHOULD have paid for it or not is beside the point after the fact).
Republicans can propose solutions that are market-based, more effective and more humane than enforcement-only; reforms that are consistent with limited government and free-market principles which the Democrats will be embarrassed to oppose. We can put Democrats on defense even as we interleave proposals for such things as repealing the 1975 amendment to the Voting Rights Act that required printing election materials in foreign languages. So we can include proposals that are dear to our conservative hearts along with olive branches to the Latino community. The list above is only intended to be a starting point.
But, Republicans absolutely need to purge from their brains the idea of deporting 11 million people. It ain’t gonna happen!
Taking the high road means refraining from foaming at the mouth in public over illegal immigration. I love Rush Limbaugh, I love Mark Levin and Michael Savage and Mike Galagher, Laura Ingraham, Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin etc, but I don’t think they have helped on net balance to win hearts and minds. The Hispanic community is very family-oriented, and many citizen voters have cousins whose legal status is less than perfect. If you appear hostile to someone’s cousin, whether you mean to or not, you alienate that person. In politics, perception is reality, and the perception is that the Republican party is anti-immigrant in general and anti-Latino, possibly with racist motives, in particular. Our challenge is at the very least not to provide cheap ammunition to the Democrat machine to shoot us with.
This does not mean we have to surrender principle. But it does mean changing the rhetoric and yes, compromising with some people and policies that we might not like so much.
Resistance to change is often based on limited information, therefore permit me to present a few facts and stats about immigration in America today:
• Immigration as a proportion of population today is about half of what it was in the peak years a century ago.
• Net immigration from Mexico for the past two years has been approximately zero.
• Immigrants complement the native population with higher numbers at the low and high end of the skills and education spectrum, while natives are concentrated in the middle.
• New immigrants are more concentrated than are natives in the youthful labor-force ages when people contribute more to the public coffer than they draw from it. The average age is 28.
• In spite of the drug cartel wars, the Mexican economy has improved under President Felipe Calderón, with a rising tide of opportunity for Mexicans at home. I wish our economy were growing half as fast as Mexico’s.
• Putting aside the Great Recession and non-recovery, our economy still creates hundreds of thousands of jobs each year that only require minimal training. The supply of native-born workers without a high school diploma is shrinking by about 300,000 per year. All of Obama’s unemployed college graduates are not pining to pick lettuce. Any immigration policy built on the premise that we won’t need any additional foreign workers in the future is doomed.
• At least one quarter of illegal aliens enter the country legally and overstay their visas and permits. Therefore sealing the border will not solve the whole problem; in fact it may be counter-productive as it discourages people who wish to return home on their own from doing so.
• Cities with high immigrant populations have lower prices for child care, house cleaning, gardening, dry cleaning and other services essential to permitting college-educated women with children to pursue their professional careers.
• Social Security and Medicare are by far the most expensive transfer payments made by the government, and these payments go almost entirely to natives. This is because immigrants typically arrive when they are young and healthy, and also because older recent immigrants do not qualify for Social Security for many years after their arrival.
Now if all of that paints too rosy a picture, let’s talk about problems commonly associated with immigration:
• Crime: While immigration rates have been on the rise in the last two decades, until Obama the violent crime rates had been decreasing. The crime rate is higher for native-born Americans than it is for immigrants. More immigration does not lead to more crime overall, even if a few exceptionally bad cases make the headlines. Offering and accepting employment at mutually agreeable wages is not fundamentally immoral.
• Infectious disease: A more open immigration policy that permitted workers to enter through the front door without fear would provide the opportunity for health screening.
• Terrorism: We need a policy that makes it more difficult for bad people to hide among the masses of honest immigrants who come for work and opportunity. More openness and transparency is the terrorist’s enemy.
• Assimilation: 88% of 2nd-generation immigrants are fluent in English. Immigrants know they can double their income by learning English. The single most formidable obstacle to assimilation is the leftist indoctrination that pupils receive in our public employee union-dominated schools, and that is not the fault of immigrants.
• Similarly regarding Communist infiltration and agitation: This also is a homegrown issue, not an immigration problem. The battleground of radical leftism is in the public schools and universities and in labor union legislation and policy; not the border.
• Narcotraffic is not an ‘immigration’ issue. Putting aside ‘Fast and Furious’, it is American drug consumers that provide the guns for the gangs with their dollars.
Speaking of compromise, it may be time to sit down with the long-haired, maggot-infested, dope-smoking commie pinko hippies like…Pat Robertson, George Schultz, the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal -- freaks like that -- who will tell you that drugs are bad, no doubt about it, but that drug wars don’t get a free pass on their track record. Agree or disagree with prohibition vs. legalization, the illicit drug industry is distinct from immigration and we must not be so clumsy as to allow the Democrat party to spin it as a racial issue with Republicans wearing the white sheets.
• Welfare and public service abuse: the problems of the nanny state are inherent to socialism. Government social welfare programs are prone to corruption and abuse. We can’t scapegoat housecleaners and migrant farm workers for the natural consequences of our own socialistic policies. Fight socialism, not immigration.
I believe these facts justify a high-road strategy mostly in favor of immigrants and immigration. I would like to persuade Republicans that the Dream Act, or similar reform, is not the worst thing ever proposed, not the greatest threat we face, but something we can live with. We say that we want illegals to get in line with everyone else, but we haven’t provided any line at all for most of them. Dogmatic opposition to this and any reform like it is costing us far more than we are getting in return.
Many of my friends on the right will find some of these recommendations too liberal to stomach, too much slouching toward amnesty, too offensive to the letter of the law and to the sovereignty of America. To those especially I would ask to consider their priorities. Is sealing the border more important than combating Obamacare? Is it more important that holding the line on tax rates on small businesses? Does punishing illegal immigrants take precedence over reforming Medicare and Social Security, reducing the size and scope of the federal government, and re-launching job creation and economic growth? What constitutes a greater threat to our freedom and prosperity: Cap and Trade, unfunded defined-benefit pensions for government employees, dependence on foreign oil and domestic windmills, expanding entitlement programs, Iran’s nuclear ambitions, China’s rapidly-growing Pacific navy, North Korea, radical Islamic Shariah law -- or Jose Gonzales, minimum wage-earning illegal food-processing worker, with a fake social security number by which he pays taxes to the treasury which he will never be able to collect as benefits?
Republicans need all the help they can get, and high priority goals are worth compromising for.
Permit me to quote a couple of liberals on this issue:
“The problem has to be solved. Because as we’ve made illegal some kinds of labor that I’d like to see legal, we’re doing two things: We’re creating a whole society of really honorable, decent family-loving people that are in violation of the law, and secondly we’re exacerbating relations with Mexico.”
That ‘liberal’ was George Herbert Walker Bush.
“Rather than talking about putting up a fence, why don’t we work out some recognition of our mutual problems? Make it possible for them to come here legally with a work permit--and then while they’re working and earning here, they pay taxes here. And when they want to go back, they can go back. And open the border both ways by understanding their problems.”
That ‘liberal’ was Ronald Reagan.
Let us not forget that the single most effective means of reducing illegal immigration would be to so destroy our economy that no one would want to come here anymore. In other words, it’s a good problem to have, and we have it a lot better here than in socialist countries like France where the immigrant male youth unemployment rate is somewhere between 40 and 50%. That is a social catastrophe we won’t face as long as remain true to our limited government principles.
America’s ideals are universal, not ethnic or limited to the direct descendants of the Mayflower. Regardless of color, accent, flavor or spices, we can still have an America we recognize in 100 years if it is based on the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. To achieve this we must fight FOR good policy, not against good people.
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
WSJ: Immigrants and the GOP
The GOP's Presidential election defeat is opening up a debate in the party, with more than a few voices saying they are willing to rethink their views on immigration. This is good news, which means it's also a good moment to address some of the frequent claims from the anti-immigration right that simply aren't true, especially about Hispanics.
Read the full article at:
Wall Street Journal
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
What Do Young People Believe?
One of the most remarkable impressions of election night was seeing, in places like Times Square and the Obama campaign stadium in Chicago, crowds of young people, cheering, laughing, dancing, crying with joy over the result. Since these are the people who will have to live with the consequences of this election the longest, it is worth asking: what is it exactly that they are cheering? What do they believe?
Read the full article at Front Page Magazine.
Monday, November 12, 2012
Reflections on Elections
Why Obama Won
The GOP's Epic Senate Fail
Economy: Post-Election Firings and Layoffs Surge
What Does the Election Mean for Obamacare?
Business Rejects Obamacare Elections, as it is often said, have consequences. As a result of the president’s reelection, the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, will be fully implemented. Unsurprisingly, several businesses are looking for ways to avoid the costs associated with the law. Just as unsurprisingly, American leftists consider such efforts to keep one’s business profitable–or solvent–unseemly.
The Meaning of Yesterday's Defeat
Vote Data Show Changing Nation
The Tea Party Got It Right, Mitt Got It Wrong
After Election, GOP Openness to Immigration
The young voters who celebrated Obama's victory don't know that they are voting against their own interest, because although many may have advanced degrees, they are substantially uneducated.
By Gary Aminoff, vice chairman of the Republican Party of Los Angeles County
The GOP's Epic Senate Fail
The National Republican Senatorial Committee, lead by establishment Republicans hostile to the grassroots and to the Tea Party, promoted a slate of mediocre candidates.
By Kimberly Strassel, Wall Street Journal
Economy: Post-Election Firings and Layoffs Surge
The victory by Barack Obama on election night has resulted in a huge wave of firings and layoffs all over America. A large number of businesses seem to have suddenly shifted into panic mode. The number of layoff announcements that we have seen in the last 48 hours has been absolutely shocking.
By Michael Snyder for Market Daily News
What Does the Election Mean for Obamacare?
The bad news is that many of the health care law’s serious effects were delayed until after the election. Ten of its 18 new tax hikes have yet to kick in. And there is still so much about the law that we don’t even know.
By Nina Owcharenko for The Heritage Foundation
Business Rejects Obamacare Elections, as it is often said, have consequences. As a result of the president’s reelection, the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, will be fully implemented. Unsurprisingly, several businesses are looking for ways to avoid the costs associated with the law. Just as unsurprisingly, American leftists consider such efforts to keep one’s business profitable–or solvent–unseemly.
By Arnold Ahlert for Front Page Magazine
The Meaning of Yesterday's Defeat
America is a deeply divided country with a center-left plurality. This plurality includes a vast number of citizens who describe themselves as moderates, but whose views on the issues are identical or similar to those that have historically been deemed liberal.
By John Hinderaker for Powerline Blog
¡Estimados Republicanos!
The GOP's immigration and Hispanic debacles.
The Wall Street Journal Review & Outlook
Vote Data Show Changing Nation
President Barack Obama's election victory exposed tectonic demographic shifts in American society that are reordering the U.S. political landscape.
The 2012 presidential election likely will be remembered as marking the end of long-standing coalitions, as voters regroup in cultural, ethnic and economic patterns that challenge both parties—but especially Republicans.
By Neil King Jr.
The Tea Party Got It Right, Mitt Got It Wrong
Mitt Romney won the primaries because he was electable. But, as it turned out, he really wasn’t electable after all. Not when the chief criteria of electability is having no opinion, no point of view and no reason to run for office except to win. Not when the chief criteria of being a Republican presidential nominee is being able to convince people that you’re hardly a Republican at all.
By Daniel Greenfield
After Election, GOP Openness to Immigration
The need to overhaul immigration laws has emerged as a rare area of agreement among leaders in both parties. The president wants to reward one of the voting blocs that helped him secure a second term, and Republicans are eager to make inroads with a constituency that seems to be moving away from them.
By Patrick O'Connor for the Wall Street Journal
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Why ObamaCare Will Fail
The failures of Medicare, Medicaid and socialized health care systems around the world are not accidents, rounding errors or bad luck of unanticipated complications. Rather, they are the inevitable, predicable result of forceful interference in the voluntary cooperation of free citizens. Obamacare will fail for the same reason that the Soviet Union failed: command-and-control economies cannot function rationally.
Read the full article at FrontPageMag.com.
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
Read the full article at FrontPageMag.com.
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
Sunday, October 28, 2012
'Hating Breitbart' movie opens
Andrew Breitbart reported the stories that the so-called mainstream media refused to touch because they did not fit the liberal-socialist-progressive agenda. He took no prisoners defending the smaller government and fiscal responsibility movement known as the Tea Party against scurrilous lies, echoed in the mainstream media, that the movement was a closet racist white supremacist club.
The movie 'Hating Breitbart' documents his one man war for truth up until his untimely death earlier this year. In theatres now. Go see it.
Resources:
The movie 'Hating Breitbart' documents his one man war for truth up until his untimely death earlier this year. In theatres now. Go see it.
Resources:
Saturday, October 27, 2012
America's Medical Society defends Free Markets in Health Care
Here is another invaluable resource in the fight against a massive government takeover that attacks the wrong problems, harms more than it solves, and makes us all bankrupt subjects of unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats and czars.
Dr. Adam F. Dorin, M.D., MBA and Founder/CEO of America's Medical Society writes in the Washington Times:
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
Dr. Adam F. Dorin, M.D., MBA and Founder/CEO of America's Medical Society writes in the Washington Times:
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
Monday, October 01, 2012
Howard Hyde Speaking October 2 at SFVRC
Howard Hyde will be presenting October 2 at 7PM to the San Fernando Valley Republican Club (Gary Aminoff, President), which meets at Galpin Ford, Roscoe Blvd near the 405 in Van Nuys.
The topic is 'Republican Priorities, Strategies and the Hispanic Vote 2012'.
Here are a few related past articles:
The topic is 'Republican Priorities, Strategies and the Hispanic Vote 2012'.
Here are a few related past articles:
- Hispanic Voters, Immigration and the Republican Party
The Hard Right and Extreme Left both need to give way to the Sober Center
- Republicans and the Immigration Trap
The next elections are too important to sacrifice over illegal gardeners.
- Environmental Hoaxes and Immigration
Human beings living under liberty and the rule of law are the ultimate resource.
- Illegal Immigration, 1806 -2006
The Homestead Act of 1862 demonstrates how law can eventually catch up with reality.
- Answering the Critics of Comprehensive Immigration Reform
Advocates of immigration reform must take seriously the arguments of critics, explain why these arguments are incorrect and, if necessary, adapt legislation to address the concerns raised.
By Stuart Anderson
- Lost in Translation: GOP Struggles With Hispanics
The Hispanic Vote polls at 63% for Obama, 28% for Romney
By Neil King Jr.
- Alabama's Immigration Miss
Arizona-style anti-illegal immigration laws are backfiring.
By Jason Riley
- Scholarly studies on Immigration
The overriding impact of immigrants is to strengthen and enrich American culture, increase the total output of the economy, and raise the standard of living of American citizens.
The Cato Institute
- Is Immigration Good For America?
Today, the demise of limited government has altered the relation between the individual and the state. People, including immigrants, are much more dependent on the state. In this institutional setting, what are the implications for immigration?
The Cato Journal
Sunday, September 30, 2012
Congressman Mike Rogers on Obamacare
Congressman Mike Rogers of Michigan speaks eloquently on the destruction wrought by Obamacare. See the video here:
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
The Inconvenient Truth about Medical Care Supply and Demand
It offends the refined sensibilities of many high-minded people that crude law of the jungle should have any place in the sacred and transcendent fields of health, education, art and so on. But the laws of chemistry certainly apply to drugs and their effect on the body, so there is no rational reason to expect that economic laws shouldn’t apply to the organization and administration of health care too. If more people are clamoring for services that fewer people are providing, either the price of that service will go up or the availability will go down; a shortage, with queues, waiting lists, black markets and other forms of rationing will ensue (see: Canada and the UK).
That’s the law of Supply and Demand, and it’s real, it is of the fundamental nature of human action in society, and it is not subject to repeal via political legislation.
It also explains what is wrong with the health care market in the United States and elsewhere.
The practice of medicine involves a whole lot of math and science (something which our public school pupils and public government politicians are woefully deficient in) but at its core it is an art: an art of human and social interaction among doctor, family and patient; the whole patient, not just the pancreas; the patient’s family history, not just today’s symptoms; the patient’s personality type, psychological profile, relationships, work, nutrition, exercise, sleep and drug habits, not just ink bubbles on a chart. Only a highly trained and experienced doctor or nurse or other provider who is free to practice his/her craft without third-party interference can provide the most effective care.
When we need care badly, we want the best practitioners of the art caring for us and are willing to mobilize our resources to get them. And in the freest nation in the history of the world, there has never been greater quality care nor greater access to it by the most common of citizens.
Yet the government-sanctioned system for regulating healthcare services completely undermines this. In the bureaucratic calculus, a bypass operation is a bypass operation is a bypass operation, whether performed by a first-year intern or a 30-year world-renowned veteran. It has a code in the system and a price that Medicare is willing to reimburse, no more, no less, no qualifiers, no accounting for skill, experience, dexterity or judgment (above all no allowance or toleration for judgment!), no exceptions.
If all there were to medicine was the correct generic, commodity cookie-cutter treatment for the matching defined disease or condition, then no doctors would be required; only kindergarten-variety bureaucrats trained to put the square pegs into the square holes and the triangular pegs into the triangular holes.
Do I exaggerate? A physician who treats a patient according to his or her professional judgment differently from what the government-sanctioned protocol produced by the ‘embedded clinical decision supports’ (the computer that tells the doctor what to do) say (s)he should faces denial of reimbursement, second-guessing of his/her decision or worse. It is happening today with Medicare billings and pharmaceutical prescriptions, and it will explode tenfold when the Medicare model is applied to the entire population.
Under Obamacare, the Independent Medicare Advisory Council (IMAC) may deny medicine, devices or treatments to Medicare patients that its ‘comparative effectiveness analysis’ algorithm deems unsatisfactory; that is, too costly (it’s about the cost to the agency, not the effectiveness to the patient). This is government ownership of your life.
It’s time to pull the plug on Obamacare.
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
That’s the law of Supply and Demand, and it’s real, it is of the fundamental nature of human action in society, and it is not subject to repeal via political legislation.
It also explains what is wrong with the health care market in the United States and elsewhere.
The practice of medicine involves a whole lot of math and science (something which our public school pupils and public government politicians are woefully deficient in) but at its core it is an art: an art of human and social interaction among doctor, family and patient; the whole patient, not just the pancreas; the patient’s family history, not just today’s symptoms; the patient’s personality type, psychological profile, relationships, work, nutrition, exercise, sleep and drug habits, not just ink bubbles on a chart. Only a highly trained and experienced doctor or nurse or other provider who is free to practice his/her craft without third-party interference can provide the most effective care.
When we need care badly, we want the best practitioners of the art caring for us and are willing to mobilize our resources to get them. And in the freest nation in the history of the world, there has never been greater quality care nor greater access to it by the most common of citizens.
Yet the government-sanctioned system for regulating healthcare services completely undermines this. In the bureaucratic calculus, a bypass operation is a bypass operation is a bypass operation, whether performed by a first-year intern or a 30-year world-renowned veteran. It has a code in the system and a price that Medicare is willing to reimburse, no more, no less, no qualifiers, no accounting for skill, experience, dexterity or judgment (above all no allowance or toleration for judgment!), no exceptions.
If all there were to medicine was the correct generic, commodity cookie-cutter treatment for the matching defined disease or condition, then no doctors would be required; only kindergarten-variety bureaucrats trained to put the square pegs into the square holes and the triangular pegs into the triangular holes.
Do I exaggerate? A physician who treats a patient according to his or her professional judgment differently from what the government-sanctioned protocol produced by the ‘embedded clinical decision supports’ (the computer that tells the doctor what to do) say (s)he should faces denial of reimbursement, second-guessing of his/her decision or worse. It is happening today with Medicare billings and pharmaceutical prescriptions, and it will explode tenfold when the Medicare model is applied to the entire population.
Under Obamacare, the Independent Medicare Advisory Council (IMAC) may deny medicine, devices or treatments to Medicare patients that its ‘comparative effectiveness analysis’ algorithm deems unsatisfactory; that is, too costly (it’s about the cost to the agency, not the effectiveness to the patient). This is government ownership of your life.
It’s time to pull the plug on Obamacare.
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
Thursday, July 19, 2012
Catholic Priest issues strong invocation against socialism
A catholic priest addressing the 2012 Colorado Republican State Assembly and Convention assails socialism for taking away, not just rights, but responsibilities of free people.
For a man representing an institution that has seemed all too willing to go along with the Democrat-party big government social welfare agenda, Fr. Andrew is a breath of fresh air.
Click below.
For a man representing an institution that has seemed all too willing to go along with the Democrat-party big government social welfare agenda, Fr. Andrew is a breath of fresh air.
Click below.
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
Milton Friedman on Socialized Medicine
With your Obamacare debate, get some wisdom from one of the greatest economists of the 20th century. We've been warned for decades. When will we learn?
Check out these videos and more:
Check out these videos and more:
A Time For Choosing, again
The more things change...
The particulars of political campaign issues change from cycle to cycle, but fundamental principles endure. In truth, there is nothing new under the sun.
As we contemplate the issues of the 2012 election, a speech from 1964 is as true today as it was then.
On October 27, 1964, Ronald Reagan, a former actor and Democrat (not yet Governor of California), addressed the Republican National Convention. It was his first nationally televised appearance.
Watch it and think: How few particulars of the speech would have to be changed to fit the present day, and how many of our problems today stem from not listening to him then.
The particulars of political campaign issues change from cycle to cycle, but fundamental principles endure. In truth, there is nothing new under the sun.
As we contemplate the issues of the 2012 election, a speech from 1964 is as true today as it was then.
On October 27, 1964, Ronald Reagan, a former actor and Democrat (not yet Governor of California), addressed the Republican National Convention. It was his first nationally televised appearance.
Watch it and think: How few particulars of the speech would have to be changed to fit the present day, and how many of our problems today stem from not listening to him then.
Monday, July 16, 2012
Obamacare is in Critical Condition on National Review Online
National Review Online has an in-depth blog dedicated to health care policy. Highly recommended.
Click below:
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
Click below:
More Health care reform resources on the Obamacare page.
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