MICKEY KAUS: “Isn’t the border fence shovel-ready?“
Archive for 2009
February 22, 2009
“MESSAGE: ‘I DON’T CARE.'”
FEDERAL CIVIL UNIONS: A compromise? I’d rather keep the feds out of the marriage business altogether. Then again, I feel the same way about the states.
BOSTON GLOBE: Bailout lament: What about me? Many who played by rules see unfairness. Gee, do you think?
“What about people like me who are playing by the rules, who got a mortgage we could afford?” said Carpenter, 52, who programs building management systems for MIT Lincoln Laboratory. “Maybe I’m too old school, but you sign on the bottom line, and you’re responsible for it.”
Carpenter is among the vast majority of Americans who work, pay mort gages, borrow responsibly, and now find themselves facing the bill to bail out those who didn’t. Over the years they lived within their means. Now they’re asking: What for?
The anger underscores the dangers government faces in private sector rescues. . . . Randy Schmid, 50, of Worcester, is one of them. A self-employed consultant, Schmid and his wife Dominika are renters. They looked into buying a home a few years ago. They hoped to find a house they could afford on a single income, so if one of them lost work, they could still meet their obligations. They didn’t.
“If we would have lived beyond our means,” he said, “we would have gotten a handout.”
How long can a system that punishes virtue and rewards greed and profligacy flourish?
TAXPROF: Tax Lawyer Alleges IRS Retaliated Against Him for Complaint About Agent. Get ready for more stories like this . . . .
ROGER KIMBALL: “The most popular journalist in America at the moment is probably Rick Santelli. . . . When Mr. Santelli spontaneously attacked the administration’s plan to step in and rewrite the contract terms for some–but only, of course, some–mortgages, you could tell that his colleagues at the other end of the video feed were a bit taken aback. Hey, wait a minute: this fellow is calling the whole redistributionist scheme into question! He called for a referendum on the question of whether people like the idea of in effect helping to pay for their neighbor’s mortgage!”
SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK for the 21st Century.
WILLIAM JACOBSON: The revolt of the Kulaks has begun.
BAD REVIEWS FOR CHRIS DODD’S BANK-NATIONALIZATION TALK: Dodd Speaks, Markets Instantly Tank. Between this and the pay-cap bit, he’s not really helping the Obama Administration.
JOHN SCALZI EXPLAINS WHY THE ODDS of your favorite science fiction novel becoming a Major Motion Picture are awfully slim.
MARC ANDREESEN: “The game is completely over.”
IN THE MAIL: Robert Heinlein’s The Rolling Stones, in a new edition from Baen. Glad this stuff is staying in print.
MEET THE NEW BOSS, YADA YADA: A screenshot from Memeorandum last night.
AMBASSADOR “Vacuum Cleaner.”
SETH BARRETT TILLMAN: The Puzzle of Hamilton’s Federalist No. 77: It Turns out Hamilton was Right After All.
U.S. FOREIGN POLICY IN A NUTSHELL: Clinton: China Must Continue to Invest in U.S. Bonds.
UPDATE: Uh oh. Foreigners Wary of Long-Term U.S. Securities. “Just when the United States really, really needs the money, overseas investors seem to be less willing to buy long-term American securities.” Well, we’re not acting like a good credit risk.
MORE: POLITICO: Last week, America ran up the credit card. This week, the statement arrives. My advice: Blame it all on Bush! Even the “stimulus!”
Plus, taking “a bullet train to bankruptcy?”
STILL MORE: A reader notes a different take from Spengler:
The silliest thing that clever people are saying about the world economic crisis is that the United States will lose its position as the dominant world superpower in consequence. On the contrary: the crisis strengthens the relative position of the United States and exposes the far graver weaknesses of all prospective competitors.
Well, we’re embarked on an experiment that will show who is right about this . . . .
CHRIS DODD UPDATE: Hartford Courant: Dodd’s ‘Cottage:’ A Cozy Purchase:
The saga of Dodd’s lucrative Irish odyssey reveals that his two 2003 sweetheart loans from subprime mortgage titan Countrywide Financial were not the first time he enjoyed a financial advantage from a wealthy benefactor. The trail begins at one of New York’s most desirable addresses.
Read the whole thing, which shows Dodd in a rather shady light. Again. Note this bit:
When Downe agreed to pay $11 million to the SEC in 1994, he claimed he was virtually bankrupt. Six months later, he made $2,000 in contributions to Dodd, again listing his occupation as “private investor.” Must be a lot of loose change in the cushions at 25 Sutton Place, even in a “bankrupt” pauper’s grand apartment. . . .
In 2001, Dodd did the favor of a lifetime for his pal, Downe. The veteran senator circumvented the normal Department of Justice vetting process and got Downe a full pardon from President Bill Clinton on his last day in office. Dodd initiated the pardon request and included in his two-page letter to Clinton the tidbit that he speaks to Downe nearly every day.
Like I said, read the whole thing.
EXAMINER: Taxpayer revolt spreads as tea party goes national.
UPDATE: Here’s more on the phenomenon from U.S. News. And here’s a cautionary note from Mark Tapscott: “As much as I rejoice in the sight of legions of fed-up Americans taking to the streets to protest the central government’s colossal waste of the first fruits of their labors, it is important that people understand that the original Boston Tea Party was neither spontaneous nor a mere lark.”
ANOTHER UPDATE: John McGinnis emails: “You have had several posts of caution on the tea party movement. Several seem to hinge on how organized the Original Boston Tea Party was. No doubt. But the build up to that was 10 years of disorganized then organized effort to that event. We are only 4 days into the cycle. Cut them some slack.” Good point.
THE ANTI-BONO: An interview with Dambisa Moyo, the author of Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa. Well worth reading. When asked whether the current financial crisis is leading people to question capitalism, she responds: “I wish we questioned the aid model as much as we are questioning the capitalism model.”
JERRY POURNELLE: “The economic forecasts are gloomy despite the hastily passed stimulus package; and we haven’t seen what new regulations are hidden in the stimulus package. I doubt that anyone has read the entire bill even yet. The best way out of this mess is the German Economic Miracle way: suspend regulations. All regulations. Make it easy to start new companies. Let ingenuity work to allocate capital. Of course we won’t do that.”
FROM ANDREW MARCUS: Video coverage of green tech at the Chicago Auto Show.
SHOULD MINNESOTA LOWER THE DRINKING AGE TO 18?
Yes. Next question?
JOEL KOTKIN: Death of the California Dream. Plus, who killed it. (Via NewsAlert). “California has returned from the dead before, most recently in the mid-1990s. But the odds that the Golden State can reinvent itself again seem long. The buffoonish current governor and a legislature divided between hysterical greens, public-employee lackeys and Neanderthal Republicans have turned the state into a fiscal laughingstock. Meanwhile, more of its middle class migrates out while a large and undereducated underclass (much of it Latino) faces dim prospects. It sometimes seems the people running the state have little feel for the very things that constitute its essence—and could allow California to reinvent itself, and the American future, once again. . . . The best great hope for California’s future does not lie with the narcissists of left or right but with the newcomers, largely from abroad. These groups still appreciate the nation of opportunity and aspire to make the California—and American— Dream their own.
YOU THINK IT’S BAD HERE: 70,000 Chinese factories have closed recently; 20 million lost jobs as a result.