politics
2008 Bailout vs. Other Large Government Projects
Kudos to Voltage Creative for this awesome pie chart:
2008 Bailout Pie Comparison
This is all pretty funny (to me, anyway), but it’s actually even better when you consider that the real cost of the bailout will be $8.5 trillion (LA Times), not $4.6 trillion as this graph would indicate. So, for maximum hilarity, roughly double the size of the red pie.
The Governator Declares Fiscal Emergency
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/12/01/MN4O14FD1N.DTL&tsp=1
“We are right now spending money we don’t have,” Schwarzenegger said. “The federal government shouldn’t give us a penny until we straighten out our mess and we can live within our means.”
LOL, good one, Arnold. Like that is going to happen.
I am deliberately trying to not post about how the economy sucks and how I think housing will see 2-4 years of decline before we hit the bottom because I’m actually focusing on things that I can meaningfully impact. It gets tiresome in pointing out how fucking obvious it is that interfering with the free market creates inefficiencies and how it’s unfair to everyone; additionally, it should be clear that it is stupid when the chosen few with incentive alignment X has the power to make decisions for the rest of the population with incentive alignment Y where X is nearly the inverse of Y.
The statists that read this blog cling to ideals like democracy (tyranny by the majority) and fairness (forcing people to believe in - and pay for - concepts they agree with), and it’s pretty unlikely they’ll ever change their thinking. After all, there was once a time where I believed in silly concepts like God and democracy, and I didn’t just “snap out of it.” Finding out that everything you believe in cannot be logically justified - no matter how much research you do - is really scary. I can’t blame people for not wanting to face reality.
How Online Gamblers Cheated
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/11/25/60minutes/main4633254.shtml
60 Minutes did a story on the Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet scandals from a year ago as originally broke by members of the 2+2 forums and Todd Witteles (Dan Druff). It’s mostly fair and a pretty short watch (available at the link above) at 13 minutes.
These people were only caught because they were reckless and stupid. It is entirely possible that this is happening with other accounts on other sites (or the same ones!) being run by less greedy and more intelligent individuals. Datamining and analyzing millions of hands like I did at PokerStars does limit blatant and even well-thought out cheating, but it is really a simple task to an intelligent insider to figure out how to circumvent these policies. The toughest part is bribing an insider or getting that information, but once it is discovered, it would be easy to exploit this without being caught for a long, long time.
It is worth noting that the people caught in this scandal were not brought to justice, and in the case of Absolute Poker, remained totally anonymous. Online poker is explicitly illegal in 13 states and possibly illegal in the rest of them depending on the interpretation of the Wire Act, and because of this, servers and companies are located offshore and do not answer to U.S. laws or regulation. While it is true that many of these sites are trustworthy and do their best to ensure game integrity, most are not. As always, when you criminalize something, it just goes underground and thrives as a black market if the demand is there.
Ron Paul Answers Your Questions - Part One and Two
The Freakonomics blog took questions from readers to present to Ron Paul. They received so many that it took two columns to publish them all. You can find them here:
http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/14/ron-paul-answers-your-questions-part-one/
http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/20/ron-paul-answers-your-questions-part-two/
Not another candidate in the world would answer all of these tough questions as straightforwardly as he did. A great read overall.
Negative Savings Rate / The Common Man
The U.S. economy has a negative savings rate - people are borrowing more money than they can spend.
(This is obviously retarded, and yet Keynesian economists would tell you that this is a good thing to do.)
However, this is not a rant against Keynesians being wrong yet again, but instead a post about my faith in the common man. It is the belief of many elitist liberals that they (and people of their ilk) are more enlightened, more educated, and more intelligent than the average person in America. As a result, they believe that they are better suited to make decisions for the common man to help save him from himself since he is obviously too stupid to grasp that gay marriage should be a right and that taxes should be spent on healthcare for the poor.
These same elitists do not realize that all the “positive” traits they list about themselves does not make them a better person than your average fly-over state citizen who works at the local auto parts store and has four children.
It is true that Americans have a negative savings rate right now, and that it has been this way for some time. As I have said before, this is lunacy. Spending money that you do not have is typically not a good idea, and it is absolutely not a good idea when you are borrowing money at rates you probably cannot afford. However, Americans have become addicted to debt - consumers, producers, and government alike.
A very common statement that I have heard from elitists typically involves this concept. They usually blame the average American for being an idiot and taking on so much debt instead of saving their money. However, they never stop to think that maybe the average American is simply too smart to save money.
Too smart to save money? Didn’t I just say that it is stupid to accumulate a ton of debt?
Well, yes, I did. However, the reason that we have a negative savings rate is not because people are stupid - it is because the government lies to us. People are not as dumb as you think - they realize that saved money is not keeping up with inflation. The government tells us inflation is 2-3% annually; realistic figures are much, much higher than that. So, sticking this money into a high-yield savings account that earns 5% APY is, at best, breaking even. People aren’t dumb - they know that money saved is simply not a good investment. They look at the stock market crashing, they look at unstable oil prices, they see the gap between wages of the regular employee and the executive widening, and they think to themselves: “Fuck this.”
Since FDR’s takeover, economists in America have been trained to believe in Keynesianism and have passed along these ideas to their students. They repeat the mantra that “consumption is good” and “savings are bad,” yet when you combine these two statements, you get exactly the type of economy we have now - one based on ever-expanding currency supplies of fiat money that has no backing whatsoever. The massive selloff of stocks around the globe has poured tons of dollars at the expense of foreign currency into the U.S., leading to deflation and the strengthening of the dollar. Yet gold remains a solid hedge against the dollar and has outperformed equities throughout this period? Why?
Again, people are not stupid. They know that the government will not stand for deflation; wages will stagnate and prices will drop. The oft-repeated lie “Steady, controlled inflation is good for the economy” will be repeated. The Federal Reserve will drop the federal funds rate; it is theorized that it will go to 0% and stay that way in 2009. This means, quite literally, free money for banks to lend to help increase the currency supply and “stimulate” the economy.
These people that you vote for believe they know what is best for the economy; that the average American citizen cannot be trusted to control their own financial destiny. But people do know the very basic facts about money - they know that the automakers should not be bailed out. It costs GM $2,000 per car more than Toyota to produce an inferior product. Automakers have “Job Bank” programs where workers are paid salaries despite being unemployed simply because the automaker had to close the plant that they worked in.
Yet the Fed is not accountable to anyone. They have the authority to hold meetings in secret and do whatever they wish - Congress has no check on them; nor does the common man, the sovereign of this nation. The board of directors of the Fed consist of former executives of banks, automakers, and other corporations that beg for bailouts and have millions of dollars appropriated for lobbyists to demand things from Congress.
If you voted for anyone but Ron Paul, these are the people that you supported. I can hardly blame you; the propaganda surrounding big brother government being good for us bombards us on a daily basis. They turn us against each other, telling us that we cannot be trusted to do anything on our own - that individualism is dead and that government control is the best way to handle things. They create paranoia and fear.
The truth is, that farmer who voted for Proposition 8 who is a devout Christian and believes that gays are going to hell is quite capable of making his own decisions. That you are mad at him for voting for something that strips the right to marry away from gay and transgendered people detracts from the real problem: Why the fuck do we have the right to tell each other what we should or should not be able to do?
Do not blame the common man. You cannot celebrate the victory of Obama on one hand and loathe the passing of Proposition 8; it is intellectually dishonest. Both are the fruits of democracy - the tyranny by the majority.
Arbeit macht frei, brother.
The Obama Administration will call on Americans to serve in order to meet the nation’s challenges. President-Elect Obama will expand national service programs like AmeriCorps and Peace Corps and will create a new Classroom Corps to help teachers in underserved schools, as well as a new Health Corps, Clean Energy Corps, and Veterans Corps. Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America, by developing a plan to require 50 hours of community service in middle school and high school and 100 hours of community service in college every year.
Hard work will truly set us free. Change we are conscripted to believe in.
How to get people to become libertarian (or at least disenfranchise them)
If you know someone who supported a major party candidate in 2008, ask them why they support them. When they invariably touch on an issue where it requires taking something from one arbitrarily-defined group of people and redistributing it to another arbitrarily-defined group of people, ask them Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
They will invariably have no good answer for it, but they won’t think that it invalidates their state-based argument. No problem; simply ask them what they think government’s role in society is. When they say that “the government should confiscate good/service X from group A and give it to group B” (or any variation thereof; if you have problems identifying these arguments, please ask me), see if they disagree with the assertion that individual people make up the government. When they agree (and if they don’t, politely tell them they are wrong), ask them what is stopping them from distributing good/service X to group B? After all, they are people, and they make up the government.
You can then ask them what right do they have to confiscate your good/service X for redistribution as they see fit. Inform them that you do not tell them how to redistribute good/service X (this only applies if you haven’t voted for a major party candidate or other socialists; if you have, you can say that you don’t plan to in the future), so what right do they have to make these choices? Take this argument to its logical extension and ask them if it would be acceptable for you to make decisions regarding their private sex lives.
Either they will think about the basis of redistribution and the role of the state, or they will tune you out. The former turns people into libertarians and anarcho-capitalists fairly quickly; the latter people are ones that will never understand economics.
Obama Mania is Scary.
My friend Terrence (who is Canadian) said this about the elections:
In all likelihood, by the end of Obama’s term(s), he will be considered the most charismatic president in at least a half-century. I actually have mixed feelings about this. To be sure, Obama is great at giving speeches and is very good at making people feel good and happy. But this actually scares me a little. Most of the worst politicians and figures in history have been charismatic individuals. I fear charismatic politicians. When it comes to a position of power, I’d much rather have a guy with just so-so charisma; someone that people like but aren’t entranced by. Obama creates this wave of excitement and fervor everywhere he goes. It’s probably just me, but I’m genuinely scared when I see massive, massive throngs of people gathering to hail any one man as the messiah and saviour and the great bringer of change and bearer of hope. People have always showed up to political rallies to support and cheer for their candidate, but Obama supporters seemed particularly fervent. And today, when his win was made official, people were so fucking happy. There’s this great sense of pride among Americans that they elected Obama. And all of that is scary to me. Because at the end of the day, he’s still a politician. He and his ilk are still going to take away liberties, still spend other peoples’ money, and still make up laws to benefit some at the expense of others. He will say things he doesn’t believe or are grounded in fallacy, and he will say them with a straight face because they are the popular things to say. He will do these things because he is a politician, and that’s what politicians do.
I completely agree. People being whipped up into fervor about an authority who will control their lives is downright scary. There is no end of leaders in the world who enjoyed popular support and parlayed that support into enacting policies of aggression and government control.
When I speak to the average college or high school student about politics or economics, they are so enthused about government doing stuff for us. They look forward to them putting their seal of approval on gay marriages, the plots for universal healthcare, and equitably distributing wealth through various social programs.
What was it that some famed Democrat said?
And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country.
My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.
My, how far we’ve come.
Election Day.
Believe it or not, I’m a non-voter. Really!
There’s a lot of “good” reasons why I’m not voting - like not wanting to legitimize a corrupt two-party system and the fact that no candidate comes close to matching my views on economics, but most people roll their eyes if I tell them those are the reasons I’m not going to the polls today. So, I just tell them another part of the truth - I am too lazy and don’t want to take time out of my day to do so. I could be sleeping, playing video games, working, paying attention to my wife, or playing with my cats - all of which are more fun and more important to me than casting a meaningless vote.
They still roll their eyes, of course, but at least they don’t ask further questions. People don’t want to hear talks about economics and the corrupt nature of our nation.
However, LJ user infopractical made an interesting comment that I largely agree with:
I have a hard time getting out of my head the belief that this election ensures that our country has given up on being a republic. I feel utterly ill and helpless.
Also my passenger-side window was smashed and my briefcase was stolen out of my car today.
Some Humor
Since I’m bored at work and flooding my blog with posts, I figured I’d post this humorous excerpt about American politics that I ran across while doing some reading about economics:
In 1958, Senator Stuart Symington accused the RAND Corporation of defeatism for studying how the United States might strategically surrender to an enemy power. This led to the passage of a prohibition on the spending of tax dollars on the study of defeat or surrender of any kind.
Awesome.