A look at Mellonomics

In the wake of our recession, and the Tea Parties, and the continuing economic stimuli, supporters of Obama's policies ask, "what's your solution, then?" Fellow libertarians are undoubtedly quick to claim that we need to reduce spending, particularly deficit spending, but also to cut taxes, eradicated social security, privatize roadways and health insurance... the list goes on and on with lovely ideas that we have, but that no one else is buying.

But there once was a time when the Secretary of the Treasury followed his own rules, and proposed monumental tax cuts, and saw unemployment rates as low as 1.8%. That time was in the 20s. And that man was Andrew Mellon.

Mellon served in the Cabinet from 1921 to 1932, under three presidents. When the crash hit in 1929, and the Depression spread, his policies and ideals seemed significantly less unfavorable. Many who began to hate on Hoover thought that he shared Mellon's lassez-faire attitude (though he didn't). Mellon's proposals of liquidation rubbed the common masses the wrong way, and he was out of the Cabinet before Roosevelt took office.

The main thought behind Mellon's theories was quite simple- if the taxes are lowered, then people will object less to paying them, and they will pay them, instead of trying to find ways around them. With more people paying taxes, the revenue increases. Genius. His plan had some highlights:

Cut the top income tax rate from 73% to 24%.

Cut taxes on low incomes from 4% to 0.5%.

Reduce the Federal Estate tax.

Efficiency in government.

Some of these measures seem dramatic. The last one seems impossible. But under Mellon, the country saw economic growth. The national debt fell from $26 billion in 1921 to $16 billion in 1930. Mellon was an advocate of supply-side economics before it had a name, and was a forebear of Reagonomics (though without the increase of administrative spending).

In short, here is a model for us. Here is a potential answer. Tax cuts so the revenue can increase. Can we dig ourselves out of a projected $20 trillion debt? It may take some time. And responsibility. (Ok, a lot of responsibility.) But the very least we can do, I think, is to remember Andrew Mellon, perhaps with a bit of nostalgia.

A little dose of reality to penetrate the Obamalove

Of course, we know that by now, he's already spent the money he saved, so...

h/t my friend Cindy, who helpfully posted this on facebook

RIP: Pontiac

Dear General Motors,

I understand that your company is going down. I understand that in today's economy, you've got to make some cutbacks. When the government declined to give you any stimulus money, you thought it was time to start looking for a way to cut costs, reduce overhead. America today isn't what it once was. I get all this.

But why did you feel the need to kill Pontiac?

I love the Pontiac line, the GTO, the Grand Prix, even the Trans Am, and of course, my baby, the Grand Am.

(Likeness only; not my actual car.)

She's the first car I bought. It was an August day in 2005. I was on my way to a friend's wedding in southern Ohio. I'd briefly considered purchasing a car of my own. So I went to the friendly Pontiac dealership. The next day, I drove off with a beautiful 2005 iridescent slate Grand Am. I named her Clytemnestra, after my favorite Greek heroine. She's the first piece of property I actually own. And not that I'd want to get rid of her, but you discontinued the Grand Am in 2005, so I couldn't get an upgrade or new replacement, should anything happen to Clytemnestra. Now the whole brand is gone.

I'm so verklempt.

Well, GM, I hope that this helps your business. I really do.

Obama on swine flu: Don't call us, we'll call you

In his speech at the National Academy of Sciences this morning, Obama talked about what the G is doing so far for the outbreak of swine flu that's killing people in Mexico. So far that includes telling people not to panic, telling people to wash their hands, and breaking into the "federal stockpile" of flu vaccines (the conspiracy theorist in me thinks, what else do they have in that stockpile?) to send to affected states.

And now, in the possibly inappropriate words of Michael from "10 Things I Hate About You," "the shit hath hitteth the fan."

The WHO has rated the outbreak at Phase 3, which is right at the end of "few human infections." The EU's Health Commissioner Androulla Vassiliou has warned Europeans against traveling to the US and Mexico, and the acting head of the CDC, Dr. Richard Besser says it's not as bad as all that. In a disconcerting turn of events, we're the ones that people are staying away from. While swine flu hasn't killed anyone in the States yet, possibly due to better standards of medical care, and possibly due to a lesser severity of the strain, there is a potential for it to get worse.

Of course, before we panic, let's remember that 63,000 died in 2005 of the flu- in America alone. And whatever happened with that avian flu "epidemic?" Only 257 people have died since it was discovered. The West Nile virus? Ok, that one's a little worse, at 1131 deaths, but that's the amount of deaths in the past 10 years. So it's good to put things into perspective before donning the haz-mat garb.

Another requisite consequence of this outbreak is the finger-pointing. The Dems are gleefully pointing out that Republicans lopped off millions of dollars from the stimulus package that would be allotted to "pandemic preparation." And while we're blaming the GOP for the downturn in the market due to investors' fear of a worldwide epidemic, let's blame them for that volcano eruption that happened after they cut out funding for "volcano monitoring." After all, that's what happens when you cut funding for something- it inevitably comes back to bite you. (That must be the entire reasoning behind Obama's stimulus package.)

On another note, I am a little curious as to why the DHS is getting so involved in the situation. While it's nice to see Janet Napolitano dealing with something actually inside US borders, shouldn't she be out violating someone's fourth amendment rights?

Update: I was meeting with a vendor today at work who plugged antibacterial spray with commenting about swine flu. Ha.

Now, what have we learned? Nothing, apparently.

One of the most useful statements I remember right after 9/11 was said by my 11th grade government teacher. He said that we wouldn't know whether or not the terrorists had succeeded in their plot for years, until things had changed. I remember contemplating that, through the days of that September, and wondering what could possibly change. Of course, I was also 16, and more interested in things other than the state of the Union.

But considering today's lockdown of the White House and almost-evacuation of Capitol Hill, I got to thinking again. These extreme measures were put into effect because the GPS system inside a single-engine airplane went awry and caused the plane to accidentally veer into restricted airspace. Two F-16s and two Coast Guard helicopters intercepted and escorted the plane to an airport in Maryland.


Now, just to put things into perspective, that's two of these things:





And two of these things:



For one of these:


Yeah, that seems about right.

Apparently, this type of situation, where small planes accidentally find themselves in restricted airspace has happened before. Back in March, Rep. Vern Ehlers (MI-R)

"suggested that authorities determine evacuations based on the type of aircraft coming in. In other words, a jet will do a lot more damage than a Cessna, and should be treated more urgently."

Now, what a novel idea that is.

Back to the concept of the terrorists' effectiveness, I'd say they've done an outstanding job of promoting fear and terror. If a single-engine plane flying a little to the East can cause the lockdown of the White House and the evacuation of Capitol Hill, that sounds very effective to me.

Hate crime protection undermines equality

In a landmark case, Allen Andrade has been convicted of first-degree murder for the bludgeoning death of Angie Zapata and sentenced to life without parole. The murder conviction wasn't too much of a surprise, because there was so much evidence against him, as well as the part where he confessed. The surprise was that it took the jury only two hours to reach a verdict, and to brand the killing as a hate crime. Andrade is the first in the States to be convicted and sentenced in a hate crime against a transgender person.

In 2005, Colorado added "transgender" status to its list of groups under the protection of "bias-motivated crimes," also known as hate crimes. Colorado is not alone in its thinking. While most, if not all, states who have hate crime statutes offer protection for gay and lesbian citizens, transgender citizens are usually not included. New Hampshire recently passed a discrimination law adding the language "gender identity" and "gender expression," and earlier this week, the New York Assembly passed the Gender Expression Non-Discrimination Act.

On the one hand, I see these changes as steps forward in our justice system. Groups of people who have been historically mistreated and harassed are now protected under the law. But the whole concept of hate crimes smacks of unconstitutionality to me. "Equal Protection" should be just that- equal. I don't agree that certain groups should have added protection simply because they're different. I realize this view is not shared by many in the GLBT community. But I can't help but feel that if gay people ever want to be equal, they've got to stop hiding behind the law. How can we claim that marriage should be equal and protected for all citizens, and at the same time claim that a person who is harmed because of his sexual orientation deserves different treatment? I don't know that a straight person killed because of his orientation would be afforded the same courtesy.

It's a sticky situation. I acknowledge that our society as a whole doesn't seem to be ready to accept the GLBT community as mainstream. I understand that there are citizens out there who feel the need to force their opinions upon those with whom they disagree. But I also think that if the GLBT community wants equality, they're going to have to give up the special protections.

He had a conscience, he just didn't feel compelled to use it

On the Rachel Maddow show Tuesday night, Philip Zelikow discussed his lone memo of dissent among all the pro-torture memos that floated around in the Bush administration.

At the time he was counsel for Condoleezza Rice. When he saw the torture memos (courtesy of The Huffington Post), he was of the opinion that they represented a "distorted view of the law" (shocking), and felt compelled to do something about it. And what was his grand gesture? Another memo. Forget the fact that the operation was classified, so only a few people even knew of its existence, so that only a few people would see the memos in the first place. Zelikow was so bothered by the twisted representation of the law, that he wrote down his own version. I don't exactly picture Jerry Maguire's midnight mission statement that turns up in the mailboxes of his entire company. I picture a few sheets of paper on government letterhead, sent to a select group of people.

In all fairness, Zelikow says that the administration tried to squash his attempts to shine the light of truth into the murky Bush darkness. But when Rachel asked him if he would have done something more drastic, like resigning? No, he said. It wasn't like that, apparently. It was really just a cordial disagreement between some lawyers who interpreted the law (for which there was really no precedent) differently.

And then we have House Minority Leader John Boehner confirming that the "harsh interrogation tactics" (or insert other euphemism of choice) are really just torture techniques. Boehner disagrees with the decision to leak the documents. He thinks that those unfriendly to the US could take advantage of this information:

When it comes to what our interrogation techniques are going to be or should be, I'm not going to disclose, nor should anyone have a conversation about what those techniques ought to be. It's inappropriate. All it does is give our enemies more information about us than they need.

So... we should just not talk about the illegal things we're doing? Well, that mindset certainly works in other areas of our government, not just our defense agencies. At least we're keeping it consistent.

Our fearless leader helps us out. Sort of.

In the midst of our non-recession, and even as he signs away more of our tax money to a social program, our president decides to throw us a bone. And what is that bone? He's cutting out $100 million from his budget.

Brad from The Liberty Papers illustrates for us:

Well, the Tea Partiers must have had an impact, because Barack Obama is about to go on a cost-cutting spree. With this quick 90-day window to identify $100B of cuts to make across his cabinet, he’s showing that he really does hear our pleas for fiscal sanity.

Oh, wait, did I read that wrong? Yep, it’s NOT $100B, it’s $100M. That’s not even enough to be a drop in a bucket!

Reason puts it in perspective:

Imagine that the head of a household with annual spending of $100,000 called everyone in the family together to deal with a $34,000 budget shortfall. How much would he or she announce that spending had to be cut? By $3 over the course of the year–approximately the cost of one latte at Starbucks. The other $33,997? We can put that on the family credit card and worry about it next year.

Expect petulant politicians, like spoiled children, when these “cuts” are identified, to scream and whine — “But we wanted our latte!”

How kind of Obama to help us out and cut some money... only to spend it again, and more, on a social program that would be better off having private funding.

Breaking News: Banks May Have Used Fraud to Get Government Handouts

I'm sure that at the beginning, the Cabinet sounded like a good idea. I'm sure the colonists were keen on the idea of the President having some buddies around him to counsel him and take care of the little things like the military, the money, the people, etc. Our first President, George Washington, was aided by a cabinet of four- Jefferson, Hamilton, (Henry) Knox, and (Edmund) Randolph. It was a different animal back then. Things were a bit more awkward, far from the well-oiled machine that cranks away today. Inevitably, what began as a pretty good idea spiraled out of control and grew into the monstrous affair we now know- fifteen (many potentially superfluous) positions accountable to the citizens only through confirmation by the Senate.

Today, one member of our esteemed cabinet, Secretary of the Treasury Tim Geithner testified before the Congressional Oversight Panel (full video here via C-SPAN). According to panel member Damon Silvers, it is the first time a Treasury representative has testified before the panel. I suppose that's fair. Geithner's got a lot on his plate. So much, in fact, that it's perfectly understandable that he didn't have time to correctly file his tax returns. I'd like to say that our founding father, Alexander Hamilton, the first Secretary of the Treasury, would have disagreed with Geithner, or at least with the goings on of late. But alas, I don't know that that'd be the case, considering his Report on Public Credit.

Anyway, Geithner testified before the COP today, defending his policies that he's implemented to help save the economy. He attempted to explain his brilliant plan of a public-private partnership (using the Treasury, the Fed, and private investors) that could dig us out of the hole we're in. Or, at least spend $2 trillion in the process. Considering the current national debt is rapidly approaching $12 trillion dollars, that seems a bit extravagant.

Now, I don't profess to know that much about economics. Even as I decry the overbearing taxation levied against the citizens of this country, I realize that I have no supplemental plan to use instead. But I do believe in taking responsibility for my consequences. For some reason, it doesn't sound quite right to me that our federal government has taken upon itself to solve the economic woes of our country (and tacitly, the world), by handing out money to corporations, by subsidizing loans, by nationalizing banks. That seems counterproductive to me.

If only there was some type of measure by which our legislators were held accountable to the citizens and taxpayers, some way to make them answer for their actions. Oh, wait...

Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it. – Ronald Reagan