Category: politics

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politics

My summary of current political thought WRT the public.

Conservatives

 

“If everyone would stop being so stupid and be more like us, everything would be much better. As it is, we better use the government to dictate the way things should be.”

 

Modern day American Liberals

 

“People at large are stupid, greedy, and sometimes even evil. The government is the only way to protect them from themselves and us from them.”

 

Libertarians

 

“People are indeed stupid and greedy to varying amounts. There are even evil people in this world. This is why we need to limit what governments can do so that people can’t use their position to do bad things. With any luck, people interested in power and influence will be less attracted to government positions when there is less power to be wielded.”

 

IMO, it is attitude number two that leads to attitude number one. Power corrupts. I keep hoping that people will eventually realize that no matter how evil someone is, they can only do massive amounts of harm with the government’s blessing. Wait… am I slipping into attitude #1…?

 

 

Categories
economics politics

This can’t be good

Via Bloomberg, the US government now pays more for credit than several other bonds. This means that investors see Berkshire Hathaway, Lowe’s, Proctor and Gamble, and Johnson and Johnson as safer bets fro getting their money back than the US government. Think abut that for a moment. The nation’s debt is starting to loom, and the latest vote has added an enormous burden to it over time. Or at least that’s how the financial world sees it. The US is in danger of losing it’s AAA bond rating from Moody’s. Treasuries may no longer be the go-to conservative investment.

I’m really hoping that this will cause some sort of fiscal restraint to enter into the political mindset before there’s a real problem. I’m not optimistic though. As long as politicians can promise benefits now and payments later, that is what they will do.

Categories
freedom politics

What the vote in Maine teaches us

It shows that there are a lot of people that don’t like gay folks. It’s hardly surprising really. Here’s the thing about votes like that, at best, you are only going to make a lot of people mad no matter how the vote comes out. I sound like a broken record (skipping CD?) but this kind of politics breeds resentment and hatred. The hell of it is that there isn’t any reason for the government and its laws to be involved at all. The best way to sort out this problem is to have the government out of the marriage business. There really are some things that governments do not do well and social/religious agreements are at the top of the list.

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economics politics

Political economy Pt.1

Back in the mid 70’s, Gordon Tullock and James Buchanan wrote “The Calculus of Consent.” Its subtitle is “The Logical Foundations of Constitutional Democracy.” This book, along with his previous writings, earned Buchanan the Nobel Prize in Economics for launching the study of political economy.

People have all sorts of ideas about how the political process works, and even more opinions about how it should work. Political economy is the study of how politics actually works. As it turns out, politicians aren’t all that different from people in any other job. On a day to day basis, they will do whatever allows them to keep their job and get them promoted. What these things are will vary depending on the type of government and the times they live in, but the general concept holds.

So why call the subject political economy? Why not just call it political science or just political studies? Another name for microeconomics is rational choice theory. By putting the label of “economy” on it, we emphasize the rationality of the actors as opposed to the ideology of them.

Political economy essentially tells us that when faced with a decision, politicians will tend to make the choice that benefits them the most. In this governmental system, politicians need votes, but it usually pays for them to target specific voting blocks. Political economy also has a lot to tell us about why bills tend to look the way they do. I’ll talk more about political coalitions and bill formations in a bit, the main idea I want to get across is that politics works the way it does because of rational choices given the incentives that they face. People’s frustrations over politicians stem much more from the system than from individual politicians. It isn’t a matter of avoiding evil ones and electing “good” ones, the system makes politicians what they are. In an ideal system, it wouldn’t matter much who was elected, but that’s not the system we have.

I think the next installment will be about voting blocks and the nature of power in the political process.

Categories
economics freedom politics

A speech I wish I could hear today

This was a speech given on national television, can you guess who it was? What are the odds that a speech like this would be made today?

“This idea that government was beholden to the people, that it had no other source of power is still the newest, most unique idea in all the long history of man’s relation to man. This is the issue of this election: Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American Revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.

You and I are told we must choose between a left or right, but I suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There is only an up or down. Up to man’s age-old dream — the maximum of individual freedom consistent with order — or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. Regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would sacrifice freedom for security have embarked on this downward path. Plutarch warned, “The real destroyer of the liberties of the people is he who spreads among them bounties, donations and benefits.”

The Founding Fathers knew a government can’t control the economy without controlling people. And they knew when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose.”

It’s an excellent point and I think I’ll use it as a launching point for a couple of posts on political economy. That is, the rational choices people make in the world of politics. Those will follow in the next couple of weeks.

Categories
economics politics

Economics vs politics

I recently caught up with a friend of mine that I had originally met in Yemen. She’s the rare breed of person that really enjoys my econ writings and she’s encouraging me to keep at it. She’s also encouraging me to apply to the State department, but more on that later…

Here’s the thing, I haven’t been writing much recently, and it feels nice not being so negative all the time. I had originally thought that this particular administration was the root cause of all of my angst, but that really isn’t fair. I was just as upset with Dubya’s reign, and I’m sure that I will be as upset with anyone else that comes and would have been as upset with any previous administration. I have to keep reminding myself that administrations do what they do not for economic reasons, but for political ones. I also have to keep reminding myself that good economic policies won’t benefit any particular group (even if the population as a whole benefits) and so will never gain any political traction.

Politics is, and will always be, a trading of privileges and powers. If you spend any time at all wallowing in it and have a conscience you will get angry. The only politicians I could ever hope to support and be positive about are ones that advocate the lessening of government influence and it’s unlikely that anyone like that will be in the news any time soon.

So I will continue to write about economics, but I am going to try really hard not to get sucked into the political end of things. That’s not a promise, but I really am going to try…

Categories
freedom politics

The difference between democrats and republicans

A friend took one of those silly facebook myers-briggs tests and was horrified to find that some prominent republicans shared her personality type. I would be honored if I were to be compared to Thomas Jefferson, but Cheney is on that list too, so I can understand the consternation.

But really, I’m surprised more people don’t the see the similarities between hard core republicans and hard core democrats. They both have ideas, BIG ideas about things. They are prepared to wage political and social war in order to have the power of government in order to bring about their visions. To a lot of people, they don’t look all that different

Oh sure, they do have different outlooks about people, morals, possibly even money, but they are united in the importance of the government and their desire to control it. Of course controlling the government is really just a proxy for controlling people that don’t agree with them. Seriously, squint just a little, Pelosi and Palin aren’t all that different in the control department.

As long as the disagreement is over how to use government to implement favorite outlooks and control the people that do not share that outlook, the political war will never end. It is this quest for power that causes the conflict.

Of course people think I’m crazy for bring this up. Duh Isaac, what else is government supposed to do? Look at the constitution, that’s what the government is supposed to do. Those things are not, for the most part, very controversial. The things that are controversial, abortion, stimulation of the economy, maintaining of the economy, protection of jobs, health care, gay marriage, etc. are all products of political party fights over power.

That’s really the difference between the two parties, how to wield power. So remember, the personality test is not a political one, don’t be too terrified if you show the same personality traits as your political enemies. The fact that you are so similar is why you are enemies, the drive is the same, just for different ends.

Categories
medical politics

A deep breath, healthcare reform, and the 10th amendment

I don’t want to give the wrong impression, but it may already be too late. If you read enough, you’ll see that people in countries that have various forms of nationalized healthcare, or at least nationalized healthcare coverage are mostly happy with it. People deal with whatever they have to work with. In other words, if something were to be passed, and it worked overall, I don’t think it would be the end of the world. That doesn’t mean I’m not worried what is hidden in those 1000 pages, but I’m not going to get crazy if it does get passed.

I am getting frustrated at people scoffing and ridiculing others for being worried about the federal government involvement in things that it doesn’t have any jurisdiction over. Calling them “unamerican” like our speaker of the house did is unexcusable. Whatever you may think of those people, they do have an argument that has some force, it’s called the 10th amendment. The 10th amendment (the last of the original bill of rights) is the key difference between our government and all of the other governments out there.

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

It is a clear limitation on the extent of the powers and scope of the federal government. Granted, the people yelling at the meetings are not citing the 10th amendment, but their sentiment is the effectively the same. Like it or not, it is there and we shouldn’t ignore it, or the people that share the sentiment.

Of course, the 10th amendment has all but been ignored for all of the 20th century. The supreme court has twisted itself into knots using the commerce clause in order justify all sorts of federal involvements that are not in the constitution. I do wish that we would remember what the federal government is supposed to do, it is very clearly spelled out in the constitution. The 10th amendment was put in there to prevent the federal government from emulating a monarchy. You have to have limits to prevent that, an the 10th is it. On the other hand, the proper use of the commerce clause could in fact help out this issue and the government could stay within its prescribed bounds. SIGH, I guess it’s too much to ask for that to happen…

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freedom of choice medical politics

"It’s not a single payer system, so what’s the big deal?"

That’s a response I got to my last post. It’s true, I don’t know of anyone seriously promoting that, but it can still do what I said in my previous post. Why? It all has to do with the fact that it is a federal program.

Imagine that you have kids and live in an area with lousy public schools. You really don’t want to send your kids to neighborhood school, what to do? Sure, you have a choice, you don’t have to choose to use the state’s school, there are plenty of private schools to choose from. Here’s the thing, even if you choose to not use the public school you still have to pay for it. Your choice to not use the school does not help you out at all. You have to come up with the money for both the public and the private school. On top of that, the public school doesn’t really care if your children don’t go, they won’t change what they do at all.

Facing that decision, most parents go ahead and send their kids to the public school. If they are really committed, they will agitate to improve the school. Of course, if anything ever does come of that agitation, it will only be long after their kids are through that school.

It’s a similar thing with a federal health insurance “option.” It will be optional to use the services, but it will not be optional to pay for it. Faced with that decision, most people will go ahead and use it. Using what you are charged for is the rational thing to do, even if that thing is substandard. The cost of using something else is just too much for most people. This is the mechanism that will cause the federal program to squeeze out the private ones.

Keep in mind that this holds even if you can opt out of the premiums. This is because the inevitable cost over runs and/or cost underestimates will still be the responsibility of the federal government. Without any real reason to worry about profitability, there will be both. It will be like Fannie mae and Freddie Mac, political promises with no incentive to rein in costs or risks. In other words, a disaster waiting to happen.

Categories
freedom of choice medical politics

My thoughts on health care reform

I have had several people say to me that I must be excited about the effort to reform the medical world what with my MS and all. Despite what some people would see as an advantage to me, I don’t really see much upside in my circumstance.

It probably doesn’t come as any surprise that I just don’t trust reform coming from DC that involves more federal activity. The political process is not conducive to doing that well. Even if they managed to set the ideal system up, how long would it last? Special interest groups will be rewarded for their contributions and we will get mission creep like all other federal programs. The bill in the house is a prime example. It is currently over 1000 pages long, it isn’t a stretch of the truth to say that nobody can understand the thing in its entirety. The most recent concession involves an ethanol program for a lawmaker in Illinois. Perhaps there should be a law stating that new laws can be a maximum of 5 pages long…

A bigger worry is that with more government involvement we will get far fewer innovations in the medical world. Say what you want about the US healthcare industry, but there’s no question that it is responsible for the vast majority of medical innovations in the world. This is especially true when it comes to drugs. It is the quest for profit that drives inventions like MRIs, laser scalpels, heart valves, etc. Of course those new treatments are one of the reasons that costs keep going up.

On a less grand scale, I also worry about people losing options that lay outside of the medical mainstream. MS is a case in point. The approved drugs are expensive, don’t have a great track record as far as effectiveness goes, and of course have various side effects. There are some other drugs that have been approved for other conditions that seem to help a lot of people with MS. They are much cheaper, have no significant side effects, and seem to have at least a similar amount of success as the approved drugs. Right now, I can get a doctor to prescribe these for me, but will I have that option if the feds are much more involved? Would I be able to get drugs that are not approved by the FDA for my condition?

So unless the lawmakers can get their act together and draft a law that anyone can read and figure out (If no one else reads it and understands it, at least they should be able to) I am firmly against this current legislation. It may have some good stuff in there, but how can anyone know?