Maggie's Farm

From Richard Posner in Does the free market corrode moral character? - one quote:

Of course politicians lie a great deal, but so does anyone who depends on the goodwill of others. Max Weber in a famous essay on politics as a vocation distinguished between private and public morality. Anyone in a public position--and this includes business and academic leaders as well as politicians--cannot indulge a taste for candor or altruism and expect to be successful at his job. It is the same reason why good business leaders drive hard bargains with their suppliers, play off subordinates against one another, lay off workers by the thousands, receive huge compensation packages, and often relocate plants overseas when foreign wages and taxes are lower.

In anticipation of further Dem assaults on the Second Amendment, guns are predictably selling like hotcakes.

I like GunBroker.com, where I found this nice camo AR 15. The SEALs love those little .223 rounds, and they resist deflection. They can mail things to your local gun shop.

Full auto, in your dreams.

Marginal Rev makes the case that slipping housing wealth is the cause of this recession, not banking. A quote:

This is truly incredible. Homeowners have lost more than $5 trillion in housing wealth. There is a very well established wealth effect whereby $1 of housing wealth is estimated as leading to 5 to 6 cents of annual consumption. This implies that the loss of wealth to date would cause consumption to fall by $250 billion to $300 billion annually (1.7 percent to 2.0 percent of GDP). If you add in the loss of around $6 trillion in stock wealth, with an estimated wealth effect of 3-4 cents on the dollar, then you get an additional decline of $180 billion to $240 billion in annual consumption (1.2 percent to 1.6 percent of GDP).

These are huge falls in consumption that would lead to a very serious recession, like the one we are seeing. This would be predicted even if all our banks were fully solvent and in top flight financial shape. Even the soundest bank does not make loans to borrowers who it does not think can pay the loans back (except during times of irrational exuberance).

Link above. Of course, these things snowball with slipping markets further reducing wealth and causing people and businesses to feel more reluctant to spend. Finally, Springtime eventually returns once marginal and undercapitalized businesses have been swept away, and pricing finds its realistic level. I continue to insist that we folks are in an ordinary recession - but the banking biz is surely in a strange and ugly one.

I figure I have lost close to 20% of my net worth thus far, but that's measuring from the peak. One should never measure from peaks, because peaks never last. (Always measure things from historical trends.) Plus I really do not care what my home and land is worth, since I have no plan to leave it, I don't mind the bank holding title to it, I like having the mortgage interest deduction, and my equity line remains open (from which I used $150,000 for restoration work on the barns earlier this year - new roofs, new windows, plumbing, electric, repair rotten siding...). I have more wealth than I had 10 years ago, and that's what counts for feeling secure.

I am utterly relaxed about my hefty mortgage and home equity because I know that Obama will pay it for me, unlike that mean George Bush who never offered to pay my bills. And I can't wait to get my government pony. Ponies are cute and, if times get tough, you can eat them.

The piece at the WSJ begins thus:

In the Washington mind, there are two kinds of private companies. There are successful if "greedy" corporations, which can always afford to pay more taxes and tolerate more regulation. And then there are the corporate supplicants that need a handout. As the Detroit auto makers are proving, you can go from being the first to the second in the blink of an election.

For decades, Congress has never had a second thought as it imposed tighter emissions standards on GM, Ford and Chrysler, denouncing them for making evil SUVs. Yet now that the companies are bleeding cash, and may be heading for bankruptcy, suddenly the shrinking Big Three are the latest candidates for a taxpayer bailout. One $25 billion loan facility has already been signed into law, and Senator Debbie Stabenow (D., Mich.) wants another $25 billion, this time with no strings attached.

Sheesh. So do I. If they get it, they'll buy munis with the money because munis are more profitable than Chevys. Read the whole thing.

Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves.

Ronald Reagan

Our friend Sipp's post inspired this contest.

Winners receive a year's free online subscription to Maggie's Farm, with a special Free Bonus of unlimited commenting privileges.

I am sure that all would agree that the famous Florida development retirement community ticky-tacky pressboard Disney World for Viagrified Republican golfers, The Villages (pictured below), could have been named far more creatively, like The Greens at Paradise, or The Coffins at Happy Acres.

So we invite our readers to put on their Marketing Hats and come up with some names for American developments yet to be built. Punsters welcome.

I'll give it a lame start:

The Lakes at Dripping Springs
The Verandas at Mosquito Point Lighthouse Point
The Niches at Holiday Harbor
The Views at Hillcrest Swamp Vale
The Breezes at Landfill Hillview Corners
The Cottages at Gator Swamp Rabbit Hollow
The Links at Dark Harbor Sunny Harbor
The Anchorages at Stormy Point Pleasant Bay
Ye Barnes at Ye Olde Farme Villagee (for AVI)
Wistful Vista at Chicken Neck Creek Mapleview River
The Preserve at Blueberry Hill - or The Hills at Blueberry Preserves?
Sweet Meadows at Beaver View Valley

A quote from Robert Samuelson's The Poor aren't Poor Because Rich are Rich:

Judged only by economic inequality, the financial crisis is a godsend. It will probably narrow the gap — though still vast — between the rich and everybody else. But what good will that do? Economic inequality also declined in the Great Depression. The country wasn't better off.

By and large, the poor aren't poor because the rich are rich. They're usually poor for their own reasons: family breakdown, low skills, destructive personal habits and plain bad luck.

The presumption implicit in the criticism of growing economic inequality is that society's income is a given and, if the rich have less, others will have more. Up to a point, that's true. The government already redistributes much income, often for the good.

During the boom years, companies might have been less lavish with top executives and slightly more generous to other workers or shareholders. Some new fortunes stem from self-dealing and financial razzle-dazzle, not the creation of real economic value. It's just desserts that some of this wealth has evaporated.

But the redistributionist argument is at best a half-truth. The larger truth is that much of the income of the rich and well-to-do comes from what they do. If they stop doing it, then the income and wealth vanish. No one gets it. It can't be redistributed because it doesn't exist. Everyone's poorer.

Read the whole thing. Of course, the whole Lefty populist mantra about "corporate greed" and "sharing" only appeals to economic illiterates, but America and the world have plenty of those.

It's difficult to create wealth if you are economically illiterate, so your own envy or greed will make you want to take it away from somebody else who created it with their creativity, effort, skill and drive.

The fallacy is the one we discuss so often: the notion that wealth is a zero-sum game. Wealth, as Americans understand better than most of the world does, is an infinitely-expandable thing. All it takes is peoples' desire and creative spirit.

Unlike material things, wealth is created from thin air - and wealth is destroyed leaving no residue.

Speaking of which, we were too caught up in the election flurry to post this video of Dem. Rep. Jim Moran discussing his thoughts on wealth redistribution. It's populist, socialistic - and either as ignorant as hell or manipulative as hell. Who does he think "owns" corporations? 2/3 of Americans "own" the corporations via being shareholders and bondholders. I'd like to see it advance to 100%.

A quote from an essay on forgiveness in literature, Why Mephistopheles had to work overtime, by Michael Dirda:

Perhaps the most striking musical expression of forgiveness occurs in Mozart’s opera The Marriage of Figaro. Caught pursuing a servant girl, Count Almaviva pleads for forgiveness for his duplicity and attempted infidelity. The countess, in a supreme moment of charity, grants him his tearful wish, even as she half-knows that he’s sure to betray her again. Mozart’s music at this point shifts its whole tonal character, and immediately achieves a kind of hushed holiness. It’s just breathtaking when heard. Similarly, Leonard Bernstein’s music to Candide concludes with a general forgiveness of sins and injuries. In a beautiful last chorus all the characters admit that they have been “neither pure, nor wise, nor good.” But from now, “We’ll do the best we know. We’ll build our house and chop our wood. And make our garden grow.”

Read the whole thing. I forgive because I constantly need forgiveness - even though holding grudges is much more fun. However, I never forget.

Here's "Contessa, perdono:"

Our friend Chris Shays (R-CT), the only Republican Congressman left in New England, was swept out of office on a wave of Obamamania emanating from his home town of sad old Bridgeport.

Conservatives loved to complain about his moderate positions, but he had no choice in his district.

He was replaced by Dem Jim Himes, a young (retired) very wealthy (and rational, or so I am told) Wall Streeter (Goldman guy) from Greenwich.

Go figure.

Photo is Chris Shays.

Quote from an 85 year-old codger neighbor yesterday afternoon (WW2 gunner, devout Roman Catholic, Repub, widower, master tomato-grower):

"I like John McCain, but I had to vote for a change. You turn on the nightly news and the whole country seems like it's just going to hell. We have to do something different."

There you go.

I planned to post something like this, but Tiger did it first, and better. Wake me up when it's over.

I very much enjoyed Sarah's speech in Nevada which we posted yesterday.

Two things stood out for me: First, that women create as many businesses in America as men. I didn't know that. Bravo!

Second, her using the term "fines" for taxes on business success. That is wonderfully Reaganesque.

There are so many fine, energetic Americans who do not spend their time figuring out how to get free stuff: they spend their time figuring out how to do stuff. No self-respecting person really wants to be a parasite, although the socialist mind-set tries to persuade us that we're entitled and should not be ashamed of being greedy takers.

Well, we had Joe the Plumber, Cory Miller the Well-Driller, and now we have Tito the Builder (I lost the link to that hairdresser gal in Ohio with a similar view):

A hearty wave of the fat Capitalist cigar, as Mr. Free Market would say, to our friend Tigerhawk, who is annoyed enough with Obama's insulting him to use the f-bomb on his family-oriented site.

I suspect that he is already into the brandy.

Ditto, Tiger, on all counts. And burn 'em while you can afford 'em.

See comparisons with other countries. It's an eye-opener. Americans may talk Capitalism, but our Capitalism serves to stuff the ever-greedy maw of government. There isn't much room to become more redistributionist without truly disincentivizing effort, initiative, creativity, and job creation (see Cory Miller the Well-Driller).

Furthermore:

The OECD, the organization of western economies, says the U.S. already has the second most progressive tax system among its members, trailing only Ireland.

Maybe there might be other ways to spread the wealth besides the tax system.

Or maybe we're already doing that, too. Remember, no matter what we do, half the households in America will be below the median income.

Tigerhawk's anticipated total tax rate of 50% surely does approach the disincentivizing point, except for those who want to get really rich quick. Hence booming lottery sales and hedge funds, because achieving prosperity and security through slow, hard work and savings gets tough against the headwind of taxation.

Yes, I know the image is a cheap scare tactic but, honestly, I am a bit scared. A bit Halloween-scared. Not so much about Obama alone, but about the combination of Obama-Reid-Pelosi. Their view of America and Americans is quite different from mine. They have no faith in us, the people. 

Via Insty:

Via Classical Values:

If the rise in the price of oil from $70 to $140 was due to "greed" (the all-purpose explanation of the other side for every economic problem), was the fall from $140 to $70 due to a sudden outbreak of altruism?

Obama's "redistribution" Constitution. Calabrese in the WSJ

Most Presidents ignore the Constitution: "The government we have today is nothing the Founders could have imagined." Napolitano in the WSJ

Obama and redistribution at Volokh

Women are approaching equality with men in the rapidly swelling ranks of the unfaithful.

Indeed, it should not be difficult for women to exceed men in this critical metric of gender equality. All it takes is to give the guy a few beers to dissolve his noble conscience, a well-timed wink and smile, followed up by a gentle touch. Right?

Just make him feel "special," and he's yours, ladies, because real, everyday life doesn't tend to make most guys feel very special. Why should it? Life owes us nothing.

And you want to feel special too.

A quote from this excellent excerpt - a fine essay in itself - (h/t, Vanderleun) from James Kalb's new book The Tyranny of Liberalism: Understanding and Overcoming Administered Freedom, Inquisitorial Tolerance, and Equality by Command:

"The tyranny of liberalism” seems a paradox. Liberals say that they favor freedom, reason, and the well-being of ordinary people. Many people consider them high-minded and fair to a fault, “too broadminded to take their own side in a quarrel,” too soft to govern effectively. Even the word “liberal” suggests “liberty.” How can such an outlook and the social order it promotes be tyrannical?

The answer is that wanting freedom is not the same as having it. Political single-mindedness leads to oppression, and a tyranny of freedom and equality is no less possible than one of virtue or religion. We cannot be forced to be free or made equal by command, but since the French Revolution the attempt has become all too common and the results have often been tyrannical.

Tyranny is not, of course, what liberals have intended. They want government to be based on equal freedom, which they see as the only possible goal of a just and rational public order. But the functioning of any form of political society is determined more by the logic of its principles than the intentions of its supporters. Liberals view themselves as idealistic and progressive, but such a self-image conceals dangers even if it is not wholly illusory. It leads liberals to ignore considerations, like human nature and fundamental social and religious traditions, that have normally been treated as limits on reform. Freedom and equality are abstract, open-ended, and ever-ramifying goals that can be taken to extremes. Liberals tend to view these goals as a simple matter of justice and rationality that prudential considerations may sometimes delay but no principle can legitimately override. In the absence of definite limiting principles, liberal demands become more and more far-reaching and the means used to advance them ever more comprehensive, detailed, and intrusive.

The incremental style of liberalism obscures the radicalism of what it eventually demands and enables it always to present itself as moderate. What is called progress—in effect, movement to the left—is thought normal in present-day society, so to stand in its way, let alone to try to reverse accepted changes, is thought radical and divisive. We have come to accept that what was inconceivable last week is mainstream today and altogether basic tomorrow. The result is that the past is increasingly discredited, deviancy is defined up or down, and it becomes incredible that, for instance, until 1969 high school gun-club members took their guns to school on New York City subways, and that in 1944 there were only forty-four homicides by gunshot in the entire city.

Read the whole essay, which very much reflects the Maggie's Farm view of things.

The press: "Yes, we're totally in the tank for Obama. So what?"

"So what?" ?

How long must we wait for the Dems to propose socialized legal care? It's only right, isn't it? How many folks are economically destroyed by legal bills? Or go without justice because they cannot afford legal help?

Universal legal representation is a right, not a luxury. Come on, Dems. Get on board, and help level the legal playing field!

As BD posted yesterday, it's sort of like feudalism, run by a "caring," "benevolent" political aristocracy on top of the heap. Scott at Powerline. 

You know, Panem et Circenses for the great mass of ignorant, feckless unwashed. Like me. It's truly heart-warming to know how much they care, and who can resist the loving, altruistic care of politicians?

What the Left always forgets, however, is that the State is totally dependent on us for its existence - on our wealth creation and wealth accumultation. The State does no work, produces no value, and pays no taxes: only free people can work that magic. Governments cannot do it, nor do they know how to do it. 

A quote from Malanga in City Journal:

Nothing could be more misguided than to renew this “tin-cup urbanism,” as some have called it. Starting in the late 1960s, mayors in struggling cities extended their palms for hundreds of billions of federal dollars that accomplished little good and often worsened the problems that they sought to fix. Beginning in the early nineties, however, a small group of reform-minded mayors—with New York’s Rudy Giuliani and Milwaukee’s John Norquist in the vanguard—jettisoned tin-cup urbanism and began developing their own bottom-up solutions to city problems. Their innovations made cities safer, put welfare recipients to work, and offered kids in failing school systems new choices, bringing about an incomplete, but very real, urban revival.

Yet this reform movement remains anathema to many liberal politicians, academics, and journalists, who have ignored or tried to downplay its achievements because it conflicts with their left-of-center views. The arrival on the scene of Obama, a former Chicago community activist and the first presidential nominee in recent memory to rise out of urban politics, has given these back-to-the-future voices their best chance in years to advance a liberal War on Poverty–style agenda. As the nation debates its future in the current presidential race, it’s crucial to remember what has worked to revive cities—and what hasn’t.

Whole thing here.