Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Sitting ducks

I am not going to over-react to the new TSA screening procedures, but I am concerned about one thing. It seems to me that a natural terrorist target is the line of people waiting to go through security at any major airport. All a terrorist would need to do is walk-up to the area with some kind of firearm or explosive device. The problem of getting through security is solved, because there would be no need to actually get on an airplane.

Shouldn't we be working on speeding the process up so that we don't invite such an attack?

Monday, November 22, 2010

Robin Hood movie

Finally saw Robin Hood with Russell Crowe this weekend, and added it to my list of the best conservative movies.

Bailing out Ireland

In 1997, I was in Ireland visiting some friends who had just arrived there and were planning on staying for about six months. They were looking for a job, but not having much success. One evening, they were talking to a couple of young Irishmen, guys in there 20's, asking them if they knew of a good place where a couple of Americans might find a job for 5 or 6 months. And they responded, "Why don't you just go on the dole?"

We laughed, but now I know, this is how that ends.

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

High fives all around

The Alaskan Senate race has just been called for Lisa Murkowski. The Alaskan Federal contractor community is thrilled!

Monday, November 15, 2010

"Welcome to the club"

Christopher Hitchens reflecting on his support for the Iraq War:
I learned that very often the most intolerant and narrow-minded people are the ones who congratulate themselves on their tolerance and open-mindedness. Amazing. My conservative friends look at me and say, 'Welcome to the club. What took you so long?' Well that's what it took and I think it's worth recording.

Thursday, November 11, 2010

The insanity of our tax code

Imagine a family where the father earns $100K, they have three children, and the wife takes classes at a local college and spent $10K on tuition and other related expenses. They have $15K in mortgage interest, $4K in property taxes, and $2K in charitable deductions.

The income tax for that family in 2009 would have been $2,540. That's right, by jumping through a bunch of hoops, a person who makes $100K can have an effective tax rate of 2.5%.

It gets worse. If he works really hard and manages to earn an extra $25K, making his total income $125K, their taxes skyrocket to $11,027. That's an additional $9K in taxes for an extra $25K in earnings. That's almost 36% tax on that last $25K, even though our highest tax rate is 35%.

Insanity.

Pelosi going after the toddler vote

Nancy Pelosi said yesterday that the deficit commission's proposal to raise the retirement age to age 68 by 2050 and age 70 by 2075 is "simply unacceptable", and that we need to keep our "promises to our seniors".

Does she realize that the commission is proposing raising the retirement age on my 4 year old twins?

Actually, I told my son this morning that it didn't look like he was going to get his social security until he was 70, and he said "No!!!!", just as if I was telling him that we didn't have time to go out for ice cream. So maybe Nancy is onto to something.

But seriously, if President Obama wanted to see his approval rating go up by about 10 points, he should come out against Pelosi on this one. But I doubt he will.

Monday, November 8, 2010

No son, you are not allowed to dress in drag for Halloween

This blog post by a mother about her five year old son who dressed up as Daphne from Scooby Doo is all over my Facebook news feed. Everyone loves her. The adoring comments have included "Thank God that there are mothers who are not afraid to let a child express individuality!" and "What a great mom!".

Besides the photo of the child, the thing that jumped out to me in this article was the following statement: "Halloween is the time of year that you can be whatever it is that you want to be".

I'm sorry, but that's just not true. He's five. Parents can set boundaries on what is and what is not appropriate. Actually, let me re-state that. Parents should set boundaries on what is and what is not appropriate.

Does this rise to the level of being inappropriate? To each his own, but I think so. If my son asked to dress in drag for Halloween, I would say no. Plain and simple. The list of costumes I would deem inappropriate is a long one, and dressing in drag is certainly on that list.

And it's not because I think it's going to turn him gay, or because I would be ashamed or wouldn't love him. I just don't think that it is appropriate for a 4 or 5 year old to dress up in drag. That's it.

Maybe Mike Castle deserves some of the blame

Yesterday on Meet the Press, political consultant Mike Murphy said this about the Republican Senate loss in Delaware:
I have a bone to pick with Jim DeMint...There has to be some level of pragmatism inside the party leadership
I never followed the Castle campaign that closely, but it seems to be that Castle deserves at least some of the blame for running a terrible campaign. Pat Caddell pointed out on a Ricochet podcast that Castle completely misread the primary electorate, and should have "thrown himself" at the tea party over the summer. Another idea? Maybe Mike Castle should have shown some "pragmatism" by picking up the phone and calling Jim DeMint. If he had done so, maybe he would be on his way to the Senate.

There has also been a lot of talk about the fact that the tea party Senate candidates fared poorly on Tuesday night. That is not exactly true considering what happened in Wisconsin, Florida, Pennsylvania, and Kentucky.

A clearer pattern is the fact that the self funded billionaires and hundred-millionaires all lost - Fiorina, Whitman and McMahon. I've read that the GOP backed these candidates in part based on their willingness and ability to fund their own campaigns.

But is that really the way to go? I mean, look at Scott Brown. He won in a deep blue state not because he was a billionaire, he won because he was a highly attractive, highly effective candidate.

And perhaps there is a conflict of interest here. Political consultants may love candidates like Meg Whitman because she can afford to spend $160 million on airtime and political consultants. Reports show that Mike Murphy was paid something like $90K a month to work on the Whitman campaign.

But according to Pat Caddel, Meg Whitman was completely mismanaged and overexposed. He argued that the campaign was designed to get consultants rich and not necessarily get her elected.

Perhaps there is an issue of incentives - an agency problem as they call it. Maybe political consultants don't always have the same incentives as the party or the candidates.

So maybe going forward we should be more "pragamatic" as Mr. Murphy likes to say, and focus on nominating candidates that can actually attract votes, rather than nominating candidates purely based on their ability to afford the likes of Mike Murphy.

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Ed Shultz: Rand Paul hangs out with the birthers

"He's just the kind of guy that would keep the birth certificate conversation alive." -Ed Schultz

That's right, the guy who sincerely believes that we are in the midst of a debt crisis, is going to spend his time talking about birth certificates.

I think what they were really disturbed by was Rand Paul's Goldwater-esque acceptance speech:
America will remain great if and when we understand that government cannot create prosperity. We have to understand that it comes from ourselves. It does not come from government. We are the creators of that prosperity. Until we understand that, we cannot truly defend and protect our liberties.

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Some thoughts from last night

I got two of my four wishes from last night. That's about what I expected, although Tancredo was never really close.

And I’m most happy about Rubio, Toomey and Rand Paul winning their elections. They are principled, smart, articulate, and persuasive. The Democrats would have loved to have Sharron Angle around to beat up on, but they won't get that opportunity. Instead, they will have to deal with these three very formidable Freshman Senators, and that will present a real problem for them.

And on Sharron Angle, she was just a weak candidate, and yes, maybe the tea party movement got carried away with her nomination. But with the tea party wave, yes, you might get some weaker candidates like Angle and O’Donnell, but you also get Paul and Toomey and Rubio and Johnson up in Wisconsin. I don't think in the real world you can get one without the other.

In the real world, the options are more like:

Option 1 (5 Republicans):Arlen Specter (yes, I know he switched parties, but stick with me), Charlie Crist (FL), Mike Castle (DE), Sue Lowden (Nevada), and Trey Greyson (KY), or

Option 2 (3 Conservatives and 2 Democrats):Pat Toomey (R), Marco Rubio (R) , Rand Paul (R), Harry Reid (D), and Chris Coons (D)

To me, option 2 is clearly the superior result, and that's the way it turned out. So overall, it was a great result, even in the Senate.

Oh, and another great result: the hot chick who drives too fast, can handle a weapon, and wants to slash federal spending is now the new Congresswoman from South Dakota.

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Fear the boom and bust returns

A new video has been posted on youtube featuring an interview with the stars and creators of the Keynes vs. Hayek "Fear the Boom and Bust" music video.

The director of the video John Papola has this wonderful insight into the difference between Hayek and Keynes:
Too much aggregation is a problem that is pretty pervasive in the way these things are talked about. We heard about having too much slack capacity. Well, slack capacity to make what? What are we making with this slack capacity? If it’s capacity to build more houses that we don’t need, maybe that slack capacity doesn’t tell us anything about what’s going on.

I think Hayek looked at the world in terms of coordination, producing specific things for a specific demand. It’s not blobs of GDP that we buy and sell, and if we stop buying them, somebody else can buy them for us.

My wish list for tonight

Below is my wish list for tonight, in increasing unlikelihood.

- Pat Toomey wins in PA by 5+, Rand Paul wins in KY wins by 10+, and Marco Rubio wins in FL by 15+
- 60+ seats in the House, including an Allen West victory in my home district
- Tom Tancredo wins the CO governorship, so I can see some heads explode
- Rob Steele defeats John Dingell and/or Sean Bielat defeats Barney Frank. How glorious would that be?

The race card...again

Pulitzer prize winning columnist Eugene Robinson goes back to the race card one more time. He asks:
One thing that struck me from the beginning about the tea party rhetoric is the idea of reclaiming something that has been taken away.

...

Take it back from whom?...Again, who's in possession of the government right now, if not the American people? The non-American people? The un-American people?

...

I have to wonder what it is about Obama that provokes and sustains all this tea party ire. I wonder how he can be seen as "elitist," when he grew up in modest circumstances -- his mother was on food stamps for a time -- and paid for his fancy-pants education with student loans. I wonder how people who genuinely cherish the American dream can look at a man who lived that dream and feel no connection, no empathy. I ask myself what's so different about Obama, and the answer is pretty obvious: He's black.
The words that come to mind when reading this column are predictable, un-insightful, un-imaganitive, and unoriginal.

Here's a clue Eugene. Before he was elected, the President said he wanted to "fundamentally transform the United States." Once he got into office and started governing, it became apparent to many that he meant it.

The tea party movement is opposed to this "fundamental transformation". The tea party wants limited government.

As Chris Christie says, "That's the fight." It's a fight between people who want government limited, and the people who believe there should be no limitations on government power. It doesn't matter what color the President is. That has absolutely nothing to do with it.

Now I am going to go vote for the Latino for US Senate and the black guy for US Congress.

Monday, November 1, 2010

President to hecklers: Don't stop heckling, go heckle the Republicans

What kind of President, when being heckled, doesn't ask the hecklers to stop heckling, but instead suggests they go heckle Republicans.



I put this in the same category as the "bitter clinger", "not thinking clearly", "you think they would be saying thank you", "Republicans need to sit in the back seat", "We're going to punish our enemies" comments. If I was an Obama supporter, I'd be shaking my head asking myself "What in the world is he thinking?"

Pat Caddel watched that video for the first time last night as a guest on Sean Hannity's show and said "This is not the guy people thought they voted for." Caddell and Doug Schoen elaborate on this point in this column:
Obama is conducting himself in a way alarmingly reminiscent of Nixon's role in the disastrous 1970 midterm campaign. No president has been so persistently personal in his attacks as Obama throughout the fall. He has regularly attacked his predecessor, the House minority leader and - directly from the stump - candidates running for offices below his own. He has criticized the American people suggesting that they are "reacting just to fear" and faulted his own base for "sitting on their hands complaining.

...

With the country beset by economic and other problems, it is incendiary that the president is not offering a higher vision for the nation but has instead chosen a strategy of rank division. This is an attempt to distract from the perceived failures of his administration. On issue after issue this administration has acted in ways that are weakening the office of the president.