Still thinking....

• Does anyone else think that sovereign countries  (e.g. Japan) buying equities (i.e. shares of stock in publicly traded companies) is a good idea? It occurs to me that the logical endpoint to this is government ownership of the nation's businesses. Or by it's other name: communism. 
• The US Federal Reserve buying up all the debt is just as bad an idea; and for similar reasons.
• What is the moral distinction between torture and targeted killing? There are people who think torture is a problem (because it is associated with one party), yet targeting citizens and combatants by drone is okay (because it is associated with that other party). Shouldn't we have a problem with that, too?
• Civilizations are made up of people. Economies are made up of people who stand to benefit from a division of labor. A builder trading some of his stored wealth with a baker, for example. The government is created solely to protect an economy and by extension, its civilization. When the government starts favoring the Baker or the Builder, distortions are introduced that do more harm than good. But that's how you buy votes. Great system, huh?
• The smallest unit of any civilization is a family. A collection of people acting as one unit for the collective benefit of the family. A collection of families is a community. However, not all aspects of the community can benefit all families, and each family must be free to connect and disconnect at will with the community. Therefore, not only is the family the smallest unit that can call itself a civilization, it is also the largest. 

Random thoughts

Happy Christmas Eve. Some topics that I need to get out there, but reserve the right to blog about again someday:

1. A comedy about the assassination of the leader of a sovereign country doesn't strike me as good entertainment. How did we get to the point of making 100 million dollar movies making fun of a government contriving an act of war?

2. People who complain about the US Constitution, calling it an outdated document created by dead people seldom have the same opinion of The Federal Reserve Act of 1913, The Harrison Narcotics Tax Act or the Sherman Antitrust Act.

3. A government that repeatedly makes a distinction of any kind with regard to the color of one's skin is perpetuating that distinction, and in the process, institutionalizing racism.

4. The government that announces a 5% rise in GDP, consisting almost entirely of the increase in health care spending as a result of the Affordable Care Act has no credibility, and apparently no need for it.

Finish the thought

A conclusion is the place where you got tired thinking.  - Martin H. Fischer (1945)

Sometimes we run out of gas when it comes to thinking things further. Picking a restaurant for dinner, deciding whether to buy a new Christmas tree. Just make a decision, you tell yourself. It matters little. Other times, drawing conclusions without gathering all the facts and thinking it through can be disastrous. Buying the red car because the saleslady is pretty; or even taking a new job, because it's next to the Starbucks. Well, okay, there are plenty of folks who often don't think things all the way through.

If you have recently concluded that government is good, but that the cops are bad, then you missed the truth that the cops are only there to implement the government's laws. If you are one of those who stopped at "government is good", yet still think cops are the problem, well, frankly, you didn't think it through.

When 21 ounce sodas are banned, the only way to guarantee compliance is to send an armed representative. How about when a citizen attempts free enterprise (e.g. selling "loosies") outside of the state tax system. Yep, guys with guns are dispatched to deal with it. If you or your elected representatives weren't all just too tired to think when that law was drafted, perhaps Eric Garner would still be around.

Every law on the books today is there, probably because some busybody moron convinced you and your neighbors that it was "best for the community". At that point, everybody stopped thinking. But consider this: every law on the books requires force, sometimes violent, sometimes deadly as part of the enforcement action. That's right, people dying for someone's idea of a law. If you are not willing to see someone die for a law. It's a bad law.

And if you have elected representatives who make laws that restrict people from earning a living, or from buying the sodas of their choice, or for heaven's sake what part of the bus you can sit in; then keep thinking; because laws by definition bring duly appointed and armed police officers to the scene. It's a forced conflict with government and legal violence at the logical end.

When you get in practice, you find you can start finishing other peoples' thoughts. If you like government, you have to love the cops. It also works the other way: If you dislike the cops, perhaps it is the government that is the problem.

People who are paid to think about things, call it a root cause analysis. Figure out what is causing the problem and fix it. Ferguson is a symptom. Occupy Wall Street is a symptom. Even the Tea Party is a symptom. The core problem remains. Once we get everybody thinking past their biases and fears, the solution will become much clearer.

The core problem as I see it is that the two parties have every reason to maintain a status quo; and a permanent solution to the problem is not in their plan. Perhaps having more people actively thinking is the way out of the mess.

Immigration Song and Dance

If you were watching The president's immigration skit last Thursday, you were treated to his plan to get something done. That will show us who the third branch of government is, by golly. For those of you not watching Univision last week, here's how the plan went down:

Three new bureaucratic task forces to hopelessly confuse strengthen border security. Because there's no problem that can't be made more better by putting a few more friends on the payroll. Also, make sure they don't talk to each other or people already doing that job.
Prioritize deportation of the really bad guys first. Meaning anyone who gets out of line.
Scatter "Secure Communities" because those were really starting to work
Give the ICE officers a fat raise. Because if enforcement is not an option they need a reason to come to work.
Give incentives for all immigrants to get here before they turn 16. That way, you can decouple them from that subversive family oriented support as quickly as possible.
Give preferential treatment to those who've managed to hide effectively for five years, and especially if they have kids while they are here. They need to be dependent on government out of the gate, of course.
Release the detainees who appear to be talented. Don't want any positive examples laying around the community centers. That would ruin everything.

As usual, the politicians are not looking for a real solution, or even to clarify the US policy on immigration. Its a complicated mess, only because thats what they want it to be. The politicos are fond of pointing out our rich heritage in welcoming immigrants. What they leave out is that all the immigrants learned English, took care of their own, and respected our country and our traditions. Instead, our elected representatives are actively supporting dual language programs, in the process guaranteeing non-integration of the newcomers into society. Some melting pot.

Here's the Wizer's plan. Drop all the bi-lingual support and force all immigrants to learn English. It's the compassionate thing to do. Term limit the benefits so that the immigrants know it is a safety net and not a hammock. Tell them this is the land of opportunity, and they are free to be part of it. If they 
want to come here it has to be for the right reasons. Finally, yes, they should read the constitution. In fact, we all should. It might change a lot of things for the better.

Scattershots and tight groupings

It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!  - Upton Sinclair

As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron. ― H.L. Mencken

Remember something, if you will, about voting: Voting is not a horse race, you're not going there thinking "Gee, I gotta pick the winner so I can brag to my friends 'Oh, I picked so-and-so and he or she won'". Voting is voting your heart and voting your conscience and when you've done that, don't ever, EVER let a Democrat or Republican tell you that you've wasted your vote because the fact is, if you DON'T vote your heart and conscience then you HAVE wasted your vote.
― Jesse Ventura

The Future of Nature, Part 1

Nature conducts its business without regard to what we think. Does the squirrel in central park care about human misery in Ferguson, Mo? Can the Florida alligator shed a tear over events in Oklahoma City? Of course not. Nature does what it does, it ebbs, it flows, it proceeds in an utterly predictable way. We know that there will be storms, and volcanos, and earthquakes. There have been since before our recording of it, and will be long after we have left this planet (or, more likely, evolved). Further, nature cares nothing about the human condition.

There are a number of things one can observe about nature that are important right now. They have nothing to do with our view of how much carbon dioxide there is in the air, and nor much should there be.These axioms of nature don't depend on some ideal measure of global temperature, high or low, or where the shoreline starts and stops. Sometimes we can't see the trees for the forest. Sometimes we believe that our purpose is grander than it really is.

Consider the mosquito. The mosquito has evolved in such a way that it requires blood from a mammal, which it detects by the exhalation (carbon dioxide, in fact) of the mammal's respiratory system. In return, it dispenses some feedback to the host, in the form of an irritant. The host is thus warned that more stings could be in its future. This warning allows the mammal-host to find an alternate path that is less painful. Does the mammal consider the universe of mosquitoes as a condition to be destroyed? No, it is probably thankful for the gentle warning, and moves along. The mosquito is served by the fact that the host is not completely consumed by a swarm of mosquitoes, and can live to serve some future mosquito. Thus the mosquito and the mammal are both served. It's natural.

Humans are also natural, meaning they are and act as an integral part of nature. Some aspects of nature are made more useful by humans (food, shelter), just as the beaver and the paper wasp will change their environments. All of these creatures, humans included will act in their own self interest. Simply, and powerfully. Humans will do what they do in the effort to improve their living condition, their chances of survival, and their future prosperity. Or stated another way: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. --- Ample evidence that people have been thinking about these things for a very long time...

Sometimes, humans will place some of their independence in the hands of other people, in the hopes that their situation can be improved. It doesn't always work out that way, but when a community appoints a sheriff, and allows him some authority, they at times have a better chance of preserving life, liberty, and happiness. Assuming that arrangement works out for the better, other town officials can be appointed, and so on until finally, there's a mayor, a city council, a water works board, etc. In a generation or so, this is believed to be a normal way to run a society.

In some future generation, this authority invariably takes on a life of its own, and creates a situation that is no longer net positive; however by then it is not possible to unwind it, because the citizens have not prepared for such a change. I believe most of society is thus afflicted.

When power is consolidated it tends to be used in ways not required or desired, and its cabal enacts laws that are not related to the task at hand. Multiply it by 10,000 times, and this is how we get to an overarching federal government, located many miles away, seemingly uninterested in the needs of your community. It's sole purpose since Woodrow Wilson's time is starting and managing wars many many more miles away, having no positive impact on our lives, but taking more and more of its resources for the purpose.

What does a war in a middle east desert do for our lives, our liberties, and our pursuits? Indeed what does Washington do for us at all, that we can't do considerably better for ourselves? And how did we get this way. How did we become so dependent on a faceless entity whose goals are in no way aligned with our own?

It's not natural.

Borders? What borders?

News item: The U.S. hasn’t decided whether to attack Islamic State targets inside Syria and won’t ask President Bashar al-Assad for permission if it does, a White House spokesman said. Bloomberg

If we can't respect borders, our own borders will never be respected. #Consequences.

Chart of the Day #28

The greatest irony is that the President is railing against inequality as one of the most important problems of the day, despite the fact that his policies are squeezing the middle class and causing the Fed – with the President’s encouragement – to engage in the radical monetary policy, which is exacerbating inequality. This simple truth cannot be repeated often enough.  -- Paul Singer

The strategy of this administration is to replace the middle class with a new majority comprised of $15/hr slaves.

H/T Zerohedge.com

Symbolic and Enduring

“We believe that we invent symbols. The truth is that they invent us; we are their creatures, shaped by their hard, defining edges.”Gene Wolfe, Shadow and Claw

It's not hard to understand the nature of the Benghazi controversy, once you observe it is the perfect representation of a number of important things:

1. A microcosm of the current administration's foreign policy.
2. A compelling example of state department incompetence
3. An indictment of the security procedures we have unwittingly relied on.
4. The lengths to which the administration would go to make it look benign, when in fact it shows that much is wrong with the system.
5. The fact that people died does not seem to merit a response.

The sum of these factors is symbolic, and is a concise telling of the story of this administration. It is now becoming iconic, a kind of shorthand for this administration. The term Benghazi describes this government over the last 5 years. Think: Benghazi scheme, like Ponzi scheme for it's crystallization of a complex idea. It's not that Benghazi is everything, it's that everything is Benghazi, or at least that's the most useful way to describe it.

Most everyone knows what a Rube Goldberg is. It's because the class of contraption is iconic. Rube didn't do every device in the genre, and Benghazi isn't every administration foulup, but it's the best way to get the idea across. This is arguably why we hear a lot about Benghazi, because the same stuff keeps happening; at the IRS, at the VA, at the department of Health and Human Services. "Look, there goes another Benghazi." Nixon had a third-rate burglary on his hands. This is Benghazi.

The term Benghazi sounds like it is overused, and some parties are fatigued, or rendered downright cranky by it; they think of it a one note symphony. In reality, it's the dominant chord in this administration's score, and we notice it most because of the dissonance.

Look for a lot of such icons out of this administration. We are being NSA'd. We are sustaining Holder after Holder. It's another Carney-ism. But somehow, I think the one that endures is that we are well and truly Benghazi-d.

The Culture of Deceit

Sometimes I'm not sure how to take O'Keefe. Exposing liberal hypocrisy is a little like exposing a tornado as a major source of wind. To the tornado, that's the whole point, and to the rest of us, it's kind of obvious.

The liberals believe that the ends completely justify the means, and they won't condemn their own, whether it be over voter fraud, judicial activism, or a the culture of deceit.

---

From: Severian 

No surprises here…

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Hollywood/2014/05/20/James-O-Keefe-Dupes-Hollywood-With-Fake-Anti-Fracking-Film

A non-fight

What persons on all three sides of the gay marriage issue are missing:

1. The federal government has no standing to govern contracts between individuals. 
2. The state government has no standing other than enforcement of legal contracts. 
3. Two people can enter in any contract they wish.
4. There should be no legal distinction between a marriage and a legal contract of the same kind.

Therefore, persons who exercise their legal rights to enter into a contract can do so whenever and however they wish. If they call it a marriage, that's archaic, but not controversial. Nobody should care. This is a non-fight, and should go away. 

Chart of the Day #27

There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion. The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as the result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved.  -- Ludwig von Mises

Economists and the New Numbers Racket

At one time I thought about being an economist. It seemed like a good path with much fertile ground for doing useful work. There is a definite need for economic characteristics and forecasting. The basic principles were simple to understand, and a talent for pattern recognition and curve fitting could be put to good use. Where it seemed to fall apart is in three key areas:

One, economic modelling can be swamped by economic policy making, such that distortions introduced by external factors would render any model or forecast unusable and misleading. 

Two, an economic model demands assumptions which depend on people doing everything they do in a predictable manner, and over an indefinite period of time. While all of us can be sure the sun will rise tomorrow, we can't be sure our brother-in-law will pick us up at the airport at 9:30. So, any forecast is doomed to failure on the human action front anyway.

Three, since economics involves money, there is incentive on the parts of many to distort the numbers further to gain a financial or political advantage. This makes economics akin to associating with thieves. Thieves with calculators, using flawed models, and applying gross misapplications of data.

As most of you know, I returned to product development instead. When you design something that doesn't depend on your brother-in-law, it can also be done without sleeping with the enemy.

The Sad State of the Economics Profession

"Although some will receive a higher minimum wage, many others will simply be thrown under the bus. "

Frank Hollenbeck

Introducing (?) Wizercare

While legislation can stimulate and encourage, the real creative ability which builds up and develops the country, and in general makes human existence more tolerable and life more complete, has to be supplied by the genius of the people themselves. The Government can supply no substitute for enterprise. - Calvin Coolidge

Governments have a tendency not to solve problems, only to rearrange them. - Ronald Reagan

The people who conceived of The Affordable Care Act typically defend it by saying its detractors offer no alternative. My first reaction to that is a better alternative to a government program is almost always "no" government program. But I think the point needs to be amplified, especially now that we know Obamacare is a failed system.

I think it is helpful to examine the whole matter on the basis of the constitution. The constitution, you may have heard reserves almost everything to the states. this it does implicitly in the Articles, and explicitly in the Bill of Rights. There. I had to say that, because it's something they don't teach in school any more.

I have trouble getting past that in the evaluation of a federal program, nevertheless I'm willing to set that aside for the remainder of this discussion. Let's pretend that the constitution does not exist, and address the question: How do you evaluate this health care program vs. the problem it was trying to solve? To examine that, we have to deconstruct a little further.

What might make sense in a free country is that we as a people might delegate certain activities to the federal government. As a free people, we may assess our certain risks, such as risks of organized invasion or of common enemies like disease and pestilence. We might reasonably allow a government to provide these essential services, and to proscribe a fair method to pay for them. So far so good.

Is it necessary to have a government for defense? No, it could be funded by merchants, like it was before the revolutionary war. But is it better to consolidate our defensive resources and deploy them in a more efficient way? Sure! Is the government the best way to do that? Debateable. But I'm going to concede that point too, to get to the end of this.

I usually come down on the side of the value added angle. Does the government provide a useful activity, or is it a net loss in value to the people.

If the idea was to get more people on the insurance rolls, this did not happen. In fact, as Jonah Goldberg points out, the number of people uninsured increased as a direct result of the plan. For this, we need a trillion dollar program?

If the idea was to reduce the overall cost of health care, well, chapters and verses are written on the increased costs medical centers are dealing with:

"The Affordable Care Act is basically insurance reform—eligibility and access—and basically, they are going to pay for that by reducing the reimbursement. It doesn't modernize how we drive to higher quality care," Dr. John Noseworthy said in a "Squawk Box" interview.

If the problem is health care for all, the reduction in doctors and nurses in the system surely makes that goal unachievable in the long run.

So, depending on what the problem was that they were trying to solve, it's clear that the opposite is happening. So, since we are reconstructing the "shouldas" with a blank slate and a beneficial unrestricted government, what could the government conceivably do to help the problems noted.

The solutions are very simple. Not easy, but simple.

1. Reduce regulations on medical care. 
1. Deregulate most medical services, such that service can be provided at low costs. 
2. Revamp certification medical requirements to reduce the cost of medical school. 
2. Tort reform. Limit malpractice benefits.
3. Reduce regulation on medicines, and allow self-prescription for most remedies (penicillin, pain meds, etc..
4. Make medical insurance a private market.
1. Eliminate medical benefits provided by government.
2. Replace with like amount in worker salaries, and have workers contract their own insurance.
5.  Consider giving tax benefits to corporations that eliminate insurance plans, thereby putting health insurance back into a free market.
6. Allow experimental medicines to proceed on the basis of a willing buyer signoff

These steps would reduce the cost of medical care to the point where insurance costs would naturally fall, and more people would seek health insurance. The remainder who are in genuine need can be subsidized at a very small fraction of the cost for the current program.

To proceed the way we are is proof that either our elected officials are incompetent or that they are disingenuous about their intent. Giving them the benefit of the doubt, they must be idiots.

Wizer One-Liner # 31

Why should anyone be comforted by the term "bipartisan agreement"?