Op-Eds and Editorials March '09

Republican Tax Travesty

Originally Posted on Forbes
By Bruce Bartlett
March, 27, 2009

On March 19, the House of Representatives voted to impose a 90% tax on the incomes of certain executives of financial institutions receiving federal funds. What was remarkable about this vote is that 85 Republicans voted for this travesty. The consequences will be felt for years to come.

The history of tax policy is that it tends to go in one direction until there is a key event that establishes a new direction. Thus the vote by a Democratic Congress in favor of a lower capital gains tax in 1978 set the stage for the Reagan tax cut of 1981 and a decade of lower tax rates. When Republican George H.W. Bush switched gears and supported higher taxes in 1990 it presaged Bill Clinton's 1993 tax increase and many years of rising taxes.
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Government Is Furiously Dancing The Two-Step

Originally Posted at Lew Rockwell
By Robert Higgs
March 26, 2009

How do once-free people lose their liberty? The formula may be stated succinctly: crisis and leviathan. Alternatively, and somewhat more fully stated, the procedure for the government officials and their supporters who hope to gain by quashing the people’s liberties is (1) cause a serious crisis, thereby heightening the public’s fears, and (2) blame others for the crisis, pose as the people’s savior, and thereby justify the seizure of new powers allegedly necessary to remedy the crisis and to prevent the recurrence of such crises in the future. This gambit is as old as the hills, yet, given the right ideological preconditions, it works every time. Strange to say, the people never learn (in part because these experiences produce ideological change that fortifies the fiscal and institutional changes the government makes during the crisis).
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Once Again, Tim Geithner Gets It Exactly Wrong

Originally Posted At Real Clear Market
By John Tammy
March 26, 2009

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rallied 6 percent on Monday after the announcement of Treasury secretary Tim Geithner’s latest bank relief plan. The stock surge might point to significant positives within his initiative, but then going back to the fall, shares have regularly rallied on the news of government help, only to decline once the harsher realities of government aid set in.
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Save The Big Banks, Trash The Dollar

Originally Posted On Lew Rockwell
By Gary North
March 25, 2009

Timothy Geithner's plan to save the big banks will be a success. This success will come at a cost. The plan will hurt taxpayers, and it will lead to severe price inflation. It will not revive the faltering economy in 2009. It will not restore the housing market. Family wealth will continue to decline.

I worry a bit about my assessment. It is shared by Keynesian economists Paul Krugman and James Galbraith. Still, I am sticking to my guns. Read More...

U.S. Headed Toward Canada-Style Health Care Rationing

Originally Posted at Tucson Citizen
By Dr. Lawrence Hunter
March 24, 2009

Bureaucrats already are under instructions to "guide" treatments. How long before that guidance becomes a push - or a mandate?

Overseas, this already has happened. In the U.K., a similar formula for determining cost-effectiveness resulted in elderly patients suffering from retinal decay being forced to wait until they are blind in one eye before seeking treatment. Read More...

Dems' Medicare Drug 'Fix' Will Curb Choices, Hike Costs

Originally Posted at Orlando Sentinel
By Merrill Matthews
March 9, 2009

In recent weeks, the nation's attention has been focused on the economy and Washington's efforts to fix it. Some lawmakers have used this opportunity to introduce legislation that would otherwise generate enormous controversy.

Most notably, a bill was introduced by Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Reps. Marion Berry, D-Ark., and Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., to overhaul Medicare PartD, the prescription-drug benefit created in 2003.
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UK says elderly are “wasting" too many bedrooms

Sunday, February 5, 2012

Source: Canada Free Press

In yet another outrageous piece of social engineering from the British government, pensioners will be encouraged to downsize to smaller properties allowing local government councils to rent their homes out as public housing and manage the tenancy.
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Federal Employee Gravy Train

Monday, January 30, 2012

Source: The Washington Times

Federal workers earn 16 percent more in total compensation — including wages and benefits — than comparable private-sector employees, according to the Congressional Budget Office. The key difference is in benefits, where federal workers average more than $20 per hour in compensation — 48 percent higher than the $13.60 in prorated hourly benefits in the private sector.
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Ind. Lawmakers: "Pee Test For Thee But Not For Me"

Friday, January 27, 2012

Source: Huffington Post

A member of the Indiana General Assembly withdrew his bill to create a pilot program for drug testing welfare applicants Friday after one of his colleagues amended the measure to require drug testing for lawmakers.
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America, arms-dealer to the world

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Source: Salon.com

Retired lieutenant colonel's take on the military-industrial complex: As a country, we seem to have a teenager’s fascination with military hardware, an addiction that’s driving us to bust our own national budgetary allowance. At the same time, we sell weapons the way teenage punks sell fireworks to younger kids: for profit and with little regard for how they might be used.
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Still Convinced Tax Increases Work?

Thursday, January 19, 2012

Source: CBSChicago.com

After largest tax increase in Illinois' history, the state still can't pay its bills. Only solution is to cut government spending says state comptroller.
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GOP Voters Split On Interventionism

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Source: The Washington Times

Nearly half of all Republican primary voters say it’s time the U.S. stops intervening in world affairs and focuses on domestic priorities instead, signaling a persistent rift that is playing out in the party’s presidential nomination battle.
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CNN Poll: Obama tied with Romney & Paul in November showdowns

Monday, January 16, 2012

Source: CNN

New CNN/ORC International Poll released Monday also indicates that Mitt Romney and Rep. Ron Paul of Texas are running even with President Obama in possible showdown this November.
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Solid Majority Want ObamaCare Repealed

Monday, January 9, 2012

Source: Rasmussen Reports

Most voters still want to see the national health care law repealed and believe repeal of the controversial measure is likely.
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Obama Darling of the Military-Industrial Complex

Friday, January 13, 2012

Source: Raw Story

President Obama is leading the pack in donations from the defense industry: according to the Center for Responsive Politics, he’d taken in almost $112,000 from defense industry donors through December 2011, twice as much as Mitt Romney, the leading Republican recipient of defense-industry campaign contributions.
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How Much Abuse Will We Accept From Government?

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Source: Huffington Post

Jail inmate dies after deputies directly sprayed him and fogged his cell with pepper spray at least 8 times. Deputies then put him into a restraining chair, a controversial device that binds inmates at both wrists, both ankles, and across the chest, and then sprayed him at least two more times after he had been strapped to the chair. He was also stripped naked, and outfitted with a "spit mask," a hood designed to prevent inmates from spitting on jail personnel, which kept the pepper spray in close proximity to his nose and mouth, ensuring he would continue to inhale it for the full six hours he was in the restraint chair.
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