Editorial
The Statists' Continued Folly!
Paul Krugman has a regular column in The Times and can discuss what he chooses to discuss so why is he fussing, as he did in a December column, that others have other topics they wish to discuss not the ones he likes? Must we all take the lead of Krugman? What conceit!
Krugman's "solution" to the unemployment "crisis" is no solution but merely a shift − let's burden future generations with higher costs and taxes, right? Yet what is needed is fewer obstacles to growth, that is to say less government regulation, much lower taxation and the encouragement of private investment and innovation − in short, Hayek instead of Keynes! What is bizarre is that Krugman and his master, Obama, are dead set on socking it to the rich, so much so that even without any need for garnering more funds from them they insist that it be done! In other words, this bunch is interested in punitive taxation, never mind budgetary concerns.
Is this to show the "base" that they are tough, merciless? Is this to very visibly implement their leftist policies just to show who is in the driver's seat now? Is it to demonstrate to the world that America's tradition of substantially free enterprise will not be allowed to continue since it makes it possible for economically savvy citizens to succeed while those not much interested in playing according to the rules of capitalism may experience losses from scoffing at ambition? That famous 47 percent, plus or minus, that expects to be taken care of by government with just a minimum of effort − effort consisting mostly of political maneuvering, not smart enterprise − must not be disappointed. Obama must continue to be their leader, guru, guide and protector!
Looks to me that Obama is making no secret of it now: he will cater to the dependent class and only throw a few bones to the entrepreneurs, enough so they keep producing enough for Obama's constituency to remain satisfied parasites. Most of them feel that those who are successful in a largely free market economy don't deserve it; they are living off the blood and sweat of Obama's people!
If you don't believe me, consider a recently deceased philosopher of the welfare state from Harvard University, the place where much of Obama's political and moral philosophy was fashioned: "The assertion that a man deserves the superior character that enables him to make the effort to cultivate his abilities is ... problematic; for his character depends in large part upon fortunate family and social circumstances for which he can claim no credit." John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1971), pp. 104.
In other words, as Obama put it during the campaign for the presidency: You did not build it: "If you've been successful, you didn't get there on your own. You didn't get there on your own. I'm always struck by people who think, well, it must be because I was just so smart. There are a lot of smart people out there. It must be because I worked harder than everybody else. Let me tell you something − there are a whole bunch of hardworking people out there...." No, you got there mostly by accident of birth! Like the rich of the feudal era!
None of us is successful without having gained from certain others in our lives. No argument about that. But, first, this doesn't entitle anyone else to rob one of the fruits of the success. It doesn't follow! Second, the entrepreneurial initiative of those who do succeed is not shared by all. They may have had some help but they needed to figure out how to put that help to good use. That is where they earned their success, not from creating things out of nothing (a ridiculous idea that the takers wish to peddle).
The bottom line is that Obama & Co. want to promote the idea that successful people have but a tiny bit if anything at all to do with their success and, therefore − which is a colossal non-sequitur − Obama & Co. may rip them off good and hard.
In fact, the human element in human success is enormous. What it requires from those like Obama is for them to get out of the way, to show confidence in the makers, not the takers.
Tibor Machan is a member of the Advisory Board for The Foundation for the Advancement of Free-Market Thinking (FAFMT) and the R. C. Hoiles Professor of Business Ethics & Free Enterprise at the Argyros School of Business & Economics, Chapman University in Orange, CA.
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Posted by 1776 on 01/27/13 08:28 PM
Here is one being kept out of our conversation of women serving on the front lines in the military.
Sex assault in military: 'What did they expect?' DAVID BOROFF, RHEANA MURRAY Monday, February 13, 2012
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Posted by Leviathanfighter on 01/25/13 06:39 PM
Folly indeed! "Economists" like Krugman are not deserving of the name. They are hired guns and propagandists for the power elite and cannot trusted.
In a nutshell, Libertarians know (no thanks to the teachings of Krugman and Keynes) that all roads of mainstream economics lead to legalized plunder, central banking, fiat money, debt slavery, totalitarianism, and war.
Naturally, they garner support from "the base" by sidestepping all this unpleasantness and stirring up class envy, a very easy and shrewd thing to do. It keeps them pacified, or, as you say, "satisfied parasites," until they can be dealt with later when the elites are ready.
When you say, "Most of them feel that those who are successful in a largely free market economy don't deserve it," this reflects the poisonous atmosphere perpetrated by the elites to serve their own ends. This is the "Anti-Capitalistic Mentality" of which Mises wrote so sagely in his book of the same name. He pointed out that, for the ordinary man, the abstract concepts of economics are "simply nonsense." (p. 46). The elites are always ready to take advantage of their envy and ignorance, and have been very successful at it, though the Internet has steadily eroded their ability to do this.
For Libertarians, the state will always remain the enemy, because as Mises put it, "The state is essentially an apparatus of compulsion and coercion." (Omnipotent Government, p. 46). I do not consider "compulsion and coercion" to be the essence of a free society, but rather the essence of crony collectivism, i.e., totalitarianism, the type of society which Krugman, Obama, et al., are in love with.
What we must continue to pound into the heads of the masses is that they have been duped by fairy tale history promoted by elites into believing what is not in their best interests about human history, economics, and society. Only by bypassing the government schools (via the Internet) can we accomplish this great task, however.
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Posted by Abu Aardvark on 01/25/13 04:46 AM
seer on 01/24/13 09:13 PM wrote: "No one should have the right to destroy the environment under the guise of being free."
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Agreed. In fact, there CAN be no such 'right'. You may want to read the following for further contemplation:
"The Libertarian Manifesto on Pollution" - by Murray N. Rothbard
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"Environmentalism and Economic Freedom: The Case for Private Property Rights" - by Walter Block
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"Law, Property Rights, and Air Pollution" - by Murray N. Rothbard
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"Environmental Preservation: A Matter of Property" - by Andrew Pack
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Posted by nailheadtom on 01/24/13 10:51 PM
" the labor movement of the late 1800's & early 1900's was due to the horrid conditions in which workers were forced to labor."
Forced? Somehow I was never informed that Irish, Germans, Italians and Poles were driven onto ships at gunpoint and after arriving at Ellis Island were forcibly stationed in front of machines. Evidently they felt that their new circumstances were an improvement on their earlier situation or they would have returned to Europe, as indeed some did. Most however, wrote their friends and relatives back home and advised them to make the trip, too.
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Posted by seer on 01/24/13 09:13 PM
An unregulated Corporatocracy would soon be a third world nightmare for most of the population. Obviously the history of the labor movement of the late 1800's & early 1900's was due to the horrid conditions in which workers were forced to labor. The planet has already been unceremoniously polluted in the name of big business and short term profits. No one should have the right to destroy the environment under the guise of being free.
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Posted by 1776 on 01/24/13 02:01 PM
Newly unemployed lawmakers buzzing about million-dollar lobbying jobs By Kevin Bogardus - 01/13/13
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Posted by theranger on 01/24/13 11:43 AM
Attacks on the "rich" by the politicians they control is simply a head fake by politicians. The real purpose is not raising money- the real purpose to encourage and legitimize the emotions of envy and greed. These evil emotions work here just as they did in Nazi Germany and serve as justification for ever increasing government control. Once upon a time no American worthy of the name would admit to envying anothers success or plotting to take their wealth by government edict. Now politicians scarcely talk of anything else but attacking their class enemies.
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Posted by nailheadtom on 01/24/13 11:33 AM
What would be an example of the "huge tax which is levied on the American public by its corporations"? Corporations are, in fact, creations of government, entities that owe their existence to the state's desire to organize the economy to suit its own ends. This is done through the machinations of the secular priests of the legal system:
"The lawyers dispense justice and have knowledge of what is right and fair, for which reason, they are the ones closest to God and to divinity [and] deserve no less praise than those who proclaim God's word."
Taken from the funeral eulogy for Sebald Welser, Nurnberg,Bavaria, 1589, Flesh and Spirit, Private Life in Early Modern Germany, Ozment, Steven, Penguin Books, NY, NY, 1999, pg.194.
Family relations, probate, taxes, crime, trade, all these things and more are regulated by the legislation of the elite legal community and enforced by their coercion branch. They are the parasites on society.
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Posted by speedygonzales on 01/24/13 06:59 AM
The most intractable part of the current financial crisis, and the ongoing problem of the US economy is the huge tax which is levied on the American public by its corporations, primarily in the financial and health care sectors, and a political system based on lobbyists and their campaign contributions.
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Solutions can find here
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Rise minimum wage is taking money out of those who pay no taxes and ship money to tax heaven to those who pay taxes and spent 'em in economy. Rising prices due to drasticaly rising minimum wage will atract investors and selfemployment which is in US single digit compare Greece, Spain, Portugal 40%.
The problem is we are in seriuos trap as there are hidden taxes and impediments to 'free trade' at every turn. The ugly truth is that capitalism-in-practice hates free markets, always seeking to overturn the rules and impose oligopoly if not outright monopoly through barriers to entry, manipulation of the political process, distortion of regulation, predatory pricing, brute force, and the usual slate of anti-trust practices.
So whoever say whatever, can be god or Nobel price holder, no matter in this political scenario.
