Month: January 2010

Marionette Bob Bennett

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photo credit: © Giorgio

While candidate Mike Lee acted like a senator on the issue of confirming Ben Bernanke for another term as chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, Bob Bennett acted like a marionette under the control of the mystical wizard of Washington D.C. With a short press release and a predictable vote, our “Senator” Bob Bennett plainly demonstrated the cancerous logic that is rampant among Washington insiders. Here is how he justified his vote to confirm Ben Bernanke:

I reluctantly cast a vote in favor of Ben Bernanke because I do not want to give President Obama the opportunity to put someone who shares his leftist views in charge of the Federal Reserve. I am aware of the mistakes that have been made at the Fed while Chairman Bernanke has been there, but I fear an alternative would be worse for the country’s economic future.

So our elected Marionette is simply trying to save us from having the president nominate someone else. Cute. Perhaps he should have engaged his brain and realized two simple facts – first, if Bernanke was not confirmed by the senate there is little chance that President Obama would have name a more extreme nominee (the natural reaction would be to nominate a safer pick); second, considering the makeup of the Senate (not to mention the final vote tally) opposing Bernanke would have been unlikely to prevent his confirmation but at least it would not have demonstrated approval for his performance (a vote to confirm sends that message more strongly than any press release about your supposed reluctance to cast the vote).

Tags 2010, Ben Bernanke, Bob Bennett, Elevated, Mike Lee, money, senate

General

The Right to be Charitable (or Not)

Post author By David
Post date January 28, 2010
23 Comments on The Right to be Charitable (or Not)

photo credit: Monjori

A couple of days ago I heard Jason Lewis on the radio talking about how socialism does not create wealth (after Obama’s “where opportunity is absent government must create it” comment it’s obvious that some people just don’t understand that fact) and that the only way that socialism can seem to work is if there are people in society selfishly creating wealth to be redistributed. While Jason started going on about how much better natural self interest is for society than synthetic altruism (my terms, not his) I began thinking that the right to be charitable is one that we must each earn in life.

As an example, I cannot donate a million dollars to help the relief efforts of Haiti. No matter how much I might want to I simply don’t have the money. There are other people who, through some combination of hard work and chance, have amassed a million dollars or more of money they don’t need for themselves and they can choose to donate that much money to help in Haiti. They have earned the right to make a decision about whether they will do something that generous, but I have not earned that right.

Tags charity, Elevated, government

culture National

Change I Could Believe In

Post author By David
Post date January 26, 2010
12 Comments on Change I Could Believe In

photo credit: jasoneppink

Back in October I wrote about the dangers of a crisis mentality and tried to show that the abuse of crisis was not a one-party trait. I see that Will Wilkinson did a better job of showing that this month in Let the next crisis go to waste:

The Aughts began in crisis when the second plane hit the second tower on Sept. 11, 2001. The Bush administration, loath to let a serious crisis go to waste, managed to parlay the nation’s alarm and credulity into an ill-conceived invasion of an entirely unrelated country, wasting over a trillion dollars and many tens of thousands of lives, all while losing control of the fight in Afghanistan and failing utterly to bring down Osama bin Laden.

Bush’s botched attempts to capitalize on crisis—the ugly aftermath to which Obama is heir—might have made an alert leader wary. But instead, Obama set up shop in the Oval Office and proceeded immediately to use crisis as (Emanuel’s words again) “an opportunity to do things you’d think you could not do.”

Rather than acting as a prudent guardian of the public good in a time of economic turbulence and hardship, Obama and the Democratic Congress have hurried to check the boxes on their partisan wish list precisely when the nation most needed a restorative break from transformative ambition.

Tags change congress, crime, Elevated, government, Haiti, KVNU FTP, Obama, unconstitutional

State

Taxes: Supply vs Demand

The bulk of the discussion at the legislative town hall meeting last week was focused on fiscal issues of one kind or another. One thing that was briefly touched on was the potential return of sales tax on unprepared food. I have always been a fan of not having that tax, because of its supposedly regressive nature and because unprepared food is generally what I spend my money on, and I see no reason to volunteer for higher taxes on it. A couple of statements in that brief discussion got my brain thinking about some different aspects of tax policy.

One statement that someone made was that when the tax on unprepared food was eliminated the stores simply raised their prices accordingly so that the savings went into their pockets rather than taxpayers. That didn’t strike me as accurate, but even if it was accurate it is no excuse to reinstate the tax – the stores would let consumers absorb the taxes on the now higher prices rather than lower the price to accommodate the tax.

Sen. Liljenquist mentioned that people don’t tend to buy luxury items in down economies. When combined with the fact that our expectations fo government tend to increase in down economies I saw why governments tend to grow endlessly – there is generally an inverse relationship between our demand for government services and our ability to pay for them. When times are tough we demand more and politicians do their best to oblige us. When times are good we tend to expand government in areas that were not previously considered crucial by eating into any taxes that exceed our recession-limited budgets. When times become lean again the once-discretionary programs are viewed as essential and demand greater sacrifice from citizens to maintain the programs that would have been considered outrageous in the previous downturn.

From this perspective it makes more sense to favor regressive or at least “fair” tax schemes where those with the least ability to pay also have a vested interest in the tax rates so that they are less likely to get extravagant when times are generally better and so that the tax revenue is generally more stable. It is simply foolish to base our most essential services on revenue sources that are unavailable when the services are crucial.

I’m not trying to argue that luxury goods should be tax-exempt, but if they form the basis of our tax revenue for essential services we will always be in for gut-wrenching decisions whenever their is a dip in our economic outlook.

Tags Dan Liljenquist, economics, House 20, Senate 23, taxes, thoughts, town hall

culture State

Defined Benefit Pensions: A Failed Experiment

Post author By David
Post date January 22, 2010
11 Comments on Defined Benefit Pensions: A Failed Experiment

photo credit: inspecie.co.uk

After the town hall meeting I attended on Wednesday I have been thinking about pension plans generally. The state of Utah is looking at changing their pension offerings for new employees to save the state from future financial ruin. I have seen other companies go through that process already. As a nation we have seen the cost of defined benefit pensions contribute mightily to the downfall of GM and Chrysler as well as having a hand in the struggles throughout the airline industry not so many years ago.

As I thought about all these examples I realized that even a fully funded defined benefit pension program is a gamble for any organization. Employees like the security, but it is an inherently risky proposition to offer such a plan.

Tags bailout, economics, Elevated, health care, money, Utah

Local State

A Current Example of Being a Good Legislator

Post author By David
Post date January 21, 2010
No Comments on A Current Example of Being a Good Legislator

Last night I attended a town hall meeting held jointly by my state senator, Sen. Dan Liljenquist; my state representative, Rep. Becky Edwards; and the neighboring district representative in Bountiful, Rep. Sheryl Allen. I came away from that meeting with a number of impressions that I will be sharing in the coming days, but the one I wanted to share first was what a good example Sen. Liljenquist was of a legislator as a communicator, specifically in communicating with his constituents on an important issue.

Almost as soon as the meeting was opened up for comments and questions from those in attendance it became very clear that a majority of the people there were public employees who were not very thrilled with the work that Sen. Liljenquist has been doing to change the pension program for state employees. They expressed their disappointment with the directions he was going and their concerns with the future ramifications of the changes the he is advocating.

He listened calmly over and over but as he spoke it was very evident that he had put a major investment of time and energy to arrive at the best available solution. He politely but decisively explained why the changes were necessary and what he was doing to protect current employees and the fiscal future of the state.

I don’t know if many people at the meeting were swayed as he spoke, but I very much respected how he tackled this difficult issue head on and did not bend to the myopic perspective of some vocal constituents by choosing the irresponsible option of punting the decision to the future.

Tags Becky Edwards, Bountiful, Dan Liljenquist, House 20, Senate 23, Sheryl Allen, town hall

life

“Whole Foods” Republican

photo credit: ilovemypit

Nearly three years ago I publicly wondered where I fit politically. Since then I have solidly concluded that the Republican party is the best fit for me, but now I have found a term for my general political view – I’m a Whole Foods Republican who Michael Petrilli describes as:

independent-minded voters who embrace a progressive lifestyle but not progressive politics. These highly-educated individuals appreciate diversity and would never tell racist or homophobic jokes; they like living in walkable urban environments; they believe in environmental stewardship, community service and a spirit of inclusion. And yes, many shop at Whole Foods . . .

What makes these voters potential Republicans is that, lifestyle choices aside, they view big government with great suspicion. There’s no law that someone who enjoys organic food, rides his bike to work, or wants a diverse school for his kids must also believe that the federal government should take over the health-care system or waste money on thousands of social programs with no evidence of effectiveness. Nor do highly educated people have to agree that a strong national defense is harmful to the cause of peace and international cooperation.

Tags Elevated, parties, Republican, Wall Street Journal

culture

How Do You Solve a Problem Like Haiti?

Post author By David
Post date January 19, 2010
4 Comments on How Do You Solve a Problem Like Haiti?

photo credit: United Nations Development Programme

These days everybody wants to help the poor people of Haiti – and that’s obviously a good thing but when I think about Haiti it makes me wonder what the proper course of action is for outside nations to help that struggling country. I’m not talking about the proper course of action to help after the earthquake last week – that’s relatively simple to answer: get aid in supplies and personnel on the ground quickly to restore order and save lives (even though it’s not an easy task). I’m talking about the real fundamental problems that have been plaguing the nation of Haiti as demonstrated by their history of the last 20 years.

In the last 20 years there have been four regular elections – the winner of all four has alternated between Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his good friend René Préval. As far as I understand they never ran against each other so this is not a matter of oscillating between political parties. Both times that Aristide was elected he was later exiled. The first time he was eventually returned to power thanks to U.S. intervention – the second time it was the U.S. that sent him into exile. Hence my question – what is to be done for Haiti?

Tags Elevated, Haiti, international, KVNU FTP, news, questions

life

Ensuring Personal Independence

Post author By David
Post date January 18, 2010
4 Comments on Ensuring Personal Independence

Last week Charles D. left a short but challenging comment stating:

I will be interested to read what steps you believe one can take to insure personal independence in the event of an economic collapse.

Today I will attempt to specifically describe what we can and must do to ensure that we are not utterly dependent on society. As I said before, I am not advocating that people should become hermits or dissociate themselves from society – in fact I advocate the cultivation of connections within society. On the other hand, when push comes to shove I am ultimately responsible to provide the necessities of life for me and my family and it is up to me to make sure that I do not fail due to a failure by someone else.

Since feeling the challenge of accurately addressing Charles’ question I ran into a reference to the book How to Sew a Button: And Other Nifty Things Your Grandmother Knew. I think the title alone is descriptive of what I had in mind – being able to do for yourself or do without in as many things as possible. Basically, you should go through the following flowchart for everything you use and find a way to end up on the right side of the chart.

This gets down to some very basic things, like electricity and the foods you eat. If you are dependent on electricity you should be figuring out how much you need and looking for ways to produce it. For food production you need to have the skills and the resources necessary to produce a minimum supply for your needs

Thankfully you don’t have to be entirely alone. One of the things that you can do is cultivate a community of people you know who are willing to pool their skills and resources to produce their combined needs. For the most basic things you should find ways to produce, or actively contribute to the production of the things you are dependent on. For other things that you could live without but would prefer not to, it might be acceptable to be dependent on a member of your personal community to produce that particular thing, but you must be prepared to offer something of value in return for their production.

Tags liberty, prepare, questions, thoughts

National

Strong National Defense for the American Dream

Post author By David
Post date January 15, 2010
2 Comments on Strong National Defense for the American Dream

Regarding strong national defense in his Contract for the American Dream Congressman Chaffetz reminds us:

The men and women serving in our armed forces are the best in the world. They can accomplish anything they are asked to do, if they are given the proper resources and clear rules of engagement.

He believes that we should be working towards:

Imagine the best equipped strategic strike forces rapidly deployed at a moment's notice to respond to the national security interests of the United States of America. Also, imagine a well compensated military that cares for the military families, now, in the future, and especially when wounded.

He thinks this will take us there:

Dedicate at least 4% of our nation’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for national defense spending.

Secure our borders, enforce our current immigration laws, and reject amnesty for those who are here illegally.

Adopt a “Go Big or Go Home” approach to our overseas military presence. We must have the best foreign intelligence, human and electronic.

Support an “all of the above” national energy policy that advocates rapid development of renewable energy, clean/green energy, and the use of our various natural resources and nuclear capabilities. Recognize that energy independence is vital to our national security.

Keep Guantanamo Bay open and continue with military tribunals.

Sustain the Second Amendment, the right to bear arms.

Support Veterans by honoring all commitments made to them.

My reactions:

Having a flat rate dedicated to defense might be better than our current what-can-we-get-away-with approach. Whether 4% is the right rate is up for debate.
We need to secure our borders, but that will probably require a long discussion about what we believe about immigration and then a complete overhaul of our immigration laws. Then we would need to strictly enforce those immigration laws once they are in line with our immigration beliefs.
“Go Big or Go Home” might help us be more careful about when and where we “go.”
“All of the above” is definitely the right energy policy.
Keeping Guantanamo Bay open is not helping our national security in any measurable way.
We should sustain basic rights – obviously including the Second Amendment.
We should honor all our commitments and our veterans have done the most to warrant making those commitments to them than any other group – certainly they have done more than most of our members of Congress.

Tags 2010, campaign promises, Jason Chaffetz, military