More Problems with Cain's 999 Plan
There is so much to like about Herman Cain. And there is also his 999 plan. Mr. Cain's website states that "Amidst a backdrop of the economic renewal created by the 999 Plan, I will begin the process of educating the American people on the benefits of continuing the next step to the Fair Tax." …
Res Judicata: Defending Romneycare
The Massachusetts health care law signed in 2006 by Governor Romney has three main parts: 1. It requires all citizens to buy a state-approved health insurance plan, 2. It provides subsidies to certain low-income people to pay for insurance, 3. It requires employers to provide health …
Romney Can't Stop the Tea Party
By all appearances Mitt Romney seems likely to walk away with the Republican Party’s 2012 nomination. We can still expect a few scares, particularly in Iowa and South Carolina, but it’s getting harder to construct a credible scenario in which Romney fumbles this one away. He looks smart, savvy, …
Super Committee Braces For Another Fight
The good, the bad and the ugly of politics has been on display for the past few days. None of it popped up spontaneously. First, the ugly. In an article in The Hill , Alexander Bolton reports that the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction (JSC) “can’t agree on how to count.” This …
Worry About Costs, Not Mandates
Revelatory Headline : "White House used Mitt Romney health-care law as blueprint for federal law." I am no fan of Obamacare. The notion that a top down system will control costs flies in the face of the fact that virtually every advanced country on earth that has a top-down scheme to manage its …
The White House Knew Solyndra Was Not Profitable
Today, the Wall Street Journal disclosed and commented upon an e-mail to Larry Summers regarding the Solyndra loans: Brad Jones of Redpoint Ventures got to the heart of the Solyndra economy in a December 2009 email to then-National Economic Council director Larry Summers: “The allocation …
The Top Sixteen Westmoreland Quotations
16. Motives: In an oral history interview: “I diligently tried to do a good job, not because I was bucking for anything higher, but because I was trying to do a job for the sake of doing a good job. That was my orientation. As a matter of fact, it was throughout my career. It was to do a job for …
Palin: Already Almost Forgotten
"I will continue driving the discussion for freedom and free markets..." - From Sarah Palin's statement announcing her decision not to run for president. Um, probably not. Sarah Palin's political voice had dwindled well before she announced her decision not to run. Now it will sink …
Inflation Hawks: Mugged by Reality, Again
Remember how the Fed's easy money stance was supposed to drive commodity prices higher and higher? Ooops. S&P GSCI Index dropped 24% since April, signalling a bear market 4 Oct, 2011, 0506 hrs IST, Bloomberg LONDON: Commodities fell to a 10-month low as signs of a contraction …
Santorum's Don't Ask Don't Tell Stance Makes No Sense
President Obama, justifiably, has scored a few political points by criticizing Republican candidates for not standing up for a gay solider who asked a question at a debate or even thanking him for his service. In a sense, though, the entire situation is being blown out of proportion: the response …
Forget the Name, How Did Perry's Family Afford Their Property?
Rick Perry's family leased a hunting property that once went by the name of Niggerhead. That doesn't seem very much of a story. The Perry family did not apply the name. They went to some effort to change it after signing the lease in the early 1980s. Yesterday's Washington Post story questions …
Government is a Lousy Investor
Jim DiPeso is right to draw attention to the Colony Shale disaster and the disastrous Synfuels government supported enterprise that helped make it happen. But there's a broader point to be made: the government is utterly clueless when it comes to developing consumer products. Aside from …
Colony Shale, The First Solyndra
Solyndra is a lesson in how the substitution of wishful thinking for green eyeshades can stimulate the growth of costly energy carbuncles that emit malodorous political fumes. Today it is Solyndra. Yesterday it was Colony Shale. Don’t remember Colony Shale? Coloradans do. In the mesa country …
The EPA is Not Insane
The Obama White House is many things—flailing as it fishtails from an adult-in-the-room pose to screaming populism; cack-handed, as it both infuriates its base and loses independents; and passive to the point of paralysis, as Chris Christie pointed out in his Reagan Library speech. The Obama …
Gold's Value? It's What We Give it.
Eli Lehrer misrepresents my intentions in his most recent piece. To be clear, my article was not making a case for buying gold going forward per se. Trading in commodities is a volatile and highly leveraged activity, and I would not presume to advise the general public on it. As I said in my …
Daniels: Government Faces "Limits" When Helping the Unemployed
Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels visited Georgetown University on Friday, September 23rd, for a refreshingly intimate conversation sponsored by the Georgetown College Republicans. Daniels is known for his candor and modesty, and both were on display when I asked him what could be done for the 14 …
Gold: Good For Nothing
Brad Schaeffer is right: Numbers don't lie. And the numbers on gold are pretty clear: it's a lousy investment over any long period of time. In times of economic uncertainty and malaise (whether it is now or the 1970s) gold prices have indeed gone up rapidly. (Just like dot.com stocks or real …
It WILL be Romney
Rick Perry's propensity for gaffes, poor straw poll performance, and lackluster debating skills are already forcing many people who thought he would surely be the Republican nominee to reconsider. They're right to have second thoughts, yet while Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, and even Jon Huntsman …
Who Broke the Government?
In my column for CNN, I explain why government institutions are failing: Under the old rules, there were certain things that political parties did not do -- even though theoretically they could. If one party controlled the Senate and another party controlled the presidency, the Senate party …