Bob Herbert Gets Ripped a New One

I know he’s an easy target, but Ann Althouse opens a big ol’ can of whup-ass on doofus NY Times columnist (but I repeat myself) Bob Herbert over his condescending tears for Nevada’s brothel workers.

The Myth of Giuliani the Manager

Campaign myth #4762: Rudy Giuliani is a good manger

Fact: Giuliani is a poor fiscal manager

- Today’s Daily News headline story: “Poor Rudy - Cash crunch leaves Giuliani campaign aids without pay”.  Ok so he’s putting his remaining $7 million into Florida and a few aids “volunteered” to go without pay.  What will Rudy do with the Federal deficit the next President is bound to inherit from our current ”conservative” administration?   By the way Rudy’s personal net worth is estimated by some to be between $30 and $60 million.

-While Rudy deserves some credit for controlling spending in his first term,  he left poor Mike Bloomberg with a $6 billion deficit. By the way - this wasn’t only due to 9/11, remember the economy was headed south long before 9/11 and City revenues along with it.  Tax-Hike-Mike’s dismal handling of the deficit will be the subject of another post on this blog.

Fact: Giuliani doesn’t set priorities well.

-In Grand Illusion: The Untold Story of Rudy Giuliani and 9/11, Wayne Barrett goes on for chapters about Rudy’s turf wars with the Port Authority, his failure to prepare NYC for terrorist attack even after the first World Trade Center bombing, his inability to cut through bureaucracy to acquire new radios for the Fire Department… the list goes on.

-Meanwhile Rudy picked fights with anyone who couldn’t defend themselves such as cab drivers, street vendors, night clubs, African hair braiders….

Fact: Giuliani can’t manage his team

In Grand Illusion, Barrett also describes how Rudy failed to resolve the turf wars between the Police, Fire Department and Emergency Management which to a great degree led to many of the problems encountered on 9/11.

 This list just scratches the surface.  Take a look at what Jacob Weisberg said in this Slate post.

“This comparison doesn’t make the case for Bloomberg as president so much as it underscores what a scary place a Giuliani White House could be. President Rudy would give powerful speeches denouncing terrorism while assuming extraordinary wartime powers. He’d reject compromise with his antagonists and ignore the nuts and bolts of running a government. After a few years, he’d be on nonspeaking terms with much of his Cabinet, never mind his fellow world leaders. By the time he got done, he might make us appreciate George W. Bush.”

Fortunately Rudy’s chance seem to be dropping fast.  Unfortunately, it’s hard to tell who would be worse given the choice of Rudy and John McCain.

Of course that isn’t the only choice.  There is still a libertarian choice in the New York primary:  Ron Paul.

Eminent Domain: Just face it Bruce Ratner is more important than you are

And the City’s politicians and bureaucrats just like him better.  And why shouldn’t they - he’s providing tax revenue that helps pay for their salaries and their pensions. Of course so does your tax money - but you have no choice and Bruce Ratner does.  Don’t like it? Who cares?  You are just an ordinary citizen.  Bruce has friend’s in the government.

Eminent Domain is no longer about replacing slums with hospitals (if it ever was). Admit it - It’ s now just the latest trick politicians use to feed their unquenchable thirst for more money and more power over every aspect of your life. 

Michael White has a great piece “Columbia Pulls a Kelo”in yesterday’s New York Sun (online version) that points out how there is money to be made in the business of seizing what you thought was your property.

A few actually seem to believe the process is moral or productive. Mayor Bloomberg once commented that potential federal limits on eminent domain would limit NYC’s ability to control it’s own future.  Our mayor seemed to miss the point that eminent domain rather limits property owner’s ability to control their futures.   Our mayor is famous for thinking he knows best how we all should live.
 
But even good soldiers in the war against personal freedom seem to admit that the process by which government seizes people’s homes and businesses is flawed at best.  In August, Supreme Court Justice Stevens lamented his Kelo position saying that “the free play of market forces is more likely to produce acceptable results in the long run than the best-intentioned plans of public officials.”   DUH!  Deputy Mayor for Economic Development Dan Doctoroff  - the guy that said the free market and the interests of the city were incompatible -  has now admitted that he never should have agreed to let Bruce Ratner’s Atlantic Yards project ignore the City’s ULURP process.   OOPS - None Killed.  A few people lost their homes but who’s counting? We have to assume the government knows best right?  If they don’t like the law - they can just get the Supreme Court to “clarify” it or ignore it altogether.
 
It almost looks as if they aren’t even trying to hide it anymore.  They will take your home or your business - because they can.  Big government costs big money.  Somebody has to sacrifice.  And you can bet it won’t be Bruce Ratner, or the New York Times, or Columbia or Michael Bloomberg or Dan Doctoroff.

Libertarian National Committee Resolution Urges Ron Paul to Seek LP Nomination

It’s no secret that many - probably most - Libertarians support Ron Paul’s Republican candidacy even though there is a large crop of candidates who plan to seek the LP Presidential nomination.  At least one prominent Libertarian candidate has said he will support Ron Paul even while he continues his own run.

Now it’s offical. The Libertarian National Committee yesterday resolved to congratulate Ron Paul for ” his success in spreading a message of peace, prosperity and freedom” and urged him to seek the LP nomination if he is not nominated by the Republicans.

Read the resolution here. 

Consume Nothing Day

Why just “buy nothing” today when you can consume nothing?

 

From the merry pranksters at Bureaucrash.

Investment of the Year

Forget the Google stock. The smart money was apparently buying up $20-denominated Ron Paul Liberty Dollars, which are now selling for $525 and up on ebay. Of course, the lucky owners can thank the feds for making the coins collectors’ items.

Liberty Dollar Bust

When the news started circulating through the blogosphere yesterday, a lot of people assumed it was a hoax, because the story was so absurd. But no, the FBI and the Secret Service really did raid the headquarters of the Liberty Dollar. To be honest, I’ve never been as big a Liberty Dollar fan as some other Libertarians – it always struck me as a multi-level marketing scheme — but there’s nothing illegal about that. It will be interesting to see if the feds really have anything on Bernard NotHaus and company, or if it’s just a typical heavy-handed bullying tactic.

The NY Sun coverage of the raid included a sidebar with a range of reaction from local Libertarians. As David Friedman once said, “Somewhere in the world there may be two libertarians who agree on everything, but I am not one of them.”

It Depends What Your Definition of “Tax Increase” Is

Apparently “everything changes on Day 1″ referred only to Spitzer’s campaign promises. Remember when Eliot promised repeatedly not to raise taxes? Well, he’s at it again.

If you plan to do any Christmas holiday shopping on the Internet, better get it in before November 30. On December 1, the Spitzer administration is going to start forcing Amazon.com and many other online retailers to collect sales tax on purchases originating in New York State.

As most everyone knows, in cyberspace you only have to pay sales tax when the retailer has a physical presence in your state. So, for example, I have to pay 8.375% sales tax on electronics purchased from BestBuy.com, but not from Amazon, because Best Buy has brick-and-mortar stores here.

Now, Spitzer is claiming that any Internet retailer with an affiliate program — and at least one affiliate residing in New York — has a “physical presence” in New York and must collect sales tax on all New York sales. In other words, if you put an Amazon link on your personal site that gets 50 hits on a good day and you live in New York, you are the physical embodiment of Amazon in the Empire State. And it’s not just sales originating from the affiliate sites that are subject to sales tax. Once that physical presence is established, all sales from New York for that web retailer get taxed.

State officials estimate the new policy will bring in $100 million in new tax revenues each year. Of course, the masters of Doublethink also insist it’s not a tax increase.

UPDATE: Just minutes after uploading the post above, I read that Spitzer is backing down on this Internet sales tax scheme… for now. Apparently his aides were worried the Republicans would talk mean about him again, like they did with the driver’s license thing. The steamroller has become the steamrolled.

Global warming or not - Green is libertarian

It’s fashionable in some libertarian circles to dismiss global warming  but I think sustainability is very libertarian.

Think about property rights.  For example,  it’s pretty obvious that if you dump your trash on my front porch, or more accurately my front stoop,  that’s a crime against my property.  If your factory belches smoke that provably gives my kid asthma that’s a crime against his person.  If you use resources without paying for them, in a way that provably and permanently damages the planet,  at worst you are committing a crime against the property of many and at best you are being a selfish meany who wouldn’t be very popular or successful in a functioning libertarian society.

Being libertarian ought to be about paying for the resources you consume whether it’s exotic hardwood for the fretboard on my next 5 string or whether it’s a cubic foot of clean air.  Of course the exotic hardwood is expensive and the (relatively) clean air - so far - is pretty cheap.  There’s that free market at work.   That part seems pretty easy.

It’s gets a little difficult to prove you are causing my kids’ asthma or global warming.  It’s also pretty hard to pin down my rights to air.  It’s made more difficult by the fact that our rulers make decisions in the back rooms about how much asthma we can accept in order to keep those workers working and the campaign contributions coming.   National standards for vehicle emissions or smoking bans might be considered a little arbitrary compared to decentralized decisions based on free will and the market.   That’s why those types of decisions need to be left up to the court system and the markets.  Of course those decisions won’t be perfect but they will be pretty good and a whole lot better than decisions made by politicians and bureaucrats.

Smoking bans are a great example.   Not too long ago an otherwise intelligent person suggested to me that smoking was somehow similar to dumping garbage on his lawn.  That’s not the first time I have heard such nonsense.  Comparing smoke that I exhale in your general vicinity and that dissipates in a second and that you can walk away from,  to dumping garbage on your lawn is complete nonsense.  It’s provably your lawn and the garbage will be there for a few days or a few weeks unless you or I remove it.  Please don’t waste my time if that’s the best you can do.   Smoking bans are nothing more than our rulers imposing their own morality on us just because they can.

Let’s talk about vehicle emissions.  I personally believe vehicle emissions reduce my quality of life considerably.  I wonder if the smoking ban supporters are willing to ante up to compensate me for that.  You can easily walk away from cigarette smoke in most cases.  Unless you want to buy me a spaceship I can’t really walk away from vehicle emissions.   If you decide not to drink (or work) in my smoking bar you haven’t lost much.  If I have to leave the city or the planet to escape your vehicle emissions it costs me a great deal.

So how could a libertarian solution help?

Re-writing history is always a little speculative but consider the myriad of ways that government has worked against the market to increase gasoline use:

-military control of the middle east to reduce gas costs

-highway programs

-GI Bill that promoted suburban housing

-protectionist tariffs on high fuel efficiency cars 

-Monday holidays to promote vacationing

-Tax incentives on heavy SUVs

 I’m sure there are many more.  See my point? 

If we pretty much agree that things are not going so well at the moment, whether it’s global warming or foreign policy, or health care, or terrorism, maybe we should try something different.  

Big government isn’t the solution.  It’s the problem.

Proposed New Democratic Strategy: Vote for Ron Paul

Sometimes I amaze myself.  I never really thought of myself as much of a political strategist - duh! I’m a Libertarian after all.  But today - things are different. First, I re-registered as a (gritting of teeth) Republican so I can vote for Ron Paul in the primary.   Years ago I used to be a Republican - something for which I will surely go to hell - and I swore I would never do it again.  But I didn’t expect Ron Paul either - so things are different.  In case you are wondering I will change back to Libertarian instantly after I have voted for Ron Paul in the primary. BTW - In violation of the law - the BOE requires you to write it in on the “Other” line in order to register Libertarian.

So today we were out in Union Square registering people to vote in the primary and the Impeach Bush crowd (a fun group who do important work) from the Village Independant Democrats set up next to us. That’s when it hit me.

Democrats should re-register Republican to vote for Ron Paul in the primary in order to hand Rudy Giuliani a crushing defeat in his own back yard. And of course it will be that much more fun if Ron Paul is the guy that beats him because as we know, Rudy isn’t a fan of Dr. Paul’s non-interventionist foreign policy.

Think about it.

Rudy has already ready informed us he is the only Republican that can beat New York’s most hawkish Senator. Certainly not Ron Paul, a peace candidate who wants to abolish the IRS. I mean, the American people really LIKE war and taxes right? Ok then - so if Rudy isn’t the Republican nominee then Hillary will surely coast to victory next November. It’s not like Hillary will need the votes to win the New York primary.

As you might expect I am no fan of our junior Senator. But if you happen to be a pro-war, socialist you have to admit my logic is impeccable.

Rudy can’t get nominated without New York. He has assured us no other Republican can beat Hillary and America’s mayor wouldn’t lie to us, right?

So that settles it then. Democrats need to run out and change to Republican by October 12th. Then of course you have to remember to vote for Ron Paul in the primary - just to - as Miracle Max (almost) said - give Rudy a nice paper cut and rub lemon juice in it.

Have fun stormin’ the castle…..