Folkertsma gets it right. Reagan fumed and railed at "big government" every chance he got. All his administration managed to do was slow its growth. Government enjoys steady growth under conservative leadership. It metastasizes under progressive leadership.
Perhaps a continued severe recession or even a turn to actual depression would be what's best for America long-term, i.e., it might help us save ourselves. More than anything, what seems to have energized the conservative base is having their 401K wiped out. Should we return to economic prosperity and halve the unemployment rate, shore up Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid, likely folks would become somnolent again, i.e., no Tea Party rallies for me. Might miss an episode of "Family Guy". I mean, at what point do we get "energized" about government size and overreach? When 80 cents of every dollar we make goes to fund government?
The relationship between the American populace and the political class can be likened to consumers who have two - and only two - choices of laundry detergent, Brand A and Brand B. Neither product will get stains out. So consumers helplessly switch back and forth between the two hoping one will work, and neither one ever does.
So Folkertsma is correct; elections have devolved to a zero sum affair. We go one way for awhile, then the other, but eventually we keep winding up back where we started.
Meanwhile, government keeps growing .. and growing. And when the wishes of the majority cannot be achieved through elections, the only recourse left is revolution.
Don't stop there. Make everything free. Make it illegal to prevent anyone from getting anything they want.
"Hi, I'd like a million dollar McMansion. With fries. And a diet Coke. How much is it? Who cares? I'm not paying for it."
This would usher in a golden age of irresponsibility. Evil corporations would fail, the lazy and inept would become prosperous, and we'd all live in 56,000 square foot homes. Nirvana for all.
Best of all, we'd have an all-knowing, all-seeing central government presiding benevolently over all, making sure all us corpulent, do-nothing morons never had to lift a finger again. It would give everyone a lot more time to spend doing what we really want - devoting more time to reality TV and Twitter, and frolicking with Peter Pan and the Easter Bunny in Elysian fields.
Compared to Rall's usual fare, this column shimmers with truth. There are the usual clangers - stop torturing terrorists and start torturing bankers, capitalism is dead, etc.
I was rooting for him all the way up to the end, like a halfback breaking for the goal line who trips over his own feet and goes down at the 3-yard line: "By mid-2009 America had become a left-wing country, not in the media but among the citizenry, telling polls that their preferred economic system was socialism."
Um, no. That's not what the citizenry was trying to tell the polls. By mid-2009, we had a Tea Party. The Tea Party - contrary to Rall's and the Leftmedia's belief - is not a bunch of whack jobs seething with rage, but mainly polite, middle-aged and elderly people whose mission statement seems to be "excuse us please, but we'd like our country back."
What the Tea Party would like - and the majority of us who work for a living, pay taxes, and produce things of value without dependence on public funds - is lower taxes, freedom to produce, invest, build wealth, and in the end be able to pass that wealth to our children, not have it confiscated by government that can't pay for itself.
It's too much to expect that Rall - or any other leftist - is going to ever be able to grasp that argument. They're too mired in statist groupthink "for the greater good".
We might, or possibly Hamilton himself might seek to answer these questions:
How did Oklahoma become so financially dysfunctional (along with a multitude of other states) that "Uncle Sugar" has to bail it out? That "Uncle Sugar" being not a benevolent federal government per se but the good taxpayers from all states in the Union?
Am I one of those (very few) idiots that actually wants to see an OHP cruiser every 100 yards? What "essential services" does the OHP deliver to us, other than cost us several hundred dollars we don't have in fines and insurance rate increases because we let the speedo creep 8mph over the limit at an inopportune time?
During the boom years of the 90's, how much of the largess went to address the actually essential services of roads and bridges? What rat hole did that money go down? As anyone who spends any time at all driving on the goat tracks that pass for thoroughfares in Oklahoma knows, it sure didn't go for roads and bridges.
Why does Hamilton blow up his own argument concerning the necessity of a state income tax? If the tax is eliminated, according to Hamilton, the real benefits go to tax-dodging millionaires. How so? Millionaires can afford to employ tax accountants to set up shelters to help them dodge taxes (just as he says). Meanwhile the family of four with an income of $50,000/yr - who can't afford a legal team to set up tax dodges for them - takes it in the chops with an extra $500 love tap from the OTC.
It appears to be the mindset of the Left in general, that revenues can only be generated directly through taxation.
There's another way to do that. Let business and the people it employs make money. Allow corporations and small businesses to keep their tax breaks - so they can hire more people and make more money. If I understand it correctly, neither corporations or businesses are required to pay a tax on losses, only on profits. So it seems keeping them healthy, viable, and in the black - and generating tax revenue for government - is the way to go. Unfortunately, this is the "voodoo economics" derided by the Left.
There's another term for it, Arnold. It's called prosperity.
I find it fascinating that Hamilton went a whole column without wanging on the "corporate welfare" saw. One cheer, Arnold.
Oklahoma does fairly well at attracting fast food restaurants and Walmarts to set up shop. That creates jobs, but the problem is these jobs don't pay very well. What Oklahoma does not do well at is attracting top-level business to the state, for example, technology and white-collar service industries that pay high salaries to certified and degreed professionals.
In the long run, that's killing us, because the problem is a two-edged sword. Oklahoma's college graduates leave the state for opportunities elsewhere because of the dearth of them here. Oklahoma ranks 45th in the nation in terms of education. That means those who do leave high school with a degree don't have competitive base-level skills. Therefore, top-tier industry won't set up shop here because of the lack of a work force with the prerequisite skills. It's a vicious cycle.
Breaking this cycle will take years, possibly an entire generation, but we need to get started now. Fortunately we have a new governor that understands just throwing money at the education problem isn't going to get it done. We need to raise standards. All options should be on the table: more charter schools, education vouchers, as well as the reforms underway in public schools. It would also serve us well to push to draw parents in, and get them to engage at the middle school and high school level. Too often, parental involvement in their child's education goes missing beyond elementary school.
That's step one; raise standards and do a better job of preparing students to land a high-paying job. Step two, keep the "corporate welfare" going. Whatever sweeteners or deal-making needs to be done to get high paying jobs to Oklahoma - do it.
Poverty's root cause in prosperous, developed nations is lack of education. Address that basic problem, and Oklahoma can get out of the hole it's in. Better education, higher wages. Higher wages, less poverty. That also has a multiplier effect of it's own; more disposable income means more charitable contributions - to further alleviate poverty's effects.
Ah yes, Rall wants to know why America is doing business and making money in places where it's considered good clean fun to stone women to death for the "dishonor" they've brought to their families for being forcibly raped.
Obama's World Apology Tour, a.k.a. the "I'm Sorry We Suck" tour and congruent foreign policy have indicated we've gotten out of the business of being a force in the world for good. The nations of Central Asia have been hard at work cannibalizing themselves for centuries (long before America arrived and kicked them into turbo). Can't we at least make some foreign investments there that generate some coin? It would help close that big budget shortfall Democrats created (and are now incessantly whining about).
Rall wants us to believe everywhere he goes, people follow him around and ask him questions, like he's an Oracle that has the answers to their problems. In reality, he's probably talking about a few wind-ups pretending to be his friends, and some cardboard cutouts of people he has posted around his cramped apartment.
I think I have an answer to Rall's last question: "If Goldman Sachs executives can make $50 million a year and then run America's economy in Washington, what's so different about what we do?' they ask."
Here it is: For all their other various shortcomings, Goldman Sachs execs don't shoot people in the back of the head and dump them in ditches, then smugly assert it was "suicide".
I'm touched and relieved that Rall will still allow "individual and private displays of religiosity" in his New World Order. Thanks, RallGrinch! Would it be OK if we said a Griswald-esque prayer or two to The Great Spirit in his Heavenly Area Up There?
Rall is correct when he says the U.S. is a secular nation. Duh. I think we all get that. As to whether or not Christmas is a federal holiday - who cares? We (private industry at least) don't determine the days we work (or don't work) according to whether or not it's a federal holiday. For example, Columbus Day is a federal holiday. So is Martin Luther King Day. But most of us don't have those days off, and we don't really much care.
Perhaps the government is clinging to a tradition it doesn't quite have enough moxie (or votes) to dismantle. It's worked hard at disassociating itself from religion in every other way. Then again, maybe it's because government employees like paid holidays every bit as much as the rest of us. Christmas, Thanksgiving, Human Sacrifice Day .. who cares, it's a day off! And one has to look no further than the riots in Greece to know public sector employees can get pretty darn feisty if you try and take something away from them.
So as a homage to our Puritan heritage, hearkening back to a day when Christmas and Thanksgiving still meant something outside of the commercial aspect, perhaps we should keep those holidays around. A majority of us still mouth appreciative noises about Christmas, whether or not we profess Christianity or have ever (or ever will) darkened the door of a church. Thanksgiving has no direct correlation with Christianity; Pilgrims gave thanks to God Almighty, the Indians to the god (or gods) of the Harvest. I doubt the Indians and the Pilgrims wasted a lot of time quibbling over theology.
Our government is supposedly about doing the will of the people, and if the majority of us still likes Christmas, I think it should remain a government holiday. If you're an atheist, or advocate of another faith, no problem. We certainly won't complain if you want to stay late at the office Thanksgiving Day, or work through Christmas. We won't create any special holidays for you, but we'll happily hold the door open if you want to leave for another country that will.
"The State Chamber and business leaders are worried sick about the state's image after the Sharia fiasco, among others, fearing it is making it more difficult to attract new business -- and jobs -- to the state."
Seriously? The "fiasco" was a state question that requested it be put into law that we won't be influenced by international or Sharia (Islamic) Law. So what is the State Chamber worried about, exactly? Tulsa won't be able to entice Al Qaeda to come set up a bomb-making factory? That Al Jazeera will nix plans for a new TV station in OKC? That the French will object vociferously to open carry and refuse to send us their best wines?
Hamilton's main concern is Oklahoma is just getting way too conservative for his tastes. He's worried about the image we're presenting to people of other cultures 10,000 miles away, of which about 99.999% don't give a rip what goes on in Oklahoma. Seems like his priorities are whacked.
If you like, Arnold, I'll try to wrangle you a visa and work permit to Yemen. Sharia law is alive and well there, and no one has guns except the terrorists.
THIS is power over death and hope for eternal life. It's what Jesus said to Martha right before he raised Lazarus from the dead:
Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And whosoever lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this? - John 11:25-26
The renewed and vociferous arguments from the gun-grabbers in the wake of the Arizona shootings for more restrictions on firearms and ammunition reminds me of an incident nearly a half-century ago, when I was in nursery school. For some reason, it stuck in my mind. Since I was 5 years old at the time, I think it’s apropos to recount the story in kindergarten language:
“Every day we had a play time. We played Legos and made forts. In the toy box was a plastic bear. Everyone wanted the bear in their fort, so we grabbed for it. One day we started shouting and fighting over the bear. The teacher got mad and took the bear away. We never saw it again. Everyone was sad.”
Those who wish to abrogate the 2nd Amendment and curtail other freedoms are taking the teacher-in-a-nursery-school approach: "A few of you can’t play nice and not cause trouble? Then no one should have those rights and freedoms."
Alexis de Tocqueville argued that "liberty cannot be established without morality, nor morality without faith." Benjamin Disraeli echoed nearly the same sentiments. Without religion there is no morality, without morality, society devolves to chaos no matter how many laws are erected and enforced. When we are moral however, laws are unneeded.
The problem isn’t guns. The problem is a dysfunctional society that has programmed itself to create a disproportionate number of the deranged, like Jared Loughner. There is no fix for that other than a return to a religious – and as a result, moral – society.
After pounding away in column after column about the critical need to fund education at the regional average, Arnold Hamilton has finally won me over to his argument. I see now our only choice to improve public education in Oklahoma is to spend vastly more on it than we do now.
Vast spending on public education will allow us to do two things. First, we can take away all those confusing choices for parents who want to get their kids out of a failing public school, because papering over a school’s problems with lots of money can’t help but fix things. No more need for charter schools, private schools, or home schooling. Second, we can raise all teacher salaries to well over six figures, and at least double that for administrators. That will insure awesome teaching and administrating.
However, I’m wondering if the more we spend kids will keep getting dumber and dumber anyway. My mom got a great education from a one-room rural school. I think they spent about $10 per year per pupil back then, which adjusted for inflation, works out to around $200 per pupil in this present age. Two hundred dollars is about $6,300 less per year than Oklahoma is spending per pupil right now. Does more mean less?
Parents can still throw wild celebrations over their children's academic achievements. Except instead of rejoicing over acceptance to MIT, Stanford, or one of the service academies, it can be when your 19-year-old finally learns to spell “cat”.
Of course we still need to set the bar for education. We just need to re-target where we set the bar. Like on the floor, so to speak.
J.R. would do good to take off the tinfoil hat once in awhile. That might allow coherent, logical thoughts to penetrate.
“State’s rights above the Constitution”? Supposedly, by design the Constitution narrowly defined federal powers and reserved all else to the states or to the people. It’s known as the Tenth Amendment. To the Constitution.
“Preaching God in public places is not God’s way”. Huh? Jesus preached sermons. Let’s assume he was talking about God in some of them. Sometimes there were people present, such as those at the Sermon on the Mount, and the feeding of the 5,000 and the 7,000. Then there was that whole Great Commission thing.
Lastly, if Republicanism is the problem and Democrat-ism is the solution … we are so screwed.
Wow, awesome. A column where Rall actually makes sense.
But I'm wondering how does he square this with last week's column ("A Fate Worse Than Japan's"), a plea to intervene in Tajikistan to defuse a killer lake, which if the dam breaks, will apparently flood half that country.
According to Rall's logic, it makes no sense to fire missiles in Libya (and at a whopping multi-million dollar cost per missile) or intervene there militarily, but it will be - in his words - "our fault" if we don't pony up a couple of billion to Tajikistan so they can defuse Lake Armageddon.
In other words, we have no strategic interest in either of these countries and we did not cause the coup in Libya nor the earthquake in Tajikistan. I agree that we should not have intervened in Libya. But neither should we globe-trot off to central Asia to hot-cash-fix another broke-back, hole-in-the-wall country for no other reason than it would be a nice thing to do. Don't we already have enough debt?
In the wake of soon-to-be $4/gallon gas, I thought I would share this gem.
Last summer, riding my motorcycle on the way home from work in sweltering heat, I pulled up next to a late-model SUV with a "Spill Baby, Spill" bumper sticker. I shouted as loud as I could "That thing got a Hemi?" but the well-coiffed lady in the driver's seat could not hear me. The human voice can't compete with an AC unit cranked to turbo, and Dolby Surround Sound. Nothing says "conserve" like a 6,000 pound vehicle that gets 20 miles to the gallon.
Note to all the Mother Earthers out there screeching about saving the planet: Until you start to practice what you preach, the rest of us will laugh at you before we listen to you.
Has anyone noticed Arnold Hamilton’s uncanny ability to reduce conservatives to members of one of three (very marginalized) groups: evil corporatists who greedily sacrifice widows and orphans for profits, angry rednecks spoilin’ for a fight, or religious zealots obsessed with someone else's moral turpitude? One (or all) of these groups sparks the ire in every column he writes.
Apparently state Republican Chairman Matt Pinnell’s tempest-in-a-teapot complaints about the Oklahoma Democratic Party really got Hamilton’s goat. But how many people (with a life) care what the New York Times thinks of Oklahoma? Oklahoma could convert every toll road into a bike trail, replace every fast food restaurant with a Whole Foods, turn every church into a Wiccan temple, authorize man-beast weddings, and legalize drive-through abortions, but people who read the NYT would still characterize Oklahomans as flyover state rubes.
After decades of bungling the state’s business, folks lost patience and Democrats were finally voted out of office. This has Hamilton in a perpetual snit. The truth is, choosing between Democrats and Republicans is like having a choice between two – and only two – brands of laundry detergent, neither of which will actually get your clothes clean. So we helplessly switch back and forth between the two, hoping that someday one of them will finally be able to purge the fudge from our underwear. Neither one ever can.
If Governor Fallin and company, along with a Republican-controlled state house can’t make meaningful, positive changes for this state, it’s not exactly like the good people of Oklahoma aren’t keeping score. If they fail they will be (and should be) voted out. Then maybe Brand B will get yet another chance to prove what it can’t do. That should make Arnold happy.
The central tenet in Ted Rall’s latest column seems to be “consumers don’t live within their means, so why should government be forced to?” In making his argument, Rall exposes the vastness of his economic illiteracy. But then, to be a Marxist that’s a prerequisite.
Rall insinuates that our economy would collapse if people were to live within their means. That’s absurd, because most American consumers are pre-wired to spend up to the point they can get in real trouble anyway. In other words, people have a tendency to spend however much disposable income it is they have to dispose of. For example, I paid off all my outstanding debts – home, tractor, motorcycle – about five years ago, which freed up more than $1,000 a month pretty much at one fell swoop. What I noticed – unfortunately – is that the amount I saved per month did not increase by $1,000. Rather, I went on a liberated spending binge that lasted two years, upgrading this and that. The point is, just because you aren’t in hock to the eyeballs doesn’t mean you’re going to help tank the economy by stuffing all your excess cash into a mattress or coffee can. You’ll still spend plenty of money.
The idea that it’s still possible for responsible people to pursue an appropriate mix of saving and spending never enters Rall’s mind either, because he’s off in his usual conspiracy-filled world where the capitalo-fascists eagerly exploit the helpless masses. Rall’s answer to debt reduction? More socialist fantasy: income redistribution, otherwise known as “let’s just tax the rich some more”, and the even more aggressive (and economically ludicrous) “let’s pay everyone the same wage”.
The only thing Rall gets right here is to assert that America has a debt problem. However, it’s not because of an exploitative capitalist system maneuvering us into untenable positions, but because consumers (the individual) and the collective (government) have lost all semblance of fiscal discipline.
One possible suggestion in helping people curb their mounting debts is for government to actually practice the economic austerity that Obama seems to be preaching at the moment, thereby encouraging responsible stewardship of personal debt. After all, “government” is not some abstract entity, but a collection of individuals, whom we (supposedly) still look to for leadership. And it would help if that leadership would lead somewhere besides off the edge of the financial cliff.
In a perfect world, the killing of bin Laden by a U.S. Navy SEAL team would not have happened. But this would have:
The SEALS don't breach a comfortable compound, shielded by Pakistani military. They don't deliver a double-tap to the forehead of a coward using a woman as a human shield. Instead, the SEALS arrive at bin Laden's cave where he's been living in squalor for 10 years, advancing the righteous cause of radical Islam. The SEALS approach, the Lion of Islam charges forth, a snarl on his lips, and with blazing AK-47s in each hand, he succumbs to a martyr's death, but not before taking half the SEAL team with him.
Or maybe this one is better:
The SEALS get permission to talk to bin Laden. They knock on his door politely and ask him to step outside. They invite him to a pub for some beers. Bin Laden doesn't drink - because of his bad kidneys. And because he's a radical Islamic warrior who would not defile himself with alcohol, that too. But he goes along as the designated driver. In a gesture of additional good faith, the SEALS let bin Laden keep their Humvee. Bin Laden drives it back to his compound shouting, "Allah Akbar! And God bless the Navy SEALS!
Bin Laden, now consumed with good will for the Great Satan, issues a fatwah ordering all holy warriors to no longer show respect for their vanquished combatants by decapitating them and dragging their bodies through streets behind trucks. "From now on", says bin Laden, "we'll stick a cigar in their mouth and set them on fire."
And in that fashion - in the perfect world, anyway - radical Islam and the Great Satan are reconciled.
It's interesting what passes for "core" services these days. In modern parlance, a "core" service is anything the government wants to spend money for. When it comes time for money to be spent on actual core services - roads and bridges are the only ones Hamilton lists - the kitty is dry.
Hamilton predictably gnashes his teeth about corporate welfare (a core service of every column he writes). He's unhappy children can't get wheelchairs because we're passing out too many tax breaks to corporations that can't respond with a single job created as a result.
Two points. One, there is absolutely no guarantee the revenue a corporation can rescue from taxes will translate into new jobs, at least not immediately or directly. That money might be reinvested in infrastructure, saved as cash for future use, or used to pay for a myriad of other things, including incremental salary increases for existing employees (not just executives) above and beyond a cost-of-living raise.
Two, a core service should meet a litmus test of whether or not it provides a benefit to all taxpayers, or at least a majority of them. Spending for roads and bridges meets this criteria. And while it tugs at the heart-strings to publicly fund wheelchairs for disabled children, funds to provide them don't pass that test.
Hamilton wants to end tax breaks for a special interest group he despises - corporations - and redistribute that revenue to special interest groups he favors, such as the mentally and developmentally disabled. There is no fiscal logic being applied here.
We should have a sensible, triage-type system to determine priority services. Funding needs for those services should be met first. Whatever remains can be spent on what's left. Otherwise, we can keep driving on dilapidated roads and crumbling bridges, as government continues to fail to meet even its primary obligation to taxpayers.
What a pathetic string of excuses Rall offers as to why Weiner shouldn't have to resign (maybe his wife is evil, he lied ... but not for long). And goodness sake, he "fessed up" .. when it was apparent the lies wouldn't hold up and he would only look more pathetic. And is Weiner's logic even that of a sane person (my wife is evil, good excuse to send crotch shots to my address book)?
Crooked politicians should be held to a higher standard than most because of the powerful positions they hold. If they do reprehensible things, it makes them far more susceptible to blackmail by criminals or terrorists who could do great harm to "we the people".
Rall offers a bizarre apples-oranges comparison, comparing Weiner's misdeeds to Bush-Cheney's alleged lies. At least Bush-Cheney sought a formal declaration of war from Congress. Prior to the military actions in Libya, Obama failed to do even that. So, which "warmongering mass murderer" is Rall referring to? Bush, or Obama?
Rall gets it a little right when he implies Weiner shouldn't be impeached just because he's an unfaithful, incompetent, self-absorbed little pervert (we expect that from politicians). As a holder of public office, when he lied Weiner lied to "we the people". He is an excessive security risk. It is for these reasons - and no other - that he should be removed from office.
I passed a billboard this afternoon that said, “Oil Spill Distress Relief Hotline”. It is supposed to be help for people who are damaged emotionally thinking about oil spills. Well, don’t call it. It doesn’t work.
I called them. I said I was in distress over spilled oil. How can it be replaced if we don’t drill, and even if we do drill, we don’t have enough refinery capacity anyway? I said I thought the only sensible thing to do would be to invade Saudi Arabia, but that I wasn’t sure that was ethical. Then I started crying.
Please allow 4-6 weeks for processing. No refunds are issued. Back issues are available for $10/copy.
We accept Visa, M/C, checks and money orders. Call to charge by phone 918-592-5550. Enter your contact information in the form below and we will contact you.
If ordering by mail, make checks and money orders payable to Urban Tulsa Weekly. Send your payment along with your complete postal delivery address to Urban Tulsa Weekly, Attn: Samantha, PO Box 50499, Tulsa, OK 74150
Address:
Address2:
City:
State:
Zip Code:
Email:
Phone:
Comments:
Urban Tulsa Weekly
1924 E. 6th St.
Tulsa OK 74104
Phone: (918) 592-5550
Fax: (918) 592-5970
e-mail: Subscriptions
COMMENTS
Posted by: toddkreigh
60 comments total
Sort Comments: Most Recent | Oldest First
Re: How the Progressives Will Win
Perhaps a continued severe recession or even a turn to actual depression would be what's best for America long-term, i.e., it might help us save ourselves. More than anything, what seems to have energized the conservative base is having their 401K wiped out. Should we return to economic prosperity and halve the unemployment rate, shore up Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid, likely folks would become somnolent again, i.e., no Tea Party rallies for me. Might miss an episode of "Family Guy". I mean, at what point do we get "energized" about government size and overreach? When 80 cents of every dollar we make goes to fund government?
The relationship between the American populace and the political class can be likened to consumers who have two - and only two - choices of laundry detergent, Brand A and Brand B. Neither product will get stains out. So consumers helplessly switch back and forth between the two hoping one will work, and neither one ever does.
So Folkertsma is correct; elections have devolved to a zero sum affair. We go one way for awhile, then the other, but eventually we keep winding up back where we started.
Meanwhile, government keeps growing .. and growing. And when the wishes of the majority cannot be achieved through elections, the only recourse left is revolution.
Re: Too Pig to Jail?
"Hi, I'd like a million dollar McMansion. With fries. And a diet Coke. How much is it? Who cares? I'm not paying for it."
This would usher in a golden age of irresponsibility. Evil corporations would fail, the lazy and inept would become prosperous, and we'd all live in 56,000 square foot homes. Nirvana for all.
Best of all, we'd have an all-knowing, all-seeing central government presiding benevolently over all, making sure all us corpulent, do-nothing morons never had to lift a finger again. It would give everyone a lot more time to spend doing what we really want - devoting more time to reality TV and Twitter, and frolicking with Peter Pan and the Easter Bunny in Elysian fields.
That would be so cool.
Re: The Obama Postmortem
I was rooting for him all the way up to the end, like a halfback breaking for the goal line who trips over his own feet and goes down at the 3-yard line: "By mid-2009 America had become a left-wing country, not in the media but among the citizenry, telling polls that their preferred economic system was socialism."
Um, no. That's not what the citizenry was trying to tell the polls. By mid-2009, we had a Tea Party. The Tea Party - contrary to Rall's and the Leftmedia's belief - is not a bunch of whack jobs seething with rage, but mainly polite, middle-aged and elderly people whose mission statement seems to be "excuse us please, but we'd like our country back."
What the Tea Party would like - and the majority of us who work for a living, pay taxes, and produce things of value without dependence on public funds - is lower taxes, freedom to produce, invest, build wealth, and in the end be able to pass that wealth to our children, not have it confiscated by government that can't pay for itself.
It's too much to expect that Rall - or any other leftist - is going to ever be able to grasp that argument. They're too mired in statist groupthink "for the greater good".
Re: Be Careful for You Ask For
How did Oklahoma become so financially dysfunctional (along with a multitude of other states) that "Uncle Sugar" has to bail it out? That "Uncle Sugar" being not a benevolent federal government per se but the good taxpayers from all states in the Union?
Am I one of those (very few) idiots that actually wants to see an OHP cruiser every 100 yards? What "essential services" does the OHP deliver to us, other than cost us several hundred dollars we don't have in fines and insurance rate increases because we let the speedo creep 8mph over the limit at an inopportune time?
During the boom years of the 90's, how much of the largess went to address the actually essential services of roads and bridges? What rat hole did that money go down? As anyone who spends any time at all driving on the goat tracks that pass for thoroughfares in Oklahoma knows, it sure didn't go for roads and bridges.
Why does Hamilton blow up his own argument concerning the necessity of a state income tax? If the tax is eliminated, according to Hamilton, the real benefits go to tax-dodging millionaires. How so? Millionaires can afford to employ tax accountants to set up shelters to help them dodge taxes (just as he says). Meanwhile the family of four with an income of $50,000/yr - who can't afford a legal team to set up tax dodges for them - takes it in the chops with an extra $500 love tap from the OTC.
It appears to be the mindset of the Left in general, that revenues can only be generated directly through taxation.
There's another way to do that. Let business and the people it employs make money. Allow corporations and small businesses to keep their tax breaks - so they can hire more people and make more money. If I understand it correctly, neither corporations or businesses are required to pay a tax on losses, only on profits. So it seems keeping them healthy, viable, and in the black - and generating tax revenue for government - is the way to go. Unfortunately, this is the "voodoo economics" derided by the Left.
There's another term for it, Arnold. It's called prosperity.
Re: Starving in Oklahoma
Oklahoma does fairly well at attracting fast food restaurants and Walmarts to set up shop. That creates jobs, but the problem is these jobs don't pay very well. What Oklahoma does not do well at is attracting top-level business to the state, for example, technology and white-collar service industries that pay high salaries to certified and degreed professionals.
In the long run, that's killing us, because the problem is a two-edged sword. Oklahoma's college graduates leave the state for opportunities elsewhere because of the dearth of them here. Oklahoma ranks 45th in the nation in terms of education. That means those who do leave high school with a degree don't have competitive base-level skills. Therefore, top-tier industry won't set up shop here because of the lack of a work force with the prerequisite skills. It's a vicious cycle.
Breaking this cycle will take years, possibly an entire generation, but we need to get started now. Fortunately we have a new governor that understands just throwing money at the education problem isn't going to get it done. We need to raise standards. All options should be on the table: more charter schools, education vouchers, as well as the reforms underway in public schools. It would also serve us well to push to draw parents in, and get them to engage at the middle school and high school level. Too often, parental involvement in their child's education goes missing beyond elementary school.
That's step one; raise standards and do a better job of preparing students to land a high-paying job. Step two, keep the "corporate welfare" going. Whatever sweeteners or deal-making needs to be done to get high paying jobs to Oklahoma - do it.
Poverty's root cause in prosperous, developed nations is lack of education. Address that basic problem, and Oklahoma can get out of the hole it's in. Better education, higher wages. Higher wages, less poverty. That also has a multiplier effect of it's own; more disposable income means more charitable contributions - to further alleviate poverty's effects.
Re: WIKILEAKS: THE DEVILS WE KNOW
Obama's World Apology Tour, a.k.a. the "I'm Sorry We Suck" tour and congruent foreign policy have indicated we've gotten out of the business of being a force in the world for good. The nations of Central Asia have been hard at work cannibalizing themselves for centuries (long before America arrived and kicked them into turbo). Can't we at least make some foreign investments there that generate some coin? It would help close that big budget shortfall Democrats created (and are now incessantly whining about).
Rall wants us to believe everywhere he goes, people follow him around and ask him questions, like he's an Oracle that has the answers to their problems. In reality, he's probably talking about a few wind-ups pretending to be his friends, and some cardboard cutouts of people he has posted around his cramped apartment.
I think I have an answer to Rall's last question: "If Goldman Sachs executives can make $50 million a year and then run America's economy in Washington, what's so different about what we do?' they ask."
Here it is: For all their other various shortcomings, Goldman Sachs execs don't shoot people in the back of the head and dump them in ditches, then smugly assert it was "suicide".
There's that.
Re: THE WAR OF CHRISTMAS
Rall is correct when he says the U.S. is a secular nation. Duh. I think we all get that. As to whether or not Christmas is a federal holiday - who cares? We (private industry at least) don't determine the days we work (or don't work) according to whether or not it's a federal holiday. For example, Columbus Day is a federal holiday. So is Martin Luther King Day. But most of us don't have those days off, and we don't really much care.
Perhaps the government is clinging to a tradition it doesn't quite have enough moxie (or votes) to dismantle. It's worked hard at disassociating itself from religion in every other way. Then again, maybe it's because government employees like paid holidays every bit as much as the rest of us. Christmas, Thanksgiving, Human Sacrifice Day .. who cares, it's a day off! And one has to look no further than the riots in Greece to know public sector employees can get pretty darn feisty if you try and take something away from them.
So as a homage to our Puritan heritage, hearkening back to a day when Christmas and Thanksgiving still meant something outside of the commercial aspect, perhaps we should keep those holidays around. A majority of us still mouth appreciative noises about Christmas, whether or not we profess Christianity or have ever (or ever will) darkened the door of a church. Thanksgiving has no direct correlation with Christianity; Pilgrims gave thanks to God Almighty, the Indians to the god (or gods) of the Harvest. I doubt the Indians and the Pilgrims wasted a lot of time quibbling over theology.
Our government is supposedly about doing the will of the people, and if the majority of us still likes Christmas, I think it should remain a government holiday. If you're an atheist, or advocate of another faith, no problem. We certainly won't complain if you want to stay late at the office Thanksgiving Day, or work through Christmas. We won't create any special holidays for you, but we'll happily hold the door open if you want to leave for another country that will.
Re: Pregame Strategy
Seriously? The "fiasco" was a state question that requested it be put into law that we won't be influenced by international or Sharia (Islamic) Law. So what is the State Chamber worried about, exactly? Tulsa won't be able to entice Al Qaeda to come set up a bomb-making factory? That Al Jazeera will nix plans for a new TV station in OKC? That the French will object vociferously to open carry and refuse to send us their best wines?
Hamilton's main concern is Oklahoma is just getting way too conservative for his tastes. He's worried about the image we're presenting to people of other cultures 10,000 miles away, of which about 99.999% don't give a rip what goes on in Oklahoma. Seems like his priorities are whacked.
If you like, Arnold, I'll try to wrangle you a visa and work permit to Yemen. Sharia law is alive and well there, and no one has guns except the terrorists.
Re: Love Letters/Hate Mail
A "theory of hope"? This is new-age drivel.
THIS is power over death and hope for eternal life. It's what Jesus said to Martha right before he raised Lazarus from the dead:
Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And whosoever lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this? - John 11:25-26
Re:
The renewed and vociferous arguments from the gun-grabbers in the wake of the Arizona shootings for more restrictions on firearms and ammunition reminds me of an incident nearly a half-century ago, when I was in nursery school. For some reason, it stuck in my mind. Since I was 5 years old at the time, I think it’s apropos to recount the story in kindergarten language:
“Every day we had a play time. We played Legos and made forts. In the toy box was a plastic bear. Everyone wanted the bear in their fort, so we grabbed for it. One day we started shouting and fighting over the bear. The teacher got mad and took the bear away. We never saw it again. Everyone was sad.”
Those who wish to abrogate the 2nd Amendment and curtail other freedoms are taking the teacher-in-a-nursery-school approach: "A few of you can’t play nice and not cause trouble? Then no one should have those rights and freedoms."
Alexis de Tocqueville argued that "liberty cannot be established without morality, nor morality without faith." Benjamin Disraeli echoed nearly the same sentiments. Without religion there is no morality, without morality, society devolves to chaos no matter how many laws are erected and enforced. When we are moral however, laws are unneeded.
The problem isn’t guns. The problem is a dysfunctional society that has programmed itself to create a disproportionate number of the deranged, like Jared Loughner. There is no fix for that other than a return to a religious – and as a result, moral – society.
Re: Red River Revelry
Vast spending on public education will allow us to do two things. First, we can take away all those confusing choices for parents who want to get their kids out of a failing public school, because papering over a school’s problems with lots of money can’t help but fix things. No more need for charter schools, private schools, or home schooling. Second, we can raise all teacher salaries to well over six figures, and at least double that for administrators. That will insure awesome teaching and administrating.
However, I’m wondering if the more we spend kids will keep getting dumber and dumber anyway. My mom got a great education from a one-room rural school. I think they spent about $10 per year per pupil back then, which adjusted for inflation, works out to around $200 per pupil in this present age. Two hundred dollars is about $6,300 less per year than Oklahoma is spending per pupil right now. Does more mean less?
Parents can still throw wild celebrations over their children's academic achievements. Except instead of rejoicing over acceptance to MIT, Stanford, or one of the service academies, it can be when your 19-year-old finally learns to spell “cat”.
Of course we still need to set the bar for education. We just need to re-target where we set the bar. Like on the floor, so to speak.
Less is more!
Re: Love Letters/Hate Mail
“State’s rights above the Constitution”? Supposedly, by design the Constitution narrowly defined federal powers and reserved all else to the states or to the people. It’s known as the Tenth Amendment. To the Constitution.
“Preaching God in public places is not God’s way”. Huh? Jesus preached sermons. Let’s assume he was talking about God in some of them. Sometimes there were people present, such as those at the Sermon on the Mount, and the feeding of the 5,000 and the 7,000. Then there was that whole Great Commission thing.
Lastly, if Republicanism is the problem and Democrat-ism is the solution … we are so screwed.
Re: No Faith for Libya
But I'm wondering how does he square this with last week's column ("A Fate Worse Than Japan's"), a plea to intervene in Tajikistan to defuse a killer lake, which if the dam breaks, will apparently flood half that country.
According to Rall's logic, it makes no sense to fire missiles in Libya (and at a whopping multi-million dollar cost per missile) or intervene there militarily, but it will be - in his words - "our fault" if we don't pony up a couple of billion to Tajikistan so they can defuse Lake Armageddon.
In other words, we have no strategic interest in either of these countries and we did not cause the coup in Libya nor the earthquake in Tajikistan. I agree that we should not have intervened in Libya. But neither should we globe-trot off to central Asia to hot-cash-fix another broke-back, hole-in-the-wall country for no other reason than it would be a nice thing to do. Don't we already have enough debt?
Re: Love Letters/Hate Mail
Last summer, riding my motorcycle on the way home from work in sweltering heat, I pulled up next to a late-model SUV with a "Spill Baby, Spill" bumper sticker. I shouted as loud as I could "That thing got a Hemi?" but the well-coiffed lady in the driver's seat could not hear me. The human voice can't compete with an AC unit cranked to turbo, and Dolby Surround Sound. Nothing says "conserve" like a 6,000 pound vehicle that gets 20 miles to the gallon.
Note to all the Mother Earthers out there screeching about saving the planet: Until you start to practice what you preach, the rest of us will laugh at you before we listen to you.
Re: Elephant Unleashed
Apparently state Republican Chairman Matt Pinnell’s tempest-in-a-teapot complaints about the Oklahoma Democratic Party really got Hamilton’s goat. But how many people (with a life) care what the New York Times thinks of Oklahoma? Oklahoma could convert every toll road into a bike trail, replace every fast food restaurant with a Whole Foods, turn every church into a Wiccan temple, authorize man-beast weddings, and legalize drive-through abortions, but people who read the NYT would still characterize Oklahomans as flyover state rubes.
After decades of bungling the state’s business, folks lost patience and Democrats were finally voted out of office. This has Hamilton in a perpetual snit. The truth is, choosing between Democrats and Republicans is like having a choice between two – and only two – brands of laundry detergent, neither of which will actually get your clothes clean. So we helplessly switch back and forth between the two, hoping that someday one of them will finally be able to purge the fudge from our underwear. Neither one ever can.
If Governor Fallin and company, along with a Republican-controlled state house can’t make meaningful, positive changes for this state, it’s not exactly like the good people of Oklahoma aren’t keeping score. If they fail they will be (and should be) voted out. Then maybe Brand B will get yet another chance to prove what it can’t do. That should make Arnold happy.
Rinse, repeat.
Re: Thrifty Families and Other Lies
Rall insinuates that our economy would collapse if people were to live within their means. That’s absurd, because most American consumers are pre-wired to spend up to the point they can get in real trouble anyway. In other words, people have a tendency to spend however much disposable income it is they have to dispose of. For example, I paid off all my outstanding debts – home, tractor, motorcycle – about five years ago, which freed up more than $1,000 a month pretty much at one fell swoop. What I noticed – unfortunately – is that the amount I saved per month did not increase by $1,000. Rather, I went on a liberated spending binge that lasted two years, upgrading this and that. The point is, just because you aren’t in hock to the eyeballs doesn’t mean you’re going to help tank the economy by stuffing all your excess cash into a mattress or coffee can. You’ll still spend plenty of money.
The idea that it’s still possible for responsible people to pursue an appropriate mix of saving and spending never enters Rall’s mind either, because he’s off in his usual conspiracy-filled world where the capitalo-fascists eagerly exploit the helpless masses. Rall’s answer to debt reduction? More socialist fantasy: income redistribution, otherwise known as “let’s just tax the rich some more”, and the even more aggressive (and economically ludicrous) “let’s pay everyone the same wage”.
The only thing Rall gets right here is to assert that America has a debt problem. However, it’s not because of an exploitative capitalist system maneuvering us into untenable positions, but because consumers (the individual) and the collective (government) have lost all semblance of fiscal discipline.
One possible suggestion in helping people curb their mounting debts is for government to actually practice the economic austerity that Obama seems to be preaching at the moment, thereby encouraging responsible stewardship of personal debt. After all, “government” is not some abstract entity, but a collection of individuals, whom we (supposedly) still look to for leadership. And it would help if that leadership would lead somewhere besides off the edge of the financial cliff.
Re: Osama Bin Laden's Ultimate Victory
The SEALS don't breach a comfortable compound, shielded by Pakistani military. They don't deliver a double-tap to the forehead of a coward using a woman as a human shield. Instead, the SEALS arrive at bin Laden's cave where he's been living in squalor for 10 years, advancing the righteous cause of radical Islam. The SEALS approach, the Lion of Islam charges forth, a snarl on his lips, and with blazing AK-47s in each hand, he succumbs to a martyr's death, but not before taking half the SEAL team with him.
Or maybe this one is better:
The SEALS get permission to talk to bin Laden. They knock on his door politely and ask him to step outside. They invite him to a pub for some beers. Bin Laden doesn't drink - because of his bad kidneys. And because he's a radical Islamic warrior who would not defile himself with alcohol, that too. But he goes along as the designated driver. In a gesture of additional good faith, the SEALS let bin Laden keep their Humvee. Bin Laden drives it back to his compound shouting, "Allah Akbar! And God bless the Navy SEALS!
Bin Laden, now consumed with good will for the Great Satan, issues a fatwah ordering all holy warriors to no longer show respect for their vanquished combatants by decapitating them and dragging their bodies through streets behind trucks. "From now on", says bin Laden, "we'll stick a cigar in their mouth and set them on fire."
And in that fashion - in the perfect world, anyway - radical Islam and the Great Satan are reconciled.
Re: Breaking the Bank
Hamilton predictably gnashes his teeth about corporate welfare (a core service of every column he writes). He's unhappy children can't get wheelchairs because we're passing out too many tax breaks to corporations that can't respond with a single job created as a result.
Two points. One, there is absolutely no guarantee the revenue a corporation can rescue from taxes will translate into new jobs, at least not immediately or directly. That money might be reinvested in infrastructure, saved as cash for future use, or used to pay for a myriad of other things, including incremental salary increases for existing employees (not just executives) above and beyond a cost-of-living raise.
Two, a core service should meet a litmus test of whether or not it provides a benefit to all taxpayers, or at least a majority of them. Spending for roads and bridges meets this criteria. And while it tugs at the heart-strings to publicly fund wheelchairs for disabled children, funds to provide them don't pass that test.
Hamilton wants to end tax breaks for a special interest group he despises - corporations - and redistribute that revenue to special interest groups he favors, such as the mentally and developmentally disabled. There is no fiscal logic being applied here.
We should have a sensible, triage-type system to determine priority services. Funding needs for those services should be met first. Whatever remains can be spent on what's left. Otherwise, we can keep driving on dilapidated roads and crumbling bridges, as government continues to fail to meet even its primary obligation to taxpayers.
Re: Should Anthony Weiner Resign?
Crooked politicians should be held to a higher standard than most because of the powerful positions they hold. If they do reprehensible things, it makes them far more susceptible to blackmail by criminals or terrorists who could do great harm to "we the people".
Rall offers a bizarre apples-oranges comparison, comparing Weiner's misdeeds to Bush-Cheney's alleged lies. At least Bush-Cheney sought a formal declaration of war from Congress. Prior to the military actions in Libya, Obama failed to do even that. So, which "warmongering mass murderer" is Rall referring to? Bush, or Obama?
Rall gets it a little right when he implies Weiner shouldn't be impeached just because he's an unfaithful, incompetent, self-absorbed little pervert (we expect that from politicians). As a holder of public office, when he lied Weiner lied to "we the people". He is an excessive security risk. It is for these reasons - and no other - that he should be removed from office.
Re: Love Letters/Hate Mail
I called them. I said I was in distress over spilled oil. How can it be replaced if we don’t drill, and even if we do drill, we don’t have enough refinery capacity anyway? I said I thought the only sensible thing to do would be to invade Saudi Arabia, but that I wasn’t sure that was ethical. Then I started crying.
They hung up on me.