Totalitarian Utopia, Version 2.0: Purificationism

Here's a great treatise on the mindset behind the left's unquestioning acceptance of the "change we can believe in" folks. This explains the comfort the left has with radical Islam, and you'll not like the reasons why. At least you'll understand how socialists, radical environmentalists and Islamofascists make such good bedfellows these days...

Know your enemies.

This is one of the most important articles I've seen this year - please read it all.

A big hat tip to Mike at Sipsey Street, linked here.

Massachusetts Special Election

Count along with me: 1, 2, 3, 3, 3, 3... Yep, turns out there several "third rails" in politics, the fatally underfunded and endlessly pilfered Social Security program is just one of many. Gun control is another, and how 'bout that socialized medicine thingy???

Since the Boy King ascended to the throne, I've watched in amazement as the Congressional Red Army enthusiastically reprised Hillary's "behind closed doors/top secret/sweetheart deals" health care debacle without even a token rewrite of her original script. As with most remakes, this new cast was in many ways even less appealing than the original.

Letterman? Leno? O'Brien? Musical sitcoms? Don't need any of 'em - this midterm election cycle will surpass any contrived entertainment. There'll likely be a lot more Republicans in office by this time next year, but more importantly this may mark the last time the American public ricochets from one wing of the left-right contrivance to the other.

Here's why: The .gov's appetite for money and power during this downturn has genuinely alarmed the gentle left as well as the center and much of the right. The left-right paradigm is wearing thin and an increasing number of everyday folks are starting to see through it. (Heat will do that to fog...)

I talk politics with a lot of people, and most everyone across the spectrum now agrees that the most humane thing government can do for most people is leave them the hell alone. A new atmosphere of critical thinking is forming. Should the Republicans again fail to bring a sincere liberty-oriented limited government mindset to the table the left/right shell game may be over. They could easily fail at this, as Peak Sincerity actually occurred a while back in American politics. (It'll be such a fascinating year!)

Brown ran as a centrist... (although I always thought that in Massachusetts John Kerry was a centrist!) Brown has a likable persona, but in actuality he's a RINO, and we shouldn't get our hopes up just yet.

On the bright side, this is another (and largest to date) rejection of Obama, and it's a also a repudiation of socialized medicine and of heavy-handed leftist governance in general. What the media lackeys (who still yearn for socialist utopia) won't tell you is that this rejection took place in a state that just tried socialized medicine, and that said experiment failed spectacularly. Moreover, it was Republican Mitt Romney who both proposed and signed the legislation, which illustrates why the Republicans had better pay just as much attention to the mood of the public as the Dems! Sure, the Repubs are getting a real present from the voters (with Obama starring as Santa Claus) but there are strings attached this time.

Bottom line: When a McCain machine campaigns for socialized medicine and a Romney machine authors and then signs such a scheme into law, the Republicans have as much if not more to learn from this election as the Dems. I say more, because unlike the Dems they pretend to know better.

For all my criticism and caution, I can state with confidence that there's at least a rather widespread recognition that we're on the wrong path. For Ted Kennedy's seat to go to ANY Republican speaks volumes! Overall a fine day, and hey, Mary Jo - this one's for you!

He's SO "third world"!

Poor guy, that Barry!

As the boy king's media induced luster fades and his diminutive stature emerges from the shadow of the facade, he looks more and more like the petty tribal kleptocrat he really is.

If there were even a smattering of "representative" left in the elected, his agenda would be dead. Despite the number of people waking up, it seems we're still deep in the woods and the fire danger is higher than ever...

Rememeber This Day...

...as today is the day that the Fed began monetizing the debt. Up until now, when someone bought a treasury note, they did so with existing fake dollars. In other words, no new money is created. As of now, that's out the window: the Fed will be buying treasuries and they will be creating new dollars to fund the purchases. Every dollar spent on this will be a newly created dollar. This is a broad expansion of the money supply, which generally means inflation. Serious inflation.

That could happen here, in the near future. Think Weimar Germany, or Mugabe's Zimbabwe. Keep in mind, though, that at this point this is just another desperate attempt to prop things up. The deflationary vacuum remain in charge, and nature abhors such a vacuum! We may end up retracing the steps Japan took over the last 15 years, in which no amount of tinkering could restart the economy, and in which a vast amount of newly created money also failed to ignite inflation. They still coast along in the doldrums, and probably will for many more years.

Methinks honest money and limited government could have been the solution to all this mischief, but I'm told that any such notions of legitimacy are outdated and unfashionable...

While You Were Sleeping

The flick by that name was kinda cute. This national debt ticker is a horror film...

Yesterday's debt (3-19-09) 8:00 AM MST $60,740,446,000,000

Today's debt (3-20-09) 8:00 AM MST $60.748,748.000.000

That's new debt of $8.3 Billion a day, $249 Billion a month, $2.9 Trillion a year...

More on Central Banking

As criticism of the Federal Reserve - our nation's central bank - increases daily, we have only to look into our own past to discover all sorts of American leaders who knew this was a bad idea.

Here's one: "Banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies . If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered." Thomas Jefferson

And another: "Whoever controls the volume of money in any country is absolute master of all industry and commerce."
-- James A. Garfield"

See? We really did have honest Presidents, once upon a time!

Hapless Sock Puppet Geithner Gets a New "Helping Hand"

According to an internal Citigroup memo, Lewis Alexander - Citigroup's chief economist - is leaving for a job at the Treasury Department. An unnamed government official says Mr. Alexander will be a ventriloquist counselor to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

Alexander has very special insights on the economy - in an early 2007 interview he had this to say about the housing bubble: "I think that's not going to spill over more broadly into the economy, and so I think we're going to have a normal kind of housing cycle that's going to last through the middle of this year"

This is just swell: Obama is bringing the Jim Jones stock tank and ladle to Washington. Wanna bet Alexander's next in line if Geithner can't hold on to the job?

It's going to be an interesting summer.

Shooting Up With Play Dough

In a single day, the economy has mainlined another trillion - give or take - by virtue of the FED's commitment to purchase long-term treasuries and mortgage backed securities. As a result, the FED's balance sheet will grow to over $3 trillion after already doubling since last year.

This desperation play comes after conventional manipulations (there's a term to reflect on!) like lowering key interest rates to zero failed to halt the slide. The stock market reacted enthusiastically, demonstrating once again that smoke, mirrors and emotion are the only forces producing gains in this climate.

This is beyond the pale. It's the creation of another trillion out of thin air, and is nothing more than an addicted parent robbing its own children for a fix.

Uber-inflation awaits. I never thought I'd say so, but I miss the days when the economy was merely a house of cards...