Claire Berlinski on free markets

The author of Why Margaret Thatcher matters (2008 Basic Books) attempts to first explain free markets, in explaining why Margaret Thatcher was so passionate about them as a key to a moral society:

“The argument for free markets involves a beautiful, fascinating, counterintuitive theory.  It is one of the great achievements in human thought.  It is also, basically, simple.  A free market is one in which the prices of goods and services are determined by individual sellers and buyers, not by the government.  It differs from a planned or command economy in that no centralized authority makes decisions about resource allocation.” p. 118

Then she goes on to explain how selling a product at gun point or deliberately not fulfilling the order on January 1 that you promised is not healthy free markets and government is needed to ensure that won’t happen. (p. 122)  Since she probably wrote this part in 2006 or 2007 she had no way to know she was predicting exactly what has happened during the Obama reign with the ACA.

Employer based health insurance  (60% of workers, 90% of market) which grew up after WWII was originally a choice by employer and employee which then developed to a jumble of government law and regulation.  The biggest plum for manipulation by Washington was exemption from income tax on that benefit.  If the government had bowed out and let the system evolve, perhaps we wouldn’t have had the messy government built system as a foundation for another failed system—Obamacare.  PPACA was signed into law on March 23, 2010 and the President has been violating it ever since.

Romney’s freedom message

The Clinton Global Initiative gives Mitt Romney a STANDING OVATION for his talk this week on sustaining economies. He begins with inspiration from the Tunisian fruit vendor whose suicide catalyzed the Arab Spring. Romney proposes solutions to despair and fanaticism. How? Job opportunities. The rule of law. Fair trade. Property rights. Prosperity pacts. "The right moral course ... Coupling aid with trade." So worth watching though 15 minutes. [Kelly Monroe Kullberg]

http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2012/09/25/161766092/obama-talks-of-slavery-romney-of-freedom-at-clinton-global-initiative

About transformation—usually a positive term

Dismal May jobs report.  Market falls.  Anticipation of Walker win, Dow up.  Walker wins, Dow up even more looking ahead to an Obama loss.  When Obama won the nomination in 2008, the economy sunk 6 months before the election in anticipation of his "transformative" presidency.

In Europe they're talking about green energy suicide. In the USA, about murdering the coal industry. That's what you get with a "transformational" president. Extends the war, expands the deficit, and shrinks the jobs.  Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and other coal states:  I hope your unions remember what he’s done to your jobs.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304203604577398541135969380.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Andrew Klavan poignantly notes: “consider…that we were born into the freest, strongest, and wealthiest nation that mankind has ever known – and elected as our president a man who promised to ‘fundamentally transform’ it.” City Journal

Do it the USSR way

“Because in the United States of America, we are greater together than we are on our own (Applause). We’re better off when we keep that basic American promise that if you work hard, you can do well — you can raise a family, you can own a home, send your kids to college, put a little away for retirement — and that that promise is open to everybody. If you’re born into tough circumstances, we’re going to give you ladders to climb up into that middle class. And if you’re in that middle class, then we’re going to make sure that you’ve got the tools to, even in a changing world, have some security and some stability in your life.

That’s what we’re fighting for. That’s the choice in this election.” Obama in a campaign speech this week

Work as hard as you want making buggy whips or transcribing 11th century Latin poetry into Gaelic, and you still won’t make it financially in capitalist, free-market-decides America, but you just might scrape up enough to barely get by if Obama gives you enough government programs to feed, clothe, shelter, insure and provide walking around money. Meanwhile, his income varies between $2-$4 million annually because of book sales (with some pressure for government offices to sell them), real estate investments (the Chicago way) and other investments in capitalist enterprises.

To the poor he promises ladders, and to the middle class tools, security and stability. But nothing beyond that, because that would require taking risks, doing without, finding people who want to back you with venture capital or loans, and postponing expensive entertainments. A woman who doesn't speak English just dropped the newspaper at my door. Perhaps she has a kid in high school or college and wants him to have extra spending money. Or maybe she is wealthy beyond her wildest dreams back home where because she was a minority or a woman she couldn't even go to school, and she sends money home to her parents. She has a car; she's probably sharing an apartment with another family of her religious or ethnic group; she may even be using a few government programs, but she's got hustle, so if there were no programs, she'd still make it. I've seen her kind before. She will make it in America. And it won't be because of transfer of wealth.

Obscene profits of health insurance companies?

President Obama, July 22: "Now, you know, there had been reports just over the last couple of days of insurance companies making record profits. Right now, at the time when everybody’s getting hammered, they’re making record profits and premiums are going up."

Speaker of the House, Pelosi, July 27: “I’m very pleased that our Chair of our Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and member of the leadership will be talking too about the immoral profits being made by the insurance industry and how those profits have increased in the Bush years. We all believe in the profit motive; we all want to reward success. But having that success come at the expense of America’s working families — have that success come by withholding care, when a person becomes ill, is just not right and we’re going to take this issue in a new direction."

Don't you just want to weep over those immoral, record profits--and yet they are 86th measured by profit margin. There are 85 industries more profitable than Health Care Plans (includes Cigna, Aetna, WellPoint, HealthSpring, etc.). So who will they go after next? The brewery business? #1 is Brewers at 25.9%--no wonder Obama tried to cover his mistakes by inviting the guys over for a beer. #15 is railroads. #31 at 7.1 is cleaning products! Auto parts stores is 5.8 for slot 53--not even close to health insurance. Hospitals are #77. August 12, Carpe Diem

Great myths of the great Depression

If you can count, you know that 1929-1941 (or 1943 by other research) is a very long time, and that both the Hoover Administration and the Roosevelt Administration created and fine tuned the so-called Great Depression with massive government interference. And now President Obama and the Reid Pelosi gang that can't shoot straight want to do it all over again and are lying to us about capitalism and about recovery. Why does anyone, president or pauper, want to recreate the pain of the 1930s? I've pointed out this article before, but in light of Obama's lies, it's worth another look.

"Old myths never die; they just keep showing up in economics and political science textbooks. With only an occasional exception, it is there you will find what may be the twentieth century’s greatest myth: Capitalism and the free-market economy were responsible for the Great Depression, and only government intervention brought about America’s economic recovery."