Posted by
The Hermit Crab on Tuesday, June 10, 2008 2:26:39 PM
I've seen a few reasons advanced for the Democrats' opposition to the Columbia free-trade agreement. Some have to do with unions, some others have to do with dislike for President Uribe (sp?). Personally, I think it's because Uribe is trying to cut off the flow of cocaine into the United States, and this raises the price, which takes money out of Democratic pockets. After all, the Democrats think that the way to lower gas prices is to continue to keep locked up the undeveloped oil, natural gas, and nuclear resources of the country, while raising taxes on the oil companies which would be only too happy to make energy more plentiful (and thus more affordable) if they were allowed to by Congress. They also think that the oil development that they restrict will be increased if they take away the tax incentives for oil exploration and development. This is the Democrats' traditional economic theory -- increasing taxes increases economic performance by the taxed. This is rather like saying that a greyhound will race faster if you cut off one of his legs.
C'mon, they have to be on drugs!
Another tiresome assertion that Democrats rely on is that our overthrow of Saddam Hussein and our continued involvement in Iraq is "a distraction from the real war on terrorism". First of all, I deny that liberating 27 million people from a blood-soaked tyrrany can ever be a mistake. Secondly, as a largely self-educated American who knows his history, I am astounded at how few lives were lost in the performance of such a great work. The Korean War cost roughly 34,000 lives (I'm going from memory -- I'm at work). Vietnam, about 55,000. The Civil War cost a nation of about 32 million population 620,000 lives. (Of course, we were both sides of that war, but still...) Iraq has cost roughly 4,100 lives, and we have eliminated in one way or another at least 200,000 terrorists, according to careful students of our Iraq front. I think this has worked out rather well, as the terrorists have been saving us the bother of hunting them down around the world. They have been coming to Iraq on their own to take their lumps. It's better for us to have them go to Iraq than to hunker down where they are -- or come to America. Iraq has become our terrorist bug-zapper.
Thomas Sowell wrote a few years ago that perhaps the greatest threat to our country's future is the economic ignorance of the average merican. He was right then, and it's even worse now. We now have a majority party in Congress entirely elected by economic idiots, and run by same. You could take all of the economic intelligence of the Democratic leadership in Congress, put it in a thimble, and still have room for your thumb. I suspect that if you aspire to be in the Democratic leadership in this Congress, and you've taken any economics courses in high school or college, that's a disqualifier.
(Actually, I take that back. Taking economics in school wouldn't be a disqualifier -- as long as you failed the course.)
Wednesday June 11 -- Little did I know as I wrote the above that last night the Democrats would take another whack at destroying our economy by destroying our energy supply. Last night they tried to eliminate the tax incentives that the gas companies would recieve if the imbecile Congress would let them explore for and develop new oil fields (we have billions of barrels of domestic oil supplies locked up that we know of), and they also tried to confiscate the oil companies' profits, which they also can't spend on exploration and development because of the idiots in Congress. Fortunately for all of us, the Republicans in the Senate rallied their forces to stop this fantastically wrong-headed proposal in its tracks. The GOP is not completely worthless, no matter what my libertarian friend Tony may think.
Have you noticed that the global warming scam-peddlars (sp?) have stopped referring to carbon dioxide being spewed into the air? They just call it "carbon" now. They want to conjure visions of little bits of coal in the air, which can't be healthy, right? They don't want you to remember that carbon dioxide is an integral component of air, and furthermore that it allows plants to grow! Do you remember those neat little drawings in your science textbooks? The ones that showed arrows going back and forth between plants and people? I know that science education in the schools has slipped since I went to grade school, but the science hasn't changed. The "deadly greenhouse gas" carbon dioxide is still necessary for life on earth, and it always will be.
By the way, have you seen the PSA on "climate change" with Rev. Pat Robertson and "Rev." Al Sharpton? Pat Robertson is a decent man, but he has always been a scientific ignoramus. My wife watches the 700 Club (Robertson's show) on Wednesdays, and tells me the health advice they give. I always ask her if she's going to watch a fitness channel next to get tips on theology.
Economics 101 time. When the Democrats, in their one great acheivement of their majority status so far, raised the minimum wage, economic experts warned that raising the wage would result in fewer opportunities for unskilled laborers and teenagers in the job market. Guess what? The latest economic figures showed a decrease in the number of new unemployment claims in the last week, but an 10% increase in the unemployment rate? This was caused by an influx of teenagers into the job market, where there were no jobs for them, because the minimum wage is now fixed higher than the value of the work they would provide to their new employers. Raise the price of a commodity, you diminish the demand. Fix the price of a commodity above its value, and you eliminate demand altogether.
To the Democrats, the obvious is always mysterious.