Cash for Clunkers is such a unanticipated success that they burned thru the pilot money in five days. Car sales went up, consumer confidence is up, housing is up, engines are more fuel efficient, new car owners are happy, and car dealers are happier. The House of Representatives moved quickly (quite an exception) to fund the program based on the pilot’s success, and the Senate, in its molasses-like breakneck pace, is thinking about it.  Think away, Sen. Reid. [update: Harry thought right]

But the only people compelled to get all crabby over the scant but hope-filled economic news are Republicans. Why do they hate ‘Merka so much?

If Limbaugh gets “his wish” and Obama fails then Obama gets to enjoy the rest of his days living at the tax payers’ expense (a lovely irony, is it not?), and four years from now the  stationary changes at the White House.  That’s the beauty of our system, and its beauty should not go lost on the party that most respects traditions. 

The Republican party is not Moveon.org and should not aspire to becoming anything like it.  Limbaugh communicates the angry side of conservative disappointment, and playing that role evidently suits him, and I for one am quite content to let him play it.  But I don’t plan to join in the anger.

Four years passes quickly.  What Republicans need to be doing is searching for the next “Reagan” to counter Obama’s Carter rerun.   The issues may well take care of themselves since Obama’s version of government created ex nihilo overlooks the rude “wisdom” of his own party’s most recent success.  Obama has forgotten Clinton’s dictum, “it’s the economy, Stupid” and seems to be stuck in the fantasy of his own advertising.  Thus we find him urging people to invest in the stock market — now — as the market drops in direct reflection of his profligate spending spree.

Well, the American people bought the Brooklyn bridge once when it first spanned the river.  They are not intent upon buying it again as a bit of private real estate.   People do not even need to recall Reagan’s question (“are you better off?”) since Reagan was only articulating what everyone asks in the quiet of his own head.

If Obama continues along this path, he’ll be a one termer.  Four years passes quickly.  Moveon.org comprised a group of very bitter people, bitter because throughout the last half of the 20th century their ideas failed to elect presidents time and again.  But Republicans have nothing to be bitter about and should not start being bitter now.

We lost an election.  We lost one election.  And as things now stand Obama is going to lose the next one with no assistance from us.  The challenge then for Republicans is finding the right candidate, one who best exemplifies the strengths of Republican ideals.  (Republicans actually have ideals.)

Indeed, we should be grateful to Obama in some respects.  He is creating the stage for a great president to come.  Just as — in a certain sense — Carter paved the way for Reagan.  Obama is paving the way for a new Republican leader.  I hesitate to say a “new Reagan,” because that’s silly and it’s just not true.  Reagan was unique! But Democrats are setting the stage for the arrival of a strong leader with real ideas who can counter all the fake, fantasy government that’s being thrown at us now.

Let the Democrat party fail.  They’re good at it.  But four years passes quickly.  And the GOP had better be prepared.  And the last thing Republicans should be doing is alienating the moderate voters or middle of the road voters who voted for Obama.  That was Moveon.org’s specialty: insulting people.   But for us, let’s cultivate the middle of the road vote.   And let’s earn them the honest way with good ideas and respect for the uniqueness of the individual.

Ordinary Americans don’t want to be losers, and they’ll vote against Obama when they see him taking this country down a path to bankruptcy and loser-dom. 

As for me, I figure Obama teaches us something we needed to recall from the Bible: “render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what is God’s.”  He cannot destroy the American spirit unless we let him.  And he won’t even destroy the economy in only four years — though he’s doing his darn best.

So, I’m not indulging anger.  Quite the contrary, I’m praying for the president during this Lenten period.  Like Limbaugh, I hope Obama fails.  But I pray for him because of the responsibility he bears, and if he recognizes the huge mistake he’s embracing it will be a miracle of divine intervention!

Pray.  Be wise.  Have faith.  Be ready.

Four years passes quickly.

By: Winthrop Sheldon

For perspective on these times, and all other times in our history when markets have become wildly volatile, I recommend strongly that people make the effort to read three books: A Random Walk Down Wall Street, by Burton Malkiel, Titan, by Ron Chernow and Snowball, by Alice Shroeder.

The first is the book that is known for being the single book to read on investing if you are interested in the topic, or not. It covers all aspects of a regular person’s life in terms of giving context to investing and allowing you to understand what happens over time. Titan is the biography of John D. Rockefeller, founder of Standard Oil, and the world’s wealthiest man, ever. The third is a recent publication that begins in 1932 and ends in September 2008, and tells the life story of Warren Buffet (Warren is 77). The latter two books work as a teeter-totter; as Rockefeller’s outward stony, conservative, Baptist purity is juxtaposed with Buffett’s outwardly cordial, down to earth, liberal mannered character. These two books take the reader from the days before America’s civil war in 1860 (Rockefeller was born in 1839, and lived 98 years) to the days of just a few short weeks ago. All aspects of modern American life were reborn after the American Civil War ended, which can be thought of as an economic forest fire in the most epic, complete and utterly unavoidable sense.

Rockefeller’s wit and courage as a young businessman on the streets of Cleveland in the 1860s allowed him to build the world’s first fortune that could topple nations. It is critical to understand Rockefeller’s ultimate opponent was not the US Government (despite the fact that antitrust laws were created to combat Rockefeller) but Russia. Yes, the resources of Russia were the only reason Standard Oil did not make it past Western Germany, and rarely very far inland from the Mediterranean Sea. The point, if not clear to the reader, is every trouble of today, every time amazing amounts of capital (read cash) are wiped out, there is a reason rooted in history. Russia is not the cause of our current struggles, but they made Rockefeller stay on his toes in order to compete globally. Rockefeller was a disciplined Baptist who scorned the excesses of the Victorian Age and who embraced the global challenge that he confronted when his corporate empire stretched well overseas. He stayed aware, he stayed on his toes, and he became immensely wealthy, ever prideful of his thin physique. This is the portrait of a great American who built this great country and we now pale in stature upon comparison.

Americans are off our toes. We are in our recliners or Ikea desk chairs, but what we are collectively doing, I am not sure. The Russia of Rockefeller’s day is now replaced by China, and what we have failed to see as we sit, not stand on our toes, is that for every dollar of stuff we buy from them, they buy about twenty to thirty cents of our stuff in return. After ten years of this (basically tied with the business liberalization in the Chinese market in the 1990s) the Chinese now own a significant amount of America, and behind them in the line of owners are the Saudis, Iranians and Russians, all of who are emboldened and made wealthy by our insatiable appetite for their native, natural resources. We need to sit in our chairs and think about each action. Americans today need to mimic the Japanese of the 1960s and the Russians of the 1890s and more than anything we need to once again understand who Americans were in the 1930s. Unless we reclaim our productivity, and thus correct our trade deficit with the global world, our teeter-totter will start to sink down on the debt side as our assets (citizens) become less valuable and our debts (IOUs to China) start to out weigh our potential as a nation.

Make no mistake, this is a critical time in the United States. In history, every period of significant national debt, inducing deficit spending, has been financed through the US Federal Government or from taxpayers (with the exception of the large loan the colonists incurred from the French to defeat the British in 1776). Now China is our largest lender, not US Citizens. For the first time the debt is real, and someone very different owns it. When a US citizen bought a savings bond in 1942, they were effectively buying stock (equity) in the US Government, a very stable investment. Thus they were buying a small piece of the future earnings of America. Then in the 1950s those same people, Tom Brokaw’s “Greatest Generation” prospered when those savings bonds paid out, and the US recovered (due to victory in WW2).

Today, US citizens have not been doing anything other than paying fewer taxes while our government spends more money, and we individually spend more than we earn, thanks to easy forms of credit. Furthermore, the Government noticed a while ago citizens no longer have money to pay higher taxes, so Congress went abroad seeking debt from other countries. Needless to say we are in a deep hole. The difference is, in the 1950s as American’s got back to work, their wages went up and their bonds paid out, their proverbial shoveling out of the hole was aided by a flood of water (war bonds) lifting them to the surface faster than normal. Today, Americans have very little average savings, which is the root cause of the entire problem in the first place. There is no rainstorm on the horizon, so we must start to dig our way out.

We have much ‘hunkering down’ to do as a nation, just as the Big Three have their work cut out for them to escape bankruptcy (Ford, maybe GM) and even to work through Bankruptcy (Chrysler). The financial sector has much more carnage to come. But it is not time to lose hope. Every one of us should take stock of what we have in the US that is unique from the rest of the world, namely individual rights and a country that offers more opportunity than any other in the world. The relative value of a country compared with its peers could be construed by some by the length and volume of the lines at its borders. America’s lines are the longest in the world, and they are filled with people who have chosen to be there, in that line.

I cannot be sure the statements I made above will prove true, but I do have faith in those lines of people at our borders, and in the small brains in our classrooms. Warren Buffett likes to remind college students being born in America is to win the ‘Ovarian Lottery’; you could have been born anywhere, to be born in the US gives you a tremendous advantage over 95% of the rest of the world. This asset on our American teeter-totter is stable and will remain. It’s on us to do our part to make the teeter-totter level again.

Winthrop can be found sitting at his computer screen watching stocks move and thinking
about why. If you’re wondering why, he can be reached at winthrop.sheldon@gmail.com.

1. AIG executives forced to live in trailer parks on $500 a week, driving used, badly maintained Ford Focuses to work.  And no, they don’t get anymore bonuses, spa treatments, or big dinners until they clean up their own mess.  Failure to comply with this arrangement will result in summary execution.  Hey, it works in China.
2. Hank Paulson carrying boxes out of the Treasury Secretary’s office to his car escorted by security.  It’s just over a month.  Let someone keep the new secretary’s seat warm until the inauguration.
3. Every time a bank comes to Washington, DC, Congress forces the CEOs to humiliate themselves.  “We need $2 billion in funds to stay solvent.”  “That’s fine, sir.  We need you to dance on a table in a thong to Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s ‘Relax.’”  “Senator, do you know who I am?”  “Yeah.  You’re the guy asking us for $2 billion in taxpayer money.  Now start dancing, Chastity.  These twenties ain’t comin’ out of our pockets ‘cuz you say pretty please.”
4. The CEO’s of the Big Three flying back to Washington on Southwest, Jet Blue, or Air Tran because “We don’t reward inefficient, poorly managed industries that have already been bailed out once.”  Yeah, I know.  I just described the Big Three.  But I hate the major airlines slightly less than I hate genocidal warlords.  The warlords just barely edge out the airlines.   Let’s put it this way.  Ford and Chrysler built me a couple of decent cars.  Delta Airlines treated me like cattle.  Guess who I couldn’t care less if they go bankrupt.
5. A lot of senior executives fired with no compensation.
6. Those same executives at a drive-thru window asking if you want fries with that.
7. Actual capitalism practiced.  See, capitalism implies that capital gets moved around and wealth gets redistributed.  (Ha!  You thought only socialism did that!  That’s what you get for listening to Limbaugh.)  What’s practiced now is feudalism.

Stephen Harper has recklessly endangered our country’s unity for the sake of scoring cheap political points with his base. It looks like we saw the first result of his negative campaign tonight, in the results from Quebec’s provincial election:

The surprise rise of the PQ may have roots in Ottawa, whereas the virulent Conservative campaign against the “separatists” supporting a Liberal-NDP coalition may have spurred soft Quebec nationalists to register their displeasure at the ballot box.

…The election marked a comeback for the PQ under Pauline Marois, 18 months after she took over the party’s leadership. Ms. Marois returned the PQ to Official Opposition status after the dismal third-place, 36-seat result of the last election under André Boisclair.

Last night’s results also became a test of Ms. Marois’s strategy to sideline sovereignty as a campaign theme. The move was seen as savvy at a time when Quebeckers have shown indifference toward the issue; the wild card was whether the strategy would alienate the PQ’s traditional base.

Instead, Prime Minister Stephen Harper may have helped reinvigorate it.

While the Liberals may be softening their commitment to the coalition with their caucus coalescing behind the barely-Liberal Michael Ignatieff, the landscape of Canadian politics will remain dramatically changed over this Conservative-created political crisis. Ironically, thanks to the extreme hatred they’ve inspired towards Quebec nationalists, the Tories will likely spend the bulk of 2009 bending over backwards to earn back the Bloc’s support.

If you’ve ever taken your family on vacation to a national park, you might be a socialist.

If you’ve ever accessed a doctor, had a major surgery, been treated in an emergency room, or received a free flu vaccination, with no charge or risk of bankruptcy, then you might be a socialist.

If you’ve attended a post-secondary school in Canada, you might be a socialist.

If you’ve graduated high school, or sent your kids to K-12 school, you might be socialist.

If you’ve given to a charity, you might be a socialist.

If you have ever shopped at a cooperative, you might be a socialist.

If your power, water, or sewage is provided by your city, you might be a socialist.

If you’ve ever used public transit, you’re most likely a socialist.

If you don’t pay a toll every time you drive to work, you might be a socialist.

In short, if you’re one of those Canadians who can’t afford to pay individually for medical care, private schooling, Ivy Leaque colleges, or private mountain resorts, then whether you know it or not, you’re a socialist.

Oh, but there’s more:

If you work a 40 hour work week, you can thank the socialists.

If you get paid overtime, you can thank the socialists.

If you’re a woman and receive equal pay for doing the same work as men, you can thank the feminists and socialists.

If you get paid holidays, you can thank the socialists.

If you have a pension, you can thank the socialists.

and so on.

Okay, so I’m phoning it in because it’s Friday, dammit. But it’s still worth reminding ourselves of how Harper’s shabby, self-interested political manoeuvres put his party before the economy and got us to this point.

h/t: 1337hax0r.com

The Globe and Mail’s Report on Business yesterday asserted:

Canada may be in a political crisis, but it is not in an economic one. Why do so many people prefer to believe that we are?    source

Here’s why: 66,000 jobs lost in Ontario during November, and 70,600 total across Canada. More to come too – count on it.

h/t: Queer thoughts

Julius Marx, that is.

What? You thought I meant Karl?  That’s the most ridiculous thing I ever hoid!

I first read this at Holycoast and pass it along here.  And, hey, you do pass on as well.  One needs to help the leftwing recognize that there are some people who are paying attention.  The essay, which really should be read in full, comes from Real Clear Politics’s Thomas Sowell:

  Abraham Lincoln said, “You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you can’t fool all the people all the time.”

Unfortunately, the future of this country, as well as the fate of the Western world, depends on how many people can be fooled on election day, just a few weeks from now.

Right now, the polls indicate that a whole lot of the people are being fooled a whole lot of the time.

The current financial bailout crisis has propelled Barack Obama back into a substantial lead over John McCain– which is astonishing in view of which man and which party has had the most to do with bringing on this crisis.

It raises the question: Do facts matter? Or is Obama’s rhetoric and the media’s spin enough to make facts irrelevant?

Fact Number One: It was liberal Democrats, led by Senator Christopher Dodd and Congressman Barney Frank, who for years– including the present year– denied that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were taking big risks that could lead to a financial crisis.

It was Senator Dodd, Congressman Frank and other liberal Democrats who for years refused requests from the Bush administration to set up an agency to regulate Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

It was liberal Democrats, again led by Dodd and Frank, who for years pushed for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to go even further in promoting subprime mortgage loans, which are at the heart of today’s financial crisis.

Alan Greenspan warned them four years ago. So did the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers to the President. So did Bush’s Secretary of the Treasury, five years ago.

Yet, today, what are we hearing? That it was the Bush administration “right-wing ideology” of “de-regulation” that set the stage for the financial crisis. Do facts matter?

We also hear that it is the free market that is to blame. But the facts show that it was the government that pressured financial institutions in general to lend to subprime borrowers, with such things as the Community Reinvestment Act and, later, threats of legal action by then Attorney General Janet Reno if the feds did not like the statistics on who was getting loans and who wasn’t.

Is that the free market? Or do facts not matter?

Then there is the question of being against the “greed” of CEOs and for “the people.” Franklin Raines made $90 million while he was head of Fannie Mae and mismanaging that institution into crisis.

Who in Congress defended Franklin Raines? Liberal Democrats, including Maxine Waters and the Congressional Black Caucus, at least one of whom referred to the “lynching” of Raines, as if it was racist to hold him to the same standard as white CEOs.

Even after he was deposed as head of Fannie Mae, Franklin Raines was consulted this year by the Obama campaign for his advice on housing!

The Washington Post criticized the McCain campaign for calling Raines an adviser to Obama, even though that fact was reported in the Washington Post itself on July 16th. The technicality and the spin here is that Raines is not officially listed as an adviser. But someone who advises is an adviser, whether or not his name appears on a letterhead.

The tie between Barack Obama and Franklin Raines is not all one-way. Obama has been the second-largest recipient of Fannie Mae’s financial contributions, right after Senator Christopher Dodd.

But ties between Obama and Raines? Not if you read the mainstream media.

Facts don’t matter much politically if they are not reported.

The media alone are not alone in keeping the facts from the public. Republicans, for reasons unknown, don’t seem to know what it is to counter-attack. They deserve to lose.

But the country does not deserve to be put in the hands of a glib and cocky know-it-all, who has accomplished absolutely nothing beyond the advancement of his own career with rhetoric, and who has for years allied himself with a succession of people who have openly expressed their hatred of America.

And Mrs. Pelosi had the audacity (of hope, no doubt!) to commend Barney Frank’s intellect with regard to the first version of the “bailout” legislation!  Yes, it does take some big something (maybe not intellect, though) to “fix” the problem that you created and then pat yourself on the back about your fabulous solution. 

It’s not the “audacity of hope,” it’s just the audacity.  Period.

It’s a variation on “it’s the economy, stupid” — except it’s the American people that Democrats think are stupid.

So how did the economy get turned into so much paper goo?

Because everyone forgot something Marillion’s Steve Hogarth knew a long time ago.

Incidentally, you can now get Marillion’s latest, Happiness Is The Road from their web site a lot cheaper than I pre-ordered it, now that the dollar’s surging against the pound.

(OK, guys. You know where to send the check.)