Great letter

From Cafe Hayek and Don Boudreaux:

Paul Krugman is confused ("Know-Nothing Politics," August 8). While I agree that Bush's attack on Iraq was both stupid and immoral, many of the reasons that persons on the left (such as Mr. Krugman) offer against military intervention abroad apply equally to "liberals'" case for government intervention domestically.

Just as many on the right naively fantasize that foreign problems are best solved by force, "liberals" fantasize that domestic problems - real and imaginary - are best solved by force. Jobs disappearing in Ohio? No problem - force Americans to buy fewer foreign goods. Too many Americans without health insurance? Force taxpayers to give it to them. The "distribution" of income doesn't satisfy some Very Caring Person's criterion? Government should forcibly redistribute. A mine collapses in West Virginia? Uncle Sam should force mine-owners to increase safety. See? All very simple.

Unlike Mr. Krugman, I believe that both political parties are the party of the stupid - specifically Republicans are the party of the stupid and the hypocritical and the Democrats are the party of the stupid and the arrogant.

Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux

Living the High Life, On the Taxpayer.

This story in the NT Times today really makes me mad.  The story is about low-income people moving to the suburbs which is great.  They are able to get away from crime and drugs that are destroying inner city neighborhoods which is very positive.  What angers me is the fact the government is subsidizing this move and giving families large quantities of tax payer dollars to do it.

Ms. Payne, a 42-year-old African-American mother of five, moved to Antioch in 2006. With the local real estate market slowing and a housing voucher covering two-thirds of the rent, she found she could afford a large, new home, with a pool, for $2,200 a month.

Two-thirds of $2200 per month!  That is nearly how much I pay for my mortgage.  A pool?  I do not even have a pool.

To begin with I am against all forms of long-term government assistance.  The only thing this does is create dependency.  What incentive does Ms. Payne have to get off the tax payer payroll?  She has a nice home with a pool in the suburbs (of course I am not sure how she affords to pay for maintenance of the pool or the utilities).

In addition, the government is killing the value of homes in many neighborhoods by creating a large rental market.  Everyone can see the decline in any neighborhood once it turns into rental properties.  People do not have the incentives to take care of the homes, so you naturally see destruction.  Yet the government does not understand why home values are falling in California?  Again, when the government gets involved bad things usually happen.

Invisible Hand vs Visible Foot

This post on Carpe Diem today was excellent.


When a heavy metal door swung over her 14-year-old son's foot, ripping the nail almost completely off his big toe, Tina Mobley didn't want to take her chances in a crowded hospital emergency room or wait for an appointment at the pediatrician's office the next day. Instead, she drove to an urgent-care clinic inside a Wal-Mart in Yulee, Fla., near her rural home. Within minutes, the doctor on duty numbed the pain with an injection, removed the nail, and cleaned and bandaged the injury.

Patients who need immediate care for injuries and illness, be it a nail-gun puncture or a severe stomach bug, are increasingly turning to walk-in urgent-care clinics. These facilities aim to fill the gap between the growing shortage of primary-care doctors and a shrinking number of already-crowded hospital emergency departments, with no appointment necessary and extended evening and weekend hours. Urgent-care clinics are staffed by physicians, offer wait times as little as a few minutes and charge $60 to $200 depending on the procedure -- a fraction of the typical $1,000-plus emergency department visit. Some offer discounts and payment plans for the uninsured; for those with coverage, co-payments vary by insurance plan but may be less than half the amount of an ER visit, which range from $50-$200.
~Wall Street Journal

MP: Another example of a consumer-friendly, market-driven, convenient and affordable health care option that didn't require Congressional approval, Senate hearings, new legislation, sweeping government reforms, or a government takeover of the U.S. health care system. Never underestimate the power of the invisible hand to provide real, workable, consumer-friendly solutions.

In contast, Senator Obama's proposals for health care reform include new government mandates, increased government regulations, and government subsidies. Never underestimate the power of the visible foot of government to provide imaginary, unworkable, consumer-unfriendly solutions.

The Boone Doggle

I usually get very cynical when a billionaire goes on a crusade for the public good. The T Boone energy "plan" is one of those things that everyone should be skeptical about. Now I really enjoy watching T Boone on TV. His banter with the CNBC anchors is great entertainment. However, his energy "plan" is a complete farse. The $58 Million in advertising to promote his "plan" is just his way of cajoling Congress into forcing people to replace the natural gas used for electricity production into a automotive fuel. Not to mention he also wants to force people to give up their property rights so he can run power cables from his giant wind farms to cities in Texas.

An opinion piece in the WSJ today summarizes the "plan" and all its buffoonery today. Here are some parts:

Having reasons is not "a plan" either, but Mr. Pickens has his reasons. He says we spend $700 billion a year on foreign oil, which he calls a "transfer of wealth." But exchanging money for oil at the market price is an exchange of things of equal value. If we didn't value their oil more than our dollars, we wouldn't participate in such a bargain.

No: As Mr. Pickens says, we can't drill our way out of the dilemmas of living in the world. But drilling is one of many things we can do that are worth doing. Over time, the price mechanism and technology will tell us how to harness the energy that is infinite around us. There's the sun, the tides, geothermal and nuclear -- energy is not in short supply; only know-how is. And a shortage of know-how is a problem that our society, as long as its basic incentives remain intact, is constantly solving every single day.

The good 'ole days.

Movie Night

Looks like this could be a really good movie. Finally something good comes out of Hollywood.

Daily Humor

For the states suffering through budget shortfalls, here are a couple suggestions:

Big Profits Equal Big Taxes

More things the media leaves out about the marginal ExxonMobil earnings:

From Carpe Diem:

Exxon has already paid $19.828 billion in income taxes for 2008 (data here), and will probably pay almost $40 billion in income taxes this year (see graph above, income tax data for 1999-2007 taken from Exxon's annual reports).

To put $40 billion of income taxes in perspective, it can be reasonably estimated that Exxon will pay more in income taxes this year (both here and outside the U.S.) than the entire bottom 50% of American individual taxpayers (about 67 million) will pay in income taxes this year.

Using IRS tax data through 2005 (in Table 6, data here), and making reasonable projections for tax payments in 2006, 2007 and 2008, the bottom 50% of taxpayers will pay an estimated $34 billion in income taxes this year, and it will probably be the first time in U.S. history that a single corporation paid more in income taxes than the entire bottom 50% of U.S. taxpayers.

Update 1: Of course, corporations don't actually pay taxes, they collect them, in the form of higher prices for consumers, lower wages for employees and/or lower dividends for shareholders. In other words, people pay all taxes in their roles as consumers, workers and shareholders.

Update 2: Exxon is a global company and operates in the United States, Canada, Europe, Africa, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East, Russia/Caspian region, and South America. In 2005, Exxon earned about 70% of its profit outside the U.S. and paid 70% of its income taxes outside the U.S., and in 2006 Exxon earned 71.4% of its profits outside the U.S. and paid 81% of its taxes outside the U.S. Source: Exxon's annual reports.

Update 3: What gets reported by the media is Exxon's second-quarter record profits of $11.68 billion for a U.S.-based company, without distinction between profits earned in the U.S. and profits earned outside the U.S. Likewise, Congress reacts to the total amount of Exxon's record profits with proposals of "windfall profits taxes," without a distinction between profits earned in the U.S. and profits earned outside the U.S.

Therefore, when it comes to a discussion of Exxon's income taxes, it also makes sense to look at Exxon's total income tax payments of $10.5 billion in the second quarter, or $40 billion for the entire year. Although not all of Exxon's income taxes are paid to the U.S. Treasury and not all of Exxon's profits are earned in the U.S., I think it is still useful to put $40 billion of taxes into perspective by comparing that amount paid by a single corporation to the amount of income taxes paid by the bottom 50% of U.S. taxpayers. In other words, record profits for Exxon = record taxes for Exxon.

What Politicians and the News Fail to Tell Us.

Most Americans recognize that while gas is expensive and our grocery money doesn't go as far as it did last year, we are still an enormously prosperous and fortunate nation.

In some countries, a depressed economic climate means mass unemployment, political instability and large-scale deprivation. In America this decade, we have reached the point at which even in a down economy, our unemployment rate does not reach 6% (lower than the rates in Canada and the European Union, let alone those in the developing world). Any unwanted unemployment is terrible; but it is worth remembering that this stability especially benefits the economically vulnerable.

Furthermore, no matter what the state of our economy, we can realistically count on uninterrupted provision of critical public services, high business start-up rates, the world's highest levels of charitable giving and volunteering, and countless other benefits that come from living in a successful nation.

We may well be unsatisfied with the current state of affairs. Some Americans are suffering, and cannot be faulted for seeking substantial political change in the coming election. But most of us are reasonable people, and can see the difference between correctable problems within a strong system of democratic capitalism and the kind of catastrophic failure that justifies real outrage.

For the nonoutraged majority, here's what the bumper sticker ought perhaps to say: "If you're not grateful to live in America, you're not paying attention."

~Arthur Brooks in the WSJ

Economic Realities

This article from Steve Chapman is the cold, hard truth.

Americans feel as though the economy is in a recession and want the government to do something about it. In reality, it is expanding. In the second quarter, it grew at a respectable inflation-adjusted rate of 1.9 percent, double the pace of the first quarter. Unemployment was up, but it's still a pretty mild 5.7 percent.

When you have a loss of wealth, the best way to cope is to accept it and adapt to a lower standard of living, sooner rather than later. Sending out rebates, eliminating gas taxes, bailing out homeowners and accelerating monetary growth, among the proposed remedies, do exactly the opposite. They spare us the obligation of dealing with reality by making us feel richer so we can keep on as we were before.

But they don't change the stark fact that we are poorer now and will remain that way for some time. And they ultimately backfire by wasting money, igniting inflation or both.

In the long run, we will adapt to the new realities, the economic impact will moderate, and the pain will fade. Till then, our least destructive option is to do something no politician would dare suggest: Suck it up.

Obamanomics

Not that we needed any more evidence that B Hussein learned economics from a bubble gum wrapper....

From Cafe Hayek:

Obamanomics

Don Boudreaux

Here's a letter that I sent to the Aurora (Illinois) Beacon News:

Barack Obama proposes to deal with rising gasoline prices by giving a $1,000 "emergency rebate" to consumers - a rebate to be paid for by taxing the so-called "windfall profits" of oil producers ("Obama pitches $1,000 energy rebate checks," August 2).

In other words, a critical part of Sen. Obama's strategy for reigning in high gasoline prices is to subsidize gasoline consumption and more heavily tax its production. This plan - which increases the demand for gasoline and reduces its supply - makes as much sense as trying to put out a fire by dowsing it with jet fuel.

Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux

Why Government Cannot Be In the Business of Business

This editorial in the WSJ describes why ALL Americans should be fearful when government gets into the business of business. Bad things happen.

The lobby efforts of Fannie and Freddie gave them protection from oversight. This political protection allowed these organizations to profit handsomely for years and provide huge payouts to their management. These goons used their political muscle to cover up, influence, and keep their opponents quiet. Even going so far as to get vocal politicians moved to new committees and get them off their backs.

As Americans we should all be very scared about this bail out and the connection that Fannie and Freddie have to OUR government.

Monster Bailout

I rarely find myself in complete agreement with Professor Stiglitz, but his column in the Financial Times is right on. While I agree that Fannie and Freddie are too big to fail, there is a solution that does not involve the socialization of the risk and loss while management and shareholders get to privatize the profits.

Steve Forbes also has a great idea that involves breaking up the giants into 10-12 smaller companies. I believe that is also a very workable solution. If the combined debt is divided up, the divides the risk into manageable pieces and eliminates the moral hazard of having the tax payer fund the downside. New companies also mean new management. The crooks the lead these two entities now have to be thrown out along with all their cronies. This recapitalisation will certainly lead to massive shareholder losses, but at least the tax payer will not be responsible.

Speculators Drive Up the Price of Oil Like Doctors Cause Sickness

More great videos here.

More Bad Government and Idiot Politicians

Yesterday, the FDIC closed down Indymac S&L. This institution was a spin-off of Countrywide Financial several years ago and they focused on the large mortgages that Fannie and Freddie could not buy. This failure will cost the the FDIC between $4B and $8B, or about 10% of its assets according to the WSJ. How did this happen? Well turns out that the loud mouth Senator from New York, Chuck Schumer, sent a letter to the Director of the Office of Thrift Supervision saying the S&L would fail. This essentially created a run on the bank's deposits. Failure was imminent.

But government involvement does not end there. It gets worse, much worse. By design, the Federal Government stands behind two institutions that have lost over 90% of the value, FannieMae and FreddieMac. Combined, they hold over $5T in assets. That should scare all Americans.

From the Financial Times:

The real problem, demonstrated in the tumbling prices of their equity, is that their capital is insufficient to support their liabilities, given the scale of possible losses. William Poole, former chairman of the Federal Reserve of St Louis, argued only this week that Freddie Mac would be insolvent if the value of its assets were marked to market.

If either of these entities goes belly-up, the US economy could be in for a serious jolt. So how could these entities go so far off course? After all, there is an army of government bureaucrats that watch over them. Taken from the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO):

OFHEO's mission is to promote housing and a strong national housing finance system by ensuring the safety and soundness of Fannie Mae (Federal National Mortgage Association) and Freddie Mac (Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation). OFHEO works to ensure the capital adequacy and financial safety and soundness of two housing government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

OFHEO's oversight responsibilities include:

Conducting broad based examinations of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac; Developing a risk-based capital standard, using a "stress test" that simulates stressful interest rate and credit risk scenarios; Making quarterly findings of capital adequacy based on minimum capital standards and a risk-based standard; Prohibiting excessive executive compensation; Issuing regulations concerning capital and enforcement standards; and Taking necessary enforcement actions.

and more:

The Federal Housing Enterprises Safety and Soundness Act of 1992 gives OFHEO a broad range of supervisory tools that the agency may employ not only to address Enterprise problems in a remedial fashion but also to take actions to prevent such problems from developing. The agency’s use of those authorities helps mitigate systemic risk by reducing the risk of failure of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

We have a Federal agency that is tasked with the sole purpose of monitoring two companies and they have watched 90% of the market value of these corporation evaporate! Even worse, there is talk these two corporations will fail? How could our government be so irresponsible? This situation is no different than any other bureaucracy. There is no punishment for failure as the taxpayer will bail out the defunct businesses. This is exactly why the government has to stay out of commercial matters like these. Government and business cannot co-exist as there is no profit and loss incentive to guide behaviors and provide consequences.

I fully expect this to be a disaster of enormous proportions because the government, especially the enormously bloated US Federal Government, cannot handle a task that the free market could be dealing with effectively.

Campaign Econ vs Real Econ

Amity Shales offers a great perspective on economics during an election cycle. Personally, I am very disappointed in McCain for his abandonment of Phil Gramm. Senator Gramm was only saying the sensible thing and delivering a message that everyone needs to hear. So much for the "Straight Talk Express."

Phil Gramm Is Right

More Scary News From Wall Street

If Fannie and Freddie fail, the US Government will be on the hook for $5 Trillion in mortgage obligations. For reference, that is the current level of US Government debt to outside creditors. So in short it will double the Federal debt.

U.S. Mulls Future of Fannie, Freddie

A Bipartisan Fix

Good opinion piece today in the WSJ:

Partisan sides are using a serious crisis to advance political agendas, create political attack sound bites, and launch hearings to "expose" the culprit. Pick your favorite: speculators, Big Oil, environmentalists, China, India, etc.

This is not leadership.

A fundamental misunderstanding of how markets work, and how an effective government can support the private sector, is delaying remedies that will bring down energy prices now. These remedies are to be found in both supply and demand – and both Democrats and Republicans need to demonstrate their command of this fact. Energy is too important a cornerstone of domestic prosperity and international stability to be used as a debating prop.

Your claim that any oil we drill for now will not come on line for five years or longer – and will thus have no effect on prices today – is incorrect. Unlike past oil crises, where the spot price of oil (that is, today's price) rose more than forward prices, the oil price for delivery in 2012 is trading at $138 per barrel. The market is sending a clear price signal that our problem is in the future – because we do not have the will to curb demand or increase supply.

How many houses would someone invest in if there were a future guarantee that the price would not decline? It is anticipation of ever-increasing prices that fuels the mania.

I do disagree with this however:

Efficiency is a huge source of new energy. It is scandalous that we have let the mileage standards decrease over the past 25 years. Whether through mandates or tax policy, active government intervention is needed. Republicans have to stop acting as if the "market" is some pristine state of nature that is not subject to active shaping.

He could not be more wrong here. Consumers are already effecting the market for cars with poor gas mileage. SUV sales are falling fast and small cars are doing quite well. This alone is driving fuel economy standards without any work by the Energy Department. Active government intervention is only needed to free up the markets, particularly drilling. It is NOT allowing the free market to work that is the problem, not a lack of government intervention.

Why McCain's Corporate Tax Break Makes Sense

From part of an article on Mises.org.:

Corporate taxes reduce the profits of business owners. This is true because net income is reduced by the tax rate. For example, Firm X, with a $100 investment, earning a 7% return has an income — before taxes — of $7. With a 10% corporate tax rate, net income — after taxes — is $6.30. Firm X now has earned a 6.3% return. In contrast, a corporate tax rate of 40% reduces net income after taxes by $2.80 to $4.20, or a 4.2% after-tax return. This rise in taxes, on the margin, reduces the profit-seeking incentive to take business risks. Why risk starting a biotech company when inflation-protected T-bill's will give you the same return? Entrepreneurs and venture capitalists less willing to take risk means less innovation and fewer innovative ideas being economically viable. This results in less economic growth. Conversely, higher returns on invested capital encourage investment and savings. All of this leads to more capital savings, more innovation, better technology, and higher wages.

Further, the above example of Firm X is true if the firm does not have the pricing ability to transfer the tax to its customers. If the ability does exist, an increase in the corporate tax rate is really a tax on customers of the firm. In this case, consumers now have less to spend and save and the end result is the same.

Finally, a firm unable to pass on a tax increase or bear the reduced profit will either attempt to cut costs by reducing wages (among other costs) or be forced to go out of business.
The main point is this: by definition, corporations do not pay taxes — people pay taxes. A corporate tax is either a tax on shareholders of the firm, customers of the firm, or employees of the firm. Less corporate tax means more innovation, capital savings, and spending by these groups — also known as economic growth.

Slavery and B Hussein

Jonah Goldberg makes a great point this week in his column. I had not thought about B Hussein's change ideas on "volunteerism" not really being voluntary.

Indeed, there's ample evidence that countries with intrusive, expensive welfare states stifle citizens' spirit of charity and volunteerism precisely because people conclude that government should solve every problem. Merely paying your taxes substitutes for charity, and cleaning up litter for two years absolves you from doing anything more.

This is the problem with national service mania: It seeks to fix what ain't broke. No, national service isn't slavery. But it contributes to a slave mentality, at odds with American tradition. It assumes that work not done for the government isn't really for the "common good."

Here is another good post along the sames lines....

First of all, these plans all amount to what Paul Thornton wisely labeled "generational welfare." Such plans are based on requiring service by teenagers or college students, presumably because they're all worthless young punks who wear baggy pants and listen to loud music all day, instead of pulling their weight (uphill both ways) like youngsters did back in the good old days.

I'm still waiting for the plan that requires volunteering* from able bodied retirees as a condition of receiving their social security checks, or requires a few hours a week of service from anyone getting unemployment benefits. This will never happen, of course, because it's clearly those rascally youths — who, by the way, probably need a hair cut and should definitely get off of our lawns — who are best suited for work without pay. Let them make the world a better place. We have better things to be doing.

So my advice to all the potential servitors is to forget the volunteering, and get a job, sir. Deliver a paper. Mow a lawn. Paint a house. Sling some fries. Forget about asking what you can do for your country, and start asking what you can do for another individual. Maybe they want to compensate you for it, maybe they don't. That's between you and them, and that kind of individual, private transaction is what really improves society, not "national service" or "community-based experiential learning" or "moon shots" or five year plans. Tell McCain, and Obama, and "the community" they can all go screw.

Banned...The Nanny State

From Reason.tv:

Food, Fuel and Drink

From the Economist today:

Don't Fall For B Hussein's Move To The Middle

From Jennifer Rubin at the American Spectator:

Obama has been talking a very a good game in the last few months. On taxes, for example, at the Philadelphia Democratic debate in April he swore off tax increases for the middle class, declaring, "Well, I not only have pledged not to raise their taxes, I've been the first candidate in this race to specifically say I would cut their taxes." On The View he likewise announced, "First of all, I don't want higher taxes, I have to pay taxes, and it's no fun. You know I think sometimes there's this presumption that Democrats, we just love taxing people. No, I would prefer to keep taxes as low as possible."

That sounds fairly promising. But the reality is different and McCain will need to bolster his communications effort to make sure voters understand that Obama voted to raise taxes 94 times and specifically to raise income taxes on those making as little as $31,850. Has Obama had a change or heart or is his voting record a reliable indicator of how he would govern if elected president?

Likewise on trade, Obama recently told a CNBC interviewer, "And on trade deals, I believe in free trade. And as somebody who lived overseas, who has family overseas, I've seen what's happened in terms of rising living standards around the globe. And that's a good thing for America, it's good for our national security." That is a far cry from what Obama now admits was "overheated and amplified" protectionist rhetoric he employed to beat Hillary Clinton in the primary.

And on fiscal restraint, Obama again sounds downright responsible when he declares "We account for every single dollar that we propose." However, independent fact checkers point out that Obama hasn't come close to specifying the revenues he wants to raise and the amounts he plans to spend. David Brooks explained that there is just not enough money to pay for all his domestic wish list by simply soaking the rich.

Obama has even been softening his language on corporate taxes. He told the Wall Street Journal in June that he would be open to reducing corporate tax rates. But it is unclear whether he really means it. Just a couple of months ago he told Tim Russert on Meet the Press that planned reductions for corporate taxes were "the exact wrong prescription for America."

Liberal politics wins you a Democrat nomination, not a general election. It should really be no surprise that B Hussein is on the move to the middle. The real question will be what will he actually do if he actually wins? My guess is he will move back to left where his voting record clearly shows his position on issues. However, now that he is a rich man......?

OPEC's Biggest Ally...Congress

Great column today from Walter Williams.

Congressional attacks on speculation do not alter the oil market's fundamental demand and supply conditions. What would lower the long-term price of oil is for Congress to permit exploration for the estimated billions upon billions of barrels of oil domestically available, not to mention the estimated trillion-plus barrels of shale oil in Wyoming, Colorado and Utah. Some politicians pooh-pooh calls for drilling, saying it would take five or 10 years to recover the oil. I guarantee you we would begin to see a reduction in today's prices even if it took five to 10 years for us to get the first barrel. Put yourself in the place of an OPEC member knowing there would be a greater supply of U.S. oil five or 10 years, hence maybe driving oil prices lower to say $40 a barrel. What will you want to do now while oil is $130 a barrel? You would want to sell as much oil now and OPEC's collective efforts to do so would put downward pressures on current oil prices. Right now the U.S. Congress is OPEC's staunchest ally.

Environmentalists' Time Machine

The one thing that really bothers me about the environmental movement is that many of these groups want to reduce the standard of living of Americans back to what it was in the 1500's. This Editorial in IBD does a good job of shedding light on the true motive of the environmental extremists. Personally, I do not want to hop in the time machine and travel back 500 years.

When The Bills Come Due

There is a good editorial today in the NYT about New Jersey's struggle to pay off the $32B debt that reckless prior governors and legislators ran up in order to appease voters. Ultimately, the challenge is now one where the debt has grown so large that interest payments are becoming a problem to pay. In fact, the State of New Jersey now has to come up with over $2B annually to cover interest alone.

Fortunately Gov. Corzine has said enough is enough. He actually pushed a budget that is less this year than last year. Not a decrease in growth (as is normally a politician's way of saying he cut spending), but a real decrease in money for 2009 vs. 2008. The Governor's good work is going to produce a $650M windfall to pay down the debt. This sounds great, but it only reduces the cost of debt by $130M (interest). At this rate, New Jersey will never get out of debt.

This is certainly a lesson for other government entities, including the Federal Government. Eventually you take on so much debt that the debt service cost becomes very hard to pay. New Jersey has reached this point and the Feds are getting closer to this same point every year. In 2007, the Feds spent $430B on interest on the national debt. This was the third largest budget item in 2007.

In 2008, the national debt will exceed $10T! This is not what is promised in future benefits (that number is closer to $60T), but the actual federal debt, money that has already been borrowed. This figure represents over $33,000 in debt for every citizen in the country. For a family of four it is a debt over $133,000. Most families do not even have a mortgage this large, but they are being force to cover the interest expense on this debt.

It is time to get this spending under control before we mortgage the future of our children and put the Federal Government in the same position as New Jersey. Vote for fiscal restraint and smaller government and save our children's future.

Congress and OPEC

Good perspective from IBD.

Congress and Opec

New polls show that Americans, far from thinking that we can do nothing, want Congress to drill, and drill some more if necessary, to break the energy crisis.

A Pew Research poll out Wednesday found that 47% say exploring and drilling for more oil and building new power plants should be the top priority for U.S. energy policy, up from 35% in February. And 50% now say they favor drilling in ANWR, up from 42%.

That follows a Rasmussen poll in June showing that 67% of Americans support drilling for more oil, and 64% think it will help bring down the price of energy.

Cartoon Of The Day

Good Reading

There are a couple very good articles today.

The Ultimate Resource
Dire News From My Colleagues
Does Patriotism Matter?

Three Great American Ideas
Let's Get Our Fact Straight

Sowell On the Supreme Court

Thomas Sowell writes a very important column today that really stresses the importance of this Presidential race. In fact, the next President could appoint as many as 3 new Supreme Court Justices. These are the same people that can influence American life for 25-30 years. For example, Justice Stevens was appointed by President Ford in 1975 and has been learning toward a more liberal position on the Court for 33 years now.

So ask yourself the question: Would you rather have Supreme Court Justices that interpret the Constitution as McCain or B Hussein? The Conservative, small-government position of McCain or the Liberal, big-government position of B Hussein? This is no small question to answer as our vote in November will determine the future of our children and grandchildren for the next 20 to 30 years. The 8 years that B Hussein could be President are nothing compared to the 30 years of policy he might influence. That is 10% of all American history.

High Stakes Courts