Crazy Talk

It seems there is a petition going around asking Congress to not do anything rash to our economic system:

As economists, we want to express to Congress our great concern for the plan proposed by Treasury Secretary Paulson to deal with the financial crisis. We are well aware of the difficulty of the current financial situation and we agree with the need for bold action to ensure that the financial system continues to function. We see three fatal pitfalls in the currently proposed plan:

1) Its fairness. The plan is a subsidy to investors at taxpayers’ expense. Investors who took risks to earn profits must also bear the losses. Not every business failure carries systemic risk. The government can ensure a well-functioning financial industry, able to make new loans to creditworthy borrowers, without bailing out particular investors and institutions whose choices proved unwise.

2) Its ambiguity. Neither the mission of the new agency nor its oversight are clear. If taxpayers are to buy illiquid and opaque assets from troubled sellers, the terms, occasions, and methods of such purchases must be crystal clear ahead of time and carefully monitored afterwards.

3) Its long-term effects. If the plan is enacted, its effects will be with us for a generation. For all their recent troubles, Americas dynamic and innovative private capital markets have brought the nation unparalleled prosperity. Fundamentally weakening those markets in order to calm short-run disruptions is desperately short-sighted.

For these reasons we ask Congress not to rush, to hold appropriate hearings, and to carefully consider the right course of action, and to wisely determine the future of the financial industry and the U.S. economy for years to come.

We ask Congress not to rush…carefully consider…wisely determine…???

Don’t these people know there is a crisis?? As such the American people require, nay! the American people demand that Congress run around like a chicken with its head cut off.

To do otherwise is clearly the mark of insanity.

(h/t to Volokh)

“It’s A Miracle!”

So the Dow Jones jumps up 2.5% this morning. Could it be that folks are realizing that the defeat of the sellout bailout doesn’t mark the end of Western Civilization?  Even the credit markets are easing a bit. Of course, that is impossible. People on television told me so.

I’m gonna sprain my eyes by rolling them so much.

Noblesse Oblige Declined

Over at The Glittering Eye this piece by David Brooks get quoted approvingly:

House Republicans led the way and will get most of the blame. It has been interesting to watch them on their single-minded mission to destroy the Republican Party. Not long ago, they led an anti-immigration crusade that drove away Hispanic support. Then, too, they listened to the loudest and angriest voices in their party, oblivious to the complicated anxieties that lurk in most American minds.

TGE adds:

I believe that what he characterizes as destroying the Republican Party is, in fact, the triumph of ideology over pragmatism and the consequence of the attempts to transform our catch-all parties into programmatic ones that are going on in both parties. Ideologues can’t agree; they are peculiarly unsuited to democratic republican government in which compromise is mandatory.

That’s what James Madison warned against in Federalist #10

Well, not really. I think what we are witnessing is just how much we have forgotten what the House of Representatives is supposed to be like. As I said over in the comments at TGE:

“Uh, what if they simply thought it was a crappy bill? Maybe they didn’t want to be stampeded into doing ’something!’ at the expense of doing ‘the right thing.’

“That is what makes Brooks’ statements so silly. Sure, average people feel anxious about the economy, but that doesn’t mean they want Congress to do something stupid just so they can say they did ’something.’

“And hell, if the Democrats actually believed this was the right thing to do they might have tried fighting for it. Obviously, they didn’t…so what does that say about the legislation?

“Besides, does Brooks really think that the calls, letter and emails that were flooding into elected officals offices (running 100-1 or more AGAINST this bailout) were really just the ideological wing of the Republican party? Thats just stupid.

“As for Madison, he didn’t have ideologies in mind because ideologies, as we think of them, were not an intellectual category back then. The idea of ‘faction’ is much more closely related to ruling political coalitions, in the Roman Republican sense. Indeed, Madison was a better (small ‘d’) democrat than you give him credit for. I really don’t think he would have had a problem if members of the House listened more closely to their constituents than other branches of government. Hell, if we are going to base this on the Federalist Papers, shouldnt we expect the Senate to go forward in a more august and thoughtful manner? (The answer is ‘yes’ they are supposed to do just that.) But did they? NO! They refuse to even begin the process by voting up or down on this measure. And why is that? Basically they are cowards who don’t want to get exposed during an election year.

“It is the ruling elite, as a whole, of this country that is failing us so badly and not this or that party or ideological wing. Brooks will never recognize that because he is so emeshed within the elites’ pattern of thinking. For him the elites ARE the country, so what they say should go, and the rest of the American people should feel themselves lucky that the elite lower themselves to do our thinking for us.”

I could have gone on. There were spontaeous demonstrations against the bailout all over the country. Did you hear or see one break out in favor of it? The notion that it is illegitimate for the most representative body in our national government to pay attention to the people writ large is deeply anti-democratic. Indeed, we are being asked, yet again, to suspend the normal process of making legislation because the elite want the money quickly. When people starting asking why, the response amounted to, “You wouldn’t understand ‘why.’ But trust us, its for your own good.”

Brooks still isn’t sure why that wasn’t good enough for us.

I Am Shocked!

Well…maybe I’m not shocked:

A READER AT A MAJOR NEWSROOM EMAILS: “Off the record, every suspicion you have about MSM being in the tank for O is true. We have a team of 4 people going thru dumpsters in Alaska and 4 in arizona. Not a single one looking into Acorn, Ayers or Freddiemae. Editor refuses to publish anything that would jeopardize election for O, and betting you dollars to donuts same is true at NYT, others. People cheer when CNN or NBC run another Palin-mocking but raising any reasonable inquiry into obama is derided or flat out ignored. The fix is in, and its working.” I asked permission to reprint without attribution and it was granted.

How much you wanna bet editors all across the country are asking their I/T guys if its possible to see if this “traitor” is in their office?

I’m sure they would just want to take them to lunch.

Amen

Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt has responded in the only appropriate manner to the Gestapo tactics of the Obama campaign in attempting to use the state to stifle dissent:

St. Louis County Circuit Attorney Bob McCulloch, St. Louis City Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce, Jefferson County Sheriff Glenn Boyer, and Obama and the leader of his Missouri campaign Senator Claire McCaskill have attached the stench of police state tactics to the Obama-Biden campaign.

What Senator Obama and his helpers are doing is scandalous beyond words, the party that claims to be the party of Thomas Jefferson is abusing the justice system and offices of public trust to silence political criticism with threats of prosecution and criminal punishment.

This abuse of the law for intimidation insults the most sacred principles and ideals of Jefferson. I can think of nothing more offensive to Jefferson’s thinking than using the power of the state to deprive Americans of their civil rights. The only conceivable purpose of Messrs. McCulloch, Obama and the others is to frighten people away from expressing themselves, to chill free and open debate, to suppress support and donations to conservative organizations targeted by this anti-civil rights, to strangle criticism of Mr. Obama, to suppress ads about his support of higher taxes, and to choke out criticism on television, radio, the Internet, blogs, e-mail and daily conversation about the election.

Barack Obama needs to grow up. Leftist blogs and others in the press constantly say false things about me and my family. Usually, we ignore false and scurrilous accusations because the purveyors have no credibility. When necessary, we refute them. Enlisting Missouri law enforcement to intimidate people and kill free debate is reminiscent of the Sedition Acts - not a free society.

The Obama campaign is a national disgrace.

Agreeable Sort, Isn’t He?

Very fast response by the McCain campaign.

Via Memeorandum.

Obama: A Liar, Pure And Simple

Remember hearing this from Camp Obama, which was dutifully parroted by MSM today from Bangor to San Diego:

Congressman Blunt just confirmed what’s been clear since John McCain rode into Washington at the eleventh hour -– Sen. McCain’s political theatrics succeeded only in stopping a bipartisan deal. During the most serious economic crisis of our time, we don’t need erratic posturing, we need steady leadership to protect American taxpayers and put our economy back on track.

Well, it turns out this is an out and out lie. Here is what Roy Blunt actually said:

I do think that John McCain was very helpful in what he did. I saw him this morning, we’ve been talking with his staff. Clearly, yesterday, his position on that discussion yesterday was one that stopped a deal from finalizing that no House Republican in my view would have been for, which means it wouldn’t have probably passed the House. Now, Democrats are in the majority. They can pass anything they want to without a single Republican vote, but they don’t seem to be willing to do that. I’m pleased we can have negotiations now that get us back towards things that we think can protect the taxpayers better, create more options, and frankly be better understood in the country than the plan—the path we were on a couple of days ago.

Lying comes as easy to this group as attempting to stifle free speech.

Can you feel the hope?

I’m Not Being Quiet On Purpose

In fact, if you ever head over to The Iconic Midwest you would see that I’ve not been “quiet” at all. The trouble is I’ve set myself a certain standard for my postings over here. Gaius has set the tone of this blog, and a good one it is. When I feel I have things to say in that mode there is no better place on the web to reach a classy readership than right here at the Crabitat.

The thing is, I’ve not been in that mode very often of late. The rigors of the campaign season and, especially, the tenor of the Obama campaign have not been conducive to calm reasoned discourse. I know, I know…I shouldn’t let them get to me, but when you add an “in the tank” media to the mix, a little vicious invective doesn’t seem so bad.

The upshot is I’m gonna try to add more of my two cents over here a little more often…at least the less screed like portions of it. Aren’t you lucky?

Fleas

I realize that the abject “main stream” media will suppress this, just as they suppressed the contents of Iranian president Mahmud Ahmadinejad’s vile speech at the UN. But had a major Republican fundraiser done this, the media would be positively spasming right now.

An Obama fundraiser - a major one - has proudly met the Iranian president and overtly offered to subvert American law to suck up to the vicious, little anti-Semite.

And she’s bragging about it, too. Apparently without “preparations”, Code Pink founders Jodie Evans and Medea Benjamin met with Iranian president and raging anti-Semite Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in New York. Evans wears another hat in this election as well; she has pledged to raise over $50,000 for Barack Obama as one of his main bundlers:

Calling it a “major step forward” in relations between Iran and the United States, leading activists Medea Benjamin and Jodie Evans of CODEPINK Women for Peace — along with more than 150 other U.S. peace group representatives — met Wednesday afternoon with Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad here following his appearance at the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday.

Ed Morissey is right here - either the Obama campaign returns the money or they deserve the fleas they get from the company they keep.

Gambit

I’ve been reading quite a few news sources and blogs. The word “gambit” comes up a lot in reference to John McCain’s sudden announcement that he will suspend his campaign in order to return to Washington to help broker a deal on the Wall Street bailout.

As a tactical move, it’s pretty strong. He’s - again - grabbed the national news spotlight. The media is going bonkers over this, as are most of the blogs, left and right. Look at Memeorandum right now - McCain has pretty much sucked all the media/blog attention up with this.

As a strategic move, it is either very risky or absolutely brilliant.

IF McCain helps broker a deal and IF that deal contains a poison pill for Wall Street executives in the form of pay restrictions in return for taking the Federal Money, I think McCain wins his gambit. The pay limits would play very, very well with Main Street America. And it would make Obama’s refusal to quit campaigning and fund raising look very, very narcissistic.

It’s a gutsy move. McCain has already scared the socks off of Harry Reid with this one - because it could be a real political dambuster, depending on how it plays out.

Super Genius

Some remarks from Joe Biden:

First:

Ad Biden called ‘terrible’ only ran six times

That Obama campaign ad mocking John McCain’s computer illiteracy only ran 6 times, according to CNN’s ad consultant Evan Tracey of TNS Media Intelligence/CMAG.

The ad, which Biden called ‘terrible’ Monday in an off-the-cuff comment to CBS News, also appeared to only air in the Washington, DC area, though it was heavily reported in blogs and news reports.

Next:

Biden garbles Depression history

“When the stock market crashed, Franklin Roosevelt got on the television and didn’t just talk about the princes of greed,” Biden told Couric. “He said, ‘Look, here’s what happened.’”

As Reason’s Jesse Walker footnotes it: “And if you owned an experimental TV set in 1929, you would have seen him. And you would have said to yourself, ‘Who is that guy? What happened to President Hoover?’”

And last but not least:

Biden: ‘No coal plants here in America’

Some great rope line video from Joe Biden’s recent Ohio swing, where he was asked by an anti-pollution campaigner about clean coal — a controversial approach in Democratic circles for which Obama has voiced support, particularly during the Kentucky primary.

Biden’s apparent answer: He supports clean coal for China, but not for the United States.

“No coal plants here in America,” he said. “Build them, if they’re going to build them, over there. Make them clean.”

“We’re not supporting clean coal,” he said of himself and Obama. They do, on paper, support clean coal.

Obviously, the man is a pure, unadulterated, one-of-a-kind genius!

No, not Joe Biden. Karl Rove for making Obama pick Biden pick Biden as a running mate.

Sheer genius.

For the left, Sarah Palin is inexperienced. Their VP candidate is ultra-experienced. In making himself look like an idiot, if nothing else.

Data Points

Disappeared from the American Media as far as I can tell:

FBI searches apartment of man implicated in Palin email hacking case

WASHINGTON - The FBI searched the residence of the son of a Democratic state legislator in Tennessee over the weekend looking for evidence linking the young man to the hacking of Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s personal email account, two law enforcement officials told The Associated Press on Monday.

David Kernell, 20, has not returned repeated phone calls or emails from the AP since last week. His lawyer said Monday the family is going through a difficult period.

It was up - very, very briefly, at CNN, but now I can’t find it there and searching for it there locks up the browser.

And Rusty at Jawa Report broke a major - really major - report that prompted a response from the target of his investigation:

Ethan Winner responds. Written like a VP in a public relations firm that specializes in crisis management and grassroots organization. I’ll post the whole thing below.

He produced the video? He paid for the voice-over narration which he found through a talent agency? The voice-over artist has never done any work for the Obama campaign?

He then goes on to sidestep the question of the lie he puts forth in the video: that Palin was a member of the Alaskan Independence Party — which she wasn’t. That is empirical fact.

Instead, in his carefully crafted explanation of the video, he claims she once attended the party’s convention and that her husband was a member. But that’s not what the video claims. The video claims she was a member. That is a lie.

I take it back, this sounds more like the company lawyer, Justyn Winner, crafted the response. You don’t defend the lie, instead you talk about everything but the lie. It might work to confuse juries Justyn, but come on dude!

Do I find his response hard to believe. Yes I do. I would especially note the carefully crafted future tense usage for when he will pay the voice over artist.

So, we have two different people, well connected to the Democrats actively engaged in trying to smear Sarah Palin.

Two points define a line. One appears to be a criminal action, the other, at the least, actionable in a civil court. Possibly criminal as well, if ties to the Obama campaign could be proven.

You, apparently, won’t be reading about either of these in the American media.

Six For Pallbearers

James Crumley has died at age 68.

Mr. Crumley’s plots did not always make perfect sense, but they probably were not meant to: in a world where nearly everyone is guilty of something heinous, finding out whodunit is largely beside the point. But if critics faulted his plotting, they routinely praised his complex, broken characters and hurtling, hard-edged prose.

“The Last Good Kiss,” widely considered Mr. Crumley’s masterwork, opens this way:

“When I finally caught up with Abraham Trahearne, he was drinking beer with an alcoholic bulldog named Fireball Roberts in a ramshackle joint just outside of Sonoma, California, drinking the heart right out of a fine spring afternoon.”

Though Mr. Crumley’s books attracted a devoted readership, they were never best sellers.

I read Crumley’s first novel, One to Count Cadence about the time it came out in 1969. I’ve had a paperback edition ever since it came out. My oldest boy is reading it right now, in fact. The characters in his books were so clearly drawn that you could feel them and hear their voices. (This poem is where Crumley got the title for The Last Good Kiss, incidentally.)

I’ll miss him.

Faint Praise

Well, Bill Clinton is campaigning for Barack Obama. Sort of. Except for the fact that he has more praise for Hillary, John McCain and Sarah Palin than for the Democratic party candidate. Thank heavens he didn’t mention Joe Biden.

However in a rare television interview tonight the former president called Republican presidential candidate John McCain “a great man” and praised GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin as an “instinctively effective candidate.”

On a day when Obama sought to convince voters that he’s best able to handle the economic crisis, the former president said it was his wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-NY, who gave today “the most detailed position.”

In an interview with CNBC’s Maria Bartiromo, Clinton, who has tried to put to rest rumors of tensions between himself and Obama said, “I’ve never concealed my admiration and affection for Senator McCain. I think he’s a great man.

Oh, Bubba kept trying to swear that he thought Obama would win, but the conviction is not there - go read it for yourself. Note also the hint at a October Surprise that might turn the Obama campaign right on its ear.

Hmmm. One wonders of something is up.

Global Coldening, Round Two

Not to be outdone by my esteemed colleague and valued Adjunct Blogger, Rich, I thought I’d add this tidbit about global cooling. The venerable Old Farmer’s Almanac (not to be confused with the upstart Farmer’s Almanac, which started publishing 26 years later than the one we’re talking about here) is predicting a global cooling period - or maybe even a mini-ice age.

The 2009 edition, published earlier this month, predicts that the earth already has entered a sustained period of global cooling.

True to form, the almanac also includes tips on gardening and how to stay warm all winter with just one log.

“The next 20 years, it’s going to be colder,” said Sarah Perreault, assistant editor of the Old Farmer’s Almanac. “We do recognize that (global cooling) could be offset by greenhouse gasses and other human effects on the earth, but we’re trending toward the cool period now.”

The almanac is predicting a period of global cooling partly due to the lack of sunspots, a situation which some scientists believe causes cooling on the sun and, subsequently, the earth.

Perreault said the staff still uses the weather prediction method devised by almanac founder Robert B. Thomas, using a combination of solar sciences, meteorology and climatology.

“Obviously we have more technology now,” she said. “We have the benefit of having more information than he had, but it’s basically the same.”

The almanac claims an 80% success rate for its predictions. Take that, Al.