Free kibbles

SOCIALISM:

Wisconsin unions threaten to boycott businesses that don't put a poster supporting them in their window. Why is this any different than any other politically motivated boycott?

The Chevy Volt is another real life example from Atlas Shrugged.

ECONOMY:

Explaining why unemployment is so bad.

"The last two recessions have changed that standard pattern. The blue line, at a February 2011 level of 108.3 million private-sector jobs, is lower than it was way back in June 1999 at 108.6 million jobs. In the more than 11 intervening years, through immigration and natural growth the (civilian noninstitutional) US population has increased by 31 million people. And yet we have fewer private-sector jobs in the country now than in mid-1999."

That should scare the crap out of everybody.

TAX AND SPEND:

Conservative propagandists are blaming Obama for spending signed into law by Bush. Granted, Democrats controlled both sides of Congress, but Bush signed on. That's how it always works. The party in power loots the American people as much as it can. When the people finally get fed up, they put the other party in power, and the party which just lost power demands the party newly in power be fiscally responsible: i.e. loot less than they did when they were in power. It's a joke.

Many people have the unfortunate tendency to fixate on the executive when complaining about big government. Thanks to Walter Williams for reminding us that Congress controls the power of the purse, not the president, and it began trashing the Constitution the first minute it was inaugurated.

The CBO says Obama's budget underestimated the deficit by $2.3 trillion over 10 years. It'll be way worse than that.

FEDERAL RESERVE:

Supreme Court refuses to hear appeal by the Fed that hoped to save it from having to reveal the banks it massively bailed out in 2008. This is a crucial point: government has all the power. The Fed can only do what it does because government created it. Government can audit it. Government can order it around. Government seize it. Government can abolish it. Government has all the power just like it has all the power in its dealings with corporations and everybody else.

Joseph Salerno slaps down Ben Bernanke.

Not only does the government and the Fed manipulate food out of the CPI in order to hide inflation, it chooses food items to further hide it.

"According to Miniplenty, the all item inflation index for consumers rose at a 0.5% monthly rate in February 2011, and a 2.1% annual rate. Seasonally adjusted ‘food at home’, essentially the measure of grocery prices, registered a 0.2% monthly increase and a 1.6% annual increase.When you peel back these numbers and dive into the details, though, the story gets more interesting. You see, in a single month, the index for fruits and vegetables rose 2.2%, fresh vegetables rose 6.7%, the meat index rose nearly 2%, and the dairy index rose 0.6%.
Coincidentally, the US Department of Agriculture recommends multiple servings daily of fruits and vegetables, and daily servings of poultry, dairy, etc. How is it possible that the staple foods which make up this pyramid rose 0.6% to 6.7% in a single month, yet Miniplenty’s index only rose 0.2%?
Clearly for the purposes of calculating food inflation, the government expects everyone to eat Ramen Noodles and other chemically manufactured food-like substances… not the recommendations of its own Agriculture Department."

This is not good for paleos.

Hacker group Anonymous targets the Fed. They're going to get busted.

HEALTH CARE:

Obamacare likely to force some hospitals out of business. Of course it will. Regulations always force marginal providers out of business because they raise the price of doing business. That's a law of economics.

GLOBAL WARMING AND ENERGY:

Frauds proven wrong about Kilimanjaro too, which is regaining its snow cap. Wrong about lost snow in the Sierra Nevadas too.

How government ruined the washing machine. Don't get rid of your old washer.

WAR:

Trophy pictures taken by members of an American unit in Afghanistan who murdered civilians then posed with the bodies are about to be revealed.

"An investigation by Der Spiegel has unearthed approximately 4,000 photos and videos taken by the men."

And we wonder why they hate us. I have a plan that is guaranteed to put an end these attrocities: end the wars. Bring our troops home.

The bombing in Libya is far more extensive than just creating a no-fly zone. Imagine that. Remember British special forces are working with the rebels. Claim that the war in Libya is a distraction to enable the Saudis to put down protesters in their own country and Bahrain.

"Simply put, the out-of-character US delays and back-and-forth statements and policy changes on Libya which provided Gaddafi free rein to advance and almost defeat the rebels was all a sideshow and diversion. Remember this was thought necessary before the sudden earthquake and tidal wave in Japan to keep the Saudi invasion, threat of genocide in Bahrain and against Shiites in the Saudi oil region off the front pages and cable news shows until the revolutions there could be contained."

I claimed yesterday that the western policy enables the war to continue to so more people will die instead of just wiping out Qaddafi's forces. That's exactly what you would expect for a distraction.

"The fiat US dollar only survives as the world’s reserve currency because the majority of the oil producers demand payment in dollars. The important significance of this was detailed in Anthony Wile’s recent "Mid-East Conflict Not Exactly About Oil" which appeared last week in The Daily Bell. Although Iran now sells oil in other currencies, the other major oil-producing nations still demand payment for oil in US dollars thus requiring ALL nations to utilize dollars as a reserve currency."

So it's more about the dollar than the oil.

Jeffrey Tucker explains the government's definition of defense: obey or die.

"Granting the monopoly power to the state for purposes of "defending" the people against some enemy (private crime, religious fanaticism, a foreign foe, or whatever) is something that elicits near-universal agreement on the Right and the Left. Those intellectuals in several centuries who have brought into question this fundamental power — not just how it is used but the existence of the power itself — can be counted on two hands and maybe even one."

But that isn't supposed to be how it is in the US. The Constitution acknowledges the natural right of people to keep and bear arms so the people can secure themselves. It says so right there in the second amendment. Further, I'm not sold on this idea that private competing security companies will be any different that governments. What is the US government but a security organization for Americans that competes with the security company for Canadians and the security company for Mexicans and other security organizations around the world. Obviously it would be wonderful if we could change security companies without having to move, but I see no reason why private security companies wouldn't use violence to stop us from doing that the same as government's do. The same type of thugs who are attracted to government and who rise to the top will be attracted to private security firms and rise to the top there too. That's why ultimately, being armed and trained is the only security we can ever count on.

"Defense in the free society (including such defense services to person and property as police protection and judicial findings) would therefore have to be supplied by people or firms who (a) gained their revenue voluntarily rather than by coercion and (b) did not — as the State does — arrogate to themselves a compulsory monopoly of police or judicial protection. Only such libertarian provision of defense service would be consonant with a free market and a free society. Thus, defense firms would have to be as freely competitive and as noncoercive against noninvaders as are all other suppliers of goods and services on the free market. Defense services, like all other services, would be marketable and marketable only."

But what would stop them from using force against the people just like governments? Armed citizens. That's it. Such an environment would have the advantage that on private security company could claim a legitimate power to use violence against non-violent citizens as the government does, but that would only be temporary. Eventually the armed gangs would use their power to steal from us and set themselves up as a government as they always do. Armed, effective resistance by the people would be the only thing to stop them.

FOREIGN POLICY:

Yemeni military officers defect. I don't see the US bombing the Yemeni supporters though.

Palestinians increase their attacks on Israelis, firing 50 shells.

Victor Davis Hansen laments that Obama doesn't do more, faster. He must be insane. Obama is making our problems worse at a record pace.

POLITICS:

Charlie Rangel renews his call for a draft.

Atlas is shrugging.

"The latest news reports reconfirm a continuing trend we at the Sovereign Society have observed since our founding in 1997; the most recent U.S. State Department figures for 2010 show the total number of U.S. citizens formally ending their citizenship is rising at double previous rates."

But that's still a pretty small number. However...

"My friend, whom I have often quoted, John Gaver, who edits the conservative web site Action America looks at this from a different angle: “What these lists fail to show is the vast and increasing numbers of wealthy U.S. citizens who are just ‘dropping out’ – taking all of their wealth and leaving the U.S. without renouncing. They just disappear off the U.S. tax rolls and appear on some other country’s tax rolls.”Based on data in polls conducted between 2005 and 2007 suggest perhaps 3 million U.S. citizens each year go abroad to live. That number, if true, is a big increase over previous years. Of special interest, the largest number of relocating households is not those with people approaching retirement, but rather those with young adults ranging from 25 to 34 years old."

That's huge.

"I have previously explained the onerous 2008 “exit tax” the U.S. Congress and George Bush imposed on those who exercise their constitutional right to end citizenship. The only other countries that imposed a tax on those citizens who sought to expatriate were Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia and apartheid South Africa.Now the ever-vigilant U.S. Internal Revenue Service has joined with the State Department for the first time, linking new and renewable passport applications to the IRS. New forms for renewing a U.S. passport state that as part of the Privacy Act information that data will be provided to the U.S. Treasury and the IRS."

Police state tactics will only accelerate the exodus.

The US is collapsing under government debt and fiat money. Japan is reeling from a tsunami. Obama started another war in another Muslim country. Revolution is lighting up the Middle East. So what do politicians in Washington do? Party. What does the president do? Hits the beach in Brazil. What does the stock market do? Up 178. The collapsing Roman empire looked stable compared to our society.

MISC:

NASA wants to build Star Trek-like radiation shields at our expense.

It turns out Britons were building fine roads before the Romans invaded.

Well deserved praise for the heroes of Japan. Yakuza sends truckloads of supplies for earthquake relief. But where did those supplies come from? If they were stolen or extorted, they're still thieves. If they were earned providing voluntarily paid for services on the black market, more power to them.