How The Obama Precedent Empowered Trump, by Victor Davis Hanson, at victorhanson.com. Excerpt from the article: “A supposedly disinterested media’s ecstasy over Obama’s election ensured that its subsequent revulsion at Trump could be taken no more seriously. Once a journalist declares a president a god or capable of sending shocks down one’s leg, then he would be no more credible if he were to pronounce another president the anti-Christ or capable of causing boils on one’s appendages…….A critical media is not a mere reset button that one turns on and off at one’s convenience. Instead, once it was short-circuited after 2008, its burned-out switch cannot be flipped back on in 2007. In sum, there is no longer a believable media that can offer credible critiques of the Trump presidency.”
Sock Puppets Taken To An Entirely New Level: ‘Click’ Farms Of 10,000 Phones That Give FAKE Likes, by John Lott, at johnrlott.blogspot.com. Fake likes produce fake stats about which stories are trending on social media. You now have the ability to manufacture fake outrage. Related article – Up To 15% Of Twitter Accounts Are Fake, Study Finds, at zerohedge.com.
Donald Trump’s Big Problem, He Doesn’t Understand Power, at targetliberty.com. Trump is an outsider who doesn’t understand the game played by the insiders.
Dismantle The FBI, And Give Its Money Back To The States, by Ryan McMaken, at mises.org. The FBI has turned into a big bloated money-grubbing political bureaucracy. Its goal is to make sure the FBI is declared the winner in every situation. It’s job of law enforcement can be done better and cheaper if it was decentralized. The leadership of the FBI, (not the rank and file agents), aren’t the guys wearing the white hats like they have been portrayed.
Public-Sector Unions Keep The Gravy Train Flowing To Fire Departments, by Ryan McMaken, at mises.org. Another example of “public servants” feeding at the public trough. From 1980 to 2013 fire runs have declined from 3Million to 1.24 million. In a free market, as demand for a service decreases the supply of that service shrinks also. In the public sector the opposite seems to happen. Government public servants want to protect or increase their skimming operation at the taxpayers expense. Excerpt from the article: “Don’t let these facts get in the way of the romantic view of firefighting perpetuated by popular culture. No organization loves the fantasy version of firefighting better than the public unions that lobby constantly for more lucrative salaries and benefits for firefighters.”
Wind Turbines Are Neither Clean Nor Green And They Provide Zero Global Energy, by Matt Ridley, at spectator.co.uk. Can the taxpayer subsidized experiment of green energy finally be coming to an end? All the money, resources, time, labor and capital that has been wasted on green energy, could have been used for more productive activities. Government “investment” is an oxymoron, because ‘bureaucrats’ aren’t “investing” their own money. Wasted resources are kept to a minimum in the private sector because businesses suffer losses. But in the public sector waste continues for longer periods of time because of the seeming unlimited supply of taxpayer money.
The reality about green energy is only optional for a little while. Read these articles. Wind Power: Michigan Voters In Three Counties Reject or Restrict It, at nationalreview.com. Oklahoma Ends Wind Tax Subsidy, at instituteforenergyresearch.org. Europe Has Little Output To Show For Its Wind And Solar Investments, at instituteforenergyresearch.org.
More Solar Jobs Is A Curse, Not A Blessing, at cfact.org. More workers employed in an industry that produces higher cost energy is a bad thing. It has taken longer for economic principles to correct for these non productive uses of resources, time, labor and capital. The tax payer money that government has invested in these non productive activities has distorted the market. The inevitable correction is happening. Fortunately economic laws always win.
The Other Shoe Drops: Prime Auto Loan Losses Surge As Recoveries Tumble, at zerohedge.com. Instead of decreasing supply to match decreasing demand, the auto industry brought future demand into the present by pushing subprime loans and low payment leases. We are going to see an over-supply of used cars because the leases have ended and also because of subprime loan defaults. There is no present demand to support the over production because demand was borrowed from the future to keep the car manufacturing plants operating in the present.
CARTOONS
AUSTRIAN ECONOMICS ADDICT 