Everyone has an agenda, me included. Look for them. They’re embedded in everything you see, hear, and read. You…YOU…have to be informed and stay informed. Take nothing at face value. You…YOU…have to be ready.
Remember this guy?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjMTNPXYu-Y&feature=related
It’s not just Rahm who thinks that. All of the power players think the same thing: “How can I take this crisis and use it to my advantage? How far can I go? Can I get away with doing things I couldn’t otherwise do?”
There’s another crisis coming, another Lehman-like event or perhaps larger.
As I’ve stated before, the solution to America’s economic dilemma is obvious:
1. Drive a stake through the heart of the regulatory process, including labor regulations, environmental regulations, business regulations. If you’re an employee and not a business person, you don’t have a good understanding of just how much time business folks waste filing paperwork with government bureaucrats. The hours wasted doing this don’t produce anything of economic value, nor do the hourly wages paid to the regulators who read the reports, file them, or do whatever it is they do with them. For all I know, they tear them up into four inch squares and put them in the restrooms. All of this for the privilege of earning a living.
2. Drive a stake through the heart of the central bank currency manipulators who make it impossible to know from one day to the next what our money is going to be worth. How the hell can I price a long term contract when the value of the dollar goes up and down by ten percent or more on a monthly basis because of the actions of some appointed board of wise men? Can you imagine trying to do a cost-benefit study on building a factory where your investment recovery time is measured in years and some of your customers will be paying you with foreign currencies? You’d have to be insane to invest hard-earned money in such a thing while there are still madmen running central banks.
3. Lower business taxes drastically. Why do you think GE offshores all of its earnings? The corporate tax rate in Hong Kong is 16%; ours is 35%. Who in their right mind would commit capital here? We want earnings repatriated and reinvested HERE.
4. Reform entitlements through means-testing, raising eligibility ages, and by REDUCING THE NEED FOR THEM THROUGH REINVIGORATING THE ECONOMY! PEOPLE NEED JOBS, NOT UNEMPLOYMENT AND WELFARE CHECKS! DUH!
But, since the CONgress gets all of its power and all of its ability to squeeze campaign contributions from its ability to extort business using the regulatory and tax codes, the necessary changes above are impossible. It’s impossible for them to even think in these terms.
And that’s the reason for this warning. Instead of getting out of the way, as this new crisis unfolds CONgress and the Fed can be counted on to embark on more interference, more interventions, more regulations, more control, and if things get bad enough, virtually anything is possible.
Liberty and prosperity go hand-in-hand. American history is proof of this. People working hard for their own enlightened self interest are the most creative and productive people the world has ever seen. THEY’RE ALSO THE MOST FREE. A rising tide really does lift all boats. But “allowing” prosperity would be tantamount to “allowing” liberty. And it seems that just can’t be allowed, not even by the so-called “conservatives.”
I really hope I’m wrong.
