June 07, 2006
Help For Americans
By: Walter Williams
John Stossel, ABC's "20/20" anchorman, has a recently released book about the various untruths we accept, many from the media and academic elite. The book is appropriately titled "Myths, Lies and Downright Stupidity."
Being a longtime media insider, Stossel is well positioned to talk about the media's gross lack of understanding that often becomes part of the conventional wisdom. Stossel gives many examples; let's look at a few.
We're sometimes presented with television scenes of starving people, and it's often blamed on overpopulation. Ted Turner warned, "There are lots of problems in the world caused by too many people." News articles warn of "the population bomb" and the "tidal wave of humanity," and people call for subsidies for birth control.
Stossel says that one writer, worrying about Niger, said that birthrates must be reduced drastically or the world will face permanent famine. Viewers and readers are left with the idea that the problem is the number of people, but that's nonsense. Niger's population density is nine people per square kilometer; however, population density in the United States is 28 per square kilometer, Japan 340, the Netherlands 484, and Hong Kong 6,621. One would have to be brain-dead to argue that high population density causes poverty and starvation. A better argument is oppressive and corrupt governments.
Continue reading "Help For Americans"
Posted by redguy at 06:43 AM | TrackBack (2)
May 24, 2006
Click It Or Ticket
By Walter E. Williams
Virginia's secretary of transportation sent out a letter announcing the state's annual "Click It or Ticket" campaign May 22 through June 4. I responded to the secretary of transportation with my own letter that in part reads:
"Mr. Secretary: This is an example of the disgusting abuse of state power. Each of us owns himself, and it follows that we should have the liberty to take risks with our own lives but not that of others. That means it's a legitimate use of state power to mandate that cars have working brakes because if my car has poorly functioning brakes, I risk the lives of others and I have no right to do so. If I don't wear a seatbelt I risk my own life, which is well within my rights. As to your statement 'Lack of safety belt use is a growing public health issue that . . . also costs us all billions of dollars every year,' that's not a problem of liberty. It's a problem of socialism. No human should be coerced by the state to bear the medical expense, or any other expense, for his fellow man. In other words, the forcible use of one person to serve the purposes of another is morally offensive."
My letter went on to tell the secretary that I personally wear a seatbelt each time I drive; it's a good idea. However, because something is a good idea doesn't necessarily make a case for state compulsion. The justifications used for "Click It or Ticket" easily provide the template and soften us up for other forms of government control over our lives.
For example, my weekly exercise routine consists of three days' weight training and three days' aerobic training. I think it's a good idea. Like seatbelt use, regular exercise extends lives and reduces health care costs. Here's my question to government officials and others who sanction the "Click It or Ticket" campaign: Should the government mandate daily exercise for the same reasons they cite to support mandatory seatbelt use, namely, that to do so would save lives and save billions of health care dollars?
Continue reading "Click It Or Ticket"
Posted by redguy at 07:07 AM | TrackBack (2)
May 10, 2006
Caring Vs. Uncaring
By: Walter Williams
George Orwell admonished, "Sometimes the first duty of intelligent men is the restatement of the obvious." That's what I want to do -- talk about the obvious, starting with the question: What human motivation leads to the most wonderful things getting done?
How about the charity and selflessness we've seen from people like Mother Teresa? What about the ceaseless and laudable work of organizations like the Red Cross, Habitat for Humanity and Salvation Army? What about the charitable donations of rich Americans, to use the silly phrase, who've given something back?
While the actions of these people and their organizations are laudable, results motivated by charity and selflessness pale in comparison to other motives behind getting good things done. Let's look at it.
In December 1999, Stephen Moore and Julian L. Simon wrote an article titled "The Greatest Century That Ever Was," published by the Washington, D.C.-based Cato Institute. In it they report: Over the course of the 20th century, life expectancy increased by 30 years; annual deaths from major killer diseases such as tuberculosis, polio, typhoid, whooping cough and pneumonia fell from 700 to fewer than 50 per 100,000 of the population; agricultural workers fell from 41 to 2.5 percent of the workforce; household auto ownership rose from one to 91 percent; household electrification rose from 8 to 99 percent; controlling for inflation, household assets rose from $6 trillion to $41 trillion between 1945 and 1998. These are but a few of the wonderful things that have occurred during the 20th century.
Continue reading "Caring Vs. Uncaring"
Posted by redguy at 07:17 AM | TrackBack (1)
April 19, 2006
Is There A Federal Deficit?
By: Walter Williams
Let's push back the frontiers of ignorance about the federal deficit. To simplify things, I'll use round numbers that are fairly close to the actual numbers.
The nation's 2005 gross domestic product (GDP), what the American people produced, totaled $13 trillion. The federal government consumed $2.4 trillion, but it only received $2 trillion in tax revenues, leaving us with what's said to be a $.4 trillion budget deficit.
By the way, it's sheer constitutional ignorance to say that President Bush spends or lowers taxes. Article I, Sections 7 and 8, of the U.S. Constitution gives Congress authority to spend and tax. The president only has veto power that Congress can override.
Getting back to deficits, my question to you is this: Is there truly a deficit? The short answer is yes, but only in an accounting sense -- not in any meaningful economic sense. Let's look at it. If Congress spends $2.4 trillion but only takes in $2 trillion in taxes, who makes up that $.4 trillion shortfall that we call the budget deficit? Neither the Tooth Fairy, Santa nor the Easter Bunny makes up the difference between what's spent in 2005 and what's taxed in 2005.
Some might be tempted to answer that it's future generations who will pay. That's untrue. If the federal government consumes $2.4 trillion of what Americans produced in 2005, it must find ways to force us to spend $2.4 trillion less privately in 2005. In other words, the federal government can't spend today what's going to be produced in the future.
Continue reading "Is There A Federal Deficit?"
Posted by redguy at 01:50 PM | TrackBack (3)
April 12, 2006
Immigration VS. Gate-Crashing
By: Walter Williams
My sentiments on immigration are inscribed at the foot of the Statue of Liberty: ". . . Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore, Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door."
These words of poet Emma Lazarus served as the welcome mat for tens of millions seeking liberty and opportunity in America -- legally. Being a relatively land-rich and labor-scarce nation, immigration has always been good for our country. Plus, for most of our history, there was a guarantee that immigrants would come here to work. The alternative was starvation.
With today's welfare state, there's no such guarantee. People can come here, not work and not starve because the welfare state guarantees that they can live off the rest of us.
At the heart of today's immigration problem is its illegality. According to several estimates, there are 11 million people who are in our country illegally, mostly from Mexico. Many people, including my libertarian friends and associates, advance an argument that differs little from saying that people anywhere in the world have a right to live in the United States irrespective of our laws or preferences.
Continue reading "Immigration VS. Gate-Crashing"
Posted by redguy at 07:23 AM | TrackBack (3)
April 05, 2006
What's with George Mason?
By: Walter Williams
George Mason University's basketball team broke into national prominence, going all the way to the NCAA Final Four matchup but losing to the red hot University of Florida Gators. The Patriots' stellar performance this season is emblematic of the entrepreneurship and risk taking that long has been a feature of the University.
In 1980, when I left Temple University to join George Mason University's Economics Department, it was a little known school in northern Virginia. Dr. George Johnson, also from Temple University, was president. In an early meeting, to settle my dispute with one of the deans, I learned that Dr. Johnson was an entrepreneur with a vision. In 1983, Dr. Jim Buchanan, a former mentor during my doctoral student days at UCLA, was enticed to join our economics department, bringing with him several members of the Center for Study of Public Choice that he founded at Virginia Polytechnic Institute. In 1986, Dr. Buchanan won the Nobel Prize in Economics.
In 1986, Henry Manne was offered the deanship at our law school. At the time, the law school was less than nondescript, with most of the faculty having only a tangential academic relationship with the school. Mr. Manne was given complete control over hiring and firing. He hired legal scholars, established the Law & Economics Center and laid the groundwork for GMU Law School to become a first-rate law school.
Continue reading " What's with George Mason?"
Posted by redguy at 07:04 AM | TrackBack (0)
March 29, 2006
Judicial Activism Or Restraint
By: Walter Williams
Are federal, state and local justices appointed to office to impose their personal views on society or to interpret law? Is it a judge's duty to uphold the U.S. Constitution, and state constitutions in the cases of state and local judges, or is it their duty to uphold foreign law and United Nations treaties? Should what a judge sees as "evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society" and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights govern court decisions, or the U.S. Constitution?
It was the former, not the U.S. Constitution, that determined last year's Roper v. Simmons decision, in which the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the execution of a convicted murderer because he was 17 years old at the time of his offense. Judges have used their power to impose their own values on our society. They've ordered federal and state agencies to spend billions of dollars to carry out their favorite policies. They've ordered legislatures to raise taxes. In pursuit of their vision of justice, they've forced universities, businesses and government agencies to engage in race and sex discrimination.
Alabama Supreme Court Justice Tom Parker has little patience with his colleagues who use their office to impose their values instead of applying the written law, but he's in trouble for saying so. Judge Parker wrote an opinion article that was published in The Birmingham News on Jan. 1. It criticized the U.S. Supreme Court's 5-4 decision that banned executions for murderers who were under 18 when they committed their crimes. He also criticized his Alabama Supreme Court colleagues who followed the high court's ruling when they set aside the execution of a young Alabama death row inmate, Renaldo Adams, who was 17 at the time when he brutally raped and repeatedly stabbed a pregnant woman, then left her to die in the presence of three children.
Continue reading " Judicial Activism Or Restraint"
Posted by redguy at 04:49 PM | TrackBack (0)
March 22, 2006
Busybodies Or Tyrants?
By: Walter Williams
Some call the people behind the Washington-D.C.-based Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) busybodies, but I call them wannabe tyrants. Let's look at their agenda, which seeks greater control over our lives.
Last year, CSPI filed a lawsuit against the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to reduce the amount of salt in packaged foods. They also called for the FDA to mandate warning labels on non-diet soft drinks that consumption increases the risk of obesity, tooth decay and osteoporosis. Earlier this year, CSPI announced its intent to sue Viacom Inc. and Kellogg Company for marketing junk food to children.
CSPI has long called for excise taxes on fatty foods, cars and TV sets. Their justification is that obesity adds to Medicare and Medicaid health costs. They want some of the tax revenue used to fund exercise facilities and government fitness campaigns.
Continue reading "Busybodies Or Tyrants?"
Posted by redguy at 11:47 AM | TrackBack (4)
March 15, 2006
Youth Indoctrination Update
By: Walter Williams
Several weeks ago, I wrote about Overland High School teacher Jay Bennish's indoctrination of his geography class. In commenting on President Bush's State of the Union address, he told his 10th-graders: "Sounds a lot like the things Adolf Hitler used to say." "Bush is threatening the whole planet." "[The] U.S. wants to keep the world divided." Then he asks his class, "Who is probably the most violent nation on the planet?" and then shouts "The United States!"
After that tirade, which included many other anti-American remarks, he gave the students the "definition" of capitalism -- telling them that "capitalism is at odds with humanity, at odds with caring and compassion and at odds with human rights."
After public exposure by my column and Denver talk-show host Mike Rosen's radio interview with 16-year-old Sean Allen, who recorded Bennish's comments, and his dad, Jeff Allen, the Cherry Creek School District placed Mr. Bennish on administrative leave. The indoctrination story became nationwide news after being picked up by major media and talk radio. The overwhelming response, including that of Colorado's governor, Bill Owens, to Bennish's classroom tirade has been disgust.
Continue reading "Youth Indoctrination Update"
Posted by redguy at 07:23 AM | TrackBack (9)
March 08, 2006
Pandering To Blacks
By: Walter Williams
Presidential aspirant Hillary Clinton used Rev. Al Sharpton's Martin Luther King Jr. birthday celebration to, as Professor Shelby Steele explains, "whistle for the black vote by pandering to the black sense of grievance." In response to a question from the audience: "I need you to tell us what distinguishes Democrats from Republicans right now," Sen. Clinton answered, "When you look at the way the House of Representatives has been run, it has been run like a plantation, and you know what I'm talking about . . . " Though the audience was largely black, I doubt whether any of the attendees had any plantation experience.
Sen. Clinton was simply employing the Democrats' political rope-a-dope for blacks. As Professor Steele asks in his Wall Street Journal editorial, "Hillary's Plantation": "Must blacks have their slave past rubbed in their face simply for Hillary Clinton to make a little hay against modern-day Republicans?" Steele also asks, "Does she really see us as she projects us -- as a people so backward that our support can be won with a simple plantation reference, and the implication that Republicans are racist?"
Continue reading "Pandering To Blacks"
Posted by redguy at 09:27 AM | TrackBack (12)
March 01, 2006
How To Create Conflict
By: Walter Williams
High up on my list of annoyances are references to the United States as a democracy and the suggestion that Iraq should become a democracy. The word "democracy" appears in neither of our founding documents -- the Declaration of Independence nor the U.S. Constitution.
Our nation's founders had disdain for democracy and majority rule. James Madison, in Federalist Paper No. 10, said in a pure democracy, "there is nothing to check the inducement to sacrifice the weaker party or the obnoxious individual." During the 1787 Constitutional Convention, Edmund Randolph said that "in tracing these evils to their origin every man had found it in the turbulence and follies of democracy."
John Adams said, "Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There was never a democracy yet that did not commit suicide." Chief Justice John Marshall added, "Between a balanced republic and a democracy, the difference is like that between order and chaos." The founders knew that a democracy would lead to the same kind of tyranny suffered under King George III. Their vision for us was a republic.
Continue reading "How To Create Conflict"
Posted by redguy at 07:37 AM | TrackBack (10)
February 09, 2006
Bogus Rights
By: Walter Williams
Do people have a right to medical treatment whether or not they can pay? What about a right to food or decent housing? Would a U.S. Supreme Court justice hold that these are rights just like those enumerated in our Bill of Rights? In order to have any hope of coherently answering these questions, we have to decide what is a right. The way our Constitution's framers used the term, a right is something that exists simultaneously among people and imposes no obligation on another. For example, the right to free speech, or freedom to travel, is something we all simultaneously possess. My right to free speech or freedom to travel imposes no obligation upon another except that of non-interference. In other words, my exercising my right to speech or travel requires absolutely nothing from you and in no way diminishes any of your rights.
Contrast that vision of a right to so-called rights to medical care, food or decent housing, independent of whether a person can pay. Those are not rights in the sense that free speech and freedom of travel are rights. If it is said that a person has rights to medical care, food and housing, and has no means of paying, how does he enjoy them? There's no Santa Claus or Tooth Fairy who provides them. You say, "The Congress provides for those rights." Not quite. Congress does not have any resources of its very own. The only way Congress can give one American something is to first, through the use of intimidation, threats and coercion, take it from another American. So-called rights to medical care, food and decent housing impose an obligation on some other American who, through the tax code, must be denied his right to his earnings. In other words, when Congress gives one American a right to something he didn't earn, it takes away the right of another American to something he did earn.
Continue reading "Bogus Rights"
Posted by redguy at 09:35 PM | TrackBack (11)
February 03, 2006
Corporate Courage
By: Walter Williams
We all remember last year's despicable U.S. Supreme Court 5-4 Kelo v. City of New London, Conn., decision that held as constitutional that the rightful property of one American can be taken and transferred to another American so long as some public purpose is served. The Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states, "Nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation." The key term is "public use," not "public purpose." That means that the powers of eminent domain can be used only to take property, with just compensation, to build public projects such as roads, forts or schools.
City of New London officials used the law of eminent domain to condemn the property of 15 homeowners and transfer it to private developers to build a luxury hotel, high-rent condominiums and office buildings. The city justified its actions by saying that taking the property away from the homeowners, and replacing it with a hotel, condos and office buildings, would generate jobs and more tax revenue. In a scathing dissent, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor said, "The specter of condemnation hangs over all property. Nothing is to prevent the state from replacing any Motel 6 with a Ritz-Carlton, any home with a shopping mall, or any farm with a factory." In other words, government officials can take your private property and transfer it to another private person, based on any flimsy claim that it will serve a better public purpose such as job creation and greater tax revenues.
Continue reading "Corporate Courage"
Posted by redguy at 11:29 PM | TrackBack (1)
January 24, 2006
In Government We Trust
By: Walter Williams
What lessons should we have learned from last summer's deadly and destructive hurricanes? The primary lesson is that we shouldn't have much faith in a federal bureaucracy like the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). They amply demonstrated their incompetence, but what's our response? We'll give them more money and more authority. That's not smart.
The FEMA fiasco is discussed in several articles in the December 2005 issue of The Freeman: Ideas on Liberty magazine, published by the Foundation for Economic Education, the nation's first free market think tank (fee.org). Hillsdale College professor of economics Robert Murphy points to some of FEMA's stupidity in response to Hurricane Katrina, which includes "delaying firefighters two days in Atlanta hotels to receive sexual-harassment training and watch videos on the history of FEMA while people were dying in New Orleans."
Continue reading "In Government We Trust"
Posted by redguy at 09:15 PM | TrackBack (4)
January 12, 2006
Tax Cut Beneficiaries
By: Walter Williams
Republican and Democratic big government advocates whine about President Bush's proposed tax cuts, particularly cuts in the capital gains tax. They say it's a $70 billion giveaway to the rich. Listening to demagoguery about the rich, I've sometimes wished that we could find a humane way to get rid of the rich so that we might better focus on what's in the interests of the other 99.44 percent of us.
Let's talk about capital gains taxes starting out with a few questions for you. Suppose you see a couple highway construction projects. On one project, the workers are employed using shovels and wheelbarrows. At the other project, the workers are using huge earthmovers, cranes, asphalt-laying machines and other equipment. On which project do the workers earn the higher wage? You'll probably answer, "Those on the project with all the machinery." Now the question becomes, why? Is it because construction company owners like machine operators more? Or, is it because the machine operators have more bargaining power?
The answer to both questions is no. The correct answer is that the workers on the project using all the machinery are more productive. They are more productive because they have much more capital (equipment) working with them. As a result, more road is built per day, per worker, and their wages reflect that higher productivity.
Continue reading "Tax Cut Beneficiaries"
Posted by redguy at 08:18 PM | TrackBack (9)
January 03, 2006
The Poverty Hype
By: Walter Williams
Despite claims that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, poverty is nowhere near the problem it was yesteryear -- at least for those who want to work. Talk about the poor getting poorer tugs at the hearts of decent people and squares nicely with the agenda of big government advocates, but it doesn't square with the facts.
Dr. Michael Cox, economic adviser to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, and Richard Alm, a business reporter for the Dallas Morning News, co-authored a 1999 book, "Myths of Rich and Poor: Why We're Better Off Than We Think," that demonstrates the pure nonsense about the claim that the poor get poorer.
The authors analyzed University of Michigan Panel Study of Income Dynamics data that tracked more than 50,000 individual families since 1968. Cox and Alms found: Only five percent of families in the bottom income quintile (lowest 20 percent) in 1975 were still there in 1991. Three-quarters of these families had moved into the three highest income quintiles. During the same period, 70 percent of those in the second lowest income quintile moved to a higher quintile, with 25 percent of them moving to the top income quintile. When the Bureau of Census reports, for example, that the poverty rate in 1980 was 15 percent and a decade later still 15 percent, for the most part they are referring to different people.
Continue reading "The Poverty Hype"
Posted by redguy at 06:41 PM | TrackBack (41)
December 01, 2005
Dead-End Jobs
By: Walter Williams
Certain jobs are derisively referred to as "burger flipper" or "dead-end" jobs. I'd like someone to define a dead-end job. For example, I started out as a professor of economics at California State University, Los Angeles and then at Temple University and for the past 25 years at George Mason University. It seems as though my employment might qualify as a dead-end job, for all I'll ever be is a professor of economics.
Those who demean so-called dead-end jobs probably aren't talking about my job. They're mockingly referring to jobs such as clerks at Wal-Mart, hotel workers, and food handlers and counter clerks at McDonald's. McJobs is the term applied to these positions. The term has even found its way into Merriam-Webster and the encyclopedia Wikipedia. Putting down so-called dead-end jobs is a destructive insult to honest work.
Continue reading "Dead-End Jobs"
Posted by tom scerbo at 09:35 PM | TrackBack (36)
November 17, 2005
What's Inflation?
By: Walter Williams
Last month, President Bush nominated Dr. Ben S. Bernanke, currently chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisors, as chairman of Federal Reserve Board to replace the retiring Alan Greenspan. Alan Greenspan's replacement comes at a time of heightened fears of inflation resulting from the recent spike in oil prices.
First, let's decide what is and what is not inflation. One price or several prices rising is not inflation. When there's a general increase in prices, or alternatively, a reduction in the purchasing power of money, there's inflation. But just as in the case of diseases, describing a symptom doesn't necessarily give us a clue to a cause. Nobel Laureate and professor Milton Friedman says, "[I]nflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon, in the sense that it cannot occur without a more rapid increase in the quantity of money than in output." Increases in money supply are what constitute inflation, and a general rise in prices is the symptom.
Continue reading "What's Inflation?"
Posted by redguy at 10:44 PM | TrackBack (9)
November 02, 2005
Do We Really Care About Children?
By: Walter Williams
I cringe with disgust when I hear politicians say, "We're doing it for the children." What's worse is so many Americans mindlessly fall hook, line and sinker for the hype. Judging by our actions, Americans could not care less for future generations, and future generations will curse us for it. Let's look at it.
According to several respected authorities, including the Concord Coalition (co-chaired by former Sens. Warren Rudman and Robert Kerrey), the Congressional Budget Office, U.S. Treasury Secretary John Snow, and the Social Security Administration, the estimated present value of the unfunded liability of Social Security and Medicare ranges between $61 trillion and $75 trillion dollars.
"Williams," you ask, "what's this present value business?" Simply put, between $61 trillion and $75 trillion dollars is the money that would have to be put aside right now, at current interest rates, in order to meet future obligations of Social Security and Medicare. To put an astronomical sum like $61 trillion or $75 trillion in a bit of perspective: The value of our entire national output of goods and services (GDP) in 2004 was only $12 trillion.
Continue reading "Do We Really Care About Children?"
Posted by redguy at 12:00 AM | TrackBack (15)
October 27, 2005
Ammunition For Poverty Pimps
By: Walter Williams
In the wake of Hurricane Katrina's destruction of New Orleans, President Bush gave America's poverty pimps and race hustlers new ammunition. The president said, "As all of us saw on television, there is also some deep, persistent poverty in this region as well. And that poverty has roots in a history of racial discrimination, which cut off generations from the opportunity of America. We have a duty to confront this poverty with bold action."
The president's espousing such a vision not only supplies ammunition to poverty pimps and race hustlers, it focuses attention away from the true connection between race and poverty.
Though I grow weary of pointing it out, let's do it again. Let's examine some numbers readily available from the Census Bureau's 2004 Current Population Survey and ask some questions. There's one segment of the black population that suffers only a 9.9 percent poverty rate, and only 13.7 percent of its under-5-year-olds are poor. There's another segment that suffers a 39.5 percent poverty rate, and 58.1 percent of its under-5-year-olds are poor. Among whites, one segment suffers a 6 percent poverty rate, and only 9.9 percent of its under-5-year-olds are poor. The other segment suffers a 26.4 percent poverty rate, and 52 percent of its under-5-year-olds are poor. What do you think distinguishes the high and low poverty populations among blacks?
Continue reading "Ammunition For Poverty Pimps"
Posted by redguy at 09:47 PM | TrackBack (45)
October 19, 2005
A Nation Of Sheeple
By: Walter Williams
President Bush informed the nation, during a press conference, that he might seek to use the U.S. military to quarantine parts of the nation should there be a serious outbreak of the deadly avian flu that has killed millions of chickens and 60-some people in Southeast Asia. That's the second time Bush has expressed a desire to use the military for local policing. The first was in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. The Posse Comitatus Act (18 U.S.C. 1385) generally prohibits federal military personnel and units of the U.S. National Guard under federal authority from acting in a law enforcement capacity within the United States, except where expressly authorized by the U.S. Constitution or Congress.
Enacted during Reconstruction, the purpose of the Posse Comitatus Act was to severely limit the powers of the federal government to use the military for local law enforcement. Would Americans tolerate such a gigantic leap in the federalization of law enforcement? I'm guessing the answer is yes. In the name of safety, we've undergone decades of softening up to accept just about any government edict that our predecessors would have found offensive. Let's look at some of it.
Continue reading "A Nation Of Sheeple"
Posted by redguy at 08:12 AM | TrackBack (19)
October 13, 2005
Dumb Responses
By: Walter Williams
Bill Bennett, former secretary of education and drug czar, now host of the "Morning in America" talk radio show, caused quite a stir and hand-wringing in his response to a caller. The caller hypothesized that had there not been so many abortions in America, Social Security wouldn't be facing its deficit problems. Why? Because there would be more workers per retiree.
Bennett dismissed what he called "far-reaching, extensive extrapolations," giving the following conditional statement: " . . . I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could, if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down. That would be an impossible, ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down. So these far-out, these far-reaching, extensive extrapolations are, I think, tricky."
Continue reading "Dumb Responses"
Posted by redguy at 12:00 AM | TrackBack (33)
October 04, 2005
Blaming Bush
By: Walter Williams
President Bush, in his post-Hurricane Katrina address to the nation, said, "And to the extent that the federal government didn't fully do its job right, I take responsibility." Accepting the blame for the federal response is one thing, but I hope he doesn't shoulder the blame for the hurricane itself.
In a Sept. 9th speech to the National Sierra Club Convention in San Francisco, former Vice President Al Gore told the audience that Hurricane Katrina and global warming are related. He warned, "We will face a string of terrible catastrophes unless we act to prepare ourselves and deal with the underlying causes of global warming."
Continue reading "Blaming Bush"
Posted by redguy at 10:02 PM | TrackBack (27)
September 21, 2005
Is It Permissible?
By: Walter Williams
Last week, President Bush promised the nation that the federal government will pay for most of the costs of repairing hurricane-ravaged New Orleans, adding, "There is no way to imagine America without New Orleans, and this great city will rise again." There's no question that New Orleans and her sister Gulf Coast cities have been struck with a major disaster, but should our constitution become a part of the disaster? You say, "What do you mean, Williams?" Let's look at it.
In February 1887, President Grover Cleveland, upon vetoing a bill appropriating money to aid drought-stricken farmers in Texas, said, "I find no warrant for such an appropriation in the Constitution, and I do not believe that the power and the duty of the General Government ought to be extended to the relief of individual suffering which is in no manner properly related to the public service or benefit."
Continue reading "Is It Permissible?"
Posted by redguy at 12:00 AM | TrackBack (94)
September 14, 2005
The Role Of Prices
By: Walter Williams
The fallout from Hurricane Katrina has featured a lot of ignorance and demagoguery about prices. Let's look at some of it. One undeniable fact is that the hurricane disaster changed scarcity conditions. There are fewer stores, fewer units of housing, less gasoline and a shortage of many other goods and services used on a daily basis. Rising prices are not only a manifestation of these changed scarcity conditions, they help us cope, adjust and get us on the road to recovery.
Here's a which-is-better question for you. Suppose a hotel room rented for $79 a night prior to Hurricane Katrina's devastation. Based on that price, an evacuating family of four might rent two adjoining rooms. When they arrive at the hotel, they find the rooms rent for $200; they decide to make do with one room. In my book, that's wonderful. The family voluntarily opted to make a room available for another family who had to evacuate or whose home was destroyed. Demagogues will call this price-gouging, but I ask you, which is preferable: a room available at $200 or a room unavailable at $79? Rising prices get people to voluntarily economize on goods and services rendered scarcer by the disaster.
Continue reading "The Role Of Prices"
Posted by redguy at 12:00 AM | TrackBack (10)
September 07, 2005
Economic Lunacy
By: Walter Williams
According to a couple of poorly trained economists, there's a bright side to Hurricane Katrina's destruction. J.P. Morgan senior economist Anthony Chan believes hurricanes tend to stimulate overall growth. As reported in "Gas Crisis Looms" (Aug. 31, 2005), written by CNN/Money staff writer Parija Bhatnagar, Mr. Chan said, "Preliminary estimates indicate 60 percent damage to downtown New Orleans. Plenty of cleanup work and rebuilding will follow in all the areas. That means over the next 12 months, there will be lots of job creation which is good for the economy."
Continue reading "Economic Lunacy"
Posted by redguy at 06:44 AM | TrackBack (67)
August 31, 2005
Gasoline Prices
By: Walter Williams
Nationally, the average per gallon price for regular gasoline is $2.50.
Are gasoline prices high? That's not the best way to ask that question. It's akin to asking, "Is Williams tall?" The average height of U.S. women is 5'4", and for men, it's 5'10". Being 6'4", I'd be tall relative to the general U.S. population. But put me on a basketball court, next to the average NBA basketball player, and I wouldn't be tall; I'd be short. So when we ask whether a price is high or low, we have to ask relative to what.
Continue reading "Gasoline Prices"
Posted by redguy at 12:00 AM | TrackBack (5)
August 25, 2005
Security or Hysteria?
By: Walter Williams
Driving through downtown Washington, D.C., a few weeks ago, I asked myself: What's happened to the character of the American people? There were barricaded landmarks, armed guards and people waiting to be searched. Several weeks ago, I visited downtown Philadelphia in the vicinity of Independence Hall. Again there were barricades, armed guards and visitors waiting in line.
During the 1940s, my cousin and I, carrying our shoeshine boxes, simply walked in and stood before the room where the Declaration of Independence was adopted and the U.S. Constitution was signed. The only barrier was a velvet-covered rope. Much of today's security measures are little more than a panicked response to terrorism and not likely to ever go away because Americans are coming to accept it as normal.
Continue reading "Security or Hysteria?"
Posted by redguy at 09:37 PM | TrackBack (89)
August 17, 2005
Civil Rights Today
By: Walter Williams
When I think of the behavior of today's civil rights organizations, I often think of the March of Dimes. In 1938, President Roosevelt helped found the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis to fight polio, an epidemic that crippled thousands of Americans. The name March of Dimes was coined by Eddie Cantor in his fundraising effort asking every American to contribute a dime.
Since 1970, polio has been eradicated in the U.S., but the March of Dimes lives on, and they're asking for more than dimes. When they accomplish their mission, most organizations don't fold the tent; they simply change their agenda. The March of Dimes now raises money to fight against birth defects, premature birth and other infant health problems. We'd probably deem them stupid if they continued their battle against polio in America. Why? Because polio has been eradicated.
Continue reading "Civil Rights Today"
Posted by redguy at 12:02 AM | TrackBack (7)
August 10, 2005
Making Intelligent Errors
By: Walter Williams
We're not omniscient. That means making errors is unavoidable. Understanding the nature of errors is vital to our well-being. Let's look at it.
There are two types of errors, nicely named the type I error and the type II error. The type I error is when we reject a true hypothesis when we should accept it. The type II error is when we accept a false hypothesis when we should reject it. In decision-making, there's always a non-zero probability of making one error or the other. That means we're confronted with asking the question: Which error is least costly? Let's apply this concept to a couple of issues.
Continue reading "Making Intelligent Errors"
Posted by redguy at 12:08 AM | TrackBack (29)
August 03, 2005
Human Rights V. Property Rights
By: Walter Williams
In the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court's recent 5-4 ruling in Kelo v. New London, statements have been made about property rights that are demonstrative of the paucity of understanding among some within the legal profession. Carolyn Lochhead's July 1st San Francisco Chronicle article, "Foes Unite in Defense of Property," reports on the coalition building in Congress to deny federal funds to cities that use laws of eminent domain to take private property for the benefit of another private party.
But it's the article's report on a statement made by a representative of People for the American Way, lead opponents to constitutionalists being appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court, that I'd like to address. According to Ms. Lochhead's article, "Elliot Mincberg, the group's legal director, said the case [Kelo v. New London] had been brought by the Institute for Justice as part of an effort by conservatives to elevate property rights to the same level of civil rights such as freedom of speech and religion, in effect taking the nation back to the pre-New Deal days when the courts ruled child labor laws unconstitutional." To posit a distinction between civil or human rights on the one hand and property rights on the other reflects little understanding. Let's look at it.
Continue reading "Human Rights V. Property Rights"
Posted by redguy at 12:00 AM | TrackBack (10)
July 27, 2005
Will We Defend Ourselves?
By: Walter Williams
Much ado in our country and Europe has been made about alleged mistreatment and torture of suspected terrorist prisoners. First, there were stories and hand-wringing over the treatment of prisoners at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison.
More recently, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., equated our military's treatment of captured Taliban and al-Qaeda terrorist suspects, held at Guantanamo Bay, with something that would have "been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime -- Pol Pot or others -- that had no concern for human beings." That statement not only demonstrates ignorance of the horrors committed by the Nazis, Soviets and Pol Pot, but it supplied ammunition for people seeking to destroy us.
Continue reading "Will We Defend Ourselves?"
Posted by redguy at 12:23 AM | TrackBack (6)
July 20, 2005
Slavery Reparations
By: Walter Williams
The slavery reparations shakedown lobby is gearing up for attacks on American industry. They've failed in the courts and Congress, so they're going after weak-kneed CEOs. At the NAACP's recent annual convention, Dennis C. Hayes, its interim president, said, "Absolutely, we will be pursuing reparations from companies that have historical ties to slavery and engaging all parties to come to the table." According to Mr. Hayes, "Many of the problems we have now including poverty, disparities in health care and incarceration can be directly tied to slavery."
Part of the reparations lobby's agenda is to pressure cities to enact laws requiring companies that wish to do business with the city to complete studies to see whether they had ties to slavery. They've been successful in getting such legislation enacted in Philadelphia and Chicago. CEOs at J.P. Morgan Chase Bank and Wachovia Corp. have apologized for their predecessors' ties to slavery and agreed to be shaken down for several million dollars to fund scholarships and black history programs.
Continue reading "Slavery Reparations"
Posted by redguy at 08:53 PM | TrackBack (12)
July 14, 2005
Aid To Africa
By: Walter Williams
British Prime Minister Tony Blair is pressuring the rich nations of the world to give more foreign aid to Africa -- to the tune of $25 billion a year by 2010. The U.S. already gave $3.2 billion last year. In the wake of this pressure, we might ask ourselves whether it's foreign aid that Africa needs most for economic development.
A standard myth is there's a "vicious cycle of poverty" that makes economic development virtually impossible for the world's poor nations. This myth holds that poor countries are poor because income is so low that savings cannot be generated to provide the kind of capital accumulation necessary for economic growth. Thus, it is alleged, the only way out of perpetual poverty is foreign aid.
Continue reading "Aid To Africa"
Posted by redguy at 10:07 PM | TrackBack (20)
July 06, 2005
Dependency On Government
By: Walter Williams
William Beach has just written a report for the Washington, D.C.-based Heritage Foundation titled "The 2005 Index of Dependency." Between 1962 and today, American dependence on government has more than doubled and shows little sign of abatement. The growth areas of dependency examined in the report are: welfare and medical care, housing, retirement income, education, and rural and agricultural services. The budgetary impact of dependency threatens perpetual budget deficits and high taxes, but to focus only on the budgetary impact is to trivialize the more devastating aspects of dependency.
Some of this has been commented upon by University of Texas professor Marvin Olasky in his 1992 book, "The Tragedy of American Compassion." One of the results of the growth of dependency on government is what Professor Olasky calls the charitable equivalent of Gresham's Law -- where bad charities drive out good charities.
Continue reading "Dependency On Government"
Posted by redguy at 12:05 AM | TrackBack (18)
June 29, 2005
Confiscating Property
By: Walter Williams
Last week's U.S. Supreme Court 5-4 ruling in Kelo v. New London helps explain the socialist attack on President Bush's nominees to the federal bench. First, let's look at the case.
The city government of New London, Conn., has run upon hard times, with residents leaving and its tax base eroding. Private developers offered to build a riverfront hotel, private offices and a health club in the Fort Trumbull neighborhood. But there was a bit of a problem. Owners of 15 homes in the stable middle-class Fort Trumbull neighborhood refused the city's offer to buy their homes, but no sweat. The city turned over its power of eminent domain -- its ability to take private property for public use -- to the New London Development Corporation, a private body, to take the entire neighborhood for private development. The city condemned the homeowners' properties. The homeowners sued and lost in the state court, and last week they lost in the U.S. Supreme Court.
Continue reading "Confiscating Property"
Posted by redguy at 12:00 AM | TrackBack (68)
June 22, 2005
Do We Want This?
By: Walter Williams
America's socialists advocate that we adopt a universal healthcare system like our northern neighbor Canada. Before we buy into complete socialization of our healthcare system, we might check out the Canadian Supreme Court's June 9th ruling in Chaoulli v. Quebec (Attorney General). It turns out that in order to prop up government-delivered medical care, Quebec and other Canadian provinces have outlawed private health insurance. By a 4 to 3 decision, Canada's high court struck down Quebec's law that prohibits private medical insurance. With all of the leftist hype extolling the "virtues" of Canada's universal healthcare system, you might wonder why any sane Canadian would want to purchase private insurance.
Continue reading "Do We Want This?"
Posted by redguy at 12:08 AM | TrackBack (16)
June 15, 2005
Click It Or Ticket
By: Walter Williams
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), an office within the U.S. Department of Transportation, just finished its annual campaign to get us to wear our seatbelts under a program called "Click It or Ticket." States receive federal subsidies to ticket drivers if they or their passengers are not buckled up.
Some states, such as Maryland, are so eager that they've equipped their officers with night vision goggles, similar to those used by our servicemen in Iraq. Maryland state troopers bagged 44 drivers traveling unbuckled under the cover of darkness. The NHTSA's "Click It or Ticket" program is another step toward making Americans serfs of the state.
Continue reading "Click It Or Ticket"
Posted by redguy at 09:41 PM | TrackBack (123)
June 09, 2005
Victimhood: Rhetoric Or Reality
By: Walter Williams
If you listened to the rhetoric of black politicians and civil rights leaders, dating back to the Reagan years, you would have been convinced that surely by now black Americans would be back on the plantation. According to them, President Reagan, and later Presidents Bush I and II, would turn back the clock on civil rights. They'd appoint "new racists" dressed in three-piece suits to act through the courts and administrative agencies to reverse black civil rights and economic gains. We can now recognize this rhetoric as the political equivalent of the "rope-a-dope."
As my colleague Tom Sowell pointed out in a recent column, "Liberals, Race and History," if the Democratic party's share of the black vote ever fell to even 70 percent, it's not likely that the Democrats would ever win the White House or Congress again. The strategy liberal Democrats have chosen, to prevent loss of the black vote, is to keep blacks paranoid and in a constant state of fear. But is it fear of racists, or being driven back to the plantation, that should be a top priority for blacks? Let's look at it.
Continue reading "Victimhood: Rhetoric Or Reality"
Posted by redguy at 12:00 AM | TrackBack (65)
June 01, 2005
Destroying Effective Policing
By: Walter Williams
Police departments must use race and sex preferences in hiring as a result of federal court consent decrees and political pressures. To meet these demands, many police departments have lowered, and in some cases eliminated, established standards for personal character and intellectual and physical capacity.
Jan Golab writes about this in "How Racial P.C. Corrupted the LAPD" in the May 2005 issue of The American Enterprise. While most of Mr. Golab's article chronicles how Los Angeles damaged its police force in its quest for "diversity," where it's had to fire 100 police officers, identical damage has occurred in other cities. Washington, D.C., had to indict or fire 250 cops; New Orleans indicted more than 100. In these cities, policemen have been charged with crimes ranging from murder and rape to robbing drug dealers and selling confiscated drugs.
Continue reading "Destroying Effective Policing"
Posted by redguy at 10:32 PM | TrackBack (127)
May 25, 2005
Our Trade Deficit
By: Walter Williams
I buy more from my grocer than he buys from me, and I bet it's the same with you and your grocer. That means we have a trade deficit with our grocers. Does our perpetual grocer trade deficit portend doom? If we heeded some pundits and politicians who are talking about our national trade deficit, we might think so. But do we have a trade deficit in the first place? Let's look at it.
Insofar as the grocer example, there are two accounts that I hold. One is my "goods" account, which consists of groceries. The other is my "capital" account, which consists of money. Let's look at what happens when I purchase groceries. Say I purchase $100 worth of groceries. The value of my goods account rises by $100. That rise is matched by an equal $100 decline in my capital account. Adding a plus $100 to a minus $100 yields a perfect trade balance. That transaction, from my grocer's point of view, results in his goods account falling by $100, but when he accepts my cash, his capital account rises by $100, again a trade balance.
Continue reading "Our Trade Deficit"
Posted by redguy at 12:00 AM | TrackBack (16)
May 18, 2005
Ripping Off The System
By: Walter Williams
How many times have we heard advertisements from law firms that specialize in elder law urging, "If you anticipate that you may have to enter a nursing home down the road, an elder care attorney may be able to help you create a plan that will both protect much of your assets and make you eligible for government benefits"? Boiled down to basics, the lawyers are suggesting that they can arrange for you to live off others should you ever require long-term care instead of having to spend the assets you've accumulated during your lifetime.
The quest to allow senior citizens to live off others doesn't stop there. If you're a senior citizen, you might be eligible for property tax reductions, subsidized prescription drugs, reduced fare on public transportation, and all manner of merchandise discounts. Don't get me wrong. I don't have anything against older people. In fact, some of my best friends are over 70, including Mrs. Williams. Let's do a bit of analysis of efforts to assist the elderly, but let's use our brains instead of our hearts.
Continue reading "Ripping Off The System"
Posted by redguy at 11:43 PM | TrackBack (45)
May 11, 2005
How Not To Be Poor
By: Walter Williams
Ministers Louis Farrakhan, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Washington, D.C.'s Mayor Anthony Williams and others recently met to discuss plans to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the October 1995 Million Man March. Whilst reading about the plans, I thought of an excellent topic for the event: how not to be poor.
Avoiding long-term poverty is not rocket science. First, graduate from high school. Second, get married before you have children, and stay married. Third, work at any kind of job, even one that starts out paying the minimum wage. And, finally, avoid engaging in criminal behavior. If you graduate from high school today with a B or C average, in most places in our country there's a low-cost or financially assisted post-high-school education program available to increase your skills.
Continue reading "How Not To Be Poor"
Posted by redguy at 12:00 AM | TrackBack (126)
May 05, 2005
Only In America
By: Walter Williams
Let's talk about the rich -- those people who, according to former Congressman Richard Gephardt, are "winners in life's lottery." Or the people whom director Michael Moore preaches, in his book "Dude, Where's my Country?" got rich off the backs of the poor.
Farrah Gray was raised in a predominantly black Chicago neighborhood. At age 8, he started a lemonade stand business, later a venture capital business, a food business and a magazine. By age 17, Farrah Gray was a millionaire, had been chief executive of four companies, and had offices on Wall Street, and in Las Vegas and Los Angeles.
Continue reading "Only In America"
Posted by redguy at 10:31 PM | TrackBack (13)
April 27, 2005
The Productive Vs, The Unproductive
By: Walter Williams
"The Greatest Century That Ever Was: 25 Miraculous Trends of the Past 100 Years" is the appropriate title of a 1999 article authored by Stephen Moore and the late Julian L. Simon and published by the Washington-based Cato Institute. Let's highlight some of the phenomenal progress Americans made during the 20th century. During that century, life expectancy rose from 47 to 77 years of age. Deaths from infectious diseases fell from 700 to 50 per 100,000 of the population. Major killer diseases such as tuberculosis, polio, typhoid fever and whooping cough were virtually eliminated. Infant mortality plummeted.
Continue reading "The Productive Vs, The Unproductive"
Posted by redguy at 12:00 AM | TrackBack (58)
April 20, 2005
Stupid Airport Security, Part 3
By: Walter Williams
Several airport security screeners have sent me polite letters criticizing some of my comments in my last two columns, prompting this question to you: In managing our personal security, should we guard against possible or probable threats? Consider the measures and the resource expenditures I might take to guard Mrs. Williams and me against all possible threats to our security.
Continue reading "Stupid Airport Security, Part 3"
Posted by redguy at 08:38 PM | TrackBack (63)
