Voice For Liberty

Tag: Wichita Pachyderm Club

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Thursday September 6, 2012

    Debbie Wasserman Schultz lies about lying

    During these convention weeks, advocates on both sides have been fact-checking the other side, and charges are being made about which side is the biggest, boldest liar. But when people lie about lying … that’s a whole new level. Human Events reports on DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz and sums up this way: “It was already common knowledge that Wasserman Schultz is a serial liar — on one memorable recent occasion, when CNN host Wolf Blitzer called her out for lying about Paul Ryan’s Medicare reform proposals, she essentially insisted that the urgency of her political agenda gives her the right to lie as necessary.” See Debbie Wasserman Schultz Caught Lying about Lying.

    Speaking of facts and Politifact

    What happens when the fact checker of record isn’t reliable? That’s the situation Politifact finds itself in, according to reporting by Jon Cassidy in Human Events: “Once widely regarded as a unique, rigorous and reasonably independent investigator of political claims, PolitiFact now declares conservatives wrong three times more often than liberals. More pointedly, the journalism organization concludes that conservatives have flat out lied nine times more often than liberals.” More at PolitiFact bias: Does the GOP tell nine times more lies than left? Really?

    Your share of the debt

    Now that the U.S. national debt has passed $16 trillion (or $16,000,000 million as I like to say) you might be interested in learning the magnitude of your personal liability. The Economic Freedom Project has a calculator to tell you. Click on What’s Your Lifetime Share of the National Debt?

    Pachyderms to host House candidates

    This week the Wichita Pachyderm Club features Republican candidates for the Kansas House of Representatives. Scheduled to appear are: Jim Howell (District 81), John Stevens (86), George F. “Joe” Edwards II (93), Benny Boman (95), and Phil Hermanson (98). The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. Meetings are Fridays at noon, in the Wichita Petroleum Club on the top floor of the Bank of America Building at 100 N. Broadway. The meeting costs $10, which includes a delicious buffet lunch and beverage. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club.

    Even garage sales can’t escape the regulatory regime

    Kansas Policy Institute comments on garage sale regulations in Wichita.

    Apply for Wichita’s civilian sign corps

    Related to garage sale signs, Wichitans can now apply to be part of the civilian sign enforcement patrol. The city has made these documents available on its website: Overview of the Volunteer Sign Removal Program and Sign Removal Volunteer Application. If you want to participate in this program, you’ll need to complete a volunteer sign removal application, complete the required training course, sign a liability release, sign an oath or statement agreeing to abide by city codes and the program rules, submit to and successfully pass a background check, have valid Kansas drivers license, have a currently registered vehicle in good operating condition, have current vehicle insurance, commit to a geographic area and time, commit to safety first; appropriately use provided vests and tools, commit to provide required reports, commit to dispose of signs as directed, commit to wear the provided identification badge, and commit to allowing only authorized (city trained and approved) persons to remove signs. The city also advises applicants to check with their insurance agents for coverage relative to the use of vehicles in this program. I can’t imagine most auto insurance companies will be happy that their customers are using their cars in a quasi-law enforcement application. … For more on why this law is a bad idea, see Proposed Wichita sign ordinance problematic.

    Activists organize!

    As a result of an excellent day-long training session recently produced in Wichita by Campaign for Liberty, activists that support limited government and free markets are meeting regularly. For information about the Wichita meetings, contact John Axtell.

    The seven rules of bureaucracy

    In this article, authors Loyd S. Pettegrew and Carol A. Vance quote Thomas Sowell: “When the government creates some new program, nothing is easier than to show whatever benefits that program produces. … But it is virtually impossible to trace the taxes that paid for the program back to their sources and to show the alternative uses of that same money that could have been far more beneficial.” In order to understand the foundation of America’s morass, we must examine bureaucracy. At the root of this growing evil is the very nature of bureaucracy, especially political bureaucracy. French economist Frédéric Bastiat offered an early warning in 1850 that laws, institutions, and acts — the stuff of political bureaucracy — produce economic effects that can be seen immediately, but that other, unforeseen effects happen much later. He claimed that bad economists look only at the immediate, seeable effects and ignore effects that come later, while good economists are able to look at the immediate effects and foresee effects, both good and bad, that come later. … Both the seen and the unseen have become a necessary condition of modern bureaucracy. (Bastiat: That Which Is Seen, and That Which Is Not Seen.) The first rule? “Maintain the problem at all costs!”

    Democracy, or majority rule?

    A new video from LearnLiberty.org, a project of Institute for Humane Studies is titled Should Majorities Decide Everything? To me, the most important part is near the end, when the speaker says that without a properly limited government, rule by majority “substitute[s] the tyranny of a king with the tyranny of a larger group.” LearnLiberty also explains: “According to Professor Munger, democratic constitutions consist of two parts: one defining the limits within which decisions can be made democratically, and the other establishing the process by which decisions will be made. In the United States Constitution, the individual is protected from majority decisions. Professor Munger warns, however, that these protections are slowly being stripped away as American courts of law fail to recognize the limits of what can be decided by majority rule.”

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Thursday May 17, 2012

    Watchdog reporter at Pachyderm. This Friday (May 18th) the Wichita Pachyderm Club features Paul Soutar, Reporter for Kansas Watchdog, speaking on “The evolution of journalism and how the new media empowers citizens.” The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club. … The club has an exceptional lineup of future speakers as follows: On May 25th: Ron Estes, State Treasurer of Kansas, speaking on “A report from the Kansas Treasurer.” … On June 1st: Gary Oborny, Chairman/CEO Occidental Management and Real Estate Development, CCIM Designated member of the Storm Water Advisory Board to the City of Wichita, speaking on “What is the economic impact of EPA mandates on storm water quality in Wichita?”

    Kansas senators vote for cronyism. Veronique de Rugy explains the harm of the Export-Import Bank of the United States in Why Would Anyone be Against the Export-Import Bank? “First, the Ex-Im Bank is nothing more than corporate welfare. This is an agency that is in the business of subsidizing private companies with taxpayer dollars. … An excellent paper by Cato Institute’s trade analyst Sallie James exposes just how unseemly, inefficient, and irrelevant the Export-Import Bank is. As James explains, the Bank not only picks winners and losers by guaranteeing the loans of private companies, but it also introduces unfair competition for all the U.S. firms that do not benefit from such special treatment.” The bill is H.R. 2072: Export-Import Bank Reauthorization Act of 2012. Both Kansas senators Jerry Moran and Pat Roberts voted for this bill. So did U.S. Representative Kevin Yoder of the Kansas third district. But Representatives Tim Huelskamp, Lynn Jenkins, and Mike Pompeo voted against it.

    Koch = big oil? Politico: “The Koch brothers have an unlikely ally in the war of words with their liberal adversaries: the nation’s journalistic fact-checkers. Both The Washington Post’s Fact Checker blog and the nonpartisan site FactCheck.org have dinged critics of David and Charles Koch in recent weeks for referring to the billionaire brothers as Big Oil. Why? Because Koch Industries’ business interests extend well beyond the company’s involvement in petroleum refining and other oil-based operations. And while no corporate midget, the company isn’t anywhere near as big as true oil giants like ExxonMobil. ‘So even if all of Koch Industries’ revenues came from its refining business — which they do not — they would still be a fraction of the revenues of the companies that actually represent ‘Big Oil,” the FactCheck.org critique read.” More at Fact-checkers and Kochs’ ‘Big Oil’. Another example of how facts don’t get in the way of Koch critics. Or try For New York Times, facts about Kochs don’t matter.

    Economic freedom. Why does the political left criticize Charles and David Koch? In the following video from last year, Koch Industries CEO and board chairman Charles G. Koch explains the principles of economic freedom, something that he and David Koch have worked to advance for many years. These principles, according to Koch, include private property rights, impartial rule of law, free trade, sound money which reduces boom and bust cycles, and a small and limited government. These principles are good for everyone, I should add, including those currently at the bottom of the economic ladder.

    We aren’t Greece … yet. “Once again, Greece finds the international community questioning its ability to pay its debts. Default and an exit from the Euro Zone (or countries which share the Euro as a common currency) threatens on the horizon. Here in the U.S., we face high debts and have a lowered credit rating due to Washington’s inability to agree on deficit reduction. Just how alike are our two nations?” An infographic from Bankrupting America explains.

    Bankrupting America

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Thursday May 10, 2012

    Kansas tax reform. A message from Americans for Prosperity, Kansas: “‘Today’s vote on a much-needed tax reform bill will provide an immediate boost to Kansas families and businesses,’ said AFP-Kansas state director Derrick Sontag. ‘The approved tax bill cuts the income tax for Kansas families and small businesses, which is certainly good news for taxpayers. The current leadership of the state Senate helped lead Kansas down a path of economic destruction as indicated by the past decade being one of lost private sector jobs, stagnant population growth, and taxpayers fleeing to other states. Yet in spite of all the evidence pointing to the failure of the tax and spend approach, the actions of Senate leadership today indicated that they wanted more of the same. Today’s action by a majority of the House led by leadership was a step in the right direction to reverse the failed economic policies of the past. We applaud the leaders of the Kansas House for this bold move toward tax relief.’”

    School funding. Two Wichita legislators on Kansas school funding. First, Representative Jim Ward: “The question is do we spend money on tax cuts for rich people and out-of-state corporations or do we spend money restoring the cuts to education.” … Then Senator Jean Schodorf: “Schodorf said business as usual is not funding schools. ‘That has become kind of the status quo in the legislature, and this year we desperately need to get a funding increase for schools.’” I wonder if either of these two legislators, both of whom hold leadership positions on education committees, know that this will likely be a record-setting year for school spending in Kansas, when all sources are considered? Fighting for school funding is a distraction from the reforms that Kansas schools really need.

    Separation of art and state. David Boaz, writing at “Room for Debate” at the New York Times: “What do art, music, and religion have in common? They all have the power to touch us in the depths of our souls. As one theater director said, ‘Art has power. It has the power to sustain, to heal, to humanize … to change something in you. It’s a frightening power, and also a beautiful power. … And it’s essential to a civilized society.’ Which is precisely why art, music, and religion should be kept separate from the state. Government involves the organization of coercion. In a free society coercion should be reserved only for such essential functions of government as protecting rights and punishing criminals. People should not be forced to contribute money to artistic endeavors that they may not approve, nor should artists be forced to trim their sails to meet government standards.” Read more at Separation of Art and State. We failed this important test in Kansas, as funding for arts is now a concern for the state.

    Stimulus spending. Robert J. Barro in the Wall Street Journal, available at the Hoover Institution: “The weak economic recovery in the U.S. and the even weaker performance in much of Europe have renewed calls for ending budget austerity and returning to larger fiscal deficits. … This viewpoint is dangerously unstable. Every time heightened fiscal deficits fail to produce desirable outcomes, the policy advice is to choose still larger deficits. If, as I believe to be true, fiscal deficits have only a short-run expansionary impact on growth and then become negative, the results from following this policy advice are persistently low economic growth and an exploding ratio of public debt to GDP. The last conclusion is not just academic, because it fits with the behavior of Japan over the past two decades.” On the idea of Keynesian solutions to economic problems: “Despite the lack of evidence, it is remarkable how much allegiance the Keynesian approach receives from policy makers and economists. I think it’s because the Keynesian model addresses important macroeconomic policy issues and is pedagogically beautiful, no doubt reflecting the genius of Keynes. The basic model — government steps in to spend when others won’t — can be presented readily to one’s mother, who is then likely to buy the conclusions. … Keynes worshipers’ faith in this model has actually been strengthened by the Great Recession and the associated financial crisis. Yet the empirical support for all this is astonishingly thin. The Keynesian model asks one to turn economic common sense on its head in many ways. For instance, more saving is bad because of the resultant drop in consumer demand, and higher productivity is bad because the increased supply of goods tends to lower the price level, thereby raising the real value of debt. Meanwhile, transfer payments that subsidize unemployment are supposed to lower unemployment, and more government spending is good even if it goes to wasteful projects.” See Stimulus Spending Keeps Failing.

    Drug court to be Pachyderm topic. This Friday (May 11th) the Wichita Pachyderm Club Judge Joe Kisner of the Sedgwick County Drug Court speaking on “A new approach to an old problem.” The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club. … The club has an exceptional lineup of future speakers as follows: On May 18th: Paul Soutar, Reporter for Kansas Watchdog, speaking on “The evolution of journalism and how the new media empowers citizens.” … On May 25th: Ron Estes, State Treasurer of Kansas, speaking on “A report from the Kansas Treasurer.” … On June 1st: Gary Oborny, Chairman/CEO Occidental Management and Real Estate Development, CCIM Designated member of the Storm Water Advisory Board to the City of Wichita, speaking on “What is the economic impact of EPA mandates on storm water quality in Wichita?”

    Elizabeth Warren. Writes Ann Coulter: “For liberals, it should be a mortal sin: Elizabeth Warren cheated on affirmative action.” A funny — and sad, because it tells us a lot about our country — column on how Elizabeth Warren, the Massachusetts Senatorial Candidate, apparently lied about being a member of a minority group (being 1/32 Cherokee) and how universities lapped it up.

    Failure of socialism to be shown. The Wichita Chapter Meeting of Americans for Prosperity Foundation continues its video presentation of Milton Friedman’s “Free to Choose” series. The next episode to be shown is “The Failure of Socialism,” followed by a group discussion on Monday, May 14, 2012 at the Alford Branch Wichita Public Library, from 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm. There is no admission charge. RSVP not required. The Lionel D. Alford Library located at 3447 S. Meridian in Wichita. The library is just north of the I-235 exit on Meridian. For more information on this event contact John Todd at john@johntodd.net or 316-312-7335, or Susan Estes, AFP Field Director at sestes@afphq.org or 316-681-4415.

    Yes we can! No they can’t! “It’s a fatal conceit. The politicians in there think they can run our economy, run our lives. But no — they can’t.” That’s John Stossel standing in front of the U.S. Capitol at the start of a television program featuring his new book No, They Can’t: Why Government Fails-But Individuals Succeed. The complete show is available on the free hulu service at Stossel – Thursday, Apr 12, 2012.

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Wednesday May 2, 2012

    When government pays, government controls. Although most liberals would not admit this, it sometimes slips through: When government is paying for our health care, government then feels it must control our behavior. The Wichita Eagle’s Rhonda Holman provides an example of this, when she wrote in a blog post about Kansas relaxing its smoking ban: “Especially with Medicaid costs swallowing up the state budget, lawmakers should be discouraging smoking, not accommodating more of it.”

    The moral case for capitalism. “Two main charges are typically marshaled against capitalism: it generates inequality by allowing some to become wealthier than others; and it threatens social solidarity by allowing individuals some priority over their communities. … Capitalism does allow — and perhaps even requires — inequality. Because people’s talents, skills, values, desires, and preferences vary and because of sheer luck, some people will be able to generate more wealth in a free-enterprise system than others will; inequality will result. But it is not clear that we should worry about that. … If you could solve only one social ill — either inequality or poverty — which would it be? Or suppose that the only way to address poverty would be to allow inequality: Would you allow it? … More by James R. Otteson in An Audacious Promise: The Moral Case for Capitalism at the Manhattan Institute.

    Moran to address Pachyderms. This Friday (May 4th) the Wichita Pachyderm Club features United States Senator Jerry Moran speaking on “A legislative update.” The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club. … The club has an exceptional lineup of future speakers as follows: On May 11th: Gary Oborny, Chairman/CEO Occidental Management and Real Estate Development, CCIM Designated member of the Storm Water Advisory Board to the City of Wichita, speaking on “What is the economic impact of EPA mandates on storm water quality in Wichita?” … On May 18th: Paul Soutar, Reporter for Kansas Watchdog, speaking on “The evolution of journalism and how the new media empowers citizens.” … On May 25th: Ron Estes, State Treasurer of Kansas, speaking on “A report from the Kansas Treasurer.”

    Funding pet projects without earmarks. Wonderful! While this plan still relies on government to some degree, it is largely voluntary, which is the direction we need to steer things. “There is a creative workaround that allows funds to flow to those prized pet projects: a commemorative coin bill.” Read more at Heritage Action for America.

    Harm of taxes. In introducing the new edition of Rich States, Poor States, authors Arthur Laffer and Stephen Moore explain the importance of low taxes. “Barack Obama is asking Americans to gamble that the U.S. economy can be taxed into prosperity. That’s the message of his campaign for the Buffett Rule, which raises income-tax rates on millionaires to a minimum of 30%, and for the expiration of the Bush tax cuts. He wants to raise the highest income tax rate by 20%, double the rate on capital gains, add a new 3.8% tax on all capital earnings, and nearly triple the dividend tax rate. All this will enhance “economic efficiency,” insists a White House economic report. As for those who disagree, says President Obama, they’re just pushing “the same version of trickle-down economics tried for much of the last century. … But prosperity sure didn’t trickle down.” Mr. Obama needs a refresher course on the 1920s, 1960s, 1980s and even the 1990s, when government spending and taxes fell and employment and incomes grew rapidly.” More in the Wall Street Journal at Laffer and Moore: A 50-State Tax Lesson for the President: Over the past decade, states without an income levy have seen much higher growth than the national average. Which state will be next to abolish theirs?

    Role of prices. Prices convey information more accurately and efficiently than any centralized organization — such a government. It provides a, well, automatic mechanism for adjusting to the changes in the world, changes which happen every day, and even every minute. Sometimes we may not like the information that price signals are sending, but they represent the truth. Daniel J. Smith of Troy University explains in this video from LearnLiberty.org, a project of the Institute for Humane Studies: “Why are prices important? Prof. Daniel J. Smith of Troy University describes the role that prices play in generating, gathering, and transmitting information throughout the economy. Information about the supply and demand of different goods are dispersed among different buyers and sellers in an economy. Nobody has to know all this dispersed information; individuals only need to know the relative prices. Based on the simple information contained in a price, people adjust their behavior to account for conditions in supply and demand, even if they are unaware of that information.”

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Monday April 2, 2012

    Action on sustainability. This Wednesday (April 4th) the Sedgwick County Commission takes up the issue of whether to participate in a HUD Sustainable Communities Regional Planning Grant. Coverage of the last discussion the commission had on this matter is at Sedgwick County considers a planning grant. So that citizens may be informed on this issue, Americans for Prosperity, Kansas is holding an informational event tonight (April 2nd), from 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm at Spangles Restaurant, corner of Kellogg and Broadway. (Even though the Kansas Jayhawks are playing tonight in the NCAA men’s basketball title game, the television broadcast doesn’t start until 8:00 pm, with tip off at 8:23 pm.) The meeting is described as follows: “On April 4, 2012 at 9:00 am on the 3rd floor of the Sedgwick County Courthouse, the Sedgwick County Commission will be holding a public hearing to consider approval of Sedgwick County’s participation as the fiscal agent on behalf of the Regional Economic Area Partnership (REAP) Consortium with an ‘in-kind’ commitment of $120,707 to implement a Regional Plan for Sustainable Communities Grant for South Central Kansas. Public comment will be invited. Learn about the Sustainable Communities Plan for South Central Kansas. Find out how you can get involved in this issue as a citizen. Consider testifying before the County Commission. Consider attending the Commission meeting as an interested citizen.” … For more information on this event contact John Todd at john@johntodd.net or 316-312-7335, or Susan Estes, AFP Field Director at sestes@afphq.org or 316-681-4415.

    Economic development through competitiveness. Next week (Wednesday, April 11th) Kansas Policy Institute will host an educational event focusing on local economic development. This event is vitally important as it is becoming apparent that Wichita’s traditional process of economic development is not working very well. Also, we’ve recently learned that in both Kansas and Wichita, business tax costs are very high, with only a handful of states ranking worse. The full agenda for this event, which is open to the public and which KPI is generously hosting at no charge to attendees, is A true path to economic growth and prosperity. A link to registration is there, or call 316-634-0218.

    Those populist Pachyderms. This Friday (April 6th) the Wichita Pachyderm Club features Jordan A. Poland, who will discuss his Master of Arts thesis in Public History at Wichita State University, titled “A case study of Populism in Kansas. The election of Populist Governor Lorenzo Lewelling from Wichita, and the Legislative War of 1893.” Lewelling — wasn’t he the last governor from Wichita? … The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club. … The club has an exceptional lineup of future speakers as follows: On April 13th: Alvin Sarachek, Ph.D., Geneticist, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Natural Sciences at Wichita State University, speaking on “Human Genetic Individuality and Confused Public Policy Making.” … On April 20th: Senator Steve Morris, President of the Kansas Senate, speaking on “Legislative update.” … On April 27th: Dr. Malcolm C. Harris, Sr., Professor of Finance, Friends University, speaking on “The Open Minded Roots of American Exceptionalism, and the Decline of America’s Greatness.”

    We just don’t understand, they say. “Reeling from the possibility the Supreme Court might undermine ObamaCare, two members in good standing of the liberal media elite, both with the New York Times, took to the Sunday shows to lament the lack of public recognition for the great benefits of the law. ‘On health care,’ columnist Tom Friedman rationalized on NBC’s Meet the Press, ‘that’s partly a failure of communication.’ A befuddled Friedman advanced the liberal narrative that blames communication, not facts, as he wondered: ‘How do you go a year and a half where so many Americans don’t even understand the benefits of this legislation when they apply to them? And that gets to this administration, which I think has been abysmal at communicating some of its most important agenda items.’ That framework would make a lot more sense if applied to a conservative President facing a media hostile to his policies. That’s certainly not the case with this administration where the media have been consistently promoting Obamacare.” (Brent Baker, writing at Media Research Center in Sunday Guests Fret Public Naivete on ObamaCare Benefits as Friedman Blames Poor Communication. … I would say the problem is that people are starting to understand the impact of PPACA, or Obamacare. We find that the more people learn, the less they like it.

    Colleges indoctrinate students. The report studied only the California university system, but it applies nationwide, writes Peter Berkowitz in the Wall Street Journal (available at the Hoover Institution at How California’s Colleges Indoctrinate Students.) He quotes the study A Crisis of Competence: The Corrupting Effect of Political Activism in the University of California: “The politicization of higher education by activist professors and compliant university administrators deprives students of the opportunity to acquire knowledge and refine their minds. It also erodes the nation’s civic cohesion and its ability to preserve the institutions that undergird democracy in America.” … He goes on to explain: “The analysis begins from a nonpolitical fact: Numerous studies of both the UC system and of higher education nationwide demonstrate that students who graduate from college are increasingly ignorant of history and literature. They are unfamiliar with the principles of American constitutional government. And they are bereft of the skills necessary to comprehend serious books and effectively marshal evidence and argument in written work. … This decline in the quality of education coincides with a profound transformation of the college curriculum. None of the nine general campuses in the UC system requires students to study the history and institutions of the United States. None requires students to study Western civilization, and on seven of the nine UC campuses, including Berkeley, a survey course in Western civilization is not even offered.” … We should note that at the same time this has happened, the cost of college has exploded, and students are laden with debt.

    Job creation. Governments often fall prey to the job creation trap — that the goal of economic development is to create jobs. We see this in Wichita where the campaign for subsidy to hotel developers was presented as a jobs program. To most of our political and bureaucratic leaders, the more jobs created, the better — without regard to the underlying economics and how much these jobs actually cost. These costs destroy other jobs. Many of our business leaders don’t do any better understanding the difference between capitalism and business. In his introduction to the recently-published book The Morality of Capitalism, Tom G. Palmer writes: “Capitalism is not just about building stuff, in the way that socialist dictators used to exhort their slaves to ‘Build the Future!’ Capitalism is about creating value, not merely working hard or making sacrifices or being busy. Those who fail to understand capitalism are quick to support ‘job creation’ programs to create work. They have misunderstood the point of work, much less the point of capitalism. In a much-quoted story, the economist Milton Friedman was shown the construction on a massive new canal in Asia. When he noted that it was odd that the workers were moving huge amounts of earth and rock with small shovels, rather than earth moving equipment, he was told ‘You don’t understand; this is a jobs program.’ His response: ‘Oh, I thought you were trying to build a canal. If you’re seeking to create jobs, why didn’t you issue them spoons, rather than shovels?” … After describing crony capitalism — the type practiced in Wichita, Sedgwick County, and Kansas, with deals like the Ambassador Hotel — Palmer explains: “Such corrupt cronyism shouldn’t be confused with ‘free-market capitalism,’ which refers to a system of production and exchange that is based on the rule of law, on equality of rights for all, on the freedom to choose, on the freedom to trade, on the freedom to innovate, on the guiding discipline of profits and losses, and on the right to enjoy the fruits of one’s labors, of one’s savings, of one’s investments, without fearing confiscation or restriction from those who have invested, not in production of wealth, but in political power.”

    Markets: exploitation or empowerment? Do markets lead to a centralization of political and economic power, or do markets decentralize and disseminate wealth? In an eight-minute video from LearnLiberty.org, a project of Institute for Humane Studies, Antony Davies presents evidence and concludes that markets and free trade empower individuals rather than exploit them.

  • Sustainable development presented in Wichita

    Next week the Sedgwick County Commission takes up the issue of whether to participate in a HUD Sustainable Communities Regional Planning Grant. This is part of an initiative to replace personal freedom with government planning.

    Today Tom DeWeese, President, American Policy Center, addressed members and guests of the Wichita Pachyderm Club on the topic “U.N. Agenda 21: Sustainable Development.” An audio presentation of his address is below.

    [powerpress]

    An op-ed in this topic written by Randal O’Toole, Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute is “Sustainable planning” not so sustainable.

    An informational sheet from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation “Need to Know” series is available at Agenda 21, ICLEI, and “Sustainable Development.”

    A paper on this topic written by Sedgwick County Commissioner Richard Ranzau is available at Sustainable Development and U.N. Agenda 21: Economic Development or Economic Destruction?

    Also, so that citizens may be informed on this issue, Americans for Prosperity, Kansas is holding an informational event on Monday April 2, from 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm at Spangles Restaurant, corner of Kellogg and Broadway. (If the Kansas Jayhawks make it to the NCAA basketball title game, the television broadcast doesn’t start until 8:00 pm, with tip off sometime later.) The meeting is described as follows: “On April 4, 2012 at 9:00 am on the 3rd floor of the Sedgwick County Courthouse, the Sedgwick County Commission will be holding a public hearing to consider approval of Sedgwick County’s participation as the fiscal agent on behalf of the Regional Economic Area Partnership (REAP) Consortium with an ‘in-kind’ commitment of $120,707 to implement a Regional Plan for Sustainable Communities Grant for South Central Kansas. Public comment will be invited. Learn about the Sustainable Communities Plan for South Central Kansas. Find out how you can get involved in this issue as a citizen. Consider testifying before the County Commission. Consider attending the Commission meeting as an interested citizen.” … For more information on this event contact John Todd at john@johntodd.net or 316-312-7335, or Susan Estes, AFP Field Director at sestes@afphq.org or 316-681-4415.

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Thursday March 29, 2012

    Sustainable development. Sedgwick County Commissioner Richard Ranzau writes that next week the commission will vote on the issue of sustainable development, and whether Sedgwick County should participate in a planning process. Writes Ranzau: “Sedgwick County will be voting on this issue next Wednesday, April 4th, 2012. Those of you that have concerns about this need to speak up now. Please email and call the commissioners and encourage them to vote NO on this. If you are a property owner, business owner, home owner, builder, developer, farmer, or taxpayer you should strongly oppose this agenda. Now is the time to stop this. This is President Obama’s plan to use HUD, DOT, and EPA to implement Sustainable Development/Smart Growth/UN Agenda 21.” Ranzau has written on this issue. His paper is at Sustainable Development and U.N. Agenda 21: Economic Development or Economic Destruction? Contact information for commissioners may be found at Board of County Commissioners. As of this writing the agenda and explanatory material for the April 4th meeting is not available. When it is, it can be found at the same page.

    Pachyderms to feature talk on sustainable development. On a related matter, this Friday (March 30rd) the Wichita Pachyderm Club features Tom DeWeese, President, American Policy Center, speaking on the topic “U.N. Agenda 21: Sustainable Development.” DeWeese is one of the nation’s leading advocates of individual liberty, free enterprise, private property rights, personal privacy, back-to-basics education and American sovereignty and independence. … The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club.

    Climate models. William Happer, professor of physics at Princeton, calls attention to the problems of modern climate science in the pages of the Wall Street Journal. He asks: “What is happening to global temperatures in reality? The answer is: almost nothing for more than 10 years. … The lack of any statistically significant warming for over a decade has made it more difficult for the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and its supporters to demonize the atmospheric gas CO2 which is released when fossil fuels are burned.” While there has been warming over the past two centuries, Happer warns of linking this to the activity of mankind: “There has indeed been some warming, perhaps about 0.8 degrees Celsius, since the end of the so-called Little Ice Age in the early 1800s. Some of that warming has probably come from increased amounts of CO2, but the timing of the warming — much of it before CO2 levels had increased appreciably — suggests that a substantial fraction of the warming is from natural causes that have nothing to do with mankind.” While we need high-quality science regarding the earth’s climate, the current climate models are not providing that: “It is easy to be confused about climate, because we are constantly being warned about the horrible things that will happen or are already happening as a result of mankind’s use of fossil fuels. But these ominous predictions are based on computer models. It is important to distinguish between what the climate is actually doing and what computer models predict. The observed response of the climate to more CO2 is not in good agreement with model predictions.” … The complete article in the Wall Street Journal (no subscription required) is Global Warming Models Are Wrong Again: The observed response of the climate to more CO2 is not in good agreement with predictions. … Some will discount this article because Happer’s specialty is modern optics, optical and radiofrequency spectroscopy of atoms and molecules, and spin-polarized atoms and nuclei — not climate science. But, we see the problems with modern climate science and its predictive abilities.

    Shy regulators. The Obama administration is so out of touch with the public that it appears shy about publicity over its actions. The Hill reports: “The Obama administration announced landmark carbon emissions standards for new power plants Tuesday, but hardly shouted from the rooftops about them. The administration rolled out the proposal with relatively little fanfare, and President Obama — who was in South Korea at nuclear security summit — did not issue a statement about the regulation. In contrast, when the Environmental Protection Agency issued final rules to control power plant mercury emissions in December, Obama praised them as major public health protections while touting White House efforts to ensure they don’t affect power grid reliability.” … More at White House, rather quietly, advances climate change agenda.

    Just say no to taxes. Those who reject tax increases under all conditions are often described unflatteringly. The New York Times house conservative David Brooks has called them “fanatics” with “no sense of moral decency.” William Voegeli, writing in City Journal explains why we should not consider higher taxes as a solution to problems. “In rejecting tax hikes, Republicans aren’t trading in fanaticism. Rather, they’re confronting a governing failure — an abiding lack of candor about what our welfare state costs — that voters grasp but Democrats refuse to admit.” … The problem is soaring spending, growing faster than the economy: “What we can say is that over the last 40 years, government revenues have kept pace with economic growth while government spending has run steadily ahead of it. … Gross Domestic Product and federal revenues, both expressed in per-capita terms and adjusted for inflation, were about two and a half times as large at the end of the period as at the beginning. Federal expenditures were three times as large.” It is welfare-state expenditures that have grown the fastest, and by far. … Voegeli lays the problem at the feet of the Democrats: “For years, the Democratic Party’s raison d’être has been to establish, defend, and expand the welfare state. The Democrats could have told us all along — forthrightly, scrupulously, and unambiguously — that their project would cost a lot of money and that, should economic growth be insufficient to pay for it, big tax increases would be necessary. Had they done so, they would be in a strong position to argue that the terms of the deal they struck with yesterday’s voters oblige today’s Americans to pay higher taxes. But that’s not what they did.” … Much more to read at Not a Penny More: The case for antitax absolutism.

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Monday March 26, 2012

    Pachyderms to feature talk on sustainable development. This Friday (March 30rd) the Wichita Pachyderm Club features Tom DeWeese, President, American Policy Center, speaking on U.N. Agenda 21: Sustainable Development. Tom DeWeese is one of the nation’s leading advocates of individual liberty, free enterprise, private property rights, personal privacy, back-to-basics education and American sovereignty and independence. … The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club. … The club has an exceptional lineup of future speakers as follows: On April 6th: Jordan A. Poland, who will discuss his Master of Arts thesis in Public History at Wichita State University, titled “A case study of Populism in Kansas. The election of Populist Governor Lorenzo Lewelling from Wichita, and the Legislative War of 1893.” … On April 13th: Alvin Sarachek, Ph.D., Geneticist, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Natural Sciences at Wichita State University, speaking on “Human Genetic Individuality and Confused Public Policy Making.” … On April 20th: Senator Steve Morris, President of the Kansas Senate, speaking on “Legislative update.” … On April 27th: Dr. Malcolm C. Harris, Sr., Professor of Finance, Friends University, speaking on “The Open Minded Roots of American Exceptionalism, and the Decline of America’s Greatness.”

    PPACAction. That is, where should you go to keep up with action surrounding PPACA, commonly known as Obamacare, as the legislation is argued before the U.S. Supreme Court this week? Try PPACAction, a project of Texas Public Policy Foundation. Also featured on the site is Experts’ Guide to the Issues.

    The seven rules of bureaucracy. In this article, authors Loyd S. Pettegrew and Carol A. Vance quote Thomas Sowell: “When the government creates some new program, nothing is easier than to show whatever benefits that program produces. … But it is virtually impossible to trace the taxes that paid for the program back to their sources and to show the alternative uses of that same money that could have been far more beneficial.” In order to understand the foundation of America’s morass, we must examine bureaucracy. At the root of this growing evil is the very nature of bureaucracy, especially political bureaucracy. French economist Frédéric Bastiat offered an early warning in 1850 that laws, institutions, and acts — the stuff of political bureaucracy — produce economic effects that can be seen immediately, but that other, unforeseen effects happen much later. He claimed that bad economists look only at the immediate, seeable effects and ignore effects that come later, while good economists are able to look at the immediate effects and foresee effects, both good and bad, that come later. … Both the seen and the unseen have become a necessary condition of modern bureaucracy. (Bastiat: That Which Is Seen, and That Which Is Not Seen.) The first rule? “Maintain the problem at all costs!”

    Civil society. Edward H. Crane, speaking nearly twenty years ago. I think things have become worse since then: “In a civil society you make the choices about your life. In a political society someone else makes those choices. And because it is not the natural order of things for someone other than you to make those decisions about your life, the political society is of necessity based on coercion. … Civil society, on the other hand, is based on voluntarism and predicated on giving the widest possible latitude to the individual so that he has sovereignty over his own life, so long as he respects the equal rights of others in society. It’s a simple concept, really, but a radical one nevertheless. It’s the concept on which this great nation of ours was founded and which was so revolutionary that it motivated tens of millions of people from around the globe to come here, often giving up everything, just to live in the ‘land of the free.’ … It does seem ironic that so many politicians in this country hold this curiously benign view of government as some kind of giant nanny, that will make everything okay if we just give it more money. Because as we enter the 21st century, government activities beyond its legitimate function of the protection of life, liberty, and property have pretty much been exposed as one of the great failures of civilization. Coercive, political society simply doesn’t work very well. Most people, whether they’re willing to admit it or not, know that now. There is a reason why East Germany produced the smoke- belching bucket-of-bolts Trabant, and West Germany produced the Mercedes, the BMW, the Porsche, the Audi, and the Volkswagen. Same people, same culture, different political system. Civil society worked; political society didn’t. Yet politicians in America continue to give credence to the idea that the political society can address our problems better than the institutions of the civil society. As Milton Friedman has observed, we seem to be saying that we know that socialism is a failure and that capitalism is a success, therefore we need more socialism.”

    One down, 48 to go. “‘Building better communities’ was the slogan of the California Redevelopment Association. But the critics charged that redevelopment agencies ‘deprived tens of thousands of working and lower-income residents of their homes and livelihoods while granting vast subsidies to billionaires.’ In the end, the social justice questions didn’t matter, but the subsidies did, so to save the state billions of dollars a year, California redevelopment agencies shut down for good last week. … California invented TIF in 1952. Since then, 48 other states have passed similar laws. Now a pioneer in ending such crony capitalism, the Antiplanner hopes the other 48 states will soon follow California’s example. Good riddance to a waste of money that benefited few people other than a few politicians and developers.” More from Randal O’Toole at One Down, 48 to Go. O’Toole also authored the Cato Institute Policy Analysis Crony Capitalism and Social Engineering: The Case against Tax-Increment Financing.”

    Economic freedom in America: The decline, and what it means. “The U.S.’s gains in economic freedom made over 20 years have been completely erased in just nine.” Furthermore, our economic freedom is still dropping, to the point where we now rank below Canada. The result is slow growth in the private sector economy and persistent high unemployment. This is perhaps the most important takeaway from a short new video from Economic Freedom Project, which is a project of the Charles Koch Institute. The video explains that faster growth in government spending causes slower growth in the private economy. This in turn has lead to the persistent high unemployment that we are experiencing today. … To view the video at the Economic Freedom Project site, click on Episode Two: Economic Freedom in America Today. Or, click on the YouTube video below.

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Monday March 19, 2012

    Eisenhower expert to present. This Friday (March 23rd) the Wichita Pachyderm Club features David Nichols, Ph.D. Dr. Nichols is a recognized expert on the Eisenhower presidency and is currently working on his third book on Ike, this one dealing with Senator Joe McCarthy with a focus on Ike’s management techniques. On Friday, Nichols’ topic will be “The Eisenhower Leadership Model: What business people (and even politicians) can learn from Ike.” … The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club. … The club has an exceptional lineup of future speakers as follows: On March 30th: Tom DeWeese, President, American Policy Center, speaking on U.N. Agenda 21: Sustainable Development. … On April 6th: Jordan A. Poland, who will discuss his Master of Arts thesis in Public History at Wichita State University, titled “A case study of Populism in Kansas. The election of Populist Governor Lorenzo Lewelling from Wichita, and the Legislative War of 1893.” … On April 13th: Alvin Sarachek, Ph.D., Geneticist, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Natural Sciences at Wichita State University, speaking on “Human Genetic Individuality and Confused Public Policy Making.” … On April 20th: Senator Steve Morris, President of the Kansas Senate, speaking on “Legislative update.” … On April 27th: Dr. Malcolm C. Harris, Sr., Professor of Finance, Friends University, speaking on “The Open Minded Roots of American Exceptionalism, and the Decline of America’s Greatness.”

    Pompeo town hall meeting. From the congressman’s office: “Kansas Fourth District Congressman Mike Pompeo will host a town hall meeting at the WSU Hughes Metroplex in Wichita on Saturday, March 24 at 11:30 am. Congressman Pompeo will take questions from constituents and discuss issues related to Congress and the federal government. The public and members of the media are welcome and encouraged to attend.” The WSU Hughes Metroplex is located at 5015 East 29th Street North.

    Crises of Governments. A new short book from Institute of Economic Affairs is Crises of Governments: The Ongoing Global Financial Crisis and Recession. Barro is Robert Barro is the Paul M. Warburg Professor of Economics at Harvard University; a Senior Fellow of the Hoover Institution of Stanford University; and a Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research. The complete book is available online at no cost. Some highlights from the executive summary include these: “The ‘Great Recession’ has been particularly deep. In the USA, the loss of GDP relative to trend growth has been 9 per cent. The recovery from recession has also been much slower than the recovery from the recessions of the early 1980s and early 1990s. After those recessions, the USA achieved economic growth of 4.3 per cent and 3.6 per cent respectively.” … “One of the major causes of the crash was the boom in securitisation whereby inherently risky loans were packaged together and sold as very low-risk securities. This was strongly encouraged by the government; Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government agencies responsible, should be privatised.” … “In general a fiscal stimulus package might raise output in the very short run but the long-term fiscal multiplier is negative. This leads growth to stall after an initial increase, as is happening at the moment.” … “Spending and welfare programme entitlements grew rapidly under President George W. Bush and that growth has continued under President Obama. In many respects, as far as economic policy is concerned, Bush and Obama are ‘twins’, just as Reagan and Clinton were ‘twins.’” … “The next crisis will be a crisis of government debt. This debt consists of both explicit borrowing and also of entitlements through social security programmes that have been dramatically expanded under Presidents Bush and Obama. This crisis of government debt is not just a US problem.” … “The coming crisis can be addressed in the USA only by reforming entitlement programmes and also by tax reform to reduce ‘tax expenditures’ or special exemptions from taxes for certain types of economic activity. In the EU, fiscal and monetary policy need to be decoupled so that member states do not become responsible for each other’s borrowing.”

    What are the limits of democracy? “Imagine if everything in society was determined through a majority vote.” Politics — elections, in particular — is an especially bad way to make decisions. Free markets allow people to get just what they want from an incredibly broad array of choices. In elections, we are usually left to choose between the lesser of two evils on the basis of their campaign promises. And once in office, we learn the worthlessness of promises made on the campaign trail. It is best that we remove decision-making from the public sphere, as much as we can. “Therefore it is important to remember that individual choice, limited government, and free markets are the necessary condition for a free and truly democratic society,” concludes narrator Professor Pavel Yakovlev in this video from LearnLiberty.org, a project of Institute for Humane Studies.