Minarchic Eudaimonist

New York Times Claims Bush is Responsible for Housing Bubble

2008-12-22T19:29:00.000-08:00

And there is actually an unspoken insight in the column. If one keeps asking, "How is it consistent with the idea of constitutionally limited government to manipulate public policy to put people in homes that they could not otherwise afford?," one is immediately struck by a tale of how "compassionate" conservatism helped destroy the economy by replacing free market principles with the overriding goal of building a "big tent" constituency for the Republican party through warm and fuzzy bribes of government cheese.

Of course, this is quite the unspoken insight. So unspoken that the actual theme of the column is that the consequences of govmint-mandated easy credit are all the fault of Bush for being too hands-off. You see, he was supposed to give people homes they can't afford (yay! government to the rescue!) while simultaneously strapping down the banks with regulations meant to stop them from doing that (boo! business is so bad!). Gotta love what passes for logic in the New York Times. And, of course, no mention is made of the laws and directives put in place by Clinton to enforce the Community Reinvestment Act, which basically forced banks under threat of lawsuits to make subprime loans.

Good to see the morons at Fox balanced by the morons at the Times.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/12/21/business/21admin.php?page=1

Lay off Judge Kozinkski

2008-06-12T06:57:00.000-07:00

The controversy over Judge Kozinksi's goofy and sexy downloads on his personal website (see http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-kozinski-gb,0,4710645.graffitiboard?slice=1&limit=10) exemplifies the dissolution of the conservative-libertarian fusion that supported . . . what exactly? What have we gotten out of that fusion besides bigger government, more spending, and greater vulnerability to the supposedly ideologically-bankrupt left? O.k. Maybe we got Reagan. And Clarence Thomas. Perhaps that's the best to hope for, but that's another post. Back to Kozinski . . .

Judge Kozinski is the closest thing to a classical liberal on the bench. He fairly consistently rules in support of individual freedom and against the expansion of government power. Somehow, and fortuitously, he ended up presiding over a federal criminal obscenity case (yes, a criminal obscenity case--in the 21st century). The next thing you know, the "public" has discovered his personal website (somehow revealed by the prosecutor of the obscenity case). And, horrors, it contains pictures of naked women! Half-clothed men chasing aroused animals! And videos of Bill Mauer!

Actually, that stuff only makes up a tiny fraction of the sometimes profane but mostly goofy downloads on his personal website. In reality, his website contained the sort of detritus that just about any guy who spends any time on the Internet might accumulate. At most, the website reveals that he shares a feature my wife says is common to adult men--adolescence. If you want to see proof, go here: http://www.uslaw.com/pop/what-stuff-was-on-judge-kozinskis-personal-website/?p=121).

But the real question is why in the world are government resources being spent on trying obscenity cases and unearthing the morsels of inanity that can be found on just about any harddrive of any wired teenager (or adult male)?

It is the misdirection of priorities resulting from the puritan conservative element of the fusion I talked about first. Like electrons spinning off of an unstable, artificially fused new element, the puritan conservatives have rocketed off the reservation.

There is no way any rational person would focus even the tiniest fraction of government resources or effort on stuff like this. It represents nothing more than the satiation of medieval preferences, which burns the same fuel that could have advanced a Renaissance in politics--nay, an Enlightenment. This is how we got "faith-based" government-funded welfare programs, rather than the dissolution of the Department of Education.

How is it that after nearly 30 years of Reagan revolution, we can point to a handful of pro-liberty marginal supreme court cases that are swamped by the likes of Kelo?

Its because the impossible is impossible. Medieval minds cannot be fused to modernity. For the conservative-libertarian alliance to work, there needs to be common ground on priorities--and that common ground needs to be based in the encroaching reality of tyrannical government.

Free speech, property rights, and economic liberty must be the focus of any fusion. Everything else is incidental, if not dangerously fissile.

Of course, that assumes the purpose of the coalition is freedom from overreaching government, rather than the warm embrace of liberal fascism.

To Serve Man

2008-05-07T04:42:00.000-07:00

It has been written that one of the defining characteristics of the American Republic is that the government is designed to serve the people, rather than the other way around. But with all levels of taxation seizing nearly 50% of the average person's income and with government pervasively violating enumerated constititutional rights, a tipping point has been reached that threatens to flip this defining characteristic on its back. The final nudge will undoubtedly happen with socialized health care--when government cheese becomes the elixer of life.

As the Left often highlights in support of socialized medicine, nearly everyone faces a serious medical issue in the course of their life. For this reason, socialized medicine threatens to place everyone on government lifesupport. And when the power to pull the plug is vested in the hands of government, there will be no doubt who serves whom.

A Brief Critique of Hayek

2008-05-05T05:12:00.000-07:00

Hayek writes:

"Freedom granted only when it is known beforehand that its effects will be beneficial is not freedom. If we knew how freedom would be used, the case for it would largely disappear. We shall never get the benefits of freedom, never obtain those unforeseeable new developments for which it provides the opportunity, if it is not also granted where the uses made of it by some do not seem desirable. It is therefore no argument against individual freedom that it is frequently abused. Freedom necessarily means that many things will be done which we do not like. Our faith in freedom does not rest on the foreseeable results in particular circumstances but on the belief that it will, on balance, release more forces for the good than the bad."

Not everything said here is true. For example, knowing how freedom will be used does not constitute a strong argument against freedom unless you take the position that the only justification for freedom is whether it tends to create net social benefits. There are many other justifications for freedom, including its fundamental role in ensuring genuine character development, which alone sufficiently establishes freedom's worth as the foundation for an individual's flourishing existence. Additionally, the fact that certain kinds of freedom will be abused--the freedom to initiate violence, for example--can be a valid argument for restricting freedom (unless one engages in circular reasoning by defining freedom in such a way that it can't be abused).

However, from a baseline principle of respecting the freedom to act without violating the equal freedom of others, there is little doubt that freedom enables individuals to ferret out knowledge that is unknown to the majority, and it is also true that such niche knowledge (electricity, telephone, nuclear energy, semi-conductors, operating systems, etc.) is what typically propels society to new levels of productivity and wealth.

For this reason, Hayek was essentially right that central planning destroys progress by encasing society in the knowledge of its annointed experts.

The Left Greased the Slide

2008-05-02T06:08:00.001-07:00

The Fourth Amendment states:

“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

The first clause clearly defines a right of security in one's property against unreasonable searches and seizures. This is a much more powerful protection than a mere right to privacy because it protects not just privacy, but a sphere of autonomy from government that bars any unreasonable invasion or seizure of one's property--not just those invasions that violate a privacy interest.

And yet, in the name of expanding the protections of the Fourth Amendment, during the 1960s Leftists on the Supreme Court abandoned the plain text linkage between the Amendment and the security of property rights in favor of mere privacy. Even worse, these decisions embraced the idea that protected privacy interests evolve with the norms of society and must be annointed with society's blessing as "reasonable."

In short, forty years ago, a firmly-rooted individual right against the collective became a momentary privilege defined by the collective.

Under this elastic and inverted interpretation, is it any wonder the Fourth Amendment's protections have done next to nothing to rein-in warrantless searches post 9-11? The only wonder is why it took forty years to slide down the slope greased by the Left.

Nothing Conserved

2008-05-01T05:51:00.000-07:00

Last night, Bill O'Reilly evidenced the lack of principled thought in modern conservativism. Interviewing Hillary Clinton, the supposed conservative bulldog blasted her with the semi-question: "you know that hillcare will bankrupt the nation?" As the exchange continued, the only arguments mustered by Bill could have equally been mustered by a bureaucratic beancounter or an angry Archie Bunker. Not once did Bill broach the obvious threat posed by giving government gatekeeper control over life or death, health or sickness--not to mention a person's most private information. In fact, Hillary ultimately prevailed in the exchange.

Confronted with nothing but O'Reilly's "I don't want to pay for the medical care of irresponsible people," Hillary blasted back with "what about a family with a diabetic child who can't afford medical care." At this, Bill was reduced to blubbering, "I support a safety-net."

This is the fundamental problem with modern conservativism. It no longer challenges the premise that people are entitled to support themselves with the resources of others. It's no longer a question of whether there should be socialized medicine, but only how much and for whom. But if you concede this premise, there is nothing fixed in reality to impose limits on its logical extension. The principle of absolving others of personal responsibility for their own lives and families knows no bounds.

O'Reilly's acquiescence in government-enforced absolution of personal irresponsibility illustrates that modern conservativism conserves no principle that once sustained it.

Time to Dust-off the Coonskin Cap

2008-04-30T05:16:00.000-07:00

Federal bailouts of foolish banks and borrowers have been pillaried for rewarding personal irresponsibility. But how is it that taxes have become a source of charity for fools? It results from presuming Congress has the power to give public charity. This premise is not a new one. It led Congress to propose a bill appropriating funds for a much more deserving charity more than one hundred fifty years ago. But that bill failed because of the principled stand of one courageous congressman.

Explaining his successful opposition to a bill authorizing the payment of alms to a war widow, none other than Davy Crockett observed:

"The power of collecting and disbursing money at pleasure is the most dangerous power that can be entrusted to man . . . for there is not a man in the United States who can ever guess how much he pays to the government. So you see, that while you are contributing to relieve one, you are drawing it from thousands who are even worse off than he . . . You will very easily perceive what a wide door this would open for fraud and corruption and favoritism, on the one hand, and for robbing the people on the other. ‘No, Colonel, Congress has no right to give charity.’"

Crockett's observation holds true whether such charity is given directly by appropriation or indirectly through more creative legislative designs, such as the loan guaranties of Fannie-Mae and Freddie-Mac, the deposit insurance of the FDIC, or the unlimited authority of the Federal Reserve to print currency.

The slope from alms for widows to bailouts for banks is slippery because both acts presume Congressional power to give something for nothing, unconstrained by the Constitution. Once this intepretative premise is accepted, there is nothing to stop the expansion of Congress' charitable powers except the political whims of its members. In the long-run, the only way to stop the modern mortgage bailout bonanza--and governmental giveaways of increasing magnitude--is to squarely and continuously challenge this premise.

It's time for Congress to dust-off the coonskin cap.

Compassionate Command and Control

2008-04-29T06:27:00.000-07:00

This just in from msn.com:

"[M]any farmers are cutting back on growing wheat in favor of more profitable, less disease-prone corn and soybeans for ethanol refineries and Asian consumers."

What is lost in this observation is how the entire ethanol phenomena is entirely created by government command-and-control of the economy.

As agricultural production shifts to non-food products inducing artificial food scarcity and causing food prices to rise, accompanied by hoarding and rioting, does anyone notice that our path in the green meadow is parallel to Stalin's fields of grain?

Courtesy of compassionate conservativism.