TX Politico's blog

I know the Left likes to ridicule anyone who mentions Ayn Rand or Atlas Shrugged. They especially like it when conservatives or Republicans say something about "Going Galt".

It seems to me that one reason for this is a (deliberate?) misunderstanding of what we -- or at least, I -- mean when we say that.

By "Going Galt", it seems to me, we (mostly) mean that someone will not take that next step, make that investment of time, effort, thought, or money, to make their mark in the world and make a difference.

Like Rand's great philosopher Hugh Akston who became a short order cook in a roadside diner, rather than using abilities to their utmost, someone who "goes Galt" might simply choose to do something else, rather than take the extreme Galt/Wyatt/Mulligan option of completely removing themselves from the reach of the looters and the moochers.

In that light, I think Obamacare is going to cause us more problems than many have been imagining. . . .

I have heard from a surgeon whom I trust and respect (though I don't know his source for this information) that much more than half of all surgeons are 55 or older.

Given the basic premise that people do things based on the incentives involved, and given the further premise that Obamacare (or, if it fails, the next incarnation of it) will reduce the financial and professional incentives to become a doctor, my friend believes strongly that we will be in for medical rationing simply because we will not be able to find enough doctors, regardless of what happens due to gov't bureaucratic manipulations.

My friend spent 14 years -- FOURTEEN YEARS -- after college training to become a doctor, then surgeon, then getting his specialty skills.

What makes people think that we will be able to find "volunteers" to go through such a rigorous and lengthy program, all the while incurring massive amounts of debt for the cost of their schooling and training, just so that they can be asked to work 36-hour shifts* for whatever salary a bureaucrat determines they are worth?

My friend loves his work. He does it for the satisfaction he gets from it.  (Now.) But when asked if he would have gone through everything he went through solely for the satisfaction of the job, he says no.  The potential to make a good living for himself and his family was definitely part of the attraction to the career choice in the first place.

There are other jobs he could have loved and been accomplished in performing, while paying well.  Plus they would have afforded him much more time to spend with his family as his children grew up, rather than having to spend significant portions of not just days but nights as well away from home and on call.

The point I want to leave you with is that we can expect to lose men such as him from the medical profession if we insist on making them gov't cogs rather than free actors, capable of making what they can in a market which rewards them for their dedication, efforts, sacrifices, and skills.

Beware what you wish for, Obamacare supporters.  You might just get it . . . and then the supply of producers whose efforts you have appropriated will dry up, relieving you of the burden of looting them.

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* Yes, I know the 24+ hour shifts don't last forever.  And that they are concentrated in the early years of training, but does that really make anyone think that people will jump at the chance to perform such arduous tasks for the pittance the DC paper pushers are willing to fork out?  Really?

If you can make it through the puerile and prurient ravings of David Shuster, sitting in for the normally oh-so-(mentally)-balanced Keith Olbermann, you find this nugget at 5:50 into the 8-minute-long stream of sexual jokes:

Lawrence O'Donnell, "[Medicare and Social Security] are well-working Socialist programs within the American government.  There's absolutely no other description of them."

Nice to hear a liberal admit this instead of trying to pretend these programs are anything but government taking from some to give to others.

I wonder who wrote this . . . .

"Genuine bipartisanship assumes an honest process of give-and-take, and that the quality of the compromise is measured by how well it serves some agreed-upon goal, whether better schools or lower deficits. This in turn assumes that the majority will be constrained -- by an exacting press corps and ultimately an informed electorate -- to negotiate in good faith.

"If these conditions do not hold -- if nobody outside Washington is really paying attention to the substance of the bill, if the true costs . . . are buried in phony accounting and understated by a trillion dollars or so -- the majority party can begin every negotiation by asking for 100% of what it wants, go on to concede 10%, and then accuse any member of the minority party who fails to support this 'compromise' of being 'obstructionist.'

"For the minority party in such circumstances, 'bipartisanship' comes to mean getting chronically steamrolled, although individual senators may enjoy certain political rewards by consistently going along with the majority and hence gaining a reputation for being 'moderate' or 'centrist.'"

If you haven't seen it already, find out here.

Todd Zwicki has a take on government rewriting mortgage contracts over at WSJ this morning.

The implications of this are obvious and potentially severe: The uncertainty will exacerbate the already existing uncertainty in the financial system, further freezing credit markets.

If Congress wants to deal with the rising number of foreclosures, it should not create a new mess by converting the mortgage crisis into a bankruptcy crisis. Doing so will open the door to a host of unintended consequences that will further freeze credit markets, raise interest rates for new home buyers, and spread the mortgage contagion to other types of consumer credit. Congress needs to reject this plan and look for better solutions.

 Reminds me of another warning about government rewriting contracts I read somewhere . . . .

Borrowing from Bastiat and "That Which is Seen and That Which is Unseen" . . . we know that every dollar the government spends is balanced by the dollar it takes from the public and thus is not spent by the public.

...the State gives poor excuse when it says, "With these hundred sous, we shall employ workmen."

The taxpayer can truthfully reply, "With the hundred sous, I would employ them myself." 

The claimed encouragement of labor is a delusion.

My question is: does anyone know the average cost of government overhead?  For every dollar it takes in, how much is spent on overhead that is not spent on the final deliverable?

If they spend $1T they take from the public, how much do they actually have to take to get that $1T?

If they have an overhead of just 10% (a ridiculously low estimate, I would guess), wouldn't they actually have to take $1.1T from our pockets to spend that Trillion?

Or should we figure it the other way: they take $1T from us but really only $0.9T is spent on "stimulus" spending and the other 10% is taken up by overhead?

I don't always agree with her, but this time Peggy Noonan offers the best version I have seen of the questions facing President Obama et al. regarding terrorists, detention, and interrogation:

The question for the Obama administration: Do they think Mr. Cheney is essentially correct, that bad men are coming with evil and deadly intent, but that America can afford to, must for moral reasons, change its stance regarding interrogation and detention of terrorists? Or, deep down, do the president and those around him think Mr. Cheney is wrong, that people who make such warnings are hyping the threat for political purposes? And, therefore, that interrogation techniques, etc., can of course be relaxed? I don't know the precise answer to this question. Do they know exactly what they think? Or are they reading raw threat files each day trying to figure out what they think?

ABCNEWS has a story about Presidential perks in light of BHO's limiting of executive pay.

The story includes this line from "presidential historian and ABC News consultant Richard Norton Smith":

"Certainly, if the president goes on vacation, it's part of the job, because the president never goes on vacation," Smith said. "I don't you think you can legitimately argue against the communications and everything else that travels with and surrounds a president."

While I fully agree with what Smith said, I am left wondering if this is the same mainstream media that would run story after story about how Bush was "on vacation" during some "national crisis"?  Even going so far as to ask Is the President Taking Too Much Time Off?

But now they turn around and admit, finally and with no hint of irony, that Presidents never really "go on vacation" because BHO is in office.

Go figure.

Anytime you hear someone say that the way to fix the “foreclosure crisis” is to “modify loans,” what you are really hearing is a desire for the government to destroy the concept of contracts.

People, for good or bad, made voluntary decisions to sign mortgage contracts which they, for whatever reason, cannot afford.  If such a contract was obtained by fraud, there is already a mechanism in place to address this; it's called suing the crap out of them.

If, however, people voluntarily jumped in over their head, then they do not deserve the drastic action being contemplated by people like Rep. Conyers.

Why do I say drastic?  Because the entire concept of contracts will be potentially voided by a move like this.

In a story about NYC's "War on Salt", this quote tells you everything you'll ever need to know about the intentions of supporters of "good ideas" and "voluntary" government initiatives.

Thomas Frieden, the city's health commissioner, said he wants manufacturers and restaurants to join the war on salt voluntarily. If they don't, the city could pass legislation making it the law.

I wish I could remember where I first heard this mentioned (so I could give credit where credit is due), but there is another thing to remember about letting the Dems run a $1T+ deficit and it has nothing to do with "economic stimulus":