Yearly Archives: 2011

Pryor voted for Stimulus earlier but now he is concerned about our deficit

August 25, 2011 – 8:21 am

David Pryor praises Obama

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Thanks to the Arkansas Times Blog and to Arkansas Media Watch for pointing out what Senator Pryor said in his recent visit to Rogers, Arkansas:

Getting the economy on track will require deep cuts to the federal budget and a fairer tax system, Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., said Tuesday.

National defense, Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid will account for more than 60 percent of federal spending in 2012, according to pie charts he displayed. Spending in those areas will have to be reduced along with cuts to other programs if Congress hopes to get the budget under control, he said.

“Everybody’s going to get cut,” Pryor said. “We’ve been living beyond our means.”

The two-term senator spoke at a Rogers Rotary Club luncheon in the John Q. Hammons Center.

Pryor said various tax breaks have created a system in which 45 percent of Americans don’t pay taxes.

“It’s hard to have a fair tax system where only about half the people are paying,” he said.

It is funny to me that Mark Pryor has been one of the biggest spenders in the U.S. Senate history with all his votes with Obama in favor of an almost 800 billion stimulus and a government overall of our healthcare system, but Pryor now wants to talk like a conservative.

I read this letter below from the Arkansas Democrat Gazette on August 13,  2011:

Time to stop insanity

The president has told us for 2 1/2 years that he is focusing “like a laser” on jobs. Well, looks like it’s time to replace this “Jobs Guy” with someone who has actually had some experience running something. We have given him a chance. Yes, he reads a pretty mean TelePrompTer, but his cockamamie Keynesian economic theory that only works in the ivory towers of academia has proved itself wrong again. We have lost a net 2.5 million jobs since his inauguration, and the few jobs the Obama administration has created have cost the American taxpayer about $250,000 each, according to the Congressional Budget Office. And how about his explodingthe national debt? To all the happy parents who have just welcomed their new baby into our world, here is the bad news: Your baby’s share of the national debt is $46,156.05 as of August 2 and is still climbing. Both Republican and Democratic politicians are responsible for our national debt, which now tops $14.3 trillion.

In the recent debate regarding raising the debt ceiling, the only grownups in the room were the Tea Party congressmen who tried to force a vote on a constitutional amendment to require the federal government to balance its budget like every state and city in the land is required to do. In the 2012 election, I suspect the Tea Party of Republicans, independents and Democrats will finally demand that politicians stop this insanity. God help us if they don’t.

RALPH C. PATTERSON Bella Vista

Mark Pryor has supported about every bill that President Obama has pushed. The stimulus was probably the biggest budget busting bill so far. Did that help get our economy going? Not according to Kathy Fettke:

President Obama is urging Congress to raise the $14.3T debt ceiling or else, he warns, the U.S. would be forced to default. Perhaps our representatives need a little lesson on good debt vs. bad debt.

Good debt gives the borrower the potential to create more money. Bad debt gives the borrower something he can’t afford but wants anyway.

In real estate, for example, good debt might be a loan used to purchase an investment property. The borrower acquires an asset that creates income. That income is used to pay off the debt. The borrower then owns an asset free & clear that continues to produce income, long after the original debt is gone.

Bad debt serves a need for instant gratification by borrowing income from the future.

An example of bad debt is getting a loan to purchase a new car. The car is worth less the moment it’s driven off the lot. From day 1, the borrower owes more than the car is worth, and the “asset” doesn’t create monthly income. It becomes a liability, unless it is used as a rental, trucking or any other profitable business use.

Is Obama asking for more good debt or more bad debt?

Politicians are expert wordsmiths who can spin facts into a slick campaigns designed for getting what they want. That’s why President Obama and the money magicians at the Federal Reserve are preaching that more debt would help the economy.

Has their plan worked so far? Let’s take a look:

During the past 5 years, the federal government has borrowed 4.5 trillion dollars to stimulate the economy. That’s a 40% increase in government debt! 

Did the stimulus work?

Political spin doctors say it did, claiming that US GDP climbed 1.9% in Q1 of 2011. But how much did that increase cost us?

We spent $4.5 Trillion over 5 years to create $690 Billion in GDP growth.  Doing the math, that means the US will receive 14 cents for every dollar of debt incurred to stimulate the economy.

With losses like this, the “stimulus” plan is really a bad debt deal – one in which borrowing results in more liabilities, not assets. And now our leaders are trying to talk us into more of it.

Just say “NO!” to raising the debt ceiling! It’s not just bad debt, it’s ugly debt.

The cure for bad debt is pretty simple and boring: cut spending and increase income. If you can’t do either, you default.

Borrowing just to keep up with interest payments and avoid default is reckless and only exacerbates the problem. It does not fix it.

Politicians must agree to cut spending. And they must avoid increasing income through taxation. As much as the general population would love to rob the rich, that method doesn’t work. Business owners who get punished for making money will stop producing and hiring.

Instead of taxing productive businesses to extended ugly government debt, offer businesses good debt so they can continue to grow.

Members of our society with solid business plans should be the ones borrowing – not the government.

Kathy Fettke is CEO of www.RealWealthNetwork.com, an educational resource for new and experienced real estate investors.

Dustin McDaniel praises Obama (says Bill Clinton knew what hard decisions had to be made to balance the budget)

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in spending out of control, Taxes | Tagged , , , , | Comments (1)

Arkansas Times Bloggers: “Are you good without God? Millions are.” (Part 4)

August 25, 2011 – 7:53 am

Debate: Christianity vs Secular Humanism (4 of 14)

Christianity vs. Secular Humanism – Norman Geisler vs. Paul Kurtz

Published on Oct 6, 2013

Date: 1986
Location: The John Ankerberg Show

Christian debater: Norman L. Geisler
Atheist/secular humanist debater: Paul Kurtz

For Norm Geisler: http://www.normgeisler.com/

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Origins of the Universe (Kalam Cosmological Argument) (Paul Kurtz vs Norman Geisler)

Published on Jun 6, 2012

Norm Geisler argues via Kalam Cosmological Argument for the origins of the universe with the Second Law of Thermodynamics. No matter how much evidence Geisler gave, Paul Kurtz refused to fully acknowledge the implications of it, while NEVER giving evidence for his own interpretation of the universe’s beginning.

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Paul Kurtz pictured above.

August 11, 2011 on the Arkansas Times Blog many nonbelievers ranted about the requirement that an atheist group had to put down a $15,000 deposit in order to advertise the phrase “Are you good without God? Millions are.”

One of the Arkansas Times bloggers that used the username  mountaingirl noted on August 12, 2011:

Recently I read “Divinity of Doubt, The God Question” by famed author and successful prosecutor and trial lawyer, Vincent Bugliosi.

It is very thought provoking and addresses some of the issues mentioned here.

I have an article below that really does a great job responding to that.

Debate: Christianity vs Secular Humanism (5 of 14)

Written on April 18, 2011 at 8:10 am by Gary DeMar

Vincent Bugliosi: Prosecutor, Judge, and Jury of God

Filed under Apologetics, Articles, Atheism {20 comments}

Vincent Bugliosi has struggled with whether God exists. He’s not sure, and he contends that both sides in the debate should not be dogmatic. The opening words on the flap of his new book Divinity of Doubt: The God Question[1] summarize his position: “Do you believe in God? If your answer is yes or no, Vincent Bugliosi will prove you wrong.” That’s a pretty bold claim for an evolved human. If God does exist, Bugliosi argues, “he has chosen to keep those he created in the dark about him.”[2] He sets forth his operating assumption in a clear and unapologetic way:[W]hat follows [in this book] is an almost unremitting, scathing, indictment of God, organized religion, atheism, and theism.[3]I’ll come back to his interpretive paradigm in a moment. How good of a prosecutor is he?Mr. Bugliosi has had a storied legal career. He was the prosecuting attorney for the city of Los Angeles during the Charles Manson trial in the Tate-LaBianca murders. He was also a professor of criminal law at the Beverly School of Law in Los Angeles. Bugliosi was something of a prosecuting phenomenon during his tenure, “in a class by himself,” at the time, “105 convictions out of 106 felony jury trials; . . . 21 murder convictions without a single loss.”[4]Bugliosi came to my attention when I read his book Helter Skelter (1974), a disturbing chronicle of events leading up to the Tate-LaBianca murders and the subsequent trial. The book digs deep into the bizarre motive behind the murders: Manson saw himself as the prophetic voice of the Beatles as he deciphered their cryptic messages embedded in songs like “Revolution 1,” “Revolution 9,” “Piggies,” “Blackbird,” and, of course, “Helter Skelter.” Manson believed that the Beatles were calling for a revolution, “an imminent black-white war.”[5] Family member Gregg Jakobson explained it this way:“It would begin with the black man going into white people’s homes and ripping off the white people, physically destroying them, until there was open revolution in the streets, until they finally won and took over. Then black man would assume white man’s karma. He would then be the establishment.”[6]After the mass killings and eventual black ascendancy, the blacks in charge would turn to Charles Manson for help. Manson reasoned that blacks had been under “whitey’s” influence for so long that they would not be able to rule effectively. He would then put the black man back in his subservient position, and he would then rule the world.[7] Manson, standing only five feet two, was convincing enough in his peculiar scheme that he got a group of teenagers and twenty-somethings to kill for him.

To a certain degree, justice was served in the Tate-LaBianca murders. Manson and five of his followers got the death penalty for their vicious crimes. But on February 18, 1992, the California Supreme Court had voted 6–1 to abolish the death penalty in the state of California. While California has since restored the death penalty, the new statute was not retroactive. Manson and his murdering compatriots remain in prison.

While Bugliosi had no official role in the O.J. Simpson trial, he followed the case with a prosecutor’s eye and wrote Outrage in response to the not-guilty verdict and what he believes was gross incompetence on the part of the prosecution. Unlike the Manson case, Bugliosi believes that justice was not served. In the Epilogue to Outrage, Bugliosi bears his soul and the struggle he has had with justifying God’s goodness with the presence of evil in the world and God’s “inaction” in the trial in allowing a murderer to go free:

When tragedies like the murders of Nicole and Ron occur, they get one to thinking about the notion of God. Nicole was only thirty-five, Ron just twenty-five, both outgoing, friendly, well-liked young people who had a zest for life. How does God, if there is a God, permit such a horrendous and terrible act to occur, along with countless other unspeakable atrocities committed by man against his fellow man throughout history? And how could God–all-good and all-just, according to Christian theology—permit the person who murdered Ron and Nicole to go free, holding up a Bible in his hand at that? When Judge Ito’s clerk, Deidre Robertson, read the jury’s not-guilty verdict, Nicole’s mother whispered, “God, where are you?”[8]

Mr. Bugliosi’s honesty is refreshing. He’s not an atheist. He finds it difficult to believe in God under the circumstances and according to his criteria.

On what grounds, however, can the atheist object? Mr. Bugliosi assumes the existence of God and the ethical system espoused by Christianity to make his case against God in light of the existence of evil. “The unbeliever,” Greg Bahnsen writes, “must secretly rely upon the Christian worldview in order to make sense of his argument from the existence of evil which is urged against the Christian worldview!”[9] In the end, the unbeliever uses stolen credentials (Christian presuppositions), establishes himself as prosecutor and judge, and then takes his seat in the jury box to render a verdict against God. Everything he uses to construct his system has been stolen from God’s “construction site.” The unbeliever is like the little girl who must climb on her father’s lap to slap his face. . . . [T]he unbeliever must use the world as it has been created by God to try to throw God off Hs throne.”[10]

None of this is designed to demean Mr. Bugliosi. But we are justified in putting his arguments on trial since he has seen fit to put God’s existence on trial. In an interview, when he was asked whether he believed in God, he stated, “If we were in court I’d object on the ground that the question assumes a fact not in evidence.”[11] The evidence is there, but Mr. Bugliosi has set the ground rules for what he will enter into evidence. In essence, if the evidence does not fit his operating presuppositions, then for him it is not evidence. John Frame answers such flirtations with wholesale autonomy in an unbending manner, as John Frame puts it:

Unbelievers must surely not be allowed to take their own autonomy for granted in defining moral concepts. They must not be allowed to assume that they are the ultimate judges of what is right and wrong. Indeed, they should be warned that that sort of assumption rules out the biblical God from the outset and thus allows its character as a faith-presupposition. The unbeliever must know that we reject his presupposition altogether and insist upon subjecting our moral standards to God;s. And if the unbeliever insists on his autonomy, we may get nasty and require him to show how an autonomous self can come to moral conclusions in a godless universe.[12]

Mr. Bugliosi consistently criticizes the prosecutors in the O.J. Simpson trial for not raising crucial points of evidence. One wonders why he nowhere deals with the argument that if there is no God then there is no morality or a call for outrage when personal sentiments (like his own) are offended.

Remember, Mr. Bugliosi is a prosecutor. He’s noted for doing exhaustive research. In addition to Outrage, he has also written Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy (2007) and The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder (2008). Reclaiming History is more than 1600 pages. It includes a CD-ROM with an additional 1000 pages of footnotes. “It analyzes all aspects of the assassination and the rise of the conspiracy theories about Kennedy’s assassination in the years subsequent to the event. The book won the 2008 Edgar Award for Best Fact Crime.”

Divinity of Doubt is different. Yes, there are endnotes, but only a few of them cite any contrary evidence. He doesn’t spar with contrary evidence put forth by those who have wrestled with similar questions and have not turned into theistic skeptics. In light of 1000 pages of footnotes on the Kennedy assassination, one would expect a more rigorous interaction with what other theistic scholars have written on the subjects Mr. Bugliosi discusses. We are talking about God here! It’s like a prosecutor making his case without a defense attorney present. Piece of cake.

Endnotes:

  1. Vincent Bugliosi, Divinity of Doubt: The God Question (New York: Vanguard Press, 2010), 129. [↩]
  2. Bugliosi, Divinity of Doubt, xiv. [↩]
  3. Bugliosi, Divinity of Doubt, xiv. [↩]
  4. Starling Lawrence, “Editor’s Note” in Vincent Bugliosi, Outrage: The Five Reasons Why O.J. Simpson Got Away With Murder (New York: W.W. Norton, 1996), 11. [↩]
  5. Vincent Bugliosi, with Curt Gentry, Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders (New York: W.W. Norton and Co., 1974), 244. [↩]
  6. Quoted in Bugliosi, Helter Skelter, 245. [↩]
  7. Bugliosi, Helter Skelter, 246–247. [↩]
  8. Bugliosi, Outrage, 247. [↩]
  9. Greg L. Bahnsen, Always Ready: Directions for Defending the Faith (Atlanta, GA: American Vision, 1996), 170. [↩]
  10. John A. Fielding III, “The Brute Facts: An Introduction of the Theology and Apologetics of Cornelius Van Til,” The Christian Statesman 146:2 (March-April 2003), 30. [↩]
  11. Quoted in Bugliosi, Outrage, 247. [↩]
  12. Frame, Apologetics to the Glory of God, 169. [↩]
  13. Bugliosi, Divinity of Doubt, 129. [↩]
  14. Bugliosi, Divinity of Doubt, 302, note 9. [↩]
  15. I’ve only found one modern author who even suggests that John might still be alive. David Dolan’s Israel in Crisis is a perfect example of forcing the Bible to fit an already developed prophetic system. Dolan tries to explain Jesus’ comments in John 21:18–23 in which Jesus says to Peter about John, “If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow Me” (21:22). Because Dolan holds to a futuristic eschatology, he must force Jesus’ words into his dispensational mold: “In further nonbiblical research, I discovered that many early church authorities believed that John had never died. This was based on the Lord’s mysterious words in John 21 and also on the fact that, unlike the other apostles, no credible account exists about his death. I suspect that may be because John did not die.” (David Dolan, Israel in Crisis: What Lies Ahead? (Grand Rapids, MI: Fleming H. Revell, 2001), 143.) Dolan speculates that John could have been living on a Greek island for two millennia, wandering around the world hiding his true identity disguised, or caught up into heaven like Elijah where he has been supernaturally preserved until he is needed. John 21:23 refutes this notion: “yet Jesus did not say to [Peter] that [John] would not die, but only, ‘If I want to remain until I come, what is that to you.’” [↩]

Debate: Christianity vs Secular Humanism (6 of 14)

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Current Events | Tagged , , , , | Comments (0)

The Sixty Six who resisted “Sugar-coated Satan Sandwich” Debt Deal (Part 22)

August 25, 2011 – 7:45 am

The Sixty Six who resisted “Sugar-coated Satan Sandwich” Debt Deal (Part 22)

This post today is a part of a series I am doing on the 66 Republican Tea Party favorites that resisted eating the “Sugar-coated Satan Sandwich” Debt Deal. Actually that name did not originate from a representative who agrees with the Tea Party, but from a liberal.

Rep. Emanuel Clever (D-Mo.) called the newly agreed-upon bipartisan compromise deal to raise the  debt limit “a sugar-coated satan sandwich.”

“This deal is a sugar-coated satan sandwich. If you lift the bun, you will not like what you see,” Clever tweeted on August 1, 2011.

Labrador Statement on Budget Control Act

Aug 1, 2011 Issues: Budget and Spending
 
 
 

Washington, D.C.—Idaho First District Congressman Raúl R. Labrador today issued the following statement following the passage of the Budget Control Act of 2011.

“The debt ceiling agreement that was considered by Congress today represents a good plan to resolve the uncertainty surrounding the debt ceiling debate.  It immediately cuts federal spending and implements new spending caps to prevent government expansion when our economy begins to recover.  While this bill has the potential to reduce the size of our budget and the trajectory of government spending, this bill doesn’t go far enough to make the changes necessary to get us out of our fiscal mess.

“I promised my constituents that I would come to Congress to fundamentally change the way the federal government operates. While this legislation is a good first step towards that goal, it also relies on the time honored Washington tradition of delegating problems to commissions instead of solving them ourselves. It places more confidence in its Super Commission than is warranted.  The legislation also lacks a rock solid commitment to passage of a balanced budget amendment, which I believe is necessary to saving our nation. With the help of the new members of Congress, the standard operating procedure in Washington has begun to change from spending recklessly to cutting spending sensibly, but there is a lot more that needs to change.  ”

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in spending out of control | Comments (0)

Dear Senator Pryor, why not pass the Balanced Budget Amendment? (Part 4 Thirsty Thursday, Open letter to Senator Pryor)

August 25, 2011 – 12:56 am

Dear Senator Pryor,

Why not pass the Balanced Budget Amendment? As you know that federal deficit is at all time high (1.6 trillion deficit with revenues of 2.2 trillion and spending at 3.8 trillion).

On my blog www.HaltingArkansasLiberalswithTruth.com I took you at your word and sent you over 100 emails with specific spending cut ideas. However, I did not see any of them in the recent debt deal that Congress adopted. Now I am trying another approach. Every week from now on I will send you an email explaining different reasons why we need the Balanced Budget Amendment. It will appear on my blog on “Thirsty Thursday” because the government is always thirsty for more money to spend.

In this paper below you will read:

America cannot raise taxes to continue overspending, because tax hikes shrink our economy and grow our government. America cannot borrow more to continue overspending, because borrowing puts an enormous financial burden on the American children of tomorrow. A BBA will help address this long-term problem because, after the multi-year process for securing ratification of the BBA by three-quarters of the states, the BBA will keep federal spending under control in subsequent years.

Washington has not been able to cut spending so the BBA is needed to force Washington to do the right thing. Your father David Pryor was the governor of Arkansas and he knew what it meant to have a balanced budget by mandate.

Thank you again for this opportunity to share my ideas with you.

Sincerely,

Everette Hatcher, lowcostsqueegees@yahoo.com

Balanced Budget Amendment: Cut Spending Later, Cut Spending Now

March 31, 2011

 

Two key principles should govern congressional consideration of an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that requires the federal government to balance its budget:

  • First Principle: A Balanced Budget Amendment (BBA) is important to help bring long-term fiscal responsibility to America’s future when the BBA takes effect after ratification by three-quarters of the state legislatures; it is equally important for Congress to cut spending nowto address the current overspending crisis.
  • Second Principle: An effective BBA will include three elements to: (a) control spending, taxation, and borrowing, (b) ensure the defense of America, and (c) enforce the requirement to balance the budget.

Cuts for the Future, Cuts for the Present

Federal spending is out of control—both obligations for the future and spending right now.

Congress must get spending under control in the long term. America cannot raise taxes to continue overspending, because tax hikes shrink our economy and grow our government. America cannot borrow more to continue overspending, because borrowing puts an enormous financial burden on the American children of tomorrow. A BBA will help address this long-term problem because, after the multi-year process for securing ratification of the BBA by three-quarters of the states, the BBA will keep federal spending under control in subsequent years.

Congress also must get spending under control in the short term. Federal overspending is not simply about the future, but also about the present. Under the President’s Fiscal Year 2012 Budget Submission, measured by the Congressional Budget Office, the federal government will spend $1.2 trillion more than it will take in, a gargantuan burden of additional debt forced on future generations to pay current bills.

Thus, America needs both a Balanced Budget Amendment for the long term and deep cuts in federal spending starting right now, without waiting for a BBA to take effect. As Congress considers budget resolutions, appropriations bills, appropriations continuing resolutions, and debt limit bills, Congress should take every opportunity now to cut federal spending, including for the biggest overspending problem: the ever-growing entitlement programs.

Congress should recognize that the best way to encourage state legislatures to ratify a BBA is to demonstrate, through consistent congressional cuts in spending, that the American people have the will to accept spending cuts to balance the budget.

Elements of a Successful Balanced Budget Amendment

A successful BBA will:

  • Control spending, taxing, and borrowing through a requirement to balance the budget.The BBA should cap annual spending at a level not exceeding either: (a) a specified percentage of the value of goods and services the economy produces in a year (known as gross domestic product, or GDP), or (b) the level of revenues. To ensure that Congress cannot simply balance the budget by continually raising taxes instead of cutting overspending, the BBA should require Congress to act by supermajority votes if Members wish to raise taxes. Any authority the BBA grants Congress to deal with economic slowdowns, by waiving temporarily the requirement that spending not exceed the GDP percentage or revenue level, should specify the amount of above-revenue spending allowed and require supermajority votes.
  • Defend America. The BBA should allow Congress by supermajority votes to waive temporarily compliance with the balanced budget requirement when waiver is essential to pay for the defense of Americans from attack.
  • Enforce the balanced budget requirement. The BBA should provide for its own enforcement, but must specifically exclude courts from any enforcement of the BBA, so unelected judges do not make policy decisions such as determining the appropriate level of funding for federal programs. A government that spends money in excess of its revenues must borrow to cover the difference. Therefore, to enforce the requirement to balance the budget, the BBA should prohibit government issuance of debt, except when necessary to finance a temporary deficit resulting from congressional supermajority votes discussed above.

America is in a fiscal crisis. Our government spends too much. Overspending must stop immediately. Overspending will stop only if Congress cuts spending now, including with respect to the ever-expanding entitlement programs. For the future, Congress and three-quarters of state legislatures can adopt and ratify a Balanced Budget Amendment to the U.S. Constitution to anchor the American willingness to live within a balanced budget.

David S. Addington is Vice President for Domestic and Economic Policy, and J. D. Foster, Ph.D., is Norman B. Ture Senior Fellow in the Economics of Fiscal Policy, at The Heritage Foundation.

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in spending out of control | Comments (0)

2nd stimulus is a bad idea

August 24, 2011 – 9:16 pm

Over and over you hear about political leaders saying that we must spend our way out of this recession, but that does not work. Below is an excellent article on this:

Is Obama Really Going to Propose Another Keynesian Stimulus?

Posted by Daniel J. Mitchell

Just last week, I made fun of Paul Krugman after he publicly said that a fake threat from invading aliens would be good for the economy since the earth would waste a bunch of money on pointless defense outlays.

Yesterday, there were rumors that Krugman stated that it would have been stimulative if the earthquake had been stronger and done more damage, but he exposed this as a prank(though it is understandable that many people — including me, I’m embarrassed to admit — initially assumed it was true since he did write that the 9-11 terrorist attacks boosted growth).

 But while Krugman is owed an apology by whoever pulled that stunt, the real problem is that President Obama and his advisers actually take Keynesian alchemy seriously.

And since President Obama is promising to unveil another “jobs plan” after his vacation, that almost certainly means more faux stimulus.

We don’t know what will be in this new package, but there are rumors of an infrastructure bank, which doubtlessly would be a subsidy for state and local governments. The only thing “shovel ready” about this proposal is that tax dollars will be shoveled to interest groups.

The other idea that seems to have traction is extending the current payroll tax holiday, which lowers the “employee share” of the payroll tax from 6.2 percent to 4.2 percent. The good news is that the tax holiday doesn’t increase the burden of government spending. The bad news is that temporary tax rate reductions probably have very little positive effect on economic output.

Lower tax rates are the right approach, to be sure (particularly compared to useless rebates, such as those pushed by the Bush White House in 2001 and 2008), but workers, investors, and entrepreneurs are unlikely to be strongly incentivized by something that might be seen as a one-year gimmick. Though I suppose if the holiday keeps getting extended, people may begin to think it is a semi-durable feature of the tax code, so maybe there will be some pro-growth impact.

In any event, we will see what the President unveils next month. I’ll be particularly interested in how his supposed short-run jobs proposal fits in with his long-run plan for dealing with red ink. He has been advocating for a “balanced approach” and “shared sacrifice” – but that’sObama-speak for higher taxes, and we know that’s a damper on job creation and new investment.

As you can tell, I’m not optimistic. The best thing for growth would be to get the government out of the way. The Obama White House, though, thinks bigger government is good for the economy.

This stimulus video was produced last year and was designed for another jobs plan concocted by the Administration, but the message is still very appropriate.

Daniel J. Mitchell • August 24, 2011 @ 10:44 am
Filed under: General; Government and Politics; Tax and Budget Policy

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Cato Institute, spending out of control | Tagged , , , , | Comments (0)

Preview of UT and Vandy in SEC East Football Division 2011 (SEC Preview Part 5) jh8

August 24, 2011 – 2:41 pm

Lane Kiffin and his wife Layla

Lane Kiffin and his wife Layla named their son “Knox.”

I really think that Tennessee has a great running back in Tauren Poole, but I have some questions about a team that has only 25% of their players as upperclassmen (Juniors and Seniors). It seems that next year they may be hitting their stride. Harry King must agree because Tennessee didn’t even get close to anyone’s top 25 this year and Harry ommitted them too in his top 25 list, “Arrows for college teams,” Arkansas News Bureau, August 9, 2011.

Although I have never personally been a Tennessee fan, I was told by my grandfather that a cousin of his was a kicker for the Vols. My grandfather grew up in Franklin, Tennessee with his brothers and sister. They used to get up at 2 am on Saturdays and travel to Knoxville by 1pm for the kickoff. My grandfather attended the University of Tennessee in 1921-23 until his money ran out. My grandfather told me he was relatives with Buck Hatcher who was a star player for the Vols.

Sure enough Buck Hatcher did play for the Vols and he kicked a 53 yard field goal on Nov 13, 1920 to set a record.  Later my grandfather’s brother Mack had the “Mack Hatcher Memorial Highway” named after him. He was a Gideon and often helped those who needed help in his Williamson County. (A Gideon is one who gives out Bibles, below you will find the gospel in tract form). He stood six foot eleven and his sister Sara Lou was six foot four.

Vandy is not going to be good, but they can sneak up on people. In fact, Arkansas does not have a good record against Vandy and they are on our schedule this year. We better watch out. My great Uncle Mack used to say. “There goes Vandy talking about their All American again. Their team stinks so they have to build up one player!!!” That player may be Jordan Matthews who is an excellent receiver.

Here is a preview from rivals:

Tennessee

Returning Starters: 13

Strengths: In his second year as Volunteer coach, Derek Dooley has found a quarterback in sophomore Tyler Bray. If the spring is any guide, the team may now have the depth and experience required in the offensive line. It returns four starters there and should be able to run the ball with more consistency than it did a year ago. The defense has some nice building blocks with four returning starters in the secondary, including hard-hitting free safety Janzen Jackson, and DE Malik Jackson.

Weaknesses: Tennessee is still pitifully thin in the defensive line, where its top interior lineman at spring practice’s end was converted O-lineman Daniel Hood. Bray must prove he can make better decisions on a consistent basis and will have to throw to a new group of starting wideouts, although Justin Hunter and Da’Rick Rogers have considerable promise. Overall, the Vols still lack the required depth to be more than a spoiler in the East Division, but are building a nice foundation.

Vanderbilt

Returning Starters: 19, kicker, punter

Strengths: No team in the SEC returns more starters than the Commodores, who if they can stay healthy for the first time in three years will threaten deeper, more athletic teams. Any SEC program would love to have the likes of RB Warren Norman, MLB Chris Marve and CB Casey Hayward on their two-deep. New coach James Franklin and his staff helped QB Larry Smith become more accurate during spring practice. Franklin recruited the school’s best class in years, even stealing four-star QB Lafonte Thourogood away from Frank Beamer’sVirginia Tech.

Weaknesses: As always, Vanderbilt doesn’t appear to have the kind of depth required to compete and win in the SEC. Its offensive line does return all five starters, but still looks like it could get pushed around by better defenses. Will the Commodores’ front seven be able to hold up against the rigorous SEC schedule? And can they play a more disciplined brand of football than they have the last two years, when they have seemed to save killing mistakes for the most critical moments?

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I mentioned above that my great Uncle Mack was a Gideon. He used to go to local churches and encourage people to join the Gideons. He passed out Bibles his whole adult life. He was not a wealthy man, but at his funeral many people stood up and told about him paying their doctor bills and bringing them food. What made him tick? It was the Christ of the Bible. Below is a simple presentation of the gospel.
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By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Current Events | Tagged , , , , | Comments (0)

Responding to Oppenneimer and Lizza:Defending Francis Schaeffer’s influence on believers such as Michele Bachmann(Part 4)

August 24, 2011 – 2:16 pm

Both Oppenneimer and Lizza have attacked Francis Schaeffer’s view, but the way to know his views best is to take time to watch his film series. I said that in my first post and I will continue to show all ten episodes of his film series “How should we then live?”

This is a series of posts concerning presidential candidate Michele Bachmann and her religious beliefs. Particularly I will be looking at the identity of Francis Schaeffer who Michele said had major impact on her views. I also would say that Francis Schaeffer was the greatest christian philosopher of the 20th century. 

In 1979 I first watched the film series “How should we then live?” and it was so impressive to me that I returned to my high school with permission from my former teacher to view the series again. In fact, Mr. Brink would tell the seniors at Evangelical Christian School in  Cordova, TN something to this affect: “I hope you realize how important this film series by Dr. Francis Schaeffer is. Here we have Everette Hatcher who is in college now, but he is coming back to see this film again because he knows how valuable it is.”

The best way to understand Michele Bachmann’s worldview is to watch the film series “How should we then live?” by Francis Schaeffer. I have provided a 30 minute episode at the end of this post with a written outline.  In this film series the humanist worldview is seen as weak because it is not able to give adequate answers to life’s tough questions while the christian worldview can.  Humanism has a finite base because it is limited to finite man while the Christian worldview is based on information provided by the infinite-personal God of the Bible.

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Bachmann: Christian Writer Francis Schaeffer Shaped Pro-Life . Views

by Steven Ertelt | Des Moines, IA | LifeNews.com | 7/26/11 12:06 PM

Congresswoman Michele Bachmann is one of the several pro-life advocates seeking the Republican nomination to face pro-abortion President Barack Obama and she cites Christian writer Francis Schaeffer as an influence on her pro-life views.

In a campaign stop to speak to local residents at a church in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Bachmann shared her testimony and talked about the Christian faith she and her husband share. That faith, which has matured thanks to the writings of Schaeffer, has led Bachman to a pro-life view that has seen her compile a 100% pro-life voting record in Congress and adopt dozens of foster children.

“One thing that Dr. Schaeffer said is that [God is] not just the God of theology. He’s not just the God of the Bible,” Bachmann said, according to the Des Moines Register. “Since he is the Creator God, he’s the father of biology, sociology, of political science, of you name the subject. … And that altered our way of thinking, that God had something to say about our career.”

“Francis Schaeffer also said that life is the watershed issue of our time, and how we come down on how we view human life will impact all other issues,” she said. “And so Marcus and I decided we didn’t want to be pro-life only, just as speaking… We wanted to live a life of being about pro-life.”

The Register indicates Bachmann told the audience that, upon the encouragement to put her pro-life views into action, she and her husband began counseling and praying with single mothers and helping them get to pregnancy and adoption centers to provide further practical support instead of abortion.

“This is not to condemn any woman who here has ever had an abortion or participated in one,” she said, according to the newspaper. “Because God is there also with grace and mercy in that situation, but to say that he is the life-giving only God who has answers in the midst of our trying times.”

Dave Andrusko, of the National Right to Life Committee, says he is not surprised Schaeffer helped shaped Bachmann’s faith and pro-life views.

“There are a couple of reasons it’s useful to talk about Congresswoman Bachmann’s talk—her testimony. Like almost all the GOP candidates current running, and most of the few who may still jump in, she is staunchly pro-life,” he says. “Schaeffer is perhaps best known to pro-life veterans for co-authoring with Dr. C. Everett Koop (later Surgeon General) the hugely influential “Whatever Happened to the Human Race?” Both as a book and a video series, the impact of “Whatever Happened to the Human Race” cannot be exaggerated. It awakened and mobilized Evangelical Protestants as nothing before had ever done.”

He called the Bachmanns “loving pro-lifers” who have expressed their Christian faith and pro-life views “through the hands and feet” of action.

How Should We Then Live 4-1

I was impacted by this film series by Francis Schaeffer back in the 1970’s and I wanted to share it with you. Schaeffer makes three key points concerning the Reformation: “1. Erasmian Christian humanism rejected by Farel. 2. Bible gives needed answers not only as to how to be right with God, but concerning the meaning of life and what is right and what is wrong, and concerning mankind and nature. 3. The people of the Reformation did not have humanism’s problem, because the Bible gives a unity between God—as the ultimate universal—and the individual things.” What a great difference this made in the world!!!

E P I S O D E 4

T h e

REFORMATION

I. The Reformation as a Reaction Against Medieval Religious Distortions of the Biblical and Early Christian Church’s Teaching

A. Illustration from Luther.

B. Luther—German; Zwingli—Zürich; Thomas Cromwell—England; Calvin—Geneva.

C. Biblical view of salvation (grace only) and its effect on certain aspects of church construction.

D. Real meaning of destruction of artwork in Reformation.

E. The Reformation rejected.

1. Medieval distortion of Church’s having made its authority equal to the authority of the Bible.

2. Medieval distortion of Church’s having added human works to the finished work of Christ for salvation.

3. Medieval distortion introduced by Aquinas: mixture of biblical thinking and pagan thought.

F. Summary of humanistic influence in church.

1. Illustrated by Raphael’s School of Athens and Disputà.

2. Illustrated by Michelangelo’s making pagan prophetesses equal to Old Testament prophets in Sistine Chapel.

G. For William Farel and the other Reformers it was the Scriptures only.

1. Erasmian Christian humanism rejected by Farel.

2. Bible gives needed answers not only as to how to be right with God, but concerning the meaning of life and what is right and what is wrong, and concerning mankind and nature.

3. The people of the Reformation did not have humanism’s problem, because the Bible gives a unity between God—as the ultimate universal—and the individual things.

4. The Reformation was no golden age, but it did aspire to depend on the Bible in all of life.

II. The Reformation and the Arts

A. German Reformation music tradition peaks in Bach.

B. Significance of Cranach’s and Luther’s friendship.

C. Dürer’s identification with Luther evidenced in his diary; significance of his work.

D. Rembrandt’s paintings show that he understood that his sins had sent Christ to the cross, and that Christ is the Lord of all of life.

E. Point is not to romanticize Reformation art but refute view that reformation was either hostile to art and culture, or did not produce art and culture.

F.Wittenberg Gesangbuch , Geneva Psalter, and revival of congregational singing.

III. Comparison of Renaissance and Reformation.

Both sought freedom. In the South license resulted from lack of absolutes; in the North freedom lasted through absolutes.

Questions

1. Can you clearly differentiate between the key ideas of the Renaissance and the Reformation, respectively?

2. “The Reformation is simply the last gasp of medieval Christianity. Once exhausted, the truly modern and humane force of the Renaissance dominated the West.” Comment.

3. “As a man thinketh, so is he”—the renewed emphasis upon the Bible’s teaching in the Reformation had practical results. If some of these results are no longer common among us, how far may this be attributed to a de-emphasis upon biblical teaching today?

Key Events and Persons

Erasmus: c. 1466-1536

Dürer: 1471-1528

Lucas Cranach: 1472-1553

Martin Luther: 1483-1546

Farel: 1489-1565

Johann Walther: 1496-1570

Calvin: 1509-1564

Erasmus’ Greek New Testament: 1516

Luther’s 95 Thesis: 1517

Reform at Zürich: 1523

Wittenberg Gesangbuch: 1524

England breaks with Rome: 1534

Calvin’s Institutes: 1536

Geneva Psalter: 1562

Rembrandt: 1606-1669

Raising of the Cross: 1633

Bach: 1685-1750

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By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Francis Schaeffer | Tagged , , , , | Comments (0)

Part 2 of Tribute to and interview of Rev. Dr. John R. W. Stott (April 27, 1921 – July 27, 2011)

August 24, 2011 – 1:38 pm

John Stott discussing when he feels most alive. This clip, and 5 others (found on LICC’s YouTube page), have been posted in memory of LICC’s founder John Stott, who passed away on 27th July 2011 aged 90. Visit the full tribute to John at http://www.licc.org.uk/tribute. The clips are all taken from 25 & On, a celebration DVD of the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity’s 25th Anniversary. The full interview is available from LICC on CD (www.licc.org.uk/shop/product/25-on).

Back in the 1970’s I read the book “Basic Christianity” by John Stott. While in London in 1979 I had the opportunity to attend a Tuesday evening prayer meeting where there were about 40 people and I got to hear John Stott speak. I was so thrilled to get to hear him speak in person.

I have included several clips on him because I wanted to honor him after the wonderful godly 90 years he lived.

Uploaded by  on Aug 19, 2008

John Stott’s classic book has introduced generations to Christianity with wisdom and clarity. This video celebrates the 50th Anniversary Edition of this important book by one of the world’s most important Christian voices.

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[The

John Stott Funeral (edited version)

Uploaded by  on Aug 11, 2011

John Stott died on 27 July 2011 aged 90 years. This video contains highlights of his Funeral at All Souls Langham Place in London on Monday 8 August 2011. Produced and displayed with permission from John Stott’s family.
Music clips used by permission of All Souls musicians and Jubilate Hymns (www.jubilate.co.uk)

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Al Molher interviewed John Stott several years ago and here is a portion of that interview:

The funeral for John R. W. Stott, one of the most famous evangelical preachers of the last century, will be held today in London at All Souls Church, Langham Place, where he served with distinction for so many decades of ministry. In honor of John Stott, I here republish an interview I conducted with the great preacher in 1987. The interview was first published in Preaching magazine, for which I was then Associate Editor.]

John R. W. Stott has emerged in the last half of the twentieth century as one of the leading evangelical preachers in the world. His ministry has spanned decades and continents, combining his missionary zeal with the timeless message of the Gospel.

For many years the Rector of All Souls Church, Langham Place, in London, Stott is also the founder and director of the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. His preaching ministry stands as a model of the effective communication of biblical truth to secular men and women

The author of several worthy books, Stott is perhaps best known in the United States through his involvement with the URBANA conferences. His voice and pen have been among the most determinative forces in the development of the contemporary evangelical movement in the Church of England and throughout the world.

Preaching Associate Editor R. Albert Mohler interviewed Stott during one of the British preacher’s frequent visits to the United States.

The Text Means What the Author Meant

Mohler: You have pictured the great challenge of preaching as creating a bridge between two worlds — the world of the biblical text and the world of the contemporary hearer. That chasm seems ever more imposing in the modern world. How can the preacher really bridge that chasm?

Stott: Any bridge, if it is to be effective, must be firmly grounded on both sides of the canyon. To build a bridge between the modern world and the biblical world we must first be careful students of both. We must be ever engaged in careful biblical exegesis, conscientiously and continually, and yet also involved in careful study of the contemporary context. Only this will allow us to relate one to the other.

I find it helpful in my own study to ask two questions of the text — and in the right order. First, “What does it mean?” and second, “What does it say?”

The answer to the first is determined by the original author. I am fond of citing E. D. Hirsch in his book Validity in Interpretation, when he wrote: “The text means what its author meant.”

That is my major quarrel with the existentialists, who say that the text means what it means to me — the reader — independent of what the author meant. We must say “no” to that. A text means primarily what its author meant. It is the author who establishes the meaning of the text.

Beyond that, we must accept the discipline of grammatical and historical exegesis, of thinking ourselves back into the historical, geographical, cultural, and social situation in which the author was writing. We must do this to understand what the text means. It cannot be neglected.

The second question moves us from the original meaning of the text to its contemporary message — “What does it say?” If we ask the first question without asking the second, we lapse into antiquarianism, unrelated to modern reality.

On the other hand, if we leap to the second question, “What does it say today?,” we lapse into existentialism, unrelated to the reality of biblical revelation. We have to relate the past revelation of God to the present reality of the modern world.

Mohler: That requires a double exegesis — an exegesis of the text and also an exegesis of life. Is it your opinion that most evangelicals are better exegetes of the text than they are of life?

Stott: Oh, I am sure of it. I am myself and always have been a better student of scripture than of the present reality. We love the Bible, read it and study it, and all of our preaching comes out of the Bible. Very often it does not land on the other side of that chasm, it is never earthed in reality.

The attractiveness of liberal or radical preaching, whatever it is called these days, is that it tends to be done by genuinely modern people who live in the modern world, understand it, and relate to it. But their message often does not come from the Bible. Their message is never rooted in the textual side of the chasm. We must combine the two relevant questions.

Mohler: Most of us think of ourselves as modern persons, and yet we may lack a suitable hermeneutic of the contemporary. What have you found to be helpful as you seek to be a better student of the contemporary world?

Stott: I mentioned in Between Two Worlds how very helpful I found involvement in a reading group I founded about fifteen years ago. They are graduates and professional people — doctors, an architect, an attorney, teachers and so on. All are committed to Christ and the Scripture and yet anxious to be modern and contemporary people. We meet every month or so when I am in London.

We decide to read a particular book, or see a particular play or exhibition, and spend the evening discussing it. We give most attention to books. We go around the circle and give our immediate impression before eventually turning and asking “Now, what has the Gospel to say to this?” I have found it enormously helpful to be forced to think biblically about modern issues.

Mohler: So you would point biblical preachers not only to the biblical text, but to a very wide reading?

Stott: Absolutely. I think wide reading is essential. We need to listen to modern men and women and read what they are writing. We need to go to the movies, to watch television, to go to the theater. The modern screen and stage are mirrors of the modern world. I seldom go on my own. I go with friends committed to the same kind of careful understanding.

Mohler: You have made it clear that you see preaching as a glorious calling and vocation. What do you see as the greatest contemporary need in preaching? Where is biblical preaching falling tragically short?

Stott: Well, in the more liberal churches, it falls woefully short of being fully biblical. Amongst the evangelical churches it falls short by being less than fully contemporary. I can only repeat the great need of struggling to understand the issues of the modern world. Nevertheless, there is a tremendous correlation between the issues of the biblical world and the modern world.

People are actively seeking the very answers Jesus provides. People are asking the very questions Jesus can answer, if only we understand the questions the world is asking.

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Current Events | Tagged , , , | Comments (0)

Ron Paul “It’s Time We Quit This! It’s Trillions Of Dollars We’re Spending On These Wars! Debate pt6

August 24, 2011 – 1:32 pm

Ron Paul “It’s Time We Quit This! It’s Trillions Of Dollars We’re Spending On These Wars! Debate pt6

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Maggie Haberman comments on the debate below:

York defends Bachmann ‘submissive’ question

By MAGGIE HABERMAN | 8/12/11 7:42 AM EDT

The Washington Examiner’s Byron York, on the receiving end of some blowback for asking Michele Bachmann a question about what being “submissive” to her husband would mean in office, defended the line on “Fox and Friends,” POLITICO’s Jennifer Epstein says:

“Well, it’s always great to be the most popular guy in the room for a while. This is a serious and legitimate question about something she has said and believe me, if she progresses very far in the campaign process, she would have been asked this question. And I personally thought she handled it very well. It was like a very human moment for her. she had been asked earlier about it by “Newsweek”, she said simply, i’ll be the decision maker. but this, I think, gave us a much better glimpse into Michelle Bachmann.”

UPDATE: POLITICO’s Molly Ball points out that Bachmann was also asked about York’s question this morning on the “Today” show, and gave a similar answer to what she delivered in the debate. However, she incorrectly said Chris Wallace – asker of the now-famous “Are you a flake?” question – was the one who posed the query.

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | Comments (0)

Liberals like Krugman and Brantley want another stimulus

August 24, 2011 – 12:50 pm

Max Brantley posted on the Arkansas Times Blog the words of Paul Krugman, “As the stimulus has faded out, so have hopes of strong economic recovery…” (Arkansas Times Blog, June 3, 2011).

The video clip above by Dan Mitchell goes over some of the past attempted stimulus plans as does the article below. Every stimulus plan in the history of man has failed but we keep on TRYING TO MOVE MONEY FROM THE PRIVATE SECTOR TO THE PUBLIC SECTOR AND SOMEHOW WE THINK IT WILL NEXT TIME. IT ALWAYS FAILS.

Stay on Vacation

by Michael D. Tanner

Michael Tanner is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and coauthor of Leviathan on the Right: How Big-Government Conservatism Brought Down the Republican Revolution.

Added to cato.org on August 24, 2011

This article appeared on National Review (Online) on August 24, 2011.

As the economy continues to teeter on the precipice of a double-dip recession, there is a growing demand for the president and Congress to rush back from their vacations and do something. But why?

What is it that we really think the president can do?

While the president’s latest economic plan remains a deeply held secret until after his vacation, pretty much everyone in Washington expects him to call for … drumroll please … a stimulus plan.

Now why haven’t we thought of that before? Oh, that’s right. We have.

We’re not the first country to rely on this stale brew of Keynesian economics.

In fact, we have now had at least five — or is it six? — stimulus plans since this recession started.

The first of these came back in February 2008 under the Bush administration: a $152 billion measure, featuring a $600 tax rebate, several incentives for businesses, and loan guarantees for the housing industry. Then, as the recession picked up steam in September 2008, Congress passed the $61 billion Job Creation and Unemployment Relief Act of 2008. This bill pumped money into federal “infrastructure projects” and extended unemployment insurance.

And of course, immediately after taking office, President Obama pushed through the giant $787 billion stimulus. He followed that up with an additional $26 billion bill in August of 2010, aimed at helping states retain teachers and make Medicaid payments. On top of that, in September 2010, Congress created a $30 billion fund to provide small businesses with low-interest loans. Finally, the December compromise that extended the Bush tax cuts included another extension of unemployment benefits and a reduction in the Social Security payroll tax, both heralded at the time as stimulus measures.

We’re not the first country to rely on this stale brew of Keynesian economics. When Japan’s asset bubble collapsed in the late 1980s, its economy went into freefall. In response, Japan pursued three major fiscal-stimulus packages, totaling 6 percent of GDP, between August 1992 and September 1993. When those failed, Japan tried still more stimulus, a total of eight different packages over eight years. The Japanese government has spent $6.3 trillion on construction-related projects alone. It also increased subsidies and social-welfare payments.

Japan began the 1990s with a budget surplus. A decade later it had a budget deficit equal to 7.9 percent of GDP. Today, its budget deficit is 8.3 percent, and its debt exceeds 200 percent of GDP. The result has been minimal economic growth. For all this spending, Japan’s industrial production in 2008 was only 2.9 percent larger than it had been in 1991. Over the past decade, Japan’s economy has grown by less than a quarter of one percent.

Now President Obama prepares to call for another extension of unemployment benefits, more infrastructure spending, and an extension of the payroll-tax cut.

The real drags on our economy have nothing to do with the failure of government to spend enough. The federal government is now spending roughly 24 percent of GDP. State and local governments are spending another 10 to 15 percent, meaning government at all levels is spending around 40 percent of GDP. If government spending brought about prosperity, we should be experiencing a golden age.

The reasons we are not growing are simple and clear:

Debt: Several studies show that high levels of government debt slow economic growth. The seminal study by Carmen Reinhardt of the University of Maryland and Kenneth Rogoff of Harvard concluded that countries with a debt totaling more than 90 percent of GDP have median growth rates 1 percent lower than countries with a lower debt, and average growth rates nearly 4 percent lower. Our national debt now tops 102 percent of GDP.

Taxes: Businesses are forward-looking. They hear the president and congressional Democrats calling for tax hikes, and they become worried about taking the risks inherent in investing, expanding, and hiring. Even if the president doesn’t sock them with any new taxes, they are facing some $569 billion in new taxes by the end of the decade as a result of Obamacare. And virtually everyone acknowledges that our corporate tax rates, the second highest in the developed world, are putting American businesses at a competitive disadvantage.

Regulation: Obamacare is coming, including a mandate for businesses to provide workers with health insurance. Making hiring more expensive is not an inducement to increased employment. The EPA is planning new carbon-emission regulations. The NLRB is telling Boeing where to locate its plants. This is not a pro-jobs agenda.

Here’s a different idea. More than two centuries ago, Adam Smith wrote that “little else is requisite to carry a state to the highest degree of opulence from the lowest barbarism but peace, easy taxes, and a tolerable administration of justice.”

President Obama could try that approach — and he wouldn’t even have to come back from vacation.

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Cato Institute, spending out of control | Tagged , , , , | Comments (0)