Real Thought

After leaving Smuggler’s Cove, we were on an eight hour run to Avalon, Santa Catalina Island.  Our course took us far outside the shipping lanes and outside of Anacapa Island.  The weather was fair, with a two to five foot swell and small craft advisories.  We heard many vessels complaining of the “heavy swell” and one person on a Catalina 30 sailboat who called the Coast Guard because his engine had overheated and they were “afraid” to set the sails.  We arrived at Avalon in the early afternoon and picked up a mooring outside of Avalon Harbor at Descanso Beach. 

Well, we left on July 31 with near perfect weather conditions.  After getting underway from Napa at 1830, I went below for some rest as I had the watch from 2000 to 000.  We passed under the Golden Gate at about 0100 in the morning and headed south under an overcast sky and with calm seas off out starboard quarter making about nine knots.  On my next watch, the drive pulley for the raw water pump came off the starboard engine, causing it to shut down..  A weld had failed.  We rigged the ship’s fire pump to the raw water system and continued on our way.  On the way down the crew sighted many dolphins and whales.  There was very little traffic. We finally dropped anchor in Smuggler’s Cove off of Santa Cruz Island on the morning of August 2nd.

Our former Vice-president was before Congress testifying that if the United States does not institute draconian restrictions on CO2 emissions through  so-called “cap and trade” legislation we will leave this planet a uninhabitable, overheated rock.  First, let me say this, if the government legislates maximum CO2 emissions levels, who is going to verify that the country, as a whole, is trying to meet them?  Furthermore, what is to keep me from planting a few trees and the selling the “carbon credits”?  What is to keep me from buying “carbon credits” and continuing to emit as much CO2 as I do now?  Clearly, the “cap and trade” scheme is nothing more than a manipulation of free market principles in order to transfer money from less “eco-friendly” industries to more “eco-friendly” industries, thus providing the preferred industries with a government mandated subsidy under the guise of a free market credit program.

On a micro economic level, individual A who has a large family, buys a large vehicle to transport said family to school, work, the store, an environmental rally, wherever.  Added to the cost of the vehicle is a “carbon offset fee”, added by the producer of said vehicle so that the producer can buy “carbon offset credits”.  Let us say that individual A has religious and personal beliefs that lead said individual to have a large family.  Individual B does not have a large family and buys a small vehicle without a “carbon offset fee” because said individual does not share individual A’s beliefs.  Individual B’s vehicle is, in effect, subsidized by Individual A and Individual A is being forced to subsidize B’s vehicle because of his beliefs.  That is simply not allowable in a free society.  Furthermore, the producer of the vehicles does not have to reduce its overall CO2 emissions because it simply passes the cost of the “carbon credits” it acquires onto Individual A.

Rather than force people to subsidize others through “carbon credits” and other schemes, I have a more effective solution; those who are concerned about the level of CO2 released into the atmosphere should lead by example.  Since almost everything a living human does releases CO2 into the atmosphere from breathing to traveling to eating food which is grown, harvested and transported using petroleum products, I suggest that those individuals reduce their emissions of CO2 to zero immediately.  The proper application of arsenic, selenium, strychnine or lead ought to do the trick.  Those of us who remain can go out and plant some shrubbery.  Without those who wish us to reduce our CO2 output emitting CO2 there should be a reduction in CO2 in the atmosphere and with the additional plants the planet can be saved.

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OK, I get it, the joke is over.  Someone put a REAL president in the White House and give Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid their cookies and warm milk and tuck them in.

The Dow is off by 200 some odd points.  Finally, someone in Washington had the guts to shoo the autoo companies away from the Federal slop trough and it is going to be a beautiful day here in northern California.  What amazes me is that so many people in our country seem to believe that the government is the answer to all of our problems.  I find this attitude more and more pervasive every year.  For those of you who believe that government is the answer, I have a small reading assignment for you.  First, read Thomas Hobbes Leviathan. Once you are done with that you then need to read the Declaration of Independence.  Finally read Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. For extra credit you may read either John Locke’s Two Treatises on Government or John Stewart Mills’ On Liberty.

Now I realize that there are those who will say, “Doug, these ideas are old and outdated and besides Ayn Rand was a nutter.”  To them I would say that there are certain principles which are timeless, one of which is the preservation of individual liberty.  Furthermore, I would argue that the furtherance of individual liberty should be the object of any enlightened society  and that the current trend toward collectivization is not a step forward but retrograde movement toward slavery and totalitarianism.  As free individuals we should not be dependent on the state, instead we should solve what ever problems may arise through individual action or voluntary association, if necessary.  If we depend on the state, we become its slave and we sacrifice that liberty which is our birthright and for which so many American lives have been sacrificed.  We squander our inheritance and like Esau sell that which should be most valuable to us for a mess of pottage, the false security of a state taking care of us.

What will it take to make the idiots in Congress, the White House and at the Tresury Department to understand that spending money the government hasn’t got, driving us deeper into debt and printing money is not the way to get the country out of a recession?  There is only one way to climb out of this and that is fiscal restraint.  Insetead of a budget that will drive the deficit to a level that exceeds all previous deficits COMBINED, how about adopting a budget with no deficit.  Yes, I know that doing so will mean drastic cuts in government costs and services.  Yes, I know that it will be extremely painful to do so but if we do so now we will get the economy on track.  We must do this and do it now.  We need to push for a constitutional amandment that will ban deficit spending and we must also limit income taxes to no more than fifteen percent of taxible income.  If we do this now, that will free up a huge amount of capital for infrastructure improvements which, in the long term will expand the economy.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished up at the end of the week.  From the reaction in the media you would think that we have all regained all the money that we lost and that happy days are here again.  Here is the problem, a year ago the DJIA was at $13,191.49; it closed Friday at $7,223.98.  That means that while the recent four and five per cent gains are nice, the market still has a deep hole to climb out of.  There is also the nagging persistance of the fear of inflation as the Federal government attempts to spend its way out of this recession.  Is this merely an uptick in the market our the beginning of a long term rally?  I hope the latter but fear the former.

Very simple.  Cut the corporate and personal income tax rate to 11%.  Raise the personal exemption to $35,000 per person.  Allow everyone to take a automatic 10% deduction for charitable donations.  Eliminate all other deductions.  Eliminate the AMT, capital gains and estate taxes.  Make all investment and interest income tax exempt.  Cut Federal spending by 50%.  Eliminate the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Education, the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Labor.  Watch the economy take off.

The only two sure things in life unless you happen to be a high ranking Democrat.  Currently we have a President who promised to restore the people’s trust and have the highest ethical standards of any administration in history, yet it seems that several of President Obama’s early erstwhile appointments seem not to know who to hire to prepare their taxes nor do they seem to be able to understand the horrific United States tax code.  So, if a former employee of the International Monetary Fund and a sitting senator and a top executive with a consulting firm all can’t seem to figure out what is taxable and what isn’t; how is the average Joe supposed to figure it out?  Of course, if the Average Joe made a $146,000 error on his 1040, he would be in Federal Prison, not sitting in the US Senate or in the office of the Secretary of the Treasury.

Perhaps the leadership of the Democratic party should listen to the words of Vice-president Biden, it IS patriotic to pay taxes, especially if you are an elected or appointed servant feeding at the public trough.  The arrogance toward the “common classes” currently on display in Washington DC is exactly what doomed the ancien regime in France.  Perhaps it is time we had a little rebellion again.  After all it was the founder of the Democratic Party who famously said:

“God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion. The people cannot be all, and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented, in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions, it is lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. … What country before ever existed a century and half without a rebellion? And what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.”

Perhaps it is time we resisted and held those we elect to be accountable for their actions.  After all, it was years of government waste and mis-management that got the United States and several of the individual states into the current political, economic and fiscal messes that they are in, perhaps it is time for some real change.  We can start by not re-electing a single incumbent to local, state or federal office.  If that doesn’t provide enough change, then perhaps a little rebellion is called for.