Any avid reader of the Ruidoso News is by now aware that the former two term New Mexico Governor, Gary Johnson is standing for the Republican Presidential nomination. Unfortunately, apart from a couple of passing references in the Adderville Examiner and a fairly positive Op-Ed in the Galts Gulch Gazette there has been little media coverage of his candidacy. The media has in the main staged a lockout.

While it is unreasonable to expect candidacy to automatically entitle anyone to inclusion in media coverage and a place in the debates, a candidate who meets the requirements should not be excluded. This is what has been done to Johnson. In May CNN blocked him from a debate in New Hampshire, although he qualified as an announced candidate with 2 percent support in three national polls during the month.

Despite being even in polls with Herman Cain and ahead of Jon Huntsman and Rick Santorum he was excluded from other debates, which included them. Since then it has been standard practice to omit him from the polls that decide places in the debates. With his campaign now faltering, it seems that media bias and bastardry has denied America a candidate who has the track record and principles to revitalize the nation. 

The most disturbing aspect to this whole affair has been the silence of the Republican Party in the face of it. By remaining mute in the face of this outrage, the establishment wing of the party has essentially abrogated its responsibility to ensure that the party’s credible candidates get a fair go. Worse still, they are allowing the mainstream media to select their nominee by default.

This of course suits the business as usual crowd of Washington Establishment Republicans who have no interest in seeing any change to the status quo in case they become victims of it. There are numerous reports of efforts by the party machine to ensure that only the ‘right people’ get up. Recently this came from Bawb, a Montana mountain man:

The Montana GOP has figured out a way to take the rank and file voters out of the loop in our state’s primary election. In February, they have a “special” primary, in which only 1,100 specially selected party faithful statewide are allowed to vote. Then, in June, us peasants may vote, after the party candidate has already long since been selected.

They do have “public meetings” before the Feb. vote. We went to ours in ’08. Three or four people spoke up for Ron Paul, one for Romney, and one Romney person who endorsed no one but gave a well-thought-out and impassioned speech against McCain.

Then the small unit of establishment-picked party faithful went behind the curtain to vote and lo and behold John McCain swept our county with more votes than all the other candidates combined. Go figure.

The GOP caught a lot of flak over that, especially in the newspaper editorials (my letter to state GOP headquarters went unanswered), but the furor eventually died down and the Party Machine kept the whole crooked mess in place. Mission accomplished. The people’s input negated.

By allowing this sort of action to go unchallenged, the Republicans are shooting themselves in the foot in much the same way as the Liberal Party are doing here. Allowing the establishment to simply remain doing the same old thing as has been done before is a guarantee of inertia and eventual collapse. In the US the Republicans are acting as Democrat Lite, in much the same way as the Liberals here are trying to be Labor Lite.

If these parties remain terrified of new blood and new ideas to challenge that which has gone before, they are going to have to rely on winning through their opponents screwing up, which is likely but not guaranteed. What is not guaranteed is that the GOP or the Liberal Party would make much of a difference if elected.

Both opposition parties, here and in the US should be embracing their time in the back paddock accompanied by the unpopularity of both governments, as a chance to renew, revitalize, and come up with an exciting new vision that will catch the imagination of the electorate.

Update: This now seems to play after reloading it.

Trooper also gives links to CNBC cancelling its poll when Ron was well ahead, and how the Guardian avoided mentioning him by name.

All small government people should be outraged at the manipulation of the electoral process by media organizations. The manner in which Governor Gary Johnson has been excluded from the process is bizarre and disgusting. It appears that the ‘mainstream’ press are determined to create a contest between Romney and Obama.

What follows below is one of the best assessments I have encountered of the current events in the Middle East from Daniel Pipes. While most western peaceniks are inclined to lay the entire blame for the dictatorships that are being overthrown at present at the feet of the US, the reality is that Western interference was carried out to counter communist interference.

Much of the Cold War was carried out by proxy, both sides supporting for strategic purposes regimes that in a decent world would be lined up against the wall and shot. The greatest threat of the West to the USSR and its allies was not so much the armed force but the idea of liberty, or what passes for it today.

Both forms of authoritarianism, secular (fascism, communism etc) and theocratic, have reason to fear the idea of their downtrodden seeing the freedom of the west and asking, “Why not here?” Regrettably, with western governments becoming more authoritarian in their efforts to make nanny statism appear to work, we are losing that advantage.

One act of bastardry too many, caused a fruit vendor in Tunisia to self immolate, igniting seething resentment into full-blown revolution. This will probably not free the people from oppressors but will give them new tyrants, this time religious ones. Probably the only bright spot for the west is likely to be Iran where the population has shown a willingness to revolt against their oppressors.

Friendless in the Middle East

by Daniel Pipes

The Arab upheavals of 2011 have inspired wildly inconsistent Western responses. How, for example, can one justify abiding the suppression of dissidents in Bahrain while celebrating dissidents in Egypt? Or protect Libyan rebels from government attacks but not their Syrian counterparts? Oppose Islamists taking over in Yemen but not in Tunisia?

Such ad hockery reflects something deeper than incompetence: the difficulty of devising a constructive policy toward a region where, other than in a few outliers (Cyprus, Israel, and Iran), populations are predominantly hostile to the West. Friends are few, powerless, and with dim prospects of taking control. Democracy therefore translates into hostile relations with unfriendly governments.

Both the first wave of elections in 2005 and the second wave, just begun in Tunisia, confirm that, given a free choice, a plurality of Middle Easterners vote for Islamists. Dynamic, culturally authentic and ostensibly democratic, these forward a body of uniquely vibrant political ideas and constitute the only Muslim political movement of consequence.

But Islamism is the third totalitarian ideology (following Fascism and Communism). It preposterously proposes a medieval code to deal with the challenges of modern life. Retrograde and aggressive, it denigrates non-Muslims, oppresses women, and justifies force to spread Muslim rule. Middle Eastern democracy threatens not just the West’s security but also its civilization.

That explains why Western leaders (with the brief exception of (George W Bush) shy away from promoting democracy in the Muslim Middle East.

In contrast, the region’s unelected presidents, kings, and emirs pose a lesser threat to the West. With Mu’ammar al-Qaddafi long ago chastened by American power and Saddam Hussein removed by American-led forces, the egomaniacs were gone by 2003 and surviving strongmen largely accepted the status quo. They asked for little more than to be allowed quietly to repress their populations and noisily to enjoy their privileges.

(R) Saddam Hussein (right) and Mu’ammar al-Qaddafi in their salad days (circa 1985).

A year ago, Western policymakers could survey the region and note with satisfaction that they enjoyed reasonable working relations with all the governments of Arabic-speaking countries, excepting Syria. The picture was not pretty but functional: Cold War dangers had been thwarted, Islamist ones mostly held off.

Greedy and cruel tyrants, however, present two problems to the West. By focusing on personal priorities to the detriment of national interests, they lay the groundwork for further problems, from terrorism to separatism to revolution; and by repressing their subjects, they offend the sensibilities of Westerners. How can those who promote freedom, individualism, and the rule of law condone oppression?

In the Middle East, full tyranny has dominated since about 1970, when rulers learned how to insulate themselves against the prior generation’s coups d’état. Hafez al-Assad, Ali Abdullah Saleh, Husni Mubarak, and the Algerian regime demonstrated with rare flamboyance the nature of full-blown stasis.

Then, last December, a butterfly flapped its wings in the small Tunisian town of Sidi Bouzid (population: 40,000), when a policewoman slapped a fruit vendor. The response toppled three tyrants in eleven months, with two more in serious jeopardy.

(R) Tunisia’s president called out the police in Sidi Bouzid in December 2010, but to no avail.

Summing up the West’s policy dilemma vis-à-vis the Middle East:

Democracy pleases us but brings hostile elements to power.

Tyranny betrays our principles but leaves pliable rulers in power.

As interest conflicts with principle, consistency goes out the window. Policy wavers between Scylla and Charybdis. Western chanceries focus on sui generis concerns: security interests (the U.S. Fifth Fleet stationed in Bahrain), commercial interests (oil in Saudi Arabia), geography (Libya is ideal for Europe-based air sorties), the neighbors (the Turkish role in Syria), or staving off disaster (a prospect in Yemen). Little wonder policy is a mess.

Policy guidelines are needed; here follows my suggested triad.

Aim to improve the behavior of tyrants whose lack of ideology or ambition makes them pliable. They will take the easiest road, so join together to pressure them to open up.

Always oppose Islamists, whether Al-Qaeda types as in Yemen or the suave and “moderate” ones in Tunisia. They represent the enemy. When tempted otherwise, ask yourself whether cooperation with “moderate” Nazis in the 1930s would have been a good idea.

Help the liberal, secular, and modern elements, those who in the first place stirred up the upheavals of 2011. Assist them eventually to come to power, so that they can salvage the politically sick Middle East from its predicament and move it in a democratic and free direction.

Mr. Pipes (www.DanielPipes.org) is president of the Middle East Forum and Taube distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University. © 2011 by Daniel Pipes. All rights reserved.

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The world is becoming used to the daily round of news of European nations in financial crisis, Greece being the current centre of attention.  There are constant updates on efforts by the more solvent members of the Euro zone to prop up failing members in exchange for financial reforms.  Meanwhile, long-suffering taxpayers are becoming increasingly outraged.

A current effort to expand the European Financial Stability Facility to 440 billion Euros has been blocked temporally by tiny Slovakia.  The ruling coalition there failed to approve the measure when the libertarian orientated Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) Party, voted it down.  The measure is expected to pass with the support of the opposition, probably requiring an early election as a condition.

This should give heart to angry voters across Germany, France, and the rest of Europe:

A recently-formed libertarian political party which represents just 12 per cent of Slovakian voters and barely 0.2 per cent of the eurozone’s 332 million voters refused to vote with the three other parties in the ruling coalition, bringing the continent’s bailout agreement to a halt.

With a population of just 5.4 million the small mountainous country in central Europe is now the centre of frantic efforts to revive the July 21 bail-out deal, which expanded the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) to 440 billion euros ($A603 billion) and gave it new powers to help Greece, failing banks and shaky nations such as Spain and Italy. …

But Radicova’s four-party coalition failed to muster the required numbers because the hardline free-market party Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) objected to the eurozone bailout as a profligate waste of money on bankers and Greeks who it says should be made to pay for their own mistakes and laziness.

Richard Sulik, the millionaire economist who helped to develop the country’s 19 per cent flat income tax and founded SaS in 2009, was unrepentant about his resistance to bailing out the Greeks.

“I’d rather be a pariah in Brussels than have to feel ashamed before my children, who would be deeper in debt should I back raising the volume of funding in the EFSF bailout mechanism.”

Slovakians had lower average incomes than the Greeks and “an honest solution” to the crisis would be “to let Greece go bankrupt,” he said.

Several days ago here in a post, “Protecting cropping land from mining, and farmers” I mentioned some of the nasties that were included in a Draft State Planning Policy for Strategic Cropping Land.  A number of normal farming activities would be removed from local control and be subject to central government decisions.

Dale Stiler from ‘Just Grounds’ has sent in a link, which makes it clear that this is a whole lot more serious than the issues raised before. Now it appears that an incredible number of activities that farmers could be expected to carry out in the pursuit of diversification, will be illegal on land that is designated “Strategic cropping land.”

The National Farmers Federation is skeptical as to the degree of protection afforded, and Carbon Sense Coalition chairman Viv Forbes, has found serious problems in the draught: 

Carbon Sense Coalition chairman Viv Forbes said the policy would stop farmers subdividing their land.

“Any other developments on their blighted land will be banned or difficult,” Mr Forbes said.  “Imagine the obstacles should they want to develop a racehorse stud, a feedlot, a new house or a private forest?” he said.

“Farmers will be condemned to be pastoral peasants on cropping land controlled forever, paddock by paddock, by an anti-farming, anti-mining bureaucracy. 

“If Queensland’s politicians were really concerned about food security they would not have sterilised millions of acres of grazing land under scrub clearing bans, conservation zones, heritage areas, national parks and other anti-farming bans,” Mr Forbes said.

In an effort to hose down Viv’s criticism, the department involved has confirmed them:

A Department of Environment and Resource Management (DERM) spokesperson said the framework would not apply to subdivision applications already approved, nor to proposed subdivisions in areas already designated for urban development.

“If the land proposed to be subdivided is, in fact, strategic cropping land and the subdivision will permanently alienate the strategic cropping land, the subdivision will generally not be approved,” they said. Developments like feedlots were unlikely to be approved.

David Leyonhjelm from the LDP, has mentioned that one of the problems with the whole issue is that farmers have little personal control over their own properties, nothing to gain, and much to lose in both mining, and CSG. The situation would be very different were farmers to have some ownership rights over the deposits themselves. 

It is no accident that the US has half of all the world’s oil wells, and that its coal seam gas industry is considerably more advanced than ours. A key difference is that landowners have skin in the game – ownership of mineral rights is a primary motivator for exploration and extraction.

For governments, the solution is to create an environment in which a market based approach can emerge. It was government actions preventing such an approach that created the current problem. More government tweaking will not help.

Essentially the heart of the problem here is that ‘public interest’ is allowed to take precedence over private property rights.  Where most landholders would have been happy with legislation allowing them to have a say over access to their properties for this purpose, the government has essentially reduced their rights to carry out standard agricultural pursuits

With the ink barely dry on the result of the 2010, “There will be no carbon tax under a …,” election, Marius Kloppers, head honcho at BHP Billiton, friend of the mining tax, and compulsive ‘certainty’ seeker, called for a carbon tax, just to give him a bit of certainty, and to put Australia ahead of the pack.

Marius, for some reason was not able to see any certainty in not having a carbon tax so rather than oppose the idea, he opted to go for it.  This can be likened to sending ships to help your enemy invade so you can be sure of what the future holds.  Now he has changed his mind on how good it is going to be and is demanding corporate welfare tart status:

 JULIA Gillard is under mounting pressure to give exporters a special deal under her proposed carbon tax after BHP Billiton chief executive Marius Kloppers yesterday became the latest business leader to warn that Australia’s go-it-alone approach would be a “dead weight” on high-polluting industries.

Mr. Kloppers, the head of the world’s biggest mining company who last year championed putting a price on carbon, yesterday reinforced the company’s support for action to cut carbon emissions but told The Australian the government’s climate change measures should adopt a “sector-specific” or “mosaic” approach.

His objection in this case is not based on any rational principle other than self-preservation in the face of the results of his own advocacy.  Essentially he still supports the concept of a costly job destroying new tax as long as BHP Billiton has a wide enough space at the deep end of the public trough.

Companies have a habit of going along with government policies while at the same time seeking special deals within legislation in order to insulate themselves from it.  The result is a gravely distorted economy much of which is consumed by the churn of funds out of and back into the it, incurring administration costs along the way.

Kloppers is a symbol of this.

Warren Buffet has copped a bit of flack over an Op-ed in the NYT last week in which he complained about tax breaks for the rich:

Some of us are investment managers who earn billions from our daily labors but are allowed to classify our income as “carried interest,” thereby getting a bargain 15 percent tax rate. Others own stock index futures for 10 minutes and have 60 percent of their gain taxed at 15 percent, as if they’d been long-term investors.

These and other blessings are showered upon us by legislators in Washington who feel compelled to protect us, much as if we were spotted owls or some other endangered species. It’s nice to have friends in high places.

This is a reasonable point in that it’s a bit silly having a higher marginal tax rate for those over a certain income, only to give breaks to those who can afford to play the system. This creates an inherent unfairness in that with the Administration pushing ‘millionaire rates’ for those who earn over $250,000 per year, the lower end of that bracket are going to be slugged much more than the Buffets.

It would be more sensible to have a lower overall rate with no breaks at all. The mega rich lobbying for them as special cases causes these breaks. Generally they are designed to guarantee politically desirable results by manipulating the system, and as such are a form of social engineering.

He then goes on to contradict his claimed good intentions:

Last year my federal tax bill — the income tax I paid, as well as payroll taxes paid by me and on my behalf — was $6,938,744. That sounds like a lot of money. But what I paid was only 17.4 percent of my taxable income — and that’s actually a lower percentage than was paid by any of the other 20 people in our office. Their tax burdens ranged from 33 percent to 41 percent and averaged 36 percent.

Why, Hell Warren, the fact that the breaks exist does not mean you have to apply them if you disagree with them. You can always decline to do so and pay the full amount if that turns you on. Apart from that, there is always the possibility of sending another $7 mil off to the IRS as a donation; with an explanation that you feel you should pay more. This will put you in a 35% bracket, and might get you a thank you letter. You will of course probably get audited very thoroughly by them to find out, “just what this bastard is covering up.”

What Warren seems to miss is that if he gave the IRS his entire personal fortune, estimated to be around $50 billion, with government expenditure for this year at $3.8 Trillion, it would only take them 4.8 days to chew through the lot. Better to hang onto it Warren.

Charles Koch has responded:

“Much of what the government spends money on does more harm than good; this is particularly true over the past several years with the massive uncontrolled increase in government spending. I believe my business and non-profit investments are much more beneficial to societal well-being than sending more money to Washington. — Charles G. Koch, Chairman and CEO, Koch Industries, Inc.

In Australia our eco-friendly government has massively increased the size of the public service, much of it in the area of environmental authoritarianism. They are forever banging on about ‘sustainability’ and the need for studies to be done on the issue. There has never been an inquiry though on whether the size of the government we have, is in itself sustainable.

The LP’s Wes Benedict, Executive Director of the Libertarian National Committee has raised the issue in reference to the S&P downgrade:

I’m sure you have heard the news about the Standard & Poor’s downgrade of the U.S. government’s credit rating.

I’m not a finance expert, so I don’t know exactly how important the downgrade itself is. I think it’s one more sign of what Libertarians have known for a long time: the Democrats and Republicans have created a giant welfare-warfare state that is beginning to collapse under its own weight. And I see no sign that they are going to change their behavior. 



However, I think it’s important to remember that these politicians aren’t operating in a vacuum — they’re elected (and re-elected) by the people. And I believe that, by and large, they’re giving the voters what they want: lots and lots of government benefits, regulations, and programs.

Even the Tea Party groups claim to demand spending cuts, but polls show a large majority of Tea Party supporters oppose cuts to Social Security, or Medicare, or the military.

As a Libertarian, I’d like to believe that most Americans are libertarian at heart, and only vote for big-government politicians because they think there’s no alternative. However, I have to admit that most Americans just aren’t there yet. They still think government is the answer (even if they won’t always admit it). For example, I’m dismayed by how frequently local bond measures pass, putting local governments further into debt. Those measures seem to pass whether local politics are dominated by Democrats or Republicans.

I believe that part of our goal, as a party is to change the hearts and minds of Americans with reason, eloquence, and evidence. We need to deliver the message that statism is not only wrong, it’s also unsustainable. The S&P downgrade gives us one more piece of evidence.

As long as Americans keep voting liberals and conservatives back into office, this decline will continue

The gist of these arguments is that the constant need to feed the cycle results in a lack of depth in debate with the result that politicians appear to be shallow and puerile. No explanation is given of why they appeared that way before the rise of the 24 hr cycle which has retaliated by blaming the government’s 24-hour spin cycle.

In an example of the problem, Federal Assistant Treasurer Bill Shorten called for Australians to respect the census and not kid around. He feels that the question on religion should only be answered in ways that the government recognizes. He has specifically banned Jedi’s, and Pastafarians, none of whom will be counted. The Jedi faith responded with a press release today:

“Australian Jedi’s have noted the blatant discrimination demonstrated by the Gillard government in their decision that our faith and that of Pastafarians not be recognized in the 2011 census.”

Spokesman for the faith, Grand Master, Bin Arby – Wan Manband said today that, “While we consider the census to be merely an exercise in information gathering for future political vote buying, Jedi’s who wish to participate, should be allowed to do so and be counted.”

“It is difficult to understand why the state wants information on religious affiliations, as it has no role to play in the church, so there is no reason for this question,” he added. “In any case if such a request is made, it seems odd to censor the answers they don’t like.”

Mr. Manband stressed that this did not upset Jedi. “Getting upset leads to anger, anger leads to revenge, revenge leads to … – well it explains why several members had left and turned up in black hoodies, clutching LNP membership tickets.”

“Relations between the government and the Jedi faith have been under stress ever since Treasurer, Wayne Swan, falsely accused the Trade Federation of causing what he has referred to as the two speed economy,” Mr. Manband said. “The reality is, that the mining sector is moving faster than the rest of the economy because the government hasn’t been as effective at screwing it as it has been with the rest,” he added. “Even a Wookie understands that, despite being as thick as two short planks.”

He stated that he also wanted to refute suggestions that Jedi mind tricks had anything to do with the public’s determination to vote out the government, or had caused the widespread perception of the greens as a ridiculous bunch of authoritarian wankers. “This is a deliberate fabrication propagated by Brown and Gillard, and disseminated through the Fairfax dark side media, the ABC’s The Drum, and leftie blogs,” he said.

“We also wish to make it clear that Jedi are nonpolitical,” he added. “There is no truth to rumours that the LNP leadership have been receiving covert Jedi arts training in secret camps in the Australian outback.” “This appears to be Coalition misinformation and seems to have the finger prints of “Menzies House” all over it,” he concluded.

Jedi’s represented 55,000 responses in 2006, down from the estimated 70,000 in the 2001 Census.

Arvin: “I just saved $350,000.”
Mark: “How?”
Arvin: “By not buying a Ferrari in 2016!”
Mark: “Nice.”

The use of double speak is not exclusive to the US though. Here we see tax hikes described as government savings. In reality this indicates that they think that the proportion of our earnings they don’t take off us is wasted.

Gillard/Brown/Abbott will take us beyond ‘Atlas Shrugged’, to ‘Atlas Sha**ed’ if this attitude persists.