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Peter Robinson writes in Forbes about what Milton Friedman would have made of the credit crisis.
The day after Milton Friedman died in November 2006, The Wall Street Journal published an article about monetary policy that Friedman had written. Unable to recall when the article had first appeared, I asked the editor. “Today,” he said. “Milton adapted it just a couple of weeks ago from a research paper he was working on.”
This took a moment to sink in. Friedman, by universal consent one of the two or three most consequential economists of the 20th century, had still been performing original economic research then describing his findings for ordinary readers–at the age of 94.
What would Milton have said if he were still with us today? Friedman spent his final three decades at the Hoover Institution–my office was just two doors down the hall from his–and earlier this week I sat down with two of my Hoover colleagues, economists Thomas MaCurdy and Jay Bhattacharya, both close students of Milton, to decide what questions we would have asked him–and how he might have replied. …
Stuart Taylor, one of journalism’s finest, weighs in on the causes of the credsis. (Pickerhead figured it’s time for a new word)
President Bush, his Securities and Exchange Commission appointees, other free-enterprise dogmatists who have stood in the way of regulating risky and opaque financial manipulations, and greedy Wall Streeters deserve the blame heaped on them for the financial meltdown that has so severely shaken America.
But the pretense of many Democrats that this crisis is altogether a Republican creation is simplistic and dangerous.
It is simplistic because Democrats have been a big part of the problem, in part by supporting governmental distortions of the marketplace through mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, whose reckless lending practices necessitated a $200 billion government rescue last month. It is dangerous because misdiagnosing the causes of the crisis could lead both to regulatory overkill and to more reckless risk taking by Fannie, Freddie, or newly created government-sponsored enterprises.
Fannie and Freddie aside, it’s worth pointing out that many, if not most, of those greedy Wall Street barons are Democrats. And that the securities and investment industry has given more money to Democrats than to Republicans in this election cycle. And that opposing regulation of risky new financial practices by private investment banks and others has been a bipartisan enterprise, engaged in by the Clinton and Bush administrations alike.
But the roles of Fannie and Freddie are my focus here. Powerful Democratic (and some Republican) advocates of affordable housing, including Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd, D-Conn.; Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y.; and House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass., have been the GSEs’ most potent and ardent champions in recent years. ..
OK, we have to cover the election. What better way than with Mark Steyn’s return to the OC Register? He has Plumber Joe thoughts.
The heart of the American Dream is aspiration. That’s why people came here from all over the world. Back in Eastern Europe, the Joe Bidens and Diane Sawyers of the day were telling Joe the Peasant: “Hey, look, man. You’re a peasant in the 19th century, just like your forebears were peasants in the 12th century and your descendants will be peasants in the 26th century. So you’re never gonna be earning 250 groats a year. Don’t worry about it. Leave it to us. We know better.” And Joe the Peasant eventually figured that one day he’d like to be able to afford the Premium Gruel with just a hint of arugula and got on the boat to Ellis Island. Because America is the land where a guy who doesn’t have a 250-grand business today might just have one in five or 10 years’ time.
I’m with Joe the Plumber, not Joe the Hair-Plugger. He’s articulated the animating principles of America better than anyone on either side in this campaign. Which is why the O-Bots need to destroy him. As Obama’s catchphrase goes:
“Joe the Plumber!
Can we fix him?
Joe the Plumber!
Yes, we can!”
For the record, I am not a government-licensed pundit. But I expect they’ll fix that, too.
Michelle Malkin reports on the efforts by Obama and the angry Left to flush Joe the Plumber.
Six-term Sen. Joe Biden’s got some nerve going after citizen Joe the Plumber. But the entrenched politician from Delaware, who fancies himself the nation’s No. 1 Ordinary Joe, had no choice. Obama-Biden simply can’t tolerate an outspoken citizen successfully painting the Democratic ticket as socialist overlords. And so a dirty, desperate war against Joe Wurzelbacher is on.
The left’s political plumbers are attacking the messenger, rummaging through his personal life and predictably wielding the race card once again. It’s standard operating procedure for the Obama thug machine.
Wurzelbacher, in case you’ve been in hibernation, is the small-business man from Ohio who questioned Obama about his tax plan during a Toledo campaign swing last weekend. The revealing exchange was caught on tape and broadcast widely across the Internet and TV airwaves.
In response to Wurzelbacher’s question about why he should be “taxed more and more for fulfilling the American dream,” Obama sermonized that he needed to “spread the wealth around” because “it’s good for everybody.” …
Michael Barone wonders if Plumber Joe can change the vote.
It was October 13. The candidate of the out party seemed to be cruising toward victory. He projected an image of confidence, promising to restore national unity, and ignored his opponent. Then he made a little mistake. Veteran reporter Robert J. Donovan tells the story:
“As the [candidate] had begun to speak from the rear platform in Beaucoup, Illinois, his train suddenly lurched a few feet backward toward the crowd in what might have been, if the movement had continued, a serious accident. However, the train stopped quickly, yet [the candidate], momentarily losing his poise, exclaimed into the microphone, “That’s the first lunatic I’ve had for an engineer. He probably ought to be shot at sunrise, but I guess we can let him off because no one was hurt.’”
The candidate was Thomas E. Dewey, who was running against Harry Truman in 1948. The most recent Gallup polls showed Dewey leading Truman 46 percent to 40 percent (September 23-28) and 46.5 percent to 39 percent (September 10-15). Truman seized on the “engineer” comment, and Truman backers portrayed it as an example of elite Republican contempt for the working man. …
Charles Krauthammer says Obama is playing the race card.
… What makes the charges against McCain especially revolting is that he has been scrupulous in eschewing the race card. He has gone far beyond what is right and necessary, refusing even to make an issue of Obama’s deep, self-declared connection with the race-baiting Rev. Wright.
In the name of racial rectitude, McCain has denied himself the use of that perfectly legitimate issue. It is simply Orwellian for him to be now so widely vilified as a stoker of racism. What makes it doubly Orwellian is that these charges are being made on behalf of the one presidential candidate who has repeatedly, and indeed quite brilliantly, deployed the race card.
How brilliantly? The reason Bill Clinton is sulking in his tent is because he feels that Obama surrogates succeeded in painting him as a racist. Clinton has many sins, but from his student days to his post-presidency, his commitment and sincerity in advancing the cause of African Americans have been undeniable. If the man Toni Morrison called the first black president can be turned into a closet racist, then anyone can. …
WaPo editors want Obama to let the voucher program continue. Good luck!
IT WOULD be nice if facts, not ideology, framed the discussion over the District’s school voucher program. In an exchange during this week’s presidential debate, Democratic Sen. Barack Obama airily dismissed the program, while Republican Sen. John McCain offered a somewhat jumbled defense of it. Lost was this: 1,903 poor children have educational opportunities because of a unique program that detracts not a whit from either public or charter schools.
The stance of the two candidates is not surprising, given the history of their respective parties. Democrats loathe any suggestion of sending public money to private schools, while Republicans see the free market as a solution to the woes of urban education. It’s important, though, that the next president — and if the polls are to be believed, that will be Mr. Obama — look past these tired political arguments to the real needs of real children served by the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program. …
One of the problems with Obama is he says so many things that aren’t true. Perhaps this is only part of the campaign. Many of our favorites have deconstructed his lies in the last debate. WSJ Editors are first.
In Wednesday night’s debate with John McCain, Barack Obama defended his opposition to the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement this way: “The history in Colombia right now is that labor leaders have been targeted for assassination, on a fairly consistent basis, and there have not been any prosecutions.” Among the many falsehoods in this Presidential campaign, this is one of the worst. …
Ed Morrissey is next covering Obama lies on Ayers, Acorn, and infanticide.
In presidential debates (and campaigns), candidates usually try to put their policies and records in the best possible light. The spin usually focuses on the positive aspects of these points to the point of hedging the entire truth, but flat-out lies are pretty rare. Last night, Barack Obama treated us to two of them, and not surprisingly, on the two most controversial points of his record. …
Obama’s tax problems? Jim Lindgren in Volokh does the honors.
I was stunned to see some document showing Joe the Plumbers’ tax problems on my 10pm (CT)newscast on the local NBC affiliate in Chicago on Thursday night. They have very little time for any national news and they actually spent time on Joe the Plumbers’ tax problems. Amazing!
But when an actual candidate — Barack Obama — released his tax returns, which on their face seemed to show an ethics violation of Illinois law, the press couldn’t care less. …
Watching the Obama folks gang bang of the upstart, Claudia Rosett says, “First they came for Joe the Plumber…”
… It seems that Joe’s sins are less than the litany would make them. He may not have a plumber’s license, but he works for someone who does. He owes back taxes, but less than $1,200. And at least to date, it is not a crime in America to use a nickname or be a registered Republican.
But to squabble over Joe’s record is to miss the real point. Obama is the one running for public office, aspiring to the country’s highest position of power and public trust. Joe is not. He’s a private citizen, who had every right to ask a very good question. He wanted to know why he was being taxed “more and more for fulfilling the American dream?”
What he got from the well-heeled Senators Obama and Biden was mockery and contempt.
Most disturbing is this: If that’s how Joe the Plumber gets dealt with while Obama is still stumping for votes, then what happens to Joe, or anyone else who dares question Obama’s plans, should Obama win the White House? …
Corner post on Michelle’s Waldorf snack.