Posts Tagged ‘socialism’
Sunday, January 25th, 2015
Greece’s far left-wing Syriza Party has won a big victory there, claiming about half the seats in Parliament.
What does it mean? I took a stab at analyzing it before. Even with a majority, there’s a good chance Syriza will have to continue meeting the EU’s demands (which means pretending to impose austerity measures) if they want mean old Aunt Angela to keep loaning them money. Remember: Greece has never practiced real austerity. Not once since the European Debt Crisis hit has Greece balanced its budget, and its deficit for 2014 was 12.2% of GDP.
But even the fake austerity imposed has been too much for the Greek people, who collectively want a cushy welfare state but don’t want to pay the sky-high taxes required to pay for it. Promising people something for nothing has been the left’s popular electoral strategy for more than a century, but reality can only be held off for so long. Germany is not due for a federal election, so it’s entirely possible Merkel might still underwrite another bailout or two if Syriza is willing to continue the farce. A Greece shorn of the Euro would still be broke and badly in debt, and newly Drachma-backed securities would likely be toxic investments for all but the most speculative of bond traders. (Perhaps Syriza should investigate how well that printing money thing is working out for Venezuela.) “Forgive our debts or we won’t let you give us more loans!” is a proposition Merkel would probably find quite easy to refuse, and I suspect the risk of a Greek exit from the Euro is already priced into European markets. If Syriza insists on anything more than (possibly) a token debt haircut, the EU will probably be willing to call their bluff.
It’s generally best for the driver of a 1974 Ford Pinto to avoid engaging in a game of chicken with a Tiger tank…
Tags:Angela Merkel, European Debt Crisis, Foreign Policy, Germany, Greece, PIIGS, socialism, Syriza, Welfare State
Posted in Budget, Communism, Foreign Policy, Welfare State | No Comments »
Thursday, January 22nd, 2015
It was about time to do another update on Venezuela’s failing socialist economy when I dropped by Hot Air and saw that Ed Morrissey had already done all the heavy lifting for me:
“The currency in what should be the richest country in South America has collapsed, as well as its economy, under the dual weight of falling crude prices and the Chavista socialism that has been choking the country for more than a decade.”
More:
Venezuela’s Chavista policies have always ignored economic reality. Socialism is a fantasy economic system, especially as implemented by Hugo Chavez and Nicolas Maduro.
The difference between Venezuela and the nanny-state petro-economy in Norway is that the latter preserves itself by respecting private property and foreign investment. From the beginning, Hugo Chavez attacked both, nationalizing oil production and criminalizing private investors as part of his “Bolivarian” revolution. When it did that, it chased off the talent needed to run oil production and the investment needed for all other kinds of goods and services. For a short period of time, their oil revenue allowed it to succeed in ignorance. When that failed, Chavez and now Maduro reacted to those predictable consequences by predictably imposing all sorts of rationing mechanisms which only decreased incentives for production and investment, especially in the legitimate economy. Now that the price of oil has collapsed, so has the official Venezuelan economy — and a populace used to a high standard of living now endures massive shortages and ever-increasing oppression to cover it up.
Morrissey, in turn, quotes a big chunk of this Matt O’Brien piece in the Washington Post:
Venezuela’s government is running a 14 percent of gross domestic product deficit right now, a fiscal hole so big that there’s only one way to fill it: the printing press. But that just traded one economic problem—too little money—for the opposite one. After all, paying people with newly-printed money only makes that money lose value, and prices go parabolic. It’s no wonder then that Venezuela’s inflation rate is officially 64 percent, is really something like 179 percent, and could get up to 1,000 percent, according to Bank of America, if Venezuela doesn’t change its byzantine currency controls.
What he said. Er, both of them.
Tags:Budget, hyperinflation, inflation, oil industry, socialism, Venezuela, Welfare State
Posted in Budget, Communism, Welfare State | No Comments »
Monday, January 19th, 2015
Enjoy a Monday LinkSwarm to get your week started:
Police conduct anti-terrorism raids in Germany, Belgium and France. Could this be the start of a real effort to halt Islamic extremism in Europe? I rather doubt it. Too many leftist parties across Europe need Muslim votes, and European elites still seem implacably hostile to the Euroskeptic parties pushing for an end to unlimited Muslim immigration.
Old and Busted: Never again! The New Hotness: More dead Jews? Meh.
The late Anwar al-Awlaki was good at two things: drawing up plans to kill innocent people in the name of Islam, and banging skanky whores.
The Prime Minister of France: “I refuse to use this term ‘Islamophobia,’ because those who use this word are trying to invalidate any criticism at all of Islamist ideology.” (Hat tip: JihadWatch.)
More from France’s PM on the new antisemitism:
“There is a new anti-Semitism in France,” he told me. “We have the old anti-Semitism, and I’m obviously not downplaying it, that comes from the extreme right, but this new anti-Semitism comes from the difficult neighborhoods, from immigrants from the Middle East and North Africa, who have turned anger about Gaza into something very dangerous. Israel and Palestine are just a pretext. There is something far more profound taking place now.”
In discussing the attacks on French synagogues and Jewish-owned businesses this summer, during the Gaza war, he said, “It is legitimate to criticize the politics of Israel. This criticism exists in Israel itself. But this is not what we are talking about in France. This is radical criticism of the very existence of Israel, which is anti-Semitic. There is an incontestable link between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. Behind anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism.”
Michael Totten quotes the late Christopher Hitchens. on the jihadist opinion of the current controversy: “Carving up grandfathers and granddaughters with an axe on New Year’s Eve can be okay if it’s done to protect the reputation of a seventh century Arabian man who heard voices.”
Bobby Jindal: “Islam has a problem.”
“Victimology is the language and currency of our politics.”
All those Harvard professors supporting ObamaCare are shocked to discover they’re paying for it.
“In 2009, 76 Democrats represented primarily white working-class congressional districts. Just 15 of them are still in the House today.”
A majority of the GOP gains since then have come from the Democrats’ near-total collapse in one set of districts: the largely blue-collar places in which the white share of the population exceeds the national average, and the portion of whites with at least a four-year college degree is less that the national average. While Republicans held a 20-seat lead in the districts that fit that description in the 111th Congress, the party has swelled that advantage to a crushing 125 seats today. That 105-seat expansion of the GOP margin in these districts by itself accounts for about three-quarters of the 136-seat swing from the Democrats’ 77-seat majority in 2009 to the 59-seat majority Republicans enjoy in the Congress convening now.
“It was not merely Democratic politicians who were wiped out in November. A plethora of liberal shibboleths were also massacred.”
Virginia voters won’t let a little thing like pleading guilty of contributing to the delinquency of a minor prevent him from regaining his seat in the House of Delegates. (Hat tip: Ace of Spades.)
How big is Texas?
Three myths about Medicaid expansion. I hope that Greg Abbott and Dan Patrick understand that we didn’t elect them to cave in on ObamaCare…
Are your tweets University of Indiana-approved, comrade? (Hat tip: Instapundit.)
Feminism’s empathy gap. Or the Shanley Kanes of the world reject the experiences of women that don’t fit their preferred victimhood narrative…
How a Global Warming true believer became a skeptic.
10 bodies, 11 severed heads found in Mexico.
Pictures of empty Venezuelan store shelves, as Socialism continue to work its usual magic.
Liberal California billionaire Tom Steyer may run for the senate. Hopefully he’ll have the same luck as the politicians he donated to in 2014…
Only found out recently that Death by Government and genocide/democide expert R. J. Rummel died March 2, 2014.
Conservatives win several rule fights in the Texas House.
Rick Perry’s farewell address.
Gregg Abbott’s inauguration will have 4 tons of brisket. Or, as we call it in Texas, “an appetizer.”
Times when climbing down a chimney is a good idea: Your name is “Santa Claus.” Otherwise? Not so much.
A cure for cracked winter hands.
“My personality is as spartan as a Danish furniture catalog, why can’t yours be the same?” (Hat tip: Dwight.)
American Sniper kills at the box office:
Tags:American Sniper, Anwar al-Awlaki, Belgium, Bobby Jindal, Democrats, feminism, France, genocide, Germany, Global Warming, Islam, Jihad, LinkSwarm, Medicaid, Mexico, ObamaCare, Paris, R. J. Rummel, Republicans, Rick Perry, socialism, technology, Texas, Venuzuala
Posted in Communism, Democrats, Global Warming, Jihad, ObamaCare, Republicans, Texas, Waste and Fraud | No Comments »
Thursday, December 11th, 2014
There’s been a lot of talk of how low oil prices are screwing Russia, but Venezuela is, if anything, more screwed thanks to the Magic Power of Socialism™:
U.S. currency is vital to Venezuela, which imports as much as 80% of what it consumes; 96% of its exports are petroleum products…In effect, the one-third decline in the price of oil means that the state oil company must either raise or divert enough production because Venezuela effectively owes China 67 million barrels of oil, roughly 27 million more than it did before, for this loan alone. And there are billions of dollars in other loans to consider.
And the outlook for the immediate future is equally grim:
Venezuela’s economy is expected to contract in 2014 and 2015, and even though it’s already recognized as the 14th least competitive economy in the world (according to the World Economic Forum) and the eighth-worst economy for doing business (according to The World Bank), [President Nicolas] Maduro’s laws seem to discourage private investments even more. The new laws reinforce bureaucracy and the difficulty of doing business in the country, particularly in the area of taxes.
“Increasing numbers of low-income Venezuelans are souring on Maduro as they suffer a declining economy, the highest inflation in the Americas, chronic shortages of basic goods and one of the world’s highest murder rates.”
If Venezuela’s economy collapses, they might take Cuba down with them, since the Castro brothers are so heavily dependent on Venezuelan oil subsidies to prop up their own moribund economy.
Compounding Venezuela’s crises is the fact that it’s probably going to default on its bonds. So they’re finally reaching the point in socialism where the run out of other people’s money. Next to that singular problem, U.S. sanctions on government Venezuelan officials for killing protestors are a trivial irritation…
Tags:Cuba, Economics, Foreign Policy, hyperinflation, inflation, Nicolas Maduro, socialism, Venezuela
Posted in Budget, Communism, Foreign Policy, Welfare State | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, February 18th, 2014
I knew things in Venezuela were bad, thanks to the magic power of socialism, but now they’re poised to get a whole lot worse.
“Over the past week, Venezuelan protesters have been fighting against corruption in the government, high inflation, and a high murder rate.”
The unjust, corrupt and incompetent socialist government of Hugo Chavez protege Nicolas Maduro just raided the offices of the main opposition party
Also, they just expelled three U.S. diplomats.
Here’s the skinny in a video nutshell:
Torture, repression, censorship, media control; Chavez and Maduro certainly learned Fidel Castro’s old playbook.
Ditto the economy, where inflation tops 50% and good shortages are widespread thanks to the usual socialist mismanagement and currency controls. (In just one indicator, Toyota suspended production in Venezuela due to the hard currency shortage. But at least Toyota sold 722 cars in January, while Ford sold a grand total of…2.)
The situation in Venezuela can’t get better as long as the current socialist government is in power, but Maduro’s thugs won’t leave without a fight.
Tags:censorship, Communism, Economics, protests, socialism, Venezuela, video
Posted in Communism, Economics, video | No Comments »
Tuesday, November 26th, 2013
The Venezuelan Parliament just passed an “enabling law” to give Socialist President Nicolas Maduro dictatorial powers.
Gee, you know what other Socialist President had his country pass an “Enabling Law” to give him dictatorial powers?
Go ahead.
Guess.
Maduro’s opponents? Not happy.
Earlier this month, Maduro sent the army to seize electronics store and force them to sell goods below cost, i.e. at the laughable “official exchange rate” of 6.3 bolivars per dollar rather than the real black market rate, which is some eight times higher. (They even tried to get Twitter to block unofficial exchange rates.) And Maduro is looking to loot more stores ahead of the December 8 elections. Given that Hugo Chavez has been hollowing out the country since 1999, I’m not even sure it’s possible for the opposition to win a large enough victory to escape the margin of voter fraud anymore.
Inflation is running at 54%. Oil prices are at 16 month lows, and the country’s oil production has been declining for a while. That, and the crazy Socialist looting, have sent Venezuela bond prices into a tailspin and sent their interest rates to an all-time high. Crime is also high, with Caracas being the murder capital of the world (yes, even worse than Chicago).
Maybe that’s why Goldman Sachs has a scheme to help Venezuela swap gold for dollars.
It’s almost as if Maduro read Atlas Shrugged and saw it as a blueprint rather than a cautionary tale. Imagine Greece, if hyperinflation was just getting started and they didn’t have German taxpayers to bail them out.
You can decree imaginary exchange rates the same way you can decree that π be set to exactly 3, and the reality will ignore and punish your delusion. Watch inflation skyrocket and business collapse as sellers are unable to buy goods and unwilling to sell at a loss, guaranteeing that a far-from rich country is about to get a whole lot poorer.
The only question now is whether Venezuela’s economic collapse will bee Argentina bad, or Weimar Germany bad.
Tags:Crime, Economics, hyperinflation, Nicolas Maduro, oil industry, socialism, Venezuela
Posted in Crime, Economics | No Comments »
Monday, November 25th, 2013
This was supposed to go up Friday, but Stuff and Things interfered once again.
Obama’s “deal” with Iran drops sanctions and lets them enrich uranium to their heart’s content. I guess Obama needs the Iran agreement as a disastrous fake achievement to distract from ObamaCare, his last disastrous fake achievement. I haven’t read all the details, so I can’t tell if it’s Madeleine Albright bad, or Neville Chamberlain bad, but it doesn’t appear to address Iran’s continued support of Assad, Hezbollah, or their other terrorist activities. Still to be decided: whether Obama personally plants the knife in Benjamin Netanyahu’s back, or has aide do it. (If Hillary Clinton wanted to put distance between herself and the Obama Administration, now would be a great time to denounce the Iran deal.)
Mother forced into Medicaid. “There was just one option—at the very affordable monthly rate of zero. The exchange had determined that my mother was not eligible to choose to pay for a plan, and so she was slated immediately for Medicaid.”
The real rationale behind ObamaCare was the redistribution of wealth. “The redistribution of wealth has always been a central feature of [ObamaCare].”
“Insurance is complex to buy”? Really, Mr. President? I’m pretty sure Forest Gump could have figured that out in less than 3 years…
The real reason behind Obama’s laughable deal with Iran is to shore up his shrinking liberal base, the only group that still supports him after the ObamaCare debacle.
John Bolton calls the deal “abject surrender”.
End result of the Iran deal? “War has now become a much more likely prospect.”
Given all that, Harry Reid nuking the Senate’s filibuster gets pushed further down the Stack of Perfidy. What it tells us is that Democrats believe they’re going to lose the Senate. “They think it’s very likely that they will lose their Senate majority in 2014. They are essentially writing off the last two years of Obama’s presidency, which means getting as much done as possible right now. They are going to spend the next year packing as many liberal justices and appointees onto the courts and various bureaucracies as they can.”
Democratic Rep mugged in DC. Does this mean she’ll turn Republican? (Hat tip: Ace of Spades.)
16 things people couldn’t believe about America until moving here. (Hat tip: Michael Totten.)
I wonder how John Carter feels about being labeled part of “the House’s own pro-amnesty gang”?
Related: How Amnesty dies: Part 1, Part 2.
Syrian Kurds declare autonomy.
Crystal Mangum, the central accuser in the Duke Lacrosse “rape” case (which wasn’t) has been convicted of murder. Somehow I managed to miss Nancy Grace’s wall-to-wall coverage of her trial…
Tags:amnesty, Benjamin Netanyahu, Border Controls, Crime, Crystal Mangum, filibuster, Harry Reid, Iran, John Bolton, John Carter, Kurds, Michael Totten, Neville Chamberlain, ObamaCare, socialism, Syria
Posted in Border Control, Crime, Democrats, Foreign Policy, ObamaCare | 1 Comment »
Friday, October 11th, 2013
A LinkSwarm heavy on shutdown-related news:
For epitomizing what Democrats have done to Detroit, Kwame Kirkpatrick gets 28 years.
Hey Venezuela, how’s that Socialism working out for you? Inflation hits 49.4%. (Hat tip: Prairie Pundit.)
Victor Davis Hanson thinks Republicans are winning.
ObamaCare, or food?
Steyn on the shutdown. “The conventional wisdom of the U.S. media is that Republicans are being grossly irresponsible not just to wave through another couple trillion or so on Washington’s overdraft facility.”
Catholic priests prohibited from giving Mass.
The revolving door between the Democratic Party and the IRS.
How the GOP establishment tried to seize control of Freedomworks.
The Magic of Obama: White House gift shop goes bankrupt.
Department of Fish & Wildlife lift ban minutes before North Dakota files lawsuit.
Le Pen poised to win European Parliament elections? That’s Marine Le Pen, or Le Pen: The Next Generation.
Five years after the meltdown, families still hoarding cash.
Kent Hance to retire as Texas Tech Chancellor. Hance’s political career is in many ways emblematic of the evolution of Texas politics, starting out as a conservative Democrat, elected to the state Senate in 1974, defeating George W. Bush for a U.S. congressional seat in 1978, played key roll in backing the Kemp-Roth tax cuts in 1981, narrowly losing the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Senate to Lloyd Doggett (who would then get stomped by Phil Gramm in the general election) in 1984, followed Gramm by switching to the Republican Party in 1985, losing the GOP Gubernatorial nomination to an un-retired Bill Clements in 1986, getting appointed to the Railroad Commission in 1987, winning re-election to it in 1988, and losing to Clayton Williams in the 1990 Republican Gubernatorial primary. He had a long, long career as a bridesmaid…
Raising the debt limit means bankrupting your children.
“This 20 year old has discovered Sex Is Awesome!!! and just wants us all to know that. Yeah Sugar-Tits we sort of know. We’ve been enjoying it for years, but without quite as much Noob Squeeing about it.”
Tags:Bill Clements, Catholics, Crime, Democrats, France, George W. Bush, IRS, Kent Hance, Kwame Kilpatrick, Lloyd Doggett, Marine Le Pen, Mark Steyn, North Dakota, Obama, ObamaCare, Phil Gramm, Republicans, shutdown, socialism, Venuzuala, Victor Davis Hanson, War on Catholics
Posted in Crime, Democrats, ObamaCare | 1 Comment »
Wednesday, February 29th, 2012
Monty, the guy who does the Daily Doom over at Ace of Spades, is taking a break, which means that I have to do my own damn research step into the breach, so here a roundup of European Debt Crises news:
After much hemming and hawing, Germany finally ponies up 130 billion Euros for the latest Greek bailout funds. “Nobody can give a 100 percent guarantee of success” says Merkel. Actually, just remove the “10” and you have the true chance of the latest bailout succeeding in solving Greece’s problems…
And the Greeks, in turn, pass “tough spending cuts”. Presumably those “tough cuts” would be the ones reducing the annual budget deficit from 9% to 7.5% of GDP. They’re don’t even require Greece to stop digging, they just want them to dig slower. And even that assumes that such cuts will actually be implemented.
But despite all that frantic activity, Standard and Poor’s still downgraded Greece’s bond ratings to “Selective Default.” You get the feeling they’ve seen this particular tragedy before, and know exactly how it ends.
Among the austerity measures were a reduction in the minimum wage, including a 22% cut on the standard minimum monthly wage of 751 euros, and a 32% for those under 25. A good idea and necessary, but once again the sons are paying for the sins of the fathers.
Unions, realizing their role in helping bankrupt Greece, have meekly accepted the cuts. Ha, just kidding. They’re going on strike.
Following the downgrade, the European Central Bank announced that they would stop taking Greek debt as collateral, at least until the new Greek bailout package goes into effect.
How bad is Greek bureaucracy? The FDA is a model of efficiency by comparison. At least the FDA didn’t require stool samples from investors.
Germany is thinking of sending German tax collectors to Athens. I’m sure it’s impossible that Greeks would take this in the wrong way.
Speaking of Germany, their high court has ruled yet again that a parliamentary panel set up to approve action by the euro zone bailout fund is unconstitutional.
Portugal is also digging more slowly, having cut its budget deficit from 5.9% of GDP last year to 4.5% this year. Meanwhile, it’s economy also contracted by 3.3%.
The Finns are in, supporting the Greek bailout to the tune of 2.3 billion Euros.
Ireland is actually allowing its citizens to vote on the European stability treaty. Of course, if they vote no, expect them to have to keep voting until they ratify the result the Eurocrats have already chosen for them.
Seeking Alpha makes the obvious point that you don’t want to hold any of the PIIGS sovereign debt. I would go further and suggest that you don’t want to hold any sovereign debt denominated in Euros…
So who, above all, wants to avoid a Euro default among the PIIGS? Would you believe Goldman Sachs? “At the end of 2011, Goldman Sachs had sold $142.4 billion of single-name swaps, contracts that pay out in the event of a default, on the five countries.” That’s an awful of of incentive to keep the game running until all the rubes taxpayers can be fleeced…
Even big-spending, welfare state cheerleader and all-around leftwing mouthpiece Paul Krugman thinks Greece will have to leave the Euro. So it only took two years for Krugman to come part of the way toward realizing what what Mark Steyn did two years ago. Of course, Krugman’s analysis is short term and technical, whereas Steyn saw the unsustainable nature of the welfare state a long time ago. Do you think Kurgman might want become a bit less of a cheerleader for big government? I wouldn’t hold your breath…
EU council president Herman Van Rompuy: All your national parliaments are belong to us.
Spain balks at letting their government reduce spending by 4%of GDP. Problem: Their annual budget deficit is 8% of GDP. That’s the problem when you get that far down the hole to serfdom: Even slowing the digging becomes unacceptable, much less stopping…
“Decades of cradle-to-grave socialism, a short work week and long vacation periods for European Union workers have taken a toll on the treasuries of the nation states. The good life lived in Europe without a thought of tomorrow has brought on these days of reckoning. Greece is an example of the limits of a European welfare state.”
What would a real solution to Greece’s problems look like? “They must roll back bureaucracy, free up entrepreneurs and reduce the burden of the welfare state, so that the private sector can begin to grow….Regrettably, this is not the approach that has prevailed so far. Indeed, as things stand a whole host of European Union and European Central Bank policies are pushing things in precisely the opposite direction.”
American liberals love to talk about Northern Europe’s welfare states, but don’t like mentioning Southern Europe. “For all their fascination with Europe, southern Europe doesn’t loom large for the American Left. But France, Italy, Spain, Belgium, Portugal and Greece are more representative of European outcomes than Sweden, Denmark, and Finland, and have equally sized welfare states. Their failure should not be ignored in the American debate.”
Tags:Euro, Europe, European Central Bank, European Debt Crisis, Goldman Sachs, Greece, Paul Krugman, PIIGS, Portugal, socialism, Spain, Welfare State
Posted in Budget, Democrats, Economics, Foreign Policy, Welfare State | 3 Comments »
Friday, October 8th, 2010
Some links of potential interest to tide you over the weekend while I work on a more substantial post.
- The 25 most dangerous neighborhoods in America. W. Lake St.
(60612) in Chicago tops the list, with two from Texas: E. Lancaster Ave. (76102, 76111, 76103) in Ft. Worth, and Church St. (77550) in Galveston. Las Vegas weighs in with three of the top 10. Biggest surprise for fans of David Simon: Not a single Baltimore neighborhood makes the list.
- Dwight over at Whipped Cream Difficulties looks a proposal by the Austin Chief of Police to arrest people who aren’t drunk for being not drunk. That’s some mighty fine police work, Art…
- Speaking of police chiefs, he also had this follow-up on the city of Bell’s police chief and his $400,000-plus annual pension.
- Another firsthand account of the One Nation rally, courtesy of one of Jerry Pournelle’s readers: “The rally was sparsely attended and quite small in comparison to the rally led by Glenn Beck. My wife and I both observed a few things such as the large pile of paper signs on the ground in a walk way right below a green party spokesman haranguing the crowd about being green. We also noticed just how overweight if not obese a lot of these people were. Most of the crowd were union members or supporters of some sort. The rest were 9-11 Truthers, communists, or socialists (well at least that’s what their signs said…). There were many signs saying those in my profession [military] are murderers.”
- Alabama Democratic Representative Bobby Bright’s future isn’t.
Tags:Bobby Bright, Chicago, Communism, Crime, David Simon, Galveston, Jerry Pournelle, Las Vegas, One Nationa Rally, socialism
Posted in Crime, Democrats, Elections | No Comments »