48 Comments

1. Orphaned Son of Liberty:

I think he’s *super serial*.

Am I the only one who looks at this and thinks he’da been a better candidate than McCain? Anyone? Anyone at all?

Dec 8, 2008 - 5:53 pm 2. steeple:

“We shall not grow wiser before we learn that much that we have done was very foolish”

“There is all the difference in the world between treating people equally and attempting to make them equal.”

Friedrich Hayek

Dec 8, 2008 - 5:55 pm 3. programmer:

Fred Thompson impressed me with his intelligence when he decided to withdraw from the campaign

Dec 8, 2008 - 6:16 pm 4. Pascal:

Inadequate. Lame sarcasm from the senator who never charged Clinton launderers of Chinese campaign money with contempt of Congress for failing to appear in front of his committee. Connect the dotted lines between his failure and Obama’s billion dollar campaign.

Here’s the question: Does Thompson believe his brand of humor will earn him the RNC chairmanship?

Dec 8, 2008 - 6:39 pm 5. Robohobo:

Fred! ran an old fashioned campaign. He put up policy positions that were ignored. They were good too. I admire him because he would not get down and wallow with the pigs in the slop. Therefore he did not capture the minds of the electorate, such as they may be.

And, yes, Wretchard, he was talking tongue in cheek and laughing at the idiots who think they are really doing something to “save us”.

We are so screwed.

Dec 8, 2008 - 6:47 pm 6. 49erDweet:

OSOL: No. Many of us do. Wow, would he have have made a great president. And W, he is as serious as Jay Leno.

Dec 8, 2008 - 7:02 pm 7. ADE:

I think the tail-end of his talk is correct – the printing presses will be working overtime. We are heading for a mighty inflation, or stagflation, to put it more accurately.

People with assets denominated in $ will loose out (eg Bond-holders, pensioners on fixed pensions).

People with real assets (houses, shares – all at the right price) will win.

People with $ liabilities and real assets (mortgage holders) will win twice.

Or at least that is what happened in the 70s.

ADE

Dec 8, 2008 - 7:29 pm 8. E. Nigma:

RE:Pascal
He could never move forward for indictments of the Clinton campaign money launderers because Robert Torricelli (remember him?) and John Glenn knee-capped him at every turn. Out of party loyalty. And Carl Levin helped. And a slew of them fled the country to evade deposition.
I watched those hearings with disgust. I think they disgusted Fred so much that he decided he wanted out of the muck and did not run for re-election.

Fred is being just sarcastic enough to be serious. It all may blow over, but I think stagflation is probably one of the most likely outcomes, and the least of our worries.

Dec 8, 2008 - 8:29 pm 9. George_1776:

It will not blow over and the fed is begging for stagflation but won’t get it. It’s deflation time: in a fractional reserve economy credit is money and it is being wiped out and it’s not coming back – not even with a fed funds rate of zero. Sure inflation will follow eventually and the game will start again. But go and see how long it took for deflation to kick in after the deflationary spiral of the great depression – despite FDRs insane new deal pumping.

Dec 8, 2008 - 8:40 pm 10. George_1776:

that is for *inflation* to kick in…

Dec 8, 2008 - 8:41 pm 11. George_1776:

Richard (or anyone): Any thoughts in Greece? Where did this come from. On the surface seems reminiscent of France – but it doesn’t seem to be Islamists or even immigrants – are these the anti-globalization wackos back in action? But so random. Here in NYC the cops shoot kids all the time – thing is the kid is usually asking for it so no one gets too excited.

Dec 8, 2008 - 8:47 pm 12. Chris Miller:

Dear Belmont Club blog:

First, I apologize for posting in the comments! Rude, i know…But i did want to reach out to you regarding a proposal i had, and I couldn’t locate a valid email address.

I first found your blog via Hugh Hewitt’s recommendation, and I’ve enjoyed your extremely enlightening posts ever since. From reading your material, I’ll hazard a guess that perhaps you might enjoy my recent musical album.

“We the People” is a pro-military, pro-america record, the likes of which the music industry hasn’t yet before (at least, not that i can think of). My songs are about 9/11, Reagan, Communism, taxes, judicial activism…oh, and… Obama. The two Barack songs are the tracks getting the most play these days, in fact: “Hope Makes the Terrorists Dead,” and “Where Were You Born?” You can have a listen via my website at http://www.patriotmusiconline.com.

I’ve been offering the free mp3 of “Where Were you Born” to anybody who requests it (this offer stands for any readers of these comments!), and the response has been very positive. Of course I’m also looking to sell a few records for Christmas, and I think this project might strike a chord with your audience. Would you ever consider stepping outside of your normal sphere and doing a music review?

Thanks in advance for any consideration you give to my question. I know I don’t have a whole lot I can offer you in return, but i’d be willing to give you a free copy at least, plus linkage to your site of course (though i’m sure you outdraw me by thousands). I can also guarantee you and your readers will laugh out loud to while listening to “We the People…”

Waddya think?

Sincerely,

Chris Miller
chris@patriotmusiconline.com
http://www.patriotmusiconline.com

PS- Keep up the great work!

Dec 8, 2008 - 9:19 pm 13. elby:

Reminds me of the ant and the grasshopper. If I had a say, I’d kick the grasshoppers out into the cold gales and return to my cozy fire. But I’m not in charge, so it looks like the grasshoppers get to party in the summer, and kick me out into the cold in the winter.

I propose a new political party: the party of the ants. One ant by itself is easily squashed, but millions of them can take down large game.

Dec 8, 2008 - 9:36 pm 14. Alexis:

Much of what got the United States into its credit crunch is our government’s propensity to split the difference whenever political pressures get too high. Liberals want higher spending and conservatives demand lower taxes. So, what we get is higher spending and lower taxes with the effect of piling on the debt.

Historically, most wars got paid for with a combination of taxes and war bonds. Our present struggle against the terrorists is paid for by tax cuts. In other words, China lends us money to fight al-Qaeda.

The United States has a backlog of deferred maintenance on our infrastructure, so we need to fix that. However, the United States needs trim fixed costs such as entitlement programs; there is no way around it. We need national defense, we need infrastructure, and we need to keep our national debt at a manageable level. That leaves Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. While these programs may drain the budget, they do produce votes. And given how votes on election day are more important than the solvency of the Dollar, there isn’t much that can be done.

Meanwhile, the Oglala Aquifer is getting overpumped. It will eventually run dry. However, telling a feedlot operation that it won’t be allowed to pump water isn’t politically possible. It may be more profitable to just bottle the water and sell it in Houston than to use the water for feedlots that stink up the place, but established feedlot operators are powerful and must be obeyed. So, the water will get overpumped until there’s no water left, and the feedlots will then demand a gigantic canal get built to bring water from Lake Superior onto the High Plains. Remember, water flows uphill toward money.

If you dare complain about the smell of manure, you will be told it’s the “smell of money”. Oh joy.

Dec 8, 2008 - 10:00 pm 15. someone:

“Meanwhile, the Oglala Aquifer is getting overpumped.”

What’s the point? Unless we don’t want cattle we need water. Maybe we should build the canal now instead?

Dec 8, 2008 - 10:36 pm 16. Pascal:

Re enigma: “the least of our worries.”

Yes, where our biggest worry arguably is who will lead the fight with the collectivists? Everybody has a story showing Thompson does not fight.

In this video he sounds much like any one of us. It’s not a leading role.

Dec 8, 2008 - 10:56 pm 17. Alexis:

someone:

Cattle can be raised nearly anywhere where there’s water and reasonable weather. Why raise cattle on the High Plains where the water is scarce and the temperatures are hot, as opposed to Michigan where the water is plentiful and the temperatures are cool?

For that matter, milk tastes better when it is produced in a colder climate. Milk from Minnesota tastes better than milk from southern Illinois, just as milk from Wisconsin tastes better than milk from Texas. Warm temperatures aren’t good for milk quality. And yet, the federal government keeps on subsidizing milk from eastern New Mexico at the expense of milk from Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Michigan.

My real point about the water is that most economic and ecological disasters are very predictable. Printing more money in deficit spending is much like overpumping groundwater. Eventually, the resource runs out. And then it’s gone. (Sure, Zimbabwe can print more and more money, but it’s money that nobody wants anymore. I’d trust Monopoly money before I’d trust Mugabe’s monetary toilet paper.)

Sustainable economics isn’t a bad idea.

Dec 9, 2008 - 12:25 am 18. Karen:

I wish we were inaugurating Fred Thompson next month. He knows there’s no such thing as “too big to fail.” But sane people just can’t seem to get elected these days.

All the trillions for the bailout/stimulus/spending frenzy plus all the looming trillions in entitlements plus all the trillions for the coming nationalized health care will put us all in a hole the likes of which we’ve never seen before in this country. We’ll see inflation much worse than the ’70s. How can it be otherwise, considering the path we’re on? And it won’t matter if you’ve always been a reasonable person (like yours truly), living within your means and saving on a regular basis – we’ll all suffer. (Well, probably the elites won’t.)

Some people think we’ll get back on track after everyone sees where current ideas lead us. I don’t think so, because Obama himself is deemed too big to fail. He’ll be propped up no matter how much misery he and Congress create. Any voice of sanity that might appear on the scene will not be listened to. We’re not a rational society anymore, haven’t been for quite a while now. Our national insanity is a long way yet from cresting; with an Obama administration and liberal Congressional majority, it’s only beginning to come into full flower. So kudos to Fred Thompson and his jokey sarcasm, it’s better than crying.

Don’t we all know the Obama government won’t help anything? That in fact, they’ll do everything they can to make a big mess an even bigger impossible mess? That Obama will do for the whole country what he and his friends did for Chicago subsidized housing? But we elected him (well, a lot of us did albeit few if any here) and we’ll be looking to him to fix things, vainly looking to him, the Obamessiah.

Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, who rely on horses, who trust in the multitude of their chariots and in the great strength of their horsemen, but do not look to the Holy One of Israel, or seek help from the Lord. Isaiah 31:1

And I heard something like a voice in the center of the four living creatures saying, “A quart of wheat for a day’s wages, and three quarts of barley for a day’s wages… Rev. 6:6

Dec 9, 2008 - 1:30 am 19. wildernesscalling:

The truth makes you want to cry, ya Fred had my vote till he dropped out, sad fact is the train is already headed down the derailment track and most are happy to open the steam lever further! “crazy train” like Ozzie O sings it! this is nothing folks, it is going to get much worse than this, “0″ will give us a very short lived respite before the cliff edge is behind us and we all fall down at a much more accelerated rate, the end of the good book tells you how we will become crazed into following anybody that will rescue the world….is “0″ the FP or AC? I don’t know, but he comes with great credentials and a background to boot.

Dec 9, 2008 - 1:35 am 20. Karen:

Alexis, there are people actively working on the water problem. Aquifer recharge is one area that currently is getting a lot of attention. For example, in dry Western states, capturing snowmelt that would otherwise run off into the river and be gone forever. Not sure what if anything might be afoot regarding the Oglala aquifer, would have to look into that.

Dec 9, 2008 - 1:41 am 21. johnclubvec:

Apparently, deflation can be a lot worse than inflation; which is to say, sometimes, even though we may abhor the causes that brought us to that state, printing money can be a good thing, and we may actually be quite fortunate that Fed chair Bernanke understands this. (Treasury, as distinct from the Fed, of course, is an entirely different kettle of fish).

Dec 9, 2008 - 5:57 am 22. Fred Thompson On The Economy « 36 Chambers - The Legendary Journeys: Execution to the max!:

[...] under: Curmudgeonliness, Economics, Keeping Cool With Coolidge — Kevin Feasel @ 8:59 am I laughed until I plotzed, as Krusty the Clown once [...]

Dec 9, 2008 - 5:59 am 23. Mike Sylwester:

I voted for Fred Thompson in the NJ primary election even though he was about out of the race by then. My fantasy was that the Republicans would nominate Thompson and then he would select Newt Gingrich as his running mate.

They would have kicked Obama’s and Biden’s butts in the debates.

Thompson should have entered the campaign much sooner. By the time Thompson did enter, too many other candidates had developed momentum in the Republican Party, and so the Republicans’ votes were split too many ways in the primaries. McCain was able to win the nomination with only a plurality of support.

Ironically, if Thompson had entered early, then I think that McCain’s candidacy would have ended early. There was a time when McCain’s campaign was practically broke, hanging on only by a shoelace. If Thompson had been in the campaign at that time, he would have taken enough of McCain’s small support that McCain would have dropped out.

Oh, what might have been.

Dec 9, 2008 - 6:44 am 24. slade:

RE the water supply

Like it or not, right or wrong, the western world is not going back to teepee’s. Recharge won’t do it, but Charles’ numerous posts on nanotube membrane technology have convinced me that desalination is around the corner – literally. In fact, I am further convinced that the “next big thing” will explode out of nanotech research now in progress. I believe it will dwarf renewable energy which will stumble over physics and life style until hydrogen fuel cells take over. (I just completed a long drive through steep windy mountain passes in a 3,000-lb car with a 250-hp V-6 engine. I won’t be doing that in an electric peddle car.) I also believe that nanotech is the only thing that will pull our chestnuts out of this economic fire.

But I’ve been wrong for all of this millennium.

Dec 9, 2008 - 7:02 am 25. Peter Boston:

The advantage of not being responsible for anything is that you can say what you really think.

Without having worked out all the implications it does seem like we have moved from a market economy to a political economy. Capital and resources are now allocated based on the recipients ability to lobby and deliver votes rather than their ability to produce anything of value. Barack Obama is the perfect foil to preside over this environment because it describes his life to a tee.

A rising tide of prosperity floats all boats. A rising tide of Gorelick class avarice drowns all of us who don’t have a boat.

Dec 9, 2008 - 7:21 am 26. dan:

George_1776, re: Greece

Well, i’m something of a broken record lately about who’s causing what, but perhaps it would be instructive to look at Greece this way: the ruling Conservatives have a 1-seat majority in Parliament. The other party? Socialist. Could it be that these are not “anarchists,” but – wait for it – Communists?

Notice that you can’t say Islamists, but you also can’t say Communists.

And if Greece were to become “Socialist” in the near future, and we should suddenly need fly-over rights or refueling rights because of a big Mideast crisis started by Iran (that is, Russia) – well, that wouldn’t be very convenient for us, would it? Remember how that whole Turkish thing worked out prior to OIF?

And if the PKK should suddenly really ratchet up attacks in Turkey or unsettle Iraqi Kurdistan? And our Pakistan supply line should really get harassed, even effectively severed?

And suddenly we had to rely on Russian satellites (the Stans) for our supply, and had to transfer a bunch of hardware out there on large bases in the middle of Central Asia…

And what if Egypt suddenly explodes?

There are many ways to pin down Gulliver. And if Gulliver is pinned down, he isn’t really Gulliver anymore, is he, especially since he has a lot less money to throw around and a president who has every political excuse not to do it…?

Of course, it could just be pissed off Greek kids too. One never knows.

Dec 9, 2008 - 7:30 am 27. Reno Sepulveda:

Camera’s just watch and listen. Fred just talks. A decent character actor perhaps but most certainly an undistinguished Senator and a lousy Presidential candidate.

Dec 9, 2008 - 7:36 am 28. Jrod:

Political economy indeed. Looks like there’s about to be a job opening for the Illinois Governor seat.

Dec 9, 2008 - 8:19 am 29. buckets:

OT – to clarify Jrod’s post above, Illinois Governor Blagojevich is in federal custody this morning.

I’m from Chicago, and my frustrations at our local system have been aired many times, and I’ve also expressed my admiration for our local U.S. Attorney, Patrick Fitzgerald. What a great day for me – Illinois corruption at the highest levels exposed, and by none other than U.S. Attorney Fitzgerald.

It’s like “Fitzmas” all over again!

Dec 9, 2008 - 8:32 am 30. John from NH:

I like Fred, but it seemed he wasn’t very interested in becoming President. His candidacy felt like it was peeking in the door and if there was massive applause he’d step through, otherwise he had other things to do.

Personally, I think he makes a much better commentator for most of the reasons mentioned above.

Dec 9, 2008 - 8:32 am 31. buckets:

P.S. Never forget that Obama thrived and rose rapidly within this system. Don’t ever start thinking he’s an honest man; that way lies damnation.

Dec 9, 2008 - 8:34 am 32. Fred Thompson on the Economy — Dean’s World:

[...] was massive applause he’d step through, otherwise he had other things to do. Anyhow, via Belmont Club here’s Fred doing what he does [...]

Dec 9, 2008 - 8:39 am 33. Lifeofthemind:

Fred Thompson is a national treasure. The Obamacrats took power by locking up two generations than get their information from Saturday Night Live and the Daily Show. If we could communicate more like Fred does, as Reagan did, then we could change the culture. The problem is that the lock on information dissemination is now so complete, and it will get even worse with the Fairness Doctrine, that 98% of the people will never hear Fred’s message. Reagan could not get his message out now.

***
The theory seemed to be that in return for renting security from the US nuclear umbrella and a free trade regime the Americans would get to spend and the saving would be done by Japanese salarymen and Chinese peasants. Thanks to years of hard work by the agents of the Kremlin called the Democratic Party the US is no longer credible as a controlling power. The Chinese are buying the commodities that are the sinews of industrial power and building a blue water fleet. The Russians are pushing to choke off Europe and humiliate America before their demographic death spiral overwhelms them. The Japanese are looking like a deer in the headlights but that could change fast. In other words it is mercantilism redux or 1930 all over again.

***
Pleased as I am to see the Chicago Democrats wounded I remember that this is the same Patrick Fitzgerald who locked up Scooter Libby, His motives, political allies and psychological/sexual motivations are suspect.

Dec 9, 2008 - 8:52 am 34. Mongoose:

Well, the obvious economic solution is to just do away with corporate taxation. That, along with spending cuts would solve it all. The majority of the internalization Corp. 2000 would relocate here.

As for defense, well, defense is a small part of GDP.
We could well remain a “controlling power” as long as we have the national will.

The real issues are political. The Democrats have spent decades demoralizing the American people; it is a matter of educating them about this. None of this is written in stone; the real issue is the Democrat party and all it represents. We need not decline at all so long as we have the will not to do so.

One thing that is not mentioned in all of this “Great Depression” doom and gloom is the very real fact that the expectation level is much, much different today than it was back then, and I am not talking about trivial exceptions about purchasing good and services. I am talking about a broad notion of what it means to be “middle class” — what one’s daily life is, what opportunities there are and what opportunities will the future hold. Most importantly, what are the opportunities that are left to one’s children. There is no way on earth that the Democrats can meet these expectation. No way at all. Can they suppress them? Can they turn us into another Cuba? That is a tall order indeed.

So what we should be doing is pointing out just what is going on, and we should be doing this as often and as clearly as we can. This is just what Fred is doing here and more power to him — it is incredibly stupid to sit around and throw rocks at him while he does so: We should be joining him.
So there is an opportunity here. We needs to stop listening to the democrats politicking about “unity” and just attack and attack. The GOP should just not vote at all for any of this garbage. Not. One. Vote.

BTW, he was a fine Senator and he would have made a great President. I have no doubt at all as to why he decided to pull out at all. Why subject himself and those dear to him to all of that vileness in front of a nation that is so deeply stupid as to give the Democrat party full reign in such a time as this? They elected Obama. What else can one say? Just look at what the country did to the current President who no matter what anyone says is a fine and decent man and who has stood firm in the face of great odds. Let us be honest and admit that Conservatives were right there in the front of the line throwing rocks at him too. He has accomplished much, helped the nation more than we can know and very soon we will miss him a great deal indeed.
Fred’s reaction was a sign of intelligence, not cowardice.
The nation would not have elected him. The nation must have its childish tantrum.

Truth is that the “couple of generations” that the Democrats have by the ear has to figure the Democrats out for themselves, just as the Boomers had to do so before them. We seem destined to pass through this dark night that is upon us.

It is, however, an open question if we will remain a world power on the other side of it, or even a cohesive nation and society.

I still say that Universal Care and immigration amnesty will be our undoing. These issues will be up first. The GOP needs to scream night and day about each of them each and every day. So do all honorable Americans.

The GOP needs to get out and fight , be clear and not be afraid to call things by their real names, consequences with the media be damned.

If we are now to become a second rate power, the question we need to ask is how we got to the point that at our greatest power — our apogee — we were so undone. The UK had to undergo WW1 and all that went with it to be undone. We have faced nothing close to that at all. Are our spirits so weak that they can be undone by one thoughtless generation of spoiled brats? If this is so then we have been fooling ourselves all along the way of the last 100 years.

Dec 9, 2008 - 10:07 am 35. Eggplant:

Karen said:

“I wish we were inaugurating Fred Thompson next month. He knows there’s no such thing as “too big to fail.” But sane people just can’t seem to get elected these days.”

John from NH then said:

“I like Fred, but it seemed he wasn’t very interested in becoming President. His candidacy felt like it was peeking in the door and if there was massive applause he’d step through, otherwise he had other things to do.”

My impression was that Fred Thompson’s campaign was incompetent. If Thompson couldn’t be bothered to run a competent campaign then he had no right to be President.

Despite having lost, I think John McCain was the Republican Party’s best shot at staying in the White House. However there were too many factors working against McCain, e.g. Obama having almost infinite campaign funding, the MSM in bed with Obama, an imploding economy, the George W. Bush legacy, etc.

Johnclubvec said:

“Apparently, deflation can be a lot worse than inflation; which is to say, sometimes, even though we may abhor the causes that brought us to that state, printing money can be a good thing, and we may actually be quite fortunate that Fed chair Bernanke understands this.”

I believe most economists agree that inflation is worse than deflation. Inflation attacks the basic integrity of the nation’s currency and undermines the government’s ability to regulate the economy. The United States has gone through many recessions in its history and one deflationary depression in recent history (1929). However the United States has never gone through an inflationary depression (the United States has never demonetized its currency, i.e. declared US currency to longer have any value). Inflationary depressions are not uncommon in the Third World (Zimbabwe is having one now). I’m very concerned that Obama could stupid us into an inflationary depression. Obama has brought Paul Volker on as an advisor to his Economic Recovery Advisory Board. This was pay back for Volker endorsing Obama as President in January 2008 (why did he do that?). At first glance, one would think/hope that Volker could restrain Obama from inflating the currency. However Volker is very old and would only hold an advisory position. Obama is a socialist and socialists normally are not shy about debasing the currency to fund government programs. I believe Obama wants to a create a “New-New Deal” as a response to the current economic crisis. However unlike under Franklin D. Roosevelt, the federal government has a serious debt problem and simply does not have the resources for a “New-New Deal” (the US could wreck its credit rating). If Obama ignores his economic advisors, an inflationary depression is not an unlikely outcome. An interesting aside: google “inflationary depression”. Most of the website on this topic are run by obvious lunatics. There does not seem to be any rational discussion about the topic on the Internet.

George_1776 asked:

“Richard (or anyone): Any thoughts in Greece?”

Greek politics has always been crazy. The standard operating procedure is for the ΝΕΑ ΔΗΜΟΚΡΑΤΙΑ party to get Greece’s political and economic house in order and then they’re replaced by the Socialists who hammer the country into the ground. The communists, anarchists and socialists have always been creating unrest in the background. People forget that Greece had a civil war and was once under a military dictatorship. The Soviet Union (correctly) saw Greece as having significant strategic importance and did considerable agitprop through the Greek Communist party. Greece (like us) still hasn’t flushed that Cold War poison out of their system.

Dec 9, 2008 - 10:12 am 36. Eggplant:

Mongoose said:

“Just look at what the country did to the current President [George W. Bush] who no matter what anyone says is a fine and decent man and who has stood firm in the face of great odds. … The nation must have its childish tantrum.”

I strongly agree with Mongoose about George W. Bush.

Obama is in for the surprise of his life when he realizes just how few options he really has for running the nation (anyone who wants to be President must be a selfless patriot or a power hungry psychopath or a combination of both).

Dec 9, 2008 - 10:36 am 37. Robohobo:

eggplant-

“My impression was that Fred Thompson’s campaign was incompetent. If Thompson couldn’t be bothered to run a competent campaign then he had no right to be President.”

If by competent you mean one that catches the eye of the ADD riddled children that elected 0bama, then yes. Otherwise he tried to run an old fashioned campaign with actual positions and policies, things like that. But that cannot stand up to “Hope & Change” soundbites for the ADD afflicted.

Dec 9, 2008 - 1:39 pm 38. Unsk:

Personally, I think the idea that Fred wasn’t all that interested and wouldn’t campaign was part of a whispering campaign started within and from the Rino’s of the RNC.

From what we saw during the General Election, can anyone honestly say that
Mc Cain could efffectuvely campaign, and was really interested in being President?

So Fred wouldn’t kiss babies. So what?” Mr Honorable”, John Mc Cain refused to address many of the key campaign issues, and sold America on the fact that the Fannie/Freddie collapse was caused from Wall Street greed, not ACORN and the leftist democrats.

Dec 9, 2008 - 1:50 pm 39. Alexis:

Eggplant:

I think the Fred Thompson’s biggest obstacle to the Presidency is that he sounds too much like Foghorn Leghorn.

Dec 9, 2008 - 2:51 pm 40. Lifeofthemind:

@Alexis,
Are you kidding? That isn’t a bug, its a feature.

Dec 9, 2008 - 3:22 pm 41. Eggplant:

Alexis said:

“I think the Fred Thompson’s biggest obstacle to the Presidency is that he sounds too much like Foghorn Leghorn.”

I knew there was something familiar about him.

Who reminds you most of Pepe Le Pew?

Dec 9, 2008 - 4:04 pm 42. Eggplant:

Robohobo said:

“If by competent you mean one that catches the eye of the ADD riddled children that elected 0bama, then yes.”

What constitutes the majority of the American people?

Hint: It’s not rocket scientists with doctor’s degrees.

Dec 9, 2008 - 4:09 pm 43. LJ Miller:

If by deflation you mean lowering prices, then what’s wrong with that? I think that lowering prices, like what we see with high tech, are a good thing for everybody. This year I could get a 50″ TV for what I spent on a 32″ two years ago. What’s the problem with that, or with gas prices at $1.449 this morning instead of $3.999 only a couple of months ago? If by deflation you mean reducing the money supply, that has already happened. The banks had been lending out $30 for every $1 in the vault, which made the total money supply 31 times the actual currency in circulation. Now they are only loaning about $1.2 for every $1 in the vault, for nearly 100% reserves. This has deflated the money supply by about 30 times. Given that you or I would be prosecuted for fraud if we lent out $30 for every $1 we actually owned, I don’t see this as a bad thing. I’d argue that deflation is actually a good thing. It encourages savings and investment, lets people know exactly what the value of money is, and demonstrates in prices exactly how much better things will get in the future. Sure it stinks to have debts under deflation. But then again, it should always stink to have debts and the inflationary spiral is not a sustainable solution.

Dec 9, 2008 - 5:59 pm 44. Chicago Boyz » Blog Archive » Thompson on the Economy:

[...] Belmont Club links to Fred Thompson; I wish that rumbling voice was going to do Saturday addresses for the next years.  Thompson, the father, concludes with an equivalent of Paine’s remarks. [...]

Dec 9, 2008 - 6:38 pm 45. veracious:

Sadly, USA has become the land of the pretenders. Acting and actors are the most respectived things around town. Real doesn’t matter, it’s the image that one should trust; the facade.

Hit me long ago that when you spend a enough of your time watching pretense (movies and such); the only way it’s any fun is if it seems real. So, we taught our brains to believe it all. Short circuited the safety mechanisms… it worked so well we’re now easily fooled by fake pretending to be real.

Dec 9, 2008 - 7:57 pm 46. A Conservative Teacher:

Thompson is trying to come off as Reagan, but it doesn’t work, for one main reason- I’m not the bad guy. You never blame people for ‘living above their means.’ Now, I might think that you and you and you are living above your means, but I’m not, so don’t accuse me of it. I might think government is living beyond its means, but my family isn’t, so don’t even imply that we are.

There is a lot I like about Thompson, but the subtle hint in his addresses that I might personally be responsible isn’t going to work politically, and it shouldn’t- America is great, it is just the government that is bad, and you have to hold to that ideal no matter what.

Dec 10, 2008 - 4:11 am 47. weSwinger:

mongoose is right to a point: except that there is no identity principle Republican = Conservative. That is what we need first. Drive the ivy league nincompoops and country club corporate favor seeker circle jerkers either into the Democratic or the Libertarian party with leadership like Jeff Flake in Congress, and then raise a conservative voice saying NO NO NO, Hell NO.

The alternative media is our voice, may it thrive.

Foghorn Leghorn, heh. “I’m not a chicken. I’m a chickenhawk!”

Dec 10, 2008 - 6:28 am 48. Unsk:

LJ-
Deflation is an economy killer. Those cuts in prices in reality means little or no profits, and often losses to manufacturers, wholesalers or retailers. Losses quickly translate to job cuts. Those job cuts then snowball into more losses at the retail sales end, which mean more job cuts until the economy reaches an equilibrium.

Capital and thus credit is the lifeblood of a capitalist economy. The economic destruction caused by the frozen credit markets has quickly spread beyond the housing sector into almost every sector of the economy. Our Dear Leader’s sily new New Deal does not address the economic problems at hand at all. It’s a joke.

Fred is right; at some point the Fed will resort to just printing money. But the real question is how much government borrowing will the markets take. Nobody knows. We may be headed into a situation with deep deflation, enormous job losses, higher interest rates, tight credit and a debased currency all at once.

BTW, I tend to disagree with Peter. The sooner conservative Republicans get control on Congress the better. Two years are much better than four. We may not be able to wait four years to remove Obama. There may be nothing left.

Dec 10, 2008 - 8:36 am

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