WUI (Writing under the influence)

"I came here, where freedom is being defended, to serve it, and to live or die for it."

Kazimierz (Casimir) Pulaski wrote these words to George Washington whose life Pulaski saved in the Battle of Brandywine. Pulaski died from wounds received at the siege of Savannah. Pulaski received 7th honorary US citizenship in 2007.

Professor Dondero would benefit from reading and understanding this simple lesson in free markets, and how constant worrying about the bottom 10% ruins free markets and prosperity for the rest of us.

"We have got to get this right, not only for our own future but for all humanity. The free market is history’s greatest invention, and destroying it now would be history’s biggest mistake – perhaps even its greatest crime."

Taxes in Oregon should be lowered not raised. But if taxes in Oregon are to go up, this is the best way. Poor and illegal will finally pay something. Of course, we will pay more but at least everybody will have some skin in the game of keeping taxes low.

I was against Obama's plan to rescue home owners who can't pay their mortgages and/or who are underwater because they owe more on their houses than what they are worth. I was against it on principle. So I didn't even have to consider how unfair this plan was. WSJ makes this excellent point today:

"At the height of the housing boom, Americans were pulling $300 billion each year out of their home equity, according to research by James Kennedy of the Federal Reserve. Since 2005, cash-out refinancings have represented a third of all mortgage originations in the United States. Rod Dubitsky of Credit Suisse estimates that close to half of subprime mortgages were cash-out refis. Spending the winnings from the rise in home prices meant that borrowers were converting to more risky mortgages, typically with higher monthly payments. According to Freddie Mac, most of its refinancings have resulted in larger loan amounts in every quarter since the middle of 2004."

"Is taking on more debt a sign of responsibility? The Obama plan focuses on subsidizing borrowers to reduce their debt-to-income ratio, but taxpayers might be more interested in another statistic. Call it the flat-screen-to-kidney-transplant ratio. Can the Administration report how many of the people due to receive tax dollars spent home equity on plasma TVs? When this figure is divided by the number who spent the money on medical care, then Mr. Obama can make his case on the facts."

What if the owner refinanced to get cash out and spent on luxuries that he couldn't have possibly afford otherwise? Why do we now have to pay for those luxuries? It's one thing for Obama to ask me to pay higher taxes for somebody's unemployment payments but it is quite another to ask me to pay for somebody's trip to Paris (especially Paris) while I was paying my mortgage off (including the 13th-month payment) without ever taking a cent out of my house.

I own two cars: 1997 w/ 170k and 2002 w/ 85k. Both paid off. WE don't have cable. We have 768kbps broadband. Our two cell phones are pay-as-you-go and we don't "go" that much; they are meant to be used in emergencies and to manage a family of 6 (i.e., son A's game went into overtime so you take daughter B to that game instead.)

I spend a lot of money on all kinds of insurance policies so when something bad happens I don't have to ask for help. I save at least 15% every year so I don't have to rely on SS. Of course, with his fantastic performance since the inauguration, Obama took care of my 401(k) so maybe I will have to cash that SS check. Obama (like many Democrats before him) are standing fairness and responsibility on its head. He is punishing me for my good behavior.

"There is a moral hazard in rewarding bad decisions. But it's worse than that: The White House plan contains penalties for everyone else. The mortgage "cramdown," allowing bankruptcy judges to reduce the amount owed, can only make investors less willing to lend to future homebuyers."

Are they really so clueless? When I hear somebody say "I hate America!" I know we are doing something right.

"Mark this down as the first of what we expect will be many such revelations for Obama Administration diplomats. Their animating conceit is that the world dislikes America merely because the Bush Administration wasn't solicitous enough of world opinion. But Durban II shows that many countries hate us merely for who we are and what we stand for."

How true, how true.

"I’ve found that the machine-gun-objection approach is common among many skeptics and liberals. They throw objection after objection at believers and conservatives but never pause long enough to listen to the answers. It doesn’t matter that you’ve just answered their question with an undeniable fact—they’ve already left that topic and are rattling off another objection on another topic as if you hadn’t said a word. They don’t really seem interested in finding answers but in finding reasons to make themselves feel better about what they want to believe."

"After all, a skeptic of one set of beliefs is actually a true believer in another set of beliefs."

But it could be even worse. When they do listen to your arguments, especially when you use their own words, they deny everything. Now they say, that they predicted this cooling period and that it is indeed proof that global warming is happening. 1984 anyone?

Please forward this to as many people as possible; especially Democrats who can still be saved.

"One day, scientists will discover the cure for cancer. The world will erupt in joyous celebration – and rightly so. Cancer is a horrible disease that each year destroys the lives of millions of people, and finding a cure will be recognized as one of history’s greatest achievements.

There’s another disease that destroys vastly more lives each year than cancer. And we’ve found the cure for it – but no one is celebrating. Indeed, hardly anyone seems even to have noticed that we’ve already figured out how to rid the world of its most destructive scourge.

This disease is poverty. And the cure for poverty is the free market. That’s because the free market is the only environment in which entrepreneurs can flourish. And it’s the entrepreneurs – and only the entrepreneurs -- who create the jobs that lift us all out of poverty."