Category: Politics

Like making Al Capone your spokesman

I’d like to think that Antigua’s complaint with the World Trade Organization against the United States could encourage the federal government to drop our nonsensical policies surrounding internet gambling (and gambling, in general). It would be great if a quick stroke of the pen could fix our stupidity, but to believe it will is a fantasy. So I put no expectation in the complaint’s prospects. But assuming for a moment that it could change minds in Congress, and acknowledging that normal sanctions by Antigua against the U.S. would be laughable, how does this make any sense?

So the Antiguans plan to ask the WTO for the right to impose sanctions that would hurt — namely, permission to copy and export U.S.-made DVDs, CDs and similar material. Hollywood is not amused.

What kind of connection is that? The U.S. government has an irrational, anti-liberty policy, which it pursues outside the United States, so that entitles Antigua to steal intellectual property from private businesses that have nothing to do with the source of the complaint, other than being (mostly) American? It’s impossible to take their complaint seriously, and I’m on their side. I don’t imagine the fair-minded souls in Congress will care for that recommendation, either. Thanks for standing up for the cause, though.

On a side note, this is amusing:

“Gambling in general, and remote supply of gambling in particular, raises grave law-enforcement and consumer-protection concerns,” the U.S. trade representative’s office said in a legal filing. Attorneys for the trade representative declined to make additional public comments.

Legalizing “local supply” of gambling via the Internets would do a lot to eliminate the “remote supply” concern. I do enjoy that gambling raises grave concerns for law-enforcement before it raises them for the protection of consumers. That’s a good priority list for the government to take. Only the most pro-liberty solution will arise.

Lust for power isn’t a virtue

Inept responses to emergencies are unacceptable but understandable because humans are involved. Mistakes happen. But covering up an inept response is unforgivable. The threat of new attacks means that an honest accounting of our past responses and how we can improve them must take precedence over any concern for public shame or bureaucratic humiliation. As such, this is infuriating if true:

Some staff members and commissioners of the Sept. 11 panel concluded that the Pentagon’s initial story of how it reacted to the 2001 terrorist attacks may have been part of a deliberate effort to mislead the commission and the public rather than a reflection of the fog of events on that day, according to sources involved in the debate.
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Maj. Gen. Larry Arnold and Col. Alan Scott told the commission that NORAD had begun tracking United 93 at 9:16 a.m., but the commission determined that the airliner was not hijacked until 12 minutes later. The military was not aware of the flight until after it had crashed in Pennsylvania.

Tell me why we should grant ever-expanding powers to government over more areas of our lives when government can’t be honest about not accomplishing one of its few legitimate tasks.

Hokies thank you for free WiFi

This story is a few months old, but since I visited Blacksburg last week, I learned about it now. The facts:

The New River Valley will soon be more connected than ever as Blacksburg Transit goes wireless with a pilot program offering Internet service aboard select buses.

The new service, created as the result of a partnership between Citizens Telephone Cooperative, based in Floyd, and Blacksburg Transit, has already begun wireless Internet service aboard a single bus, but plans are in the works to add six more by the end of May. “We’re still testing, but we should have them all done by the end of the month,” said Tim Witten, manager of BT Access.

“We’re doing it as a pilot program. We’re deploying this to see how it works, and hope it would be a really attractive part of our service, and serve as an example to the rest of Virginia,” Witten said.

That’s fancy enough, but I don’t imagine students clamored for this service. Although my experience is eight-plus years old, I’m confident that local travel patterns among Virginia Tech students haven’t changed that much. Most users aren’t on the bus long enough to scan for the wireless network and connect, much less to check the status of their fantasy football. Those students who are on the bus long enough and want to download the latest Paris Hilton song should pay for it themselves.

The program is being paid for by a series of grants from the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation and the federal government, thus restricting the number of buses that will receive wireless service.

Because it’s some tech nerd’s vision of cool does not mean it’s a public good. Should I also point out that Blacksburg Transit does not intend to test the program on specific routes? That the routes could change daily? I’m sure that will inspire riders to bring their laptops on a regular basis. Hopefully this flawed premise will help the program fail. As long as it’s in place, when the Hokies take the field and the leaves change colors this fall, you should stop by Blacksburg and surf the free wireless you’re providing.

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(General hat tip to Kip for the basic structure of this post.)

Only consumers of redistribution count

Shouldn’t researchers ask you and me what we think?

Most senior citizens who signed up for Medicare’s new prescription drug coverage say they are happy with their plans, but some report that they are not saving money and many say the overall program could be better designed, two new independent studies show.

I’d also say the program could be better designed. Barring the obvious course (elimination), those receiving the “benefits” should pay for them. Those of us not receiving benefits shouldn’t. The phrase private markets comes to mind, but I’m probably being selfish.

Leslie Norwalk, deputy administrator of the Medicare agency, said, “I was heartened to know that we were largely successful.”

Let’s wait more than two months to pop the champagne. The longer-term success might need different standards to determine success.

Baseball has no shot clock

So what?

Federal regulators said yesterday that Comcast Corp. may have discriminated against a regional sports television network by refusing to carry the network’s broadcasts of Nationals games.
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In a 10-page opinion, the FCC said it found that MASN had made a “prima facie showing” that Comcast had discriminated against the network and had “indirectly and improperly demanded a financial interest” in the network in exchange for carrying it. The FCC also said, however, that there were factual disputes on both points that would have to be decided by a judge.

Media lawyers said the FCC’s finding shifted the burden to Comcast to prove that it has not broken any of the agency’s rules. The lawyers said it was possible that the judge could find Comcast had played by the rules and was justified in declining to carry the network.

I don’t know the specifics of the rules, but shouldn’t we first be asking whether or not the FCC should have rules governing this? Is this regulatory burden in the interest of customers, or is it in the interest of regulators? Let’s all ponder that for a long nanosecond.

Cleaning out the aggregator

My server died last Tuesday, locking me out of my site. My hosting company finally resurrected it late Wednesday, but by then my vacation interfered. Rare access to the Internets, as well as general mental decompression, stood in the way of regular posting. So I disappeared for almost a week. In no particular order, here are a few items filling my news inbox while I was away.

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From Reason’s Hit and Run, I think I might be the only person in America who answers Yes and No instead of some other combo.

…, New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer fielded two questions on marijuana. One: Would he legalize medical marijuana? Two: Had he ever smoked marijuana? The answers: No and yes. The terror of Wall Street has picked up and run with the old Clintonite maxim: Do as I say, not as I did.

Spitzer should’ve been discredited as a candidate for any number of actions he’s taken, but this is just further proof that the people of New York need to see more than (D) when they get in the voting booth. I suppose it should be comforting to know that Virginia isn’t the only state with hack politicians.

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Is anyone shocked by this:

The federal government will need to either cut spending or raise taxes down the road to pay for extending President Bush’s recent tax cuts, the Treasury Department said in a report released [last Monday], dismissing the idea popular with many Republicans that such sacrifices can be avoided.

My question should be rhetorical, but there are many people in this town who will probably be genuinely shocked. Okay, actually, the shocked people will be voters. Those who are not shocked, but are bitter that the Treasury Department could be so treasonous as to impugn the American economy this way, will complain among themselves that their secret is revealed.

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Maybe I can start a network and force Comcast to air it:

After more than a year of inaction, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin J. Martin yesterday addressed a dispute that has kept Washington Nationals games off the region’s biggest cable network.

The Mid-Atlantic Sports Network (MASN), which carries most of the team’s games, asked the FCC in June 2005 to order Comcast Corp. to begin carrying the games immediately, but the agency took no action.
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MASN now has the right to seek a resolution to its complaint through the FCC process or take the path of arbitration.

Shouldn’t customers decide whether or not MASN is important to them? Of course, lack of competition due to regulatory monopolies prohibits customers from having a sufficient voice, say to cancel and switch to a cable provider that carries MASN, but I’m certain the answer is not to push the regulatory hand deeper into the industry.

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Tomorrow MTV turns 25. Being old enough to remember the early days of MTV, and young enough to enjoy them, the present-day celebration is good for reliving fond memories. But this explanation of why MTV evolved (devolved?) into what it is broke the spell:

“I think we started as an idea with very little content; it was more like a radio station with songs and cheesy, hair-metal videos,” says Van Toffler, president of MTV Networks’ music/film/Logo group. “But we quickly realized the novelty of music videos wore off and was not repeatable with thousands of viewings. So we evolved into being more about TV production — yet still sloppy, live and organic.”

Forget that my musical tastes are stuck more in early MTV than current MTV, which means I don’t watch most new videos. The video has not gotten old. Look at iTunes and its music video sales. There is a market, meaning the novelty didn’t die. MTV killed it with its repetition of the same tiny number of videos.

Early on this was necessary due to the newness of the form. But by the late ’80s, that didn’t hold. MTV abandoned it. Today, when I watch music television, I watch the extra music video channels like VH1 Classic. Even when I’m watching country music videos, I’ll flip to the all video channels rather than the regular channels. When original programming appears on any regular music channel, I almost always pick up the remote. I understand that I’m not MTV’s target audience, but I didn’t age out of that audience. MTV decided my viewership didn’t matter. But that makes sense, because my money is not green, it’s plastic.

This is too clever. I know.

In seeking solutions to our health insurance crisis, the most immediate action needed is to separate insurance from employment and allow the free market to organize efficient methods of pooling risk and resources. The tax system currently protects our inefficient scheme, to the benefit of some and the detriment of others. Fixing the flawed tax structure would detach the ability to purchase reasonable insurance from the requirement of joining a specific form of the corporate workforce, namely employment with a large company. The free market could then find the best solution(s).

In trying to resolve this, there’s a political argument we’re married to, which hinders real progress. Special interests have a stake in keeping the status quo. Most often it’s reduced competition, but any whim of the favored is accepted almost without question if the price is paid. We have to move beyond that. But what about saving traditional health insurance?

We’ve encouraged health insurance through a specific method of provisioning for decades. Everyone has the same right to cheap healthcare, as long as they join a company large enough to take advantage of group purchasing power and expense tax deductibility. If you differ from that viewpoint, that’s too bad.

Is it too bad? Should an individual’s preferences matter? Should we adjust the way society works just to accommodate people who have different needs? That’s absurd in the push to reform health insurance accessibility in America. Anyone who respects liberty understands that different people have different requirements. One solution may not work across the entire spectrum of individuals.

So why is the same logic not absurd to the people pushing for amendments to outlaw civil marriage reform?

Protecting America from the Constitution

The House legislation to bar federal courts from hearing constitutional challenges to “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance is a bad idea. Whether its goal is to solidify federal recognition of the Christian God as ruler of America or to allow state and local courts to better reflect the supposed will of the people to force everyone to worship the same, nothing good can happen if the Senate passes its version. I suspect the Senate will choose to be the chamber where bad bills go to die, so I’m not particularly worried.

Instead, it’s worth highlighting two quotes from the debate. First:

“We should not and cannot rewrite history to ignore our spiritual heritage,” said Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn. “It surrounds us. It cries out for our country to honor God.”

Actually, our history cries out for religious tolerance and governmental indifference. Many of the first settlers of the New World fled religious oppression. That some of them wished to impose their own oppression here is worth noting, specifically because it failed. As evidence see the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which is our true spiritual heritage. But, if this debate is about not rewriting history, how to explain this:

  • 1892 to 1923: “I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands: one Nation indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all.”
  • 1923 to 1954: “I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands: one Nation indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all.”
  • 1954 to Present: “I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands: one Nation under God, indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all.”

It seems history can be rewritten. All Rep. Wamp wants is for us not to rewrite the historical rewrite. Wouldn’t honesty be a part of the Family Values Tour 2006, or whatever Republicans are calling this wrecking ball publicity stunt?

Second:

Rep. Todd Akin, R-Mo., who sponsored the measure, said that denying a child the right to recite the pledge was a form of censorship. “We believe that there is a God who gives basic rights to all people and it is the job of the government to protect those rights.”

I believe that there is a Constitution which gives basic rights to each person and it is the job of the government to protect those rights. The facts support my position. The current state of civil liberties protections in America, as exhibited by the House and Senate, indicates that many of our leaders in Congress share Rep. Akin’s misconceptions. Instead, Rep. Akin holds a view of our government which allows him to enforce laws not supported by the Constitution, and to deny rights that conflict with what he believes people should do. Denying a child the ability to say the Pledge of Allegiance, with its recent addition of “under God”, may be censorship, but I wonder what he would call forcing a child to say something he doesn’t believe? Perhaps the honorable gentleman from Missouri thinks every child can’t wait to recite “under God,” but it’s also possible that some children notice the inherent flaw in American spiritual strength that forced religious patriotism represents.

He’s a political promise keeper

Two quick points on President Bush’s veto explanation, now that he’s actually used that power. (I know, I’m as shocked as you that it took him this long to discover a real power. With all the imagined powers he now has, you’d think he would’ve already burned through all of his real powers. Anyway…)

“This bill would support the taking of innocent human life in the hope of finding medical benefits for others,” Bush said at the White House, following through on his promise to veto the bill. “It crosses a moral boundary that our decent society needs to respect. So I vetoed it.”

First, if I was mistaken in my post yesterday, so is President Bush. Hopefully every Congressman who voted for the bill should call him out if he’s wrong. Otherwise, this is just politics as usual. Ahem…

Second, of all the reckless misadventures of the last 5½ years by the Congress and the Administration, this is the first to “cross a moral boundary that our decent society needs to respect”? Right. Perhaps the President needs a better moral compass, one that involves civil liberties and fiscal responsibility.