CFTC Chairman Wants to Replace LIBOR

In an interview with Bloomberg news, CFTC Chairman Gary Gensler states he would like to replace LIBOR.  The only problem is that, when asked what he would like to replace LIBOR with, he has no answer.  Perhaps we should replace the market based LIBOR (of which the lowest and highest bids are actually dropped before calculating in order to filter out potential manipulation) with the Federal Fund Target Rate.  Yes, replace a rate that has been sometimes manipulated by market participants with a rate that is constantly manipulated by central bankers.  Not surprising that Gensler then complains that the CTFC is underfunded and, of course, needs more resources from the brain trust known as the 113th United States Congress.

Democrat in Assembly, N.Y. Times, Call on Silver to Quit

Sheldon Silver is so corrupt that he is being called on to resign by a fellow Democrat in the Assembly, The New York Times Editorial Board, and The New York Divide Editorial Board:

Unforgivable Conduct in Albany

Scrutiny of Silver Continues as Lopez Is Set to Resign

Democrat in Assembly Calls on Silver to Quit

Sheldon Silver, as lawmaker and trial lawyer, claims that he has never had a conflict of interest.  CC Sabathia wouldn't have a conflict of interest either if he were allowed to be an umpire for the games he pitched.

Gun Control Versus Criminal Control

Instead of taking the rights away of law abiding citizens - the same law abiding citizens that are more likely to stop a crime from being committed - state and federal governments should instead focus on controlling criminals.  Politicians have proven to be incompetent at controlling criminals, and should be fired in droves:

The districts that contain Chicago, Los Angeles and New York City ranked last in terms of federal gun law enforcement in 2012, according to a new report from Syracuse University's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, which tracks federal data.

Federal gun crimes include illegal possession of a firearm in a school zone, illegal sale of a firearm to a juvenile, felon, or drug addict, and illegal transport of a firearm across state lines. In Chicago, the majority of gun charges last year were for firearms violations.

The districts of Eastern New York, Central California, and Northern Illinois ranked 88th, 89th and 90th, respectively, out of 90 districts, in prosecutions of federal weapons crimes per capita last year, but it wasn't always this way. All three districts fell lower on the list than they had been in years past. In 2010, for example, Chicago was 78th in federal weapons prosecutions.




These cities also have some of the nation's most restrictive gun laws, as well as the most active mayors in championing gun control. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa are all members of the national Mayors Against Illegal Guns campaign.

 D.C., which also has tough gun laws, was in the lower half of the list in 2012, coming in at 78th. In 2011, D.C. prosecuted a higher number of gun crimes, coming in at number 49.

National Rifle Association chief Wayne LaPierre first pointed to the report on Meet the Press Sunday, when he demanded to know why the national press corps wasn't asking the White House or U.S. attorneys general to explain lax federal enforcement of gun laws.

Mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent.

Mark Levin on the Democrat Party

Mark Levin brought up some history of the Democrat Party during his show on March 29, 2013:

"The real racists, ladies and gentlemen, they're are on the left.  They have a grand history.  Oh yes.  In fact they call their favorite racists 'the grand this' and 'the grand that' [referring to Democrat Senator Robert Byrd, former KKK recruiter, before serving as President pro tempore four times when the Democrat Party held the Senate].

But lest we forget, the Democrat Party not only defended slavery but promoted slavery.  Lest we forget the Democrat Party not only defended segregation, it promoted segregation.  It was the party of racism.  The Republican Party was founded as the abolitionist party, as the anti-slavery party.  The Republican Party has never stood for slavery.  The Republican Party has never stood for segregation.  Ever.  I can't think of single Republican Governor who stood in the school house door to prevent African American children from going to elementary school, or junior high, or high school.  But I can think of a number of Democrat Governors.  I can't think of a single Republican Attorney General who tapped Martin Luther King's phone either.  We have a Democrat Attorney General who did.  The left's great hero Woodrow Wilson; a bigot with a capital "B", a racist with a capital "R".  Some progress had been made by his predecessors, both Republicans, Theodore Roosevelt and Howard Taft toward integrating the federal government.  Do you know what Wilson did?  He put out orders to re-segregate wherever there had been integration.  This is the leading public figure of the time of the Democrat Party and of the progressive movement.  That's the history of the Democrat Party.  The Democrat Party was schizophrenic on Civil Rights.  It was a party fighting with itself.  A party fighting with itself.

But there's a common thread, believe it or not even from slavery to today - and I'm not saying that they promote slavery today, that would be absurd - but what they do promote is the destruction of the individual.  Not the same way they used to support the destruction of the individual, now they destroy the individual by claiming to stand for the individual.  And yet they smother the individual, they tax the individual, they punish the individual if a person is successful.  They claim that it's not the individual's own success; if you look at a guy like Ben Carson.  Who's attacking Ben Carson?  The left.  Why?  Because he is successful.  Because Ben Carson is saying 'hey everybody: don't listen to them, listen to me, I have a story to tell, I used to be like them, now look at me, look what I've accomplished and here's how I've done it, here's the prescription'.  And there's nothing worse than an individual who's demonstrated you can be independent, be successful, be a contributing member of society - because then the whole game is up.  The whole game is up.  Ben Carson came out of the ghetto, he came out of Detroit, and look - the head neurosurgeon at Johns Hopkins - one of the greatest hospitals in the world.  Rather than hold this man up as a living example of what's possible, the left tries to destroy him.  The left tries to destroy him.  It's an old communist, Soviet, Maoist technique.  Castro did it and does it.  Hugo Chavez did it.  They all do it.  They all do it and it's grotesque.  And what they do is they make success a bad word and those who actually are successful are made out to be bad people.

The Left is Only Compassionate With Other People's Money

Being "compassionate" with other people's money is not admirable.  Since "liberals" are not liberal at all (unless we are speaking of being liberal with other people's money) and compassionate conservatives do not wish to conserve other people's money, one is left asking which political ideology is not a complete joke.

Gallup now reports that 55% of Americans view their income tax rates as "fair", according to their polls.  The problem with this figure is that 49% of Americans do not pay income taxes.  Therefore the majority of our country, and the leading political party, now maintain the self-righteous belief that the problems of our society should be resolved and paid for by someone else.  It is very difficult to be an optimist in 2013.

Ending the Fed

Ending the Fed, and any other major bureaucracy in Washington D.C., will never happen.  When was the last time any bureaucracy in Washington D.C. was downsized or "ended"?  Instead of trying to "end the Fed", we should instead embrace currency competition and seek to end the monopoly that the federal government (along with the help of the Federal Reserve) currently maintains upon our currency.    This process would not be simple, and would require a constitutional amendment, however it is much more plausible than ending the Fed.  Allowing states to mint their own currency would force the Federal Reserve to change the loose money policies that continue to devalue our dollar.  This would in turn fix the Fed instead of hopelessly trying to end it.

The Un-SAFE Act of New York

Calling an Act affordable, protective, or safe does not make it a so.  The Act not only infringes upon our rights as law abiding citizens, but it will also make us less safe.

F.A. Hayek dedicated an entire chapter to "Our Poisoned Language" in The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism.  "Liberals" are not liberal.  "Progressives" are not progressive.  Statists purposely manipulate the language in order to advance their agenda and increase their power.

Time to join New York State Rifle and Pistol Association (NYSRPA) and Shooters Committee on Political Education (SCOPE).

Mercy to the Guilty is Cruelty to the Innocent

Anyone that does not read Thomas Sowell's columns should start now.

Christmas-Tree Totalitarians:

If I were rich, I would have a plaque made up, and sent to every judge in America, bearing a statement made by Adam Smith more than two-and-a-half centuries ago: “Mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent.”

Gun-Control Ignorance:

Neither guns nor gun control were the reason for the difference in murder rates. People were the difference.  

Yet many of the most zealous advocates of gun-control laws on both sides of the Atlantic have also been advocates of leniency toward criminals.

The Role of 'Educators':

This misuse of schools to undermine one’s own society is not something confined to the United States or even to our own time. It is common in Western countries for educators, the media, and the intelligentsia in general to single out Western civilization for special condemnation for sins that have been common to the human race, in all parts of the world, for thousands of years.  

Meanwhile, all sorts of fictitious virtues are attributed to non-Western societies, and their worst crimes are often passed over in silence, or at least shrugged off by saying some such thing as “Who are we to judge?”

Destruction

It seems as if everything is being destroyed.  The law, the currency, the family, and the individual.

The law is being disregarded, particularly supreme law.  The Constitution is supreme law and to disregard whenever convenient sets a dangerous precedent.  When the government disobeys their own laws it is acting in a tyranical manner.

The currency is being eroded, and it is the only currency allowed by law.  Quantitative easing, debt issuance being purchased by our own Federal Reserve Bank, and lack of a proper budget (a process that controls spending and has been ignored for years under the Senate Majority Dictator Harry Reid) all lead to more irresponsible spending, credit risk, and currency debasement.  The problem is that this currency is the only one allowed by law.  Citizens and subjects have to follow laws.  Regimes and Dictators are obviously above the law.

The family is being disassembled with an ever-increasing amount of people relying on their government instead of their family.  As Jonah Goldberg outlines in Liberal Fascism, Hillary Clinton's grotesquely deformed concept of civil society (page 339) pursues the creation of a society in which everyone is responsible for everyone else's child.  Aparently Hillary Clinton has never heard (or comprehended) the quote "If everything is a priority, then nothing is a priority".  In her ideal world, we are all responsible for everyone else's children and it is the role of "society" to raise children.  When society fails, the government steps in.  Although Hillary Clinton lost her run for President in 2008, her vision is being pursued by others that are far more ruthless than her.

Individual rights are being eroded as well.  The IRS confiscates more of the product of your labor.  The TSA molests citizens in the name of "security" and have yet to prevent any major attack against our country.  Religious freedoms are being eroded by the new "health care" law.  Second Amendment rights will soon face yet even more attempts at blatant violation, despite recent progress.

It is very difficult to remain optimistic for the future of our country.

Economics, Politics, and War

Politics is an extension of economics by other means.  War is an extension of politics by other means.  Therefore, failed economic policies (lack of economic freedom and free markets) lead to politics.  Furthermore, failed political strategies (disregarding the laws, even supreme law, that leaders swear to protect when accepting a political position) unfortunately has the potential to lead us down a dangerous path, as Thomas Sowell wrote in 2007 (Sowell does NOT advocate this - and neither do we - however he merely states that our current path is a dangerous one).

"When I see the worsening degeneracy in our politicians, our media, our educators, and our intelligentsia, I can’t help wondering if the day may yet come when the only thing that can save this country is a military coup."