Archive for the ‘Giuliani’ tag
From here and from there - 9
Through Maggie’s Farm I found this very interesting essay (PDF) about the origin of the US involvement in the Middle East. It isn’t short, but it is very good reading. And anyway an essay that state the following, can’t be really bad:
“When it comes to making sense of recent history, the American people, encouraged by their political leaders, have shown a demonstrable preference for clarity rather than nuance.”
An interesting discussion about the mixing of economy, as a scientific discipline, and the moral driven political action:
So in response to hatchet-job campaigns like that in The New Republic, or pundits such as David Fraum, we should be prepared because of our failure to prevent the conflation of Austrian economics and libertariansim, and the rhetorical emphasis many have chosen to pursue in presenting the libertarian political philosophy. We must be prepared to respond.
First, to insist that economics is not an ideologically disputed discipine anymore than chemistry or physics are. The basic teachings of economics are in place, it is the implications, and outter edges, that are in contention just like any other vibrant scientific discipline. There is, in short, nothing out of the mainstream of economics to insist that people respond to incentives, that disperse knowledge is coordinated through the price system, that inflation can distort economic activity, that regulation can be captured by powerful interest groups, etc.
Second, to point out what role the economist plays in society (Teacher, Student, Social Critic). Economics per se does not lend itself to advocacy of this or that policy, it does provide wisdom on the spontaneous ordering of society, and technical knowledge on means-ends efficiency. Economics must be combined with some moral sentiments (themselves up for debate) to be transformed into advocacy. But the discipline independent of moral assessment provides us with knowledge that places parameters on people’s utopia. Wishing it so doesn’t make it so, and economics tells us why. So much of political campaigning is about selling wishful thinking to a population that doesn’t know any better. Economics has not only a role to play, but a unique and powerful role in serving as the prophylactic against public fallacies. We need to defend the structural integrity of that prophylactic so it can do its job!
Third, be able to step away from our position as economist quo economist and instead take on our role as citizen and express our libertarianism as a doctrine of empowerment and inclusion. Libertarianism is not a fancy excuse for individuals who want to freely express racism, or bash certain sexual lifestyles, or businessmen who want to smoke dope. Of course, in a free society, just as in any society populated by human beings, there will be those who are ignorant and prejudice. The question is one of minimizing the access to politcal power of the ignorant and prejudice so that whatever repugnant views they may hold cannot be instantiated into policy and must always be confroted with free competition in ideas, in associations, in the market. In short, libertarianism doesn’t promise perfection, it just promises an institutional regime where man’s imperfections are held in check through decentralization of power, and competition.
And last for today is a link for Giuliani’s plan for straitening homeland security. It is interesting to note the classical path for tyranny - the development of external demonized enemies that ambushing in every corner, the siege and the total drafting to fight the “enemies”:
Getting and keeping federal agencies communicating with one another isn’t enough. An effective homeland security plan also has to establish links to, and make use of, the valuable information collected by the country’s 800,000 state and local law enforcement officers. We should view these officers as counterterrorism resources–"first preventers," as the Manhattan Institute’s R.P. Eddy calls them. Even beyond uniformed services, people such as DMV clerks, and even everyday citizens, may notice clues that would help law enforcement identify would-be terrorists. It was a clerk at Circuit City, after all, who provided the key tip that enabled federal authorities to stop the Fort Dix plot. (We should also reform liability laws so that individuals who act in good faith, such as those who report suspicious behavior on airplanes, will not get sued for trying to help their fellow citizens. Fortunately, a law authored by Rep. Peter King was recently passed to protect Americans who do just that.)
The article is full of incoherent arguments, self contradictions and over simplifications - which is perfectly in line with Giuliani’s foreign policy.
Exciting
Beyond my typical cynicism, and the healthy mistrust in political campaigns that I developed over the years, I have to admit that I am very excited about the Ron Paul’s campaign. My wife call it obsession but it is much more than that. I would have followed the political process, and the coming elections, with great interest regardless of the list of candidates - but Ron Paul candidacy makes me excited.
It is hard to explain why - after all I strongly disagree with many of his core agenda. I think that his “Pro Life” position contradicting the idea of liberty he so strongly advocate for, I do not agree that the states should regulate many of the things his is willing to allow the states to regulate and I’m taken back by his statement about the evolution theory. I think that Ron Paul is a much better candidate than we saw for many years, but he is not an ideal candidate - not practically and not in terms of his agenda. And yet, I’m excited and hoping for, against my best observing judgment, for the coming elections.
There’s something that seems a little tragic about the Paul volunteers’ devotion–they’re spending their Christmas vacation in chilly cabins, eating Velveeta potatoes for a week, and their candidate doesn’t arrive in Iowa until the day before the caucus–until I see that it’s not really about Paul. They almost never mention his biography or his leadership style when talking about their movement, a startling contrast with rival campaigns like Huckabee’s or Obama’s. I ask Eli, the student who would have bought Joe’s graphic history of World War I, whether he thinks Ron Paul has charisma. Eli pauses. "He’s so nice," he replies. "He reminds me of your grandpa–your righteous grandpa." A volunteer named Eddie in a tidy checked Oxford shirt says, "He did a rally with us the first night and shook everybody’s hand. It was cute."
"I like his aloofness, to be honest," observes Matthew, the World War II buff.
It’s not about personality worship for the volunteers, the fetishization of a person’s capacity to shine in public or persuade. It’s about questions like the purpose of our Federal Reserve, which really piques these volunteers’ interest, and which just so happens to get a Texas congressman named Ron Paul going, too. When Nickel muses, "I think centrists are the most extremist, because they don’t believe in anything but people," it suddenly seems to make a lot of sense.
In the hands of the volunteers, I’m becoming a Ron Paul convert, and I have to get out. On the way to my car, I take a peek into one of the cabins. There are 17 bunks crammed on the lower floor, boys’ stuff scattered everywhere. Posted on the door is the only sign of raucousness I’ve seen the whole night: a Hillary brochure with little Hitler mustaches doodled onto her pictures. As I examine it, a burst of laughter comes from the cabin’s second level. Suddenly it occurs to me: Did I get stuck with the earnest ones over in the main hall, and this is where the wild, blow-up-the-establishment Ron Paul people are?
A few people are shouting at once, and I can’t make out what they’re talking about. Girls? Nasty gossip about Mitt Romney? Then a phrase rises above the jumble. "That’s why the French had mercenaries!"
They’re debating the comparative merits of how governments throughout history have spent their revenue.
It is getting hot
Now that the Huckster’s surge is basically a fact it is only a question of time when the threatened campaigns will move on the attack. We can already see some, small, evidences of the coming offense, but it will be interesting to see which candidate will be the first to openly attack the new darling of the GOP primaries. If I need to bet I will risk and say that it will be probably Romney on the social issues and Giuliani on the fiscal policies. I hope to see a decent criticism, unlike the petty stupidity we saw on the last CNN/YouTube debate, and the fact is that with Huckabee there is enough room for a lot of it.
It will be also interesting to see how will such attacks will effect Ron Paul’s numbers…
Crash course
I said before that his electability is a legend that would be blown as the Clinton start giving him personal treatment, but apparently his rivals at the GOP didn’t want to leave her the pleasure.