One of the truisms of political campaigns is that candidates send out surrogates to make the tough jabs at their opponents, and then deny that the campaign had anything to do with it.
General Wesley Clark is the liberal's general, and a senior advisor to the Obama campaign. He is trotted out whenever the left wants someone in uniform to make their points. Yesterday, General Clark went after John McCain's qualifications to be President. he said that John McCain had never held an executive command in wartime conditions (John McCain commanded the largest air squadron in the Navy, but not during wartime). He hasn't "ordered the bombs to fall". He further said that getting shot down over Vietnam does not qualify him to be President. It was a revolting performance. George McGovern, John J. Rockefeller and others have made similar "hits". It is no accident.
Do the Democrats really think this is a winning strategy - to attack McCain's decorated military record? If the Democrats are going to run on the issue of Senator McCain's experience and military record then they've already lost. Every time they make statements like this they accentuate Barack Obama's lack of experience in both public and private service - made even more stark when compared to Senator McCain.
Today, speaking in Independence, Missouri, Barack Obama said, "I will never question the patriotism of others in this campaign. And I will not stand idly by when I hear others question mine." It reminded me a great deal of the scene in The Godfather when Al Pacino sits innocently in church while his soldiers, following his orders, assassinate the key leaders of the other New York crime families to consolidate power for the Corleone's.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Clearing Up Confusion About Types and Uses of Energy
The national debate on energy is a confusing mish-mash. I hear both private individuals and pundits talking about nuclear, clean coal, ethanol, new domestic drilling, synthetic gas, and every other sort of fuel in the same breath. The fact is that it is very important to separate the sources of energy from the uses - and how that use may change over time.
The most important differentiation is to always separate energy used for transportation verses energy used for electricity - our two biggest needs. We can build nuclear plants to greatly expand the generation of emission free electricity. But for now, this is largely irrelevant to our consumption of oil and the resulting distillates.
80% of the oil consumed in our country is for transportation - gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, etc. The current ethanol mandate is diverting 30% of our corn crop to produce 3% of our automotive transportation fuel. Plus, ethanol consumes as much energy as it produces, or worse. We can produce all the electricity in the world, while having zero effect on the price of gas.
51% of our electricity in the United States is generated using thermal coal. Without a rapid build out of additional generating capacity, we will limit our economic growth and our standard of living. Without an accelerated build out in new electricity generation we may begin to experience countrywide what is occurring in California - a lack of reliable electricity and rolling brown-outs. Right now nuclear energy is the only technology that can scale quickly enough to provide baseline power to the grid. In fact, nuclear power gives us a much better short term solution than we have for transportation fuel. Solar and wind are important components but solar in particular is years away from being cost effective.
There are currently no economical substitutes for transportation fuel. Longer term, there is great hope that electricity will fuel our cars, but that is a still a long while off. We need to greatly improve plug-in and hybrid technology. In the meantime, we need to continue to develop new sources of oil to bridge the gap. Synthetic fuel produced from coal is a technology that already exists but is currently not cost competitive - even with gas at $4.25 per gallon. Hydrogen fuel cells are extremely expensive to operate and free hydrogen is not free.
I don't think we need to worry about oil prices falling to a level where it will impede research and development. We need to keep pushing on all fronts - electricity and transportation - traditional and alternative.
The most important differentiation is to always separate energy used for transportation verses energy used for electricity - our two biggest needs. We can build nuclear plants to greatly expand the generation of emission free electricity. But for now, this is largely irrelevant to our consumption of oil and the resulting distillates.
80% of the oil consumed in our country is for transportation - gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, etc. The current ethanol mandate is diverting 30% of our corn crop to produce 3% of our automotive transportation fuel. Plus, ethanol consumes as much energy as it produces, or worse. We can produce all the electricity in the world, while having zero effect on the price of gas.
51% of our electricity in the United States is generated using thermal coal. Without a rapid build out of additional generating capacity, we will limit our economic growth and our standard of living. Without an accelerated build out in new electricity generation we may begin to experience countrywide what is occurring in California - a lack of reliable electricity and rolling brown-outs. Right now nuclear energy is the only technology that can scale quickly enough to provide baseline power to the grid. In fact, nuclear power gives us a much better short term solution than we have for transportation fuel. Solar and wind are important components but solar in particular is years away from being cost effective.
There are currently no economical substitutes for transportation fuel. Longer term, there is great hope that electricity will fuel our cars, but that is a still a long while off. We need to greatly improve plug-in and hybrid technology. In the meantime, we need to continue to develop new sources of oil to bridge the gap. Synthetic fuel produced from coal is a technology that already exists but is currently not cost competitive - even with gas at $4.25 per gallon. Hydrogen fuel cells are extremely expensive to operate and free hydrogen is not free.
I don't think we need to worry about oil prices falling to a level where it will impede research and development. We need to keep pushing on all fronts - electricity and transportation - traditional and alternative.
The Supreme Court Affirms An Individual Right To Bear Arms
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/27/opinion/27fri1.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin
I seems to me that the New York Times editorial page used to be more intelligently reasoned and better written. The above link to their editorial on the Heller decision is a combination of the absence of legal reasoning, lots of examples of why guns are bad (interesting but irrelevant), and out and out falsehoods and misrepresentations.
Let us start with the examples of why guns being bad and are used for evil purposes. Great detail is provided in a number of example such as the shootings at Virginia Tech and more recently at Northern Illinois University and statistics about the large number of guns in the country. All of this is interesting, and factual, but it has nothing to do with whether the Constitution recognizes an individual right to bear arms. I believe the term is “red herring”.
How about the absence of legal reasoning? The New York Times claims a “radical break form 70 years of Supreme Court precedent”, but offers no legal facts. The truth is the Supreme Court has never ruled directly on whether the Second Amendment is an individual or collective right, and there is no radical break. The 70 year old case to which they are referring is United States v. Miller. Miller litigated a law enacted after the St. Valentine’s Day massacre where warring mobsters were machine gunned down a Chicago alley. The law restricted ownership of certain types of weapons that were not in general use, such as the fully automatic weapons used in the massacre. The Court agreed that the restriction was Constitutional, but in no way impeded individuals to own most types of guns.
There are only two other cases in Supreme Court history that directly rule on the second amendment. Both cases occurred after the Civil War, and neither addressed the individual verses collective right issue. The Supreme Court in Presser v Illinois did point out that the overall intention of the Bill of Rights was to restrict the federal government from infringing on individual rights. All three cases have affirmed that the right to bear arms is not unlimited, and have supported reasonable gun regulation. But the New York Times assertion that the Supreme Court ignored precedent is blatantly false.
The District of Colombia law required that any weapons kept in the home be rendered inoperative, such as by having them unloaded and disassembled. The Supreme Court ruled that such a restriction effectively bans an individual from bearing arms in the protection of his home, and is therefore effectively a ban on the individual right to bear arms.
If ever there was a case that you think would be ruled on 9 to 0, this was it. Even if you set aside the most radical members of the court, Justices Stevens and Bader-Ginsberg, the ruling should be 7 to 2. Let’s think about Justice Stevens assertion that this ruling “creates a new Constitutional right”. All of the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights are intended to limit the government from restricting individual actions. The drafters of the Constitution were very wary of a strong federal government. The Bill of Rights was added as amendments to the Constitution in order protect of individual rights and weaken the power of the federal government. Research shows that the founding members of the country clearly believed in an individual’s right to bear arms, separate from government service.
Antonin Scalia, who authored the majority opinion, is an originalist. He interprets the constitution on the strict construction of what it says, but also the plain original meaning of the day. In other words, when the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were drafted, what was the common public meaning of the day? Justice Scalia brilliantly parses the prefatory and operative clauses of the second amendment to show how the right to bear arms is an individual right, and that maintaining an effective militia is one purpose, but not an exclusive purpose. The liberal argument that the second amendment is only a collective right that is controlled solely for the purposes of the federal government flies in the face of original intent.
If the right to bear arms, even with the use of reasonable restrictions, is untenable for our country, then we should change the constitution to make it so. Liberal judges, like Stevens, conjure up new meanings from the constitution as if it was some sort of legal ouija board. Liberal judges rely on a “right to privacy” for justifying all sorts of individual actions and behaviors. The “right to privacy” as a broad, individual right is nowhere to be found in the Constitution. Using the excuse that the times have changed as cover to “reinterpret” the Constitution is the hallmark of legislating from the bench. The Constitution is not a living document. If it needs to be changed because circumstances have changed, then we should change it. In fact, many individual rights issues are not Constitutional issues at all. They are legislative issues.
I love the part where the New York Times states, “This audaciously harmful decision, which hands the far right a victory it has sought for decades…” Maybe these are the same "far right" people that make up working class families in middle America that are bitter and clinging to their guns and religion. So it is now “far right” to simply believe the constitution means what it actually says? Even Barack Obama believes that the right to bear arms is an individual right – subject to reasonable regulation, of course.
I seems to me that the New York Times editorial page used to be more intelligently reasoned and better written. The above link to their editorial on the Heller decision is a combination of the absence of legal reasoning, lots of examples of why guns are bad (interesting but irrelevant), and out and out falsehoods and misrepresentations.
Let us start with the examples of why guns being bad and are used for evil purposes. Great detail is provided in a number of example such as the shootings at Virginia Tech and more recently at Northern Illinois University and statistics about the large number of guns in the country. All of this is interesting, and factual, but it has nothing to do with whether the Constitution recognizes an individual right to bear arms. I believe the term is “red herring”.
How about the absence of legal reasoning? The New York Times claims a “radical break form 70 years of Supreme Court precedent”, but offers no legal facts. The truth is the Supreme Court has never ruled directly on whether the Second Amendment is an individual or collective right, and there is no radical break. The 70 year old case to which they are referring is United States v. Miller. Miller litigated a law enacted after the St. Valentine’s Day massacre where warring mobsters were machine gunned down a Chicago alley. The law restricted ownership of certain types of weapons that were not in general use, such as the fully automatic weapons used in the massacre. The Court agreed that the restriction was Constitutional, but in no way impeded individuals to own most types of guns.
There are only two other cases in Supreme Court history that directly rule on the second amendment. Both cases occurred after the Civil War, and neither addressed the individual verses collective right issue. The Supreme Court in Presser v Illinois did point out that the overall intention of the Bill of Rights was to restrict the federal government from infringing on individual rights. All three cases have affirmed that the right to bear arms is not unlimited, and have supported reasonable gun regulation. But the New York Times assertion that the Supreme Court ignored precedent is blatantly false.
The District of Colombia law required that any weapons kept in the home be rendered inoperative, such as by having them unloaded and disassembled. The Supreme Court ruled that such a restriction effectively bans an individual from bearing arms in the protection of his home, and is therefore effectively a ban on the individual right to bear arms.
If ever there was a case that you think would be ruled on 9 to 0, this was it. Even if you set aside the most radical members of the court, Justices Stevens and Bader-Ginsberg, the ruling should be 7 to 2. Let’s think about Justice Stevens assertion that this ruling “creates a new Constitutional right”. All of the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights are intended to limit the government from restricting individual actions. The drafters of the Constitution were very wary of a strong federal government. The Bill of Rights was added as amendments to the Constitution in order protect of individual rights and weaken the power of the federal government. Research shows that the founding members of the country clearly believed in an individual’s right to bear arms, separate from government service.
Antonin Scalia, who authored the majority opinion, is an originalist. He interprets the constitution on the strict construction of what it says, but also the plain original meaning of the day. In other words, when the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were drafted, what was the common public meaning of the day? Justice Scalia brilliantly parses the prefatory and operative clauses of the second amendment to show how the right to bear arms is an individual right, and that maintaining an effective militia is one purpose, but not an exclusive purpose. The liberal argument that the second amendment is only a collective right that is controlled solely for the purposes of the federal government flies in the face of original intent.
If the right to bear arms, even with the use of reasonable restrictions, is untenable for our country, then we should change the constitution to make it so. Liberal judges, like Stevens, conjure up new meanings from the constitution as if it was some sort of legal ouija board. Liberal judges rely on a “right to privacy” for justifying all sorts of individual actions and behaviors. The “right to privacy” as a broad, individual right is nowhere to be found in the Constitution. Using the excuse that the times have changed as cover to “reinterpret” the Constitution is the hallmark of legislating from the bench. The Constitution is not a living document. If it needs to be changed because circumstances have changed, then we should change it. In fact, many individual rights issues are not Constitutional issues at all. They are legislative issues.
I love the part where the New York Times states, “This audaciously harmful decision, which hands the far right a victory it has sought for decades…” Maybe these are the same "far right" people that make up working class families in middle America that are bitter and clinging to their guns and religion. So it is now “far right” to simply believe the constitution means what it actually says? Even Barack Obama believes that the right to bear arms is an individual right – subject to reasonable regulation, of course.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Our Upside Down Government
So much of what our government does is upside down.
The Democrats want to confiscate profits from oil companies, which have one of the lower profit margins as an industry at 9%. This is money that we badly need for the oil companies to plow back into further exploration and production.
But now we turn around to the banking and mortgage industry, which is losing huge sums of money due to reckless lending, and are going to bail them out to the tune of $300B! Not only that, some of the key provisions of the bill were written by banking lobbyists. Never mind that the chairman of the Senate banking committee, Chris Dodd (D-CT) got a special mortgage deal from Countrywide, the largest benificiary of this bailout.
This bill will allow these mortgage companies, like Countrywide, to cherry pick the worst loans in their portfolio and dump them on the FHA. How's the FHA doing? Darn it, the FHA has experienced loan defaults at more than twice the industry rate for the last 6 years! And this bill will place on the FHA balance sheet all of the worst ARM loans made by the mortgage industry, for the taxpayers to cover.
It gets better. This bill will let certain non-profit groups originate loans with no documentation and no down payments and then hand them off to the FHA. Didn't we just do this? Have we learned nothing? I thought the Democrats were against "corporate welfare"? Get your checkbooks out.
Our government's upside down governing goes on and on. The newly passed farm bill will funnel hundreds of billions of dollars to the farm industry at a time where crop prices at are an all time high. Most farmers have never made so much money. Even worse, the "floor" price for crops has been raised to the level of the new incredibly high levels. That means that if crop prices later come down the taxpayers are on the hook for the difference. All of this nonsense raises prices for everyone on everything from cheese to grains and everything in between.
On the flip side, our government then turns around and has to pay out subsidies to lower income families who can't afford the food that the government made more expensive. What many people don't know is that the farm bill legislation is always "bundled" with the food stamp bill. Not all members of Congress have agriculture as a major constituency, but all have people that benefit from the food stamp subsidy. This is how the farm bill always gets broad support.
Going back to energy, Obama wants to seize oil company profits, and redistribute the money to families who are being challenged by high fuel prices, among other things. But it is Congress' energy policies that have directly contributed to high energy prices and have placed us in a situation where there are no short term solutions.
Too often our government is like the woman who swallowed the fly, with each action striving to fix the problem caused by the last problem, and causing the next.
Disclosure: at the time of this publications, the author was long BAC.
The Democrats want to confiscate profits from oil companies, which have one of the lower profit margins as an industry at 9%. This is money that we badly need for the oil companies to plow back into further exploration and production.
But now we turn around to the banking and mortgage industry, which is losing huge sums of money due to reckless lending, and are going to bail them out to the tune of $300B! Not only that, some of the key provisions of the bill were written by banking lobbyists. Never mind that the chairman of the Senate banking committee, Chris Dodd (D-CT) got a special mortgage deal from Countrywide, the largest benificiary of this bailout.
This bill will allow these mortgage companies, like Countrywide, to cherry pick the worst loans in their portfolio and dump them on the FHA. How's the FHA doing? Darn it, the FHA has experienced loan defaults at more than twice the industry rate for the last 6 years! And this bill will place on the FHA balance sheet all of the worst ARM loans made by the mortgage industry, for the taxpayers to cover.
It gets better. This bill will let certain non-profit groups originate loans with no documentation and no down payments and then hand them off to the FHA. Didn't we just do this? Have we learned nothing? I thought the Democrats were against "corporate welfare"? Get your checkbooks out.
Our government's upside down governing goes on and on. The newly passed farm bill will funnel hundreds of billions of dollars to the farm industry at a time where crop prices at are an all time high. Most farmers have never made so much money. Even worse, the "floor" price for crops has been raised to the level of the new incredibly high levels. That means that if crop prices later come down the taxpayers are on the hook for the difference. All of this nonsense raises prices for everyone on everything from cheese to grains and everything in between.
On the flip side, our government then turns around and has to pay out subsidies to lower income families who can't afford the food that the government made more expensive. What many people don't know is that the farm bill legislation is always "bundled" with the food stamp bill. Not all members of Congress have agriculture as a major constituency, but all have people that benefit from the food stamp subsidy. This is how the farm bill always gets broad support.
Going back to energy, Obama wants to seize oil company profits, and redistribute the money to families who are being challenged by high fuel prices, among other things. But it is Congress' energy policies that have directly contributed to high energy prices and have placed us in a situation where there are no short term solutions.
Too often our government is like the woman who swallowed the fly, with each action striving to fix the problem caused by the last problem, and causing the next.
Disclosure: at the time of this publications, the author was long BAC.
...what do you do, sir?
The Democrats gained the House of Representatives and the Senate on the strength of their opposition to the war in Iraq. Barack Obama was fortunate enough to not be in the U.S. Senate when the vote to authorize military force against Saddam Hussain was cast. It has provided him the luxury of opposing the war from the start. Who knows what he would have really done in the "line of fire" on the big stage.
Barack Obama has made withdrawing from Iraq on a fixed timeline starting on day one of his presidency a core policy of his campaign. Unfortunately, for the Democrats, the story in Iraq has changed dramatically. The talking points on which they have successfully attacked Bush and the GOP are being rapidly eroded by the facts.
The surge has succeeded beyond the most optimistic expectations. Violence has dropped dramatically. Anbar's Sunni province has been transformed. Al Qaeda is on the run. The Iraqi Army has taken the lead in successful miltary operations to clear Shiite insurgents from Basra and Sadr city. Sadr himself is refocusing his attention on political rather than military power. Oil revenues are being distributed fairly to the provinces. Oil production is increasing. Most of the legislative benchmarks have been met. Even the fact that the Iraqi's have driven a tough negotiation regarding a long-term security agreement with the U.S. is a positive sign that Iraq is comfortable asserting its national sovereignty.
Despite all of this, Senator Obama has doggedly stuck to his plan to withdraw our forces, without regard to what is happening on the ground. John Maynard Keynes, the famous British economist, was once challenged about changing his position on a particular issue. Keynes responded, "When the facts change, I change my mind - what do you do, sir?"
The success of a democratic Iraq in the most dangerous and autocratic region of the world is now within sight. It is worrisome that the man who may be president will not adapt his position to a situation when the facts change - or be so invested in defeat that he cannot admit he was wrong.
Barack Obama has made withdrawing from Iraq on a fixed timeline starting on day one of his presidency a core policy of his campaign. Unfortunately, for the Democrats, the story in Iraq has changed dramatically. The talking points on which they have successfully attacked Bush and the GOP are being rapidly eroded by the facts.
The surge has succeeded beyond the most optimistic expectations. Violence has dropped dramatically. Anbar's Sunni province has been transformed. Al Qaeda is on the run. The Iraqi Army has taken the lead in successful miltary operations to clear Shiite insurgents from Basra and Sadr city. Sadr himself is refocusing his attention on political rather than military power. Oil revenues are being distributed fairly to the provinces. Oil production is increasing. Most of the legislative benchmarks have been met. Even the fact that the Iraqi's have driven a tough negotiation regarding a long-term security agreement with the U.S. is a positive sign that Iraq is comfortable asserting its national sovereignty.
Despite all of this, Senator Obama has doggedly stuck to his plan to withdraw our forces, without regard to what is happening on the ground. John Maynard Keynes, the famous British economist, was once challenged about changing his position on a particular issue. Keynes responded, "When the facts change, I change my mind - what do you do, sir?"
The success of a democratic Iraq in the most dangerous and autocratic region of the world is now within sight. It is worrisome that the man who may be president will not adapt his position to a situation when the facts change - or be so invested in defeat that he cannot admit he was wrong.
Leniency For Depravity
In a 5-4 decision today the Supreme Court overturned a Louisiana law allowing for capital punishment in cases of child rape. I can think of nothing on this earth more disturbing and reprehensible than raping a child.
"With respect to the question of moral depravity, is it really true that every person who is convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death is more morally depraved than every child rapist?" —Justice Alito writing in dissent, in which Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia and Thomas joined.
"With respect to the question of moral depravity, is it really true that every person who is convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death is more morally depraved than every child rapist?" —Justice Alito writing in dissent, in which Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia and Thomas joined.
Green To the Max, No Matter What It Costs!
Here is a link to an article in today's Wall Street Journal regarding the Democrat's "Green Convention" in Denver.
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB121434145793701111.html?mod=blog
Back in the day the Democratic Party was the party of working, middle class Americans. These families, and the Democratic Party, had what today are considered conservative values. Now the Democratic Party is so consumed with paying tribute to radical fringe groups that they are no longer relevant to middle America.
This article is a great vignette of a good idea taken to extremes. Not only does everything at the convention have to be environmentally correct, but politically correct too. One example: only products produced by American unionized labor can be used. It is apparent more and more that the far left wing of the Democratic Party is pushing harder than ever to do two things: promote a government takeover off all significant segments of the economy (recent nationalization proposals include: healthcare, mortgages, oil companies, refineries, student loans, etc.), and mandate behavior based on liberal beliefs through rationing and legislative fiat. For the convention, they have even mandated what colors the food has to be on the plate. If Obama wins in November, and the GOP loses a filibuster quorum in the Senate (both very possible scenarios), then it is almost certain that the government will have to begin rationing electricity within a number of years.
New York City has banned transfats from all restaurants. So I no longer have the right to choose to eat something cooked with transfat, even once a year? I’m all for requiring disclosure so that consumers can make an informed decision. But a total ban? The Democratic convention has banned all fried foods, regardless of color or type of oil. How long until my Emeril Lagasse deep fryer is outlawed and I have to deep fry my occasional guilty pleasure in secret under the threat of a fine or even arrest?
Locally produced food is a good idea, to the extent it is practical. But it is hard to see how an ever growing global population can be fed solely by local food. The world’s population has outgrown that. There is a certain productivity in industrialized agriculture that cannot be avoided. OK, maybe off-season fruit from Chile delivered by jetliner is something to debate. But I’d still like to have my Spanish Rioja, Italian Parmesano Reggio, bread made from Kansas grown wheat, and black peppercorns from Indonesia.
What the radical liberals never consider is the cost of their obsessions. Flex-fuel transportation fueled by beer waste. Products from low productivity union shops. A crew of 900 sorting all the garbage by hand. A very expensive event to be sure.
As an aside, the Denver Democratic organization responsible for raising money for the convention has come up short. I guess it’s harder to obtain money for all this radical stuff when you have to ask nicely instead of seizing it from society’s producers by threat of force.
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB121434145793701111.html?mod=blog
Back in the day the Democratic Party was the party of working, middle class Americans. These families, and the Democratic Party, had what today are considered conservative values. Now the Democratic Party is so consumed with paying tribute to radical fringe groups that they are no longer relevant to middle America.
This article is a great vignette of a good idea taken to extremes. Not only does everything at the convention have to be environmentally correct, but politically correct too. One example: only products produced by American unionized labor can be used. It is apparent more and more that the far left wing of the Democratic Party is pushing harder than ever to do two things: promote a government takeover off all significant segments of the economy (recent nationalization proposals include: healthcare, mortgages, oil companies, refineries, student loans, etc.), and mandate behavior based on liberal beliefs through rationing and legislative fiat. For the convention, they have even mandated what colors the food has to be on the plate. If Obama wins in November, and the GOP loses a filibuster quorum in the Senate (both very possible scenarios), then it is almost certain that the government will have to begin rationing electricity within a number of years.
New York City has banned transfats from all restaurants. So I no longer have the right to choose to eat something cooked with transfat, even once a year? I’m all for requiring disclosure so that consumers can make an informed decision. But a total ban? The Democratic convention has banned all fried foods, regardless of color or type of oil. How long until my Emeril Lagasse deep fryer is outlawed and I have to deep fry my occasional guilty pleasure in secret under the threat of a fine or even arrest?
Locally produced food is a good idea, to the extent it is practical. But it is hard to see how an ever growing global population can be fed solely by local food. The world’s population has outgrown that. There is a certain productivity in industrialized agriculture that cannot be avoided. OK, maybe off-season fruit from Chile delivered by jetliner is something to debate. But I’d still like to have my Spanish Rioja, Italian Parmesano Reggio, bread made from Kansas grown wheat, and black peppercorns from Indonesia.
What the radical liberals never consider is the cost of their obsessions. Flex-fuel transportation fueled by beer waste. Products from low productivity union shops. A crew of 900 sorting all the garbage by hand. A very expensive event to be sure.
As an aside, the Denver Democratic organization responsible for raising money for the convention has come up short. I guess it’s harder to obtain money for all this radical stuff when you have to ask nicely instead of seizing it from society’s producers by threat of force.
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