Rational Review

“America’s military misadventure in Iraq comes to an end this week, with Tuesday’s official declaration of an end to combat operations and a handover of authority to the Iraqi government. It’s a strange end — neither victory nor defeat — to a war made all the stranger since it’s not entirely clear what’s ending here…. it’s also a clear demonstration of the fact that the Obama administration’s policy of disengagement has succeeded as spectacularly as the Bush administration’s policy of invasion failed. And it’s important to recall the scope of that failure. The war was initially framed primarily in terms of the need to halt an Iraqi nuclear-weapons program that didn’t exist.” (09/02/10)

“In the market for a used car? Good luck finding a bargain: The price of ‘pre-owned’ vehicles has climbed considerably over the past year. According to Edmunds.com, a website for car buyers, a three-year-old automobile today will set you back, on average, close to $20,000 — a spike of more than 10 percent since last summer…. Why are used-car prices rocketing? Part of the answer is that demand is up…. But an even bigger part of the answer is that the supply of used cars is artificially low, because your Uncle Sam decided last year to destroy hundreds of thousands of perfectly good automobiles as part of its hare-brained Car Allowance Rebate System — or, as most of us called it, Cash for Clunkers.” (09/01/10)

“As every Mafia don knows, even the slightest loss of control might lead to unraveling of the system of domination as others are encouraged to follow a similar path.SHARE THIS ARTICLE | Amid all the alleged threats to the world’s reigning superpower, one rival is quietly, forcefully emerging: China. And the U.S. is closely scrutinizing China’s intentions. On August 13, a Pentagon study expressed concern that China is expanding its military forces in ways that ‘could deny the ability of American warships to operate in international waters off the coast,’ Thom Shanker reports in The New York Times. Washington is alarmed that ‘China’s lack of openness about the growth, capabilities and intentions of its military injects instability to a vital region of the globe.’ The U.S., on the other hand, is quite open about its intention to operate freely throughout the ‘vital region of the globe’ surrounding China (as elsewhere).” (09/02/10)

“Sitting at a sidewalk coffee shop a block from the White House, Andy Stern, former president of the Service Employees International Union, is reflecting on a series of visits he’s made since 2002 to China, where he has discussed organizing and collective bargaining with leaders of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU). China’s economic transformation is a profound challenge to the United States, and to American workers in particular, Stern says…. Few would argue that the rise of China has world-altering significance. But across the American left there are sharp, sometimes acrimonious differences about what constitutes appropriate and principled responses to China’s emergence as a great power, and whether the country’s ascendance is promising or ominous.” (09/02/10)

“Liberals have become hysterical. Who can blame them? Just when things were going so well, their beloved leader has done the unthinkable – he has flopped. Not only has President Obama crashed in the polls, but he has managed to anger the right, the left and the center of the country, not an easy feat. Worse for the U.S., the policies that energized his followers have failed as well. An economy that was sending out ‘green shoots’ and accelerating a year ago has slowed before the anti-business invective and regulation-happy policies of the White House as surely as a race car dragging Mt. Rushmore in its wake.” (09/02/10)

“Remember the auto-bailout? Around beginning of June, and again in mid-August, we started seeing reports that it at last this bailout was starting to pay off. Particular attention given to GM’s turnaround: the first quarterly profit reported in almost three years, rising prices for the company’s cars, filing to once again sell shares publicly, and already producing returns on the government’s investment. Where U.S. manufacturing has lost nearly 175,000 jobs in the last two years, the U.S. auto parts and production sectors grew by 41,000 jobs to 704,000 between July 2009 and July 2010. No wonder president Obama, when he toured a GM factory in Detroit, touted the success of GM’s turnaround to vindicate government intervention to save U.S. automakers — and the jobs of auto-workers, as well as those in the parts, supply, and service sectors that depend on the auto-industry.” (09/02/10)

“When we think of human-rights problems, most of us imagine arbitrary arrests, political repression, religious persecution, torture, show trials, censorship, and the like. In America, we don’t often have those kinds of problems. Even the current controversy over an Islamic center near ground zero isn’t about the right to build there; it’s about the wisdom of doing so. All of which made it surprising to learn from the Obama State Department that America does indeed have human-rights problems.” (09/01/10)

“As President Obama gave a self-congratulatory speech about keeping his campaign promise to remove U.S. combat forces from Iraq by the end of August, he accomplished this feat by merely redefining the mission of the 50,000 combat-trained U.S. forces remaining there to ‘advising and assisting’ Iraqi forces. Of course, this really means that we are not out of the woods yet in that fractured and violence-prone country.” (09/01/10)

“If it were a crime to venture onto Capitol Hill to reveal yourself as a self-absorbed liar with an inability to admit mistakes, there would be tumbleweeds blowing through the vacant halls of Congress. Fortunately for members of the legislative branch, that is not a crime. Unless your name is Roger Clemens.” (09/02/10)

“A state appeals court ruled Tuesday that two gay men from Dallas who were married in Massachusetts may not get divorced, essentially binding them in marriage slavery unless the[y] return up north. The case against granting the divorce was argued by the Plano-based Liberty Institute, which recently helped to get charges dropped against a local activist harassed in Wautaga who was exercising free speech on so-called public property. It goes to show that even so-called liberty supporters are willing to concede their principle of ‘Responsible and limited Government’ for the sake of a higher-ordered religious belief.” (09/02/10)

“Are the masters of ‘drone porn’ committing war crimes by remote control? It’s a bit shocking that more people aren’t asking this question. I have a feeling that many of us, particularly liberal Obama supporters (like myself, for instance), haven’t wanted to look too closely at what is being done in his name, in our name, when these remote-controlled and often tragically inaccurate weapons of small-group slaughter incinerate innocents from the sky, in what are essentially video-game massacres in which real people die.” (087/31/10)

“The middle of the road in American politics today is a sort of mushy libertarianism. Voters don’t want high taxes, don’t want lots of regulation, are tired of the wars and foreign interventionism, don’t trust politicians of any party, and aren’t particularly interested in imposing ‘Christian values’ on our largely secular society. This doesn’t mean there is a consistent libertarian streak by any means — just witness the ugly anti-immigration hysteria disgustingly pandered to even by some Libertarian Party candidates. This is why I refer to the middle as a mushy libertarianism. It is not consistent and it is not principled but it is there.” (09/02/10)

“Even in markets it is very tempting to treat all potential customers as if the same goods and services were proper for them all. Thus we have mass marketing of stuff that really can only benefit some people — a certain type of exercise, a back ache cure, or a headache remedy. The more this is understood, the more the notion starts to make sense that one person’s way of life could well be perfectly well suited for that person without this being an offense to others for whom it is not suitable. Yet the idea persists that everyone ought to worship alike or admire the same artists or fashion designer’s work. Here the temptation isn’t just a mistake but also a desperate hope since if one size does fit all, those who make that size will be able to cash in on this big time.” (08/31/10)

“The Iraq war? Fuggedaboudit. ‘Now, it is time to turn the page.’ So advises the commander-in-chief at least. ‘[T]he bottom line is this,’ President Obama remarked last Saturday, ‘the war is ending.’ Alas, it’s not. Instead, the conflict is simply entering a new phase. And before we hasten to turn the page — something that the great majority of Americans are keen to do — common decency demands that we reflect on all that has occurred in bringing us to this moment.” (08/31/10)

“According to a commission set up by the Scottish Labour Party, in order to reduce alcohol consumption, a ‘floor price’ for alcohol should be introduced together with a levy on alcohol retailers. Its report also suggests a limit on the number of licences available for retailers and a halt to the sponsorship of sporting events. However, under scrutiny these suggestions may be ineffective.” (09/02/10)

“The implication, reinforced elsewhere in the piece, is that the Democrats did the right thing, just not enough of it. Their only mistake was not making the stimulus even bigger. If only they had spent even more and taxed even less, the economy wouldn’t be in such miserable shape. That is one possible interpretation of what happened. Another is that Romer is like a medieval physician explaining to the grieving relatives that if only he had bled the patient a few more times, he would have recovered.” (09/01/10)

“There are multiple conceptions of American creed equally consistent with American history. That’s why movements to glorify, elevate, and honor a particular conception of American identity based on a particular conception of the American creed necessarily marginalize equally or more historically plausible conceptions and therefore tend to suggest that citizens who favor those conceptions are less or even un-American. It seems pretty clear to me that this is exactly how the conservative politics of American identity works.” (09/01/10)

“Last month, in recognition of the program’s 75-year anniversary, the Social Security Administration put out a statement by President Obama declaring his administration’s dedication ‘to strengthening our retirement system’ and to preserving ‘this program’s original purpose in the 21st century.’ But what was the original purpose? Social Security was first devised not by Franklin Roosevelt, but by Prussia’s autocrat Otto von Bismarck, as a way to co-opt socialists, ensure the loyalty of the people to the regime, and finance militarism.” (09/02/10)

“The message of real promise, of peace and independence, will never emanate from an institution defined by aggression or from anyone who applauds what it does. Reduced to its essentials, market anarchism is the extension of the anti-war reasoning to all patterns of human interaction, tolerating force only as an act of defense. If individuals forswear hostile intervention in each other’s lives, whether next-door or across some line on a map, then a stateless society is the ineluctable result.” (09/01/10)

“For most of my adult life I’ve tacitly or explicitly operated on a doctrine of ‘natural rights,’ and for about half that time the particular doctrine in question has been Objectivist …. Over time, though, I’ve often noticed Underpants Gnome problems (’Phase 1: Collect Underpants; Phase 2: ?; Phase 3: Profit!’) in implementation of ‘natural rights’ doctrines …” (09/01/10)