E mais ainda sobre a crise (isto dá para um blogue inteiro)

Um post de Chris Dillow: Nationalize mortgage lending

The case for it doing so is simple. The cost of financing is lower for the government than for private mortgage lenders - especially now. It should, therefore, be able to lend on better terms than private lenders, potentially under-cutting the lot of them.

But wouldn’t the greater inefficiency of state-run organizations, plus their notorious lack of innovation, offset this advantage?

Why not let the market tell us, with government competing against banks? I suspect the latter wouldn’t do too well. These have been badly managed. And what innovation they have undertaken has consisted largely in new ways to lose money, rather than genuinely useful innovations such as long-term fixed rate mortgages or shared equity schemes.

Perhaps, then, mortgage lending is a job that could be better done by the state than private sector.

Este post ocorre-me na sequência da discussão sobre a regulação ou não-regulação do sector bancário.

Se tivermos bancos não regulados e não seguros pelo Estado, em principio teremos um risco permanente de corridas ao banco (mesmo que não haja nenhuma razão para elas).

Se tivermos bancos não regulados mas seguros pelo Estado, os donos terão um incentivo para conceder empréstimos de alto risco, já que é um jogo "caro ganho eu; coroa, os contribuintes perdem".

Se tivermos bancos regulados e seguros pelo Estado, temos o problema de como fazer uma boa regulação.

Possíveis soluções:

a) Nacionalizar a banca (ou então, limitar a garantia aos bancos públicos; quem depositasse nos bancos privados faria-o por sua conta e risco - mas suponho que, assim, os bancos privados em breve abandonariam o mercado, excluindo alguns vocacionados para clientelas especificas, estilo private banking)

b) Os bancos passarem a emprestar no mesmo prazo que os depósitos que têm - isso implicaria não concederem empréstimos sobre depósitos à ordem; os depósitos a um ano só poderem ser emprestados a um ano (ou menos); só concederem crédito a 30 anos se tiverem depósitos pelo prazo de 30 anos, etc. (não me parece muito prático, mas eliminava o problemas das corridas aos bancos)

c) Os bancos passarem, em caso de "corrida ao banco" e já se terem acabado as reservas, a dar aos seus depositantes uns vales dizendo algo como "a partir de 01/01/2010 pode ser trocado por 1.000 euros aos balcões deste banco". P.ex., eu ia ao banco levantar 1.000 euros e, como não tinham o dinheiro, davam-me 5 vales no valor de 230 euros, um a levantar daqui a um ano, outro daqui a 2, etc., o que representaria um juro real de cerca de 5%. Isto pode parecer uma coisa absurda, mas a probabilidade de um banco (com reservas fraccionais) conseguir honrar esta promessa de pagamento faseado é muito maior do que a de conseguir honrar uma promessa de pagamento imediato (e, se houvesse confiança de o banco conseguir mesmo pagar daqui a um ano, até era possível que esses vales fossem aceites como moeda em lojas e afins), logo este sistema seria menos instável que o sistema "clássico" (e, logo, mesmo as "corridas ao banco" seriam menos frequentes que nos bancos clássicos.

Estes três sistemas bancários parecem-me os mais seguros a longo prazo (com alguma incorrecção, acho que poderíamos chamá-los, respectivamente, o "sistema Marx", "o sistema Rothbard" e o "sistema Spooner/Tucker")

Ainda sobre a crise

Há dias, David Osler escrevia o seguinte:

Despite my political past, it is comparatively rare for me to quote Trotsky approvingly these days. But the Old Man makes some pertinent points on this score in no less a work than the Transitional Programme, when he writes:

The banks concentrate in their hands the actual command over the economy. In their structure the banks express in a concentrated form the entire structure of modern capital …

[I]t is necessary to merge all the banks into a single national institution, he writes, and goes on to call for the expropriation of the private banks and the concentration of the entire credit system in the hands of the state

A single national bank in state hands would obviously be unworkable. It would be unnecessarily bureaucratic and open to political abuse. But a substantial degree of so9cial ownership in financial services has always struck me as a good idea.

(...)

As I argue below [aqui], the ‘conservatorship’ of Freddie and was not in any sense an anti-capitalist measure; it was a pro-capitalist necessity. But the free market fundamentalist administration of Dubya has effectively implemented the form, if not the content, of a key Trotskyist policy. These are the times in which we live.

Lembrei-me desse artigo ao ler isto: "Estados Unidos apelam a que outros países preparem planos de intervenção" (em vez do plano de intervenção num só país).

A esquerda face à crise

The left's response to the crisis, por Chris Dillow (como frequentemente noto, o facto de eu re-postar um post não quer dizer que concorde com ele):

The credit crisis hasn’t just been an embarrassment for apologists for actually-existing capitalism. It’s also highlighted a woeful fact pointed out by Nigel - that the left has for years had little interest in economics. The result has been that lots of lefties have called for new ideas (or a reassertion of old ones) without actually proposing them.

So, to kick things off, here are some suggestions. These aren’t intended as firm policy proposals, but for directions to think in.

1. Don’t presume that regulation of individual banks is the answer. If Dick Fuld and John Thain didn’t know how to keep Lehmans and Merrills afloat, why should regulators have been able to do so, given that these always know even less than bosses, and face weaker incentives? Regulation always has unforeseen effects; it might be that one form of regulation helped cause the current crisis.

Regulation of the entire system might be improved. But even this accepts what should be questioned - the existing capitalist structure.

2. This is - in part - a failure of ownership. Dispersed shareholders can’t control chief executives sufficiently, and bosses can’t control trading desks. The left should therefore ask: in what circumstances is stock market quotation a sensible ownership structure? Mightn’t other modes of ownership - partnerships, mutuals, co-ops, whatever - be more efficient?

3. In nationalizing Fannie, Freddie and AIG, the Bush administration has shown that there are no principles of liberty or justice that rule out nationalization. Efficiency trumps property rights. The left might take the hint.

4. Bosses are chancers and rent-seekers. Multi-million pound salaries are not rewards for rare skill, not the price that must be paid for “good management.” If Thain and Fuld couldn’t even keep their firms alive, might it be that management skill is an illusion? The left should question the legitimacy of the boss class. This doesn’t just mean recognizing that one argument against low taxes on the rich is now weak. It means questioning their right and ability to control big organizations.

5. Recognize that markets have a role. The state cannot - and perhaps (pdf) should not - manage the economy to remove all fluctuations. What it should do is help protect people from the consequences of downturns. And this could well mean adopting Robert Shiller’s proposals for macro markets.

This crisis has been the result of misdirected financial innovation, not of markets inherently.

6. If the state can spend billions bailing out banks, it can spend billions bailing out people too. If a big welfare state is good enough for capitalists, it’s good enough for workers. Standard arguments against welfare states - that they are expensive, dampen incentives and that people should stand on their own two feet - have been gravely undermined.

7. The response of the Bush administration to the crisis show that the capitalist class will pay any price, bear any burden and ditch any principle in order to protect its own. Again, the left should take the hint.

Yes, none of these ideas are immediate solutions. But they're not meant to be. Hasty policy is usually bad policy. And I suspect the immediate material effects of the current troubles - less availablity of credit and an economic slowdown - will now be cured by the passage of time. The longer-lasting, deeper effect of this crisis is that it's undermined capitalist ideology. The left not only should respond to this. It can.

Afinal, quem é o Ferrari e quem é o Fiat 600?

Agora, é frequente dizer-se que Luís Filipe Menezes comparou a sua direcção a um Ferrari e a de Ferreira Leite a um Fiat 600 (e é essa a versão da imprensa).

Mas será que foi mesmo isso que aconteceu? Indo ao vídeo da RTP, parece-me que Menezes disse exactamente o contrário (suponho que com intenção sarcástica):

"Não tenho também quaisquer dúvidas sobre a diferença, do ponto de vista de capacidade para liderar, conhecimentos, dimensão cultural, dimensão intelectual, daqueles que estavam comigo e daqueles que hoje governam o PSD. É uma diferença que vai do Fiat 600 para um Ferrari"

[Não que esteja muito preocupado com o PSD e a capicua LFM-MFL...]

Anarco-capitalistas segundo Raposo

"Alguns anarco-capitalistas (já não são liberais) tentam fundir a moralidade com a economia, tal como fizeram os marxistas. Nesta visão, quem abre as portas ao capitalismo é automaticamente benigno, mesmo quando estamos a falar de ditadores (muitos desculpam Pinochet da mesma forma que a esquerda desculpa Fidel Castro). Estes anarco-capitalistas partilham uma obsessão com os marxistas do passado: a revolta contra a Política. Acham que encontraram o fim de história, a era pós-política onde uma poção mágica - que unifica economia e moral - põe termo aos conflitos e tensões entre homens."

Bem, sim e não. Existe quem se deixe levar pelo eficientismo, típico do neo-liberalismo associado a Chicago. Mas para mim, ninguém se motiva pela eficiência. Motiva-se sim pela sua própria noção de justiça. A Política vive em sentido abrangente existe na não-política em sentido restrito. Existe dentro de uma associação, de uma empresa, de uma igreja.

Em sentido restrito da política de um Estado, este é o reino do não-direito. A política é o espaço onde o Direito não reside. Decidem-se coisas, mas nada é contratual. É apenas Vontade Geral de Rosseau e o absolutismo de Hobbes.

Embora, como já tenho referido, a redenção da democracia ou do Estado, é conceder a liberdade de separação às suas partes constituintes. Tal direito é apenas natural e impossível de negar sem que a contradição seja evidente, quer para a ideia de democracia quer a de Estado em geral.

Sobre a crise financeira (IV)

Um post de Paul Krugman a repeito da questão de quem vai pagar a «salvação» das empresas que estavam para falir:

Where will the money for the big bailout come from? I keep being asked that. In the long run, of course, it will come from you — the taxpayer. But what about the immediate cash flow?

The answer, if you think it through, is that it doesn’t have to come from anywhere. Ultimately, the Paulson Plan will move money in a circle.

Think about what’s been happening in the markets. The public basically wants out of the private financial system and into Treasuries. But the financial system has been unable to meet that demand, because it can’t sell off toxic paper. Now, under the Paulson plan, the Treasury will buy the toxic paper, which will give the financial sector the funds to pay off debtors, who will use the funds to buy the Treasuries the feds will have to issue to finance the toxic-paper purchases.

Ou seja, parece-me que, em última instância, o que aconteceu foi passar-se de uma situação em que o John devia 100.000 dólares ao Peter para uma situação em que o John deve 100.000 dólares ao Tesouro e o Tesouro deve 100.000 dólares ao Peter (claro que, se/quando o John não pagar, vai ter que vir dinheiro de algum lado para pagar ao Peter).

Sobre a crise financeira (III)

Um título giro de Paul Krugman - "Comrade Paulson seizes the economys commanding heights" (Henry Paulson é o Secretário do Tesouro dos EUA).

Sobre a crise financeira (II)

Who should be bailed out?, por Chris Dillow:

The interesting thing here is the political aspect. If tax-payers should help protect the rich (or once-rich) from suffering from problems of their own making, isn’t there a more pressing requirement - in justice at least - to protect the poor from suffering as a result of forces beyond their control.

And these forces are large. Half, or maybe more, of inequality in lifetime earnings is determined by the age of 18 - by genetic endowments and schooling. These causes of relative poverty are far more beyond the control of the poor than banks' losses are beyond the control of the rich.

So, if it’s a legitimate, just, use of tax-payers money to support banks, it must be even more just to use it to eliminate at least half of inequality.

(...)

I know, I know. I’m missing the point. This bail-out has nothing all to do with justice, but is (arguably) necessary to ensure economic stability.

But this only reminds us of some important facts. A capitalist economy is very different from a free market. Capitalism has nothing to do with justice. And if you want the state to help you out, you must appeal not to rulers’ sense of justice, but to their fear.

Adenda:

Worker Bailout Fund? por Mark Thoma:

In response to the financial crisis, as we help firms that are deemed too big and too interconnected to fail, hundreds of billions of dollars are being tossed around as though it is mere pennies.

Since it is widely expected that the crisis will get worse before it gets better, and since there is a non-trivial chance of a substantial uptick in unemployment, shouldn't we begin thinking about a worker bailout fund?

Or are workers too little to be helped?

A prisão preventiva e novo CPP

Fernanda Câncio, aparentemente, desmonta o argumento de alguns juizes que diziam que, de acordo como o novo Código do Processo Penal, seria impossível atribuir prisão preventiva aquele individuo que baleou outro na esquadra de Portimão.

Veremos se os juristas que diziam o contrário dirão alguma coisa a esse respeito (note-se que o que está aqui em questão é se era legalmente possível decretar a prisão preventiva, não se devia ou não ter havido prisão preventiva).

De qualquer forma, quem não seja de Portimão nem imaginará a quantidade de gente que está a favor do que deu os tiros (solidariedade tribal?) - hoje, à hora do almoço, até estava um a compará-lo aos policias que matam alguém quando enfrentam alegados criminosos.

Discutir o "criacionismo" na escola?

Um post de Chris Dillow sobre uma polémica qualquer que houve na Royal Society sobre o assunto:

What’s odd, though, is what Francis points out - how close his remarks seem to the official position of the Royal Society.Reiss said:

There is much to be said for allowing students to raise any doubts [about evolution] they have — hardly a revolutionary idea in science teaching — and doing one’s best to have a genuine discussion.

The Royal Society says:

If a young person raises creationism in a science class, teachers should be in a position to explain why evolution is a sound scientific theory and why creationism is not, in any way, scientific.

What’s the difference here?

On a nasty interpretation of both, there could be a huge one. Reiss’s “discussion” could be just a woolly-headed mush in which everyone “respects” others’ beliefs. The Royal Society’s “explanation” could be just a blank assertion that religious mumbo-jumbo has no place in the classroom.

The cuture war between scientists and religion has sunk so low that both interpretations are too plausible.

But there is an alternative. To good teachers, Reiss’s discussion and the Royal Society’s explanation should be the same thing.

E um comentário de um leitor também com alguma lógica:

I'm not sure the Royal Society doesn't have a point. If you look at what Reiss said, he does seem to be suggesting that teachers' responses to kids who espouse creationism actually shouldn't include telling them they're wrong. In an ideal world this would lead into the kind of free-ranging scientific discussion Chris describes, but in the average classroom it's just going to leave the impression that Sir said creationism is a valid point of view.

I also think - although this probably wasn't what the Royal Society management was thinking - that kids love to derail boring lessons by starting irrelevant discussions, and any teacher who *encouraged* a discussion of whether creationism was scientifically valid would be lucky to get any teaching done for the rest of the term.

"But, Sir, evolution is just a *theory*, isn't that right?"

Doctor Who

Bernardo Pires de Lima escreve "A Rússia estava desde Junho a caminhar militar e logisticamente até à fronteira com a Geórgia. Estava a projectar o seu poder militar de forma assumidamente intimidatória pelo território georgiano dentro. Bombardeou Tbilissi, a capital, bombardeou Gori, cidade vital na rota energética para a Europa de Leste. Provocou até mais não poder, depois de nos útlimos três anos ter sobrevoado com caças o espaço aéreo georgiano sempre que lhe apeteceu, ou fechado a torneira do gás quando para aí acordava de manhã. O que se pede a um líder é que, em primeiro lugar, garanta a segurança dos seus cidadãos perante uma ameaça externa."

Face ao bombardeamento russo de Tbilissi e Gori, Saakashvili tomou o que, com certeza, lhe pareceu a atitude mais correcta - meteu-se na Tardis, viajou uns dias para trás no tempo e ordenou o ataque à Ossétia do Sul (provavelmente na esperança de a iniciativa lhe dar alguma vantagem estratégica).

Bernardo Pires de Lima

Diz que o nacionalista Saakashvili, que atacou a matar soldados da manutenção da paz, abriu os olhos ao Ocidente: o que está em causa é o controlo do Mar Negro (what the fuck do i have to care with that?). Estará a falar daquele porto que sempre foi Russo e é habitado por Russos e que só está na Ucrânia porque os Russos ofereceram no contexto de uma Federação?

"Convém não adulterar os factos. (...) O que se pede a um líder é que, em primeiro lugar, garanta a segurança dos seus cidadãos perante uma ameaça externa. Dir-me-ão, aqui do alto da perspectiva portuguesa com fronteiras fixadas há mais tempo no continente europeu, que as províncias não são território da Geórgia. De facto, não são. Mas não foi com esse programa que Saakashvili foi a votos e eleito."

A forma como BPL pronuncia (juraria que o consigo ouvir) "Lider" é um pouco suspeito. Hitler era um bom Lider por exemplo. Apenas quis proteger territórios alemães (retirados num não-tratado imposto) habitados por alemães onde qualquer referendo lhe daria a vitória. E foi o programa com que foi eleito.

BPL representa um perigo para o Ocidente da mesma forma que quem atirou Mussolini para os braços de Hitler (Mussolini deslocou tropas para a Áustria para evitar a anexação, mais tarde uns idiotazinhos moralistas da Liga das Nações - erguida para manter o Status Quo da Império Britânico como o maior Império da história - quererem punir a Itália por esta se armar ao micro-imperiozinho na Abissínia.) tal como agora querem expandir-se para os jardins da Rússia atirando-a para os braços da China. BPL é defensor do Ocidente tal como Roosevelt que preside à maior vitória militar que se conhece: a de Estaline sobre o Ocidente. Por isso provavelmente admira Roosevelt.

Estes tipos são um perigo para a humanidade. Algúem lhes dê um tabuleiro de Risco para se entreterem.

Sobre a crise financeira

Why aren't hedge funds failing as fast as banks?, por Chris Dillow:

The Western world faces the worst financial crisis since the 1930s. So they say. But they're wrong. To a large extent, the troubles that have claimed Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch, and may yet do for AIG, are not so much a financial crisis as an ownership crisis. It is not markets that have failed, but a peculiar form of ownership that we have taken for granted for decades - stock market-listed companies with dispersed shareholders.

To see this, consider the curious incident of the dog that hasn't barked - hedge funds. We have not (so far) seen a widespread collapse of these. (...)

This is a surprise. Before the credit crunch started, countless experts warned us that hedge funds were a source of “systemic risk”. They were wrong.

Instead, the big dangers to the financial system have come from elsewhere. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac - the guarantors of US mortgages - had to be nationalised. Three of Wall Street's big five investment banks have ceased to exist as independent entities. And the future of AIG, which helps to insure investors against defaults on bonds, is in doubt. [já não]

There's a pattern here. The biggest shocks to the financial system have all come from stock market-quoted companies. By contrast, hedge funds, which many expected to cause trouble, have been innocent bystanders. These are, generally, owned as private partnerships.

So, one form of ownership has caused a crisis, and another hasn't. The reason for this lies in what economists call the principal-agent problem, and what everyone else calls the difficulty of getting your employees to act in your interests rather than their own.

Big, quoted companies have been unable to solve this problem. Shareholders - often, ordinary people with pensions - have little control over fund managers. Fund managers have little control over chief executives. And chief executives have had little control over trading desks, partly because they just didn't understand the complexities of mortgage derivatives.

So traders were free to gamble with other people's money. They got multimillion bonuses if they did well, but faced almost no meaningful sanction if they failed: John Thain, Merrill Lynch's chief executive, is rumoured to be in line for an $11 million payout. The result was excessive risk taking.

In hedge funds, things have been different. Very often hedge fund managers invest their own money and take key decisions themselves, or at least closely watch those who do. Their incentives to take huge risks have been smaller. So these have at least survived.

What we're seeing, then, is the cost of separating ownership and control. In private firms, or partnerships - even limited liability ones - the two are closely aligned. In stock market-quoted firms, they are not.

(...)

People have countless ways of losing money - greed, hubris and stupidity are always with us. Good organisations find ways to restrain these impulses. A lesson of this crisis is that firms with dispersed shareholders might not be best able to do this.

Although few have said this explicitly, investors know it tacitly. One reason why the markets rose last week, after the US Treasury nationalised Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, was that investors realised that state ownership, for all its obvious faults, can be less dangerous than dispersed private ownership.

So, this is a crisis of a form of ownership, not of markets. This distinction might seem odd to those whose economic attitudes have not changed since the Cold War. The traditional Right defended markets and traditional ownership structures. The Left attacked both. But it's always been theoretically possible to defend markets while being sceptical of particular forms of ownership.

RE: Politica internacional e verbos irregulares

Notar na linguagem:

"Claro que tudo depende da ingerência russa e dos apoios ocidentais".

Portanto, semelhante aos eslavos cristãos ortodoxos da Sérvia (por quem os Russos fizeram a Grande Guerra):

Os Russos cometem o pecado da ... "ingerência", Russos parvos que ainda não descobriram o isolacionismo advogado pelos analistas proto-neo-cons.

Os Ocidentais dão ... "apoios".

Isto para falar de eslavos cristãos ortodoxos na Ucrânia, parte dos quais Russos e parte do território de origem Russa (como a Crimeia, onde os Czares passavam férias e sempre estacionaram a sua Frota Naval).

Politica internacional e verbos irregulares

A respeito da crise política na Ucrãnia, Bernardo Pires de Lima escreve "[e]sta crise pode, contudo, ter semelhanças com a Sérvia recente: um reforço das forças pró-europeias nos actos eleitorais. Claro que tudo depende da ingerência russa e dos apoios ocidentais".

Isto faz lembrar famosos verbos irregulares, como "I have an independent mind, you are eccentric, he is round the twist" ou "I like to give my children plenty of space to make their own decisions; you are very patient with your offspring; her kids are hooligans".

Falar

(Sarah Palin) na possibilidade de guerra por causa da Geórgia se esta pertencesse à NATO é uma boa coisa. E tem toda a razão. Ou é para isso ou a NATO que acabe. E quanto mais for apresentado como certeza mais depressa pode ser que acabe pelo ridículo da coisa.

Falam da doutrina Bush

como se existisse uma. Depois o problema é de Sarah Palin.

Madonna

Passou para o próximo nível e pouca gente que viu e ouviu estava preparada, o que estranhamente resultou mais ou menos em plateia imóvel no concerto mais dançável de sempre, meio pasmada a olhar para as imagens dentro da realidade (se calhar é mais ao contrário), enquanto esperava ser socorrida por "músicas antigas", o que não acontecia, pelo contrário aparecia era mais Madonna com guitarra em versão pesada. A faceta activista passou ao de leve, mas foi leve, levemente, por isso por mim está perdoada. A religião esteve presente e Deus perdoou-lhe.

Acaba sem encore com as palavras "Game Over" e a música de fundo (completa e intencional) "God Save The Queen" para pôr o ponto final. Depois o silêncio. Ainda estaremos amanhã a perceber e a discutir o que aconteceu.

Will the real Sarah Palin please stand up? (a propósito de)

1982 - a já famosa rivalidade left-ibertarian versus anarchist-austro-libertarian já vem de há muito tempo atrás ...

"Will the REAL Tom Palmer Please Stand?

Taxation is one of the most important features of Statism
that libertarians can assail. Not just because extorting taxes
from people is one of the multifarious ways in which the State
commits wide-scale aggression, or even because it's one of the
most obvious and burdensome forms of oppression, but also
because the continuation of many of government's other
aggressive activities depend on the steady influx of funds to
finance them. Thus it is fitting for, and indeed behooves,
libertarians to assail the concept of taxation and to struggle
against taxes.

Much to our surprise and delight, the New York Times ran
a piece on Tax Day, April 15, attacking taxation. It was written
by a libertarian - by that LP veteran and Koch-era SLS
officer, Tom Palmer. Painfully aware of his previous
association with the low-tax liberal forces who managed the
Clark campaign, SLS, Cato and many other libertarian
institutions through 1981, we were doubly pleased to read these
words from Tom Palmer's pen:

While the Internal Revenue Service boasts of
a 'voluntary compliance' system of tax
collection, the fact is that taxation is carried
out at the point of a gun. If you choose not to
pay - whatever reason - armed men will
seize you and forcibly take you to jail. If you
resist, violence will be used against you. This is
not 'voluntary compliance.' It is theft.
Bravo Tom!

Only a few weeks later, we received our copy of Update,
the Craniac organ. Amid the routine (and silly) denunciations
of everyone known to have resisted their control, and the gushy
praise for anyone who does submit to their benevolent rule, was
quoted another Tom Palmer statement:

...( T)here have been other negative reactions
to Project Liberty's strategy (of Libertarians'
advocating repeal of the Income Tax
Amendment - Ed.). Tom Palmer ... told
Update that most voters 'perceive drives to
amend the constitution as "kooky," unless
they have a tremendous amount of support, as
in the case of the Equal Rights Amendment or
the Balanced Budget Amendment.' He said
this particular drive, which was started by the
Liberty Amendment Committee over fifty
years ago, has 'definite right-wing conno&-
tions in the eyes of the media.'

Whew, Tom, how can we keep up with you? Just this April
past you were describing taxation as theft. Now you criticize
trying to abolish the income tax as having "right-wing
connotations." Are we supposed to think that it's bad to
address issues and call for action on them, just because they
have "right-wing connotations'? Then perhaps we oughtn't talk
about property rights or the free market because these, too, are
tainted with "right-wing connotations." Let's let the CIA,
Selective Service, and EPA continue their fine work financed
by taxation we're afraid to attack. Which is the real Tom
Palmer: the public Tom Palmer who stands steadfast for
libertarian principle, or the private (intra-movement) Tom
Palmer who counsels his fellow libertarians to avoid "rightwing
connotations'?

But maybe we're being a bit unfair to Tom. Update
preceded his remarks by saying "there have been other negative
reactions" to the income-tax repeal campaign promoted by
Project Liberty (which was founded by Craniac critic David
Nolan - perhaps reason enough for Update to reject the antitax
strategy), whereupon Tom was quoted, presumably to
illustrate one of these "negative reactions."So we read his quote
accordingly. Upon closer reading, however, the statement that
an issue has "right-wing connotations" doesn't necessarily
imply disapproval. It's simply a sentence expressing Tom
Palmer's view on what the media thinks of the issue. It needn't
mean that he disapproves of taking up a "right-wing" issue. If
so, our apologies go to Tom, and all our venom goes instead to
Update for printing Tom's remarks in a misleading manner -
or, at least, for once more making impressive-looking claims
unfavorable to Craniac opponents ("there have been other
negative reactions to Project Liberty'') without a shred of
substantiation.

Sobre Sarah Palin

Pela blogger Kathy G.:

Sarah Palin -- Mother of the Year, or Mommie Dearest?

To my surprise, some of the people who think Sarah Palin's mothering is an appropriate subject for public debate have been liberal feminists. Some of my listserv buddies have said that lots of people they've spoken to have been harshly critical of Palin as a mother, and that this might prove to be a promising line of attack against her. We liberals shouldn't be afraid to "go there," because it will help our side. And besides, she puts her family "out there," and practically uses her kids as props, so shouldn't we have the right to ask some tough questions about her family life?

Here's what I have to say about all this: stop the attacks on how Sarah Palin organizes her family life. Just. Stop. It.

Honestly, I loathe this woman, but the attacks on her based on how she chooses to balance her career and family infuriate me. No man would be asked these questions, ever. How she chooses to parent her children is her own and her family's business, and nobody else's, period.

Some people on our side are, unfortunately, being completely hypocritical about this issue. We liberals are the ones who strongly believe in the right to privacy concerning our families and our sex and reproductive lives, aren't we? We were the ones who were disgusted and appalled at the right's grotesque invasion of family privacy during the Terri Schiavo circus. And we rightfully railed against the wingnuts and the media for being panty-sniffers with an unhealthy obsession with the most intimate details of the Clintons' marriage. But the concern trolling about what kind of mother Sarah Palin is -- call it diaper-sniffing -- is not much different. In a way, it's worse, because it's so explicitly antifeminist.

Sarah Palin -- the right's latest kulturkampf gambit

The more I think about it, the more I realize that choosing Palin was McCain's shot-across-the-bow in the neverending culture wars.

I think one reason many blue state types (myself included) have had such a strong negative reaction to her is that she's the embodiment of red state culture. Let's start with the five kids. Does anyone on this list have any friends who have five kids? Large families like that seem to be largely a Republican, red state phenomenon. We wine trackers worry far too much about getting our kids into good schools and paying those tuition bills than about having large families. Two kids seems to be the norm with most of the people I know -- three is the absolute limit. So -- five. Wow!

Then there's the jocks vs. the nerds thing. Palin is also a jock who went to a state school, whereas many of us professional middle class types have never exactly been athletic competitors. We worried more about having the grades to get into exclusive schools than about making the basketball team. But I noticed during her speech today when she mentioned something about sports -- maybe it was about having been a high school athlete -- it got a big cheer from the crowd.

Don't misunderestimate Sarah Palin

A lot of elites have been awfully quick to size Palin up and blast her for being a lightweight without actually knowing much at all about her. This is dangerous, especially for our side. Liberals have had an unfortunate tendency to often underestimate conservatives -- both as a movement and in terms of individual conservative leaders.

Maybe Palin will indeed turn out to be a gaffe-machine like Dan Quayle was. I sure hope so! But I don't know -- as we've seen, the woman has charisma to spare and can give a very good speech. When she was running for governor, she apparently acquitted herself well in the debates. Her approval ratings in Alaska are sky-high, in spite of the fact that that state has a culture that's reputed to be extremely sexist. And also in spite of the fact that, unlike the state's other leading female politician, Lisa Murkowski, Palin is not the beneficiary of daddy's political machine. She made it on her own. Unlike Bush, she wasn't born into money, and unlike McCain, she didn't marry it. She comes from an ordinary middle class family -- her dad was a schoolteacher and her mom was a secretary. Given her talent for expressing scary, extremist ideas in a personable and nonthreatening manner, she could end up being a powerful weapon for the G.O.P.

And hey -- we gleefully bashed Ronald Reagan for being a lightweight. Dubya also. But the joke, of course, ended up being on us. Both of those SOBs managed to be extremely successful (Bush, though massively unpopular, has managed to get re-elected and to get a lot of his agenda through, after all).