Election Day is coming, a ceasing of the endless and despicable character assassination ads, the ‘misinformation’, and vile vitriol issued forth regarding the candidates.
If you are to take them at face value then you will be left believing that Kari Lake is a fraud, an enemy of all women’s reproductive rights, an ’election denier’, and an enemy of our democratic republic. You would believe David Schweikert is an unrelenting and unapologetic felon who should be locked up, and Blake Masters is a dangerous right-wing racist ideologue who is an enemy of democracy, women, and America.
The bottom line is simply this: if you like sky-high gas prices, energy and food shortages, an open border, an endless supply of fentanyl killing our kids, and the most partisan federal agencies on record (think DOJ, DHS, IRA, and Department of Education to name just a few blatant examples), then you must vote for the Democrat ticket and keep the Democrats in power.
Let’s examine a few of the stark choices before us. There was a time in our country when justice and the rule of law were evenly applied, regardless of party affiliation. In the past 20 months, since this administration took over, there has not been a single serious attempt to investigate and punish the thousands of rioters in the Summer of Love riots where 2,037 police officers were injured and dozens of Americans killed. While there were over 16,000 people arrested for these riots, over 90% of these charges were either not filed or dismissed and no Federal charges were ever handed out. Over 800 people were arrested for the events of January 6, most of which have received jail sentences or are still locked up and awaiting trial for Federal charges. The only person who lost their life on January 6th was an unarmed Ashley Babbitt, shot by a capital police officer who has never been investigated for discharging his weapon and killing her.
Our vaunted FBI and its overseer, the DOJ, and Attorney General Merritt Garland have seen fit to classify parents, who object to programming our children in public schools and preaching gender fluidity to their children, are classified as domestic terrorists. (A weighty tome could be written to dive into this comprehensively.) The DOJ recently prosecuted Steve Bannon (an advisor to President Trump) for not complying with a Congressional subpoena. He is now sentence to three months in prison. Do you remember Obama’s Attorney General Eric Holder? He never even faced charges for the very same refusal to answer a Congressional subpoena.
DHS Secretary Alejandro Majorkas has stated repeatedly that there is no crisis at our southern border! Conservatively, over 2 million illegal immigrants (a number greater than the population in 15 individual states) have crossed since Biden took office. The most public move he has taken was to publicly vilify equestrian border guards for merely doing their job – because it looked like it was bad. Meanwhile, over 100,000 American children and adults have been killed by fentanyl poisoning, mostly manufactured in China and then shipped across our southern border. There is wide agreement that the sex trafficking and rape taking place on our southern border are at record numbers.
Now let’s look at our economic policies which are destroying our economy with unbridled inflation. It begins with the ‘woke’ agenda revolving around “climate change”. This began as fear of ozone layer depletion, global warming, etc., which are claimed by radical environmentalists to represent an existential threat to our species and the planet. It has morphed into an all-out war on our energy industry. 20 months ago we were an ‘energy independent nation’ and we didn’t rely on our enemies to supply us with oil. Now, we are begging our adversaries in Saudi Arabia and Venezuela to produce more oil, just so we can keep our lights on. Hundreds of thousands are protesting in Europe over severely rising prices and dangerous energy shortages as winter commences. Germany currently has no firewood for sale as it is the new source of heating there. They now turn off their traffic signals at night to save electricity. Yet Mr. Biden and his team keep telling us they are doing everything they can to increase our energy production – which can only be seen as ignorant or an intentional lie.
There is a myriad of problems that have been created since this administration has taken over. Several are detailed here, but there are many more. It is depressing to enumerate them all.
The bottom line is this: if you enjoy a persistent decline in your standard of living, an intentional reduction of your liberties, the unprecedented invasion of illegal aliens, an unequal application of justice and constant energy shortages – then keep voting blue. If, however, you want to see a return to liberty, energy independence, and the rule of law, be sure to check all the red choices on your ballot for this election.
TAKE ACTION
How Not to Vote in Arizona
The 2022 midterm election is fast approaching.The system for voting in Arizona is predominantly by mail-in ballots (around 80% of all ballots).The ballots will be mailed out to all voters registered for mail-in voting on October 12th. The actual ‘day’ of the election is Tuesday November 8,27 days later.
Once upon a time when all voters went to the polls on the day of election, the tabulated results were announced the night of the election date.If the result of a specific race was razor thin and less than a legislated margin, a recount might prevent the naming of a winner. That was the exception for calling the results of the election.
It is still this way in most first world countries but not the United States and certainly not Arizona. Voting rules (some unconstitutional) were dramatically altered in many states in 2020 because of the Covid pandemic.
We at The Prickly Pear are very concerned about the flaws in Arizona’s predominant ‘mail-in’ voting system.
Please click on the red TAKE ACTION link below to learn How Not to Vote in Arizona as a mail-in ballot voter and to be certain your vote is included in the count the evening of November 8th.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00ThePricklyPear.orghttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngThePricklyPear.org2022-10-24 02:28:002022-10-24 02:28:00Throw the Bums Out: You Have the Power
Hard working Americans continue to suffer from historically high levels of inflation caused by the Biden administration’s out-of-control spending and opposition to domestic energy production. Soon after the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the Consumer Price Index (CPI) report for September, which confirmed inflation is accelerating and isn’t going away anytime soon, President Joe Biden claimed “If Republicans win, inflation’s going to get worse.”
Such a reckless claim demonstrates the president’s fundamental misunderstanding of the problem his policies have caused … or how to solve it.
Overall inflation was up another 0.4% in September, or 8.2% year-over-year. Even the less volatile measure of “core” inflation increased by 0.6% in September for a 12-month increase of 6.6%. This is the highest increase in core inflation in 40 years and shows that inflation is broad-based and continues to spread throughout the economy.
Americans are well-aware that food prices have increased dramatically. Food prices rose 0.8% in September alone and have increased 11.2% in the last 12 months. This is the highest year-over-year increase in the United States since 1979. Cereals and bakery items are up 16.2%, dairy items are up 15.9% and fruits and vegetables are up 10.4%.
American workers also suffered another month of declining purchasing power last month. These decreases have become all too customary under the Biden administration’s policies, and in just the past year, purchasing power fell by 3.3%. Since the beginning of the Biden administration, the average worker has paid a $2,500 inflation tax. Lower-income Americans and senior citizens on fixed incomes are particularly vulnerable to rapid price increases.
Ongoing inflation has led the Federal Reserve to engage in some of the most aggressive monetary policy most Americans have ever seen. That’s bad news for Americans whose investments are being destroyed and whose dreams of owning a home or starting a business are being delayed. The Wall Street Journal reports that 30-year fixed-rate mortgages now average more than 7.1% compared to just 3% a year ago.
For a homebuyer borrowing $250,000, the monthly interest and principal payment has increased from approximately $1,050 per month to a staggering $1,680 per month.
The only thing keeping the headline inflation rate from hitting another 40-year high is that energy prices declined slightly in September. That appears to be changing quickly, and not in a good way.
The energy prices in September’s inflation report were recorded before the OPEC+ announcement that the cartel will cut production by two million barrels per day starting in November. A market correction also looms around the corner when the administration’s releases of oil from the strategic petroleum reserve will come to an end. Because it refuses to expand domestic production, the Biden administration will be left with few real options to lower prices at the pump.
The announced reduction of 2 million barrels per day, combined with the long overdue termination of releases from the strategic reserve is already assessed to send oil prices skyrocketing. Goldman Sachs recently forecasted that oil prices will likely reach $110 per barrel.
The 4.9% decline in gasoline prices in September is but a temporary reprieve, and it is highly probable that a national average of $5.00 per gallon will once again crush Americans’ wallets.
Oil and gasoline are only one piece of a more eerie picture. The coming winter should be of significant concern. Natural gas prices are driven by global factors, and with the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, Europe is facing a potential economic catastrophe driven by extreme energy volatility. This would further raise prices for heating American households.
The Biden administration’s embrace of big government socialism has wrought the worst economy in 40 years. Rather than trusting the American people’s ingenuity, the administration’s centralization of authority and special interest cronyism have devastated our Nation’s citizens. Government debt is now more than $31 trillion, and forecasters estimate deficits of more than $1 trillion per year in the future.
Dependency, debt, and demagoguery are not the foundation of a strong economy. Only by returning to an America First economic approach led by renewed energy independence can the American people once again realize the shared prosperity we enjoyed a few short years ago.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Sam Buchan is a former Director for International Economic Policy on the National Economic Council and is currently the Director of the Center for Energy and Environment at the America First Policy Institute.
Michael Faulkender is a former Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy at the Department of the Treasury and is currently a Senior Fellow at the America First Policy Institute.
Republicans are focusing on issues that matter to voters:
✔️Lowering prices on everything from gas to groceries ✔️Keeping our communities safe ✔️Securing the southern border ✔️Stopping the flow of fentanyl into the country ✔️Investing in our children’s education
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-10-23 18:51:362022-10-23 18:51:36An Inflation Nation — The New Norm
The Whole Foods founder offered a clear message on capitalism at LibertyCON in Miami, where five hundred delegates from 50 countries recently gathered.
On October 14, LibertyCON kicked off with an interview between Students for Liberty CEO Wolf von Laer and John Mackey, founder of Whole Foods Market.
Mackey studied philosophy and religion for several semesters while working part-time at a vegetarian consumer cooperative. In 1978, he and his girlfriend founded a vegetarian supermarket, SaferWay, which evolved into Whole Foods Market two years later through a merger. He recounted how, after starting the company, he initially lived on $200 a month, and since he had no place to live, he and his girlfriend slept in the store. Since there was no shower, they had to wash in the sink. But he has fond memories of those days: He was in love, starting the business was a great adventure, and he didn’t actually need money privately. Later, he became very wealthy, taking the company public on the NASDAQ technology exchange and, in 2017, it was acquired by Amazon for $13.7 billion.
Today, Whole Foods operates more than 500 stores in the US, Canada, and the UK.
Capitalist, Vegan, & Animal Rights Activist
Whole Foods was the first grocery chain to commit to animal welfare. Mackey was influenced by animal rights activist Lauren Ornelas, who criticized Whole Foods’ animal welfare standards at a shareholder meeting in 2003. Mackey gave Ornelas his email address, and they corresponded on the issue of how the company treated ducks in particular. Mackey became concerned with the problems associated with factory farming and decided to switch to a mostly vegetarian diet that included only eggs from his own chickens. Since 2006, he has been living on an exclusively plant-based diet. He is an advocate of more humane animal treatment, a vegetarian, and an enthusiastic fan of capitalism—which I like, because I am all of those things myself.
To say Mackey is a proponent of free markets is an understatement.
“Capitalism is the greatest thing that mankind has ever done,” Mackey declared at the event.
The number of people living in extreme poverty, he reminds us, has dropped from about 90 percent to less than 10 percent since the capitalist era began 200 years ago.
Mackey’s support of capitalism inspired him to write a book on the subject titled Conscious Capitalism, but it has not been without consequences. He triggered a flurry of negative reaction when he wrote an article against Obamacare that was published by the Wall Street Journal in August 2009. He did not only offer criticism, he also made ten suggestions on how to reform America’s ailing healthcare system. But his solution was not more government – as with Obama – but more market, which prompted left-wing groups to organize boycotts of his businesses.
Wolf von Laer pays tribute to the modest, soft-spoken entrepreneur for his courage in taking political positions. But Mackey himself says he would no longer write such a political article after his experience in 2009, because the response to it was so damaging to his business. That’s how it is today, and not only in the United States: Political statements from business people are only tolerated if they are critical of capitalism or “woke.” Otherwise, there is the threat of negative reaction and boycotts, as was the case against Whole Foods.
“Cancel Culture” is the name given to this anti-culture, which is nothing less than an all-out attack on freedom of expression.
Drug Legalization
Libertarians are caught between two stools. By European standards, they combine both right-wing and left-wing policy positions. On the one hand, they are enthusiastic supporters of capitalism and stridently oppose socialism, the welfare state, and wealth redistribution. On the other hand, they passionately support LGBTQ rights and drug legalization. The drug issue marks a dividing line between conservatives and libertarians, according to a panel discussion on “It’s Time to End the Drug War.”
One participant used to oppose drug legalization and now supports it for all drugs, She said the turning point for her was realizing that what she personally liked or disliked had nothing to do with what should be legal and what should be illegal. The panelists taking part in this discussion at Students for Liberty agreed that the state has lost the war against drugs, and that legalizing drugs would lead to fewer drug deaths, less crime, and more freedom and personal responsibility.
Venezuela: It Could Happen Here?
The convention moved to another topic. Why are more and more countries in Latin America sliding into socialism? Daniel DiMartino is a Venezuelan who fled the socialist country – along with a quarter of the population. He has now lived in the United States for six years and speaks of an “epidemic of envy” in Latin America. But he also criticizes conservative governments who, when in power, have not seized the opportunity to introduce the kind of radical free-market reforms that truly change people’s lives. He cites Maurico Macri in Argentina as an example.
Martha Bueno, whose parents fled Cuba and who now lives in Miami, warns young American supporters of socialism not to be overconfident that what happened in Venezuela could not happen in their country. As she explains, Venezuela was a democracy and had one of the highest standards of living in the world. And, she reminds us, Venezuela has the largest oil reserves in the world. She is convinced that no one ever would have believed that the socialists could run the country into the abyss, robbing it of its freedom and prosperity, in such a short space of time. But that is exactly what happened. And, she warns, it can happen here too, in the United States.
It was worth coming to Miami, to this event with so many interesting discussions. Wolf von Laer, the CEO of Students for Liberty, has succeeded in building the organization into the world’s largest network for libertarian students. The annual convention, to which fewer students can come than one would wish, partly because of the costs involved, is not actually the most important thing Students for Liberty does: that would be the thousands of events the organization holds with students around the world every year.
Dr. Rainer Zitelmann is a historian and sociologist. He is also a world-renowned author, successful businessman, and real estate investor. Zitelmann has written more than 20 books. His books are successful all around the world, especially in China, India, and South Korea. His most recent books are The Rich in Public Opinion which was published in May 2020, and The Power of Capitalism which was published in 2019.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-10-23 16:53:522022-10-23 16:53:52John Mackey: ‘Capitalism Is the Greatest Thing Mankind Has Ever Done’
Editors’ Note: Looking back at the Covid lockdowns, the overall response looks even worse than before. At the time they were being imposed, The Prickly Pear opposed them on a variety of grounds; medical, economic, and because they violated human rights and freedom. Now in hindsight, it is clear lockdown, mask requirements, and forced immunizations, did not stop the spread of the virus but did succeed in trampling all over our liberties and dividing the public into warring camps. It obliterated what was left of medical ethics. It has touched off fearsome inflation and given us a vicious bear market that is mauling the retirement hopes of millions. It will also likely give us a severe recession. It wrecked our educational system which was already underperforming. Remember, this was not caused by Covid per se, but by the political and institutional response to Covid climaxing in lockdown. Increasingly, evidence shows the spending to supposedly repair the self-inflicted damage, was perhaps the biggest boondoggle in the history of the world, spawning fraud on a gargantuan scale. To be sure, much was done in a panic with insufficient information and financial controls. But both political parties were involved and it would be nice to see at least some Republican leaders come forward and say it was a mistake. That would include former President Trump as well, although the press bullied him badly screaming listen to Fauci! Nevertheless, legislation was passed with much bipartisan support that now looks foolish. Can someone say it was a mistake and they are sorry? And while we are at it, could we have a thorough investigation into the origins of the virus and the extent to which the US government itself subsidized the Chinese research? If we can’t learn the lessons from mistakes, then the pain of those mistakes goes for naught.
COVID fraud is at this point a redundant phrase. Congress appropriated more than $5 trillion for COVID relief but almost $600 billion may have been lost to fraud — an astounding 12%. Washington’s pandemic pratfalls are the greatest federal boondoggle of this century.
Prosecutors are having a turkey shoot nailing COVID crooks: More than 1,500 have been indicted and almost 500 have been convicted. On September 14, the Justice Department announced the creation of three COVID-19 fraud strike force teams.
When President Biden recently signed a law to extend the time to prosecute COVID fraud, he declared, “My message to those cheats out there is this: You can’t hide. We’re going to find you.” But the sheer amount of fraud makes it unlikely that the vast majority of thieves will be charged.
Policymakers acted as if waiving standard federal fraud protections would somehow thwart the COVID virus. On September 22, the Labor Department inspector general estimated that COVID-19 unemployment fraud amounted to $45 billion and could exceed $163 billion.
“Overseas organized crime groups flooded state unemployment systems with bogus online claims, overwhelming antiquated computer software benefits in blunt-force attacks that siphoned out millions of dollars,” NBC News reported.
Prison inmates, drug gangs, and Nigerian racketeers easily plundered the program. One swindler collected unemployment benefits from 29 different states. In the first year of the pandemic, Maryland detected more than 1.3 million fraudulent unemployment claims — equal to 20% of the state’s population
Beginning in June 2020, the feds distributed $813 billion in Paycheck Protection Program loans to businesses. President Donald Trump’s Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin boasted that PPP is “supporting an estimated 50 million jobs.” But many of those jobs existed solely in the imagination of political appointees.
The Small Business Administration (SBA), which administered the program, effectively told people, “Apply and sign and tell us that you’re really entitled to the money,” according to Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz. The SBA camouflaged its “don’t ask, don’t tell” loan standard by claiming to perform economic miracles. The SBA ludicrously boasted that PPP loans saved more jobs than the total number of employees in at least 15 industries.
Yet CBS News found that PPP loans had gone to more than a thousand “ghost businesses” in Markham, Illinois — indicative of a nationwide problem of deluging nonexistent companies with federal cash. The feds gave “loans to 342 people who said their name was ‘N/A,’” the New York Times reported.
Fraud permeated relief programs of practically every federal agency that gushered money. On September 20, the feds charged 47 people in Minnesota with looting $250 million from the federal child nutrition programs’ COVID aid. Prosecutors denounced the “brazen scheme of staggering proportions,” but federal and state bureaucrats should have stopped the pilfering from the start. “Feeding Our Future,” a nonprofit organization, pocketed $300,000 in subsidies in 2018 and a windfall of almost $200 million in 2021. Fraud snowballed because the US Department of Agriculture issued waivers to “suspend all on-site monitoring of providers” of children’s meals.
Instead of feeding hungry kids, tax dollars were pilfered using a list of phony recipients generated by the website listofrandomnames.com. (No wonder Feeding Our Future wasn’t invited to attend Biden’s White House Summit on Hunger last week.) When the state of Minnesota sought to cut off funding, Feeding Our Future sued, claiming the action “discriminated against a nonprofit that worked with racial minorities,” the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported. Leftist firebrand Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) received thousands of dollars in donations from individuals indicted in the scandal.
Fighting fraud is tricky for federal investigators when some politicians openly used COVID stimulus money to bribe voters. In the January 2021 Georgia runoff race for US Senate, the campaign of Democratic candidate Raphael Warnock distributed fliers declaring, “Want a $2,000 Check? Vote Warnock.” That promise helped Warnock win, sealing Democratic control of the Senate and opening the floodgates for trillions of dollars of additional Biden administration spending.
The single biggest COVID fraud will never show up in triumphal press releases issued by federal prosecutors. On August 24, Biden invoked the COVID-19 emergency to justify canceling $400 billion in student loans. A few weeks ago, Biden told 60 Minutes that the pandemic was over — thus invalidating his justification for loan forgiveness.
But Team Biden signaled that it was entitled to spend hundreds of billions of tax dollars to purchase Democratic votes in the midterm congressional elections regardless of the president’s admission.
Plenty of scoundrels will be convicted in the coming months for stealing COVID money. But it was the politicians of both parties who unleashed the reckless spending that left us with the soaring national debt, roaring inflation, and a fading mirage of prosperity.
Americans should never permit politicians to absolve themselves by uncorking geysers of tax dollars.
The 2022 midterm election is fast approaching.The system for voting in Arizona is predominantly by mail-in ballots (around 80% of all ballots).The ballots will be mailed out to all voters registered for mail-in voting on October 12th. The actual ‘day’ of the election is Tuesday November 8,27 days later.
Once upon a time when all voters went to the polls on the day of election, the tabulated results were announced the night of the election date.If the result of a specific race was razor thin and less than a legislated margin, a recount might prevent the naming of a winner. That was the exception for calling the results of the election.
It is still this way in most first world countries but not the United States and certainly not Arizona. Voting rules (some unconstitutional) were dramatically altered in many states in 2020 because of the Covid pandemic.
We at The Prickly Pear are very concerned about the flaws in Arizona’s predominant ‘mail-in’ voting system.
Please click on the red TAKE ACTION link below to learn How Not to Vote in Arizona as a mail-in ballot voter and to be certain your vote is included in the count the evening of November 8th.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00ThePricklyPear.orghttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngThePricklyPear.org2022-10-23 09:16:002022-10-23 09:16:00Covid Fraud: A Staggering $600 Billion
Holy-moly mortgage rates of 7% slash demand for new houses due to super-inflated prices, but prices are now coming down.
Traffic of prospective buyers of new single-family houses plunged to the lowest since 2012, excluding the two lockdown months April and May, and is now approaching even the levels of those two lockdown months, according to data today from the National Association of Home Builders.
The NAHB index for traffic of prospective buyers dropped to 25, about where it was in mid-2007, well on the way down into Housing Bust 1. From 2008 through 2011, the index hovered around 10. Only this time, the descent is happening a lot faster than in 2005-2007:
Traffic is a sign of interest among potential homebuyers, but many of them lost interest amid still sky-high prices and holy-moly mortgage rates of around 7%. The response from homebuilders is to reduces prices and offer incentives (including mortgage-rate buydowns, anything to avoid the stigma of a price reduction).
The overall confidence of builders of single-family houses fell for the 10th month in a row in October, as “rising interest rates, building material bottlenecks, and elevated home prices continue to weaken the housing market,” the NAHB report said.
With today’s index value of 38, the NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index is now nearly where it had been in May 2020 during the lockdown, and below where it had been in February 2007, on the way down into Housing Bust 1.
Current descent is much faster than during Housing Bust 1.
From April this year, when mortgage rates began to bite, until October, the index dropped by 39 points in six months (from 77 in April to 38 in October).
When Housing Bust 1 took off for homebuilders in October 2006 (index at 68), the index dropped in six months by 17 points. There was never any 6-month period during Housing Bust 1 when the index dropped anywhere near 39 points. The fastest drop was 24 points in the 6-month period that ended in September 2009.
The current 6-month drop now nearly matches the 6-month plunge through lockdown April 2020:
The 2022 midterm election is fast approaching.The system for voting in Arizona is predominantly by mail-in ballots (around 80% of all ballots).The ballots will be mailed out to all voters registered for mail-in voting on October 12th. The actual ‘day’ of the election is Tuesday November 8,27 days later.
Once upon a time when all voters went to the polls on the day of election, the tabulated results were announced the night of the election date.If the result of a specific race was razor thin and less than a legislated margin, a recount might prevent the naming of a winner. That was the exception for calling the results of the election.
It is still this way in most first world countries but not the United States and certainly not Arizona. Voting rules (some unconstitutional) were dramatically altered in many states in 2020 because of the Covid pandemic.
We at The Prickly Pear are very concerned about the flaws in Arizona’s predominant ‘mail-in’ voting system.
Please click on the red TAKE ACTION link below to learn How Not to Vote in Arizona as a mail-in ballot voter and to be certain your vote is included in the count the evening of November 8th.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00ThePricklyPear.orghttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngThePricklyPear.org2022-10-23 02:28:002022-10-23 02:28:00Housing Bubble Woes: Plunge in Buyer Traffic & Homebuilder Confidence a Lot Faster than During Housing Bust 1
Holy-moly mortgage rates of 7% slash demand for new houses due to super-inflated prices, but prices are now coming down.
Traffic of prospective buyers of new single-family houses plunged to the lowest since 2012, excluding the two lockdown months April and May, and is now approaching even the levels of those two lockdown months, according to data today from the National Association of Home Builders.
The NAHB index for traffic of prospective buyers dropped to 25, about where it was in mid-2007, well on the way down into Housing Bust 1. From 2008 through 2011, the index hovered around 10. Only this time, the descent is happening a lot faster than in 2005-2007:
Traffic is a sign of interest among potential homebuyers, but many of them lost interest amid still sky-high prices and holy-moly mortgage rates of around 7%. The response from homebuilders is to reduces prices and offer incentives (including mortgage-rate buydowns, anything to avoid the stigma of a price reduction).
The overall confidence of builders of single-family houses fell for the 10th month in a row in October, as “rising interest rates, building material bottlenecks, and elevated home prices continue to weaken the housing market,” the NAHB report said.
With today’s index value of 38, the NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index is now nearly where it had been in May 2020 during the lockdown, and below where it had been in February 2007, on the way down into Housing Bust 1.
Current descent is much faster than during Housing Bust 1.
From April this year, when mortgage rates began to bite, until October, the index dropped by 39 points in six months (from 77 in April to 38 in October).
When Housing Bust 1 took off for homebuilders in October 2006 (index at 68), the index dropped in six months by 17 points. There was never any 6-month period during Housing Bust 1 when the index dropped anywhere near 39 points. The fastest drop was 24 points in the 6-month period that ended in September 2009.
The current 6-month drop now nearly matches the 6-month plunge through lockdown April 2020:
The 2022 midterm election is fast approaching.The system for voting in Arizona is predominantly by mail-in ballots (around 80% of all ballots).The ballots will be mailed out to all voters registered for mail-in voting on October 12th. The actual ‘day’ of the election is Tuesday November 8,27 days later.
Once upon a time when all voters went to the polls on the day of election, the tabulated results were announced the night of the election date.If the result of a specific race was razor thin and less than a legislated margin, a recount might prevent the naming of a winner. That was the exception for calling the results of the election.
It is still this way in most first world countries but not the United States and certainly not Arizona. Voting rules (some unconstitutional) were dramatically altered in many states in 2020 because of the Covid pandemic.
We at The Prickly Pear are very concerned about the flaws in Arizona’s predominant ‘mail-in’ voting system.
Please click on the red TAKE ACTION link below to learn How Not to Vote in Arizona as a mail-in ballot voter and to be certain your vote is included in the count the evening of November 8th.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00ThePricklyPear.orghttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngThePricklyPear.org2022-10-23 02:28:002022-10-23 02:28:00Housing Bubble: Buyer Traffic and Homebuilder Confidence Plunge Faster than Expected
Ryan Crownholm’s story perfectly illustrates how occupational licensing laws stifle competition.
Ryan Crownholm is a self-described “serial entrepreneur” and the founder of a California-based business called MySitePlan.com. Founded in 2013, the business creates unofficial “site plans” for various clients using publicly available imagery. Hotels and resorts will sometimes use the plans as maps for their guests. Homeowners and contractors often use the plans in their permit applications when they are preparing to make minor changes to a property, such as building a shed or removing a tree.
Over the years, MySitePlan.com has built a strong reputation for itself, and customers are consistently impressed with the quality of the work and the short turn-around times (often within 24 hours).
“I had the first draft within 8 hours and they made changes to accommodate what the city needed. Good service!” writes one recent reviewer. “Amazing service! So incredibly quick! I will recommend this company to anyone in need of a site plan,” writes another.
Crownholm and his customers are certainly happy the business has been successful, but it seems not everyone feels this way. In December 2021, Crownholm was given a citation from the California Board for Professional Engineers, Land Surveyors, and Geologists. The order demanded that he “cease and desist from violating” the law and pay a fine of $1,000.
What was Crownholm’s crime? According to the Board, Crownholm and his company were illegally practicing land surveying without a license. In the Board’s view, “preparing site plans which depict the location of property lines, fixed works, and the geographical relationship thereto falls within the definition of land surveying,” and thus requires a license.
It’s worth noting that MySitePlan.com never claimed to create official land surveys by licensed surveyors. In fact, a banner at the top of their website plainly states, “This is not a legal survey, nor is it intended to be or replace one.”
Now, it’s tempting to say Crownholm should just get a license and move on, but it’s not that simple. Obtaining a land surveying license is an arduous process. In the state of California it requires six years of higher education and practical experience, passing four exams, and earning references from four existing licensees.
So rather than getting a license or shutting down his business, Crownholm has chosen to take the Board to court. On September 29, Crownholm joined with the Institute for Justice to file a federal lawsuit against the Board, claiming that the regulation violates his First Amendment right to free speech.
“California regulators are strangling entrepreneurs, like me, with red tape even though customers are pleased with the valuable services we provide,” Crownholm said. “Prosecuting my company hurts homeowners, contractors, landscapers, farmers, wedding venues and others who depend on my service.”
“California’s regulations go far beyond what other surveying regulators think is appropriate,” said Institute for Justice Attorney Mike Greenberg. “This is yet another example of an established industry using the government to shut down popular, innovative competition. If read literally, California’s laws could harm services everyday people use such as Uber and Google Maps. It would even criminalize drawing a makeshift map on a napkin to help a lost tourist find the way to their destination.”
A Mysterious Motive
The question on everyone’s mind, of course, is why? Why would this regulatory board go after an entrepreneur when he’s clearly not in the business of official land surveying?
The simplest explanation is that they’re just really eager to enforce the law to the letter. That seems to be the argument they’re going with. But if that’s the case, why don’t they also crack down on the homeowners and contractors who regularly make identical site plan drawings? As the Institute for Justice press release notes, “California’s own building departments teach [unlicensed] homeowners and contractors how to make the exact same drawings Ryan makes.”
So if litigiousness is the goal, why single out MySitePlan.com?
Perhaps they think he’s taking safety shortcuts, but that makes no sense. There’s nothing dangerous about what he’s doing. Maybe they’re concerned he’s a fraud, and that the quality of his product doesn’t match what he promises? It’s possible, but a quick glance at his glowing reviews ought to set the record straight on that. Maybe they think he’s misrepresenting himself, pretending to have a license when he really doesn’t? Again, that makes no sense. He’s very explicit on the website that he doesn’t do official land surveys.
Perhaps they just think it’s unfair that everyone else has to go through an arduous licensing process while he gets to avoid it despite doing very similar work. That would be understandable, but if it was really just about fairness, wouldn’t it make more sense to push for scrapping the burdens on everyone else rather than imposing those burdens on him?
None of these motives make much sense.
There’s another possible motive, however, and that’s the malicious one. Perhaps the regulators were simply looking to protect licensed surveyors from competition. After all, less competition means higher prices and more business for those who have jumped through the hoops. I’m sure many licensed surveyors weren’t particularly happy to see MySitePlan.com taking away potential clients.
Even assuming the absolute best of intentions, one must admit the decreased competition would be at the very least a convenient side-benefit for the established special-interests.
Oh, and did I mention that the the guy who issued the citation—Richard B. Moore, the Board’s Executive Officer—is himself a licensed land surveyor?
Bootleggers and Baptists
This isn’t the first time entrepreneurs have been impeded by these kinds of regulations. Occupational licensing requirements like this are ubiquitous, not just for doctors and engineers, but also for jobs that have little to do with safety like hair braiding.
Every industry has a similar story. Decades ago there was an accident, maybe a series of accidents, or some fraudulent practitioner. As a result, people pressured the government to “do something,” and the government responded by creating a licensing scheme.
The thinking is pretty straightforward. We make it illegal for someone to practice a trade unless they have a government-approved license, and the government only gives licenses to people who can prove they are trustworthy and capable. Ostensibly, the system protects consumers. But that’s just the official narrative.
Whether by design or by accident, licensing laws also have the effect of limiting competition, resulting in higher prices and fewer options for consumers.
I say “by design or by accident” because it isn’t always clear what the intentions were of the people who promoted these schemes. Though it’s nice to think they were all motivated by an altruistic desire to help consumers, it’s more realistic to see this as a classic “Bootlegger and Baptist” alliance—a phrase that was coined by economist Bruce Yandle in a 1983 paper in reference to the Prohibition era.
The “Baptists” are the true believers. They are motivated, in their desire for government regulation, by genuine—though often misguided—concern for consumers. The “Bootleggers” are the special-interest groups who stand to benefit should these laws pass. The strategy of the Bootlegger is simple and surprisingly effective: simply paint yourself as a Baptist and push for the regulations with altruistic arguments, even though your real goal is to hurt your competitors.
“A carefully constructed regulation can accomplish all kinds of anticompetitive goals,” Yandle wrote, “while giving the citizenry the impression that the only goal is to serve the public interest.”
In 2014, Yandle expanded on his theory in a book titled Bootleggers and Baptists that he co-authored with his grandson Adam Smith (not to be confused with the original Adam Smith). In a review of the book, economist Art Carden summarized the theory rather succinctly.
“Public policies…emerge because a moral constituency (the Baptists) and a financial constituency (the bootleggers) come together in support of the same policies,” Carden wrote.
Quoting the book, Carden notes that special interests looking to pass anti-competitive regulations often seek out “a respectable public-spirited group seeking the same result [in order to] wrap a self-interested lobbying effort in a cloak of respectability.”
Carden goes on to identify occupational licensing in particular as a good example of the Bootleggers and Baptists theory playing out in real life.
The Case against Occupational Licensing
While the drawbacks of occupational licensing laws are difficult to deny, some may still have reservations about abolishing them. If we let just anyone practice these professions, wouldn’t there be a proliferation of fraudulent and dangerous practitioners? Isn’t that why these laws were needed in the first place, to protect us from the evidently disastrous results of free markets?
This is a common line of argumentation, but it’s missing some key nuances. First, it’s important to keep in mind that the mental picture many have of the pre-license market is likely distorted. The special-interest groups pushing for these laws have a strong incentive to exaggerate how bad things used to be; it would be naive to simply take them at their word.
Further, it’s important to remember that people were much poorer back when these laws were first introduced, so we shouldn’t be surprised that the general standard of living—including the quality and safety of services available on the market—was far lower than it is today. The fact that “things used to be bad” is much more a reflection of our ancestors’ relative poverty than an indictment of unregulated markets.
For another point, clearly it’s tragic when people get injured or killed because of incompetent workers, but there is always a trade-off between cost and safety. Sometimes people prefer slightly less safe options (such as workers with less training) because those options are cheaper. And if that’s a risk they want to take, we’re only making them worse-off by taking that option away.
The other thing to consider is that businesses that are downright dangerous or fraudulent get weeded out very quickly. As a business owner, if you don’t provide a reasonable level of quality and safety in your products, you’ll be out of business in no time. Since entrepreneurs know this, they have a strong incentive to avoid hiring dangerous and fraudulent workers. Economists call this the discipline of continuous dealings. This, not licensing, is the reason we can trust most of the businesses we patronize.
Besides, there are plenty of ways to ensure product safety and quality that don’t involve licensing laws. Workers can get voluntary certifications and consumers can look at reviews to help them decide who they can trust. Just think about MySitePlan.com and their reviews we saw earlier. Did you really need them to have a license to know they were a trustworthy business?
What Consumers Really Need
Though government licensing may seem like a good way to protect consumers, the reality is that these schemes unnecessarily restrict competition, with fewer options and higher prices being the inevitable result. In other words, they mostly end up hurting the very consumers they were supposed to help.
The best way to help consumers is to give them lots of choices and a rigorously competitive market. And the way to achieve that is not by protecting established special interests from new players. It’s by letting the Ryan Crownholms of the world compete.
This article was adapted from an issue of the FEE Daily email newsletter. Click here to sign up and get free-market news and analysis like this in your inbox every weekday.
Patrick Carroll has a degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Waterloo and is an Editorial Fellow at the Foundation for Economic Education.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-10-22 16:51:502022-10-22 16:51:50California Entrepreneur Who Was Fined $1000 for Drawing Informal Maps without a License Takes Regulatory Board to Court
BOCA RATON, Fla./PRNewswire-HISPANIC PR WIRE/ — Hispanics are increasingly concerned about their personal finances, leading to a decline in optimism in the U.S. economy during the third quarter, according to a new poll from the Florida Atlantic University Business and Economics Polling Initiative (FAU BEPI).
The Hispanic Consumer Sentiment Index dropped to 74.3 from 78.3 in the second quarter and 92 for the first quarter, the survey found.
Only 44 percent of the 454 respondents said they are better off financially than a year ago, down from 56 percent in the second quarter and 65 percent in the first quarter. In addition, a smaller percentage of respondents are more optimistic about their financial futures.
Hispanics also remain troubled over the cost of living, with 81 percent saying costs are going up, compared with 80 percent who said that in the second quarter.
“They are less optimistic about their personal finances because Hispanics spend a greater share of their budgets on items that have seen the most inflation, like used cars, food, gas and housing,” said Monica Escaleras, Ph.D., director of FAU BEPI in the College of Business.
In three other questions used to create the index, respondents were slightly more upbeat compared to the second quarter but not nearly as optimistic as the first quarter.
When asked about business conditions over the next year, 44 percent of respondents said they expect conditions to be good, up from 43 percent in the prior quarter but down from 55 percent in the first quarter.
Compared to the second quarter, a higher percentage of respondents (53 percent) expect good times for the country over the next five years, but that still was down from 61 percent in the first three months of 2022.
Finally, while 40 percent said now is a good time to buy a big-ticket item, 50 percent felt that way in the first quarter. Only 26 percent said it’s a good time to buy a house, but 49 percent felt that way in the first quarter.
In all the questions, Escaleras noted that younger Hispanics generally appeared more optimistic than their older counterparts.
The poll is based on a sampling of Hispanic adults from July 1 to Sept. 30. The margin of error is +/- 4.59 percentage points. The polling results and full cross-tabulations can be viewed here.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-10-22 16:51:472022-10-22 16:51:47FAU Poll: Hispanics Losing Confidence in U.S. Economy
If you want to know what the left wants to do to the entire nation, look at California: unsustainably high taxes, soaring crime rates, filthy, dangerous cities full of insane and criminal homeless people — California is a leftist’s paradise. If Gavin Newsom is the Democrat nominee in 2024, as many are whispering now, and becomes the next president, that will be it for America. The companies that are fleeing California in droves now will flee all of America, and with good reason, as all they will be able to expect here will be robberies that go unprosecuted, confiscatory taxes, immense economic burdens due to climate fantasies, and worse.
California officials are sounding the alarm after recent statistics showed that fewer corporate and start-up activity in the state was leading to a decline in tax revenue, according to a report by Bloomberg News.
This year, just nine companies based in the state had held initial public offerings (IPOs), which is when a company first lists shares for sale on the stock market – considered a milestone in its growth after strong activity and high valuation, the report revealed. In 2021, California – whose start-up ecosystem in ‘Silicon Valley’ is considered the most prodigious in the world – saw 81 companies conduct IPOs, making 2022 a year of a nine-fold decrease.
Moreover, the value of these IPOs was far lower than in the past, raising merely $177 million, or 2% of the total amount of money raised by U.S. companies that went public in 2022. By contrast, in 2021, California’s share of the revenue generated by IPOs was 39%, by far the largest of any state.
Over the last few years, many companies have departed from California for other states run by Republicans, with Texas being the top destination, gaining 44% of companies that left according to a report by BuildRemote, a business consultancy. These include high-profile departures such as that of electric carmaker Tesla, Inc., led by CEO Elon Musk, which moved its headquarters to Texas.
Musk and other entrepreneurs cite the state’s left-wing policies, enacted by a heavily Democratic state administration, of high taxes, permissive bail reform and drug-use laws, chronic homelessness and stringent COVID-19 regulations as reasons for leaving. Musk called the state the “land of overregulation, overlitigation and overtaxation” when describing his decision to leave….
California has some of the highest tax rates in the nation, with a 7.25% sales tax and a top income tax rate of 13.3%, both of which outrank all other states. The revenues it gathers far exceed the state’s regular expenditures, and it ran a budget surplus of $97.5 billion in 2021.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-10-22 14:52:492022-10-22 14:52:49California’s Economy Heading For Disaster As Companies Flee Socialist Insanity In Droves
Newly released polling data shows that a majority of Americans say the federal government has too much power.
Gallup released the poll Wednesday, which showed that 54% of Americans said the federal government is “too powerful.” The survey found that 39% said the federal government has the right amount of power while only 6% said it has too little.
In 2005, the percentage of Americans who said the federal government had too much power crossed 50% and has not dipped back down. Sometimes that number has topped 60%.
“Currently, 74% of Republicans, 32% of Democrats and 54% of independents believe the federal government has too much power,” Gallup said.
The poll also found that 53% of those surveyed said the government is “doing too many things to solve nation’s problems” while 43% said the government should be doing more.
Since Gallup began tracking the data, Americans have usually favored less government action, not more.
“There have been only three instances since 1992 in which more Americans have called for the government to do more than to do less,” Gallup said. “These were in early 1993, after Bill Clinton took office following his victory over the incumbent George H.W. Bush in an election focused on economic issues; in October 2001, weeks after the 9/11 terrorist attacks; and in 2020 during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.”
When it comes to business regulation, Americans say the government is too involved.
“Twice as many Americans believe the government regulates business too much (46%) rather than too little (23%), and 29% say there is the right amount of regulation,” Gallup said. “For the past two years – the first two of Biden’s administration – the percentage of Americans saying there is too much regulation has exceeded the percentages measured in 2018-2020, the last three years of Trump’s administration. Similarly, more Americans thought there was too much business regulation under Barack Obama between 2009 and 2016 than under George W. Bush between 2001 and 2008.”
The 2022 midterm election is fast approaching.The system for voting in Arizona is predominantly by mail-in ballots (around 80% of all ballots).The ballots will be mailed out to all voters registered for mail-in voting on October 12th. The actual ‘day’ of the election is Tuesday November 8,27 days later.
Once upon a time when all voters went to the polls on the day of election, the tabulated results were announced the night of the election date.If the result of a specific race was razor thin and less than a legislated margin, a recount might prevent the naming of a winner. That was the exception for calling the results of the election.
It is still this way in most first world countries but not the United States and certainly not Arizona. Voting rules (some unconstitutional) were dramatically altered in many states in 2020 because of the Covid pandemic.
We at The Prickly Pear are very concerned about the flaws in Arizona’s predominant ‘mail-in’ voting system.
Please click on the red TAKE ACTION link below to learn How Not to Vote in Arizona as a mail-in ballot voter and to be certain your vote is included in the count the evening of November 8th.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00ThePricklyPear.orghttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngThePricklyPear.org2022-10-22 02:28:002022-10-22 02:28:00Americans Say Federal Government Has Too Much Power
Stacey Abrams and other Democrats are fighting for abortions at eight, nine months and post birth. And they think they have the moral high ground. Monsters.
And now Abrams has made the abortion issue not just about women and reproductive rights, but about inflation. The Biden regime has wreaked havoc on the economy. Inflation is skyrocketing because of the regime’s corrupt tendency to throw money to all its cronies, including Zelensky, and because of the regime’s war against the domestic oil industry. And now, instead of returning to responsible fiscal policies, Stacey Abrams is arguing that the solution is simply to abort your babies. Again: monstrous.
.@staceyabrams says abortion can help address inflation issues: “Having children is why you’re worried about your price for gas, it’s why you’re concerned about how much food costs. For women, this is not a reductive issue.” pic.twitter.com/BNHJWqKRpa
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-10-21 14:51:182022-10-21 14:51:18Stacey Abrams’ Plan to Fight Inflation: Abort Your Children
Younger voters online are closely watching Blake Masters’ Senate race in Arizona. Masters’ background as a disruptive innovator in technology and his penchant for irreverently challenging sacred cows has made his candidacy stand out in a noisy political moment. Despite an attempt by Democrats to fund an out-of-touch Libertarian candidate to spoil his chances, Masters represents an opportunity to build a family-focused liberty movement with broad appeal.
When I tuned into the recent Arizona Senate debate, I was surprised to see a Libertarian Party candidate on stage with Blake Masters and Democratic incumbent Mark Kelly. That the LP candidate would use the opportunity to bring attention to the idea of lowering the age of consent reminded me why that party has so far failed to resonate with millions of Americans with liberty instincts. The idea of lowering the age of consent may be fascinating to some of the D.C. types in the left-wing groups funding this Libertarian to curb Masters’ chances for an upset, but that’s about it. Americans are much more interested in liberty ideas that enrich their families and local communities.
Although they get almost no coverage, serious liberty lovers need to take a closer look at the reforms Masters has shown interest in bringing to Washington. I recently interviewed him on my podcast and found his willingness to creatively roll back D.C.’s aggression against families promising.
In our discussion, Masters expressed interest in politically challenging the Federal Reserve’s insane monetary policies—something the Senate desperately needs more ambitious voices to do immediately. Both parties printed trillions of dollars, using the pandemic as an excuse to enrich cronies and corporations. Now historically high rates of inflation continue to tax our savings at close to 10 percent while wages are stagnant and food, energy, medicine, and housing costs soar.
As Steve Bannon recently echoed from Ron Paul’s lifelong crusade, we need to abolish the Federal Reserve. A more moderate but urgent proposal Masters affirms would be simply to remove capital gains taxes on gold, silver, and cryptocurrencies. This simple move would give families—young and old alike—life rafts out of this inflationary disaster. Being able to have precious metals and crypto would provide middle class families a low-cost ability to have their checking and savings appreciate in value relative to the goods and services they need. Instead of having 15 percent of a monthly income and savings stolen through inflation—on top of high taxes—families could actually build wealth. What a novel concept—middle class families building wealth outside the control of Wall Street.
With D.C. seemingly hellbent on precipitating a dramatic dollar devaluation with its disastrous Ukraine policy, families need this relief from inflation now. As the Mises Institute’s Tho Bishop has pointed out, Masters could be a key addition to a block of senators who could leverage such a provision in a Republican-led Senate tax reform.
Another fallout from D.C.’s exploitation of the pandemic, climate change hysteria, and the Ukraine conflict is food system failures. Barren shelves are a staple of Biden’s America. Recent cyber attacks on our oligarchic beef system revealed the national security imperative to decentralize food distribution. Cronyism has created nutrient-depleted groceries disrupted by chaotic foreign affairs. The answer to lawless globalism is stable localism. Even liberals love their farmers markets.
We need a cyber attack-resilient local food renaissance that will provide families with high quality nutrition at prices less affected by far away world events and actors. What stands in the way is rigged regulations written by big business. Masters has signaled interest in bringing reforms like Representative Thomas Massie’s (R-Ky.) PRIME Act to allow farmers more freedom to sell beef and other products direct to local consumers.
Masters and I talked about how families should be free from the humiliation of watching their tax dollars subsidize rancid vegetable oil-laced foods—despite the growing scientific evidence that they drive diseases like debilitating chronic pain, menstrual agony, obesity, and diabetes.
The iconic localist farmer Joel Salatin recently said, “Wealth is far more than paychecks; it’s far more than cash. I would say the most valuable things in life have nothing to do with cash. Resilience in food, clothing, shelter, and relationships is better than cash.”
That’s something Beltway Democrats, Republicans, and Libertarians do not understand. Life is not about money and power for normal people. We need to promote a family focused culture to win liberty again. Families deserve the freedom to have money that actually appreciates in value. They should have the right to buy food from local farmers they know. They should be free to use generic, inexpensive medicine that is safe and effective without government running interference on behalf of Big Pharma. All of these are values Blake Masters has a real shot at bringing to the halls of power in the U.S. Senate.
The 2022 midterm election is fast approaching.The system for voting in Arizona is predominantly by mail-in ballots (around 80% of all ballots).The ballots will be mailed out to all voters registered for mail-in voting on October 12th. The actual ‘day’ of the election is Tuesday November 8,27 days later.
Once upon a time when all voters went to the polls on the day of election, the tabulated results were announced the night of the election date.If the result of a specific race was razor thin and less than a legislated margin, a recount might prevent the naming of a winner. That was the exception for calling the results of the election.
It is still this way in most first world countries but not the United States and certainly not Arizona. Voting rules (some unconstitutional) were dramatically altered in many states in 2020 because of the Covid pandemic.
We at The Prickly Pear are very concerned about the flaws in Arizona’s predominant ‘mail-in’ voting system.
Please click on the red TAKE ACTION link below to learn How Not to Vote in Arizona as a mail-in ballot voter and to be certain your vote is included in the count the evening of November 8th.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00ThePricklyPear.orghttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngThePricklyPear.org2022-10-21 02:10:002022-10-21 02:10:00Blake Masters and a Family-Focused Liberty Movement
Pundits commonly depict the ongoing calamity at our border as the result of Biden administration incompetence. As with inflation, urban crime, and the deficit, their near-complete lack of insight and management skills is leading us over a cliff.
But this analysis itself is a major error. They know exactly what they are doing, and they are doing it well. They are executing a long-range plan that is achieving great success.
The Biden administration is doing everything it can to bring as many illegal immigrants across the border as possible, braving considerable political blow-back to achieve their goals. They believe the mostly unskilled, uneducated migrants will gravitate to the party that promises more government benefits and thus ensure Democratic dominance indefinitely.
So, they alternately claim the border is actually “closed” and admit they are concerned but don’t know what to do about it. Now, admittedly some of the Washington Dems aren’t that bright, but it’s not possible to be so stupid as to not be able to see what is happening here.
Immediately after his inauguration, Biden announced the border was open and reversed the Trump policies, “Remain in Mexico” and “Title 42,” that had limited illegal border crossings. Now, illegal immigrants face no consequences if they defy the border police and make it across the line.
Instead, they are treated humanely, fed, housed and released into America, usually with a deferred asylum hearing which most don’t attend, since few have legitimate asylum claims. Yet our VP border czar pretends not to understand why five million illegal immigrants have crossed the border on her watch or what to do about it.
But open borders advocates gave away the real game. Czar Kamala, and others, said a plan to control the border might be worked out if Republicans would only “come to the table.” However, the only way to control the border would be through “comprehensive immigration reform,” which is their euphemism for amnesty.
So, there you have it. Democrats are okay with cranking up a situation so intolerable that Republicans will be forced to grant citizenship to the millions who entered America illegally.
Not long ago, Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama called for strict border enforcement to protect the wages of low-income workers. Democratic opinion changed when the offspring of 20 million or so illegal aliens began to vote as anchor babies.
California has become a one-party state, and several other western states seem poised to follow suit (although the Democrats’ grip on Latino voters may be fading as they become Americanized).
Playing-dumb Democrats aren’t the only group that benefits from open borders. Foreign governments benefit from billions of dollars of remittances, money that immigrants send back home saved from their earnings and, often, government subsidies they receive here.
The political champions of racial grievance benefit from a large community of immigrants whose relative poverty purportedly is proof that America is nativist or racist. Thus, Latino welfare organizations, academic departments, lawyers, and political organizations are required to remedy this lack of social justice.
Employers clearly benefit from a pool of young compliant workers who work for wages and conditions unacceptable to growing numbers of Americans. Caring progressives not only get a cause to pontificate for, but nannies, gardeners, and housekeepers to make their lives easier.
Of course, illegal immigrants benefit too, although they successfully competed against a legal applicant who waited and played by the rules. But unlike legal immigrants, illegals don’t come because they love America and want to become loyal Americans.
Their illegal entrance shows their disdain for the Rule of Law. Many cheered wildly when socialists like Hugo Chavez of Venezuela promised to confiscate land and assets from “the rich” and give it to “the people,” ultimately resulting in the economic devastation they are now fleeing.
Americans are bound together as a nation not by blood or soil, but by the values and ideals which brought us freedom and prosperity. Our future depends on an immigration policy which selects for immigrants, of any color or ethnicity, who understand this and want to share with us not only the privileges, but also the responsibilities, of being an American.
***** This article was published by AZ Free News and is reproduced with permission.
TAKE ACTION
How Not to Vote in Arizona
The 2022 midterm election is fast approaching.The system for voting in Arizona is predominantly by mail-in ballots (around 80% of all ballots).The ballots will be mailed out to all voters registered for mail-in voting on October 12th. The actual ‘day’ of the election is Tuesday November 8,27 days later.
Once upon a time when all voters went to the polls on the day of election, the tabulated results were announced the night of the election date.If the result of a specific race was razor thin and less than a legislated margin, a recount might prevent the naming of a winner. That was the exception for calling the results of the election.
It is still this way in most first world countries but not the United States and certainly not Arizona. Voting rules (some unconstitutional) were dramatically altered in many states in 2020 because of the Covid pandemic.
We at The Prickly Pear are very concerned about the flaws in Arizona’s predominant ‘mail-in’ voting system.
Please click on the red TAKE ACTION link below to learn How Not to Vote in Arizona as a mail-in ballot voter and to be certain your vote is included in the count the evening of November 8th.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00ThePricklyPear.orghttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngThePricklyPear.org2022-10-21 02:08:002022-10-21 02:08:00Dems Are Successfully Executing a Long-Range Strategy on the Border
Host propagandist Andrea Mitchell began, “Let’s talk about rising inflation concerns along with crime, giving momentum, new momentum to Republicans after the Democrats were closing the gap, the historic gap. After the Supreme Court ruling, there was huge outrage. That has seemed to subside, at least among overriding concerns. Despite all the legislative accomplishments, and I want to cite them, I want to say it’s been an extraordinary session. You and the president have done so much in terms of domestic concerns, the economy. So why do you think the president hasn’t gotten it through to the voters?”
Pelosi replied, “Well, first of all, let me say that I think that much of what you’ve said I don’t agree with, that is to say, the New York Times poll, I think is an outlier poll, you cite one poll, but all the other polls —”
Mitchell interjected, “It’s also the RealClearPolitics average is showing similar issues.”
Pelosi said, “No, but that was one that brought down the average, and it was an outlier. It wasn’t even that big a sample. So I dismiss that. I have been since Congress adjourned, I’ve been in an average of five states a week. And I can tell you that women’s concerns about their freedom are very, very much still very significant in terms of how they will vote.”
It’s just like a Democrat to tell the voters what their concerns are.
Video of Pelosi Saying on January 6, 2021, That She Would Like to Physically “Punch … Out” President Trump & Go to Jail As a Consequence
On October 13, 2022, CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360aired never-before-seen video footage that had been filmed by Nancy Pelosi’s daughter Alexandra during the breach of the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. in that footage, the House Speaker stated that if President Trump were to come to the Capitol that day, she would physically assault him and would be glad to serve time in jail as a consequence. (During his speech earlier that day at the Ellipse, Trump had told a large crowd of his supporters: “And after this, we’re going walk down, and I’ll be there with you. We’re going walk down to the Capitol.”) A staff member told Pelosi, “The Secret Service said they have dissuaded him from coming to Capitol Hill. They told him they don’t have the resources to protect him here. So at the moment, he is not coming, but that could change.” An enraged Pelosi responded: “I hope he comes. I want to punch him out…. I’ve been waiting for this, for trespassing on the Capitol grounds. I want to punch him out, and I’m going to go to jail, and I’m going to be happy.” Pelosi also stated: “Tell him [Trump] if he comes here, we’re going to the White House.”
And this comes from a Left leaning poll. Lee Zeldin can win. The rational citizens of the state of New York must come out in full force and vote for Lee Zeldin. Vote the Left out of office. Save the state of New York. #Zeldin2022!
New Quinnipiac NY poll has Kathy Hochul up only 4 over Lee Zeldin
NY Governor (D) Kathy Hochul 50% (+4) (R) Lee Zeldin 46%
Independents (R) Lee Zeldin 57% (+20) (D) Kathy Hochul 37%
🚨Our race was just moved to TOSS UP by @RealClearNews! We have just 24 days to go until we FIRE @KathyHochul & save our state. It’s not too late for Hochul to come out of hiding & do multiple debates with me across New York, starting immediately! pic.twitter.com/eYrm1TUYnD
“Save our state” was the chant as NY Gubernatorial candidate @RepLeeZeldin was mobbed today at the Long Island Fall Fair in Huntington pic.twitter.com/WR1HNEkkmu
The issue of crime is topping inflation among Republicans, Democrats and independents in New York, and Republican Lee Zeldin has surged to within four points of his opponent, Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released Tuesday.
A Siena College poll released earlier Tuesday showed Zeldin having closed to within 11 points of Hochul.
In the Quinniqiac poll of 1,617 likely New York voters, crime topped the list of most pressing issues heading into Election Day among Republicans and independents. Democrats listed protecting democracy as their top issue, followed by crime, then inflation. The poll has a margin of error of 2.4 percentage points.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-10-20 12:51:512022-10-20 12:51:51ZELDIN SPIKES: NY Race Now A Toss-Up In Blue NY State As Voters Put Crime, Inflation As Top Issues in Midterm Election
Editors’ Note: The choice for the next Senator from Arizona between Blake Masters and incumbent Mark Kelly is not only critical for determining the majority in the United States Senate but vital for America’s national security interests. The following article explains the threat China poses to our nation on many levels but importantly details the role Mark Kelly has played in enabling China’s entanglement and use of our technology and how his business dealings and advisory role advanced the CCP’s interests against America. This should alarm all citizens but should particularly impact the choice Arizona voters make during this election cycle for who represents our state in the U.S. Senate and helps protect our national security in that role.
On October 17, 2022, The Wall Street Journal published a main editorial about the “coronation” of Chairman Xi for another five-year term as dictator of China.
As the nation’s most widely read newspaper, and entwined as it is with Fox News, this is a watershed event, and likely an important inflection point in the way our elites think about China. Here are a few salient passages:
“In a decade, Mr. Xi has crushed all dissent, imposed a vast censorship regime, and created an intrusive surveillance regime beyond anything the East German Stasi imagined. He has erased the autonomy for 50 years that China had promised Hong Kong and made Xinjiang province a prison camp for the Uyghurs.
He has restored the Communist Party to the commanding heights of the economy, putting decades of market reform in reverse…He has abandoned the restraint abroad that marked the first 30 years, after Mao. He has occupied and militarized disputed islands in the South China sea, though he had promised not to.”
Concerning the challenge China now poses to the United States, the Journal says, “it is the most formidable the US has faced since World War II, with economic and military power backed by ideological conviction and nationalist ambition.”
We agree and with great emphasis, express concern about the many ways China has succeeded in sinking its menacing tentacles deep into the fabric of American society. This ranges from their power in our prestigious universities, their influence on our entertainment conglomerates, our sports franchises, their extensive ability to steal our technology, engage in industrial espionage, penetrate our military supply companies, and the environmental movement.
Many of their young people are trained at America’s best universities, only to return home and help build up the Communist dictatorship. Is that a good use of our educational resources? Yes, US universities make a good buck at full tuition, but at what cost to the country?
China’s economic vitality extends broadly into key supply chains for pharmaceuticals, computer chips, and petroleum refining capacity. China has become the key supplier of many things vital to the US economy. Is it smart for us to grow dependent on a country that represents the greatest global threat since WWII?
Economic ties have entwined many of our industrial and political leaders including Republicans such as Mitch McConnell all the way to President Biden’s family. They have actively built up a mighty adversary to this country, for their personal profit.
This creates an obvious conflict of interest, pitting their own financial well-being against the security and prosperity of this country.
The Chinese government also has demonstrated an amazing ability to manipulate Chinese nationals in the free world, by threatening their relatives back in China. A little bit of thuggery goes a long way it seems.
America’s naivete about China has been a bipartisan error. It goes back a number of years. It even involves the classic liberal love of “free trade” and comparative advantage and the liberal notion that strong trade ties are prophylactic against war. But do you want to elevate comparative advantage (let the cheap producer win) as a value above national security, especially if the cheaper producer also gets state subsidies and uses slave labor?
It also exposes an intellectually popular myth, that is that when the Berlin Wall came down, it marked the “end of history.” The superiority of western democracy and free market capitalism was triumphant in the long struggle against communism. Not only did the Chinese leadership not get the memo that the Western model was better, but communist ideas also surged within the West itself, such as Black Lives Matter and the Green Movement.
The consensus was that commerce and cultural exchange would create a democratic China. Close economic ties would mean shared interests, that would prohibit aggression by either party. That theory has proven to be a great mistake and a misreading of Chinese history, culture, and Communist ideology. It is nice to see the Wall Street Journal, often a voice for commercial interests, acknowledge that fact.
One of the few holdouts to this almost universal consensus held by the American Establishment was Donald Trump and those who support his Make America Great Again movement. However, The Wall Street Journal could not bring itself to mention that uncomfortable fact in their otherwise stunning editorial.
The real irony in the relationship is that they did not become more like the democratic West, but rather the democratic West has become more like them. We even adopted in large measure, their response to Covid, all the while covering up the China’s role in the origins and spread of the virus.
Our government may have even paid for the research that lead China to the development of Covid at a laboratory that does work for the Chinese military.
Just today, news has broken, that retired members of the RAF have been training Chinese fighter pilots. Has the West gone mad? Is money really that important? Maybe China will bribe our elites just to give up our country to them?
It is clear, this country is not prepared to meet the challenge of China. That is worrisome.
Unlike the old Soviet Union, China is not an economic basket case. Further, while the Soviet Union was good at espionage, and did develop an extensive network of intellectual sympathizers, as witnessed by the considerable inroads into some of our institutions such as Hollywood and the State Department. Our country eventually reacted to these incursions. However, they never penetrated into America’s business and political culture like China has achieved.
It appears the sheer love of money recruits innocents even faster than ideology. Or, money simply buys silence from our compromised officials.
Today, our institutions are not resistant to China, but in fact, are eager to partner with them. Both our institutions and our political class are so attracted to the immense money to be made, they have not barred the wolf from the door but instead invited him in.
Our social media companies are now compromised, and the ESG movement is pretty much a carbon copy of the Chinese Communist social scoring system.
The US needs to recognize reality before it is too late. That will require bold political leadership to change course.
The Senate of the United States has greater responsibilities than the House as it relates to foreign relations. That is because the Senate gives advice and consent on ambassadors and must ratify treaties.
If he ever felt that China represented a threat to the US, it would be hard to explain Kelly’s extensive commercial and advisory dealings with that dictatorship. If you feel that may be too harsh, just remember the Chinese government does not make investments in US technology companies without the approval of the Chinese Communist Party and the People’s Army. Kelly either knew that or should have known that.
And speaking of entanglements, Kelly even met his second wife, the former Congresswomen Gabby Giffords, during a trip to China.
Senator Mark Kelly, the so-called moderate from Arizona, has been involved in extensive business dealings with the Chinese. We think that is a problem. No doubt he has served his country honorably with his military service. And to his credit, on occasion, he has said some intelligent things about US dependence on China for semiconductors. But saying is one thing, and doing financial deals and serving in advisory positions for aerospace technology with our adversary is quite another.
As voters fill out their ballots, they need to ask themselves a basic question: Which candidate running for US Senate in Arizona is best suited to deal with the challenge from China?
We don’t think it is Senator Kelly, because he chose to do business and invest with them, knowing they are a dictatorial and brutal regime that poses a threat to the security of the United States and our allies in the Far East. He literally invested with the nation which is now the most formidable foe the US has faced since World War II, to use the description by the Wall Street Journal.
To be sure, he is not alone among politicians, in making investments in China. But he is our Senator, not somebody else’s.
Either way, it is very troublesome. Either he did not view them as a threat, so he partnered with them or he did know the threat, and he partnered with them anyway. He is either naive or venal or both, two not very good choices for Arizona.
TAKE ACTION
How Not to Vote in Arizona
The 2022 midterm election is fast approaching.The system for voting in Arizona is predominantly by mail-in ballots (around 80% of all ballots).The ballots will be mailed out to all voters registered for mail-in voting on October 12th. The actual ‘day’ of the election is Tuesday November 8,27 days later.
Once upon a time when all voters went to the polls on the day of election, the tabulated results were announced the night of the election date.If the result of a specific race was razor thin and less than a legislated margin, a recount might prevent the naming of a winner. That was the exception for calling the results of the election.
It is still this way in most first world countries but not the United States and certainly not Arizona. Voting rules (some unconstitutional) were dramatically altered in many states in 2020 because of the Covid pandemic.
We at The Prickly Pear are very concerned about the flaws in Arizona’s predominant ‘mail-in’ voting system.
Please click on the red TAKE ACTION link below to learn How Not to Vote in Arizona as a mail-in ballot voter and to be certain your vote is included in the count the evening of November 8th.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00ThePricklyPear.orghttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngThePricklyPear.org2022-10-20 04:00:002022-10-20 04:00:00Relations With China and the Arizona U.S. Senate Race
In 2021, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen assured Americans that recent inflation was “transitory.” Back in 2017, Yellen, then Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, hinted there would not be another financial crisis “in our lifetimes.”
Maybe she got that idea from Morgan Stanley boss James Gorman, who in 2013 put the chance of a crisis “in our lifetime” as “close to zero” as he could imagine. Well, imagination, as the song says, is crazy. “Your whole perspective gets hazy.”
These two experts, as Alex J. Pollock and Howard B. Adler tell us in Surprised Again! The Covid Crisis and the New Market Bubble, are far from alone. Economic experts, they confirm, have a collective accuracy that would embarrass a busload of blind golfers. Not one expert, they remind us, saw the Great Depression coming. And none foresaw the Calamitous Coronadoom Panic of 2020. Which lasted until now.
What is fascinating is that being wrong in no way dents the awesome armor of assurance donned by our experts. Whatever they do when given power, they do it boldly and without doubt. Whether this lack of humility is caused by amnesia or hubris can be debated. But no one can doubt the astonishing effects of the economic “solutions” foisted upon us by a string of experts during the panic, each trying to correct the ill effects of the other “solutions.”
Pollock and Adler take us through it all: From the Covid lockdowns to the Fed printing money with glee; from the resultant market swings to the rush and retreat from cryptocurrencies; from the run in the housing market to crushing municipal debt and its ill effects on pension funds; from ballooning student loan debt to—again—the banks and the Fed.
This book serves as an excellent introduction to modern economics and monetary policy, presenting it cleaner than in any textbook, and with a complete absence of pedantry. Theory is backed by observation in a wonderful sort of Appendix (my favorite part) at the book’s end, a mini spreadsheet where the reader can write down a handful of indices when reading and compare them with history and with the authors’ predictions (also printed there).
Primarily, this is a book in which we re-learn the ancient truth that much of what we have learned will be forgotten in the next crisis. One perennially lost lesson, even though it’s been verified by history time and again, is that panic kills, both in the literal and figurative sense. This is not a book about public health, though. Pollock and Adler accept medical (what passed for ) “solutions” as a given, and only question economic “solutions.”
Take the catastrophic effects of lockdowns. The Dow was hovering around 29,000 when the Coronadoom panic hit. Then the government caused record unemployment by forcing many out of work for “two weeks” to “flatten the curve.” The Dow then plunged by about 10,000 points. The same kind of thing with the NASDAQ, and with other market indices around the world. GDP dropped ten percent.
People rushed to cash and caused “an inability of market makers to efficiently handle trades.” Bonds, collateralized loan obligations, and other similar instruments were smacked hard. Tax revenue dropped, and municipalities that received income from airports, stadiums, and the like suffered, putting great pressure on public pension funds. Commercial real estate, like malls and retail rentals, felt deep pain.
Things weren’t all down, down, down. One thing that went up was residential mortgage delinquencies. And, eventually, inflation. That went way up.
Inflation was triggered, mainly, by the Fed’s printing spree, which, our authors tell us, happened because they followed the advice of Walter Bagehot, who had argued “central banks should lend early and freely” during crises to quell fear. And this advice worked. Sort of. “The short-term effects of the federal programs were beneficial; the longer-term financial impacts raise profound concerns,” the authors tell us. It is those profound concerns that interest us most.
The panic, in economic terms, is a story of the creeping tendrils of government insinuating themselves into every available crevice. The style and motive of government beneficence in the panic puts one in mind of Mr. Potter from It’s A Wonderful Life. Like our rulers, Mr. Potter guaranteed his bank sufficient funds to remain open during a run. The side effect was that, after the panic ended, he was left in control of the bank.
What about our panic—and future panics? Given the almost routine occurrence of economic panics, should the government make it known they will guarantee banks, loans, and other monetary investments? “Or,” the authors asked, “should the government promise never to make any future interventions, in order to force the market to price in all the risk?” In other words, make people act and accept responsibility for their actions. “Who would believe that promise? We wouldn’t. Would you, Candid Reader?”
If you did believe, it would, as the saying goes, be the triumph of hope over experience.
One thing good about government is that it never lets a crisis go to waste, including those crises it created.
There isn’t space here to discuss every aspect of the panic our authors tackle. But one of the most relevant is cryptocurrencies. At the start of the panic, Bitcoin, the best known and therefore most viable faith-based currency, was about one per $10,000. Like with other markets, the panic led to a sell off, and the price dropped almost in half.
Over 2021, after government interventions and the partial return of calm, it blasted off, making it to over $63,000 in April 2021. There was a sell off later that summer, then another rally followed by a long, steady decline. As of the end of August 2022, it’s around $20,000.
Will it fall to its pre-panic level? Stay steady? Shoot up again? If I knew, I’d invest. But I’d be skeptical, and, like our authors, am prepared to be surprised.
There are solid reasons for skepticism. One is the rise of competing cryptos, which give other outlets for those seeking escape from fiat currencies. Yet the confusion and uncertainty in their proliferation limits acceptance. Another concern is growing regulation. China forbids Bitcoin. What if more governments ban Bitcoin? They are surely considering it, because crypto is something they can’t control.
Facebook’s attempt to create its own coin is telling. They first called it Libra—get it? Then, after their aspirations smacked into government suspicion, they called it Diem. The blows kept coming. Finally, they called it nothing.
They had meant Libra to be a stable, worldwide form of money, controlled in some vague way by an international board, convened by Facebook, and based in Switzerland (which, of course, isn’t the United States). Finance ministers from the G-7, the Bank of England, Reserve Bank of Australia, and others all wondered out loud how they were going to get a piece of the regulatory action. After that, Facebook gave up.
Government did not, however. The lure of paperless money, with its attractive regulatory possibilities, was and is too strong. So governments set out to create their own crypto-like currencies, a process under development in many nations, including the US and China.
The first thing to fix is volatility. Bitcoin price, as we saw, is far too touchy. Our authors give a brief history of the development of “stable coins,” instruments that do not, by their nature, share the volatility of the traditional (strange word here!) cryptos. Yet to make a coin stable turns out to mean, more or less, pegging it to some fiat currency. Doing so turns the coin into something very like a digital currency.
That is no problem for rulers because, hey, did you know criminals use unregulated crypto? Of course, the definition of what counts as “criminal” has only expanded in time and likely will continue to expand. Anyway, why would you use crypto? Do you have something to hide?
The Fed wrote a whitepaper on the pluses and minuses of a digital dollar as interest swelled in cryptocurrencies during the Coroandoom Panic. The digital dollar, for most of us, is already here, though not centrally controlled. Paper cash hasn’t been king for a long time. Starbucks, for instance, recently announced they soon won’t take cash.
A digital dollar is more than just bits in a computer at your bank. It’s all transactions tracked and watched over by experts in government. Our authors deadpan, “it would be tricky to balance protecting privacy with the need to maintain cybersecurity and prevent money laundering and other criminal activities.”
They summarize the story of cryptos using the Doctrine of Unexpected Consequences (they don’t call it this):
[O]ne of the surprises on the 2020s is that a libertarian revolt against central banks in the form of cryptocurrencies looks to be taken over by central banks and may well end up vastly increasing and centralizing bank and government power.
One thing good about government is that it takes what is now infamous advice to heart. It never lets a crisis go to waste, including those crises it created. For instance, during past crises and government cures, the number of FDIC-insured institutions went from about 17,000 in the 1980s, to about 7,500 in 2009-2012, to just under 5,000 during the covid panic. This allowed government (in which we include the Fed) to fully take over Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Ginnie Mae, which our authors note together comprise about “69 percent of the total mortgage market.”
Even though housing prices were juiced by the panic, the Fed accelerated their mortgage security buys. This kept mortgage interest rates low, which caused housing prices to rise. And it caused the Fed to swell. In 2006, on the eve of the last crisis, the Fed owned $0.875 trillion in mortgages. By the end of 2021, it was three times higher—$2.6 trillion. This money is part of the $8.9 trillion in total Fed assets, up from $5.3 trillion right before the Coronadoom Panic.
Then there was the government takeover of student loans. First came the government-dictated “pause” in payments during the panic. Then the recent wiping away of a certain amount owed. These moves were billed as more solutions, in part to cover the soaring cost of college. But our authors recognize (emphasis theirs) “the bloated price of higher education is sustained by the student loan bubble.”
How, or is it even possible, to draw back the powers government assumed during the Coronadoom Panic? When the book was written in early 2022, the Fed “began discussing the possibility of shrinking its balance sheet.” But, as of the end of August 2022, there hasn’t been any shrinkage. It’s not only the US finance system, of course. It’s the same story in Switzerland, Canada, Japan, Europe, and wherever the panic was embraced.
If we keep looking to government for solutions, we might end up here:
[O]ne might even imagine the extreme case in which the central bank becomes the monopoly bank for the whole country, holding all consumer and business deposits, supplanting the private banking industry, and with its political agenda dominating the allocation of loans.
It no longer takes as much imagination as it did to envision this scenario.
The 2022 midterm election is fast approaching.The system for voting in Arizona is predominantly by mail-in ballots (around 80% of all ballots).The ballots will be mailed out to all voters registered for mail-in voting on October 12th. The actual ‘day’ of the election is Tuesday November 8,27 days later.
Once upon a time when all voters went to the polls on the day of election, the tabulated results were announced the night of the election date.If the result of a specific race was razor thin and less than a legislated margin, a recount might prevent the naming of a winner. That was the exception for calling the results of the election.
It is still this way in most first world countries but not the United States and certainly not Arizona. Voting rules (some unconstitutional) were dramatically altered in many states in 2020 because of the Covid pandemic.
We at The Prickly Pear are very concerned about the flaws in Arizona’s predominant ‘mail-in’ voting system.
Please click on the red TAKE ACTION link below to learn How Not to Vote in Arizona as a mail-in ballot voter and to be certain your vote is included in the count the evening of November 8th.
Have you taken a peek at the balance in your 401(k) retirement accounts lately? Here’s our advice: Don’t bother. It will ruin your whole day, week and month.
Here’s why: We’ve now had seven straight months of 8%+ inflation. A year ago we were assured by the White House economic wizards that these rapid price increases in everything from groceries, to rental cars, to gasoline at the pump, to health insurance were merely “transitory.” Whoops.
The most immediate sticker shock from Bidenflation, of course, has been to shrink real take-home paychecks of workers. We have calculated that over the past 20 months, this rise in consumer prices over wages means that the average family in America has lost nearly $6,000 in purchasing power. This from the Lunch Bucket Joe president who promised to help boost the incomes of the middle class. When, exactly?
But this pay-cut effect on family incomes is only part of the curse of runaway inflation. We’ve just completed an analysis of how the highest inflation rate in almost 40 years has impacted the retirement funds of ordinary Americans. Here is what we found.
Not surprisingly, since President Biden took office, monthly savings have collapsed, falling 83%. (We could never understand how Biden could say with a straight face that Americans are saving more. His “transformation” of the US economy has had just the opposite effect.) Many millions of Americans who are living paycheck to paycheck just don’t have the money after paying the inflated bills to save much.
But to add insult to injury, even what has been already saved and invested by older Americans over past years and even over several decades has been erased from these accounts.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-10-18 10:51:402022-10-18 10:51:40Under Democrat Rule Average 401K Plans are Down $34,000, More Than 24% In Less Than A Year
Finally, people are catching on to how our corrupt elites are beholden to China, starting with the first family.
The Biden family received a $5 million interest-free, forgivable loan from a Chinese energy company five years ago, according to FBI evidence. Senator Chuck Grassley called for a pay-to-play corruption investigation. Joe Biden was out of the White House at the time, but a witness said the money was compensation – deliberately deferred – for work Hunter and James Biden did while Joe Biden, who benefitted from the deal, was vice president. A whistleblower who was part of the deal confirmed Joe Biden was personally involved and said the Bidens eventually expected to make billions from the Chinese. The $5 million was eventually sent to entities tied to Hunter and James Biden. Lawyers for those two have declined to answer questions about the deal. Senator Grassley, in calling for an investigation, said the evidence points to potential criminality. Pay-to-play – an investigation would uncover exactly what the Chinese received in exchange for the $5 million forgivable loan. Enquiring minds want to know.
Meanwhile, Joe Biden continues to appoint China sympathizers to the State Department. His latest appointment once told Americans to “embrace China” and worked with Chinese front groups to advance Chinese interests in Washington. Get this – this person is being appointed to a position supposedly created to counter China’s growing influence. Yeah, like that’s going to happen. Talk about the fox guarding the henhouse. This fox joins the other China-sympathizing foxes Biden has appointed to State Department positions.
Currying influence in Washington has paid off for China. U.S. government agencies gave $29 million in joint research grants to Chinese entities in a recent six-year period. The grants came from the CDC, NIH, and Pentagon and went for research into vaccines, drones, and drugs. Sounds pretty benign until you realize the communist Chinese do not distinguish between civilian and military research. All research is military research in China. Talk about giving them the rope to hang us with. We wouldn’t know about this if Republicans hadn’t asked GAO for the information. GAO said in its report there are ways around reporting requirements, so the true extent of U.S. taxpayer money going to China for research is unknown.
But money doesn’t have to go to China for China to get its hands on U.S. research. A new Pentagon study shows China seeks out U.S. companies that get federal research funding and recruits them to perform work for Chinese entities tied to the Chinese military. The U.S. companies betray their own country by selling out to the Chinese, at which point their research is transferred to Chinese subsidiaries. The kinds of research ending up in China this way involve drugs, drones, spacecraft, bio-sensors, solar energy, and a catch-all category ‘military devices’. The Pentagon study concluded China benefits more from our research than we do. People say China can’t innovate, but this is pretty darn clever. Legislation is needed to disqualify U.S. firms that have ties to China and pose this kind of national security risk.
One final note: the CEOs of Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, and Citigroup told Congress last month they would follow U.S. government guidance to refrain from doing business in China if China were to invade Taiwan. But given the forgivable loans, expectations to make billions, and ‘10 percent for the Big Guy’, can you really see Joe Biden giving the CEOs the order to pull out of China? I can’t. That’s just one possible consequence of allowing China to capture our elites. There are others.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-10-18 09:51:222022-10-18 09:51:22Pay-to-Play in the China Swamp
Washington, D.C. — Today the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) submitted a public comment in response to a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) that seeks to significantly alter the physical document examination requirements associated with employment eligibility verification (Form I-9).
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) instituted temporary flexibilities and waived the physical examination of employment and identification documentation for employers facing a sudden and near-total shift to a remote workforce. The Biden administration now seeks the authority, on a discretionary basis, to cement those flexibilities when certain conditions are met.
“Any action taken under the authority provided by this rule, if finalized, will be viewed as an attempt to ease the requirements of employment verification. While a welcome change for employers contending with large-scale remote workforces, it will be abused by bad actors who will hide behind a far easier good faith compliance defense,” wrote Dan Stein, president of FAIR. “With the unprecedented numbers of illegal alien apprehensions and encounters along the southern border and the ever-growing crisis that we are presently witnessing, the demand for work is high, and any attempt to diminish verification will be routinely used by smugglers, traffickers, and unscrupulous employers. Any authority used to weaken document verification requirements will erode the intend of the underlying statute aimed at ensuring that only lawful aliens are eligible to work in the United States.”
Stein also noted that the proposed rule is arbitrary and overly broad. “It fails to justify any policy determination or provide a reasoned analysis at all. Accordingly, this regulatory amendment appears to be a solution in search of a problem. It is patently unclear why DHS believes that this change is necessary and, assuming arguendo that such authority is necessary, why it must be so broad,” said Stein.
“FAIR strongly opposes this proposed rule and urges the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to withdraw it. Instead, DHS should promulgate regulations aimed at enhancing security and anti-fraud measures associated with the employment verification process and continually ensuring that, pursuant to statute, only lawful aliens are able to work in the United States,” concluded Stein in the comment.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-10-18 09:51:202022-10-18 09:51:20Biden Administration’s Attempt to Loosen Document Verification Would Clear the Path for Fraud and Unlawful Employment
