Today's Nutshell

James Taranto, WSJ Best of the Web:

By now it should be clear that the only new idea Obama introduced into American politics was the idea of Obama: Obama the voice of a new generation, Obama the brilliant technocrat, Obama the postracial leader.

The reality of Obama has been quite the opposite. The fresh-faced young leader has governed according to stale old ideas. The dazzling intellect has proved inadequate to basic managerial challenges. We haven't even been able to enjoy the achievement of having elected a black president, because so many of Obama's supporters (though not Obama himself, to his credit) won't shut up about how every criticism of the president and his policies is "racist."

Yet in America's current predicament, there is ample reason for optimism. We'd like to think that the failure of Obama's policies will discredit the bad economic ideas on which they're based, that his incompetence will discredit the notion that the cognitive elite should run the lives of everyone else, and that the phony charges of racism will discredit the long-outdated assumption of white guilt, at last bringing America closet to the ideal of a colorblind society.

This is not to deny that the Obama presidency has been ruinous. But sometimes the costliest mistakes are those from which we learn the most.

I Want A Pin!

Neidermeyer: [to Kent] Redo those buttons! Dress that belt buckle! Straighten that cap! And goddamn it, tuck up those pajamas! Attention! Eyes front! What's that on your chest, mister?

Kent: It's a pledge pin, sir.

Neidermeyer: A pledge pin! On your uniform?

Meh

Chart of the Day:

Today's chart illustrates rallies that followed massive bear markets. For today's chart, a 'massive' bear market is defined as a decline of greater than 50%. Since the Dow's inception in 1896, there have been only three bear markets whereby the Dow declined more than 50% (early 1930s, late 1930s until early 1940s, and during the very recent financial crisis). Today's chart also adds the rally that followed the dot-com bust during which the Nasdaq declined 78%. The current Dow rally has followed a path that is fairly similar to that of post-massive bear market rallies. The initial surge of the current rally lasted nearly 300 trading days and has been trading flat/choppy ever since. If the current rally were to continue to follow the post-massive bear market rally pattern, the current choppy phase would continue for another 200+ trading days.

The Googleopoly

Precursor:

There’s no net "economic" growth or net "job" creation in a “free” Internet sector model -- only: a deflationary price spiral; net negative growth, property devaluation, job losses, and monopolization. Over 20 industries, 200+ US/EU companies, and hundreds of thousands of jobs are at risk from Googleopoly’s anti- competitive price deflationary spiral.

[...]

Google has systematically assembled all the building blocks in the “stack” of necessary capabilities to become the dominant platform of the consumer Internet media ecosystem: a winner take all dynamic; omniscient mission and omni-directional ambition; omnivorous info collection; Internet omnipresence; Internet scalable infrastructure; omnifarious products, services & info types; Internet behavior omniscience; and omnivorous ecosystem share.

[...]

There is more at stake than competition from a global information access bottleneck; Googleopoly threatens economic growth, jobs, privacy, intel. property, a free press, fair elections, cyber-security, & sovereignty.

In other words, er picture . . .

Today's Nutshell

The Wall Street Journal:

To put it another way, the real roots of Mr. Obama's economic problems are intellectual and political. The Administration rejected marginal-rate tax cuts that worked in the 1960s and 1980s because they would have helped the rich, in favor of a Keynesian spending binge that has stimulated little except government. More broadly, Democrats purposely used the recession as a political opening to redistribute income, reverse the free-market reforms of the Reagan era, and put government at the commanding heights of economic decision-making.

Mr. Obama and the Democratic Congress have succeeded in doing all of this despite the growing opposition of the American people, who are now enduring the results. The only path back to robust growth and prosperity is to stop this agenda dead in its tracks, and then by stages to reverse it. These are the economic stakes in November.

Kibbles and Bitch

The President of the United States:

They talk about me like a dog. That's not in my prepared remarks, but it's true.

Well, you have been acting like a whiny bitch lately.

But really, all seriousness aside, let's look at the real dogs:

United States foreign policy
United States immigration policy
United States economic policy
United States education policy
United States Department of Justice
United States health insurance policy
United States housing policy
United States unemployment policy
United States tax policy
United States energy policy

That's your kennel, Mr. President. Those are your dogs. And you are an out of control breeder.

Labor Day

Sent from my iPhone

Posted via email from Sydney's posterous