Defending Kim Kardashian

Unlike the majority of us who live relatively boring lives, Kim Kardashian has made a career out of selling the public an up-close-and-personal view of her private affairs. This recently included a rumored farce of a wedding to NBA superstar Kris Humphries, which fizzled after only three days but made the reality star millions.

Ms. Kardashian's financial success hasn't been met warmly by everyone however. According to the Wall Street Journal, an activist group composed of union and left-wing political interests has started a campaign to push for an increase in California's millionaire's tax and is targeting Kardashian directly. Titling themselves "Courage Campaign," this association is dedicated to "bringing progressive change and full equality in California and across the country." In addition to their website TaxKimK.com, the group has created a video to promote their agenda. The video claims that Ms. Kardashian made more than $12 million in 2010 yet only paid 10.3 percent in taxes. That's only "1 percent more" than the 9.3 percent that "middle class" Californians pay.

Like ravenous sharks at the smell of blood, Courage Campaign has its eyes set on more income ripe for plundering through taxation. Their aim is to increase the Golden State's millionaire tax from 10.3 percent to 13.3 percent for income over $1 million and 15.3 percent for income over $2 million. On top of California's already horrendous business climate, this tax will undoubtedly provide more of an incentive for Atlases to do the proverbial shrugging and flee overzealous and overburdening government regulation.

Whether or not you agree with the type of life Kim Kardashian leads is ultimately a question of morality and ethics. However, her ability to attract fans and monetary compensation is something to admire. Unlike the government, Kardashian forces no one to purchase the products she endorses, view her television reality shows, attend her birthday party, or cover her exploits for various media publications. What she gives up in terms of a private life has brought her and her family a financially comfortable standard of living.

But like Frédéric Bastiat's important lesson on accounting for the unseen in economic affairs, the Kardashian tale goes far beyond the millions she rakes in every year. In The Anti-Capitalist Mentality, Mises writes on the importance of capital and savings:

The only source of the generation of additional capital goods is saving. If all the goods produced are consumed, no new capital comes into being. But if consumption lags behind production and the surplus of goods newly produced over goods consumed is utilized in further production process, these processes are henceforth carried out by the aid of more capital goods.… Capital is not a free gift of God or of nature. It is the outcome of a provident restriction of consumption on the part of man. It is created and increased by saving and maintained by the abstention from dissaving.

From the theory of diminishing marginal utility, we know that those with more income are in a better position to add to their saving balances. Money, in addition to being a commodity, acts as a unit of exchange. The more money one accumulates, the more goods and services can be purchased. As demands are met on an individual's priority valuations, it becomes feasible for income to lose its appeal to meet immediate demand in favor of future consumption.

The act of savings both forestalls present consumption and, when placed into a bank or financial institution, adds to the amount of funds available to be lent to aspiring entrepreneurs. With more funds available, longer-term and better methods of production can be sought to increase the supply of consumer goods. In an economy not subject to continual monetary debasement and inflation via a central bank, prices are allowed to fall, thus raising real income for consumers.

Reality stars such as Kim Kardashian aid in this process as their revenue-generating ability allows them to set aside more of their income. This accumulation of savings leaves more money to be invested in base capital, which increases the productive capacity of the economy. This isn't supply-side economics; it's a simple acknowledgement of the scarcity that dominates our world.

The public should always be wary of the motives of those who use emotionally loaded terms like "child healthcare" and "middle-class jobs" to make the case for further taxation. Their object tends not to lie in their admitted goal but with enriching their own ends. Courage Campaign partners with many California labor unions; it only makes sense that they would push for tax increases. More money in the state coffers means more tax funds to throw into an already bloated public sector.

And as economist David Henderson points out, even Courage Campaign's math is disingenuous. If Kardashian does indeed make $12 million a year, she pays about $1.2 million in income taxes compared to the $2,000 the average middle class Californian family with an income of $47,000 pays. The difference between $2,000 and $1.2 million is hardly the "1 percent more" statistic thrown around.

Rather than generating real wealth, Courage Campaign wishes more money to be confiscated from the productive members of the state and given to bureaucrats to divvy how they see fit. But the political class will never be capable of the type of efficiency-driven economic calculation private individuals must utilize when limited in their income earned through voluntary means. If California ever wants to improve its economy, both taxes and public-sector spending must be cut significantly. This in turn frees up more money for the private sector to create jobs fulfilling demand. The government should not be looked at as a job creator but instead as the parasitic institution it is. To really improve the lives of its citizens, California must attract successful individuals like Kim Kardashian, not scare them away with the threat of more thievery.

"Defending Kim Kardashian" by James E. Miller is reprinted from Mises.org.

James E. Miller holds a BS in public administration with a minor in business from Shippensburg University, PA. He is a former staff columnist to the Shippensburg Slate and current contributor to his hometown newspaper, the Middletown Press and Journal. See his blog. See James E. Miller's article archives.

Defending Kim Kardashian is a post from: The Classic Liberal Blog

The Community Organizer in Chief went to Kansas and gave a speech

The Community Organizer in Chief went to Kansas in an effort to portray himself as a modern day Teddy Roosevelt. Unfortunately, people forget that Teddy Roosevelt, in reality, was not a beacon of free market capitalism himself (see MCT post on the subject here).

According to the AP, the speech in Kansas is an opportunity for Obama to offer "a sweeping indictment of economic inequality and unleashed his own brand of prairie populism."

The following are excerpts from Obama's speech:

But for most Americans, the basic bargain that made this country great has eroded. Long before the recession hit, hard work stopped paying off for too many people. Fewer and fewer of the folks who contributed to the success of our economy actually benefited from that success. Those at the very top grew wealthier from their incomes and their investments — wealthier than ever before. But everybody else struggled with costs that were growing and paychecks that weren’t.

The above paragraph reads a lot like lot like this:

The bourgeoisie or capitalists are the owners of capital, purchasing and exploiting labour power, using the surplus value from employment of this labour power to accumulate or expand their capital.

It makes sense that the collectivist Barack Obama would look to emulate Teddy "the consummate Progressive" Roosevelt. No surprise here.

But did you know on the very same day that Obama was invoking progressive hero Teddy Roosevelt, the alleged conservative Newt Gingrich was singing Roosevelt's praises too?

Gingrich To Glenn: 'I'm a Theodore Roosevelt Republican'

I'm a Theodore Roosevelt Republican. In fact, if I were going to characterize my — on health where I come from, I'm a Theodore Roosevelt Republican and I believe government can lean in the regulatory leaning is okay. — Newt Gingrich (the gibberish too).

To some—perhaps many—Republicans, to be a Theodore Roosevelt Republican is quite respectable. Therein lies the rub. If you're the type of (Robert) Taft Republican who values your life, liberty and property — then Teddy Roosevelt, "the guy who started the Progressive Party," and was a proponent of "progressive ideals" — is bad news.

If you didn't already know Newt was bad news; then Glenn Beck makes it abundantly clear.

The Progressive Liberal 'Tea Party' Candidate Newt Gingrich

OK, let's go straight to the legend himself, TR:

"[I]n the days of Abraham Lincoln [the Republican party] was founded as the radical progressive party of the Nation. * * * It remained the Nationalist as against the particularist or State rights party, and in so far it remained absolutely sound; for little permanent good can be done by any party which worships the State's rights fetish or which fails to regard the State, like the county or the municipality as merely a convenient unit for local self-government, while in all National matters, of importance to the whole people, the Nation is to be supreme over State, county, and town alike.

"As to all action of this kind there have long been two schools of political thought, upheld with equal sincerity. . . The course I followed, of regarding the executive as subject only to the people, and, under the Constitution, bound to serve the people affirmatively in cases where the Constitution does not explicitly forbid him to render service, was substantially the course followed by both Andrew Jackson and Abraham Lincoln.

"When I was inaugurated on March 4, 1905, I wore a ring . . . containing the hair of Abraham Lincoln.. . . I often thereafter told John Hay that when I wore such a ring on such an occasion I bound myself more than ever to treat the Constitution, after the manner of Abraham Lincoln, as a document which put human rights above property rights when the two conflicted.. . . . I believed in invoking the National power with absolute freedom for every National need. . . " [Theodore Roosevelt: an Autobiography (New York: Macmillan Company, 1913) pp. 381–382, 394–395, 420 (emphasis added)].

Yeah, I'd say TR fan Gingrich is a progressive liberal.

"Sort of makes it clear what our choices might be come November 2012, eh?"

Yet, Progressive Cap and Trader Newt Leads in the polls ... Go figure.

So much for the Tea Party revolution, eh?

I'll let Minnesota Republican and presidential candidate, Michele Bachmann, take it from here

[Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney are] the great pretenders right now because they're trying to pretend and talk and walk like they're conservatives when… they hardly have a conservative record. Both of them have real problems in their background with the pro-life issue. Both of them supported the $700 billion Wall Street bailout. Both of them were in favor of the climate change reg-legislation. They both were for advocating for – or at least was advocating for Freddie Mac. [Gingrich] was on the take… And they have a serious problem on ObamaCare among a lot of other issues. They were the father and the grandfather of the ObamaCare legislation.

Seriously, if you're thinking of voting for one of these 2 bozos, do us all a favor and sit out, or at least vote for Barack Obama instead. Otherwise, drop your "limited-government" rhetoric and be honest with the rest of us ... by admitting you love the state every bit as much as the left.

Let's hope Obama wins a second term!

Because otherwise, we'll have merely hit the "re-set" button again – and can expect a much worse situation – from the standpoint of liberty – by the next election cycle in 2016.

Reason? A Newtie (or Romney) presidency will be taken as a "conservative" presidency, implying a liberty-minded presidency, when as we all ought to know by now, it will in fact be another authoritarian-statist-corporatist presidency. Which have the effect of further delegitimizing liberty in the mind of the average American, who already rightly equates Republican "conservatism" with everything foul.

No, a much better tactic – if you value liberty - would be to sit this one out and let Obama run the train off the cliff. It is going off the cliff regardless – but it will matter, in terms of public perception, who is the engineer when it does. If either Newtie or Romney becomes the engineer, then the public will blame "right wing" ideology and politics – which will be equated with limited government politics – even though it will in fact be more of the same-same authoritarian politics that we would have been on the receiving end of under Obama's "leadership."

So, let's let him lead.

Nothing fundamental will change anyhow; merely the superficial appearance.

If Obama is re-appointed Frontman we'll still get more and bigger (and meaner) government, to be sure. But then he will own the whole stinking mess. And instead of being played by the ongoing WWF match of "liberals" vs. "conservatives" the public – enough of the public to make the difference, at least - may finally demand a real alternative.

Someone like Ron Paul, even.

But if we get Newtie or Romney, what will happen is four more years of war, fearmongering, diddling of our civil liberties and ruination of the economy – all building to a crescendo of disgust and anger about three years later, at which point a new messiah will be trotted out promising to "change Washington." The exhausted, bewildered masses will rally to his flag, especially if he is a glib, personally attractive messiah. The "conservatives" will be routed; the new Messiah installed.

And we will get four more years.

And then the cycle will re-set.

And repeat.

SSDD. And whether you wish to admit it or not, you know it's true.

How much more of this are you willing to take? Are your "leaders" more important than you?

This just in ...

Rush Limbaugh Proclaims Progressive Idealists are the Only True Conservatives

The man can't be parodied.

So what prompted Limbaugh to proclaim himself and fellow talk radio hosts the only true conservatives? The fact that some conservative journalists are criticizing Newt Gingrich. "No matter where you look in the Republican establishment media today, there looks to be a coordinated attack on Mr. Newt," he said. "I'm not gonna mention any names because you know when I do, all I do is elevate these people." If that quote and the excerpt above are any indication, Gingrich and Limbaugh have now bonded over their unseemly, egomaniacal delusions of grandeur.

When I predicted that Gingrich would be ruinous for the Tea Party I had no idea it would happen this quickly. The most powerful broadcaster in the conservative movement is already carrying water for the new Republican frontrunner just like he admitted to doing during the Bush administration.

It makes sense, in a way.

If you have to support a devious, flip-flopping Washington insider who co-sponsored 418 bills with Pelosi to be a "conservative," then the conservative label is dead. Either Rush Limbaugh, the Tea Party movement, or both are about to "jump the shark."

So, which one will it be?

The Tea Party rev­o­lu­tion that wasn't ...

Continuing some thoughts I expressed in the comments on this post here, the Tea Party movement is tragically embarrassing itself.

Outside of a brief flirtation with Michele Bachmann, the Tea Parties have thrown their support behind candidates who require them to betray their own core principles.

Support TARP? Check. Support bailouts? Check. Support money-printing (stimulus)? Check. Support crank Keynesian economic theory? Check. Support socialized healthcare? Check. Support "active government?" Check. Need I continue?

Adherence to the Constitution (the law of the land)? We ain't got time for that now. Liberty? That's so like, yesterday. What we need is a strongman, er, "leader" to follow!

I know, I know, you're a super-​​serious-​​realist and what­not. But what, may I ask, are you being realistic about? Reversing the growth of government? Don't make me laugh.

The con­ser­v­a­tive move­ment, including it's Tea Party faction, has become rud­der­less, drift­ing any which way the Estab­lish­ment blows them. It has no con­vic­tions of it's own. Nothing it refuses to compromise. So, it should be no surprise to anyone why the coun­try keeps leaping rapidly left­ward ... Because as wrong as they certainly are, at least, unlike the grassroots right, the left­wing base has conviction.

You can let polls do your thinking for you. You can let the media do your thinking for you. You can jump on a bandwagon because somebody told you that a candidate is the only "practical" alternative to Mitt Romney, or tell yourself ... that Newt's the only GOP candidate who can beat Obama next year.

Or you can think for yourself and tell all the pundits and pollsters to go straight to hell.

As for me, I remember October 2009, when Tea Party activists were doing everything they could to help Doug Hoffman win the NY-23 special election, and Newt Gingrich went on TV — over and over and over again — to praise Dede Scozzafava as the best choice for conservatives. -- Stacy "The Other" McCain

More on Newt Gingrich's progressive hero Teddy Roosevelt:

• How Theodore Roosevelt Changed America for the Worse ...
• Retire Progressive John McCain!
• John McCain's Mission to Destroy the GOP!

More on Newt Gingrich and the Tea Party:

• Why a Newt Gingrich Candidacy Would Doom the Tea Party
• If Gingrich is the answer, Tea Party has failed
• Gingrich rise is a sign tea party movement is destroying itself
• Newt Gingrich is no conservative
• Newt Gingrich Is No Libertarian
• The Truth Is That Newt Gingrich Is Not A Real Conservative
• Newt Gingrich: Serial Hypocrisy
• 'Conservative' Newt's New Deal
• The Real Newt Gingrich
• Newt Gingrich: The Un-Conservative

Newt Gingrich: Progressive “Tea Party” Candidate is a post from: The Classic Liberal Blog

I find a large percentage of committed Republican 2012 presidential voters to be hypocritical and dangerous. -- Bungalow Bill

The commitment to individual liberty exhibited by the majority of Tea Partiers and other so-called conservatives is basically, well, zilch. Their real commitment is to the Republican Party. That's why any old Establishment figure offering nothing but cheap rhetoric and "amazing" 57-point plans which promise to calibrate statism continue to lead Republican polls.

Newt Gingrich in a Nutshell

ABC News and Yahoo sponsored a round of interviews with the Republican presidential candidates earlier this month. Here's Newt's response when he was asked what other graven image he thought should adorn Mount Rushmore.

Who should be the fifth president on Mount Rushmore?

Gingrich: I'll go for five and six: F.D.R. and Reagan.

Yes, you read that correctly. Newt Gingrich wants to honor Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the very man whom the modern conservative movement rose to fight against. See: FDR and the Collectivist Wave.

The FDR legacy is not individualism, and it's certainly not liberty. FDR's legacy is that of crushing property rights, constructing huge public works programs, printing money, confiscating gold, massive unemployment, and unprecedented government intervention and power. FDR is the very symbol of the leviathan state. He represents everything conservatives profess they oppose.

In other words, he wants to honor conservatives most fearsome enemy.

There is nothing conservative about Newt Gingrich.

• News Flash: Gingrich Not Conservative
• Under his skirt, Newt Gingrich is revealed to be a bankster operative
• Gingrich Latest Phony to Rise in Polls
• The Real Newt Gingrich – Outting The Radical Progressive Republican – Videos

Battered-Conservative Syndrome

How Bad Do Things Have To Get? When will enough be enough?

Our founding generations went to war over fewer regulations, significantly lower taxes, and fewer rights infringed than what we deal with, yet we're afraid to cast our single, statistically insignificant vote, for anyone we haven't been all but assured (by the Establishment) can "win?" Really?

Have conservatives learned to love the leviathan state? Or have they simply lost their balls? Either way, it's a sad state of affairs indeed.

Newt Gingrich has betrayed conservatives so many times, it's a wonder how anyone gets away with calling him a conservative. He betrayed conservatives on global warming. In 2009, he supported the ACORN and WFP linked Dede Scozzafava over conservative Doug Hoffman, then scolded the Tea Partiers for "purge[ing] the party" of leftists. But these barely scratch the surface, because Newt Gingrich has a long list of radically statist agendas he's pushed for over the years, and nothing has changed his ay of thinking.

Newt Gingrich: Progressive

Newt Gingrich, a progressive conservative who wants government to shape a brave new world

But what would Newt replace the welfare state with? Most American conservatives of a traditionalist or libertarian hue (those folks waving signs at Tea Party rallies) would simply demolish it and leave it at that. But Gingrich's conservatism is more technocratic and it echoes many of the themes of the early 20th-century Progressive movement, which tried to improve America through governmental and social reform. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, he argued that the welfare state should be replaced with an "opportunity society". For every problem and corresponding program that the welfare state addressed, he urged conservatives to come up with an alternative "new idea". To be sure many of these "new ideas" were conservative in flavour (privatised Social Security, tax cuts, term limits). Conceptually, however, Gingrich remained wedded to the belief that government could and should promote economic opportunity and healthy living. He told Mother Jones Magazine, "I believe in a lean bureaucracy, not in no bureaucracy. You can have an active, aggressive conservative state which does not in fact have a centralised bureaucracy." Gingrich's role model was progressive Republican reformer Teddy Roosevelt. "We have not seen an activist conservative presidency since TR," he said.

One of Gingrich's new ideas was to hand out government-subsidised laptops to the poor. The role of technology was crucial to Newt's thinking. Unlike traditionalist conservatives (the guys who hunt Saturday and pray Sunday), Gingrich calls himself a "conservative Futurist". It's a staple of Right-wing thinking that the past holds all the answers, but Gingrich has faith in tomorrow. On November 11, 1994, he told his fellow Congressional Republicans that he was a believer in the "third wave" theory of history. According to this view, societies evolve in turn with technological/economic change, and America was in the process of shifting from an industrial society to a consumer-orientated, high-tech one. Rather than bemoaning the associated loss of jobs and identity, Newt urged Republicans to embrace the future – to use government to reach the stars and spread the revolution across the universe. He made a further, surprising statement: "I do not believe Republicans or the Congress have a monopoly on solving problems and helping America make the transformation necessary to enter the Third Wave information revolution. Democratic mayors … are making real breakthroughs at the city level. Some of the best of Vice President [Al] Gore's efforts to reinvent government nibble in the right direction."

President Barack Obama promised to "fundamentally change America" too. How's that working out for you so far? Do you really want another "transformation," this time into Newt's "Third Wave?"

Are you sure? Because, now call me crazy, but I liked the way America was before everyone began thinking they could "immanentize the eschaton" via government.

See: How Teddy Roosevelt Changed America (for the worse), and The Progressive Assault on America’s Founding Principles.

Newt's Crazy Prophet

Alvin Toffler: Newt Gingrich's Reverend Wright

Newt Gingrich is not loyal to America folks, make no mistake about it. This man is a one world communist advocate and his every action in public life, despite all the "conservative" publicity stunts, prove this point explicitly. Like Larry McDonald said, Newt is not to be trusted. From a recent New American article,

In 1994, Gingrich described himself as "a conservative futurist". He said that those who were trying to define him should look no farther than The Third Wave, a 1980 book written by Alvin Toffler. The book describes our society as entering a post-industrial phase in which abortion, homosexuality, promiscuity, and divorce are perfectly normal, even virtuous. Toffler penned a letter to America's "founding parents," in which he said: "The system of government you fashioned, including the principles on which you based it, is increasingly obsolete, and hence increasingly, if inadvertently, oppressive and dangerous to our welfare. It must be radically changed and a new system of government invented---a democracy for the 21st century." He went on to describe our constitutional system as one that "served us so well for so long, and that now must, in its turn, die and be replaced."

Are you with me so far? When asked what he believed in, he pointed people to this Alvin Toffler guy. In fact, Newt wrote the forward to Toffler's book, Creating a New Civilization: The Politics of the Third Wave. He's not just a fan, he's really, really into the Third Wave, ok?

In 1995, he gave a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Affairs:

"The American challenge in leading the world is compounded by our Constitution," he said. "Under our [constitutional system] — either we're going to have to rethink our Constitution, or we're going to have to rethink our process of decision-making." He went on to profess an oxymoronic belief in "very strong but limited federal government," and pledged, "I am for the United Nations."

Newt Gingrich, the technocratic kook, is "conservative?" ... Yeah, and monkeys might fly out of my butt.

Disagreement is one thing, it's what happens when any two or more people walk into a room. But that's not what we're talking about here. Newt Gingrich represents a radically different approach toward organizing society and governing philosophy than anything even remotely considered conservative. Just like Obama, Newt's a radical interventionist.

Should we be trading our principles for electability? Of course not, but a vote for Newt Gingrich is much worse than that. A vote for Newt Gingrich is a rejection of American conservatism itself.

‘Conservative’ Newt’s New Deal is a post from: The Classic Liberal Blog

Continously caught red-handed at the center of crisis after crisis, but none dare question the "wise" and "benevolent" Fed. The dollars we work so hard for buy us less and less in return everyday, but none dare question the sole manufacturer of those dollars - the Fed. Wrong on every prediction and prescription ever made, the Fed chairman continues to grow in stature ... because none dare question the Fed.

A relic of Woodrow Wilson's Progressive Era, the necessity, no, the magistery of the Federal Reserve continues to go unchalleneged. Printing money, playing with interest rates, loaning trillions of dollars to their cronies and foreign banks ... We serfs obediently accept the unimaginable power and tricks of our masters. The Fed Chairman is, at least we've come to believe, our own personal Wizard of Oz!

The following essay by Victor Sperandeo published in The American Spectator, tells the truth about the Federal Reserve, and how communists saw the central bank as key to destroying capitalism.

The Fed's Philosopher King

Having one man control the money supply of 311 million Americans is itself a fantastic and unreal notion. When you then consider the effects of the U.S. Dollar on the remaining 6.6 billion people on this planet, the idea becomes unimaginable.

Meet Ben Bernanke: the dollar's whimsical "Philosopher King," and the Chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve. He is arguably the most powerful person in the world, with powers far surpassing those imagined when his position was created. Who knew the Fed Chairman could become so influential?

Well, perhaps there are some who foresaw the potential. In the Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx listed ten absolute principles for overturning capitalism. Number five on his list is the most relevant when discussing the Federal Reserve: "Centralization of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly."

Even the early Communists acknowledge this as a path to destruction, to say nothing of the Founders. Who does King Ben answer to? He is not an elected official. Where does a man who makes multi-trillion dollar bets and has control of the world reserve currency and its printing presses get such authority?

Chairman Bernanke only indirectly answers to the President. He can be impeached for a crime, but not for incompetence. The President appoints the Chairman, but once confirmed neither the Federal Reserve Chairman nor the Federal Reserve Governors can be removed for their policy views. So, like a union worker, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) can't be fired. All the Chairman has to do to get reappointed is help get the President reelected.

If you think the rest of the FOMC has any oversight on the Chairman, think again. As the anointed "sun king of currency," no Federal Reserve Chairman can long tolerate discord in his ranks. The pressure for the FOMC members to follow the lead of the Chairman is immense.

Granting the power to print an unlimited amount of paper "money" to one unelected individual is like playing monetary Russian roulette with a Glock ...

Read the whole thing here: The Fed's Philosopher King

Related:

• Breaking Down the Bernanke Speech
• Gold Is A Girl's Best Friend (& bona fide)
• The Fed as the U.S. Economy’s New Central Planner

The Ben Bernanke Manifesto is a post from: The Classic Liberal Blog

Krugman calls for space aliens to fix U.S. economy?

Ken Rogoff: Infrastructure spending, if it were well-spent, that's great. I'm all for that. I'd borrow for that, assuming we're not paying Boston Big Dig kind of prices for the infrastructure.

Fareed Zakaria: But even if you were, wouldn't John Maynard Keynes say that if you could employ people to dig a ditch and then fill it up again, that's fine, they're being productively employed, they'll pay taxes, so maybe Boston's Big Dig was just fine after all.

Paul Krugman: Think about World War II, right? That was actually negative social product spending, and yet it brought us out.

I mean, probably because you want to put these things together, if we say, "Look, we could use some inflation." Ken and I are both saying that, which is, of course, anathema to a lot of people in Washington but is, in fact, what basic logic says.

It's very hard to get inflation in a depressed economy. But if you had a program of government spending plus an expansionary policy by the Fed, you could get that. So, if you think about using all of these things together, you could accomplish a great deal.

If we discovered that space aliens were planning to attack and we needed a massive buildup to counter the space alien threat and really inflation and budget deficits took secondary place to that, this slump would be over in 18 months. And then if we discovered, oops, we made a mistake, there aren't any aliens, we'd be better –

Ken Rogoff: And we need Orson Welles, is what you're saying.

Paul Krugman: No, there was a Twilight Zone episode like this in which scientists fake an alien threat in order to achieve world peace. Well, this time...we need it in order to get some fiscal stimulus.

Here's the video.

Folks, this is what passes for "logic" in global Ruling Class circles. Let's see ... 1) destroying lives and assets in war creates an economic boom; 2) the mere act of printing dollars (inflation) creates wealth; and 3) spending money defending against a fake space alien threat can revive the economy.

In the words of Robert Wenzel, "total madness."

Total madness that fails to understand that wealth and a growing economy are created by increased production, not spending on non-existent space aliens.

Put me down as against government spending against non-existent space aliens.

If only the world operated like Krugman's fantasy-land, huh? There would be no need for productive work, no need to accumulate capital, no need for anything other than a printing press and some space to move around. I mean, why dig ditches and fill them back up when you can simply pay people to take a walk? Then to really get rich, we can start a war.

Talk about quackery. Yet this is what passes for mainstream "respectable" economics these days. And this quackery is why Bernanke just pledged to screw your grandmother for at least 2 more years (and your children until their last dying breath).

Can 'Space Aliens' Save Us?

According to Krugman and his "progressive" co-thinkers, if the US engaged in constant warfare, and employed the non-military population in the "work" of digging holes and filling them back up again, we could achieve permanent prosperity. Just keep those government printing presses – or, today, pixels on a computer screen – running at top speed. Contemplating Krugman's farrago of fiscal fallacies, I can't help but think of Garet Garrett's prescient remark, made in 1950, that

"War becomes an instrument of domestic policy. Among the control mechanisms on the government's panel board now is a dial marked War. It may be set to increase or decrease the tempo of military expenditures, as the planners decide that what the economy needs is a little more inflation or a little less — but of course never any deflation. And whereas it was foreseen that when Executive Government is resolved to control the economy it will come to have a vested interest in the power of inflation, so now we may perceive that it will come also to have a kind of proprietary interest in the institution of perpetual war."

Many conservatives who are now coming to question the vast expenditures it takes to maintain our overseas empire of bases and "interests" do so in the name of fiscal austerity. However, lurking just beneath the surface of this economic objection is the suspicion that the Warfare State is just another aspect of the Janus-faced Welfare State – and that one makes the other possible. Krugman's remarks confirm this, which is why one should always listen very carefully to one's political enemies.

War and inflation are the twin Harpies, the twin miseries of the modern world, and it's no accident – as the old-timey Marxists used to say – that the advent of modern warfare, the Great War, was visited upon the world at the same time the US Federal Reserve came into existence.

How else could one wage warfare on that kind of unprecedented scale without expending unprecedented sums of money – conjured out of thin air? The Fed gave the War Party a blank check – which they proceeded to cash, and are still cashing, rolling up record deficits.

"War becomes an instrument of domestic policy" – the conservative Garrett, a former editor of the Saturday Evening Post and a stalwart of the pre-WWII opposition to the New Deal, saw the Age of Obama coming from a long way off.

David Kramer on Krugman the Crank's Keynesian space alien quackery.

Krugman Says War Is Good for an Economy

And he's all smiles about it too! He also admits that World War II was "negative for social product spending," but it was still good because it got us out of the Depression. (So I guess Krugman has read Bob Higgs, he just doesn't hold Bob's negative opinion. Spoken like a true Bankster puppet.) He also says we need some inflation. Sure, higher prices are just what the poor people who "liberal" Krugman "cares" so much about really need.

In related news ...

The End of Bretton Woods

It's good to see the birthday of fiat money getting attention today. Mises.org covers it, and LRC too. Lewis Lehrman offers a fascinating story of the Camp David meeting where the gold window was shut and where a handful of Nixon aides decided to impose wage and price controls at the same time. Very chilling material here. I'm particularly intrigued at the passing mention of Nixon's own demand for a unified front. These economic advisers had to be for it all even if they were against it all. It's a real look into the heart of how every regime works.

More on Paul Krugman and the Space Aliens:

• Paul Krugman Calls for Space Aliens to Attack Earth Requiring Massive Defense Buildup to Stimulate Economy
• Paul Krugman’s Suggestion to End the Economic Slump: Mobilize for a Space Alien Attack
• Paul Krugman's jobs program for aliens
• Krugman: You know what this economy needs? A space alien invasion!
• VIDEO - Krugman Wants To Create A Keynesian-Infused Space Alien Economic Bubble To Revive U.S. Economy

Paul Krugman and the Menace from Outer Space is a post from: The Classic Liberal Blog