They always go together, says this insightful editorial on the wacky left wing alternet.org. Now if they would just come around and oppose the welfare part of the welfare-warfare state.
Source link: http://blog.mises.org/5299/inflation-and-war/
Inflation and War
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Well the old liberal ideal that as long as we raise taxes everything will be fine. The government can spend like crazy and everyone will be happy just like in Europe or some other utopia.
The problem is that it is the amount of taxing done but the amount of spending that hurts. Bush is just stupid enough or smart enough to believe that he can do both and get a way with it.
It makes me wonder about the Left. Would they oppose the war if “their guy” was in office? Did they stick their thumb in the air to see which way the public opinion wind was blowing?
In my opinion, it doesn’t really matter, as long as they oppose the war.
Ummm…actually, they already went after the Corporate Welfare State (http://www.alternet.org/columnists/story/38323/). Oh, I forgot, corporate welfare gets a free pass on Mises.org. I wonder why that is?
wow, strong claim. Please please back it up. When or where has Mises.org ever given a free pass to corporate welfare? I need to know since that would violate our raison d’etre.
jeffrey,
If one were to scrutinize mises.org articles in an assholic fashion, any appraisal of a market solution that plays itself out in real life, unfortunately doesn’t stress (heavy enough) the fact that we all use public roads, and therefore stinkers like public good X can be construed as corporate welfare.
But then again, nothing could ever be written.
Fortunately we can be just as pedantic and point out that the word ‘Corporate’ can also mean ‘possessing or existing in bodily form’, therefore these assclowns still support Corporate Welfare for the case of individuals.
But that would be pointless, since these neoliberals support both, but for different ends, even if they deny it, that is what their proposals amount to.
As if welfare isn’t its own corporate lobbyist.
Do these guys even oppose the war?? It seems like they are more concerned about the threat of bankrupting the state coffers than they are with ending the brutal slaughter in Iraq (or Afghanistan, Colombia, or anywhere else). Check out this quote:
“Instead of paying for the war…the mechanics of business and finance — is providing and what is being provided are dangerous dollops of inflation.”
Instead of paying for the war…as they should? It sounds like everything would be hunkydory if the government just raised taxes — because as we all know, taxes are only imposed on the infinitely wealthy rich and not average joes. Sorry, I pay through the teeth in taxes, and I would hardly call myself rich. Here’s an idea, Mr. Alterliberal, END THE WAR. Just say no to war, and just say no to inflation as well! No need to limit yourself to just one or the other. Pay as you go?? They are! Just by diluting the value of our dollar rather than taking the one’s in our pocket. Tax collection is more expensive than running printing presses. Ridiculous. We see the real concern of liberals is truly the health of the state, and not the wealth and prosperity of average Joe. Not even the plight of the average Mo(hammad) is as important as the spector of a bankrupt America! Bomb them to hell — just make sure to tax the rich before you do it!
jeffrey,
With this: “wow, strong claim. Please please back it up. When or where has Mises.org ever given a free pass to corporate welfare? I need to know since that would violate our raison d’etre.”
Posted by: jeffrey at July 10, 2006 10:16 PM
You may want to review the puff-piece that Paul Kirklin wrote, that was posted here, about Wal-Mart, for starters.
ME Hoffer, it won’t do to make a vague reference like that. The Wal-Mart piece heralded a company for its market operations and criticized it for failing to defend itself these grounds. Nowhere has any article on this website defended government subsidies to any business. Show me otherwise and I’ll eat my laptop.
Boy, am I tired of reading about the evils of Wal*Mart on here. How about somebody going after the infinitely more evil economic evils of, say, Boeing, or Lockheed-Martin, two staples of the warfare state?
The other posters are right though – von Hoffman seems unconcerned with the conduct of war, just that the Bush administration has chosen inflation rather than wealth taxation to fund it.
jeffrey,
Would lack of government enforcement of its own rules and regulations qualify as a, de facto, subsidy?
“Wal-Mart piece heralded a company for its market operations”, yet it was strangely mute on two points: 1) its employ of working conditions, well-known and knowable, that would 2) place it at odds with various “anti-dumping” concepts, at the very minimum.
Granted, my constuct is not equivalent to: “Gov’t subsidies are Good.”, but, there is much, more than most, to WMT’s success, owing to pliant USGov “oversight”.
That that the side of the coin would be ignored, in an article so ebulient in praise of Wal-Mart, gives rise to claim(s) made above.
Gary, you really should have picked a stronger example than a satiric Will Durst screed against the excrable flag-burning amendment. It doesn’t even begin to make your point – apparently, unless you cite an article otherwise, the folks at alternet are not anti-war, but are simply irritated that their boy Gore didn’t win and get “credit” for 9/11. You and they are SO p0wned.
M.E.;
Either you ignored my comment, or you think that corporate welfare is just dandy as long as the murdering warmongering corporation at issue employs red-blooded ‘murricans at good union wages. Sounds like more of the same hypocrisy to me, QED.
Vince,
First, your post hit while I was “typing” mine out.
Second, I agree that that MIC is an abomination and if “they” needed funding, “they” should go to the capital, as opposed to Capitol, markets or sally forth new versions of “Liberty bond” drives.
Labor Unions, too, especially those the “service” employees of the State, should, in my view, be properly retired to the ashcan.
If one believes that an organization that avails itself to the utilization of literal slaves should be lionized, I have no retort for them.
In most cases involving corporate welfare, labor interests also support and lobby for the subsidies. The case of government-funded roads is an excellent example, since the construction unions are almost always strong supporters and beneficiaries of the government funding. When money is up for grabs, supposedly disparate interests many times find substantial common ground.
Well, the bomb dropped by ME Hoffer certainly was a dud. His example of corporate welfare that Mises.org supports is the failure to enforce anti-dumping regulations. He seems unaware that anti-dumping regs are themselves a corporate subsidy, instituted and enforced to help large and entrenched domestic producers at the expense of consumers.
M.E.,
Thanks for the reply. Sorry if I was impatient.
You or I would not work for the wages paid to factory workers in China, granted. But what is the alternative – starvation? How does a refusal to buy products of ‘literal’ (but in most cases not actual) slavery help these people?
Et tu, jeffrey?
Kind arbiter, would you deign to take my post(suggestion), in the whole?
Namely: “That that the side of the coin would be ignored, in an article so ebulient in praise of Wal-Mart, gives rise to claim(s) made above.”
What is your need to be bombastic? How, in any regard, could that be construed as leading by example? towit: “Post an intelligent and civil comment”
Did I not preface my remarks with a question seeking clarifying consensus? As well, did I not grant that the perceived error was not evident, on its face, but may be construed?
Yet I’m derided as a clueless bomb thrower?
Your position cannot be so very tenuous, could it?
Dear ME (he said civily) recall that you accused Mises.org of supporting corporate welfare–in the form of a question, yes, but there it was. When someone sugests, in effect, that Mises.org is contradicting its very basis of existence, evidence is needed. Then it turns out that your evidence is Mises.org’s failure to call down the state on those who “dump” products on the market at low prices.
Here is a funny paragraph from MNR on the topic:
“As for ‘unfairly’ low pricing or dumping, this is trumped-up nonsense by American firms who are being out-competed. But if a foreign country should be silly enough to engage in this practice, we should rush to take advantage of it rather than penalizing it. Suppose, for example, that Mexico, by some quirk, decides to “dump” steel by giving it away free, or charging a nominal penny a ton. Instead of barring these goodies, we should applaud as American buyers–in this case steel-using manufacturers–rush to buy these bargains so long as they might last. Until the inevitable day comes when Mexico goes bankrupt and reverses this nutty policy, the American buyers and the consumers will enjoy a bargain bonanza. “Dumping” can harm only the dumper; it always benefits the dumpee.”
Dennis said;
“In most cases involving corporate welfare, labor interests also support and lobby for the subsidies.”
Excellent point – made by this article today;
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/tcarney3.html
By a lot of debate for the simple concept that when a State (left, right, up, down) promises more than can be feasible achieved with limited domestic economic resources, it must turn guns outward. In an effort to provide guns and butter, it incurs debt, which is pays off by issuing more currency, causing inflation, hoped to be offset by that which it plans on taking with the guns.
With a $46 trillion accrual debt (driven by welfarism), and private wealth of $45 trillion, it’s not surprising that guns are blazing in Iraq.
M.E. Hoffer wrote:
Would lack of government enforcement of its own rules and regulations qualify as a, de facto, subsidy?
No. If the government taxes me for 95% of my income, but fails to collect 10% of that, I cannot be said to have received a 10% subsidy of “the government’s money.” This is the same logic employed to conclude that tax breaks are the same as “giving” money to “the rich.”
M.E. further writes:
That that the side of the coin would be ignored, in an article so ebulient in praise of Wal-Mart, gives rise to claim(s) made above.
No it doesn’t. Why not tease out your thoughts and form a cogent argument rather than vague references and suspiciously passive verbs (such as “gives rise to”).
Stop messing around with clouded setences and poetic rambling. Spell out for us in simple, direct English how Mises.org has ever supported corporate welfare over free market principles. (Was that not your initial idea in this thread?). Then we will have something to discuss.
Not exactly related, but I think it is disgusting that they name aircraft carriers after presidents. I think the newest one is called the CVN George H W Bush. Also, putting president’s faces on the money is also pathetic. I remember reading that George Washington never wanted his face on the money.
More to the point, from a defensive perspective, why do we need so many aircraft carriers? I mean, I am willing to concede SOME specialized naval force for coastal defense, but other than aggression around the globe, what good are they all?
“Boy, am I tired of reading about the evils of Wal*Mart on here. How about somebody going after the infinitely more evil economic evils of, say, Boeing, or Lockheed-Martin, two staples of the warfare state?
This article by Timothy P. Carney, posted at LewRockwell.com, should illustrate why the “staples of the warfare state” get close to a blanket exemption:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/tcarney3.html
Mark well his last sentence!
Regarding the use of the likeness of presidents on our coinage, this was not always the case. I believe the practice began in 1909 with the use of (fittingly) Lincoln’s portrait on the penny. Prior to that, virtually every other U.S. coin contained a symbolic female portrait of liberty, the idea that best represents why this country was founded. Or as Rothbard phrased it, the U.S. was “Conceived in Liberty”. And the reference on the coinage was to liberty, and not democracy.
Vince already beat me to it. Sorry about the duplicate posting of the link; I posted my own earlier comment without going through all of the previous comments first.
I apparently confused user names and attributed one post to ME Hoffer that belonged to someone else. So for the record: it was not Hoffer who initiated the spurious complaint that Mises.org is soft on corporate welfare. My apologies.
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