Author: George Noga

Lives of Quiet Desperation

George Noga

By: George Noga – February 15, 2013

      You could see it in their faces; the look was unmistakable. I noticed it throughout our trip but it was confirmed by Mario on our final day in Europe. My wife and I were staying in Paris and took a hotel shuttle to the airport. We were the only 2 passengers on the shuttle van for the 30 minute ride and immediately struck up a conversation with Mario, our driver.

     Mario, age 33, was trilingual and personable. We soon learned he was from Italy where he  had completed his schooling but moved to France because there were no jobs in Italy. His job driving the shuttle van had zero possibility for upward mobility and he expected to remain in the same menial, monotonous position his entire working life. He was living with his girlfriend but stated he had no intention ever to marry; he was adamant about never having children. He had already begun to think about his pension which was at least a quarter century in the future.

     Contemplate Mario’s situation. He left his native country and family for a low paying, dead end job in another country where he never would totally belong. He already had driven the van for 14 years and was facing another 29 years – a total of 60,000 hotel/airport round trips. He would subsist perpetually on the economic fringe of society, eschewing wife and children. Yet, according to his calculus, this hardscrabble existence was better than the life he left behind in Italy. Multiply Mario by tens of millions of others in Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece and elsewhere and you will begin to understand the magnitude of the quiet desperation I witnessed.

“We are a lost generation for sure.”

    Take Carlos from Madrid, who was quoted in a recent Bloomberg report. He graduated from university but faced Spain’s 52% unemployment rate for those under age 25. He now washes and chops vegetables for a salad bar in London. Of the 17 employees, 13 are from Spain, including 3 from Carlos’s university. “We are a lost generation for sure“, Carlos stated.

     As bad as the situation is currently, it is certain to get far worse as governments and central banks impose anti-growth policies including massive tax hikes and pile on ever more onerous regulations. Even the courts add to the perdition. The European Court of Justice just ruled workers who don’t feel well during vacations are entitled to a paid makeup vacation day for every day they were ill. Meanwhile, thanks to many millions like Mario and Carlos, Europe’s demographics are imploding. Unfortunately, Europe’s problems have reached the USA.

America is Becoming More Like Europe

    More and more Americans are working part time and in low wage jobs. Our unemployment rate is 15% when including involuntary part-time workers. Unemployment for those under age 25 is higher at 16% and that number is set to soar as ObamaCare kicks in and the cost of insuring full time workers skyrockets. America gradually is descending into a low wage, part-time economy with stagnant growth accompanied by decreasing social mobility.

     Obama’s policies fix these trends in place for at least the next 5 years – 4 more years of Obama and at least one year to change course. The high rate of government spending, massive debt, huge deficits and higher taxes are certain to result in tepid economic growth. We will be  lucky to average 2% growth per year and to avoid recession and/or an  existential debt crisis.

     In short, the youth (and increasingly the middle class) of America are becoming more like Mario and Carlos. They will be part of a lost generation and it is just a matter of time until we will begin to see the unmistakable looks of quiet desperation in our children’s faces.

Clinging to the Global Warming Religion

George Noga

By: George Noga – February 1, 2013

      Why do some people still cling to the man-made global warming myth? As the headline above suggests, it has transmogrified into a religion. As all religions, it is based on faith in things unseen; it has its high priests and dogma. It is replete with its own sacraments (bio-fuel, windmills, ethanol) and demons (coal, oil, CO2). As a religion its core beliefs are unassailable and impervious to all countervailing facts and logic. It is harsh toward apostates, labeling them deniers. However, its high priests and numeraries succumb to all the usual temptations of money, power, politics and arrogance.

     Their co-coreligionists, i.e. the state sycophant media, serve as enablers by their grotesquely distorted reporting. Let’s examine recent reportage (and non reportage) to see how this works.

  • An acolyte of the warmist religion recently emailed me, gleefully citing a media story about the melting of the polar ice cap. That’s true enough insofar as it goes. However, the media never report that the antarctic ice cap has been increasing for many years. And oh by the way, the antarctic ice cap is 10 times larger that its arctic counterpart.
  • Recently the media have been flogging the story about 2012 being the hottest year in the lower 48 states by a full degree Fahrenheit. Again, a true statement. But did the media report 2008 was cooler than 2006 by 2 degrees? Did they report 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011 all were cooler than 1998 by a greater margin than 2012 was hotter than 1998? Did they note the continental US is only 1.58% of  earth’s land mass?
  • It is an uncontested fact there has been no warming trend for the past 16 years. So, what does the media do? They glom on to the fact that the decade including 1998 was the warmest on record. Given 1998 was the hottest year, it follows statistically almost automatically the same decade would be the warmest decade. This media misdirection is solely to assuage readers’ anxiety from unwanted facts counter to their religion.
  • What the media ignore can be equally significant. The US Department of Energy reports US CO2 emissions are the lowest in 20 years (by 14%) despite 50 million more people. You didn’t read this in your local paper because these incredible gains result from free market hydraulic fracking and not windmills, solar or government diktats. By the way, have the media reported it has been nearly 2,300 days since a Cat 3 storm hit the USA? So much for climate change and the purported increase in extreme weather events.
  • Arguably the greatest failure of the global warming religion (and its media stooges) is to account for temperature readings from planets and moons in our solar system. NASA has taken readings from several bodies over many years and they closely track changes in Earth’s temperature. Unless there are CO2 belching SUVs on Mars and Triton, this can mean only one thing: temperature changes result from solar activity. When faced with such overwhelming evidence, warmists do what one would expect – they totally ignore it.

       Thus far I have failed to mention the ultimate apostasy, i.e. the amount of warming now projected for the remainder of the century is a net benefit to mankind. I am going to miss the warming religion when its final adherent figuratively closes the door and turns out the lights much as I have come to miss the former Soviet Union. They have much in common. Both were religions based on deeply flawed premises; they became funny (in a pathetic way) as their stars faded. And, they were such inviting targets to write about. But religions never die and there are a few die-hard commies around as there will be a similar number of warmists in a few years.

Note to readers: We have tweaked the format slightly and also added more social media sharing options which now include: email, Twitter, Facebook and Linked-in; The links are at the very top of the posting.

IPCC: Global Warming Vastly Overstated

George Noga

IPCC Draft Report: Global Warming is Minimal and a Net Benefit to Mankind!

By: George Noga – January 24, 2013

    The (“IPCC”) or United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the very same folks who perpetrated the man-made global warming hoax on the world, is poised to release its Fifth Assessment Report later this year. A draft has leaked; it is posted on the Internet for all to see. I have read much of it and it is pure dynamite.

     Scientists who reviewed the draft, state that data contained therein lead inexorably to the four  observations listed below. Please be forewarned however; as always, the final report will be highly politicized. Its summary and conclusions will contradict data buried in the body of the report. The media and warmists will selectively extract data and quotes solely for scare purposes. Despite this dissembling, the conclusions are:

  1. There has been no warming for the past 16 years.
  2. Computer models used in the past to predict disaster are invalid.
  3. There will be a rise of only 1 degree Celsius between now and 2100.
  4. There will be a net benefit to mankind from this amount of warming.

        It was simple long ago to conclude man did not cause warming in any significant measure. NASA had many years of accurate readings from several planets and moons in our solar system showing their temperature changes tracked closely with earth’s. Ergo, it had to be a solar phenomenon which man could not possibly be causing.

Kyoto and Carbon Dioxide

  The world little noticed, but the Kyoto Protocol on climate change expired at the end of 2012. So, just how successful was it and how did the United States (which did not sign the treaty) fare compared to the self righteous countries that did and castigated the US? Japan promised a 6% CO2 reduction but experienced a 7% increase for a net negative margin of 13%, and this from a nation losing population and in a generation-long economic slump.

  Australia experienced a negative CO2 margin of 56% – bummer! Our neighbor, Canada, a rabid Kyoto supporter, had a margin of negative 30%. The Netherlands had a negative margin of 26%. The European Union as a whole met its target due solely to three factors: (1) economic stagnation; (2) rigging the starting date to coincide with the collapse of communism; and (3) the related closure of grossly inefficient Soviet era power plants and industries. Meanwhile, Uncle Sam had an increase over the past 20 years of only 10% despite economic development and population growth that vastly surpassed most of the world.

Europe Back to the Stone Age; Pineapples in Alaska

   Global warming has attained the status of a religion in Europe. And religions don’t die. Zoroastrianism, which faded away over 1,000 years ago, still has hundreds of thousands of adherents. Europeans believe warming could drive them back to the stone age. They may be right, just not the way they envision it. Their misplaced faith in global warming – not warming itself – could result in much of Europe reverting to a Neolithic lifestyle.

     European Union law mandates an 80% cut in CO2 emissions by 2050. In Britain, many industries face a 140% increase in energy costs by 2020. Planned offshore wind farms will cost Britons $10,000 per person. France and Germany with massive shale resources ban exploration. Germany has half the photovoltaic capacity on the planet even though a top German utility executive compares this to growing pineapples in Alaska. Europe is destroying the foundation of its prosperity because of obeisance to a dead religion – not to mention that it also is going bankrupt from unsustainable debt and social programs. Zoroastrianism may be a better choice.

Climate Religion, Zoroastrianism and Polar Bears

  The climate religion is dead. The IPCC report should be the final nail in its coffin. Yet I suspect many of its acolytes will continue to cling to it much like modern day Zoroastrians. The same pantheon of gods (IPCC) that giveth, now taketh away. There is no significant man made global warming and there never was! To the very limited extent (1 degree Celsius between now and 2100) solar caused warming may exist, it is a boon to the human race.

  Much or all of what adherents to the warmist religion ever believed is wrong about, inter alia, CO2 emissions, ethanol subsidies, rising sea levels, biofuels, melting ice caps, ocean temperatures, hurricanes, green energy, fossil fuels and polar bears whose record numbers continue to proliferate. Please don’t forget the polar bears!

Guns and Schools Revisited

George Noga

Guns and Schools – Part 3

By: George Noga – January 17, 2013

      My recent miniseries on guns and schools was among the most forwarded of all time; reader response was incredibly favorable (thank you) and heavy. Given the strong reader interest, I am reprising the topic for what I trust is the final time. I covered much ground in the prior posts whereas in this one I hone in on the quintessence of the issue.
“The greatest cause of school killings is untreated mental illness
which exists for one reason, and one reason only: liberal dogma.”
      Far and away, the greatest causal factor in mass school killings is untreated severe mental illness  particularly of those prone to violence. Mental health experts estimate there are 70,000 such people in the USA today. This situation exists for one reason only: liberal dogma. Progressive groups, led by the ACLU, prevent states from passing laws that force treatment or, if necessary, institutionalize the severely mentally ill. Connecticut is among the very worst.
      It wasn’t always this way. Due to some bona fide concerns about abuses in mental facilities, but mainly due to a twisted and perverted notion about individual rights that became a canon of progressivism in the 1960s, mental hospitals were emptied. Since that time, beds in public psychiatric hospitals have shrunk by 90% despite an increase of 140 million people. Another byproduct of compliance with this liberal shibboleth is homelessness; a vast majority of which are comprised of such unfortunate souls; the same is largely true of prisons.
     Rich Lowry, editor of National Review, framed the issue in a compelling manner; he said, “Imagine the national outrage if people with Alzheimer’s were permitted to wander about the streets uncared for. But, by some perverse logic, it’s considered okay for schizophrenics.” Let’s sum up. The severely (potentially violent) mentally ill go untreated, wander among the general population, become homeless, populate our prisons and are condemned to tortured, miserable lives – all in obeisance to the liberal religion. Oh yes, and when there is a school shooting by one of these tortured souls, they blame it all on guns – also in obeisance to liberal religion.
“The severely mentally ill go untreated, wander the streets, become homeless, populate our prisons and are condemned to tortured, miserable lives – and all in obeisance to the liberal religion.”
      The second greatest causal factor in school killings is the copycat effect. Most people don’t understand just how real this phenomenon is. In fact, it is about as old as the media itself. In 1774 Goethe wrote his classic “The Sorrows of Young Werther” in which the hero committed suicide in a certain manner. Following publication, there was a spate of identical suicides throughout Europe – and this at a time of low population when few read and news was local and moved glacially. Today there are over 7 billion people (all interconnected), the media is global and pervasive and news moves at the speed of light. Oh yes, and when there is a copycat school killing, the media blame it all on guns – all the while flogging the story for all it’s worth.
      Yes, there also are some other causes (see the first two parts of this series), although guns is not one of them. Nevertheless, untreated severe mental illness and the copycat effect are, by a large measure, the two leading causes. Both result directly from the liberal religious creed and are propagated by liberal institutions. That explains why they reflexively point to guns as the cause – to shift opprobrium from themselves and onto a standard liberal demon – guns.
     All the while, they fully understand the flap over guns is an ephemeron and that there will be no changes to gun laws. One of the few, if any, bipartisan consensuses in Congress today is about guns – specifically opposing any new restrictions on firearms. The identical pattern repeats every time. First, there is a tragedy followed by demands for more gun laws. Second, after a predictable interval the clamor subsides, no new laws are passed and everything is exactly as it was before. So it is this time and so it will be again the next time.

Guns and Schools: 10 Keys to Prevention

George Noga
Guns and Schools – Part 2
By: George Noga – January 3, 2013
  
     My previous post corrected much of the pervasive media misinformation and bias about the Newtown tragedy. It also described the real causal factors for mass shootings in schools. This post presents a principled plan to prevent rampage school killings.
  1. Change the culture. We have lowered expectations and standards for personal and civil conduct – the vicious attacks, untruths and extreme negativity of the recent election campaign being a good example. Long established rules, limits and barriers have been destroyed. Daniel Henninger in the WSJ describes it as removing all the guardrails for society. There is a linkage between cultural disarray and personal disarray. When the entire spectrum of acceptable behavior shifts, those at society’s margins go off the tracks. Our intellectual, political, religious, media and cultural elites need to rediscover self control. This will take time and won’t solve 100% of the problem, but it is a needed start.

  2. Reduce the copycat effect. The copycat effect is real and proven. This is where the media need to exercise self restraint. No one advocates legal restrictions on the press, but a voluntary industry wide code of conduct would be a good start. Before this can happen the media must acknowledge its culpability in creating future horrors. Right now the media is too busy flogging the story for all it’s worth and deflecting blame onto the NRA.
  3. Treat and/or institutionalize the violently mentally ill. The statistics are too numerous to list but they all prove most rampage type attacks are perpetrated by the mentally ill. The heart of the problem is the existence of numerous people with severe mental disorders who are not being treated – and under existing law cannot be forced to accept treatment. In the 10 worst mass US killings, the majority were by people with untreated schizophrenia. Instead of changing gun laws, the imperative is to change laws pertaining to mental illness. That will do more than anything else to prevent future tragedies.
  4. Eliminate (fake) gun free zones. A sign proclaiming a gun free zone is a welcome mat for rampage killers. Gun free zones such as at airports are real as they are backed by  metal detectors and a police presence. However, most gun free zones are merely notional and work only to increase the danger to those within the zone. It has been proven ad nauseum that more guns equate to less crime. Numerous mass killings have been stopped (see Part 1) by citizens with legal guns. Over 2,500,000 times each year legal guns prevent or stop crimes. The Gun Free School Zones Act of 1990 needs to be repealed.
  5. Understand that guns are not the issue. As I wrote last week, neither of the two deadliest school attacks in America involved guns. On the very same day as the Newtown tragedy, there was a mass school killing in China where 22 children were stabbed. Other mass school killings have involved dynamite, cars and fire. The sooner we all disabuse ourselves that guns are the culprit, the sooner we can begin to focus on the real causes.
  6. Learn from business. Mass killings in the workplace are down nearly 70% in the past 20 years and without any changes to gun laws. Of 20 mass shootings this year, only 1 involved businesses which have become more adept at understanding personality and risk. Most businesses use the run-hide-fight paradigm; they don’t ignore threats; they have violence prevention programs and they practice deterrence. They change the calculus in a potential killer’s mind that he will be able to control the situation until the SWAT team arrives. And yes, this calculus involves guns; there are few, if any, fake gun free zones in businesses.This approach is proven to work and it is idiotic to ignore it.
  7. Enact universal school choice. School deaths may be caused by individual monsters but they are abetted by a collective monster – government. Families are forced to send their children to specific schools where it is impossible (under existing law) for anyone to defend them. Some countries (Israel included) promote guns in schools and this has saved lives. If every family had choice, they could decide for themselves which school to send their children for the best education and also the best protection. I wonder how many liberals would choose to send their children to so-called gun free schools.
  8. Understand 100% protection is not attainable. Despite the best preventative measures, we cannot eliminate all school murders. Even if all the measures described herein were in place, some incidents would happen. We could use these to learn and to further enhance preventative measures. These should not be occasions for knee-jerk attacks on guns.
  9. Seek real solutions not political solutions. It is abundantly clear that viable solutions exist to vastly reduce school violence. We must resist the urge to adopt quick, feel-good political faux fixes which may satisfy for a short time but will do nothing to solve the problem. Passing a law can be quick and easy but real solutions take time and effort to bear results. We may need to shed some old shibboleths about guns in the process.
  10. Government is part of the problem not the solution. Government doesn’t do anything well except perhaps the military. Theoretically, it may be helpful to tweak gun laws to keep guns from the untreated mentally ill. I don’t advocate this however because government would botch mental illness the same way it botches everything else. Do you really want the same folks as at the DMV in charge of deciding who is too ill for guns? The solution to preventing school violence lies in more liberty and less government.
“It is not possible for any scient person to read this and continue to believe more gun laws are the answer. Yet that is all we are hearing.” 
     It should not be possible for any scient person to read this and continue to believe more gun laws are the answer – or even a tiny part of the answer. Yet that is all we are hearing. That is why I interrupted my holiday torpor to write these posts. We can vastly reduce school violence but only if we first abandon myths about guns and the lust for a quick political solution.
     Finally, I cannot write about guns in America without pointing out that our constitutional right to keep and bear arms is not primarily about hunting, target shooting, sport or even self defense. Our founders considered gun ownership, first and foremost, a political right and it always must be understood in that context.

Guns and Schools: Plain Truths

George Noga
Guns and Schools – Part 1
By: George Noga – December 27, 2012
  
        The staccato drumbeat of claptrap and counterfactual blathering by the brain-dead state sycophant media and their progressive camp followers roused me from my holiday torpor. It impelled me to write this unplanned 2-part posting. First, an elegiac:  my thoughts, prayers and condolences go out to all the victims and their families and friends. Although predictable, it nevertheless saddens me that so many are so quick to politicize every gun related tragedy by advancing their anti gun political agenda.
“The two worst school mass murders in America didn’t involve guns.”
     This first of two postings is a presentation of facts and perspective which thus far has been largely absent from the pubic debate. In part 2 (next week) I advance a principled approach for the future to address guns and schools including measures for prevention.
Correcting Media Errors and Bias
       It is falsely asserted Sandy Hook was the worst school killing in America, or at least second to the Virginia Tech tragedy. Agitprops for gun control conveniently forget about the deadliest school mass murder in 1927 Bath, Michigan in which 44 were killed. They forget because guns were nowhere present; the perpetrator used dynamite. Moreover, 500 pounds was found unexploded; had it detonated, the death toll would have been far, far worse.
       Nor does anyone mention what arguably is the second worst school related mass murder in America, i.e. the Janet Reno approved attack by agents of the federal government in Waco, Texas in 1993. In that attack (spearheaded by tanks for crying out loud) 28 school children and 55 adults were killed. Again, guns did not play a role as the casualties resulted from fire.
“The guns used in Newtown were not assault rifles.”
      The litany of media misinformation continues. For starters, there is no such thing as an“assault rifle“; that term was created from whole cloth in the 1990s by gun control advocates to frighten the low information crowd. Connecticut has an assault rifle ban and the guns used in Newtown were legal and would have been so even if the federal ban were still in place.
       Firearms are used 2,500,000 times a year in the USA to prevent or to stop crimes; this fact is never reported because the number of lives saved often is indeterminable. Many mass murders have been prevented by citizens with legal guns; these include Shoney’s in Anniston, Alabama 1991, Pearl, Mississippi High School 1997, Edinboro, Pennsylvania school 1998, New Life Church in Colorado 2007 and just a few weeks ago at the Clackamas Mall in Oregon.
       The most disgraceful media coverage was the 2002 shootings at Appalachian State in which 3 students retrieved legal guns from their cars to stop the killer. Over 400 media outlets covered the story, all knowing the role guns played in stopping the tragedy. Yet 99% failed to mention  that guns stopped the killing; instead, they used terms such astackled and subdued.
The Real Causal Factors
      Undeniably there is a copycat effect that is caused or exacerbated by the media; the very same folks who want you to believe the cause is guns are themselves an integral part of the chain of causation. This is well documented and explained in the 2004 book “How the Media and Popular Culture Trigger the Mayhem in Tomorrow’s Headlines“. Media coverage  is much more pervasive today than in the past because of the ubiquitous, 24/7 in-your-face news cycle. And don’t expect any mea culpas from the media; they are too busy flogging the story.
      Another real casual factor is the deinstitutionalization of the mentally ill – including those who are violent. Recall this was a liberal shibboleth from the 1960s and 1970s. In earlier times the violently mentally ill would have been in a state institution. The New York Times(ugh) did a study that found 47% of “rampage murderers” were mentally ill. Pursuant to the liberal diktat to release all the mentally ill, hospital beds for mental patients have plunged to the level of 1850 – over 160 years ago. Don’t waste your time waiting for regrets from liberals; they are too busy deflecting the blame from their failed policies; it’s not their fault; they meant well.
“If your home had a ‘gun free’ sign, would you be more or less safe?”
      Yet another real cause is ersatz gun-free zones; it is no coincidence that most of the recent mass killings have taken place in schools, movie theaters and shopping malls, all make-believe gun free zones. A sign proclaiming a gun free zone is like a welcome mat for perpetrators. If you put a “Gun Free Home” sign outside your house, do you believe you would be more safe or less safe? Memo to progressives: This is not a trick question. People who engage in mass killings are not hardened criminals, they are weaklings and cowards who dissemble when an armed citizen materializes. At the Clackamas Mall, the killer, who just had begun his rampage, was confronted by a citizen carrying a legal handgun; His next shot was to kill himself.
       Surprise! Government is a cause, the same government that gives families no choices about where to send their children to school and then dictates gun free zones making it impossible for anyone to defend them. John Lott in his books “More Guns, Less Crime” and “The Bias Against Guns” proves to any reasonable reader the efficacy of an armed population. States that adopted right-to-carry laws experienced a 78% drop in deaths from rampage attacks.
      Finally, the intellectual climate is to blame including university professors, journalists and politicians who evangelize a new culture where the long established rules of civil conduct no longer apply. We have drastically lowered the barriers on acceptable political and personal conduct. The most vulnerable and marginalized among us lose all self restraint. If we truly want society to have no restraints then we must be prepared to reap the whirlwind.
“Workplace shootings are down 70%; prevention is possible.”
       Next week in Part 2 I present a fact-based and principled plan to prevent future mass shootings at schools. Preview: workplace shootings are down by about 70% in the past 20 years and without any added gun regulations. This occurred because businesses implemented real world solutions instead of phony political solutions. Stay tuned.

You Didn’t Build That

George Noga

Prehistoric Barbarians and Bandits Knew Better

By: George Noga – December 8, 2012

       The very instant I heard Obama’s infamous “You didn’t build that” statement I knew it was not only wrong but bass ackward. Economic literati understand viscerally that economic activity must precede political activity. However, it took Tom Palmer in “The Origins of State and Government” to provide much of the necessary historical and logical underpinnings to juxtapose economic activity (business) and government.

“Economic means must always precede political means. Nomads and hunter-gatherers never have a government.”

      Palmer’s axiom is that the economic means always must precede the political means. That explains why there never are governments among primitive societies; they have leaders but never a state. Hunter-gatherers and nomads don’t generate enough of an economic surplus to support a permanent predator class. Nevertheless, such societies were victimized by roving bandits (precursors of government) who moved on once they plundered what little was available. There was no reason for them to stay once they pillaged all the meager supplies available. Also, the nomads and hunters were not stationary and not easy targets for predators.

      Everything changed once people settled permanently and established agriculture. Now they generated a constant economic surplus and remained vulnerable in one location. Once again, roving bandits came, pillaged and plundered. However, the bandits were not stupid. They quickly understood and grasped the opportunity. Now there was a reason for them to stay inasmuch as the farmers couldn’t migrate and they could pillage permanently. Hence, roving bandits morphed into stationary bandits who, through sheer force (subjugating the people and keeping out other roving bandits), acquired a monopoly on sanctioned physical violence within a given territory and, viola, government was created.

“Once agriculture was established, roving bandits became stationary bandits enforcing a monopoly on physical violence in a given territory and, viola, government was created.”

     The evolution and causation is clear enough. An economic surplus is an a priori condition for the existence of a state. Indeed, government cannot exist without the entrepreneur class; they have to build it before government can plunder it. Without those who invest, take risks and build businesses (despite hindrance by the state), government wouldn’t have any resources and would not exist. Even the earliest farmers had to invest (plant seeds, tend the crops) and take risks (drought, pestilence, etc.) while the now-permanent bandits did nothing productive.

   It is no different today. Permanent bandits, who now sanctimoniously  go by titles such as  kings, emperors, presidents and prime ministers, plunder billions  through their enforced monopoly on violence. It continues in kleptocracies across the globe; witness Putin and the ill-gotten wealth of Chinese leaders on full display during the sordid Bo Xilai affair. Witness most of Latin and South America, the Caribbean, most of Africa, all of Arabia and all the countries ending in stan. Don’t forget the narcostate of Mexico and significant pockets of Southeast Asia.

“Even authentic bandits in ancient times sometimes understood that pillaging less today enabled them to pillage even more tomorrow – thus benefiting both the pillagers and pillagees.”

   Is America really any different just because our rulers may govern with the pro forma consent of the governed? They may call themselves mayor, governor, congressman or president but they continue to behave like bandits. They enrich themselves in many illicit ways including money, perquisites, preferments, legal exemptions and power. They plunder from the rest of us in reliance on a legal monopoly on violence largely to ensure their reelection and thereby continued membership in the predator class.  And now the chief bandit in all the land has the sheer chutzpah to proclaim that government is the font of all economic success – a notion that even the barbarians of yesteryear would have found absurd. Even they, lacking any education, understood that the plunderers did not help the plundered create their businesses.

     We may be better off with authentic bandits of ancient times, like those in the Capital One commercials.  At least sometimes they got sated and left us alone. And some of them even understood that pillaging less today caused the economy to grow faster such that they could pillage even more tomorrow, thus  benefiting both the pillagers and the pillagees. Were it so in America today. Our current crop of bandits never gets sated and is less enlightened than some of their counterparts who swept into the west from the steppes of Central Asia.

The 1787 Constitution is Pure Genius

George Noga

Return to Government We Revolted Against in 1776

By: George Noga – November 23, 2012
        America’s problems and peril are in direct proportion to its deviation from the framework and principles of the 1787 Constitution which created a constitutional republic and not a democracy. The original constitution was and still is pure genius – the best blueprint for governing a free people that ever existed and that may ever exist on our planet. America achieved its ne plus ultra throughout its first 150 years during the time it generally was governed well within the confines of its constitutional box.
         Under the 1787 Constitution, individuals casting votes in a federal election, as in the one just-concluded, were not the sine qua non. We now have come to overvalue our vote (in federal elections) due to the original denial of votes to, inter alia, women and blacks. As regrettable as that was, it was ineluctable given the zeitgeist. As Edward Crane of CATO propounds, the subsequent struggles for suffrage led these formerly disenfranchised groups to vastly overvalue the vote; the notion glommed on them that with the vote they could do all kinds of things. But this was a chimera and never part of the grand constitutional architecture. Under the gestalt of  a constitutional republic, the vote at the federal level never was intended to be vital.
“Direct election of senators destroyed the basis of federalism.”
          In 1913 the 16th (income tax) and 17th (direct election of senators) amendments passed. The income tax eventually led to the ability to finance a government of a size and scope never contemplated by the founders. Perhaps the greater evil was the direct election of senators which utterly destroyed the basis of federalism. Until 1917 senators were elected by state legislatures for the explicit constitutional purpose of representing the states and to vouchsafe their rights from the federal government. Absent the 17th amendment, it is inconceivable Obamacare could have passed or that our republic could be on the verge of bankruptcy.
        Congress, as originally designed, was intended to take active responsibility for all laws including rules and regulations issued pursuant thereto. Instead Congress has morphed into a body  that oversees (and loosely at that) a gaggle of bureaucrats and rule makers and takes no responsibility for their output. It has erected a multitude of new offices and sent hither swarms of regulators to harass our people and to eat out their substance. If that sounds familiar, it is. That was one of the reasons cited in the Declaration of Independence for our revolution.
       The judiciary also has transmogrified in ways never intended. This has occurred not only because of judicial activism beginning with the Slaughterhouse cases but due to longevity – which never was contemplated in 1787. Again, a senate composed of members beholden to the states would be loath to ratify appointments to the Supreme Court to judicial activists.
“The House of Representatives should be chosen by lottery.”
       The problems are clear enough, but what about solutions? I kinda like Leonard Read’s suggestion that the House of Representatives should be chosen by lottery every two years. Regarding the Senate, why not go back to the original Constitution and have the states select them. William Howard Taft, who served both as 27th President and 10th Chief Justice, was fond of saying every town with 5,000 people contains a Supreme Court Justice. I am fond of a different solution. Justices should serve staggered 18 year non-renewable terms. There would be a vacancy every 2 years and each president would predictably get 2 appointments per term.
        There was an enchanted time when ordinary Americans  read, understood and cherished the Constitution. Davey Crockett once was campaigning for reelection to Congress when he came upon a man (Horatio Bunce) plowing his field. Crockett timed his arrival for when the farmer would be near him at the end of the row. Crockett introduced himself whereupon Bunce promptly said: “I know who you are Colonel Crockett, but I shan’t be voting for you.” When Crockett pressed for an explanation, the farmer told him he once had voted contrary to the Constitution. Upon Bunce’s explanation, Crockett agreed and vowed never again to breech it.
“We are technological titans but political and economic cretins.”
        We now may be technological titans but we are political and economic cretins. We have gone full circle and become the very type of petty and intrusive government we revolted against in 1776; only this time it was not imposed by a foreign power; we did it to ourselves. We have destroyed the best form of self government devised since man walked upright and we will reap the whirlwind. Reprising Kipling’s words:
“As surely as water will wet us and fire will burn, the Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!”

Racism in America

George Noga

Racism: Discrimination or prejudice based on the belief a particular race is superior to another in character or ability.

By: George Noga – September 24, 2012

      In my three score and ten years I have witnessed both overt racism and the sea change in the hearts and minds of my countrymen that has taken place in the past half century. I experienced Jim Crow firsthand growing up in rural Florida and Georgia in the 1940s and 1950s and understand the ugliness of racism. I also witnessed the transformation in attitudes and race relations in America that began in the 1960s. So, where are we today?

       In any country of 310 million souls one can find some of everything. Certainly there are some among us who are racist. We cannot therefore aver that racism does not exist in America nor, in all likelihood, will we ever reach that exalted state. Opining about how much racism exists in today’s America requires a Clintonian construction, i.e. it depends on what the meaning of racism is. Let’s begin by understanding four things that are NOT racism.

  1. Racism is NOT disparate outcomes. Those who assert America is a racist nation use self-fulfilling criteria. Race mongers use false and convoluted concepts such as disparate outcomes to claim racism exists where there is none. In the recent Countrywide case, the DOJ used disparate outcome theory to assert Countrywide discriminated because 40% of minorities paid higher mortgage rates than the average of all whites. Duh – 50% of whites also paid a higher rate than the average of all whites. Countrywide paid $335 million to DOJ to be distributed to minorities (but not to whites) who paid above average mortgage rates. Folks, I can’t make this stuff up.
  2. Racism is NOT based on statistical legerdemain. In New York City crime rates have plummeted because of tougher policing policies; yet liberals employ statistical prestidigitation to allege the policies are racist because a disproportionate share of blacks is stopped. They fail to mention 75% of all violent crime in NYC is committed by blacks compared to less than 5% by whites. The NYC police policies target behaviors and not race. Meanwhile, the victims which are 62% black, support the tougher police policies that have made their neighborhoods much safer.
  3. Racism is NOT disagreeing with liberal shibboleths. The last refuge for race baiters is to tar everyone who doesn’t agree 100% with their politics as racist. This is liberals’ go-to method of avoiding arguments they can’t win on the merits. I started the first private school voucher program in Florida in 1995 and was a leader of the school choice movement. I raised a large amount of private money to pay for non-government schools for hundreds of children from low income families attending failing public schools. Even though 90% of the beneficiaries were minorities, in every public forum where I spoke, I unfailingly was publicly branded a racist because school choice was against liberal dogma. We often used to guess how soon into the program I would be called racist for the first time; the over and under was 5 minutes!
  4. Racism is NOT being opposed to black politicians. Racially tailored electoral districts serve to make black politicians more extreme because they never run in multiracial districts or have to appeal to multicultural voters. The predictable result is that only blacks run for office; the turnout is low; and those who play the race card best and are furthest to the left win and then retain the seat for life. Black voter turnout is suppressed by racial gerrymandering and lack of competition – not by voter ID laws.   Keeping blacks in inner city ghettos therefore becomes indispensable to black politicians because if ghettos didn’t exist, there would be few safe black seats as is the case for Hispanics, Asians and Indians who are not residentially clustered enough to create safe seats. Thus, residential integration is not in the interest of black politicians and the end result is much greater racial strife than otherwise would exist.

           It is clear enough that if one imputes racism based on disparate outcomes, statistical prestidigitation and any utterance inconsistent with liberal dogma or opposed by black politicians, there will be legions of racists in America. If none of these is racism, then what is?

Real Racism and its Prevalence in America

         To determine if someone is a racist is uber-simple and straightforward; he/she must conform to the commonly accepted definition of racism given supra; to wit: be prejudiced or discriminate against people of another race because of a belief they are inferior in character or ability. The only way to know if this definition applies is by a person’s direct words or actions. Calling someone racist is so serious and ugly it can only be justified by such direct and unambiguous words or actions. Furthermore, anyone who blithely charges someone with racism without such a standard is hardly better than a racist.

         The same standard for determining racism also applies to organizations and racism cannot be imputed by the racial makeup of its membership. However, even if an organization is not racist, it should not tolerate racist behavior on the part of any member and must actively police itself to purge any such speech or behavior. No group does this better than the Tea Party which has been called racist solely for its stance against liberal orthodoxy.

         How many racists do you know? I know a great many people and I don’t know even one who conforms to the accepted definition. From my perspective genuine racism in America is well along the path to extinction. We have come a long way in the past 50 years; however, we should never rest until the scourge of racism is reduced to its irreducible minimum.

         The greater danger today is race mongering, i.e. creating or exacerbating racial differences for political or economic reasons. It is far past time also to end that scourge. Leaks from the secret liberal media JournoList are revealing. One blogger urged fellow journalists to call Obama’s critics racists; he wrote: “Call them racists to raise the cost on the right of going after the left . . . to let the right know that it needs to live in a state of constant fear.”

        Sadly, but paradoxically, the left’s chronic misuse and overuse of racism has caused that charge to lose much of its erstwhile moral power just as overuse of the ef word has diminished its once potent shock value. It’s long overdue for liberals to give up name calling and try to win arguments the old fashioned way – based on the facts and logic. America is not a racist nation despite concerted efforts by liberal race mongers to portray it as such for rank political benefit.

Intelligence (IQ) and Public Policy

George Noga

Mokita – Something we all Know but Won’t Discuss

IQ – Intelligence Part 2

By: George Noga – June 23, 2012
  
        This is the second of two posts dealing with IQ; the first is on our website www.mllg.us; it revealed the radically transformed role of IQ in our private lives. This post undauntedly goes where few have gone before, the role of IQ in public policy. In Papua New Guinea their Kivila language has a word, Mokita, which describes a truth we all know but agree not to talk about. So it is with IQ.
“A mokita is a truth we all know but agree not to talk about.”
     So why does MLLG go there now; why not leave well enough alone? The US public policy debate has become atrophied and twisted by myth and political correctness. Many of our biggest social and economic problems (education, poverty, homelessness, et seq.) are much more accurately defined and explained by IQ than by any other cause. Before we can begin to solve such problems, we must understand them and be willing to look for solutions where the data lead. What follows is a fact-based and principled look at IQ and public policy in America.
Psychometrics of IQ in America
     We are a nation of 310 million; that means about 2.5%, or 8 million of us, have IQ below 70 which is two standard deviations (“SD”) below the norm. Another 30 million have IQ between 70 and 80. An IQ below 70 means significant limitations in two or more areas and de facto retardation. IQ between 70 and 80 means trouble with everyday demands such as filling out routine forms; such people have borderline retardation and limited trainability. Those 40 million Americans with IQ of 80 or less are the focus of public policy questions in this post.
The Role of IQ in Public Policy
     Jumping straightaway to the ineluctable point, IQ should inform our public policies where applicable. Today we not only ignore IQ, we are loath even to talk about it and quick to castigate the few intrepid souls who dare raise the issue. Every measure of social pathology is strongly correlated with low IQ. Poverty, unemployment, welfare, poor parenting, crime, injury, delinquency, drug abuse, illegitimacy, child neglect and even incivility are inexorably and directly linked. The converse is true of those with high IQ; they manifest virtually no social pathologies including every one of the aforementioned listedsupra. Let’s touch briefly on just three areas where policy should be informed by IQ: poverty, education and homelessness. Of course, criminal justice, the drug war and many other areas of public policy also are impacted.
“Poverty, unemployment, welfare, bad parenting, homelessness, crime, injury, delinquency, drug abuse, illegitimacy, child neglect, incivility and all other social pathologies are strongly correlated with low IQ.”
     Poverty: The true level of poverty in America, as defined by those who experience material hardship, i.e. lack the resources to meet basic needs for healthy living including food, shelter, clothing and medical care, is only 2% to 3% of the population. Of the people government classifies as being in poverty, two-thirds (67%) by their own reports suffer no material hardships; in addition, another 17% are illegal aliens. When we subtract those two cohorts, the computed result is eight million people living legally in America who suffer material hardships. These eight million people who experience material hardships are substantially the same eight million cohort with IQ below 70. It seems clear enough; poverty at its root is not primarily an economic or social problem, it is one of low IQ that demands entirely different solutions.
     Education: What if the vast majority of children in the very worst schools had sub 70 (or sub 80) IQ? There is  no amount of spending that could make a difference. Contrary to public perception, Head Start is a failure; it achieves only short-term gains, all of which disappear by third grade. What is bien entendu is no way ever has been demonstrated permanently to raise IQ. Programs like Head Start only raise performance up to the level of a student’s inherent capability as circumscribed by IQ. Throwing unlimited money at schools with low IQ students is ineffective. Remember, these are kids who are either retarded or have difficulty filling out a form. If we honestly recognized the situation, we could craft better approaches. We are not doing justice to the very kids we are trying to help and all because we find truth uncomfortable.
     Homelessness: This is open and shut; today no one in America is homeless absent social pathologies. That explains why the media go into a frenzy whenever they think they find a mainstream family in that circumstance. Because both homelessness and low IQ involve pathologies, it seems clear enough that homelessness results from low IQ; government agencies now understand this but aren’t willing to extend this knowledge to poverty and education.
Implications and Solutions – Private and Public
     Let’s distinguish between private and public behavior. Individuals (liberal and conservative) readily understand the increasing role of IQ in achieving success. People want smart kids and make their marriage and parenting decisions accordingly. The market value of IQ is soaring and differences between elites and others are turning into a chasm. Something must be done about this cavernous cognitive and cultural divide before we soon inhabit a brave new world in which vastly outnumbered Alphas become isolated in communities surrounded by razor wire to protect against the Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons bent on their destruction. It already is happening in much of the world and the trend is well underway in the USA.
“We must not shirk from the truth even when it is radioactive.”
    In the public sphere, we must change the culture to value truth above all else and not to shirk when it is uncomfortable – even radioactive. None of our worst problems will be solved with myths and political correctness. We must craft approaches and solutions to real problems based on real causes. We can improve failing schools, poverty and other problems only if and when we are honest. Failure to bridge this cognitive/cultural chasm will come at a steep price indeed.
“Everyone needs a valued place in society and to live on a human scale in a community without complex rules in a culture emphasizing virtue.”
    There are other things government and society can do to shrink the cognitive-cultural divide and to permit everyone a valued place in America; these actions include:
  1. Restore and emphasize local neighborhoods and communities;
  2. Vastly reduce and simplify laws, rules and regulations to make it easy for people to live;
  3. Make it easier to earn a living;
  4. Facilitate living a virtuous life including restoration of marriage and, above all;
  5. Everyone, regardless of cognitive ability, should have a valued place in society.
    Mokita harms those who practice it because they fundamentally are dishonest; the greatest toll however is on those we purport to shield via vapid political correctness. Of course, all the while we engage in mokita publicly, we privately practice selective marriage and breeding. After all, we certainly don’t want political correctness to interfere with our own family, do we?
Credits and source notes: Charles Murray’s books “The Bell Curve” and “Coming Apart” were the source of ideas and data about the role of intelligence as was “The Global Bell Curve” by Richard Lynn. In addition, I read numerous scholarly journal articles in 2008-09 while researching a chapter about IQ for a book on family history.