McCain's Energy Economics

I watched John McCain's acceptance speech last night on Fox News. In my opinion, it was a good speech. The portions dealing with his personal challenges involving combat and imprisonment were effective and poignant, as many pundits had demanded they should be.

One area, however, continues to puzzle me.

McCain gave nearly literal voice to Boone Pickens' energy non-plan and contentions on the danger of Ricardian trade flows involving imported oil. Fair enough. McCain highlighted the political and security risks of the now-well-circulated figure of $700B/year bill for America's oil imports.

However, what McCain declined to explain, as have Al Gore, Boone Pickens, and the Illinois freshman Senator, is the inflationary economic effect some of this in-sourcing of energy production will have on Americans.

First, McCain's generous promises for subsidies to renewable energy sources will merely continue an ongoing mistake. How long must we pretend solar and wind can be economically-viable options, while subsidizing the hell out of their provision?

Either they make economic sense, or they don't. If they don't, then for heaven sakes, John- and Al, Boone, and Barack- admit that you are going to stoke American energy-based inflation fires big time with these massive energy subsidies.

Second, McCain then uttered the by-now familiar, sacred Pickensian domestic energy sources of wind, solar, natural gas, offshore (but not ANWR) drilling, and 'clean coal.' Fine.

Why aren't they online already? Is it because of environmental and other regulatory roadblocks? Or are they uncompetitive with oil at current prices?

If it's the latter, John, why not give Americans your famous 'straight talk' about the inflation they will be feeling when you and the rest of the Federal government machinery crank up the production of expensive domestic energy sources?

I'm very uneasy with this headlong rush into domestic energy, without a clear, trustworthy analysis of just how much of a Ricardian price we will pay for choosing more expensive domestic energy over cheaper, if insecure and potentially destabilizing foreign energy sources.

Sarah Palin's Acceptance Speech

Sarah Palin's acceptance speech of two evenings ago was a tremendous success. That's evident, and no news at all at this point.

What is news, though, is the reaction of the freshman Senator from Illinois.

After spending the bulk of the past 19 months campaigning on style, race and personality, the rookie Senator cum Democratic party Presidential candidate now criticizes Sarah Palin's speech as being lacking in substance.

Obama cried foul because she didn't mention his Illinois state legislature (ine)experience. He should be thankful she didn't focus more attention on his do-nothing career as a part-time legislator.

But it's far richer irony that the Presidential candidate who hides behind race, inexperience and an arrogant attitude, preaching merely 'change,' without admitting to the destructive consequences of his promised programmatic solutions to all of our nation's supposed ills, would complain that Palin didn't provide details of The McCain/Palin ticket's approach to governing the US.

One thing is very clear. Obama and his hapless running mate are now running scared.

Sarah Palin displayed a panache and appeal two nights ago that nobody expected. Her crowd appeal and magnetism is the equal of, if far different from, the Black Adder's own mesmerizing prose and delivery.

But you can bet that Obama's campaign didn't expect anything like the electrifying, enormously likable and telegenic personality that McCain picked as his running mate.

Obama knows that, secretly, quite a few Reagan Democrat and independent women are doing the math and realizing that the chances of Sarah Palin either succeeding McCain during his first term, or running for his job in 2012, are higher than average.

McCain's body took a tremendous amount of abuse in captivity. Whatever you may think of his skill and fortitude, the Presidency is a very weighty job. Everyone who has held the office looks far more aged on the way out.

Either way, Sarah Palin has a fairly high probability of running for President in 2012 if she and McCain win this election. And women everywhere know this.

Obama and Hillary both campaigned heavily on their minority status- one racial, the other politically-contexted gender. Now, of course, their party's pundits and the media which backs them decries the same sort of single-issue voter intent for Palin that they banked on for Hillary or Obama.

Yes, the left is now more scared than before of Sarah Palin. And John McCain's suddenly-brighter chances at gaining the Oval Office come January.

The Liberal Media Attempts To Crucify Sarah Palin

In the scant few days since Sarah Palin was announced as John McCain's VP choice for the Republican party Presidential ticket, the liberal media has exploded in an orgy of outrage that conservatives would dare to nominate a woman to the GOP ticket.

Rather than celebrate Palin's multi-tasking accomplishments as wife, mother and governor of Alaska, as they unquestionably would, the liberal media is now questioning whether the mother of a Down's syndrome infant can effectively serve as VP.

Rather than focus on Palin's accomplishments in moving up the governing ladder in Alaska, while unseating corrupt Republican politicians and elected office-holders, they castigate her for being so, well, normal.

Maybe what the left meant when they celebrated Hillary Clinton's candidacy was that only elitist women from prominent East Coast colleges, with law degrees and Washington pedigrees, are acceptable female candidates for our nation's highest offices.

Working her way up as mayor of her hometown, then governor of her home state, as Sarah Palin has, is not acceptable in the liberal Democratic playbook. It simply doesn't count.

Like the rookie Illinois Senator, style and form are infinitely more important than the fact that you haven't actually accomplished anything while in the public sector. Neither Obama nor Hillary have actually made a difference to Americans with their work in the Senate. The freshman from Illinois didn't do much for his state's citizens, either. Nor for his constituents in the manner of protecting them from the graft and corruption of the Chicago machine which he tolerated and accommodated.

Seeing an actual example of a successful woman in government, the liberal media is simply enraged that she is Republican, a reformer, and possessing a fairly normal life and family.

It's as if, though they won't actually print or say this, the liberal and their media lapdogs mean,

"How can a non-elitist woman from a state outside the lower 48, i.e., a bumpkin from the hinterlands, possibly be a serious candidate for VP, and, if necessary, ready to be President?

As Dick Armey said on CNBC this morning, I'd take a two-year sitting governor and former town mayor over a windbage Senator- or two- any day.

It takes a lot of skill to successfully operate a city as mayor. Governors have to make things work. They can't get away with merely punching in on the Senate floor, making a few speeches for the cameras, and ducking off to fundraisers. And maybe, occasionally, even showing up to vote on typically dead-end legislation.

In my opinion, the outraged squawking you hear from the liberal Democrats and their media allies are evidence of just how good Sarah Palin is as McCain's choice for VP. I think the liberals are running scared. Very scared.

That women might vote for another women, regardless of party. When it was Hillary, that was okay. Now, with Palin, it's not.

That independent and swing Democrat voters might vote for a proven reformer with a track record of accomplishments in real governing jobs, rather than a freshman windbag Senator.

Yes, the noise you hear in the media is of anguish and fear. They rightly worry that McCain has outmaneuvered Obama in selecting a much more competent, experienced and capable running mate than "Lying Joe" Biden.

One that will actually attract more voters to his ticket in November.

McCain's Masterstroke: Sarah Palin for VP

One cannot underestimate the brilliance of John McCain's choice of Alaska governor Sarah Palin as his running mate yesterday.

Despite the grousing of Democrats that selecting a female VP candidate will only enrage women who see it as a shallow sop to win their votes, if that's true, then the campaigns of Hillary and the Illinois rookie Senator are the same, in spades. Neither Senator is qualified to be President, and each ran on his/her own minority status.

But, back to McCain and Sarah Palin.

As a sitting governor, Palin already has way more experience with actual government and governing than the Illinois freshman. Obama's handlers' remarks that the choice of Palin "takes experience off the table" is totally wrong. And basically wishful thinking on the part of the Democrats, who are now scared stiff at the prospect of running against a female on the Republican Presidential ticket.

Palin is a conservative's dream- solidly right-wing, a hunter and fisher, possessing a family and husband. As well as a maverick, similar to McCain, in her own state.

Some friends have expressed to me their fears that Palin isn't ready to be President, while McCain has an above-average chance of not making it to the end of his first term.

Personally, I'd take any Republican governor over the Illinois rookie Senator, or Senator "Lying Joe" Biden. Neither of whom has had any experience running so much as a lemonade stand, or crafting anything resembling important legislation.

Further, as today's Wall Street Journal points out, Sarah Palin has actually effected real change. She shook up cozy, corrupt ties between old-boy Alaskan Republicans and oil industry donors.

If Americans want change from someone who's actually done it, rather than just talks about it, McCain with Sarah Palin on his team is a better place to begin than two Democratic windbags from the Senate, one of whom has spent decades doing nothing but lose Presidential primaries and be caught lying.

Finally, by choosing a sitting female Republican governor as his VP candidate, McCain shows that he's not some stodgy old white politician. He 'gets it.' He has introduced fresh, exciting talent into the GOP upper ranks, and shown Americans he is open-minded, creative and running to win.

The squawking of Democrats about how ineffectual and wrong a choice Palin is for McCain's VP is an indication of just how on-target and effective it actually is.

Senatorial Presidents

Regardless of who wins in November, we will have a former Senator serving as President of the US.

Is that a good thing? Probably not.

FDR had been a governor, but Truman was a sort of accidental Senator. Chosen by Boss Pendergast's Kansas City machine, Truman ultimately contributed to putting his old patron in prison. Now hailed as a great Democratic president, Truman wasn't accorded any accolades for a good fifteen years after leaving office.

Kennedy, Nixon and Johnson were all Senators, after being elected as Representatives to Congress. None was particularly competent with domestic issues, although Kennedy's tax cuts helped get the economy moving after the late-Eisenhower inflation.

Ford was only a Representative, and a short-timer, as Presidents go.

Carter, though a governor, was woefully inept and unprepared for national-level politics and government. As a recent Wall Street Journal editorial reminded us of a prior one, from the Clinton era,

'so we are once more introduced to an unknown Democratic governor.'

Carter....Dukakis.....Clinton. All lesser-known governors upon their nomination for presidential candidate in the Democratic party.

Reagan was, of course, a successful governor of California, and went on to be one of the country's greatest Presidents, defeating the Soviet Union and communism before leaving office.

George H. Bush was a US Representative and executive in numerous governmental agencies, as well as having had a successful private career in the oil industry.

His son, of course, defeated two Senators- Gore and Kerry- for the White House.

Of all the Presidents since FDR, I think it's safe to say that Johnson, Nixon and Kennedy either performed the worst, or had little impact, of any of the office holders.

Kennedy kicked off Vietnam, while Johnson mismanaged the war and the economy. Nixon, though a Republican, introduced the only wage and price controls the US has ever had outside of wartime.

Of the Senators, only Truman could be viewed as reasonably effective over the long term. His Four Point program defeated communism in Europe, while he aggressively fought communist aggression in Korea. But Truman was much less of a professional politician than the other three Senators who recently served as President.

Traditionally, in the modern era, Senators have largely been empty windbags with little or no prior managerial experience. Gore, Kerry, Obama, Biden and McCain are no exceptions.

Thus, no matter who wins, we shouldn't expect a great deal of competent domestic economic management. Rather, it's clearly more of a contest of values and principles.

McCain's are pretty clear. Obama has none.

But on the subject of competence in governing, sadly, Americans are almost certainly in for four years of its absence.

Romney, Giuliani, and perhaps even Richardson could have delivered this. But they were all, ultimately, unelectable.

Between the prospect of a spendthrift, runaway Democratically-controlled Congress and either of two administratively inexperienced Presidential candidates, the American voting public had better buckle their seatbelts for a rough economic four years.

The Democratic Party's Statist Economics

In the past weeks, I've seen a campaign ad for the rookie Senator for Illinois extolling how many 'green collar' or 'green energy' jobs he will personally be adding to the US economy.

If one is to believe the ad, a man who has never really worked in the private sector in his life is somehow going to magically know how to allocate resources to create vast numbers of new jobs for other Americans.

Funny, because I thought that, in America, entrepreneurs developed ideas for businesses, products and services. Those that were good ideas brought in more revenue than it cost to produce them, enjoyed growth, repaid the inventor's risk and capital, while frequently creating jobs for others.

The only time the US government directly tried to create jobs was through FDR's failed NRA. Time has dimmed the memories of humorous icons of men leaning on shovels to depict the WPA or PWA. But the overall effect was to simply pay Americans for low-value time spent on the government tab.

Contrast that with JFK's more astute approach to stoking US economic growth- the space program.

Kennedy didn't create an entire new industrial complex of government-run businesses. Instead, a few agencies, notably NASA, expanded from its predecessor, NACA, was authorized to secure bids for designing, producing and operating the equipment which would take US astronauts to the moon.

In the process, for example, companies such as Intel prospered through government contracts for small, powerful microprocessors. The microprocessor industry was born and thrived, kicking off an economic growth wave in southern California.

It's one thing for the Federal government to set an objective, allocate funds and spend them via the private sector to solve appropriate problems or produce solutions.

It's quite another for a bunch of windbag Senators, led by one of the most junior of their number, to brazenly announce they will form a wholly new agency, staffed, no doubt, with cronies and other non- and sub-performers who can't make it in the real economic world, to unilaterally choose which technologies and businesses merit investment by the government.

Will there be graft? Corruption? Revolving-door lobbying? "Consulting" by old friends to the new agency?

You can count on it.

Scandals? Of course. Plenty of them, after the freshman Senator is midway or more through his term. Or perhaps, more safely, after he's lost his second bid for office.

But when have civil service employees ever been able to outperform the private sector in selecting technologies, creating sustainable, value-generating businesses, or legitimate, long-lived jobs in our economy?

Never.

With that track record, why is anyone giving any credence to Obama's claim that, if elected, he'll direct a firehose of Federal dollars, through an agency he'll form, to magically create thousands of new jobs that smart, private-sector businesspeople couldn't conceive first?

If there were money in alternative-energy related businesses and jobs, you can bet some entrepreneur would be, or already is, doing it. The only thing Obama's idea will do, besides wasting out tax dollars on corruption and stupid ideas, is to squeeze out legitimate, existing private sector activity in the same areas. Much as FDR's ham-handed confiscation of the private power production business did when he created subsidized Federal power projects, thus starving the sector of private capital for decades.

There's a history of the sort of public works Obama has in mind, all right. And it is littered with waste, corruption and ineffectual use of American tax dollars.

1968

This past weekend's edition of the Wall Street Journal featured an illuminating political editorial by Ted Van Dyk, former aide to the hapless Democratic party's Presidential candidate Hubert Humphrey, entitled "How The Election of 1968 Reshaped the Democratic Party."

Van Dyk provides a very entertaining and detailed account of the dynamics of 1968, wherein the Democratic party's lasting penchant for catering to fringe lunacy was born. He hilariously, but accurately, refers to the 1972 Democratic party platform as "acid, amnesty and abortion."

As Van Dyk explains, 1968 resulted in a splintered party,

"Since 1968, independent and on-the-fence voters have come to perceive that there are, in fact, two Democratic Parties represented by two kinds of candidates. There is the middle-income, middle-minded, socially more conservative, bread-and-butter Democratic Party. Then, there is the better-educated, higher-income, socially liberal Democratic Party. The candidates of these wings do not have their feet wholly in one camp or another. Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton campaigned successfully as undefined populists, and benefited from weak Republican opposition. But as a rule, Democratic presidential candidates have not since 1968 been able to restore the party that was broken that year. Lyndon Johnson, in 1964, was the last Democratic presidential candidate to gain a national majority of white voters."

With that prologue, Van Dyk continues,

"Will Mr. Obama, at the upcoming Democratic convention in Denver, be able to bring Reagan Democrats finally home? I am not counting on it. His Republican opponent, John McCain, has a maverick reputation and an appeal to Reagan Democrats that Mr. Obama will find difficult to match. The Democratic Party platform is still filled with the single-issue, single-interest and social-issue planks that have plagued it since 1972.

The classic winning coalition for Democrats is the 1960 John F. Kennedy coalition which included Catholics, Jews and Protestants, whites, African-Americans and Latinos, both better- and less-educated voters, labor-union members and academics. The 1960 Kennedy platform -- built around a strong national defense, assertive foreign policy, economic growth and social justice at home -- is still the platform most likely to attract Democratic voters of all outlooks, as well as independents. JFK's promise to "get America moving again" is what Americans are looking for in 2008.

Will Mr. Obama grasp that platform, broaden his appeal, and capitalize on Republican weakness to win a broad mandate to govern? Or will he allow himself to be typed as a black Adlai Stevenson or Eugene McCarthy, articulate but snooty, and out of touch with ordinary folk? The Denver convention offers him the chance to break out, show himself as relating to all his party's factions, and restore what has been damaged since 40 years ago in Chicago."

Van Dyk's analysis is incredibly lucid, insightful, and compelling. I believe it 100%.

The one thing about which I disagree with Van Dyk is that the Illnois rookie Senator can "grasp that platform, broaden his appeal and capitalize on Republican weakness."

He can't, and he won't, because it's not him, and it's not in him. Similarly, he won't just "allow himself to be typed as a black Adlai Stevenson or Eugene McCarthy, articulate but snooty, and out of touch with ordinary folk."

That IS the junior Illinois Senator! Obama is articulate and snooty. No typifying necessary by Republicans. He's already there!

To be honest, I had ironically forgotten all about the parallel with Adlai. But it's more than apt. A snooty, egg-headed Illinois Senator. And the Black Adder doesn't have any of the experience Stevenson actually possessed, including a stint as Governor of his state.

With the Stevenson comparison, I'm even more confident McCain will win in November.