10 Comments
1. Alan Simpson is very cool.
//comments on 1: I wish all Republicans were more like him. I wonder why he is even a Republican? He is down with gay rights and is basically a feminist. He doesn't think the courts should decide on abortion and he doesn't even think men have the right to vote on the abortion. At best, he argues, the father should perhaps be involved to some extent in the process - but that is it.
2. Sheryl Swoops. Very cool that she came out.
//comments on 2: Dude, while it is nice, her partner is screwed for life. (no pun intended.) Swoops came out and explained that her partner was her boss. That is a big no-no - players screwing their assistant coaches, are you kidding me?
3. Ann Coulter argues that Bush needs to appease his base now and that he ought to appoint an ideologue. Bill O'Reilly responds that Ann can't ever criticize a lefty-nut activist judge if she encourages right-wing ideologuism. He argues that if one asks Bush to put up an ideological judge, it is no different whether the ideologue is left or right wing. He explains that judges should be pro-dialogue, pro-discourse, and not be ridiculously stuck to their ideologies.
4. When Ann Coulter kept referring to things that "we" had to do (she was referring to herself + Bill as a collective conservative unit), Bill responds "who is this we? Do you have a mouse in your pocket?" And then basically goes on to tell her to not include him in a "we" when she talks about her support for an ideologically conservative nominee.
//comments on 3-4: Wow ... I was pretty shocked to hear that from O'Reilly. Very interesting.
5. Dick Morris made 3 interesting points. First, it is very good that Miers is gone because it marks the first time the administration has looked to competence as a criterion. Second, that now the administration should nominate one of the 90 appointees to lower courts who got through Congress just fine. Since a number of these guys and gals are right wing ideologues, he can appease his base in the process. Third, the President needs us to get away from oil. Drilling ANWAR is bad. (a) Global warming exists. (b) We have shitty weather b/c of warming. (c) Oil money (some percentage of it) goes to terrorists. (d) We need a new energy source.
6. O'Reilly argues that if you are the President's legal counsel, you do have some experience (obviously) with constitutional law. Miers should have been given her due process.
//comments on 5-6: I've talked enough about Miers so you know my views there. As for oil, see below.
7. O'Reilly rags on oil companies. He argues that oil companies are screwing Americans with price gouging. Record high oil prices and record high profits (Exxon Mobil reporting $12 billion) means that they are screwing the consumers. He went on a tear on Bush's stupid tax exemptions for oil companies!
8. Dean Bakers, Co-Director of the Center for Economic Policy Research (CEPR), and co-author of growth literature with Krugman and DeLong, explains the reasons for the exploding profits. First, crude oil prices have sky-rocketed. Limited supply and phenomenal demand spikes, especially due to China and India's increasing needs. Second, Katrina knocked out oil refineries so a number of regions have experienced rather large shortages. He argues a way to deal with this is through a windfall profit tax - which essentially is a tax on a large sum of unexpected wealth (take that to mean whatever you want it to be).
9. O'Reilly responds is against windfall taxes because apparently that isn't what capitalism is all about. So instead, he advocates a Gandhi-esque solution: consumers punishing oil companies (whatever that means).
//comments on 7-9: this is what I love about capitalist ideologues. Ok, so their philosophy is the free market. But here is the thing. Economists aren't ideologically pro-free market. They are so because they realized that empirically, things were more efficient in an open market in a situation of perfect competition. (For one thing, oil companies are oligopolistic, not competitive - so I don't even know if O'Reilly's "logic" is applicable.) But more importantly, there isn't some blind adherence to libertarian philosophy in play here. We see above, a fairly respected macroeconomist arguing for intervention in that form, and O'Reilly responds with "capitalism is about people doing what they want". Hell, even conservatives like Gary Becker argue for intervention at times. Even if it interventions to straighten out a market and make it more competitive, or intervention to force insurance purchases upon houses in hurricane-prone regions. The point is, ideological "economic conservatism" or ideological "capitalism" is idiotic. You won't find any respected economist (essentially the proponents and scholars of capitalism) backing such idiocy. So why are strict libertarians so crazy?
10. Catherine Crier is damn cool.
//comments on 10: I wish more conservatives were like her too. But if I had a choice, obviously I would take them being like Alan Simpson.
//comments on 1: I wish all Republicans were more like him. I wonder why he is even a Republican? He is down with gay rights and is basically a feminist. He doesn't think the courts should decide on abortion and he doesn't even think men have the right to vote on the abortion. At best, he argues, the father should perhaps be involved to some extent in the process - but that is it.
2. Sheryl Swoops. Very cool that she came out.
//comments on 2: Dude, while it is nice, her partner is screwed for life. (no pun intended.) Swoops came out and explained that her partner was her boss. That is a big no-no - players screwing their assistant coaches, are you kidding me?
3. Ann Coulter argues that Bush needs to appease his base now and that he ought to appoint an ideologue. Bill O'Reilly responds that Ann can't ever criticize a lefty-nut activist judge if she encourages right-wing ideologuism. He argues that if one asks Bush to put up an ideological judge, it is no different whether the ideologue is left or right wing. He explains that judges should be pro-dialogue, pro-discourse, and not be ridiculously stuck to their ideologies.
4. When Ann Coulter kept referring to things that "we" had to do (she was referring to herself + Bill as a collective conservative unit), Bill responds "who is this we? Do you have a mouse in your pocket?" And then basically goes on to tell her to not include him in a "we" when she talks about her support for an ideologically conservative nominee.
//comments on 3-4: Wow ... I was pretty shocked to hear that from O'Reilly. Very interesting.
5. Dick Morris made 3 interesting points. First, it is very good that Miers is gone because it marks the first time the administration has looked to competence as a criterion. Second, that now the administration should nominate one of the 90 appointees to lower courts who got through Congress just fine. Since a number of these guys and gals are right wing ideologues, he can appease his base in the process. Third, the President needs us to get away from oil. Drilling ANWAR is bad. (a) Global warming exists. (b) We have shitty weather b/c of warming. (c) Oil money (some percentage of it) goes to terrorists. (d) We need a new energy source.
6. O'Reilly argues that if you are the President's legal counsel, you do have some experience (obviously) with constitutional law. Miers should have been given her due process.
//comments on 5-6: I've talked enough about Miers so you know my views there. As for oil, see below.
7. O'Reilly rags on oil companies. He argues that oil companies are screwing Americans with price gouging. Record high oil prices and record high profits (Exxon Mobil reporting $12 billion) means that they are screwing the consumers. He went on a tear on Bush's stupid tax exemptions for oil companies!
8. Dean Bakers, Co-Director of the Center for Economic Policy Research (CEPR), and co-author of growth literature with Krugman and DeLong, explains the reasons for the exploding profits. First, crude oil prices have sky-rocketed. Limited supply and phenomenal demand spikes, especially due to China and India's increasing needs. Second, Katrina knocked out oil refineries so a number of regions have experienced rather large shortages. He argues a way to deal with this is through a windfall profit tax - which essentially is a tax on a large sum of unexpected wealth (take that to mean whatever you want it to be).
9. O'Reilly responds is against windfall taxes because apparently that isn't what capitalism is all about. So instead, he advocates a Gandhi-esque solution: consumers punishing oil companies (whatever that means).
//comments on 7-9: this is what I love about capitalist ideologues. Ok, so their philosophy is the free market. But here is the thing. Economists aren't ideologically pro-free market. They are so because they realized that empirically, things were more efficient in an open market in a situation of perfect competition. (For one thing, oil companies are oligopolistic, not competitive - so I don't even know if O'Reilly's "logic" is applicable.) But more importantly, there isn't some blind adherence to libertarian philosophy in play here. We see above, a fairly respected macroeconomist arguing for intervention in that form, and O'Reilly responds with "capitalism is about people doing what they want". Hell, even conservatives like Gary Becker argue for intervention at times. Even if it interventions to straighten out a market and make it more competitive, or intervention to force insurance purchases upon houses in hurricane-prone regions. The point is, ideological "economic conservatism" or ideological "capitalism" is idiotic. You won't find any respected economist (essentially the proponents and scholars of capitalism) backing such idiocy. So why are strict libertarians so crazy?
10. Catherine Crier is damn cool.
//comments on 10: I wish more conservatives were like her too. But if I had a choice, obviously I would take them being like Alan Simpson.
posted by arun at 11:43 AM
2 Comments:
Interesting post. Never thought Bill O'Reilly would actually disagree with Coulter.
Although... "windfall profit tax" seems a bit uhh... communist to me?
you are joking, right?
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