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Primarily about Penn State football, this is a tale told by idiots, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

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We’re Screwed!

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It’s a Penn State bye week, so no football this week. Instead, I call upon an old, retired, neurotic mouse to ramble on about our dystopian future and politics in the forthcoming presidential election year. With high visibility crap going on all around us: Immigration crises, Hamas attacking Israel, Ukrainian funding, abortion rights, and two shaky candidates for our highest national office, he focuses on the American elephant in the room, the one-way ticket to hell in a Chinese handbasket: our national debt. Let the Mouse begin. —TNT

Greed and Dependency, and No Way Out

Government spending (i.e., institutionalized vote buying) is the biggest existential threat to the United States of America today. Our national debt has increased $12 trillion during the past two administrations, an exponential acceleration due to spending binges. This untenable indebtedness will not improve until we stop fighting fire with fire (e.g. misnaming spending legislation ludicrously as “The Inflation Reduction Act”), but methinks it is too late for that. We will continue to fiddle with minutiae while we elect irresponsible leaders who care only about remaining in office while Washington consequently burns.

Does It Matter?

Whether we elect Trump or Biden as our next president is inconsequential to resolving the national debt morass. Their track records on spending and those of Congresses during their administrations suck big time. What we’ll get is spending in either case. Half of us will agree with the spending by either ideological figurehead. The other half will say their candidate would have done better. Both halves are wrong. Both sides drink from the same fountain of power, and both buy our votes in hopes of keeping the elixir flowing.

I focus on Trump and Biden, but I don’t see much of a chance that this will not be a rematch of 2020. I am discounting the chances of any of the other so-called candidates. Barring anything spectacular, like Trump being deported to Mars, Biden sailing off on a Viking ship, or Hillary Clinton charging into Washington on elephant back a la Hannibal, we’ll be stuck once again deciding on the lesser of two evils. Both Biden and Trump have more negatives than positives, but that’s what our system and our greed yields as a parody of “choice”. Both are representative of who we think we are, and what we are ain’t pretty, either.

Spend, Spend, Spend, or Lose

Regarding spending, no viable candidate would dare to threaten closing the floodgates, a prospect that would doom their election. We are in a spending frenzy of governmental and civilian overindulgence, so anyone who vies for the big job must show that they can spend more than the others to satisfy the demands of the electorate. We want handouts, direct or indirect, but we don’t want to work for them. Furthermore, we don’t want to pay for them via either taxes or inflation. They know it and they want to buy our votes, whether through direct payments or tax cuts. No one is saying how the debts will be paid; no one wants to hear about it. It’s all just vote buying at a time long past when we needed to get the national debt under control.

Sweeping Our Bills under the Rug

We need to pay our bills — no question about it — but no politician will dare to do anything about it. At best, they’ll pay fleeting lip service “reducing deficits”. Those reductions never amount to much, because they cannot amount to much. Discretionary spending is dwarfed by the twin realities of entitlements and interest, which cannot be slashed. Hell, we’re at the point at which we cannot pay interest on our debts without borrowing more to do so!

No one will be elected on a platform of pain, rationing, austerity, and responsibility. We want to have our cake and eat it, too. Mo’ money, less work, and more entertainment. Tax cuts buy votes. Big spending buys votes. Hell, Trump managed to do both — he ain’t no dummy! One way or the other the government carves out our hearts and souls and wallets while leaving us just enough pocket change to keep us content in our anesthetizing hedonistic pursuits. We’ll wind up on the scrap heap of history, but we’ll be happy campers during our last moments!

Tytler Said It — Or Not

The now well-known and well-worn words, presumably but not provably spoken by Scottish historian Alexander Fraser Tytler over two hundred years ago, apply: “A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; From spiritual faith to great courage; From selfishness to apathy; From apathy to dependence; From dependence back into bondage.” Tytler might have said some or all of that at different points during his life. The concepts this pseudo-quote expresses are summed up pictorially below (courtesy of Wikipedia).

In any case, the so-called Tytler Cycle depicted above resonates with me. Our national attitude is somewhere between “Complacency” and “Apathy”, and we are diving headlong toward “Dependence”. We prefer to keep our heads up our asses and elect those who make us feel good momentarily. Our false dichotomy loving politicians cow us into believing that public welfare is superior to corporate welfare, or vice-versa, and we vote accordingly, while we collectively bend over and are screwed from both directions. As Ronald Reagan once said, “Government is the problem.”

Too Late, Baby?

Is it too late? This mouse thinks so. The Tytlerian point of no return is nigh if we have not already reached it. All the money floating around has distorted the value of everything, leaving us ripe for the taking. Modern Monetary Theory is a form of denial that legitimizes complacency for many anesthetized liberals, while many simplistic, monomaniacal conservatives merely ignore the debt issue. If Trump did it, it was good! Still others think the problem will resolve itself. Three heaps of different flavored mouse shit, I say. It’s bigger than all of us, so we throw our hands up in the air and conduct pseudo-intellectual ideological barroom debates, deluding ourselves by thinking it will be better when our guy wins. However, when we strip away all the bullshit and boosterism, finding the dust encrusted switch to our brains and daring to flip it to ON, we find no quick fix. Furthermore, our instant enlightenment reveals that our society, long accustomed to living beyond its means, will be unwilling to endure the hardship required to fix itself, so we quickly flip that switch back to OFF and hope it goes away.

Nero fiddled while Rome burned. Apathy and distraction never fixed a complex problem. That we spend trillions on entertainment while neglecting infrastructure, and that we divert more public funds to supplying disincentives to productivity than to promoting productivity are blaring billboards of societal deterioration. So is giving fringe elements of society standing for wacko causes by the hundredfold. We do not intend to give those things up, good or bad, no matter who we elect. And they don’t intend to change those dubious features of our advanced culture, so, they merely promise us more of the same. A chicken for every pot and a car for every garage. False prosperity has a distant echo.

We’re Screwed

Not only do we not know how we will pay the bills for the spending spree; we simply do not care. No one has a solution, so let us just keep fiddling. We have our football, our Taylor Swift, and our food stamps, all thanks to loose money and our beloved Federal Reserve. God forbid we should compromise any of that! Vote Trump! Vote Biden! They’ll give us more of the same, and future generations will pay for our excesses, because with complicity by corrupt Congress, they’ll both sweep the bills under the rug to be paid for by inflation. At the worst, financial chaos, scarcity, and perhaps revolution appear in my mouse-sized crystal ball. We’re screwed anyway I see it. We can only argue how more or less screwed we are within a small delta, but the major trendline of screwage marches immutably upward.

Just Frustration

Am I offering solutions? No, just frustration. We have descended into a pit that I loathe. While I fear similar consequences regardless of which of the two clowns running for President is elected, the big mess is far beyond the capabilities of either one of them in the first place. Am I advocating voting for no one? No, I am not. However, the two-party system is rigged to favor power entrenchment in government, and they all know that a house divided cannot stand. So they promote the ideological dichotomy knowing that they — government — will ultimately win, no matter who we elect. They win, we’re screwed.

My frustration will only end when I shuffle off this mortal coil; however, I fear the Orwellian consequences future generations of Americans will face due to the stupid decisions and greed of my generation and its successors.

If I haven’t driven you away with my frustration blather, I’ll be back with a preview of the UMass bye week.

Reagan was a Keynesian; Krugman is a socialist

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John Maynard Keynes, Paul Krugman's mentor
John Maynard Keynes

Any way you slice it, Paul Krugman, who prides himself on being a disciple of John Maynard Keynes, is a socialist. His op-ed in the New York Times yesterday makes that clear, if his drooling partiality to President Obama and his failed policies was not already disgustingly apparent. Your Rambunctious, yet Sedated, Rodent is here to tell Mr. Krugman a thing or two.

Krugman compares Obama’s spending with Reagan’s and — surprise of surprises! ???? ????? — Obama comes out the thriftier. Reagan spent lots of money on a big, bad military build-up, so Krugman makes his point all the more saliently while he preaches to his leftist choir. Right, Dr. Nobel, Reagan spent our money on things of lasting value — building things — not trying to make us feel good. In not trying, he succeeded. People were put to work, significant research was done, and Communism was laid to rest, leading to a brighter future for all of us. The financial scandal of the time, the Savings and Loan debacle, was handled in an adult manner, and the Resolution Trust Corporation oversaw the shovel job as a partnership between the public and private sectors, spreading the burden via debt assignment and auctions. casino arab It was a helluva lot more effective and painless than TARP I and TARP II, which threw big gobs of money around with little planning and follow-up.

Krugman asserts:

“[Republicans] love, in particular, to contrast President Obama’s record with that of Ronald Reagan, who, by this point in his presidency, was indeed presiding over a strong economic recovery. You might think that the more relevant comparison is with George W. Bush, who, at this stage of his administration was — unlike Mr. Obama — still presiding over a large loss in private sector jobs.”

At this point in the Bush administration, the “dot bomb” bubble had burst, for which Bush could not be blamed, as the big, speculative run-up was 1998-2000. Bush took office in 2001, nine months before the second great economic shock, the 9/11 attacks, which threw already precariously perched markets into turmoil. Meanwhile, back at Obama, it is the business cycle, not fiscal policy that is causing the bounce-back in employment, which, by the way, is slowing. Hewlett-Packard recently announced a five-figure layoff, for example. Krugman must be looking at the famous job growth chart that Obama’s operatives posted on the White House website and Obama uses ad nauseam. The devil, as usual, is in the details.

Krugman apparently uses the other famous Obama chart to “prove” that Obama is a less profligate spender than Reagan. This is the appropriately named Nutting Chart, published in Market Watch a couple of weeks ago. As you are all undoubtedly aware, this chart has been debunked. ???????? It threw every major expenditure of Obama’s first year in office into Bush’s column, just because the fiscal year started on Bush’s watch. Also, TARP I, which Bush was going to leave to his successor to implement, was pushed through congress at Obama’s pleading on Bush’s watch. Sure, succeeding years’ increases look puny when compared with a false base. Just sayin’.

Krugman’s rambling continues until he eventually reaches his real point, just before he adds as an afterthought (whoops, I almost forgot what I was trying to prove here because I’ve been prattling on) that in his opinion, Reagan was a Keynesian and his success proved that we should be doing the same now. The real point is:

“As many economists have pointed out, America is currently suffering from a classic case of debt deflation: all across the economy people are trying to pay down debt by slashing spending, but, in so doing, they are causing a depression that makes their debt problems even worse. This is exactly the situation in which government spending should temporarily rise to offset the slump in private spending and give the private sector time to repair its finances. Yet that’s not happening.”

Deleveraging is going to be painful, no matter how and when it is done. The socialist bureaucracy can make it appear less painful by sucking money out of my pocket and sticking it into the pocket of some poor schmuck who didn’t know how to properly manage risk, thus kicking the can down the road to an eventual massive deleveraging of government debt, devaluation, and a monetary crisis, or we can bite the bullet now and admit that actions have consequences. Why are some of us better off than others? Perhaps we worked harder and managed risk better. Those who played the game and lost, well, pick your asses up and start over. Why penalize those of us who are debt free, forcing us to pay off the debts of those who sucked ass at managing money and were too greedy for their own good?

With “Taxmageddon” looming, throwing more money around is like running water into a bathtub with the drain open. At the end of the month, you have to pay the water bill and you didn’t even get clean. Obama’s stratified society will only become more stratified into the ever growing supported class, the screwed middle class (who wind up bearing the brunt of the tax increases that begin in 2013), the affluent middle class (whom Obama calls “rich”), and the true upper crust wealthy (those who Obama courts for support). Add to this mix as burgeoning class consisting of overpaid and unnecessary government workers, and that’s what this Mouse calls Obamanomics. It ain’t going to work!

Sorry, Krugman, Nobel Prize or no, you are wrong.

I am the Mouse Who Ate Xanax, and I approved this message.

Repudiate Trump? Why?

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The Mouse Who Ate Xanax
The Mouse Who Ate Xanax

One of this politmouse’s on-line liberal ex-friends gratuitously provided this perfunctorily haughty advice to Mr. Romney: “Obama repudiated Wright. Romney should repudiate Trump.” I don’t think he was reading the Facebook thread in which she posted that pontification. If he was, he would certainly shrug it off.

In the minds of some, it’s a tit-for-tat game, this election thing. Punch and counter-punch. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. Hey, it’s a chess match, not  tiddly-winks.

Try to be elected president and you have 300 million pundits running around telling you what you “should” do. Well, American woman, you’re in over your head. Admit it. You have no idea what your own guy should do, let alone his opponent. You just like to be the mouth that roared. (Pun intended — remember the movie? You better.)

Anyhow, why should Romney repudiate Trump? So he can do exactly what the Democrats  want? I think the Mormon guy is a little smarter than the mud-slinging opposition wants him to be. For example, speaking of repudiation, he has publicly nixed a SuperPAC’s plan to sling down and dirty mud at Obama by rubbing salt in the Jeremiah Wright wound opened by conservatives, Hillary, and perhaps, John McCain’s organization back in 2008.

Romney did well to stand above all that and eschew the politics of distraction. Standing up and defending himself against each distracting mosquito bite delivered by the Democrats is a weak posture. Ignoring them, which many wise uncommitted voters will also do, is the best posture on inconsequential issues.

On the other hand, dare this mouse say that the politics of distraction is about all of a wad the Obama campaign has to shoot?

Back to Trump. Yes, he’s a loose cannon, and he has a big mouth, and out of that mouth comes some pretty strange stuff. However, notwithstanding not playing into the Democrats’ hands, there are several good reasons to stay involved with the Donald. The first three are money, money, and money. Trump and friends are worth a bundle. Furthermore, with Trump happily committed to the GOP camp, he’ll eschew the notion of a third-party run at the presidency, which would be disastrous to GOP hopes for 2012. He is at times unpredictable, but he’ll do what he’s going to do, so just let sleeping cats lie. (Well? I am a neurotic mouse, after all.)

Just as I wrapped my little mouse brain around this subject, James Taranto published his “Best of the Web Today” in the Wall Street Journal, some of which addressed this same topic. (The rest of it is worthwhile reading, too, but insults to Poland and such are off-topic for today.)

Taranto made light of a Web ad by the Obama campaign. In his words:

“What’s weird about the ad is the abrupt shift in tone. It starts off by presenting the prejudices of anxious McCain voters as menacing and threatening, but the mood immediately lightens when the subject turns to Romney and Trump. It’s as if the Obama people wanted to portray Trump as fearsome but just couldn’t do it, so they ridiculed him instead. But isn’t it redundant to ridicule Donald Trump?

“To the extent that there’s anything serious about the Romney-Trump contretemps, Byron York of the Washington Examiner gets at it:

Romney’s refusal to repudiate Donald Trump sends a signal, both to Democrats and the voting public: With the nation’s future at stake in this November’s election, Romney will not accommodate calls that he disown supporters who make ill-considered, unpopular, or sometimes outrageous statements on matters not fundamental to the campaign.

Romney aides believe that cooperating with Democrats and media figures who are demanding a Trump disavowal would most certainly lead to more calls for more disavowals of other figures in the future–leaving Romney spending as much time apologizing for his supporters as campaigning for president. Team Romney views it as a silly and one-sided game designed to distract voters from the central issue of the race, which they remain convinced will be President Obama’s handling of the economy.

“Besides, Obama has a lot more crazy celebrities in his corner than Romney does.”

This proud Mus musculus feels that Messrs. Taranto and York must have had a Myomorphic ancestor somewhere in their family nesting material. Their thought patterns rival the type of brainwaves yours truly produced in the experiments at the lab. SQUEAK!!! But I digress.

Taranto goes on to describe the mainstream media take on the association between Romney and Trump — well, at least that of one ABC reporter.

“ABC News’s Amy Walter thinks the talk of Trump will help Obama anyway: ‘Every day that Trump, or other shiny objects like him . . . distract the media, is another day that talk of the economy/jobs is on the back burner. And that is a small, but significant, victory for Team Obama.’

“Can Obama really win re-election via a campaign of distraction? Walter immediately backs away from the suggestion that he can: ‘At the end of the day, however, ‘winning the news cycle’ only goes so far toward winning the race. Voters perceptions of the economy are going to drive this contest more than any one celebrity or ad or campaign flub.’

“If Walter herself couldn’t remain distracted for more than one paragraph, voters ought to be able to regain their focus by Election Day.”

I’ve been scurrying around taunting the cat (who is a career Democrat) ever since I read today’s “Best of the Web Today”. It hit several nails on the head.

Switching to other fine red herrings of the inedible variety, bane for a hungry mouse, this rodentious pain was fain to gain a sane perspective on the main idea behind the Bain refrain, before it completely wanes (someone left the cake out in the rane with Zane, but I digress). Holman W. Jenkins (how’s that for a completely WASPish name) writes in another piece in the Wall Street Journal:

Who says Wall Streeters aren’t filled with a desire to please? Two big-name Democratic financiers, Roger Altman and Steven Rattner, may not be ready to defend the president’s deceitful Bain ads. But they promptly took to the airwaves to defend the president’s defense of the ads, after President Obama himself issued a few syllables they could cling to, saying the ads merely questioned whether profit maximization is an appropriate governing principle.

Some Democrats, like the cat named Diane, have claimed that Romney is “running on his performance at Bain Capital.” Correction to the mouth that roared: Romney is playing this one straight. It is your fellow Democrats who are trying to make a big issue out of it, so they can demean Romney as a big, bad capitalist who actually believes in prrrrrrrrofits and who sometimes has to terminate large numbers of employees because, dadgum it boys and girls, companies are not in the business of supporting employees! Yep, that’s right. They’re in existence to make money. Dirty, filthy money to you who think you stand above the fray, as if you’re not trying to pile up all the money you can while telling everyone else how to spend theirs. Easy, right? Anyhow, this mouse is in need of another Xanax.

Jenkins continues:

[Whether profit maximization is an appropriate governing principle] of course has nothing to do with anything. It certainly has nothing to do with the Bain ads. The ads aren’t meant to engage viewers in a discussion of the limits of the profit motive. The ads are about pure ressentiment.

The word is French and was once adopted by philosophers as diverse as Kierkegaard, Nietzsche and Weber. It describes a kind of moral scapegoating of others to explain our disappointments and dissatisfactions.

Wikipedia is especially instructive in the matter: Sartre also used the term “bad faith” for the habit of blaming others for our plight.

This neurotic, hypochondriacal mouse enjoyed the foray into European philosophers. It made me scratch my head and think. Or was that a mouse mite? Give “The Bain Ads Are About Spending” a read.

That does it for today. I have to scurry under the sofa for a while. I’ll be squeaking at you soon.