Who is John Galt?

luskin: "check your premises"

Something along these lines came up during Obama's ABC "infomercial": At what point is the cost of medical care to extend a life not justified?  Donald Luskin questions the context of the question:

Set aside whether the fault is with this blog post or the sources it links to (it's both). The problem here is the premise it is implicitly based on -- the idea that medical goods and services are different from any other from the consumer's point of view, or from a moral point of view. How can a "medical paper" opine on whether a health care cost is "justified"? Doesn't each consumer have his own utility function for that, just as he does for all other goods and services, based on his personal needs, preferences, and endowments? Why is it useful to point to a New York Times' reporter's banal observation that these services are scarce resources? What services are not?

These questions only mean anything worth debating if you presume from the start that government is supposed to be paying for these things. That presumption makes these questions a matter of public choice, and this debatable. But if you assume that patients ought to be free to decide as they will, then who cares about any of this?

Framing it this way is not about actually debating the issue of scarce resources at all. For economists like Kwak (aptly named, I might add), the idea is to insert the unspoken premise of government involvement for its own sake -- to make a "baseline scenario" of the debate, not to be questioned.

Luskin, of course nails it.  But this is not just a false premise -- there is in fact a correct answer.  I'll have more on that later.

cheaper medicine, not cheaper insurance

On his New York Times blog, Paul Krugman basically went ad hominem on George Will and Greg Mankiw.  Virtually no argument, and plenty of personal attack.

I read the heavily moderated (translation: they'll never post my response) comments.

LOL. Two pages of people debating why insurance is so expensive and who should pay for it.  Not one comment questioning how we ever came to need insurance to pay for simple doctor's visits in the first place.  Krugman must be winning the hearts and minds thing if the debate accepts his faulty premises.

"saving" you money

The White House is touting energy-efficient light bulbs.  Use these bulbs instead, Obama says, and you will save money on electricity.

Now, Obama may tell you that buying his light bulbs (which many people find inferior at, well, producing light) will save you money in the long run -- but do you honestly think he's going to let you keep that money? 

Would it surprise you to learn that the Obama administration is constantly looking for ways to help you save money so you can afford all the things government is going to require you to buy?  Tell me, is that what you're planning for when you save money on your own?  More government?   And isn't it true that you already sock a little more away -- doing without; sacrificing -- just because you don't know if you're really going to have enough to retire on as it is?

And wouldn't you say that all these plans -- for your money -- are a surprising agenda for a guy who promised that some 95% of Americans wouldn't see their taxes go up?

What really makes people free, anyway -- making money, or deciding for themselves what to spend it on?

A good slave makes a lot of money -- but for whom?

why obama won't let private insurance die

Sadly, I realized this weekend where this healthcare thing is heading.  As bad as this could get, I won't get much satisfaction reminding you that you heard it here first.

I believe Obama will seize upon the public's insistence that private health insurance be preserved.  Maybe it'll even be part of some sort of deal.  Then, as insurers collapse one by one -- which is a mathematical certainty -- they will also be "bailed out." Because of the "promise" that you would be permitted to keep your private insurance, your healthcare provider would be "saved."

Then the guy who doesn't want to run the car business -- but who hires and fires CEOs, sets their salaries, and tells them where they can build what kinds of cars -- will reluctantly also take over the insurance companies that he doesn't want to run, and will begin making all of their "tough decisions," too.

So don't worry; your private insurance won't go away. 

But do watch for a provision protecting the public option from pain and suffering lawsuits.  No such protection will be extended to profit-seeking private insurers, of course, whose Obama-appointed executives will be regularly bleeding as an offering to the trial lawyer lobby.

You know, that public plan sounds better all the time.

wsj on "cap and trade"

Titles say it all: Cap and Trade Fiction -- Democrats offloading economics to pass climate change bill. 

Between this mess and healthcare, a familiar pattern emerges -- that of more brainpower being used to cook the books than to craft legislation.  Clearly, the smartest people working on these bills are the ones spending all their time trying to figure out ways of making them look cheaper on paper than they really are.  And that's not saying a lot.

The leadership's solution to this problem is to simply claim the bill defies the laws of economics.

he's dead. get over it.

As I write this, there are 6 different headshots of Michael Jackson on foxnews.com. And one picture of a gurney with a body on it, and one more of the ambulance.

iran

Remember after Desert Storm, when there was uprising in Iraq, and America looked the other way as Saddam Hussein put down the rebellion?

Anybody else getting the distinct impression that's happening again, right now, in Iran???

use your imagination

I want you to imagine two things.  First, imagine that your kids go to private school.  The school takes you seriously, and your kids are learning the things you want them to learn.  Nobody's trying to program or "indoctrinate" your kids against your wishes.  You might have even fired a school or two over the course of your children's education -- or perhaps you would have even had the school fire a teacher -- because you weren't satisfied with what you were getting for your hard-earned.  Having your kids in private school is a luxury.  It would be like being rich -- or like being in Congress.  You would expect -- and receive -- results.

And second, I want you to imagine that tonight Barack Obama is going to come on ABC to pitch public schools.  For years, you would have been hearing that private schools are in a crisis, with the media clamoring for a government solution.  Tonight you will hear how private education is driving the deficit. 

AP finds "world's best job"

John Stossel uncovered this years ago: New York City pays full salaries to tenured teachers who cannot teach, some of whom are actually too dangerous to be around children, for reporting to a "rubber room" every day. 

There are some real nuggets in this article.  Let's look at some of them!

The department blames union rules.

Well, actually, this is a result of a contract, a collective bargaining agreement -- meaning that the department actually agreed to it.  In the real world, nobody would fall for this sort of nonsense with their own money, but it happens all the time in government where nobody's playing with their own money.

This disconnect, between government and the work that goes into providing for it, is the reason the state allows itself to contract with unions that would never make it in the private sector, but it's also precisely the reason government should not be permitted to enter into those contracts in the first place.

if you believe healthcare's driving the deficit now,

...just wait till it's free. 

Apparently Obama (our $2T-deficit-running president) has never heard of P.J. O'Rourke.