John Stossel on Intuitively Trusting the Government

robertringer.com

In his new book, No, They Can’t: Why Government Fails — But Individuals Succeed, John Stossel has zeroed in on an interesting theory about what causes people to believe they need government to be involved in so many areas of their lives. He believes that the notion that government can do things better than individuals is “intuitive.”

But what, exactly, is intuition? One dictionary defines it as “Direct perception of truth … independent of any reasoning process.” That definition, however, invites another question: What is “truth?”

A person’s perception of truth can be correct or incorrect. By correct or incorrect, I’m equating truth to reality. If a person’s perception of truth is not reality, his intuition is defective. On the other hand, if a person’s perception of truth is reality, his intuition is sound.

Thus, the kind of intuition John Stossel is talking about is defective intuition — i.e., people who perceive untrue things to be true, without applying reason to their thinking. Such people are said to be “out of touch with reality.”

There’s little doubt that defective intuition is an epidemic in today’s Orwellian world. But it does raise yet another question: What causes people to have faulty intuition?

Hint: The late and legendary Andrew Galambos, whom Harry Browne once dubbed the “unknown libertarian,” is purported to have taught in his private lectures that almost everything everybody believes is wrong.

Many of Galambos’s ideas were, and still are, controversial, but my firsthand experience has convinced me that he was spot on with this particular insight. I never cease to be mystified by how so many people so readily embrace myths — particularly government myths — even when such myths clearly contradict common sense.

Worse, myths tend to grow and become more entrenched over time. To parody the words of Thomas Jefferson, the natural progress of things is for truth to yield and myths to gain ground.

The reason government myths are so prevalent is that, through gradualism, generations of citizens have become used to government dominating their lives. This acceptance of government intrusiveness as the norm causes people to intuitively believe all kinds of myths about government, politics, ideology, and economics, all of which are interconnected.

For example:
Why do so many people intuitively believe that political action is the answer to so many of our problems, when the empirical evidence is that it almost always makes problems worse?
Why do so many people intuitively believe that electing someone new will change things for the better, when almost all newly elected politicians end up protecting the status quo?
Why do so many people intuitively equate wealth with evil when, in fact, the two are in no way connected?
Conversely, why do so many people intuitively equate poverty with moral superiority, when, in fact, the two are in no way connected?
Why do so many people believe that government should “do something about the economy,” when it has proven, time and again, that its actions almost always make the economy worse?
Why do so many people believe that government should make life more fair, when it has no constitutional authority to become involved in an abstraction such as fairness?

I happen to believe in Stossel’s premise that individuals can do most everything better than the government. In fact, I would classify it as an axiom.

Do I believe individuals can operate private fire-fighting companies that are superior to government-owned and operated fire departments? Yes!

Do I believe individuals, acting in their own self-interest, can protect the environment better than the government? Yes!

Do I believe that individuals, voting with their dollars, can discourage monopolies more effectively than the government? Yes!

Do I believe individuals can build and operate streets and roads better than the government? Yes!

Based on the ideology, arrogance, and incompetence of the criminal class that now controls the levers of power in Washington, I’m not even certain that government can do a better job than individuals when it comes to carrying out its traditional duties of defending our national security, protecting our lives and property, and providing a court system for settling contractual disputes and punishing those who commit aggression against others.

Finally, the biggest driver of the defective, intuitive belief that government is all-knowing is our entitlement-centered culture. It’s not just a figure of speech when we repeatedly hear that people are addicted to entitlements.

This addiction to unearned benefits can cause people to panic when government runs out of other people’s money — as we’ve seen in Greece, Portugal, Spain, California, Wisconsin, New Jersey, et al. In this regard, the words of Buddha are as relevant today as they were more than 2,500 years ago: “All unhappiness is caused by attachment.” Have you seen a happy Greek lately?

Buddha said something even more profound when it comes to combating myth-based intuition: “Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense.”

Barack Obama, on the other hand, says, “Believe everything I say, no matter what you read or hear to the contrary, or who said or wrote it, no matter if God said it, regardless of whether it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense.”

Unfortunately, because Buddha isn’t on television every day, about half the people in America seem to be taking advice from the guy who is — Chairman Obama.

If you ever find yourself saying things like, “There ought to be a law” or “The government needs to reform this or that” or “Congress has to stop the bickering and get something done,” it’s a sure sign that you need to work on your intuition. Start with the writings of the Founding Fathers, then move on to Lysander Spooner, Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek, and Ayn Rand … and keep going.

When you reach the point where you think you understand why government fails and individuals succeed, and a mustachioed chap with a familiar face invites you inside, you will undoubtedly have arrived on John Stossel’s doorstep.

And don’t be surprised if he asks you, “What took you so long?”

You have permission to reprint this article so long as you place the following wording at the end of the article:

Copyright © 2012 Robert Ringer
ROBERT RINGER is a New York Times #1 bestselling author and host of the highly acclaimed Liberty Education Interview Series, which features interviews with top political, economic, and social leaders. He has appeared on Fox News, Fox Business, The Tonight Show, Today, The Dennis Miller Show, Good Morning America, The Lars Larson Show, ABC Nightline, and The Charlie Rose Show, and has been the subject of feature articles in such major publications as Time, People, The Wall Street Journal, Fortune, Barron's, and The New York Times.


Comment:

"Intuition" may be just a trained response.  We are trained to believe that government does better than individuals.  This was not always so.  "Rugged individualism" went out of style during the Great Depression and the subsequent New Deal.  Everybody was trained from being independent and self reliant into being more dependent upon the government.  The process continues.

Blogging standards

1. Read this list before I make any more posts.  Each new post, review this list first in order to see if the new post adheres to these standards.
2. I won't talk out my ass.  If I do, I'll put a speculation alert in the body of the post.
3.  Whatever I do, I won't include my personal feelings in any of this stuff, it is supposed to be about the future, and how that future may unfold, not how I feel about it 
4. With respect to politics, I won't electioneer.  Sure, I'd like to see Dems lose, but if they don't, that is the way it is.  This country has been moving in the wrong direction for a long time, nothing I can do about that now. 
5.  Try to be professional.  This is a weak point because I tend to be sloppy and careless.  Try to be more careful and exact.  Always.
6. Don't let myself get caught up in the latest fad.  Fads don't have staying power or they wouldn't be fads.
7. Nobody reads blogs anyway.  Outside their own church, that is.  Write as if nobody is reading.  In case anybody is, that may be considered a plus, but don't count on it.  Don't write for popularity.  Write for accuracy.  Nobody's interested in accuracy.  That's why this blog will never be popular.
8. This world reminds me of the Simpsons.  Yeah but, remember the sense of humor.  That's cuz you're gonna need it.

Update:

Note on the above standards:  I don't adhere to them rigorously, but the conventions below, I do:

Throw in a few conventions with respect to links here:

1. Links to posts in this blog are in bold like this: Blogging standards
2. Links to Amazon are in italics , like this:  Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think
3. Links to pdf files are in green, like this:  The Microwave Thruster Concept

All-Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Thorium Energy

thorium documentary. com blog

By the way, the above link is to a blog about this film:



Update:

Here's a video comparing the mastery of fire with thorium. The cavemen who were afraid of fire had a harder time to survive. Perhaps there's a lesson for us here.

Next Big Future: Could Thorium solve the world's energy problems?

Next Big Future: Could Thorium solve the world's energy problems?: Nuclear technologist Kirk Sorensen has spent much of his career researching the potential of thorium fission reactors. Sorensen has rece...

Is any of this true?

This guy talks about "fairness". But how is it fair that his records can be sealed, but any Tom, Dick, or Harry can paw through your or my own records? Hmm?

So, I'm wondering. Are any of his records sealed and why? If he's going to talk fairness, he should answer that question.

Aeon Flux (2/10) Movie CLIP - Welcome to Bregna (2005) HD

There's a scene is this movie that reminds me of what has happened in our own time and place.

This clip introduces a dystopian future, in a place where nobody has freedom, and certainly no privacy. Everybody is monitored in every detail, including conversations and sexual relations.

What prevents the full scale monitoring of all human activity today? The power of technology exists that can do that. Even that which already exists is scary stuff. You really have to fight for the tiniest amount of privacy and freedom. We are way, way too regulated and controlled. Unfortunately, it is getting worse.

She's interesting because she is right

Yeah, it is pretty bad out there. Unfortunately, it has gone too far already. At this point, what can you do about this stuff?

Are biofuels the answer?

Maybe five years ago, I remember reading about algal based fuels which could be produced for about 25 bucks a gallon.  There was a promise that costs would come down.  Now that all this time has passed, how much have the prices come down?  Not much, if this is any indication:

As part of this support, in December the Navy agreed to spend $12 million for 450,000 gallons of “advanced biofuels,” which can be blended with petroleum in a 50:50 mixture and burned in conventional engines. The Navy and Air Force have both set a goal of using advanced biofuels for 50% of their fuel use by the end of this decade. But the current $26-a-gallon price tag angered congressional Republicans, who accuse the Obama Administration of using the military to support its green agenda [ via Behind the Black blog  note: emphasis added]

 The green agenda must be a scam.  I'd be very surprised if any of this ever pans out.

Why freedom of speech is important

So we don't get something like this.

Terror in the tides : Prime time : SunNews Video Gallery

Terror in the tides : Prime time : SunNews Video Gallery

This news is all over the blogosphere, or everywhere I go on the blogosphere. Looks like some sort of Soros funded thing.

Adam Sandler - I Feel Pretty - Anger Management

Uploaded by adamsandlerfan3 on Jul 5, 2008

A funny film, but there were one too many scenes. The last scene in the movie could have been taken out. It wasn't a bad scene, but it may have been slightly better if it wasn't in there. Kinda like overkill.

Note: the clip below ain't that scene. But you probably already knew that.

Choom Gang

Ace

quote:

Now a soon-to-be published biography by David Maraniss entitled “Barack Obama: The Story” gives more detail on Obama’s pot-smoking days, complete with testimonials from young Barry Obama’s high school buddies, a group that went by the name “the Choom Gang.” Choom was slang for smoking marijuana.

Comment:

Shoot, the left won't think badly of this.  They might think of it like a resume enhancement.  Stuff like this worked for Clinton.  The difference with Clinton, though, is that the economy appeared to be working better.  Obama might have a little more trouble with that.

The New Swing States

Dick Morris TV: Lunch Alert!

Ask Chris Matthews if the ‘Thrill’ is Still There, and He’ll Call You a Horse's Ass

pjmedia.com/tatler

quote:

“I hope that you feel satisfied that you’ve used the most obvious question that is raised by every horse’s ass right-winger I ever bump into,” Matthews responded, after defending the comment.

Comment:

Looks who's talking!

Scooter Obama Outs Navy SEAL Team 6 Leader For Movie

IBD Editorial

quote:

New documents obtained by a watchdog group show our commander in chief gave the name of a Navy Seal Team 6 commander to the makers of a movie about Osama bin Laden. Valerie Plame, call your office.

Comment:

Yes, this has a bad smell.  But Ann Barnhardt said something much worse than this has happened with Obama.  Here's the link for Barnhardt.

The stunning chart that shows the Obama spending binge really happened

blog.american.com

excerpts:

• In a column on Tuesday, Rex Nutting of MarketWatch ran some budget numbers and concluded the following:
  
  Almost everyone believes that Obama has presided over a massive increase in federal spending, an “inferno” of spending that threatens our jobs, our businesses and our children’s future. Even Democrats seem to think it’s true. But it didn’t happen. Although there was a big stimulus bill under Obama, federal spending is rising at the slowest pace since Dwight Eisenhower brought the Korean War to an end in the 1950s.
• Nutting’s methodology assumes spending in the first year of a presidential term should be credited to the previous president. OK, fine. But he attributed a $410 billion spending bill in March of 2009 to George W. Bush even though it was signed by Barack Obama. Nutting also didn’t use inflation adjusted numbers

Comment:

Apt name for Nutting, if you catch my drift.

Rebuttal to Obama’s Negative Ad — Romney’s World View

dickmorris.com

Pondefecate: translation don't talk out your ass

A bit of urban lingo there.  It is also a pun, because the word sounds like "pontificate", which has a somewhat different meaning.

I try not to, so I'll link to sources frequently.  By the way, I am updating the index for navigating this blog.  Always striving to make improvements in the blog.

SpaceX Dragon docking with ISS

BBC

Looks like a go for rendezvous with ISS some time today.  Here's a live feed of the events today.

Update:

Dragon spacecraft approaching ISS

Update:

Closing in!

Remote arm and Dragon in the same frame

Update:

Go for capture!

Update:

Captured! It is confirmed. Congrats, SpaceX.

Cocooned Liberals Are Unprepared for Political Debate

Michael Barone, Real Clear Politics

quote:

Journalist Bill Bishop, who lives in an Austin, Texas, neighborhood whose politics resemble Kael's, started looking at national data.

It inspired him to write his 2009 book "The Big Sort," which describes how Americans since the 1970s have increasingly sorted themselves out, moving to places where almost everybody shares their cultural orientation and political preference -- and the others keep quiet about theirs.

Comment:

Another example of how ideology can make you stupid.  You should at least know what your opponent is up to.

Family Guy Picard and Troi

Uploaded by CristoofRomania on May 17, 2011

Not lemonade? Yuk, yuk.

Solve for X: Neal Stephenson on getting big stuff done

Uploaded by wesolveforx on Feb 2, 2012

This discussion follows the thinking of expressed during the debate between Diamandis and Gilding.  Why don't problems get solved?   Is it because there are too many people out there who don't want them to be solved, and those people tend to have a lot of influence?

How the Recovery Went Wrong

Harvey Golub, Wall Street Journal h/t Instapundit

excerpts

• Over the past 60 years, there have been 11 recessions and 11 recoveries. Sadly, this recovery is near the bottom of all 11. Cumulative nonfarm job growth is just 1.9% 34 months into recovery, the ninth-worst performance and well below the average job growth of 6.5%. Cumulative GDP growth is just 6.8% 11 quarters into this recovery, less than half the average (15.2%) and the worst of all 11.
• this administration has been overtly hostile to business across the economy except for progressive favorites like electric cars or wind and solar power
• he says millionaires and billionaires aren't paying their fair share. He forgets, or simply does not know, that the top 1% of earners actually pay as much as the bottom 90%, and the bottom half pay no income taxes at all.

Comment:

This is an ideological president who is running an ideological campaign. Romney can run as a problem solver as contrast. The question that could get answered is this: will the public respond to a non ideological candidate? Or will people prefer a red meat campaign with both sides running towards their respective bases?

Morning Jay: The 'Bain' of Romney, or Obama?

Jay Cost: The Weekly Standard

excerpts:

• There is dissension in the Democratic ranks on President Obama’s reelection strategy. His campaign team has decided to focus on Mitt Romney’s time at Bain Capital
• much more interesting is how terribly lame Team Obama’s strategy is... There are two, enormous problems with this.
• First, Team Obama does not enjoy a monopoly on defining Romney. The latter will have more than a little say in how the public comes to view him. And – contrary to what you might read in the lefty blogs and the Washington Post – he actually has a good story to tell.
• Second, it’s not so much that Team Obama is using Bain, which would be an inevitable part of any campaign (Democratic or Republican). It’s rather that they have so little else to work with. What is the positive message of the Obama campaign? What is the vision for a second term? 
• just in case you think this “radical GOP” meme really has some underlying purchase on what’s happening, remember that the Beltway establishment said the exact same thing about the 104th Congress, elected in 1994. Yet Clinton dealt with them, producing a balanced budget, tax cuts, a line-item veto, health care portability, and welfare reform.

In other words, it's blame the other guys.   He has nothing positive to run on.

Negatives won’t kill Romney

Dick Morris : TheHill.com

excerpts:

• Bain: The polling shows Romney can survive the hit by saying that “sometimes he succeeded in helping companies, and sometimes he failed.” 
•  outsourcing:  But when Republicans point out that General Motors, a federally owned company, outsources 160,000 of its 220,000 jobs worldwide, it blunts the criticism
• Medicare: a key finding is that the GOP can avoid the false choice between slashing benefits and raising taxes on Medicare by focusing on expanding the number of doctors to avoid rationing and allowing lower costs through greater efficiency rather than by restricting coverage
• Oil-company profits: The key is for Romney to explain that higher oil-company taxes will “only cut the money they have available for exploration and drilling” and to warn that doing so will “not cut, and might raise, gasoline prices.” Swing voters break even on agreeing or disagreeing with this line of argument by 47-46.
• Buffett Rule: when told that Obama himself only pays 20 percent in taxes, it blunts the issue. The second rebuttal is to tell voters that the bill would garner only $70 billion to remedy a $3.7 trillion deficit. After learning this, most swing voters see the president’s position as more motivated by getting votes than by cutting the deficit.

How To Persuade A Swing Voter

Dick Morris TV: Lunch Alert!

Yeah, go after those swing voters.  You won't get anywhere with the true believers.

But, there's an argument that can go the other way too.  It is just a matter of which one is the most persuasive.

The Truth About Obama’s Positive Ad

dick morris

The politics must be heating up.  One thing I need to remind myself of--- you really need to just relax because things will go whatever direction they are going to go.  There's not a whole lot you can do about it.

I'm going to have to remember this somehow.  But the emotion drags you back into the fight.  But the fight is over what???  Nothing at all.

Our trouble is our politicians.  The Framers of the US Constitution knew that--- that's why there's checks and balances.   If it were otherwise, there wouldn't be a need for those, now would there?

Things may be getting worse after all

Just went over to the New York Times and read David Brooks' piece on How Change Happens.  It seemed to be a realistic description of what happened in the eighties.  But after reading the piece, the first comment was from a guy who said that basically it was free enterprise that was at fault for the current troubles.   Oh, my.

With that mode of thinking, things are definitely going downhill.  If this is the mindset that prevails in November, 'Katy, bar the door'.  We are in deep, deep doo doo.

Politics is making us stupid and the internet is accelerating the idiocy.

Zero Hedge Clueless about Planetary Resources

Next Big Future: Zero Hedge Clueless about Planetary Resources, Spa...: There are various groups who in the past claimed that world crude oil production peaked in 2005 at about 72.75 million barrels per day. Ze...

The most fascinating thing about this is the "debate" between Diamandis and Paul Gilding.  Gilding even said that Diamandis' hope is canceling out his fears so that nothing gets done.  My fear is that ideology is making us stupid so that no problems will be solved.  Instead, we are instructed by the masters of ideology to pray harder and believe harder.  My opinion is that we need to think harder and address the problems instead of pointing fingers.

The author at Zero Hedge seems to agree with Gilding.  Brian Wang of Next Big Future appears to side with Diamandis.  I like Diamandis, and I think Gilding may not be on the level.  This is a charge that will likely create a bit of resentment amongst his believers. The truth of the matter is that we've been living under the threat of diminishing resources for decades that I have personally witnessed, only to see that this has not been borne out by the facts.

I want to quote something from Zero Hedge

The second crucial problem is a failure to consider the limit outlined by Paul Gilding, which is that present growth rates of energy consumption, for example, imply an economy that just about everyone can agree is simply too large for the planet to handle. You simply cannot keep growing the size of the human-created heat engine up to the level of a star. This was articulated beautifully by physicist Tom Murphy in his recent and very wide read post Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist. When problem solvers entirely avoid the subject of limits it is both appealing, and exciting, but eventually it becomes vaguely pathological.

But it won't be necessary to grow energy consumption to the level of a star.  This is a straw man.  As Diamandis pointed out, the sun strikes the Earth with thousands of times the energy that we currently consume.

If the Zero Hedge guy thinks that there are limits to growth, he is right in theory.  But the assumption is that growth will continue just as it is.  That hasn't even happened in the United States.  Why should it happen all over the world?  The USA uses less energy per capita than it did when I was in school decades ago.  Efficiency has increased.  This undermines his argument.  It is possible to grow the economy and limit the growth in energy consumption.  It has been done.  Not only that, but to grow energy supply, limit consumption, and spread prosperity across the globe.   All of this has been done.

Update:

The following link is to a video in progress, but at the very end.  I'm putting it in here to show a rather startling assertion that the productivity of scientists has dropped to only 1% of what it used to be!  A lot of what he says rings true.  We've allowed politics into science and this has destroyed our ability to solve our problems that way.  The results could be disastrous.

Fairness? Whatever does he mean?

Here's Obama discussing some points on the issue of fairness. Let's focus on his statement that everyone should pay their fair share.

The government spends over 3 trillion dollars each year.  There are about 300 million Americans.  Doing the math, the government spends approximately 10,000 dollars per capita.  Could you not say that the fair thing to do would be to send a bill to every American for 10,000 so that the government can be funded?  No, there are many who could not afford that.  A family of four would not be expected to pay 40,000 dollars on taxes each year.  There are many households in this country where the income isn't even that much.  To expect them to pay such high rates would be confiscatory.  Nobody would favor that.  But it isn't a matter of fairness.

Taxes are set up on the ability to pay, not on the basis of fairness.  The "rich" pay more because they are able, not because it is fair.  For instance, how is it fair to pay nothing at all even if you benefit as much from that 10000 in spending as the richest person in the country?  Or, to put it another way, how is just paying nothing at all "fair" when you benefit from that spending?

The only way it can be deemed fair to force the "rich" to pay more than those who are not is to say that somehow the "rich" did something "unfair" in order to get their money.  Therefore, they must be punished in order to set things right.  What the president seems to be giving voice to is the notion that there is some injustice being done by the rich to the rest of us.  Therefore, the need for "fairness" in the tax code.

This sets up the notion that income must be redistributed.  It is all a zero sum game.  Whatever the rich have gotten has come at the expense of everyone else, so it is justice to take that unlawful booty away from them and give it to the rest of us.  It denies that wealth is created.  If wealth is created, who creates it?  Why nobody creates it.  It cannot exist.  Whatever is good must have been taken from something else and the rewards must be distributed fairly.  Wealth has been taken from the poor, or it has been taken from the earth, or it has been taken from the rest of the world's population.  Wealth itself cannot exist apart from others.  Therefore, it cannot exist, because it is already there.  That's what makes it a zero sum game.

This must be the logical conclusion from the president's remarks.  There's no wealth creation.  That's because if there is, somebody must be creating it.  Then it would be much harder to argue for the redistribution of it because it invariably means that you have to take it away from those who create it and give it to others.  This is not justice, it is coercion, it is theft.  Theft is unjust.

Update:

Pursuing the thought a bit more, I posed a question and submitted to a google search- does wealth exist?

The results didn't satisfy me much, as nobody seemed to get the point. Wealth is not money, per se.  It is the relative availability of goods, at least that is how I see it.   But this is an interesting essay- Does Wealth Exist in a Vacuum?


Wealth doesn't exist in a vacuum, in my opinion.  But the collective cannot create it.  It is an individual process.  The collective can magnify its significance, but the creative process cannot exist apart from an individual.  That's paraphrasing Ayn Rand, by the way.


Or to paraphrase Ronald Reagan- we are not ants on an ant hill.  We are separate and distinct from each other.  Each person has his/her own gifts and each person utilizes those gifts with more or less effectiveness.  Equality cannot mean sameness, because we are not the same.  Equality can only mean equality of opportunity- anything else produces a monstrosity like the Soviet Union.

Update:

Here's another problem that I see with the Occupy manner of thinking.  Just because someone is a member of a certain group, such as the 1%, doesn't make them guilty of anything.  Nor does membership in a group, such as the 99%, make anyone a victim of anything.  Guilt or innocence is determined in relation to individuals with respect to specific acts.  Merely judging one simply because of one's being a member of a group isn't valid, rather, it is highly prejudicial thinking.  It should be the very thing that those who claim to be liberal would be the most against.  It is the same as saying that being a member of a certain racial or religious group are somehow less worthy than another.

There can't be any concept of group guilt in a civil society.

Falcon 9 to try launch early Tues morning

Live feed.

Watch live streaming video from spaceflightnow at livestream.com

Parody song

Word sung to Ghost Riders in the Sky
with apologies to Johnny Cash and others

Ghost Writer for This Guy

An old donk went polling about one dark and windy day
Upon a bridge he pondered as he spun along his game
When all at once the winning word of slogan he foresaw
A-rising through a dimming hope and change the poll's outcome

His vision was still on fire when his news got off the reel
The word needs black man bright and clean give breath to the deal
A bolt of fear went through him as he thought about the guy
For he knew the writer had not skill and needs a better try

Barry, oh nooo
Barry, oy vaaaaay
Ghost writer for this guy

His face's dark, his speeches un slurred, their hearts beat pitty pat
He's writing hard to catch those words, but he ain't found them yet
'Cause they've got to tell these folks 'bout a story of their guy
A slogan caught fire
As their chests heave an adoring sigh


As the One wrote about himself he heard one yell 'all the same'
If you want to save your poll from Hell writing bout hope n change
Then donkeys change your game today or with us you will fry
Trying to catch the Devil pubs, with our endless lies

Barry, oh noooo
Barry, oy vaaaaay

Ghost writer for this guy
Ghost writer for this guy
Ghost writer for this guy

Did Ayers write Obama's books?

Little known Grand Funk related stuff

videos Uploaded by JohninFunk

comments:

When I was younger, I took a bit of grief about being a Grand Funk fan.  There's a lot of Grank Funk on YouTube.  Evidently, they are still popular.  That may cause certain people to roll their eyes, as Grand Funk got a lot of bad press back then.  This may have been a gimmick, as their manager is quoted to have said that there was no such thing as bad publicity.  All of the bad publicity may have helped to make them popular with the rebellious youth of the day.  It also may have made them a bit underrated, in my opinion.

Anyway, not having much in the way of ideas for posting, I started browsing some Grand Funk stuff on Youtube.  I found some stuff I haven't seen before, and thought I'd link it up here.

The first here is from the pre Grand Funk days when Mark Farner, the front man of the group, who at the time of this recording was with a group called The Pack.  This song here is similar to the Locomotion, which was one of Grand Funk's most popular songs,  making it all the way to number one in 1974.  This particular song, which is a bit different, but similar in that it is a dance song,  is called Widetrackin'.  I could be wrong, but that almost has to be Farner doing the vocals.  Farner's voice is much more laid  back in this song, but it is clear to me that it is him.

The next song is a cover of Jimi Hendrix' Fire.  It is also a Pack recording done way back in 1968.  Grand Funk got started in 1969, if memory serves.

Farner did another cover of a Christian song called Isn't it Amazing?  This recording was in 1989.

Just after Grand Funk broke up, Farner went solo and here's a song off one of the two albums in the late seventies.  It is called He Sent Me You.  This live performance of that song was recorded in 1988.

Recovery? Just 16 States Have Gained Jobs Under Obama

investors.com  h/t Instapundit

quote:

IBD also compared state job growth with business friendliness. States that rank highest on this measure — which typically focuses on tax rates, regulations, tort reform and the size of the state government — have experienced faster job growth rates than those ranking lowest.

Comment:

California scores poorly in business friendliness, Texas scores highly.  The jobs numbers correlate perfectly.

Nuff said.

Evening Wrap

Bringing that back today, but maybe for the day only.  I want to make an all around post about random topics.

First of all, the topic today was lying, more or less.  This led me to some thoughts about the duality of man.  On the one hand, people want to believe things.  On the other hand, people lie a lot.  I see those as opposites, a type of duality.  It also gives people the incentive to lie because people will believe the lies.  If people didn't believe lies, there would be no incentive to tell lies.  You have to be able to trust people in order to function, but that trust can be violated.  Not such a happy thought.

Moving on to a different topic, which I covered yesterday, which was the LFTR technology.  Something came out of that that could be the fly in the ointment for LFTRs.  That is, it may be at least theoretically possible to use this technology to make bombs.  So, I spent a little time on that.  This is one of those cases in which you have to decide whether to trust the source not to trust the source.  Up to this time, I figured that I would believe Sorensen when he says that there's little risk.  After what I saw yesterday, a little disquieting feeling has come into the picture.  I can't dispel it completely by studying it, so basically you just have to make a gut call on it.  Nothing in life is obtained without risk.  This just may be a slight risk that would have to be endured if LFTR technology is going to be implemented.  Unfortunately, we are living in a risk averse society these days.

Next topic is about SpaceX.  Actually, it is more about space in general.  As you may know by now, the Falcon 9 didn't launch as expected.  You may also know that the problem appears to be a faulty check valve, which could be repaired easily and another attempt can be made on early Tuesday.  But that's no biggie.  The big thing is in the way this thing is being perceived.  Since we are such a risk averse society, anything that looks like a failure is going to be bringing a lot of handwringing and knashing of teeth.  But why should it?  If people had this attitude about cars and planes, we'd all still be in the horse and buggy era.  If you leave it up to the deep ecologists, we just may end up there.  No risk, no reward.

Another thought about space is that I get the feeling that the Apollo Era wasn't all that it was cracked up to be.  The result of the program was that people think that space flight is always going to be too dangerous and too expensive.  Politicians seem to think that way too, relegating space to the "bread and circus" mode it now labors under.  But the Apollo Era should have led to space colonization.  The fact that it didn't indicates to me that something has gone very wrong even though the program appeared to be a great success.  The bad thing about it all is that nobody seems to understand the great opportunity that space offers.  Many of the problems that people seem to be so worried about could be greatly mitigated if there was a serious program to colonize space.  But I've covered that on numerous posts.  All that I can add here is what a shame.

Jig's Up, Cherokee Liz

IBD Editorial, Posted 05/18/2012 07:00 PM ET h/t Free Republic

quote:

There's no truth whatever to Democratic Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren's claim to Indian ancestry. She's been proved a fraud. Time for her to fess up and end this charade.

Comment:

Wanna bet that she'll do that?  The dishonesty is really brazen these days.  Getting caught in a lie won't shame these people.  She'll probably claim a smear!

The truth is a slippery thing, especially if someone is lying to you

Lie spotting, Pamela Meyer Ted talk, h/t Ace

Does this woman look honest to you?  Find out how you can tell.  ( Assuming she's telling the truth, of course)

Ghost riders in the sky - Johnny Cash - Full Song

Uploaded by justicejayant on Jul 27, 2008

An idea for a parody song comes to mind...

Obama used a ghost writer, so replace "ghost riders in the sky" with "ghost writers with this guy"

Nah!  It makes Obama look better than he deserves.