Heritage Foundation Blog

Wow, this is on top of the GOP silently kicking younger members out of budget committees earlier this week for not bowing enough to the party line[1]. The GOP has had opportunities lately to shed some of their hypocritical big-government stances; their growing younger libertarian-ish/anti-special-interests wing (Rand Paul, Justin Amash, etc) is in my view their best hope for long-term survival, but the establishment seems to be denying that as much as possible. [1] http://blog.heritage.org/2012/12/04/huelskamp-amash-say-house-leadersh…

No article on the US debt is going to be neutral. Someone posted an interesting video the other day: http://www.kpcb.com/usainc/ The Heritage Foundation has a different take on it: http://blog.heritage.org/2011/07/28/the-truth-about-obamas-budget-defi… Which shows that Obama is more to blame than Bush. Situation is normal as each side is blaming the other side. John Mauldin has a book called Endgame, which is worth reading through Interlibrary loan. It presents some interesting ideas. Think we need a new super post that just allows everyone to post articles on who's responsible for the US debt underneath.

US bases outside of America are vital to the US if it wants to operate on other continents[1]. The bases in Germany for instance were used for medical care of casualties from Iraq and Afganistan. It's fair to say that without such bases, the US probably could not operate in the way it does. The US has aquirred it's bases for different historic reasons. Some, in the pacific, were leased off the UK for money. Others, like the bases in Japan and Germany, were forced on countries that lost a war with the US, and as few who fought in or supported that war are still alive, you can see why those countries might consider whether they benefit from them. It is hard to separate beneficial activities that the US does, like the protection of shipping as it travels past East Africa, from it's pursuit of strategic objectives, such as rivalry for dominance in Africa with the Chinese, and middle eastern power blocks. And in addition, there is a legitimate counter terrorism aspect, which probably benefits the US more than other countries. The thing is that the US had a great deal of control over Western Europe, imposed by force in the 1940s, and declining since then, and this was achieved as part of a struggle between the US and USSR, where European countries were really pawns. As the power declines (in part due to increasing strength and unity between EU countries), it's hard to imagine that the US will be able to maintain it's bases. I think you should try to see it more…

If ad hominem is the best you can do... I didn't provide anything deeper because this has been rehashed many times, and those claiming that G-S is what allowed the crisis have never offered anything of substance in those previous discussions. But if you insist on more meat, consider (from the original citation [1]): the evidence so far shows that Gramm-Leach-Bliley has helped soften the blow to taxpayers by allowing commercial banks to take over trouble investment firms. Just look at which organization’s have failed: Bear Stearns was an investment bank before it was sold to JP Morgan Chase (which includes a commercial bank). Fannie Mae were Freddie Mac were government sponsored entities before the government bought them. Lehman Brothers was an investment bank before it want bankrupt. Merrill Lynch was an investment bank befor it was sold to Bank of America (which is a commercial bank). AIG is an insurance company with no commercial banking division. Remember, Glass-Steagal was passed to protect commercial banks from failure by forbidding them from investment bank practices like trading in securities and underwriting stocks and bonds. As you can see above non of the failed institutions are commercial banks that got in trouble through risky investment banking. Instead, it is the commercial banks that are providing some stability to the system by purchasing troubled investment banks. Without Gramm-Leach-Bliley they would not even be allowed to technically do this. Or…

This is essentially what Paul Krugman has been saying in the New York Times for a while now. Essentially the idea is this: in a bubble, or period of economic growth, large amounts of deficit spending is a bad thing. In a recession or depression, John Maynard Keynes famously argued that, counterintuitively, it may be highly beneficial to enter a short period of extreme deficit spending. The idea behind this is that in a recession or depression, the entire economic system contracts. In a period of success, everyone's a little more loose with their money: everything's goin great out there, why not take a risk? The opposite happens in a recession: people are worried, so save , save, save. Troublingly, this is the exact opposite of what is needed to get out of a recession. In order to increase employment and restore growth, spending needs to increase, not decrease. If consumer spending is at an all-time low, why would corporations hire more people, instead of less? This is where Keynes came in. He argued that, unlike corporations, the government wasn't limited by the temperamental swings of the market. In fact, the government had the ability to do what very few corporations can: go into a very large amount of short term debt. The idea behind this is to commission large projects which force corporations to rehire and increase expenditures. As such, employment increases and salary for those employees does as well. Once consumers have a sufficient amount of disposable income, the…

The article's author is obviously unfamiliar with Japanese customs. A bow without a smile is taken as insincere. http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/obamajapanbow09111… http://thumbs.dreamstime.com/x/two-young-smiling-woman-japanese-kimono…

"Florida students have demonstrated the strongest gains on the NAEP in the nation since 2003, when all 50 states began taking NAEP exams. Moreover, between 1998 and 2008, the average score for black students increased by 12 points in reading from 192 to 204. In Florida, it increased by 25 points—twice the gains of the national average. If African American students nationwide had made the same amount of progress as African American students in Florida, the fourth-grade reading gap between black and white would be approximately half the size it is today." http://educationnext.org/florida-defeats-the-skeptics/ http://blog.heritage.org/2011/04/02/florida-education-reforms-succeed-…

You have a strong political opinion, and an inflated sense of authority. That smells like youth, so I forgive you for it. I promise when you're older you'll look back and be embarrassed at claiming to be entitled to make authoritative economic claims. Regardless, there are certainly economists with more than an undergraduate degree in economics who have held out Detroit as a warning for the US debt problem. Do you have more authority than Rachel Greszler who has a masters in Economics from Georgetown? I know, you'll disregard her because she works for an conservative group. Just be honest and acknowledge that this is about a political difference, not an authoritative truth. http://blog.heritage.org/2013/08/05/morning-bell-learning-from-detroit…

Not to nitpick infinitely on this question, but not only was it possible politically for Obama to refuse the Nobel Prize, it would have been the Constitutional thing to do http://blog.heritage.org/2009/12/10/does-obama%E2%80%99s-nobel-peace-p…

Well, they do: http://blog.heritage.org/2010/02/09/the-canadian-patients%E2%80%99-rem…

we're not going to let people suffer and die in the street It's funny how people are going to die in the street when they're arguing for nationalized healthcare, but the healthcare laws somehow need to cover free contraception, abortions, and breast pumps. When taxes need to be raised, it's because children are starving in poverty, cops are being fired, and single mothers are being turned out into the streets. Yet, we're wasting billions in foreign aid, sponsoring an Indian reality show for hundreds of millions[1], and wasting billions on obvious avoidable failures like Solyndra. How can we have an honest dialogue about where we've been, where we are, and how we should proceed when this kind of extreme rhetoric/propaganda is so commonplace? [1] http://blog.heritage.org/2012/10/16/top-10-examples-of-wasteful-federa…

There's no doubt that Bush was a massive spender - but let's face it, it was nothing compared to what is being projected under Obama - so I think there's a legitimate critique here: http://blog.heritage.org/2009/03/24/bush-deficit-vs-obama-deficit-in-p… The problem with spending big is that most people have no idea what's in the spending bills - witness all the ridiculous things (e.g. AIG bonuses and the questionable outrage that happened under Obama/Geithner).

As a professional liberal, it pains me to have to do this. But since nobody else is, here's the conservative take. Because, seriously, there are real debates about this stuff. Imaginary Cato institute position: "Leaving higher education to the free market is always more efficient. People naturally make the most rational economic decisions in their journey to achieve maximum happiness. Government interventions, such as confiscating money through the threat of violence (this is what they call taxes) to support free higher education will always distort this market, leading to inefficiencies on the path to maximum happiness. Governments are incompetent and inefficient because of the lack of market incentives, while markets are ruthlessly efficient." Imaginary Mitt Romney position: The financial support I have received from for-profit colleges is immense. Seriously, those places basically print money. We need more of them. Real Heritage Foundation positions: http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2010/01/ways-to-make-higher-e… http://blog.heritage.org/2010/08/10/the-assault-on-for-profit-universi… I really do agree with the above comic strip. But liberals like me don't operate on a vacuum. Donate some money to us, you rich silicon valley types.

>Paternalistic meddling with free consumer choices is always fraught with peril. Actually I'd say that governments typically get away with paternalistic medding with free consumer choices. Elon Musk has the right of this argument, and it's heartening to see a CEO take aim at the politicians that are doing that paternalistic meddling. But I don't see Tesla's CEO fighting back against paternalistic governmental meddling that artificially raises the price of gas cars while producing artificial revenue for Tesla: http://blog.heritage.org/2013/03/04/cant-afford-a-new-car-washington-p… By the government’s own account, the stringent new CAFE standards will increase the average cost of a new car by $3,000 in 2025. The Energy Information Administration warned that new cars priced under $15,000 may no longer be available by 2025. http://www.marketplace.org/topics/sustainability/teslas-secret-success… If a company comes up short, it has to pay a penalty of up to $5,000 per credit. Or it can buy credits from a company like Tesla, which happens to earn a lot of credits on every car it makes. Tesla has sold enough credits to post its first profit.

You are correct there is an unfair assumption in the article of some 1:1 conspiracy of firing 1,000's of Americans with intent to replace them through some as of yet Immigration reform. However, to answer your question, yes there is evidence to suggest companies want to hire immigrants to fill the same jobs that Americans were laid off from. This is a link to a case of first impression (lawsuit) for this kind of discriminant practice, firing Americans for foreign workers, showing American's were kept on board to train their foreign replacements, then fired without cause. http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/01/16/1055249/-Discrimination-Lawsu… Ironically, the discovery in the lawsuit tends to show that the foreign workers were more expensive, because more had to be hired to replicate the productivity of the "skilled American workers". More evidence, but a stretch, is the Immigration reform proposed by "the gang of 8" which allowed for the corporate demanded H1-B's but created strict regulations (protections for the American workers before allowing the foreign candidate to be hired; for example the H1-B employee would have to be paid more than their American counter-part), which was opposed by these very same corporations. http://blog.heritage.org/2013/05/20/immigration-gang-of-eight-would-ma…

There are lot's of good reasons to be against the Act. How about it forcing the young and relatively poor to subsidize the old and relatively rich -- it's a giant intergenerational wealth transfer mechanism. Young adults will pay higher premiums under Obamacare because of its age rating system. The law stipulates that the maximum variation allowed in adult premiums is a cost ratio of 3 to 1. But as Heritage research shows, “The natural variation by age in medical costs is about 5 to 1—meaning that the oldest group of (non-Medicare) adults normally consumes about five times as much medical care as the youngest group.” Obamacare’s “rate compression” causes insurers to charge artificially low premiums for older adults and higher premiums for younger adults. Moreover, “Actuaries estimate that the effect will be to increase premiums for those ages 18–24 by 45 percent and those ages 25–29 by 35 percent while decreasing premiums for those ages 55–59 by 12 percent and those ages 60–64 by 13 percent.” http://blog.heritage.org/2012/03/21/obamacares-2nd-anniversary-no-gift…

If things stay as they are, things will be easier and cheaper. But things never stay the same, and even for their needs, crypto won't suddenly become useless (maybe the kind that relies on central parties, but people who take this stuff seriously probably don't rely on the "we promise we wont look at your key generation" in their threat models, and look, even AFRICOM uses Chinese satellites[0] which I'm sure numerous of SIGINT folks had to give their ok for, right?). And there are things on the horizon like meshnets[1] that should prove to bring more challenges for governments (and private contractors/companies) that seek to tap backbones, DIY cellphones[2] that bypass coercive governments who sweet talk org/corps, and cheap drones that can be controlled by gestures of potential targets at the disposal of the masses[3] that enable crowd-sourced data collection and attack vectors previously not available to the common man. Also, impromptu DoD initiatives[4], don't make me think things are as asymmetric as most people may think. [0] http://blog.heritage.org/2013/05/07/american-military-communications-s… [1] http://forum.chimeshnet.com/ [2] http://hlt.media.mit.edu/?p=2182 [3] http://startupdestiny.com/2013/11/19/why-i-hacked-an-ar-drone-with-lea… [4] http://www.zyn.com/sbir/sbres/sbir/dod/darpa/darpasb133-002.htm