Quick reads

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Good articles by Pat Buchanan and Ann Coulter

Good counter point by Larry Kudlow

9 thoughts on “Quick reads”

  1. Buchanan is wrong on all points — as is usual in his economic arguments. Coulter, like a typical journo discussing issues she isn’t expert about, trivializes the economics debate as a political horse race.

    Kudlow is not only right — free trade is an unqualified good, and the U.S. is doing reasonably well economically — but has a better attitude than Buchanan and Coulter combined. It probably helps that he knows what he is talking about and isn’t merely trying to rile up his readers.

    Thomas Sowell had an excellent WSJ op-ed on economic illiteracy a couple of days ago. It’s only available by subscription, but you can get a good innoculation against populist economic claptrap by reading some of his archived columns here.

  2. I liked Buchanan as a debater on CNN’s Crossfire. It seemed the perfect setup for him. Aside from that, I could never be bothered to care about him.

  5. I like Pat. Despite his shortfalls, he’s definitely pro America. He’s also about as conservative as you get.

    Ann is Ann. She’s a good read for entertainment value – a good Republican attack dog for lack of better term.

  6. Buchanan’s got a great delivery, as well as a natural instinct for eight minute debates. Greatest Industrial Republic??? Wha? There’s no escaping the modern era. Automation costs jobs. Computers trim jobs. Does he perhaps propose to run out, stir up a mob, and destroy all the steam driven weaving frames… oppps. That’d be too obviously Luddite.

    Coulter brings up something I’ve been mulling over. Organized labor is a service industry. And although the old industrial Unions have lost their purpose in the US (mainly by bad political choices), perhaps it’s time they started to think of themselves differently. Why don’t the Unions expand into new markets? They’ve got the pension dough to fund foreign investment. They’ve got plenty of unemployed members who could easily set up and run new operations with their eyes closed.

    I’m not suggesting that they set up as a Union in a place like Brazil or China, but rather than they handle operations in those countries vastly messy supply chains. Meat Processing, packing, light industry, etc. in a Country like China and India are run by the most corrupt and useless political placemen around. The AFL-CIO has more money in it’s pension funds than most Countries National reserves, as well as a skill base and organizational experience in exactly the industries that other Countries are now constantly underbidding us on.

    And although the Unions might be corrupt, there’s one thing that has to be admtitted about them. They’ve managed their members pensions better than any Socialist or Communist Party in history.

  8. Good point Alexander about Unions organizing other countries.

    I’ve often thought the same about radical feminists and race-baiters. Relatively speaking, America is the most tolerant country in the world with respect to women’s rights and racial equality. They’re pretty much preaching to the choir at this point, so they’ve become demagogues and bullies (or rather, cowards). They should go where their efforts would make a bigger difference.

  9. Is Pat Buchanan a Republican again? If he is then I’m not any more.

    I’ve asked this question hundreds of times but never gotten a satisfactory answer:

    If the Reublicans are now for protectionism and big governmment, then who is going to be the party of samll government and free trade? Can we pronounce the Goldwater/Reagan wing of the party officially dead now?

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