The Felonious Monk Tells The President & Federal Government to PAY THEIR BILLS!

FYI - Some REAL education & #TRUTH for the Federal Government from The Felonious Monk!

#LiveFree

#ProgressiveLibertarian

#PushBack

-ADY "A Regular Guy On The Issues"

A Conversation with Jon Huntsman - a REAL public servant

FYI - A GREAT conversation with former Governor and Ambassador, Jon Huntsman, Jr. - a REAL public servant, not a politician. 

This really is a must watch with some very good food for thought.

#LiveFree


-ADY "A Regular Guy On The Issues"

Show Solidarity With Walmart Employees!

Walmart: The High Cost of Low Prices

#Solidarity

-ADY "A Regular Guy On The Issues"

Sen. Jim Demint: Government Shouldn't Tilt The Field For Anyone.

FYI - From the Office of Senator DeMint (R-SC).

-ADY "A Regular Guy On The Issues"

Government Shouldn't Tilt the Field for Anyone

Greenville News

by Jim DeMint

When people ask me if I’m pro-business or pro-labor, I say I’m neither: I’m pro-freedom.

Freedom is the only political principle that cannot be bent to serve special interests. Remember how 7-Up used to call itself the un-cola? Well, freedom is the un-special interest.

Freedom, protected by the Constitution and the rule of law, works for everyone. It allows everyone -- left or right, young or old, rich or poor -- to make their own choices according to their own values.

Government’s job shouldn’t be to tilt the field for one team or another, but to guarantee a level playing for everyone.

That’s why I’m against forcing workers to join unions, congressional earmarks for favored groups, government bailouts of Wall Street, and energy subsidies -- both for oil companies and for green energy.

Now, look at recent events surrounding the Boeing Company, one of South Carolina’s most important employers. As a South Carolinian, as an American, and just as a guy who likes cool planes, I love Boeing.

When Boeing’s home state labor union ganged up with President Barack Obama’s National Labor Relations Board to try to sue Boeing for building a new factory in North Charleston, I strongly supported Boeing’s freedom to build factories wherever they pleased.

More recently dust has been kicked over the extension of the Export-Import Bank, a federal program that subsidizes American businesses’ exports. Because Boeing receives Ex-Im subsidies, and because I favor winding down the Ex-Im Bank instead of increasing its budget, some ask if I went from being pro-Boeing to anti-Boeing.

Neither. All I’ve ever been is pro-freedom.

In both cases, my guiding principle is the same: liberty.

Freedom isn’t perfect, but it is fair. And any time government hands out favors, they’ll be unfair to someone.

When Washington picks winners and losers, in the end taxpayers always lose, and Ex-Im is no exception.

Ex-Im started out decades ago with a lending cap of $5 million to help American companies sell into a "global economy" that barely existed. Today, the cap has ballooned to $100 billion, in a booming global economy. And what have the American people gotten for their money?

Ten-million dollars in loans benefitting the now-bankrupt Solyndra. Millions in loans to another solar company to sell solar panels to itself; $600 million in loans to Enron projects before Ken Lay went to prison. All this after Ex-Im has already sought its own $3 billion taxpayer bailout.

This isn’t a criticism of an agency, or an administration, but of government subsidies in the first place.

When government stays out of markets, businesses focus on their customers. Quality improves, prices fall, and everyone wins.

When government steps in, businesses turn their attention from their customers to their congressman and hire influence peddlers instead of innovators. Competition sags, the pace of innovation slows, prices rise, and product quality suffers.

Defenders say Ex-Im is needed because Europe subsidizes their exporters. But Europe says the same thing about Ex-Im! We’re in a bidding war with other countries for the biggest subsidies.

Still, exporters say the cost of doing business in America is too high to compete.

I agree! We have the highest corporate tax rate in the world, so let’s cut taxes. Let’s reform our insane, $1.75 trillion-per-year regulatory state. Let’s reform education to liberate kids from failing schools and create a better-prepared workforce for the future. Let’s repeal the government takeover of health care, and put an end to predatory lawsuits filed against innocent businesses.

In short, let’s fix the rules of our game to make all our exports competitive rather than rigging them for one company or product at a time.

Our policies should make the United States the best place in the world to buy, sell, farm, manufacture, patent, invent, invest, innovate and educate -- for everyone in every industry.

Look at what today’s ad-hoc economic policymaking has done to America -- where a collection of narrow special interests vie for the favoritism of discredited politicians while we mount unsustainable debt onto the backs our children and grandchildren.

That is what I’m against. What I’m for is a level playing field, a clear set of rules that guarantee the freedom of entrepreneurs to make and sell what they want and the freedom of consumers to buy what they want.

I’m not for big business or big labor. I’m for big freedom, for everyone.

The Democratic Leadership Council: Free Trade Can Fight Terror.

FYI - Some good food for thought from the past!  I wish more of my fellow Democrats still believed, like President Clinton did, in free trade.

From the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC):  Free Trade Can Fight Terror.

-ADY "A Regular Guy On The Issues"

National Defense & Homeland Security The War Against Terrorism

The Wall Street Journal | Opinion | August 15, 2008 Free Trade Can Fight Terror By Edward Gresser and Marc Dunkelman Editor's Note: This op-ed originally appeared in The Wall Street Journal. When trade flares up as a political issue -- as it is likely to do in the presidential campaign this year -- one aspect of the debate is almost always neglected. There is a fierce competition among foreign countries to sell their products here, in the United States, the largest commercial market in the world. Moreover, by opening up our market to Muslim countries, we could not only help American consumers, but also serve a larger strategic goal: that of boosting the economies which now produce large pools of unemployed, embittered youth. We can make trade an effective weapon against terrorism. Our tariff regime puts many nations in the Middle East, whose young people are susceptible to the sirens of Islamic fundamentalism, at an unintended disadvantage. This works against our efforts to stamp out jihadism. Fortunately, the problem is easy to fix. The U.S. buys about a fifth of all the goods and services traded world-wide -- importing $2.63 trillion worth of the world's products last year alone. Socks come in from the Caribbean, towels from Pakistan, cheese from France, and oil from Saudi Arabia. But apart from oil, very little comes from the Muslim world. The 30 majority-Muslim states of the greater Middle East, from Morocco through Egypt to Pakistan and Central Asia, account for about 10% of the world's population. They provide about 1% of our manufactured imports, and an even smaller fraction of our farm imports. The statistics hint at one of the least-studied but most ominous aspects of the modern global economy. Most of us frame the last quarter-century with narratives about globalization, the rise of China and the spread of the Internet. But for the Muslim countries of the Middle East, and their neighbors in Pakistan and Central Asia, it was a period of economic disaster rivaling our Great Depression. Between 1980 and 2000, their share of world trade fell by 75%, and their share of investment fell even faster. The region's unemployment rate became the world's highest, rising to an average of 25% for young people. With the region's population rising by nearly a quarter-billion, the high unemployment rates mean a pool of perhaps 25 million jobless and sometimes hopeless young people, often easy targets for fundamentalists. Will oil -- now selling at record prices -- put these legions to work? Historical experience is not promising. Oil can bring in money, but it also centralizes wealth and power. The effects mark a strong contrast with factory and farm exports, where revenue is spread more evenly through the working public. Apart from gasoline, we rarely find consumer products from the Muslim world stocking our shelves (apart from the shirts and shoes trickling in from Turkey, Egypt and Pakistan). In part, that is because our tariff system makes life harder for developing countries. A Japanese car, for example, is subject to a mere 2.5% tariff, a Chinese TV 5%, and European medicines are subject to no import tax at all. Likewise, oil and natural gas get a nominal 0.1% tariff. But tariffs on the items that are most important to developing economies are much higher. Clothes are subject to an import tax that averages 14.5% and can run as high as 32%. Luggage is taxed just as heavily. Shoe tariffs rise to 48%. Trade pacts like the North American Free Trade Agreement, and preference programs like the African Growth and Opportunity Act, exempt many imported goods from those tariffs. Jamaica, Peru, Jordan, Kenya, Mexico and dozens of other nations export towels, clothes and luggage here duty-free, so American stores can sell their products at a lower price -- or a higher profit margin. Nice for them -- but not so attractive to the nations not privy to a special trade agreement with the U.S., and whose citizens compete with Jamaicans, Peruvians, Kenyans and Mexicans for factory jobs. Towels, for example, are Pakistan's top export. Each container full of towels exported to the U.S. brings in enough income to employ about 500 Pakistanis. But while Pakistani towels are subject to a 7.5% tariff, competing towels from the Dominican Republic or Costa Rica -- both of which benefit from the Central American Free Trade Agreement -- come in duty-free. Likewise, luggage made in Indonesia is subject to a tariff that can rise to 22%, but competes with tariff-free suitcases manufactured in Mexico. Lebanon, which exports preserved fruits and vegetables, must compete with similar duty-free items exported from Peru. Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) has taken a step toward fixing this problem, by introducing a bill, the Afghanistan and Pakistan Reconstruction Opportunity Zones Act of 2008, to waive tariffs on many goods from Afghanistan and Pakistan's frontier provinces. The next president should follow up with a broad, tariff-exemption initiative to help the Muslim world break its downwards spiral, revive trade and put its young people back to work. Of course, a comprehensive solution to Middle East economic problems will require efforts to stamp out corruption, improve schooling and end political oppression. But few things could do more to combat terrorist recruitment than draining the pools of angry and unemployed youth that are spread across this region. Fixing American trade policy would be a good start. Mr. Gresser is director of the Trade and Global Markets Project at the Progressive Policy Institute. Mr. Dunkelman is the vice president for strategy and communication at the Democratic Leadership Council.

Donald Trump: China Is Laughing At Us!

It's true...

-ADY "A Regular Guy On The Issues"