What does the former president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis and senior fellow at the Cato Institute think about the negative interest rate policy by the Bank of Japan and the European Central Bank? “It won’t work,” writes William Poole in the WSJ.
Negative central-bank interest rates will not create growth any more than the Federal Reserve’s near-zero interest rates did in the U.S. And it will divert attention from the structural problems that have plagued growth here, as well as in Europe and Japan, and how these problems can be solved.
Part of the impetus behind a central bank’s negative interest-rate policy is a desire to devalue the currency. With lower market interest rates, holders of euros, for example, may sell them to flee to countries with higher interest rates—driving down the euro’s exchange rate, boosting European exports and growth. But it is impossible for every country in the world to depreciate its currency relative to others. If the European Central Bank hopes to force euro depreciation against the yen and the Bank of Japan hopes to force yen depreciation against the euro, one or both of the central banks will fail.
Socialism. Really? A self-described “democratic socialist” from Vermont is breathing down the neck of the Democratic Party’s icon?
Do Bernie Sanders’ supporters, many of whom are under the age of 30, even know what socialism means? And why would they be willing to “sacrifice economic growth and prosperity in exchange for a bunch of bureaucratic programs that sound good but don’t actually work?”
Well, for years, writes Cato Institute’s Michael Tanner, politicians, academics and the media have pounded away at capitalism, making it “synonymous with Wall Street shenanigans or bank bailouts. Perhaps we need to be reminded of what free-market capitalism really is, and how much better it has made our lives.”
Consider that in the last 25 years, a period during which much of the world has embraced free markets, a billion people have been lifted out of poverty, and the global poverty rate has been slashed from more than 37 percent to less than 10 percent.
It’s not just the decline in poverty that tracks with the adoption of free markets and capitalism. Literacy rates increase and infant mortality declines as countries adopt market-based economies. Life expectancy rises, and people’s health improves. Even the environment gets cleaner.
According to the Human Freedom Index, more economic freedom correlates with more personal freedom. Just consider countries with state-controlled economies and how little personal freedom they allow. On the other hand, countries with free-market economies tend to be free in other ways, too.
New Hampshire has not clouded or brightened the picture as we move on toward South Carolina. Trump continues to embarrass the Republican field. And Mr. Trump is going to gain momentum in S.C.
John Kasich worked hard in New Hampshire and not unexpectedly put up some decent numbers, but is most unlikely to continue into S.C.
Rubio short sheeted his bed in the New Hampshire debate and paid the not unexpected price when the votes were all in. He will rebound in S.C., but has shown his vulnerability in terms of his robotic presentations.
Cruz continues unimpressive and has not been able to shake Rubio. He, like Rubio, will continue to muddle along in S.C.
Poor Jeb Bush. He just cannot get started even though Jeb has the support and the money to try to right the ship.
Chris Christie appeared to be getting things going in New Hampshire but, in the end, was unsuccessful. Chris may well be on the way out, which will be too bad because he is a solid competitor.
Dr. Carson and Carly Fiorina had nothing going on when each landed in New Hampshire and less when the votes came in. Carson and Fiorina should be packing it in with their support swinging to Cruz.
The Sanders/Clinton skirmish ended as expected with more egg on Clinton’s face. What a pathetic embarrassment she has been in the early going. Unfortunately, things will get better for Clinton in S.C., where it is hard to see Sanders making much headway.
In 2014, Hillary complained that when the Clintons left the White House, they were “dead-broke.” Fortunately, Hillary and her husband have dug themselves out of poverty’s hole through their $153 million in speaking fees, $675,000 of which came from three closed-door speeches she gave in 2013 to top Goldman Sachs execs.
The Washington Post reports: “According to the Federal Election Commission and the Center for Responsive Politics, wealthy donors from the financial industry have given Mrs. Clinton’s 2016 campaign bid more than $21.4 million.”
Bernie Sanders and some news media have asked Hillary Rodham Clinton to release the text of her Goldman Sachs speeches. “I will look into it. I don’t know the status, but I will certainly look into it,” she has promised. But Glenn Kessler, The Washington Post’s relentless fact checker, who has also been asking Hillary’s campaign “directly and pointedly” to release copies of the paid speeches, notes, “The silence is deafening. …‘I will look into it’ means, of course, no way, no how, not ever.”
New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd writes that Hillary gave a “stupefyingly bad answer to a predictable question” about taking “the obscene Goldman Sachs windfall.” The real reason Mrs. Clinton refuses to releases the texts of her speeches is the “don’t worry, I’m one of you” implications.
Sens. Rubio, Graham, McCain and fellow neocon traveller Sen. Mark Kirk celebrate “victory” in Libya after the death of Ghadafi.
The American Conservative’s Daniel Larison brings readers Marco Rubio’s tale of fiction. Says Rubio: “No one on that stage has more experience or has shown better judgment or has shown a better understanding of national security threats than I have.”
Daniel then brings this Rubio masterpiece to the table, advising readers “More so than any Republican candidate still in the race, Rubio was on board with Obama’s foolish military intervention in Libya, which helped to destabilize Libya and its neighbors for the last five years.”
Larison continues with a look at Rubio’s position on Syria: ”Any Republican candidate unwilling to risk an armed confrontation with a nuclear-armed major power over Syria has already shown that his judgment is better than Rubio’s. … Like Clinton, he invokes his foreign policy record as if it were something to be proud of, but in the eyes of many Republicans it is exactly the opposite.”
Forty-five years ago, in 1971, I traveled to London on behalf of the institutional research and trading firm where I was then associated. My firm was one of the primary players in the South African gold shares market. My task was to write a position paper for our firm that would lead to a regularly released research report series on the gold shares market. I did indeed start writing on the international gold market and not long afterword began Young’s World Money Forecast, a 50-page monthly analysis of the international economic and monetary system, world currencies, and the precious metals markets. I remain as active as ever in these markets, and today’s extraordinary volatility is but an indication of the problems that lie down the road due to extraordinary mismanagement by the Obama administration and the Fed.
Few Americans understand the mess America is in today better than Ron Paul and Rand Paul. And it is Rand who voters, with a breathtaking display of ignorance, have tossed on to the presidential scrap heap in favor of two frightening Marxist-influenced political dinosaurs and a pack of competitors largely comprising neocon-centric pretenders. A unwelcome outcome lies ahead for America unless one of the neocon-flavored crowd breaks away from the pack and gives voters reason to think that he understands the crossroads that America is at today and has a specific menu crafted to right the ship of state before it is too late. As things stand today, my level of confidence is low.
If Americans need any reason to not understand this warning, listen to any of the clips from from the appalling Democratic debate. These two individuals are running for president of the United States? Any American not scared before last night should be scared now.
Given the above, can there be any reason to not understand why the price of gold is soaring to the point that Barrick Gold Corp, the world’s largest gold miner, is up 63% in just six weeks? The Wall Street Journal as often as not gets the gold story as wrong as it gets foreign policy. Here the Journal does a pretty good job of bringing Americans up to date on what negative interest rates might mean for gold. This theme is but a pee hole in a snow bank in regards to the jam in which the Obama administration and the Fed have put America in over the last eight years. When will Americans wake up?
Some video from Ron Paul on the benefits of buying gold:
The Tax Foundation has released its annual review of income tax rates among the states. There were some big changes in a few states, and overall they were business friendly tax reductions. The Tax Foundation’s Nicole Kaeding writes:
Several states changed key features of their individual income tax codes between 2015 and 2016. These changes include:
Arkansas lowered its top marginal rate from 7 percent to 6.9 percent on income over $35,100. Also, it adopted a new tax schedule for individuals earning between $21,000 and $75,000 in income. The state now has three tax schedules, with differing rates, depending on income.
Temporary tax increases expired in Hawaii. The three top rate brackets were eliminated, and the top marginal rate fell from 11 percent to 8.25 percent.
Maine lowered tax rates and added a third tax bracket. Rates were cut from 6.5 and 7.95 percent to 5.8, 6.75, and 7.15 percent.
Massachusetts’s rate fell from 5.15 percent to 5.1 percent.
Ohio’s tax rates decreased with the top marginal rate falling from 5.333 to 4.997 percent.
Pat Buchanan tells readers, “Republicans should tell our “transformative” president that his days of transforming America are over, that he will not be remaking the court into a bastion of the left after his departure, and that, while he has the right to nominate whom he wishes, the U.S. Senate will exercise its right to reject any nominee he sends up. If the court will then face many 4-4 decisions for the next year, so be it.”
Pat continues “What kind of Supreme Court do the American people wish to have?” …”Does the nation want an activist judiciary to remake America into a more liberal society, as Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor would like to see it remade? Or do the American people want a more constitutional court that returns power to the people and their elected representatives?”
FLASHBACK VIDEO: Pat explains the militant liberalism of Sonia Sotomayor:
Laura Ingraham, a nationally syndicated ratio show host, attacks the argument from conservatives that Donald Trump is not conservative enough. Republicans claim to promote a humble foreign policy, but look at our foreign entanglements in the last 15 years. How about knocking back government spending? It’s a joke. “So everybody’s credibility is shot. And a couple of guys come around like Trump and Cruz, and they turned everyone’s consciousness upside down.”
