Watching one of the first showings of part II of Atlas Shrugged was a surrealistic experience after testifying to the House Transportation Committee about Amtrak. In the movie, government officials piously argue that for the “greater good” (a phrase that turned out to be just as deadly in Harry Potter as in Atlas Shrugged) they need to provide “guidance” to the nation’s capitalists–and the more guidance they give, the more capitalism fails, which justifies even more guidance.
In the hearing, I testified that Amtrak can’t be reformed because as a government entity it will also be controlled by politics, and the only solution was privatization. This led Peter DeFazio, my own former congressman (I moved to an adjacent district four years ago) to ream me out for not having faith in government.
“You don’t believe government should run our air traffic control? You don’t believe government should run our highways? You don’t believe government should subsidize the Port of Los Angeles?” Before I could fully answer each question, he would roll his eyes and interrupt me with incredulous moans. Fortunately, one of the other committee members rescued me and gave me a chance to answer.
Ironically, one of DeFazio’s own questions should have been his undoing. Somehow, he didn’t think Americans could manage to buy cheap goods from Asia unless the federal government subsidized the Port of Los Angeles. Aside from the fact that he probably bemoans the import of cheap goods from Asia, why subsidize the Port of Los Angeles when there are so many other suitable West Coast ports–and in particular, the heavily underutilized Port of Coos Bay in DeFazio’s own district?
Of course, DeFazio also thinks the feds should subsidize the Port of Coos Bay. But given that the Los Angeles metro area has 12 million people and therefore some two dozen representatives in Congress, while the Coos Bay area has about 60,000 people and therefore a fraction of one representative, subsidies are mainly going to go to the former and not the latter even though the latter is a much better natural harbor.
If the customers announce that the item is excellent and offer excellent mouthsofthesouth.com generic cialis online results, you may move on with your purchase. The minute they were asleep, we made the low priced cialis most fantastic love that I have ever experienced. Leafy Green Vegetables like Celery purchase cheap viagra mouthsofthesouth.com and Spinach can increase circulation because of high concentration of nitrates. The flow of blood decreases in the genital areas of the female cialis body and that’s why a penis loses its erection.
But it was not just DeFazio who supported government control of the economy. Republicans and Democrats at the hearing were equally guilty of thinking that they, the enlightened representatives of the people, should decide where “investments” should be made in transportation, how much people should get paid, and who should produce what, all for “the public good.”
“Everyone here believes in creating jobs,” said one Republican. I wanted to raise my hand and say, “No, I believe in creating wealth, not jobs. Your idea of ‘creating jobs’ destroys wealth by taking from some people the wealth they created and giving to others who aren’t creating it.” But I realized that by “everybody here,” they meant “every elected official in the room,” not us nonentities who were there to testify or witness the hearing.
Later, another Republican who had been critical of Amtrak’s losses said, “No one here wants to destroy Amtrak; we just want it to run more efficiently.” Once again, I wanted to raise my hand and say, “I want to destroy Amtrak, because Amtrak is spending phenomenal amounts of money running crappy trains.” But again, I restrained myself.
Rather than privatize Amtrak, at least some Republicans propose to contract out Amtrak’s trains to private operators. Congress would still decide where those trains should run. The Republicans who support this proposal would also require the private operators to honor Amtrak’s contracts with workers. Those two requirements would destroy most of the benefits of contracting out.
In Atlas Shrugged, a man named John Galt convinces all the smart people in the country to “go on strike” until the government fails from mediocrity. Fortunately, such a strike won’t be necessary in real life as the mediocre results of government control will lead to failure all by itself. We just have to hope that there is enough wealth left in the country that we can put it back together.
Amen, Randal. The goons in government think they’re better and smarter than the rest of us, and they feel they have the privilege to force “good” things on us. Hey just look at our persistent planner pal Dan who keeps coming here and looking down his nose at us non-planner, non-government employee folk.
Though you want to force people to live a certain way too!
I really shouldn’t reply to the troll, but how do “I” want to force anyone to live a certain way? I just want to be left alone, like every other, OK, most every other American. It’s the smart growth thugs who want to mess everything up and force us all to live in tiny apartments, whether by making single family homes too expensive, or maybe by gunpoint in their most private dreams.
You don’t want a level playing field between road and rail.
Oh, by level playing field, you mean 50% of the money should go to the modality (rail) that carries 1% of the people, right?
Roads don’t exist on a profit or loss basis.
Railroads should not have to exist profit or loss basis as well.
Roads pay their own way. Rail doesn’t. That’s the difference for dense idiots like you.
Roads pay their own way the same way that sidewalks, parks, schools, police, fire departments and mass transit pay their own way via property taxes.
I don’t object to using property taxes to construct and maintain railroads as well.
“Faith in Government” *snicker. Ha ha ha….ha ha ha *Cough Cough*
Stop making me laugh, I’m gonna pee myself
This is the same government that was sending social security checks to dead people. The same government that shipped the cremated remains of 274 of it’s military personnel to a Virginia landfill. The same government that at least nine FAA air traffic controllers admitted to falling asleep while on the job and were not fired. The same government that gave 2 billion dollars to failed solar energy companies they can’t find. Labor Secretary’s ode to American workers falls when Secretary Hilda Solis meant well when she was asked by reporters about her snazzy government-issued hybrid SUV. She said the Chevrolet Equinox was designed to “send a signal that we are for supporting our American workers, [and] American-made products. But reporters soon discovered that General Motors assembles the vehicle at two manufacturing plants…..in Canada. Demand is high for the Equinox that GM is hiring more workers in Canada. Even Solis’s aides privately admitted that the Obama administration’s point person on (American) job creation goofed, big time. And these goofs were in 2011 alone.
Faith in government, I gonna have to change my pants.
I don’t have any faith in the private sector either.
Just curious: if not an organized group of citizens, electeds or appointeds, who mitigates the inevitable market failures, greed, selfishness, theft and manipulation of information in the fairy-dust world of Galtian Free Markets(TM)? Enron? Global Crossing? Bechtel? Bankers and financiers?
That is: who speaks for people and the publics in complex, advanced societies? Surely there is absolutely, utterly no one who thinks that rational individual agents working alone can navigate a complex society! So then who?
Note: if you think that this is a call for more of th’ gummint, then please change the channel or put down the third-rate novel.
DS
Yes! More Enron myths!
Are you actually attempting to imply Enron’s shenanigans came at no cost to the public or markets? Srsly?
DS
Did you read the article? Seriously? I’m not attempting to imply anything. You’re implying is myth number two from the article linked: “Myth #2: Without proper regulation from government, companies like Enron will abuse the financial system.”
That wasn’t my assertion, implication or question.
So I really don’t know what you are replying to.
DS
“if not…electeds or appointeds, who mitigates the inevitable market failures…of Galtian Free Markets(TM)? Enron?”
Enron was not a product of a free market; it was the product of government intervention and regulation.
Also, “market failure” is a myth:
I never asserted/implied/questioned that Enron was the product of a free market, so I don’t know what you are replying to.
Nevertheless, of course in earth’s system of reality there are market failures. If you need to feel there aren’t market failures, you are going to do poorly in college when you take MacroEcon 101 unless you drop the need to wish it to be true.
DS
Dan, you know I attended Chico State. It’s the same institution that msetty attended, and I believe you also attended the California state higher education system.
Just because of disagreement, there is no reason for msetty to call me an “economic ignoramus” or you to question my ability to pass econ classes.
I passed both macro and micro and my other econ-related courses with flying colors, even though one statist professor docked me points on my midterm that predicted the higher education bubble due to government intervention; he angrily scrawled in red ink that “education may not be similar to a hamburger!” This from the same prof who failed students who walked out of lecture. His class was so dull and dry that he had to coerce students to remain.
Just because I’m a proponent of the heterodox Austrian School rather than a neoclassical or a Keynesian doesn’t mean I’m ignorant or stupid. I just disagree.
BTW, as you know, macroeconomics is theory, not fact.
And if you want to continue questioning my ability to pass econ classes, I’ll have to broach the topic of reasons for your unfinished masters in planning.
Frank, I think we’d all very much like to hear why planner boi failed his masters in planning!
Yes, of course there are market failures and have been for centuries, and econ is theory (just like gravity, relativity, probability, evolution…). And I personally describe econ as being sometimes helpful in describing the world, but often doesn’t do a good job explaining the variance. And I never give an econ reason alone when advising on policy.
And if you want to continue questioning my ability to pass econ classes, I’ll have to broach the topic of reasons for your unfinished masters in planning.
No one would think that was scurrilous or craven at all, no siree Bob!! Nevertheless, don’t bother making up a long list, as there is only one reason. But don’t let me ruin your storytelling. What hokum can you make up? Cough ‘er up!
And saaay, all this typing and no answers to what replaces standard, thousands-of-years-old standard institutions to protect us from the inevitable human condition: market failures, greed, selfishness, theft and manipulation of information!!
Wonder why concerns like that get buried? Huh. Just can’t figure it out…
DS
Once (if) you submit your thesis, let me know. Can you submit your thesis eight years after finishing coursework at UW? Their website states “All work toward the degree must be completed within six years of entrance into the program.” Does that mean you’ll never be able to get your master’s degree? Hmm… So far they have no record of your thesis in the catalog, your degree hasn’t posted, and your resume lists “thesis pending.” But whatever. Make up stories about my ability to pass econ classes if it alleviates symptoms of your narcissistic personality disorder.
Anyway, you should head on back to samefacts.com or continue trolling Al Gore’s Facebook page. I’m not going to bother responding to your nearly unintelligible gibberish any more. No more feeding trolls.
You poor thing, you tried to spam the comment with weak attempts at distraction but had nothing. Again.
At least you stick to your patterns! Good for you on being predictable! Yay predictable! Bye now! So long.
Still no answers to what replaces standard, thousands-of-years-old standard institutions to protect us from the inevitable human condition: market failures, greed, selfishness, theft and manipulation of information!! No one holds their breath waiting for answers.
DS
You’ve been given answers, Dan, but you refuse to consider them. Back in June I linked to a working paper written by two economic Ph.Ds at NYU. Titled Discovering Law: Hayekian Competition in Medieval Iceland, the paper concludes stating that “Iceland provides a historical example of how private legal
institutions can spontaneously evolve and successfully function.” Bury your head in the sand and flat out refuse to review it like Andrew.
Speaking of Andrew, you mentioned Bechtel previously. It’s hard to translate your intended message, but you seemed to be asking who would be in charge absent government. I don’t know a whole lot Bechtel, but perhaps you and Andrew can chat about Bechtel since he works for Jacobs Engineering, which owns Bechtel.
Good evening, trolls.
Andrew can chat about Bechtel since he works for Jacobs Engineering, which owns Bechtel.
Interesting, now we know why Andrew likes rail. At least one light rail line in this country (Portland airport) was built by Bechtel!
It’s hard to translate your intended message, but you seemed to be asking who would be in charge absent government.
I phrased it in simple language and re-phrased it to be clear for the low-information sector. Either your CSU education was inadequate, or you are still flailing about looking for play. Either way isn’t working for you.
You’ve been given answers, Dan, but you refuse to consider them
Yet again you are making it up. Just because you type something doesn’t make it true. If you can’t come up with an answer to the basic question you pretend to not understand, you can’t play as your links don’t address the basic issue: there’s no there there, as here on earth there are humans.
But it’s fun to see them flail about trying to hide it, surely.
DS
I was wrong. Bechtel and Jacobs Engineering Group own Bechtel Jacobs. So hard to keep the corporate relationships clear.
But to expand on Andrew’s obsession with rail, which is to the point of lying about Bolt Bus, one need only look at his LinkedIn profile to see that he got a MS in Railroad Civil Engineering (and unlike Dan, he actually finished his master’s program). His obsession with trains is further highlighted in the photos posted to his his Facebook page. What’s interesting is the dichotomy between Randall’s affinity for trains and his ability to see the reality of cost/benefit analysis and Andrew’s utter obsession with rail to the point it blinds him to economic reality.
“Just curious: if not an organized group of citizens, electeds or appointeds, who mitigates the inevitable market failures, greed, selfishness, theft and manipulation of information in the fairy-dust world of Galtian Free Markets(TM)? Enron? Global Crossing? Bechtel? Bankers and financiers?”
Let’s see. “Electeds” nor “appointeds” are words. Add in several prep phrases strung together. Add in non-conventional capitalization. Add in “Galtian Free Markets” a phrase totally coined by Dan and having no matches on Google. Add in “fairy-dust world” which is an appeal to ridicule. Add in (TM) which is a pathetic attempt to be clever, perhaps after three glasses of Merlot. Then an incongruous list of corporations and the banking industry, which I have railed against here.
Yes you “phrased it in simple language” Dan. Sure. Right. My CSU education was inadequate in general, but at least I earned a master’s degree.
Now shut the fuck up and leave me the fuck alone.
“you can’t play as your links don’t address the basic issue: there’s no there there, as here on earth there are humans.”
Totally crystal clear, Dan. There’s hope for you if give the steps a try.
Yes you “phrased it in simple language†Dan. Sure. Right. My CSU education was inadequate in general, but at least I earned a master’s degree. Now shut the fuck up and leave me the fuck alone.
Awh! Again, your patterns appear: quote mining and petulant lashing out. Maybe it is because of the cognitive dissonance that no cogent replies appear.
Oh wait: I’m typing to no one, because you weren’t going to reply any more. *eye roll*
DS
Frank, politics trumps economics all the time or else you’d be paying $2 for every mile you drive.
Not quote mining, just quoting your incoherent babbling. Hey, I saw on another website that you and your wife are thinking of leaving the USnA for Europe. Let me know if you need help packing your bags! Once you get there, you’ll see Europeans are not so enamored with state railways. If you want to go to the most fiscally sound country, you should pick Bulgaria. I have to warn you, though, their trains are horrible (feces on the toilet seats), but the buses are quite nice. Let me know if you need any help. 🙂 I <3 Planner Dan
“Free market” is just another term to say shop lifting.
“the highwayman” is just another term to say “semi-literate,” “non-sequitur-uttering chatbot slathered in Asperger salad.” Ha ha, LOLZ J/K
Sorry, that was mean. I’m sure when you’re not tethered to the keyboard writing about oligarchic highway Koch-Sauce you’re a nice guy. But come on, man, at least raise your game. The tired cliches, the OCD-style infatuation with the illegitimacy of roads, the prose that screams 18-year-old failing infrastructure poetry student…it’s all a bit ‘much,’ no?
I’m not against roads.
Though you don’t have to be against railroads.
The crap Amtrak Web site mangled my request for a Seattle-to-Portland ticket the other day (although there was some user error/navigation clumsiness on my part). Nevertheless, I opted for an alternative: BoltBus — $20 for a non-stop ride from Seattle-to-Portland (vs. my mangled $47 Amtrak ticket).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BoltBus
The BoltBus alternative, I quickly discovered, was vastly superior to Amtrak. Plus it dropped me off at a much more convenient Portland location (SW 5th and Salmon) than Union Station, where the sh#t sandwiches of Amtrak and Greyhound converge and reality dies screaming.
I’ve taken the Bolt Bus from Seattle to Portland. It was awesome. Clean bus. Upscale clients. WiFi. Only $10 for my ticket since I bought in advance. And it doesn’t have to slow down with the tracks get too hot. Plus it’s also the most affordable option to Vancouver, BC. Here’s a great review of Amtrak to BC from Yelp: “Didn’t live up to the advertising. The ‘dining car and lounge’ turned out to be a stand-in-line counter and a car with tables. Arriving in Vancouver we waited between a chain link fence and the running locomotive to get into the terminal. OK ride, overpriced, be ready to ‘rough it'”.
Yeah, I’ll probably use Bolt again. Ten-to-$20 dollar fares definitely trump the $40 I would spend on filling up my gas tank or the $30-to-$50 price range Amtrak seems to typically offer.
BoltBus is great if you are a 5’4″ midget with a narrow frame and can use a tray table the size of a envelope.
For those of us of a more normal size, its cramped and uncomfortable.
On June 29th, 2011, Andrew said “I have no experience with Megabus as I earn enough money to not need to resort to such means of transportation now”.
Did you have a loss of income, Andrew? Or are you making $h!t up?
Bolt has more legroom than other buses: “More legroom – we’ve taken a standard coach configuration and removed seats. This adds about three extra inches of legroom per seat.” I’m over six feet tall, and almost always feel cramped, but Bolt Bus was fine for me.
(BTW, the term “midget” is now considered offensive. They prefer “little people.”)
Also, there are no tray tables on Bolt. Are you making $h!t up?
We get it. You love the train and are a snobby-wobb who doesn’t travel by plebeian bus. No need to make $h!t up about Bolt Bus.
So why are there no Bolt Trains?
BoltBus is great if you are a 5’4? midget with a narrow frame and can use a tray table the size of a envelope. For those of us of a more normal size, its cramped and uncomfortable.
I’m 6-foot-4-inches and 260 lbs. I was perfectly comfortable on Bolt.
“We just have to hope that there is enough wealth left in the country that we can put it back together.”
There won’t be much wealth once the looters are done. “Tax the rich!” the looters froth rabidly. If we looted the 400 richest Americans, we could pay off about 10% of the national debt. We could fund the federal government for less than a year. But hey, those evil greedy capitalists, you know, people like Bill Gates who give away billions…well, they deserve it! That’s what they get for creating a popular product that relies on voluntary transactions! Selfish bastards.
Nope. Government is quickly destroying wealth faster than it can be created.
I hope you know how to hunt and gather, Randal. 😉
Frank:
You seem to be making a number of wild a priori assumptions.
1) Why do we NEED to pay off the debt? The debt is the source of money. No national debt = no money. The NEED is stated, but not proven.
2) The purpose of taxing the rich is to create a more equitable allocation of the worlds goods and of income, because, for example, one person clearly cannot spend $1 billion in cash on anything but frivolities – this is readily obvious snce most people live for a lifetime on far less. if we accept that the purpose of economic transactions and the human laws that regulate them is to bring about a general happiness in all, then a person is not entitled by natural right to more goods and land than he can readily use when other persons are suffering from want.
3) The origin of wealth is in government spending, Since wealth comes from savings, and savings are not possible without the injection of money into private hands from another source, and the only other source is the government. Therefore, the government is not presently destroying wealth, seeing as it continues to inject money into private hands.
4) Taxation is not looting. Our government is representational and voluntary, meaning we can participate in it, and if we do not like it it allows us to leave its jurisdiction by moving elsewhere. Taxation should rightly fall most heavily on those with the most means, and should be lightest on those who have little, as those with the most have benefitted the most from civil society existing.
My number one assumption is that voluntary transactions are morally superior to the use of coercion and force.
“one person clearly cannot spend $1 billion in cash on anything but frivolities”
Tell that to Bill Gates, whose Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has spent $26 billion helping other people and creates jobs in Seattle in the process.
Andrew, you are so full of shit.
“My number one assumption is that voluntary transactions are morally superior to the use of coercion and force.”
This is an absolutist stance. I can’t agree with this statement nor disagree with it. One can think of many instances where this statement is both proven and disproved. Obviously there are many voluntary transactions that are morally bankrupt, but on the whole I tend to err on the side of personal liberty. I think the point is that there are exceptions to your statement and there are market failures. This is historically when government intervention has been deemed appropriate. Somehow the culture wars have driven some to reject this societal tradition in leu of some sort of anarchistic/plutocratic (which should be mutually exclusive. see: hypocrisy) hybrid.
To me, there in lies the crux of the Randian/Galt philosophy. Any selfless act is viewed as weak, idiotic and morally inferior to a self serving alternative. The problem is, throughout human history people ALWAYS come together under some sort of communitarian banner to collectively solve problems. The Randian utopian dream ignores this historical fact. Sure most people would agree “that voluntary transactions are morally superior to the use of coercion and force,” but when push comes to shove we actually like government services and regulation dispite what we say on the soap box.
bennett, when you see looters, coercion, force, statist, market failures are myths etc etc. you know that comes from a low-validity environment (albeit confidently stated).
So most have learned by now that The Randian utopian dream ignores this historical fact as well as ignores basic human nature.
Most have also learned by now that The Randian utopian dream still has no answers to what replaces standard, thousands-of-years-old standard institutions to protect us from the inevitable human condition: market failures, greed, selfishness, theft and manipulation of information.
And no one holds their breath waiting for answers because none (on topic) are forthcoming.
The third-rate novels failed to provide them. Fizzbin with the Iotians, IOW.
DS
The Autoplanner; “You don’t believe government should run our air traffic control? You don’t believe government should run our highways? You don’t believe government should subsidize the Port of Los Angeles?â€
THWM: DeFazio made a good point.
Trucking/automobile, aviation and marine industries wouldn’t be where the are today if they couldn’t profit off of the public domain.
The Antiplanner wrote>
Rather than privatize Amtrak, at least some Republicans propose to contract out Amtrak’s trains to private operators. Congress would still decide where those trains should run. The Republicans who support this proposal would also require the private operators to honor Amtrak’s contracts with workers. Those two requirements would destroy most of the benefits of contracting out.
Agreed. That’s giving the illusion of privatization while accomplishing nothing, except perhaps driving up the costs of the trains even more.
Agreed. That’s giving the illusion of privatization while accomplishing nothing, except perhaps driving up the costs of the trains even more.
It would throw some graft or skimming opportunities to some buddies or donors. That’s an accomplishment. ;o)
DS
Congress would still decide where those trains should run.
Heh. At the age of 59 — after a lifetime in private business — I took a job at the Post Office.
Hard as it is to believe, the Postal Service’s management wants the thing to turn a profit.
But Congress won’t let it close tiny, rural post offices.
Congress won’t let it close unneeded mail-processing plants.
Congress won’t let people ship cigarettes by the mail.
Congress won’t let people ship alcohol (think mail-order wine) by the mail.
Both of the above result in a loss of many millions of dollars annually for the Postal Service — all “for the children,” of course.
People love to criticize the Post Office and some of that criticism is valid, but Congress is the real culprit.
You have a point, sir. Over the 8 years that I’ve used the post office to run my eBay business, they have significantly improved service and features. However, when they try to cut costs, like you mentioned (among other things), by closing a post office in Nowhereville, USA, serving 8 people, someone always intervenes and prevents it.
Some thing like a small postal service counter in a local drug store could work too.
Less over head for the post office, more revenue for the drug store.
“People love to criticize the Post Office and some of that criticism is valid, but Congress is the real culprit.”
Agreed.
People love to criticize planners, but politicians are the real culprit.
People love to criticize planners, but politicians are the real culprit
In general, I agree with this statement. Planners here in Portland are not exactly omni-benevolent saints though (and yes, I realize they are not New World Order ghouls either), so cleanly defining it this way is not 100% accurate.
In Portland, I tend to go more with blaming Metro & Portland planners. Why? Because METRO isn’t stacked top to bottom with elected politicians; it’s full of know-it-all technocrats (like danny boy) playing around with other people’s money and wreaking havoc.
In Sweden, all post offices were closed and replaced by “Postal Service Points” located in gas stations and retail stores.
But then how does the Swedish parliament carry out the oh so important task of naming Swedish post offices after some politically popular person? 😉