Obamacare

5. The differential payment rates across Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance are becoming unsustainable more quickly than I had anticipated; see for instance the link in #4.  Further reforms will be required more quickly than had been anticipated, but it's not obvious how such reforms should proceed.  It's hard to either upgrade the Medicaid (and Medicare) rates or to downgrade the private insurance rates.  Monitor this one closely, because it is likely to prove the breaking point of our health care status quo, with or without the Obama plan.  (This is our version of the ticking time bomb within the eurozone, namely that natural rates of growth split apart a distortion, increasingly, over time.)

6. I am less worried about mandate enforcement than I used to be; Austin Frakt has had good posts on this at TheIncidentalEconomist, see here.

7. I am more worried about employers shedding employees onto the subsidized exchanges than I used to be; Reihan Salam has had good posts on this topic and how it could prove to be a fiscal breaking point for the new law.  You can argue that this is the actual long-run restructuring plan, but unless we are willing to go the "Medicaid for all reimbursement rates" route, I don't see how we afford it.

via marginalrevolution.com

That's Tyler Cowen of Marginal Revolution. Be sure to check out the link for all nine of his points which constitute a sober assessment of where things stand with the health reform.

Is #5 an argument for or against the "Medicare for All" strategy? I'd say against, at least if we want to continue to demand the level of medical services we currently do. Say we adjusted all payment rates down to current Medicare rates, what would be the effect on supply? If you believe the AMA, it would be dire.

WRT #7 I was of the opinion that real health insurance reform should have eliminated the current system of employer provided insurance. Obamacare instead made this relationship stronger, at least notionally.

As Cowen mentions, perhaps one of the unintended consequences of the reform will be to weaken the link between employment and insurance. If removing this link really is key to fixing health insurance in this country, then it would appear we are taking a long, slow, painful route to get to that point.

Posted via email from rhymeswithclown's posterous

The Partisan Mind

But people who follow politics closely — whether voters, activists or pundits — are often partisans first and ideologues second. Instead of assessing every policy on the merits, we tend to reverse-engineer the arguments required to justify whatever our own side happens to be doing. Our ideological convictions may be real enough, but our deepest conviction is often that the other guys can’t be trusted.

via nytimes.com

That's NY Times columnist Ross Douthat. While he's sometimes dimssied because he writes for the NYT, I would remind the reader that just because he's an anointed conservative doesn't mean he isn't correct in what he writes.

In this case, I'd say he hits the nail on the head and I don't think anyone should be afraid of a little self-reflection to test Douthat's hypothesis.

Be sure to check out the link to read the whole thing. You might be surprised to read his conclusion about whether this state of affairs is a good thing or a bad thing.

Posted via email from rhymeswithclown's posterous

What Health Insurance Isn't

Crap health coverage wins a regulatory victory. - By Timothy Noah - Slate Magazine

How's this for a deal: You pay me $13.09 a week. In exchange, I will pay your medical bills, but only up to $2,000 a year. Maybe that deal makes sense if you know with absolute certainty that your medical expenses in the coming year will fall between $680.68 ($13.09 each week for 52 weeks) and $2,000. It makes no sense at all if there's the slightest chance you might end up in the hospital. True, if your hospital expenses exceed $2,000 you'll have lowered the bill by about $1,300. But $1,300 won't likely cover even the cost of an ambulance, much less anything that happens after you arrive. You'd be better off using that $13.09 to buy yourself a weekly lottery ticket.

That's Slate's Timothy Noah describing a health insurance plan that McDonald's offers to its employees. A plan that Noah goes on to describe as "crap health insurance".  The proximate cause of this denunciation is the Obama administration's granting of a waiver to allow McDonald's to continue to offer this type of limited coverage, coverage that was supposed to be illegal by now under the recent health reform.  Noah speculates about why HHS Secretary Sebelius couldn't have at least denounced the McDonald's insurance as she issued the exemption.  He writes:

Why lie to protect McDonald's? Sebelius could have said, "Yes, McDonald's says it may not offer health insurance to its workers anymore. But what they call health insurance wouldn't meet the fiduciary standards of a second-rate Christmas club." Why didn't she say that?

Set aside for now how this episode is an example of why we will never have in practice the health reform system Obama and the Democrats designed, focus instead on Noah's choice of analogues, a Christmas Club, and you'll see why we can't even talk about health insurance in this country.

Insurance is not a Christmas Club where you put aside some amount of money for a particular expense and expect to get back at least that amount at some definite date in the future.  Insurance is about risk.  It's where the insured pays a premium on the chance that his medical expenses will exceed the amount he pays in premiums and the insurer takes the other side of that bet, trying to take in more in premiums, plus the investment income derived from the premiums, than they pay out in claims.

In this country, Noah's Christmas Club metaphor is the dominant way of thinking about insurance.  People believe that since they pay premiums they shouldn't have to pay for all sorts of care ranging from physicals to the utterly predictable trips to the doctor for minor ailments that all of us will take during our lives.  And under most insurance that is written in this country, they'd be right!  At some point our system stopped being about the possibility of catastrophic loss and went into effect at the first dollar. (Keep in mind that even if you pay the first dollar, but it goes toward your deductible, the terms of your insurance contract are kicking in even with that first dollar that you pay.)

In my estimation one consequence of first dollar coverage is that costs for routine care, including some less common things like stitches and simple broken bones, are driven up by the fact that they are covered by insurance.  I guess one could argue that the coverage provided for these items outpaces the cost distortions and that consumers come out ahead in this, but I'm skeptical that this is the case.

The conception of insurance as a health expenses savings account funded by one's premiums is unfortunately widely held.  I believe it remains one of the major stumbling blocks to enacting real reform in this country that accomplishes the twin goals of reducing cost for everyone while providing a social safety net befitting the richest country on earth.

Ribble Indebted to the Voters for Campaign Victory

I realize journalism is in something of a sorry state here in the new media age, but I read this story on the site of a local radio station and couldn't help but be confused.  That is my bold in the quote below.

1150 WHBY » News » Special interest group targeted Wis. races

Some of the races for Congress a lot of outside money in the last election.

Dave Levinthal of the Center for Responsible Politics says groups spent more than $2 million on the race between Reid Ribble and Steve Kagen, in the eighth congressional district.

He says that was the 18th most special interest money for any race in the House of Representatives. Levinthal says now voters have to watch to see if the money affects the way that Congressman-elect Reid Ribble votes.

I think just about anyone reading this story would get the message that the outside spending in this election went to benefit winner Reid Ribble.  The line that I highlighted has a rather ominous tone suggesting that Ribble will somehow be indebted to that outside money.  The only problem with this story is that the outside money was spent primarily in an effort to re-elect Steve Kagen, an effort which ultimately failed.

The Center for Responsive Politics compiles the numbers on campaign spending and reports them at OpenSecrets.org.  After about fifteen minutes of poking around, I was able to find the 2010 outside spending breakdown for WI-8 and as I said, it was Kagen that primarily benefited.

About $220,000 was spent in support of Reid Ribble and about $630,000 in opposition to Steve Kagen, for a total of about $850,000 of outside spending that went to benefit Ribble's campaign.

About $250,000 was spent in support of Steve Kagen and $1.1 million in opposition to Ribble, for a total of about $1.3 million of outside money spent in an attempt to get Steve Kagen re-elected. (A big chunk of this was from the public employees union, AFSME.)

The news story above gives the exact opposite impression of outside spending in the race for WI-8.  The line I highlighted above isn't a direct quote, so perhaps it's been misrepresented in some way.  If so, I'd say WHBY should be a little more thorough in its reporting.  If not, I'd say Mr. Levinthal ought to check out the numbers his group reports before issuing statements.

Either way, while I think we have a responsibility to hold our new congressman accountable for his actions in office, I really doubt that he feels indebted to anyone other than the voters for his victory.

If Walker Doesn't Kill the Train, Could the TSA?

The next step in tightened security could be on U.S. public transportation, trains and boats.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says terrorists will continue to look for U.S. vulnerabilities, making tighter security standards necessary.

“[Terrorists] are going to continue to probe the system and try to find a way through,” Napolitano said in an interview that aired Monday night on "Charlie Rose."

“I think the tighter we get on aviation, we have to also be thinking now about going on to mass transit or to trains or maritime. So, what do we need to be doing to strengthen our protections there?”

via thehill.com

I'm really surprised it took this long for someone to raise the question of where the full body scan, or it's substitute the enhanced pat down, would show up next. I really don't think it takes a criminal mastermind to make the leap from attacking planes to attacking trains.

The thing about demand for plane rides is that there aren't that many good substitutes. So higher costs of plane trips, in the form of humiliating security protocols, may not do that much to deter passengers.

A train ride from Milwaukee to Madison, by comparison, has a very close substitute in a nation that is centered around automobiles.

If you think the economics of HSR is bad now, try to imagine the cash flow of an operation where ridership is depressed as people try to avoid what they believe to be overly intrusive security measures.

Posted via email from rhymeswithclown's posterous

The Left Wants to Put Women in Their Place

It's really too bad this isn't a culture wars blog since, despite all the debt and deficit talk, social issues have been at or very near the surface of events of late. But since this isn't a culture wars blog what I'm about to say should in no way be construed as a shot fired.

It has become clear to me that the left-wing in this country is absolutely not the least bit interested in allowing people, especially women, to be free to make their own choices in life.

Surprised? I can understand why since the left likes to cloak its positions in the language of "choice" and in opposition to government intrusion into what are "private matters" but don't be fooled. The left has an orthodoxy no less rigid than the fiercest Puritan only with a lot more self-indulgence.

This strict idea of how people should behave is particularly acute when it comes to the role of women. The latest in a seemingly endless string of examples comes in an excellent post by Randy in Richmond at Fairly Conservative. It is comedian Tina Fey during her acceptance speech for the Mark Twain Prize:

And, you know, politics aside, the success of Sarah Palin and women like her is good for all women – except, of course –those who will end up, you know, like, paying for their own rape ‘kit ‘n’ stuff,” Fey said. “But for everybody else, it’s a win-win. Unless you’re a gay woman who wants to marry your partner of 20 years – whatever. But for most women, the success of conservative women is good for all of us. Unless you believe in evolution. You know – actually, I take it back. The whole thing’s a disaster.

Now Fey intends this to be funny, and it is. That doesn't make it any less damning.

The message here for women is clear. If you consider yourself a conservative you are a fool. Fey, and those of like mind, can't fathom that a woman might have thought and read about the issues facing our country and come to the conclusion that a conservative approach is the right one. The only explanation they can admit for such an outcome is one that has the woman playing the role of duped victim yet again. How sexist is that?

This attitude extends beyond politics, of course, right up and into the home. It can't permit that a woman might find satisfaction in a loving and respectful marriage between equals with different roles, in the care and raising of children, and in the successful management of a household. The message that so many on the left seem to have imbibed from modern feminism is that all of these things represent oppression, and no woman could ever freely choose these.

Adding to the hidden nature of this liberal orthodoxy is it enforcement mechanism. While no less coercive, it is infinitely more subtle. Its transmission is through the culture itself. From books, televisions, magazines and now blogs, the message is loud and clear: There is only one role for women and it is not to serve in the traditional roles of wife and mother, it is to be as much like men as possible. Bombarded with this attitude in the popular culture, is it any wonder that so many women have adopted it and in turn proclaim it in coffee shops, conference rooms, and even our churches?

This attitude is, of course, most harmful to women. Attempting to remake women in the image of men destroys what is best in women. It removes from our society those attributes particular to women, and particularly lacking in men. And, as a result, women suffer, families suffer, and the nation suffers.

I'm not surprised people on the left think everyone ought to live like them. A belief that others ought to be just like us is probably just part of our human condition. As such, the left should just drop the charade that they want women to be free to make their own choices. What they really want is women to emulate the lives of the left-wing elite. You have to wonder just who do they think is going to clean the hotel rooms of and pour the coffee for all the powerful and privileged while they hammer away at the glass ceiling. And while those sheets are changed and tables cleared, who do they think will care for the children of the women doing so?

So the next time someone tells you the right-wing in this country seeks to control the private lives of its citizens, be sure to tell them maybe that's true, but it's no less true of the left. The only problem is that no one on the left will admit it.

The TSA's Got Nothing on You

Doug's Blog: The Emperor Wants You to Have No Clothes

In our latest installment of the “let us throw aside all principles of freedom, constitutional liberties, and moral proprieties for the perception of state-certified security” chronicles, we find Uncle Sam introducing full-body scanners and “nothing-is-sacred” physical body exams for Americans who travel by plane..

In defense of this barbarism, officials tell us that the right to fly is a privilege, and that normal constitutional rights do not apply. By agreeing to fly, we also agree to waive the rights of citizenship protected under the Constitution. This is a helpful ruse which can be extended to virtually every area of life. It is precisely the type of thinking our Founding Fathers sought to defend us against when they declared that “the right of the people to be secure in their persons . . . shall not be violated. . . .”

That is Doug Phillips on the TSA controversy.  I urge to check out the link for Doug's full take, including an excellent concluding paragraph noting how the government makes use of fear to induce compliance with these sorts of outrageous schemes.

Oh, and this post definitely wins the best title award of all those I've read on this issue.

DIY Budget Fix

The New York Times recently featured an interactive chart where readers could tackle the federal budget. Various parts of the cheddarsphere gave it a go (Zach, Cindy) so I did too. (H/T Letters in Bottles.)

Maybe it's the 18 hours of darkness that seem to have suddenly been thrust upon us recently that has me in a more skeptical mood than usual, but I'm not very impressed by these sorts of exercises.

Perhaps at some margin it makes citizens more informed, but an interactive graphic, even a really cool one, is a long, long way from any real effort at tackling our nation's taxing and spending policies.

Case in point is capping the growth of Medicare spending to GDP growth plus 1%. This is the biggest single line item in the exercise and it sounds great, but it's not realistic. We already have laws restricting the growth of Medicare spending and Congress regularly votes to not comply with those laws. This is the "doc fix", a series of temporary laws that are now a permanent part of the legislative calendar.

And why do we have the doc fix? So doctors will continue to take Medicare patients and we don't have seniors lined up at the Capitol demanding to know why Congress won't pay rates that doctor's are willing to accept.

Inflation in the market for healthcare will ultimately determined by supply and demand notwithstanding a government edict demanding prices not grow quicker than GDP + 1%. Now if Congress stopped paying for as many procedures and visits, we might see some costs come down with lower demand. Does anyone think restricting access to care on a large scale is politically feasible?

Saying we are going to limit the growth of spending may sound great, but it's really just more of the free-lunch disease that grips so many of us when it comes to making the hard choices concerning government spending.

Possible Consequences of the Earmark Ban

Ezra Klein argues that conservatives are right on this. “[Earmarking] feeds D.C.‘s massive lobbying complex, and in general, it’s not a wise way to spend federal money,” he writes. It is true, lobbyists lobby Congress way more often than they lobby agencies. But lobbyists can and do lobby agencies, and as agencies get more power over the federal budget under the moratorium, they will undoubtedly start lobbying the agencies more. The earmark moratorium will not curtail the lobbying complex, it will change how and where lobbyists do their work. When Congress has passed limited moratoriums in the past, this is exactly what has happened.

In fact, lobbyists looking for funds might prefer working with agencies because, unlike Congress, the people making decisions in agencies are not accountable to an electorate. They’ll also still be able to lobby members of Congress to lobby agencies and ask for money to be spent on their pet projects. Believe it or not, this happens, and it’s totally secretive and undisclosed.

via opencongress.org

With Mitch McConnell finally getting the hint, we will see a vote on the DeMint proposal to ban earmarks.

While I'm for it, I don't think it is a panacea. I also take seriously the chance that there could be some perverse outcomes from the ban. Something that, on its face, has merit.

Posted via email from rhymeswithclown's posterous

The Coming MERS Bailout

Get Ready for the Great MERS Whitewash Bill - CNBC

When Congress comes back into session next week, it may consider measures intended to bolster the legal status of a controversial bank owned electronic mortgage registration system that contains three out of every five mortgages in the country.

The system is known as MERS.  It may have allowed banks to avoid paying some recording fees as mortgages changed hands.  It also has come under scrutiny for sloppiness.  It appears to not have done a very good job at the very thing it was intended to do, keep track of the ownership of mortgages. 

As with so many things these days, though, MERS may not suffer for its poor performance:

it appears that Congress may attempt to prevent any MERS meltdown from occurring. MERS is owned by all the biggest banks, and they certainly do not want it to be sunk by huge fines. Investors in mortgage-backed securities also do not want to see the value of their bonds sink because of doubts about the ownership of the underlying mortgages.

So it looks like the stage may be set for Congress to pass a bill that would limit MERS exposure on the recording fee issue and perhaps retroactively legitimate mortgage transfers conducted through MERS private database.

If Congress does does this and allows MERS, and the big banks that benefited from it, to avoid the consequences of its actions it will tantamount to another bank bailout.

It remains to be seen if voters will be as motivated by such an action as they were over TARP, or if bailout-fatigue fatigue has set in.

Brief Thoughts on the Edmund Fitzgerald

With the mild weather we had today, it's hard to believe that 35 years ago today the Edmund Fitzgerald sank on Lake Superior in the midst of a gale.

This anniversary serves as a good reminder that many people put their lives on the line through the simple act of going to work. While this is clear to everyone of our military, police, and fire personnel, there are great many other occupations that present real risk to life and limb.

It's also a reminder of the awesome power of nature. Amidst all of our technological advances and modern conveniences, we need to be reminded of this now and then.

On a personal note, I consider myself lucky to have lived in two of the most unique environments on the planet. I grew up in the Sonoran desert of the Southwest, and now call the Great Lakes region my home. For those of you who grew up near the lakes and have a tendency to take them for granted, let this be a reminder of just how special they are.

Let's Get the Money Back in Politics!

When I posted a link on Twitter on Facebook yesterday to the first bill scheduled for a vote in the Senate lame duck session — the Promoting Natural Gas and Electric Vehicles Act of 2010 — people asked a good question: why, given the time restraints and all the important issues that need to be dealt with, is this bill getting the first vote?

One possible answer is that the vote is part of a straight-up quid pro quo (via an Oct. 6 piece from subscription-only Roll Call):

Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens said Wednesday he thinks that Sen. Harry Reid will be able to move an alternative fuels subsidy bill in a lame-duck session in part because of Pickens’ promise not to make campaign contributions this cycle

via opencongress.org

For my pre-Vatican II brethren, would this be quid pro nihil?

Posted via email from rhymeswithclown's posterous

Doyle's Legacy on Jobs

Ludeman said mature firms in particular learn to do more with less during a recession - and those are the types of companies that dominate Wisconsin.

"Our economic development polices have not brought the new gazelles, the new technology firms into Wisconsin," he said. "We've more relied on our older firms, and they're not going to give us the same bounce-back."

Walker is talking about changing that. Along with adding 250,000 new jobs, he has said he will develop strategies for creating 10,000 new businesses by 2015.

That, however, could be even harder than increasing the jobs.

According to Census Bureau surveys, from 2002 through 2007 - five years of an expanding economy - Wisconsin added about 3,100 business establishments with employees. That amounted to growth of 2.3%.

The growth for the United States as a whole during that period: 25.9%.

via jsonline.com

This is from a JS article on Walker's promise to deliver 250,000 new jobs, but this portion is really more about Jim Doyle's tenure than the outlook for Walker's.

Ludeman is a retired labor economist for the state.

Posted via email from rhymeswithclown's posterous

Why Kagen Lost

My bold:

What went wrong for Steve Kagen in 2010? | greenbaypressgazette.com | Green Bay Press Gazette

In his concession speech Tuesday, Kagen told about 40 campaign volunteers and supporters gathered at the Radisson Paper Valley Hotel in Appleton that corporations had no constitutional rights.

He had more to say after he left the stage and thanked supporters who huddled around him. He railed against the influence of corporate money in politics and called for a push back against its involvement in elections and government.

Millions of dollars from these groups — many of which do not disclose their donors — flowed into the state, including $2.6 million in the 8th District.

No one questions that kind of cash played a role in the outcome, but there's no guarantee Tuesday's results in Northeastern Wisconsin would have been different had outside groups stayed out. Kagen's campaign, for instance, slightly edged Ribble's in the support it received from outside groups in the final stretch.

Another explanation for his loss might be that voters were simply tired of excuses.  Particularly ones that don't quite seem to make sense given the actual facts.

Does Boehner Get It?

In today's Fox Politics E-News (sign up at the link to get this delivered right to your email) Jo points us to Slate columnist Will Saletan who writes (my emphasis):

Last night, in the wake of another landslide, incoming Speaker John Boehner sent a very different message: "While our new majority will serve as your voice in the people's House, we must remember it's the president who sets the agenda for our government."

Saletan goes on to argue that Boehner is making an understandable, but defensive political move that could backfire. From my perspective, this comment makes me wonder if John Boehner understands the Constitutional role of the House of Representatives at all.

Having fought a war under the Articles of Confederation, the Founders saw the wisdom in having a strong executive at certain times. Also, knowing that passions can sometimes be overheated, they designed tempering forces in our system of government. But does anyone doubt that the House of Representatives was designed to be the unit of government most responsive to the people and, as such, most reflective of their desired agenda?

I'll leave it to others to track down the moment in time when the presidency grew so large that it began to overshadow the other branches of government, but I'm certain it was long before the election of 2008. The other thing I'm sure of is that the Congress, and more specifically, the House, was not designed nor intended to carry out the President's desired agenda, regardless of his party affiliation. That is what the Cabinet is for.

My understanding of American history and the Founder's intent may be imperfect, but it seems to me that the People's House ought to be in the vanguard when it comes to setting the agenda. Why doesn't the next Speaker of the House understand this?

NRO Gang Proves The Other McCain Right

The other day Dad29 noted this item from The Other McCain (warning: strong language at the link):

If you’re a thousand miles away from a district and don’t actually know anything about what the candidates and their campaigns are doing, it is tempting to look at poll numbers, examine past voting trends, and start making assumptions about what the result will be. But when we yield to that temptation, we ignore the Hayekian insight: Information is diffused throughout society in such a way that no one — not even the best-informed “expert” — can know everything.

And on the heels of that, I read this from National Review's Reihan Salam:

Like many of you, I’ve been baffled by the fact that Sharron Angle and Christine O’Donnell became the faces of the Tea Party during this cycle as opposed to, say, Ron Johnson or Nikki Haley. As Rich Lowry wrote last week, Johnson

has as good a case for being a face of the Tea Party as just about anyone this year — he was urged to run after two speeches at Tea Party rallies, he’s a political outsider and businessman, he campaigns frankly on repealing Obamacare and limiting government, he speaks passionately about American exceptionalism, and he’s on the verge of unseating a liberal lion of the Senate.

The problem with this is that as most of us in Wisconsin know, Ron Johnson wasn't a "Tea Party" candidate. Johnson is a Republican who's principles aligned with the Tea Party in many instances. This allowed him to garner votes from both groups. Combine this with independents moving to Republicans and you have the makings of an historic victory.

Hopefully, he will turn out to be a great Senator and he will always have the title of the guy who knocked out Feingold, but I don't think he will ever be the face of the Tea Party. A story about a a national media conspiracy to deny him this mantle may make for interesting reading inside the beltway, but it's simply not true.

I'm a fan of Salam, so my advice to him is this: Stop making it so easy for The Other McCain. He loves few things more than exposing the follies of what he considers anointed conservatives. Sure he does it primarily because he's jealous of your high-profile lucrative writing gigs, but if he keeps turning out to be right, he's probably not wrong to think he deserves one too.

Pelosi's Values

Liberal blogger Matthew Yglesias writes approvingly of Speaker Nancy Pelosi

Yglesias » Pelosi: No Regrets

You don’t get to be Speaker without being a shrewd political thinker, but a big part of her shrewdness was not overdoing the political thinking. She always kept her values front and center and made the political thinking subordinate to her substantive mission in politics. The politics, in other words, was a means to an end and the ends she served were important. We need more people like that in DC, not fewer.

I don't disagree that Pelosi kept her values front and center, the problem is that her values don't match mine, or much of the rest of the country for that matter.  They may be perfectly aligned with the voters of her California congressional district, but beyond that I'm not so sure.

I will say that I agree we need more people who are willing to stick with their values.  Candidates have a hand in this, to be sure, but voters are largely responsible for finding and then electing politicians whose values they agree with and that have made a convincing case that they can stick with those values.  For many of us, we appear to have fulfilled the first half of that formula with Tuesday's election.  Now it remains to be seen if we were right about the second half.

Low Expectations for QE2

So if QE2 has already done what it's going to do, does that mean that our problems are already solved? Certainly not, because our problems were much bigger than any of the weapons in the Fed's limited arsenal. I do think that QE2 may be modestly helpful in terms of making credit more available to small businesses, encouraging a little more refinancing to enable more spending, encouraging net exports, and breaking the deflationary psychology that may have been a factor in so much cash sitting idle.

More than that, I do not ask or expect from the Fed.

via econbrowser.com

That's Professor Hamilton at Econbrowser.

Posted via email from rhymeswithclown's posterous

No Excessive Celebration Here

This entire election season I haven't hesitated to share my opinion about the candidates and issues, not only here on the blog, but in real life too.

The result of this is that many people knew I was a strong supporter of Reid Ribble and the other GOP candidates. This meant that today I was peppered with questions like, "you must be happy," "how late did you stay up celebrating," and, "go ahead and gloat."

But like I told somebody at work today, the election victory is the beginning, not the end.

While yesterday means we removed a bunch of people from office with whom I clearly disagreed, their replacements, at this point at least, are a set of fresh faces and promises to do the right thing, though not much else. That means all of the hard work is ahead, not behind, us.

With yesterday's vote we didn't do any of the following: Reduce the national debt, simplify the tax code, reduce unemployment, ease the regulatory burden on small business, increase certainty about the future role of government, end the war in Afghanistan, end the massive U.S. military presence in Iraq, or take action on any of the other important issues facing this country.

All of that remains to be done. Are the new batch of legislators, new and old, up to the task? I hope so, but that is very much an open question.

A Thought on Voting

In case you didn't know, voting takes place on Tuesday November 2nd.

In case you've never read this blog before, I think you should vote for Reid Ribble in Wisconsin's 8th Congressional District. If you want to know why I think Reid Ribble is the right choice, check out this link.

If you want to know why I think current congressman Steve Kagen is the wrong choice, check out this link.

Here is some advice on voting from Pastor Voddie Baucham that Mrs. RWC recently shared with me and that I found helpful:

For those who romanticize the past, remember, Politics has always been brutal, men have always been vicious, and we have always needed the gospel. Moreover, our ultimate hope has never been, and will never be in the election of a man, but in the return of the God-Man. So cast your vote for decent candidates (there is... none good but God)... but place your hope in Christ.