Hardcore Capitalist's Perspective - 11/14/2010

• TSA Backlash Costing Airlines 41M Flights/$9.4B
  Citizens are in revolt. A U.S. Travel Association survey found that growing backlash against Gropegate is costing airlines millions of flights, and billions in lost revenue. A November 24th "National Opt Out Day" movement is encouraging people to opt out of airport porno-scanners en masse, on the busiest flying day of the year. Airlines are taking notice and are pleading with HS Sec. Napolitano for some sanity. A showdown is coming.
• Palin to Freshmen Reps: Avoid Cutting War Spending
  Sarah Palin's sage advice to newly elected congresswomen and men was mixed with some other, questionable marching orders. She advised them to avert their gaze from the massive war budget in their zeal for fiscal responsibility. I understand she's honestly looking out for the nation's safety, but Sarah must understand that a bigger war budget does not = a stronger defense, any more than throwing more money at the Department of Education = a better educational system. Republicans should heed Sarah's good advice to repeal Obamacare, stand strong against tax increases, and get serious about cutting spending, but they should include bloated war spending near the top of their list of budgets to slash. The debt is now a bigger national security threat than any group of terrorists.
• Secret Walmart Survey Shows Inflation Is Here
  Inflation has been here all along. Monetary inflation affects different sectors of the economy to different degrees. Prices have been skyrocketing in the key areas of education, health care, and energy, for instance, for years. Walmart says inflation is now making its way down to even the lowest-order consumer goods. As I've been saying since the Fed first started slamming down on the monetary printing press's pedal a few years ago, now is the time to invest in gold and commodities.
• Woman Loses Access to Driveway in Tax Dispute
  An elderly woman paying for chemo therapy treatments was unable to afford Connecticut's stiflingly high taxes, and the city foreclosed on a couple acres of her land (specifically, her driveway). Her driveway is now chained off, and she must walk through the woods to get to her car. She is effectively blockaded from rescue personnel in the event of a medical emergency, and though the local news station has picked up her story, the city government refuses to talk about it, except to say that "the easiest and quickest solution" is for her to buy a different adjacent plot of land and build a new driveway to a different street. No, the easiest and quickest solution would be for the city to return her stolen property.
• "Keep the Govt's Hands Off My Social Security!"
  Social Security recipients are getting worried about the budget scalpel that's inching closer to their entitlements. While they are justifiably upset, since they feel they have paid into a system that is trying to scam them out getting their own money back, we need to start coming to terms with the fact that the State has spent and wasted all the money retirees have paid in. The money is not there. There is no easy solution. While payments to current Social Security recipients should arguably be the last thing to cut (except for recipients who are already very wealthy), entitlements must be on the table. All reputable statistics show that entitlement spending is set to entirely consume the federal budget within a matter of decades.
• Post Office Runs $8.5B Deficit
  The deficit is up from $3.8 billion last year. Time to privatize the post office. Losses are the market's way of informing us that value is being destroyed for society. The US Postal Service has given back to society a product that society judges to be $8.5 billion less valuable than the resources the US Postal Service used up. There is no reason government has to run the postal service--FedEx and UPS have shown the market is capable of delivering physical mail. Supporters of a State-run postal system fear that private enterprise would not be able to offer first-class mail delivery for a mere 46 cents an envelope, but they do not take into account that we also pay in taxes and inflation the entire budget (including the deficit) of the Postal Service.

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Published at RightOSphere.com.