The Great Expansion

From 1980 to 2007 the entire world expanded at an average 3.4% per year, which is an increase of 145%! The US grew a little slower, but even with the Great Recession the US averaged 3.0% growth. We are all much richer than we were in 1980. 

Did the middle class shrink? (I hate calling an income grouping a "class.") The broad grouping of $35k to $105k inflation adjusted to current dollars did shrink. But the lower income group didn't grow; the higher group grew! And around the world the lower income groups grew.

What we can learn from the "Great Expansion" of 1980 to 2007?

Henry R. Nau is a fellow at Hoover Institution. Quoting:

… Even more importantly, the global surge in growth spread wealth from the rich to the poor countries, creating greater equality in global markets than ever before. Throughout this period, developing countries grew two and even three times faster than developed countries. As a result, the share of world GDP held by emerging markets increased to 22% from 13%, while the U.S. share remained steady at approximately 26%. The "Great Expansion" created a global middle class of some 600 million-800 million people in China, India, Brazil and other developing countries.

What were the policy trends that produced this Great Expansion? 

Precisely the free-market policies of deregulation and lower marginal income-tax rates that Mr. Obama decries.

President Ronald Reagan's decision to reverse the high-tax, loose-money, and interventionist government policies of the 1970s brought an end to the painful "stagflation" of that decade. Privatization world-wide reversed the growth of government, and new trade rounds were launched to open global markets and roll back protectionism. The Uruguay Round and later the North American Free Trade Agreement liberalized trade in agriculture and services and brought fast-growing emerging markets into the global system. This was combined with the liberalization of private financial markets, creating the global banking system that mobilized massive savings in emerging markets to fuel the industrial engines of the Great Expansion.

Global financial markets could have been better regulated, but President Obama's policies go far beyond any reforms that would bring an end to "too big to fail." His policies shift the emphasis back to public-sector growth while squeezing private-sector initiatives. He raises federal spending to 25% of GDP, favors higher taxes to keep it there, and touts government investment in clean energy and infrastructure to spur economic growth.

Meanwhile, he imposes health-care, regulatory and other costs on the private sector, restricts credit by trashing "fat cat" bankers, and discourages imports by pandering to labor's fears of globalization. Sadly, his policies resemble those that brought on the stagflation of the '70s, not those that ignited the Great Expansion.

This also appeared in the Wall Street Journal Thursday.

150 dead in Nigeria. Muslims claim credit

150 people were killed in Nigeria in the past week. There were bomb blasts in northern city Kano. Muslim group Boko Haram claimed credit for coordinated attacks on Saturday.

Charlottesville to avoid the snow

To avoid the snow and ice in Seattle... And we got freezing rain.

We flew to Charlottesville, VA, Tuesday morning. Good timing. The same flight left more than 4 hours late on Wednesday and was cancelled Thursday. (Go to FlightStats.com and select an airport, date, and time to see how many flights were cancelled or severely late.)

We had two cold days with sunshine. Then a partly sunny day ending with freezing rain. It took Gini over 20 minutes to thaw the car - I am still down sick for the second day.

It's a beautiful, historic area - University of Virginia, Thomas Jefferson & Monticello. But it sure is hot and sticky in the summer. And it's far enough inland to get snow, but coastal enough to have had one hurricane pass over while our family members have lived here.

Update: The Tacoma Narrows Bridge was closed due to ice falling from the 500-foot-high towers! NWCN


Photo: The Rotunda at University of Virginia. Appears to be from New York Times, date unknown.

Post Office refuses to deliver mail in immigrant neighborhoods in Malmo Sweden

Post Office refuses to deliver mail in imigrant neighborhoods in Malmo Sweden because their carriers are not safe. Why are they not safe?

The Local (Sweden)

The article doesn't say. It does say that the problem neighborhood is majority foreigners. Wonder what foreigners attack postal carriers? No mention here.

Telegraph UK says there is an increase in attacks on Jews by Muslims.

And Fox News says Muslims are attacking police and firemen as well as postal workers. Why?

Swedish authorities in the southern city of Malmo (search) have been busy with a sudden influx of Muslim immigrants — 90 percent of whom are unemployed and many who are angry and taking it out on the country that took them in.

Obama has two of the top seven product flops of 2011

When big brother decides what products get built big brother has to get people to buy them. Big Obama decided that you were going to buy certain cars, but you didn't buy. Is that his fault or yours?

In the top seven -- Chevrolet Volt. Obama said they would sell like hot cakes and he give $7,500 of our tax money to each buyer. Administration officials predicted far higher sales, in part, because GM and some of its parts suppliers have received hundreds of millions of dollars in start-up funds. Moreover, the federal government is buying some of the vehicles, and is paying for state and local governments, as well as regulated companies, to buy even more.

Also the tiny Fiat 500. “The car was expected to be a big seller, rivaling BMW’s Mini… [and] Fiat expected to sell 50,000 500s during 2011 in North America,” according to the Yahoo! Finance Top 7 list. However, “Fiat sold fewer than 12,000 [and] sales were so poor that Chrysler Group, which manages the Fiat brand in the United States, ousted U.S. chief Laura Soave this past November,” noted Yahoo.

Daily Caller 



Graphic from a photographer in India. 

Professor Krugman has top quote of the year 2011

Media Research Council collected (voted on) the quotes of the year 2011 MRC

Did you know that NY Times partisan Professor Paul Krugman got a Nobel Prize, and it's not for peace. His notable words were for the 9/11 anniversary:

“What happened after 9/11 — and I think even people on the right know this, whether they admit it or not — was deeply shameful. [The] atrocity should have been a unifying event, but instead it became a wedge issue. Fake heroes like Bernie Kerik, Rudy Giuliani, and, yes, George W. Bush raced to cash in on the horror. And then the attack was used to justify an unrelated war the neo-cons wanted to fight, for all the wrong reasons....The memory of 9/11 has been irrevocably poisoned; it has become an occasion for shame. And in its heart, the nation knows it.”

One runner-up for the MRC 'quote of the year" award was Stephen Marche of Esquire Magazine, who was cited for saying:

“Can we just enjoy Obama for a moment? Before the policy choices have to be weighed and the hard decisions have to be made, can we just take a month or two to contemplate him the way we might contemplate a painting by Vermeer or a guitar lick by the early-seventies Rolling Stones or a Peyton Manning pass or any other astounding, ecstatic human achievement? Because twenty years from now, we’re going to look back on this time as a glorious idyll in American politics, with a confident, intelligent, fascinating president riding the surge of his prodigious talents from triumph to triumph....’I am large, I contain multitudes,’ Walt Whitman wrote, and Obama lives that lyrical prophecy....Barack Obama is developing into what Hegel called a ‘world-historical soul,’ an embodiment of the spirit of the times. He is what we hope we can be.”

The other runner-up for this award was MSNBC anchor Chris Matthews who said his daily cable news program,

“Hardball is absolutely non-partisan.”

And there are many more: Thomas Friedman, Margaret Carlson… Go to the link at the top to enjoy.

Via Wash Times

Margaret Thatcher's record as prime minister

The left is rewriting history of Margaret Thatcher's twelve years as Prime Minister of UK. Apparently the new movie about her continues this effort. (I will see it anyway.) Patriot Statesman

The Labour Party in Britain has for the last decade spread falsehoods about the period during which Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister, riding the 1990 recession into four terms of parliamentary leadership. Labour tirelessly repeats myths about Thatcher’s impressive accomplishments. And now Hollywood screenwriters, intellectually lazy and most likely ideologically-driven, have assigned themselves the task of institutionalizing these myths via the vehicle of cinema. Oscar-winner Meryl Streep has lent her reputation to this demagogic enterprise.

Let's remember what the Iron Lady did. American Thinker

Her first accomplishment was challenging the then-regnant policy of accommodation with -- really, appeasement of -- the growth of the Soviet Empire. Even before Reagan was running for president, she held that NATO should increase its military strength to oppose Soviet expansion and roll back the USSR's control of Eastern Europe. 

Thatcher also instituted far-reaching free-market economic reforms, starting with facing down and defeating the communistic mine-workers' union. Here she was aided by the British classical economics think-tank known as the Institute of Economic Affairs, which provided her with much intellectual ammunition for her work. 

She brought the top income tax rates down from 98% to 40% during her time in office. She brought the national debt down and privatized key industries. In truth, she ended British socialism. She brought unions under control, with time lost to strikes down by an astounding 94% during her time in office, from 29.5 million working days lost to 1.9 million. 

... her policies increased real employment, decreased inflation, and made the poor and disabled better off. He also explains why her policies were not responsible for the problems experienced by the coal industry and those caused by the Exchange Rate Mechanism.

See the first link above for more.

The photo: from Telegraph UK.

Let's just skip tomorrow

Samoa, the Pacific island nation, has decided to skip December 30 and go straight to the 31st. Huh?

They decided to move one time zone to the west to make it easier to work with their neighbor nations. But that requires moving across the International Date Line. And skipping one day less one hour.

Oregon science center blocks global warming discussion

OMSI in Portland cancelled a meeting about global warming. Prominent scientists were involved. But they didn't pass the PC test. They are asking questions. They doubt man-caused GW.

Victoria Taft

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas. Orbusmax has a page of Christmas videos, including some songs, which I call "still videos."

Orbusmax

Religion of peace - 25 killed in Nigeria church bombings

Tell us again that Islam is a religion of peace. I do blame President Bush for pushing this major pile of nonsense on us. Nigeria again.

MSNBC

ABUJA — Islamist sect Boko Haram claimed responsibility for a wave of Christmas day bombings on Sunday, including an attack on a Catholic church that killed at least 25 people.

Boko Haram spokesman Abu Qaqa claimed the bombings in a statement to the journalists' association of Maiduguri, capital of the group's heartland.

The Christmas Day attacks show the growing national ambition of Boko Haram, which is responsible for at least 491 killings this year alone, according to an Associated Press count. The assaults come a year after a series of Christmas Eve bombings in Jos claimed by the militants left at least 32 dead and 74 wounded.

The first explosion on Sunday struck St. Theresa Catholic Church in Madalla, a town in Niger state close to the capital, Abuja, authorities said. Rescue workers recovered at least 25 bodies from the church

Your senators voted for Keystone XL pipeline

The much-talked-about US Senate version of the "Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act of 2011" includes the provision that the president must approve the Keystone XL pipeline within 60 days or else determine that it is not in the national interest. Bill text

Both of our senators voted "yea" which requires making the decision within 60 days. That's a vote for the pipeline. An Obama move would delay the decision until after the next election, then after the next election, then... The vote

I am glad they supported the pipeline. They surely don't think it is not in the national interest. They both support getting the oil our economy needs from safe, friendly sources, like Canada. Not from Middle East dictators and/or through the Straits of Hormuz. Don't they?

Iran leaders say they will block Hormuz. Zawya Report. And Iran is practicing to block the Straits of Hormuz [Fox News] so this pipeline within Canada and the US is in our national interest.

Cantwell has a long record of efforts to make oil more expensive. Then holding the oil companies responsible when it happens. Her efforts: less foreign oil in 2006 - more regulation of oil markets in 2010 The Hill. And annual witch hunts to blame evil oil companies for manipulating the market for oil. In 2005 her hunt found... nothing:

"Absolutely. I just don't have the document to prove it," Cantwell said when asked if oil companies are price gouging. "It takes a lot to get the document to prove it and there's no way the (Federal Trade Commission) is going to produce that anytime soon." Seattle P-I

Some content via Amy Ridenour.

China will buy nuclear power tech. How about the US?

Bill Gates is taking his nuclear power project to China; he was welcomed. The US is fighting it tooth and nail, except for an occasional Obama photo op.

Gates and partner Nathan Myrvold are negotiating to sell their breakthrough traveling wave reactor technology to China's National Nuclear Corporation. TerraPower’s “fourth generation” nuclear technology promises to revolutionize the energy sector within two decades by making it possible to power a nuclear plant with depleted uranium for decades at a time, without the need for refueling or waste removal.

Washington Post

…TerraPower is one of a handful of nuclear power start-ups tagged as the future of the industry. What makes TerraPower so important is not the megawatt star power of Bill Gates — it’s the fact that the company has found a way to combine supercomputing technology with nuclear power technology to create a future vision of cheap, sustainable energy. Traveling wave reactor technology makes it possible - at least theoretically - to power a nuclear plant for decades without the need for re-fueling or waste removal. 

Imagine being able to power entire cities or industries with cheap, plentiful energy. If nuclear technology is still viewed with apprehension within the U.S., it’s much more attractive abroad, especially for governments like China that have massive population growth and the need to power immense new mega-cities. Even Japan, humbled by last year’s nuclear reactor core breakdown at Fukushima, has shown interest in the Bill Gates nuclear technology.

Add $4 million to US debt for another Obama vacation

Nile Gardiner at Telegraph UK

Around $4 million (£2.6 million) – the expected total cost to the US taxpayer of the Obama Christmas family vacation to Hawaii according to the Hawaii Reporter (hat tip: Rob Bluey at The Foundry). This is an astonishing amount of public money to be spending in an age of austerity – when the president is supposed to be leading efforts to cut the US budget deficit, the largest since World War Two, and a towering $15 trillion national debt:

Hawaii Reporter research shows the total cost for the President’s visit for taxpayers far exceeded $1.5 million in 2010 – but is even more costly this year because he extended his vacation by three days and the cost for Air Force One travel has jumped since last assessed in 2000. In addition, Hawaii Reporter was able to obtain more specifics about the executive expenditures. 

The total cost (based on what is known) for the 17-day vacation roundtrip vacation to Hawaii for the President, his family and staff has climbed to more than $4 million.

My photo of Diamond Head. Click to enlarge.

EPA wants to control every culvert of rain flow

We can't make this up. Obama's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has gotten desperate in trying to stop industry in the US. Now they claim that rain runoff is a point-source of industrial waste.
If an industrial pollutant covers the ground in an area the rain runoff will be polluted. Agreed. But the source is the industrial plant. Obama's big thinkers propose that every culvert the runoff goes through be considered a point source of the pollution. So? It would allow Obama to require paperwork and hearings for EVERY culvert the flow goes though

Why is Obama doing this? Because it would give him more control - over every culvert. Can you think of another Obama motivation for nonsense like this?

Powerline Blog

We have written repeatedly about the EPA’s war on energy and, more generally, on economic growth. But a case that may soon make its way to the Supreme Court is, critics argue, even more extreme than anything mandated by the Agency. The case is Georgia-Pacific West, Inc. et al. v. Northwest Environmental Defense Center. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled, reversing more than 35 years of practice and statutory interpretation, that runoff of rain water from forest roads that passes through one or more pipes or culverts constitutes point source pollution that must be permitted through the EPA’s NPDES program. 640 F.3d 1063. If this ruling is upheld, the EPA will be charged with regulating the runoff of uncontaminated rain water from vast areas of public and private land. It is not clear how many permits would need to be applied for and issued, but the number may be in the millions.

The defendants in the original action have now petitioned for certiorari in the Supreme Court, and the court’s response to that petition is expected tomorrow. SCOTUS Blog lists the case as one of the “Petitions We’re Watching,” and you can read the 9th Circuit’s opinion and the petition for certiorari here. The petition states the issue presented as follows:

Since the passage of the Clean Water Act, the Environmental Protection Agency has considered runoff of rain from forest roads–whether channeled or not–to fall outside the scope of its National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (“NPDES”) and thus not to require a permit as a point source discharge of pollutants. Under a rule first promulgated in 1976, EPA has consistently defined as nonpoint source activities forest road construction and maintenance from which natural runoff results. And in regulating storm water discharges under 1987 amendments to the Act, EPA again expressly excluded runoff from forest roads. In consequence, forest road runoff long has been regulated as a nonpoint source using best management practices, like those imposed by the State of Oregon on the roads at issue here. EPA’s consistent interpretation of more than 35 years has survived proposed regulatory revision and legal challenge, and repeatedly has been endorsed by the United States in briefs and agency publications.

The 9th Circuit decision conflicts with a ruling by the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals in Newton County Wildlife Association v. Rogers, 141 F.3d 803. In a decision written by my former partner Jim Loken, the 8th Circuit held that the claim that “culverts and other discrete sources and conveyances” of runoff associated with logging roads constitute point sources of pollution was “without merit.” Twenty-six states have joined with the petitioners in asking the Supreme Court to take the case and overturn the 9th Circuit decision.