United Liberty

This video is from the Ludwig von Mises Institute and is the first in a series of videos featuring Austrian economists discussing Henry Hazlitt’s Economics in One Lesson:

The latest Rasmussen Reports tracking poll shows President Obama with the lowest approval rating of his term:

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Monday shows that 30% of the nation’s voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Forty-one percent (41%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -11 (see trends).

(…)

Overall, 46% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of the President’s performance. That’s the lowest level of total approval yet measured for Obama. Fifty-three percent (53%) now disapprove. Eighty-one percent (81%) of Democrats approve while 83% of Republicans disapprove. As for those not affiliated with either major party, 66% disapprove.

And the Gallup Poll numbers, which measure Obama’s approval among all adults rather than likely voters as Rasmussen does, aren’t any better:

And you can see the same trend in the RealClearPolitics polling average:

Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) told the head of advertising at the Las Vegas Review-Journal that he hopes the paper goes out of business:

On Wednesday, before he addressed a Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce luncheon, [Sen. Harry] Reid joined the chamber’s board members for a meet-‘n’-greet and a photo. One of the last in line was the Review-Journal’s director of advertising, Bob Brown, a hard-working Nevadan who toils every day on behalf of advertisers. He has nothing to do with news coverage or the opinion pages of the Review-Journal.

Yet, as Bob shook hands with our senior U.S. senator in what should have been nothing but a gracious business setting, Reid said: “I hope you go out of business.”

Later, in his public speech, Reid said he wanted to let everyone know that he wants the Review-Journal to continue selling advertising because the Las Vegas Sun is delivered inside the Review-Journal.

This is probably not the type of behavior you want to exhibit, especially when you’re trailing to both of your potential GOP opponents and your approval numbers are stuck around 30% or so.

Get caught possessing marijuana in the City of Denver and you could one day get less than a slap on the wrist:

DENVER - A city panel in charge of overseeing marijuana possession crimes in Denver recommended on Wednesday that the fine for possession be set at $1.

If Denver’s presiding judge accepts the recommendation from the Denver Marijuana Policy Review Panel, the fine would be the lowest in the entire nation for marijuana possession.

(…)

“By setting the fine at just $1, we are sending a message to Denver officials that the era of citing adults for using a less harmful drug than alcohol is over. It’s simply not worth the city’s time or resources,” said panel member and SAFER Executive Director Mason Tvert, who coordinated the successful Denver marijuana initiatives.

Sounds like a great idea to me.

H/T: Carpe Diem

“I have come to the conclusion that one useless man is called a disgrace; that two are called a law firm, and that three or more become a Congress.” - John Adams, played by William Daniels, in 1776.

Yeah, people aren’t happy with Congress:

If they could vote to keep or replace the entire Congress, just 25% of voters nationwide would keep the current batch of legislators.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 57% would vote to replace the entire Congress and start all over again. Eighteen percent (18%) are not sure how they would vote.

Overall, these numbers are little changed since last October. When Congress was passing the unpopular $700-billion bailout plan in the heat of a presidential campaign and a seeming financial industry meltdown, 59% wanted to throw them all out. At that time, just 17% wanted to keep them.

These types of polls aren’t too uncommon. They don’t like your representative, but their representative is doing a good job and they’ll vote to re-elect that person next year.

This article will be the third installment in a discussion on health care/insurance reform. In this first entry, I argued that insurance, in its true form, is not a public utility. Insurance businesses can become “too big to fail” and thus proper regulation is necessary. That was followed by a discussion on rights and the role of the state in protecting, preserving and granting rights. My conclusion was that health care rights are positive claim rights, and thus it would be dangerous for the state to legislate a right to health care.

Health care is a very important issue. It is full of emotion. People’s lives are at stake. This cannot be ignored when analyzing the role of the state in such an issue. While insurance should not be a public utility nor should the state sanction positive claim rights, that, in my opinion, does not close the issue. The concept of human needs must be explored.

When I first began to think about this from a human needs perspective, I asked myself how one could define human needs. My first inclination was to define these basic needs as food (including water), clothing and shelter. My second inclination was to do some research on the subject. After a quick review of the subject area of needs, I found Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to be worth a review.

Rep. Diane Watson (D-CA) recently told a group of supporters that the reason people oppose Barack Obama is because he “looks like [her]” (Watson is an Africian American). It can’t be because he promotes statist economic policies.

Watson also had some nice things to say about health care in Cuba and Fidel Castro. I guess she visited the hospitals that the government directed her to, not the hospitals for average Cubans:

The blogosphere has been abuzz over yesterday’s story in The Washington Post discussing how Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the self-described mastermind of the September 11th attacks, went from adversary to alleged CIA asset:

After enduring the CIA’s harshest interrogation methods and spending more than a year in the agency’s secret prisons, Khalid Sheik Mohammed stood before U.S. intelligence officers in a makeshift lecture hall, leading what they called “terrorist tutorials.”

In 2005 and 2006, the bearded, pudgy man who calls himself the mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks discussed a wide variety of subjects, including Greek philosophy and al-Qaeda dogma. In one instance, he scolded a listener for poor note-taking and his inability to recall details of an earlier lecture.

Speaking in English, Mohammed “seemed to relish the opportunity, sometimes for hours on end, to discuss the inner workings of al-Qaeda and the group’s plans, ideology and operatives,” said one of two sources who described the sessions, speaking on the condition of anonymity because much information about detainee confinement remains classified. “He’d even use a chalkboard at times.”

In May 1984, Senator Ted Kennedy conveyed a message to Yuri Andropov, the leader of the Soviet Union, through a long-time Kennedy friend and confidant:

Kennedy’s message was simple. He proposed an unabashed quid pro quo. Kennedy would lend Andropov a hand in dealing with President Reagan. In return, the Soviet leader would lend the Democratic Party a hand in challenging Reagan in the 1984 presidential election. “The only real potential threats to Reagan are problems of war and peace and Soviet-American relations,” the memorandum stated. “These issues, according to the senator, will without a doubt become the most important of the election campaign.”

Kennedy made Andropov a couple of specific offers.

First he offered to visit Moscow. “The main purpose of the meeting, according to the senator, would be to arm Soviet officials with explanations regarding problems of nuclear disarmament so they may be better prepared and more convincing during appearances in the USA.” Kennedy would help the Soviets deal with Reagan by telling them how to brush up their propaganda.