I moderated a panel on infrastructure and jobs at the Bipartisan Policy Center this morning, and one of the topics that came up was an infrastructure bank. Asked about it, one of the panelists said “what I’d like is to make all the members of Congress write a 100 word essay on what an infrastructure bank is.” It was a good line, and the audience laughed because it hints at something all too true when it comes to discussing policy: there are a lot of ferocious advocates of policies they can’t explain. […]
The passion is certainly real, and understandable. But the attachment to Glass-Steagall is not. Of the hundreds of times I’ve seen this, in all but two or three cases it’s been absolutely clear that the person advocating this could not describe the content of Glass-Steagall (presumably the one passed in 1933), nor the multi-decade unraveling of its major provisions. If anyone makes any of the obvious criticisms–“Really? You want to bring back Regulation Q?”–they’re not even particularly sheepish about admitting that well, of course, they’re not exactly familiar with the whole thing, but . . .
…What follows is usually a defense of the one provision they are familiar with: the enforced separation of commercial banking and investment banking activities. But when asked how this would have helped, when it was the pure play investment banks created by Glass-Steagall that had the most trouble, I’ve never seen any of Glass-Steagall’s fans provide a convincing explanation; indeed, it’s often been quite clear that they weren’t aware of this fairly well-known fact.
Wow, Wheylous, you’re a total downer. Things are starting to get really, really scary. The worst part is how completely unaware the general public is to the gravity of what is going on. The significance of this murder is not merely that “it’s a minor!” but the fact that it’s a minor is always supposed to be a big deal (e.g. consider statutory rape) but, in this case, it isn’t because The Powers That Be don’t want it to be a big deal. They can obtain exemption at will from the very memes they have themselves created to control the rest of us with.
So let’s see: Herman Cain is a former local Federal Reserve chairman beloved by so-called limited government people. He speaks in soundbites generally. His foreign policy is, “I’ll talk to my advisors.” He states that he would negotiate hostages with terrorists before recanting the position hours later. He says abortion is, “not his call” yet proceeds to state he is pro-life and that abortion should not be a legal option.
A Suffolk University poll of Florida Republicans finds 25% in support of Mitt Romney and 24% supporting Herman Cain. In other words, these voters believe the country is about 4 percent off track but basically all right. For all their talk about how bad Obama is, apparently things aren’t that bad if they want to replace him with a safe establishment man like Romney or Cain (former head of the Kansas City Federal Reserve). […]
You can imagine how much “change” we can expect from a guy like that — the whole establishment lines up on one side (the New York Times, the Washington Post, the cable news commentators, John McCain, Barack Obama) and the American people on the other, and Cain goes with the establishment. But he’ll be a big maverick next time that happens, right? Sure.
PolitiFact: Cain said that China “indicated that they’re trying to develop nuclear capability.” According to the U.S. State Department, China conducted its first test of a nuclear weapon in 1964. So Cain’s approximately 40 years behind the times. China is a long-standing nuclear power. We rate his statement Pants on Fire.
“… [they see it that] we have an aggressive government that’s always hunting for war.” Interesting quote, especially since this interview appears to be sometime in the 1950’s when America was supposedly on its highest moral ground after its supposed battle against the forces of evil during WWII.
