Obama, Ph.D’s, And Some Bizarre Ideas About Labor

There is absolutely nothing wrong with President Obama’s big-government economic policies. We simply need more of them, and more time for them to work – or so the President and many academicians would have us believe.

It’s interesting to watch Barack Obama run for re-election against his own track record. When he became President in January of 2009 he promised to “fundamentally transform” America, and in terms of our nation’s economic policies he has certainly achieved this objective.

But after almost three years of “transforming”- which has involved putting healthcare under government control, a government take-over of two car companies, huge expansions in government control over banking and lending institutions, hundreds of millions of dollars spent to create “green jobs,” and a roughly 30% increase in government spending overall – nobody seems happy with the results (not even the President himself). In light of the history-making “zero job growth” month of August, things are perceived as being so bad that many Americans who once believed the President’s promises about job creation and free healthcare are now wondering if – maybe – our government needs to try a different approach.

This doesn’t seem to deter President Obama, or many of his ideological soul mates. At the White House, as in many universities, it is simply understood that private individuals and organizations only do reckless and self-serving things with wealth. And it is equally understood that when super smart politicians and government bureaucrats control greater portions of the nation’s wealth – with more taxation, more government spending, and more government regulations – well, those super smart politicians always produce great results for everybody.

Thus, despite the growing discontent among us everyday folks, the President is vowing more big-government programs, while highly educated intellectuals at universities and think tanks keep thinking of more big-government “ideas.” We’ll get to some of President Obama’s plans in a moment. But first, consider this idea from Yale graduate Daniel Hamermesh, Ph.D., currently an Economics Professor at University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Hamermesh has proposed special legal protections for “ugly people” in the workplace. Yes, he calls them “ugly” rather than homely, and he argues that “being ugly” is a disability that should be protected under the “American’s With Disabilities Act.”

Good looking people have all the advantages in this economy, Dr. Hamermesh suggests, and “for purposes of administering a law,” he reasons that “we surely could agree on who is truly ugly, perhaps the worst-looking 1 or 2 percent of the population.” “Affirmative Action for ugly people” (another term he uses) would likely create lots of opportunities for employment law Attorneys, but it is difficult to imagine that this would incentivize businesses (other than law firms) to begin hiring again.

Then there’s one of my favorites – the “Spread The Jobs Around” agenda from University of Michigan alumnus Dean Baker, Ph.D. As head of the left-wing Center For Economic And Policy Research in Washington, D.C., Dr. Baker has proposed that businesses be “encouraged” (read “mandated”) to stop laying-off workers, and instead be “encouraged” to cutback fulltime workers’ hours and wages so as to “share” the work and wages with everybody, and keep people on payrolls.

“Spread the Jobs Around” probably looks great on paper at Dr. Baker’s office, and it sure seems like a super-smart guy’s clever way of preventing the unemployment rate from going higher (something Obama desperately needs). But if business owners are further restricted (government already places enormous constraints on hiring and firing practices) from hiring and firing whomever they need to in order to be profitable, businesses will have even more reasons to NOT hire new workers.

As for President Obama himself (by the way, his degree title is “J.D.” in case you’re interested), he recently established a new division of our federal government whose agenda looks like the mission statement of a college “diversity” office. By Executive Order, the President has created “The White House Office of Diversity And Inclusion.”

Exactly what this “office” will attempt to do to business owners is unclear (and the lack of clarity from the government is yet another one of those things that creates uncertainty in the economy and inhibits job growth – but I digress), yet its’ stated agenda reads as follows: “Eliminate demographic group imbalances in targeted occupations and improve workforce diversity. To attain this, special initiatives have been created targeting specific groups, including Hispanics, African Americans, American Indians, women and gays and lesbians.” In short, the President has a problem with some of his key supporters – Black and Hispanic people in particular: the unemployment rates among these groups are in some regions topping 30%. The goal of the “Diversity and Inclusion” office would appear to be to threaten and coerce businesses into hiring more workers from these “minority” categories, so as to enhance President Obama’s chances for re-election.

We’ll know more of what the President intends to do about “jobs” after his upcoming speech. But we can be assured of this right now: Barack Obama will seek more control of the economy as a means of “fixing” it.

My, we got shrill here. Let's see if we can discover why...

Ping away Carry

Whereupon you put out three posts, two of which were completely redundant. Somebody get you just a little skeered? Could there be just a little guilt there maybe? Hmmm???

I would hazard a guess that you actually would rather have liberal dems like BHO than a conservative you don't agree 100% with.

How silly. NOBODY agrees 100%. So in order to have a case, you simply had to pick the hyperbolic rhetorical number, because you know any reasonable charge might be refuted, especially given your apparent history of "compromises."

For the record: I voted for Hunter in the primary and McCain in the general. OTOH, I voted against Schwarzenegger at every opportunity for which history bears me out.

You see, it's a matter of judgement, not fear. Let's see which one it is in your case.

Which makes you just as much as a danger to the conservative cause as any DUmmy.

God how stupid. You don't know who I am or what I've done. Worse, you posted without checking. Had you done so, you would have found out that I have authored two books, and exercised a rather extensive record of posting original and well documented articles of some substance here on FR over the last decade.

Can you say that? No.

Take your rhetoric to the foothills and build a wee fort and leave the adults to govern, and quite polluting the party with your do or die crap... it is your ilk in part I can thank for the economy.

Horseshit. It was the jumping Jim Jeffords, Snowe, McCaskill, IOW RINOS who fell for the regulatory restrictions and socialized risks that killed this economy, from Dodd/Frank, to using Fannie Mae as a plaything, to pretending to care about "The Environment" by banning domestic production (which pleased oil company stockholders to no end) that put us in this mess. That is what got Congress summarily ejected in 2006. Yes, the public should have fixed it by nominating conservatives, but their own GOP stood square against them, preferring "moderate" status quo incumbents to principle. Just like you do.

I'm tired of you people electing dems because you don't get your way...

You don't even know who I am, much less who, "you people" are. The reality is that you cave to your fears and vote for RINOS even in primaries because "he can win" while rationalizing it as a "step in the right direction." It's crap.

As the record proves, there has NEVER, in the 20th Century been a moderate progressive Republican followed by a more conservative Republican. Not one (Ford doesn't count because he never won an election). In fact, in the only time a progressive was followed by another Republican at all (Teddy by Taft), the latter went on an immediate strengthening of regulatory government, which led to straight to Wilson. On the other hand, the TWO conservative presidents in that century pleased the people so much they elected a Republican to follow. Unfortunately, both were RINOS. Every GOP "progressive" has got into political trouble for corruption or induced "progressive" policies that induced sufficient damage to get tossed, with the exception of Roosevelt, in that the unconstitutional regulatory policies he instituted in the name of "good government" had not been around long enough to show themselves for the political corruption they in fact were even then. In either case, a leftist media has always ensured that conservatism takes the blame when the corporate crooks get caught. See: "Nixon."

As the record proves, once said "moderate" representative is ensconced, the power of incumbency is so great that it is nearly impossible to unseat said malefactor in a primary (especially in the Senate).

I want someone as conservative as I can get - I just won't tell everyone that they should sit out if the person I want doesn't make it.

And here is where we get to the lie you keep telling yourself. You see, the phrase, "as I can get" presumes that you absolutely KNOW what the threshold for "he can win" really is. Being a frightened conservative, you just want to be sure. So you back off your preferences and accept less, even in the primaries. Hence, although you think yourself a conservative, you vote like a moderate.

not much of history buff are you Carry.

Had you even the three clicks worth of research it would have taken to realize how stupid this statement is, you would never have done so.

Unlike your posting record, my understanding of history has been validated many times on FR. Such as HERE, HERE, or HERE.

Did you write anything like that "history buff"?

You were rattled, you were rushed, and you didn't think. You acted out of fear. There are enough of you that the GOP can be herded into nominating a "he can win" RINOS like frightened sheep.

I never said the founding fathers approved or disapproved of political parties.... I said they didn’t agree.... which is part of the political process.

Here is what you wrote: Politics is typically the choice between two evils.... even the founding fathers knew this.

No, it is not, nor did the founders believe that political choices were always binary. Even then, there was a history of nations where choices involved multiple parties or even no parties in decision-making at all, such as Switzerland, of which they were well aware.

BTW - I don’t want RINOs I want conservative repubicians first, republicans second.

Show me. So far, it looks to me like "evil lite" is your preference because that is what say you do. You don't trust your fellow voters to make the choice you say you prefer. I couldn't care less what you say. As far as I am concerned, you are internally dishonest. I care what you do.

Your second choice looks like democrat.

I have never voted democrat.

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