Game Marketer. Game Developer. Libertarian.
"Success seems to be largely a matter of hanging on after others have let go." - William Feather
The $10 Trillion Problem
By Tommy Leung on 07/22/2008 in Politics
Secretary Henry Paulson has been calling for a bailout of the insolvent Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the Democrats in Congress are looking to pass a bill to raise the limit on the national debt. The national debt is over $9.4 trillion already and the deficit for next year is approaching $500 billion. The bailout for Fannie and Freddie is estimated to cost $25 billion by the government.
So, if you and I were in $1,000,000 of debt that was accruing interest on a daily basis, would extending how much more debt we are willing to take on going to solve our problem? Is it a good idea? Of course not! The kicker here is that this $10 trillion of debt is OURS! We are even making monthly payments on it–the government steals money from us every paycheck. Unfortunately, the money that is being taken from us is also being spent instead of paying down debt.
Our national debt in 2001 was in the $5 trillions. We will have almost doubled that by the time Bush leaves office. Neither the Republicans or the Democrats in Congress are fiscally responsible. They are like teenagers with their daddy’s credit card. Paulson has also recently said that we are turning the corner in this housing crisis. Even if that were true, we have just added to another problem: the $10 trillion problem.
Bash Ron Paul, Get Traffic
By Tommy Leung on 07/22/2008 in Politics
Thomas Woods brought up this blog post at LewRockwell.com–one of my most frequented blogs. The author of the above blog post had some degrading remarks for Ron Paul’s recent book deal with the publisher of Revolution: A Manifesto to write an autobiography.
I certainly added my own two cents:
You need to work on the Stephen Colbert imitation; it’s not very good. Unless, you weren’t doing a Stephen Colbert, in that case, you must be writing such ridiculousness to get people to read and comment–like I just did and the other folks above, including the ever-intelligent Tom Woods.
I am very interested in Paul’s autobiography which is only tentatively titled, Revolution: A Memoir.
And do you really think taxpayers should be paying for medals for Rosa Parks or Mother Theresa? Paul did suggest that the representatives who supported it could shell out their own money–they didn’t. Using other people’s money to give gifts is ridiculous.
Not too long after that, more pro-Ron Paul comments piled on. The lesson here: bash Ron Paul, get web traffic!
Obama: Out of Iraq in 2010?
By Tommy Leung on 07/22/2008 in Politics
We voted in 2006 to get out of Iraq. It is the second half of 2008 and we are no closer to leaving Iraq. The Democrats’ are still trying to convince us that they will leave Iraq if you only elected one of them to the White House. None of us can predict the future but, a Democrat in the White House looks likely at this point.
Barack Obama recently visited Iraq and reports are saying that the Iraqi Prime Minister shares his view of withdrawing troops by 2010. But, there is fine print: any withdrawal plan is subject to the level of violence. As much as I care about what the Iraqi Prime Minister thinks, I care more about what Americans think. 70% of Americans are not in favor the war in Iraq. We wanted to leave in 2006; we want to leave right now.
A timetable for withdrawal based on the level of violence in an area as unstable–and made more unstable by our presence–as that region is as good as having no timetable. We need to leave now. Protect our troops from harm that can be avoided and bring them home. Obama’s withdrawal plan should be to start the day he steps foot into the White House; not in 2010 based on violence levels of a violent area.
Don Harrold July 4th
By Tommy Leung on 07/10/2008 in Politics
I’ve been watching Don Harrold’s videos on YouTube for quite a while now. He makes a lot of good videos about the markets, CNBC, Mad Money with Jim Cramer, etc. I didn’t see this particular 4th of July video until now and felt compelled to share. Check it out!
Video on Gas Prices
By Tommy Leung on 07/07/2008 in Politics
Found this video at The Freetarian blog, you might know him better as Val Venis of wrestling fame. Does a great job explaining the real reason behind why the price of gas is so high today. I’ve wrote about it but, this is a quick two minute explanation; perfect for those who don’t like to read. :)
Why Are Gas Prices So High?
By Tommy Leung on 07/02/2008 in Politics
I live in New York City so I don’t really have to drive anywhere if I didn’t want to but, I do have a car: Nissan Altima with a decent MPG. My frequency of driving has gone quite far down since prices have started spiraling out of control. The last time I filled up the tank, regular unleaded was at about $4.15 a gallon. I saw prices at almost $4.40 the other day. These high and ever-increasing prices are incredibly irritating. Even those who do not drive are affected by it because the prices of everything else will also go up as long as gas is used in the transportation or manufacturing of the product. While politicians are trying to come up with bad new policies to try and lower the price of gas, we should be asking: why are gas prices so high?
As a student of Austrian Economics, the recent increase in prices of everything did not come as a surprise. Austrian economists have been talking about the problem of inflation and bad monetary policy for years. Most people hate economics. It probably has something to do with schools generally teaching Keynesian Economics. Did you know how to pronounce that? Probably not. The Keynesian teachings are generally flooded with lots of charts, graphs, and math. I’d imagine most people get turned off by that–I certainly do. Austrian writings are a lot easier to understand and don’t turn economics into physics with a multitude of formulas, equations, and symbols.
