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February 2010
One of the challenges of putting out nearly daily content is to find a title for all of the various pieces. Ideally titles should be clever and also provide the reader with some idea of what’s to come.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) seems to have a similar challenge—how to “Title” various things, which is why you should be concerned about the recent talk of moving Internet oversight from Title I to Title II.
One might be forgiven for thinking this is just inside-the-Beltway meddling and jamming the iPod earplugs back in. But in fact it is just that freedom to stream music, play a massive multiplayer game, watch video, send messages, and enjoy the future bounty of innovation that could very well be at stake. One could say that the “open Internet” as we know it is at risk.
Communications systems of various sorts get placed under either Title I or Title II of the Communications Act of 1934. Read More...
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World markets have been worried about the financial disaster threatening Greece. And well they should.
The European Union member country recently revealed that it had been hiding its debt. Greece’s total debt is 113 percent of GDP for 2009, and expected to rise to 125 percent by 2010. E.U. rules require that total debt not be higher than 60 percent of GDP, according E.U. Business.
And so the markets stumbled for several days over the prospect of a Greek failure, until other E.U. countries hinted they might help out.
But looking at the mounting debt facing the U.S., we have to wonder if we’ll be the new Greece.
Veronique de Rugy of the Mercatus Center has just put together a chart highlighting our own challenges. It shows gross U.S. federal debt for 2010 at $11.9 trillion. That’s 94.3 percent of GDP. Not quite Greece yet, but heading that way quickly.
Read More...
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When will the Census Bureau enter the 21st Century—or even the 20th?
It’s time to take the constitutionally mandated census once again. But while the rest of the country gathers and processes information with the speed of light, the Census Bureau still operates at the speed of shoes, where few, if any, technological tools exist to streamline the process. And they seem uninterested in improving their processes.
This is a recurring theme in government: the misapplication of government interest in technology.
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) pushed for years to create a means for taxpayers to file their taxes online, even though the private market had created Turbotax, a popular and successful tool for individuals to file their taxes. Government plowed ahead and created an ability to file, but only because of an agreement with Intuit. Reneging on the agreement might have run the company out of business.
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Our thanks to FedEx Chairman Fred Smith for dredging up a 2001 IPI study and resurrecting its recommendations in a Wall Street Journal op/ed this past Saturday.
In his op-ed, Mr. Smith rightly touts accelerated depreciation as a powerful tool through which the federal government could stimulate real job creation in the private sector through tax policy.
He’s right—in 2001 IPI found that for every $1 in tax reductions through accelerated depreciation, the economy would reap $9 in increased GDP.
But depreciation fixes are not the only tax tools available to the feds to stimulate economic growth. Read More...
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In the federal government, regulators are not directly accountable to the electorate. While an elected official must account at every election for their actions, typically regulators, such as FCC commissioners, are appointed by elected officials and hence do not answer directly to the people.
This simple fact may explain the FCC’s seeming determination to assert increased government control of the Internet, or at least the belief by pro-government control activists that the FCC deliver their agenda on a silver platter.
Years ago, the FCC determined broadband would be regulated as an “information service” rather than a “telecommunications service.” So, the FCC decided, and later the Supreme Court agreed, that broadband is not to be burdened with antiquated “common carrier” regulations, rules created in 1934 to impose heavy government control of the then monopoly telephone system. Read More...
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President Obama introduced his budget this week amid lots of calls for Republicans to support the president’s laundry list of new and expanded spending programs, along with a minimal spending freeze and some tax cuts.
For example, Politico cites White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer saying that Republicans “have a responsibility now to partner with the President, to try to get things done for the American people.”
In short, Pfeiffer wants Republicans to quit being the party of “no.”
But bipartisanship is only good when the proposed legislation is good. And frankly, most of the president’s proposals have been stinkers.
Take the administration’s proposal to try accused 9/11 planner Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in downtown New York City. Republicans opposed the plan, as did most of the public. Read More...
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Author: Bartlett Cleland || Location: Lewisville, Texas, USA