The War on Walmart

From Reason TV we have an excellent display of the union thuggery and economic illiteracy that prevents Walmart from opening in places like Washington D.C. and New York City. Of all the outrageous claims made to deny citizens the right to choose where they spend their money - not to mention their private property rights - this one is the hands down winner:

Walmart will make criminals of our children, argues Washington D.C. commissioner Brenda Speaks, because "kids are kids" so they'll shoplift and then "security will grab them."

I don't think I've ever heard a defense of moral bankruptcy used as a political argument or a business being vilified for "making criminals" out of criminals who steal their property. But I guess if you listen to the left long enough, they can rationalize anything if it fits their agenda.

Affordable rental housing scarce in U.S., study finds

From The WaPo

The share of renters who spend more than half their income on housing is at its highest level in half a century and it’s no longer just low-income tenants who are feeling the pain, according to a Harvard University study scheduled for release Tuesday.

About 26 percent of renters — or 10.1 million people — spent more than half their pre-tax household income on rent and utilities in 2009. That’s because incomes slipped dramatically from their peak at the start of the decade even as rents kept rising.

Normally, this would be good news for sales as high rents should induce people to buy. Interest rates and home prices are low and there is no significant building of new rental housing. But the government and its cronies have devastated the housing market to such an extent that we still don't where the bottom of the sales market is or when it will reach that point. Millions of homes are still waiting to be put on the market as the system slogs through an unprecedented quagmire of foreclosures. Uncertainty kills markets.

And the recent implementation of the ironically named Dodd - Frank financial bill that is now increasing the cost and reducing the incentive to lend, will only prolong the agony.

It also doesn't help that the economy is still bouncing along the bottom on a path to stagflation.

Killer Combo of High Gas, Food Prices at Key Tipping Point

From CNBC

The combination of rising gasoline prices and the steepest increase in the cost of food in a generation is threatening to push the US economy into a recession, according to Craig Johnson, president of Customer Growth Partners.

Johnson looks at the percentage of income consumers are spending on gasoline and food as a way of gauging how consumers will fare when energy prices spike.

With gas prices now standing at about $3.90 a gallon, energy costs have now passed 6 percent of spending—a level that Johnson says is a "tipping point" for consumers...

"The combined increase in the necessities of food and energy creates a harsh double whammy for already stressed consumers," Johnson said. The last time this happened was in the recession that lasted from 1973 to 1975.

Johnson estimates that food and energy eat up about 15 percent of consumer spending at today's prices, compared with about 12.7 percent two years ago.

Of course, at lower income levels, these percentages are much higher.

Yes they are. Inflation is the most regressive tax there is when it's caused by rampant government spending paid for in phony dollars hot off the Fed's printing press. The people hurt most are those who voted in the highest percentages for a hopey changey world run on unicorn farts.

Our Horrible 'Addiction to Economic Growth'

Jonah Goldberg describes this as "So, so, much stupid crammed into such a small space. Might create a blackhole of dumb," Yes, but more to the point, this gathering of frighteningly ignorant "students" is actually a meeting of the brightest lights of government school indoctrination. It takes true dedication and determination to empty your head of all critical thinking skills while convincing yourself that you're really smart, hip and cutting edge. Their masters in academia have successfully wrapped the brutal and colossal failure of collectivism in the guise of "justice", be it social, economic, environmental or whatever. These blindly idealistic students are technically adults, but are really gullible children that are being take advantage of by cynical, power hungry tyrants who will throw them to the wolves as soon as they stop being useful idiots. And all of this is brought to you by the Democrat party.

Top 5 Environmental Disasters That Didn’t Happen

Reason T.V's list places the Paul Ehrlich's Malthusian population bomb drivel at number one, although I would give the nod to their runner up: Rachel Carson's pesticide scare that led to tens of millions of deaths stemming from the ban of DDT and other chemicals that were well on their way to wiping out malaria and other mosquito borne illnesses. Most of those killed from first world junk science were third world children and pregnant women.

The Rich Aren’t Getting Richer

Kevin D. Williamson gives a lesson on income mobility:

When somebody says that that top 1 percent saw its income go up by X in the last decade, they are not really talking about what happened to actual households in the top 1 percent. Rather, they are talking about how much money one has to make to qualify for the top 1 percent. All that really means is that the 3 million highest-paid Americans in 2010 made more money than did the 3 million highest-paid Americans in 2000, the 100,000 highest-paid Americans this year made more money than did the 100,000 highest-paid Americans made in 2000, that the 50,000 highest-paid Americans made more money this year than did the 50,000 highest-paid Americans made in 2000, that the 1,000 highest-paid Americans this year made more money than did the 1,000 highest-paid Americans made in 2000, etc., which is not shocking. But, as the Treasury data show: They are not the same people.

WSJ: Dissecting the liberal smears of Paul Ryan’s budget

• Deficits and debt. Perhaps the most bizarre complaint is that Mr. Ryan's blueprint would worsen the U.S. fiscal imbalance compared to current law. So the House Budget Chairman has proposed supposedly hideous cuts to popular entitlements at great political risk for . . . the fun of it?...

• Medicare "cuts." The Mediscare machinery is grinding into gear, and the same people who say Mr. Ryan is imposing too much pain on seniors by requiring them to pay a larger portion of their health costs also claim that he's a coward for exempting everyone in or near retirement. In other words, the soup is terrible and the portions are too small...

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