Category Archives: Free Markets

Keeping The Competition OUT

EU, Free Markets, Internet, Regulation, Socialism, Taxation, Technology, The State

Under the guise of upholding a fair and free-market order, uncompetitive companies, given the option, will petition centrist establishments to regulate the market. This kneecaps the competition and ensures the lobbyists retain ‘market share’ without having to compete for it. This is what ETNO is doing.

“The ETNO,” informs RT, “is made up of telecommunication companies including Swisscom and Spain’s Telefonica that are well-established in nearly three dozen European countries.” The ETNO’s Executive Board, which is a European-based lobby group, “has asked the United Nations to tax American websites that provide services abroad.”

In December, the leak reveals, the European Telecommunications Network Operators Association (ETNO) approached the United Nations with a proposal that would outline a restructuring of the Internet’s business model when taking into account Web entities with an international presence. If approved, the legislation would tax American-based content providers — such as Apple, Google and Netflix — for offering services to customers overseas. Should they get their wish, the ETNO might soon usher in some serious revisions for the International Telecommunications Regulations (ITR), a legislation that deals with cross-border communications traffic that has remained untouched since its last revision in 1988.


MORE.

The Pain In Bain

Business, Capitalism, Critique, Democrats, Economy, Elections, Ethics, Fascism, Free Markets, Hillary Clinton

According to Salon’s Glenn Greenwald, a defense of “Bain Capital, Mitt Romney’s former firm,” and “the paragon of capitalist evil,” must be rooted entirely in corrupt self-interest. So there’s not even a smidgen of truth in Newark Mayor Cory Booker’s condemnation of the Obama campaign’s attacks on Bain? How about the other two prominent Democrats to defend Romney and his work? (Read on.)

“Booker went on Meet the Press and angered hordes of Democrats when he condemned the Obama campaign’s attacks on Bain as ‘nauseating,’ equating the anti-Bain messaging to the GOP’s sleazy use of Jeremiah Wright, and then demanding: ‘stop the attacks on private equity’ (in response to the backlash, Booker then released a hostage-like video recanting his criticisms and pledging his loyalty to President Obama).”

Without explaining the mechanism by which the private equity firm achieved this feat, Greenwald asserts further that the likes of Bain Capital are “destroying the middle class in order to enrich greedy vulture oligarchs.” AND, “We also all know that the Democratic Party is the defender of the middle class and the bold adversary of corporate pillaging.”

Do we?

DITTO Deval Patrick. HuffPo uses the same “reasoning”—“a history of ethically questionable connections to financial firms”—to condemn the Massachusetts governor for his defense of the Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney [05/31/2012] … during TV appearances.”

“The Democratic politician was supposed to be serving as a surrogate for President Barack Obama. Patrick, who has a history of ethically questionable connections to financial firms, applauded Boston-based Bain Capital, implicitly criticizing the Obama campaign’s attacks on Romney’s record at the private equity firm.”

Patrick is the second Obama surrogate with strong ties to the financial industry to defend Bain, following in the footsteps of Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker, who ignited a week of outrage from Democratic Party strategists for describing the Obama campaign’s slams against Romney’s Bain work as “nauseating.”

AND THEN THERE WERE THREE. One other major Democrat has defended Romney and his job record. “This is good work.” “I don’t think we ought to get in a position where we say this is bad work,” said Bill Clinton.

The DC Decoder’s correspondent floats yet another crazy ad hominem: “Bill may be intentionally sabotaging President Obama in order to set Hillary up for a run in 2016,” which, to her credit, she doesn’t quite buy.

Others suggest the former president simply misspoke. But we don’t buy that either.
Here’s the thing: Clinton’s comments weren’t just “off message.” They were a declaration of war on the message. They underscore a fundamental split within the Democratic Party that’s less about Romney’s record at Bain than it is about whether the party as a whole is perceived as a friend or foe of Wall Street and the world of business and high finance.

Microsoft Previews Windows 8 OS

Free Markets, Internet, Outsourcing, Private Property, Science, Technology

News comes that “Microsoft has launched the most complete preview yet of its forthcoming Windows 8 operating system.” Is that good or bad? I live with a Microsofty who tries to defend the Machine as best he can. Yet, I dread each and every improvement in this indispensable technology.

I’m just a simple user; not a designer. And each and every “improvement” seems to come with added complexity.

To me, a technological “improvement” means ease of operation. I long to go back several revisions of Microsoft Word and Outlook. I swear; each and every function I once achieved with one or two clicks of the mouse, now takes nine. I’ve even documented a bug or two, which, when challenged on, my better half smiles and walks away.

This weekend we were forced to replace the home’s telephones. (The free market is fabulous. Most Americans can afford a few “telephones.”) The lines kept crackling. It turns out the noise was not the fault of the old, trusted telephones, answering and fax machines.

The upshot of the improved technology: Whereas I was once able to press a single button, and by so doing activate the answering message; I now must click through a whole process to get the same result.

I am told that this added complexity and inconvenience is due to cheap innards. Extant hardware must be made to carry as much programming as possible. Designing for customer comfort is secondary to the price of the components.

Ultimately, each time I accidentally click to update my browser or any other of the things I use to function online, I dread the complexity that will ensue.

Some things are best kept simple. Technology is one such thing.

UPDATED: Blame The Beast (DC) For Big Business’ Moral Bankruptcy

Business, Capitalism, Ethics, Free Markets, Government, Morality

Myron Pauli sends along an interesting series of Venn diagrams, reflecting the intersection between The DC Beast and Big Business, and purporting to “show how corrupted American ‘democracy’ really is.”

Registering his disgust, Myron writes this (with his usual flare):

“While the American Booboisie gets distracted with this ‘election,’ where the grandson of a polygamist
debates the son of a polygamist on ‘gay marriage,’ as the Welfare-Warfare-Deficit-Jail State
goes on – 800,000 arrested for marijuana last year – hundreds wounded or maimed in Afpakistan,
trillions of new debt and malinvestment, television cameras proliferating everywhere to catch
American citizens (e.g. ‘criminals’) violating an ever increasing list of ‘crimes’ ….”

Agreed, except that companies don’t have much option. Without buying and paying for a plant to do their bidding within the State apparatus, they are doomed to be investigated and prosecuted non-stop by the government’s alphabet soup of regulatory agencies; the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, the Securities and Exchange Commission, on and on. Business gets dragged into court every other day and sued. By necessity, entire departments and budgets within corporate America are given over to lobbying and pacifying The Beast.

“When Bill Gates neglected to schmooze Washington, Joe Klein, the Justice Department’s top dog, picked up the scent and gave chase. The lesson being that if he wants to survive, the entrepreneur must also pay protection money to his political masters.” (“CONGRESSIONAL CHURLS TROLL FOR VOTES”)

Our “overlords who art in DC” “are the ones who force the entrepreneur to replace viable, voluntary trades and transactions with bureaucratic, politicized decision making. Rather than concentrate on satisfying consumers, proprietors must divert resources from innovation and production into getting around the bureaucrat’s tax and regulatory laws.”

“Unlike government (and CNN’s Anderson Cooper), you can keep private enterprise honest. Business aims to please its constituents, the consumers. …”

Downsize the state, strip it of its police-state powers—and business will shape-up. Capitalism is moral if practiced. We do no longer practice it.

UPDATE: Yes, Myron, why can’t I get this URL to work? I found another valid hyperlink for “18 Venn diagrams showing how corrupted American ‘democracy’ really is.“