TEA PARTY ECONOMIST

The TEA PARTY ECONOMIST Ron Paul's original staff economist, Dr. Gary North! Monday, December 31, 2012

Yes, I Watch Duck Dynasty. What’s It To You? Duck Dynasty is about business — big business, bottom-line, keep-customers-happy business. It’s about repeat business. And it’s all based on guns. It’s about family — just no family that anyone has ever seen on TV. This is not Ozzie & Harriet. It’s about redemption. The patriarch, Phil Robertson, was a drunken lout. He left his... READ MORE Ban Public Schools, Not Guns Gary North’s Reality Check (Dec. 31, 2012) Columbine. Virginia Tech. Newtown. What do they have in common? They are shorthand for “tax-funded schools where mass murderers plied their trade.” The murderers all were students in, or graduates of, the tax-funded, state-run educational system in the United States. The murderers were enrolled students at Columbine and... READ MORE Welfare State Young Greeks Whine Over Liberty. Tough Dolma. One of the things I love about the black market in labor is that it makes things better, despite whining from state-educated kids who want a free lunch. In Greece, there is 56% unemployment for young adults. Why? Because the unions have closed the job market to them. So has the government. They expected an... READ MORE The Economic Year in Review David Collum is a chemist. But he is also an insightful economic commentator. Here is his economic year in review for 2012. Print it out. Get out your highlighter. Pour a cup of coffee. If you can’t read it all today, skip the Who Cares Bowl tomorrow, and finish it. Click the link. ... READ MORE Don’t Spend That Tax Refund. Pony Up More for Next Year. Welcome to the AMT: the alternative minimum tax. The AMT will drop down in 2013 to people who make $65,000 a year or more. It presently hits only people making over $400,000. Americans have not budgeted for this. Here are other things they have not budgeted for. No more deduction for state and local sales... READ MORE Senator Feinstein’s Gun Control Bill Is DOA California’s Senator Feinstein puts the jerk into knee-jerk liberal. She introduced a comprehensive gun control bill three days after the December 14 shootings in Newtown, Connecticut. If you think she wrote that bill personally, you’re wrong. If you think it was written from scratch in three days, you’re wrong. If you think the bill will... READ MORE Spending Cuts? Surely, You Jest. Quick. How much money will be cut from 2012's level of federal spending in 2013 if there is no agreement to repeal the Budget Control Act of 2011? Give a ball park estimate. If you answered “none,” you’ve got it right. The so-called sequestration is not a reduction in spending from today’s level. It is... READ MORE Milking the Taxpayers: $7 a Gallon When We Go Over the Fiscal Cliff The price of milk will double if Congress does not pass a replacement farm bill. We will be paying $7 a gallon. That’s because the federal government’s milk producers’ subsidy will go to $7 a gallon. The daily industry will rejoice. “Happy days are here again!” “We’re in the money!” The lapse of today’s farm... READ MORE