What's good for Wall Street is good for Capitol Hill

Yours truly had an epiphany last night while watching coverage of the idiots running our nation into the ground trying to justify why they should be in charge of deciding how people's compensation packages are structured.

They are so convincing with their arguments that those dastardly employees of AIG should give back their bonus money. They are so righteous in declaring support of salary caps for executives.

That's when it hit me. Something about a goose and a gander.

Why don't we start capping politicians' salaries, too?! I mean they are just as responsibile, if not MOST responsible, for the financial mess we are currently experiencing.

My sanctimonious, narrow-minded, and heavy-handed approach would work something like this.

Since the pols live and die by the polls anyway, let's tie their pay to their public approval ratings (PAR's)!

Say a given office pays a $100,000 salary, but the sycophant that occupied said office only has a 50% approval rating. The PAR adjusted salary would only be $50,000. And, the difference could revert back to the treasury to offset the massive "stimulus" plans of the ObamaNation!

Hope and change!

Why has the stock market taken such a dive?

The simple answer is that too many politicans have been talking about nationalizing the banks.

Politicizing our banks will crush our economy, and prudent investors know that.

Study your history, ye socks! We used to have a national bank back in the early days of our republic. But, Andrew Jackson wisley dismantled it.

Governments are inherently inefficient machines, and they bring their inefficiencies to the market place whenever they take over any business.

They do not have the profit motive necessary to succeed in the private sector. Remember, it was governmental regulations that required banks to give mortgages to people who couldn't make downpayments--or, worse, whose only source of documented income was government welfare programs.

This lack of a profit motive has resulted in government-controlled institutions elsewhere around the world to engage in predatory pricing. In the case of the banks, they would be able to offer below-market loan rates (especially to applicants with the "right" political connections) and thus force any remaining private sector competitors out of business.

Scary though, huh? Yeah. The folks on Wall Street think so, too . . .

Hope and change!

It's finally starting to dawn on the media

If you don't believe me, check out Bill Kristol's op-ed piece in today's New York Times.

Like most folks in the "major media," he is not too thrilled about the rise of Mike Huckabee. But, at least he/they are finally forced to take notice. And, they're giving the former Arkansas governor grudging respect.

Kristol points out Huckabee's calm, measured response to a question posed at Saturday night's debate at St. Anselm's College up in New Hampshire. He was asked how he would contrast himself to Barack Obama if the two of them ended up being the two major parties' nominees. Without missing a beat, he gave three issues where they differ: guns, abortion, and same-sex marriage.

As Kristol put it, Huckabee's choice of these themes show he is in tune with the "work-hard-to-get-ahead strivers" that made up the core of Regan voters twenty-odd years ago.

This is how Republicans win national elections. You have to appeal to a broader base than Wall Street and Washington. You have to connect to Main Street. And, Huckabee is doing that.

Huck wins in Iowa!