Music labels and radio broadcasters can’t agree on much, including whether radio should be forced to turn over hundreds of millions of dollars a year to pay for the music it plays. But the two sides can agree on this: Congress should mandate that FM radio receivers be built into cell phones, PDAs, and other portable electronics.
The Consumer Electronics Association, whose members build the devices that would be affected by such a directive, is incandescent with rage. “The backroom scheme of the [National Association of Broadcasters] and RIAA to have Congress mandate broadcast radios in portable devices, including mobile phones, is the height of absurdity,” thundered CEA president Gary Shapiro. Such a move is “not in our national interest.”
“Rather than adapt to the digital marketplace, NAB and RIAA act like buggy-whip industries that refuse to innovate and seek to impose penalties on those that do.”
Posted on 2010 06, 21 by duo
Image by Getty Images via @daylife
By Midwesterner
This is a quick thumbnail of money supply for those of you having trouble finding understanding in the tsunami of Keynesian Kool-Aid coming from our ‘betters’.
On October 3rd of 2008, Republicrats and Democans responded to the failure of Lehman Brothers, bankruptcy of Bear Stearns, incipient collapse of AIG Insurance, threatened insolvency of other major financial institutions, and general panic in the financial community, by passing Public Law 110-343. This law contained two basic sections. The most infamous brought us the first of the ‘TARP-ulus‘ genre. But a very important offsetting function was contained in another place in that same law that is known as the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008. Way down in the fine print, it authorized the Federal Reserve Bank to begin immediately paying banks to not loan out money. That was not their exact choice of words. In fact, read Section 128 where they did it and it is almost impossible to tell what exactly they were doing.
Three days later on October 6th of 2008, the Federal Reserve Bank announced it would begin paying banks to not lend money. Again, not their exact choice of words.
Within less than a month the Federal Reserve Bank began discreetly ‘monetizing’ by purchasing Fannie and Freddie debt.
By March of 2009, attempts at discretion fell by the wayside and the Federal Reserve began buying US Treasurys outright. Put simply this means that the Federal Reserve began ‘printing’ money and giving it to the United States Treasury to spend.
During this period of time (from September 2008 through current) the St Louis Adjusted Monetary Base went up by approximately 1 trillion dollars.
Posted on 2009 07, 16 by duo
By Vincent Gioia
In the finest tradition of the car salesman who says “Here is my final offer but you have to take it right now,” House and Senate Democrats at the urging of President Obama want to push through legislation by the end of August that will transform Americans’ health care, probably irreversibly. Imagine; a complete overhaul of medical care in the United States, said to be about one-sixth of the total US economy, to be rushed through congress with virtually no review, analysis or deliberation by the Senate and House. More time is likely spent on mundane things like national recognition of one or the other organization or person than on something as important as enacting a system that will change how Americans receive medical care in the future or, indeed, whether or not they will receive any healthcare at all.
Until now opposition has focused almost entirely on the cost of the Democrat/Obama healthcare plans. Although the cost is a legitimate issue to consider, there are far worse things in store for Americans if the Democrats are successful. [This will be addressed in a future article,]
At an estimated cost of $1.5 trillion, there is no doubt that Americans will be required to shoulder enormous tax burdens. However the purported cost estimate is specious; the actual cost will like be twice or more this estimate. Add the cost of the healthcare program to already-incurred other costs of the no stimulus “Stimulus Bill and other spending for the budget deficit, TARP, et al, and you have a total expenditure and deficit which is unimaginable even in modern times.
Posted on 2009 03, 25 by duo
By George F. Will
With the braying of 328 yahoos — members of the House of Representatives who voted for retroactive and punitive use of the tax code to confiscate the legal earnings of a small, unpopular group — still reverberating, the Obama administration yesterday invited private-sector investors to become business partners with the capricious and increasingly anti-constitutional government. This latest plan to unfreeze the financial system came almost half a year after Congress shoveled $700 billion into the Troubled Assets Relief Program, $325 billion of which has been spent without purchasing any toxic assets.
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