Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Gov. Steve Beshear and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Idea

Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear has declared an emergency over the price of gasoline. The action comes at the behest of our wonderful Attorney General, Jack Conway. The law that this action was taken under allows the governor to declare an emergency when the price for a product is "grossly in excess of the price prior to the declaration [whatever the heck that means] and unrelated to any increased cost to the seller."

In other words, the market laws of supply and demand take a back seat to politicians who want to grandstand. Thankfully, Beshear will never actually do anything, since this little declaration allows him to look like a populist without actually doing anything. But that's less harmful than if he actually did prosecute any cases because, if the government actually did do something.

This is a stupid law, designed only to allow Democratic politicians to demagogue economic issues.

Oh, and by the way, why is it that liberals are in favor of allowing "consenting adults" to engage in any sort of social behavior that violates traditional morality, but are against letting consenting adults make economic decisions like whether they want to buy and sell gasoline at whatever price they agree to?

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Demagogy is what politicians do. And we, as the electorate, reward them by electing and re-electing them.
The only partial justification I can imagine for this is to prevent a monopoly or oligopoly from raising prices arbitrarily. But there are already laws enacted almost a century ago to control some of this activity. But if it gets you elected, why not do it? It is just as reasonable as harping on one's moose gutting abilities to justify a candidacy.

The difference between this and consenting adults private activity is one of power. A few years ago, power companies in the West artificially raised prices (cf. Enron et al.). There was no real free market. The US does not have an unregulated capitalistic system as most people feel this would put too much power in the hands of a few (cf. Enron et al.). On the other hand, what individuals do in their own private lives does not generally have a significant economic impact on others.

That of course goes back to what this country was founded on, the principle that individual humans have certain rights. And ironically, there are many people today who distort the beliefs of the Founding Fathers to deny individuals these selfsame rights and to impose a morality on others.


jah

Martin Cothran said...

Jah,

So you are against laws that impose morality on others?

Anonymous said...

It depends. If the sole reason for a law prohibiting behavior is that the behavior offends some people's morality, yes, I am against that law.

For example, I would be against a law requiring that women's heads be covered, if the reason was that bare headed women offended some people. On the other hand I would be in favor of a law requiring women to cover their heads if that covering was a helmet while they rode motorcycles and I had to subsidize their medical treatment in emergency rooms, since in that case there is an appreciable economic interest.

jah

Martin Cothran said...

What about civil rights laws?

Anonymous said...

In light of other recent misunderstandings, I'm going to need a little bit more information than that in order to respond.


MC: What about civil rights laws?

jah

David Adams said...

Thanks for the solid post, Martin. At a time when people prefer greatly to be lied to about economic issues, someone has to keep preaching the truth.

Martin Cothran said...

Jah,

You said, "If the sole reason for a law prohibiting behavior is that the behavior offends some people's morality, yes, I am against that law."

Civil rights laws apparently offended the morality of some people in the south, so, according to your criteria, you should be against them.

I was just curious as to whether you were going to follow your own logic.

Anonymous said...

If for example a law forbids miscegenation or requires separate facilities for different races, yes I would be against such laws.

If Mr Cothran is saying that I should be against laws requiring integrated facilities, then he doesn't understand what I wrote. Let me rephrase my earlier comment. I am against laws which are passed to uphold the moral standards of some subgroup when these moral standards affect the civil liberties of another group.

If that is not clear, I can try again if the area of confusion is pointed out.


jah

Martin Cothran said...

Jah,

I appreciate the clarification, although it is much different from your previous comment, I'm sure you'll agree.

Anonymous said...

MC: I appreciate the clarification, although it is much different from your previous comment, I'm sure you'll agree.

based on the earlier

MC: You said, "If the sole reason for a law prohibiting behavior is that the behavior offends some people's morality, yes, I am against that law."

Civil rights laws apparently offended the morality of some people in the south, so, according to your criteria, you should be against them.


No, I don't think my statements are inconsistent. I have no idea what Mr Cothran means in the 2nd quote above.

He wrote "Civil rights laws apparently offended the morality of some people in the south"

True, I accept that.

But his conclusion does not follow
"so, according to your criteria, you should be against them."


My criterion was
1) Behavior offends morality of some people.
2) These people get a law passed prohibiting the behavior for everyone.
3) I am against that law.

Example:
1) Homosexuality offends some people. (Offensive behavior is homosexuality.)
2) A law is passed prohibiting homosexuality.
3) I am against that law.

Mr Cothran's example.
1) Civil rights laws offend some people. (Offensive behavior is defending civil rights through laws.)
2) A law is passed prohibiting the behavior? Mr Cothran does not mention this. His argument makes no sense.


jah

Lee said...

> The US does not have an unregulated capitalistic system as most people feel this would put too much power in the hands of a few (cf. Enron et al.)

If you amend that to "some people", I would agree. But if putting power in the hands of a few is bad, what do you call it when you put power in the hands of one institution -- i.e., "the government"? That's the part that always confuses liberals.

The government made lending institutions -- to pick a current example -- lend a lot of money to people who couldn't afford it -- minorities, bad credit risks, etc. The lending institutions would in fact be punished if they did not lend more money to go to minorities and bad parts of town, the types of loans they wouldn't make if they weren't being forced.

Instead of fighting it, though, the lending went along with it, as they discovered there was a lot of money to be made, so long as property values kept going up.

So of course, we know the rest of the story and the taxpayers have now had half a trillion in losses handed to them,.

This wouldn't have happened in the first place without the government's threats to the lending institutions. And making the taxpayers suck it up couldn't happen without the government's power either.

Seems to me government is the problem. Without them, AIG would be out of business and wouldn't be in a position to hurt the taxpayers anymore.

> On the other hand I would be in favor of a law requiring women to cover their heads if that covering was a helmet while they rode motorcycles and I had to subsidize their medical treatment in emergency rooms, since in that case there is an appreciable economic interest.

You would assume the power to make that woman do something. This is what Jonah Goldberg is talking about when he refers to "liberal fascism." As government continues to grow and take over all aspects of life, public and the formerly private, everything is politicized and nothing is private. In England, for example, they're proposing to take away obese kids from their parents. Of course it's for their own. We can put those words on freedom's headstone: "It's for everyone's own good."

I would simply quit subsidizing stupidity with public funds. But then that's just me, I guess. But I wouldn't take away your ability to pay for the bike lady's medical bills, but only your ability to compel anyone else to assume them, and at the same your ability to compel her to wear what you want her to wear.

> I am against laws which are passed to uphold the moral standards of some subgroup when these moral standards affect the civil liberties of another group.

But you said you would be in favor of compelling someone to wear a helmet if costs you money to pay for her treatment.

Who moral standard says she has no right to demand your money? Whose moral standard says you have a right to object to her preempting its use? And what makes that moral standard able to trump any others?