Saturday, December 06, 2008

Citas del dia

Del siempre muy citable Thomas Sowell:

"Most people on the left are not opposed to freedom. They are just in favor of all sorts of things that are incompatible with freedom.
Freedom ultimately means the right of other people to do things that you do not approve of. Nazis were free to be Nazis under Hitler. It is only when you are able to do things that other people don't approve that you are free."



"The essence of bigotry is refusing to others the rights that you demand for yourself."

Obama y el mito de las pequeñas donaciones

Desde hace meses empezó a circular en los medios la idea de que la campaña de Obama se financiaba con pequeñas donaciones (que según los expertos en el tema son aquellas menores a 200 dolares).

Pues bien, era un mito (así como que Obama era el cambio). Lo descubrió la organización independiente y no-partidista llamada "campaign institute reform". Estos son algunos apartes del reporte:

"REALITY CHECK: Obama Received About the Same Percentage from Small Donors in 2008 as Bush in 2004
Obama also raised 80% more from large donors than small, outstripping all rivals and predecessors
It turns out that Barack Obama's donors may not have been quite as different as we had thought. Throughout the election season, this organization and others have been reporting that Obama received about half of his discrete contributions in amounts of $200 or less. The Campaign Finance Institute (CFI) noted in past releases that donations are not the same as donors, since many people give more than once. After a more thorough analysis of data from the Federal Election Commission (FEC), it has become clear that repeaters and large donors were even more important for Obama than we or other analysts had fully appreciated. "The myth is that money from small donors dominated Barack Obama's finances," said CFI's executive director Michael J. Malbin. "The reality of Obama's fundraising was impressive, but the reality does not match the myth."



Obama received about 80% more money from large donors (cumulative contributions of at least $1,000) than from small donors. While the large donors thus were responsible for much more of Obama's money than either his small or middle range group, he received somewhat less proportionally from large donors than did his rivals or predecessors. Forty-seven percent of Obama's money came from large donors compared to 56% for Kerry and 60% for both Bush and McCain. However, because Obama's 47% is based on a larger total, that means he also raised significantly more large-donor money in absolute terms than any of his rivals or predecessors.

Much of this money was raised the "old fashioned" way. Since only about 13,000 of those who started out small for Obama ended up crossing the $1,000 threshold, that means the bulk of Obama's $213 million in large-donor contributions during the primaries came from about 85,000 people who started out giving big and stayed there. Much of this large-donor money – perhaps close to a majority – came to the campaign through bundling methods initially perfected by Bush.

According to the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP) – which in the absence of legally mandated disclosure had to use information provided by the campaigns – 561 "bundlers" had raised a minimum of $63 million for Obama by mid-August and 534 people had raised a minimum of $75 million for McCain. The bundlers undoubtedly were responsible for more than these amounts because the campaigns reported the bundlers in ranges and CRP's minimum totals were based conservatively on the low end of each range. A reasonable guess might estimate the real amount at about 50% above the minimum – the mid-point for each range – yielding a total of perhaps about $90 million for Obama as of mid-August and more than $100 million for McCain.

At the top of the bundlers were 47 of Obama's and 65 of McCain's who were listed by the campaigns in mid-August as being responsible for at least $500,000 each. In addition, Public Citizen lists 2,205 people as having contributed in their own names at least $25,000 to joint fundraising committees supporting Obama and 1,846 people as having made similar contributions to joint fundraising committees supporting McCain. "


Con todos los hechos que vienen sucediendo despues de la elección de Obama (o como en este caso, son revelados) me pregunto, si desde la luna de miel del nuevo emperador con la opinión pública de su pais y del mundo durará tanto como sus partidarios mas acerrimos lo esperan.

Tuesday, December 02, 2008

Cita del dia

"Some may consider freedom may bring chaos to a society. It is in fact true for a society there is no freedom currently, freedom at first may bring some chaos to such society. Societies without freedom under a strong leader may first seem to be in order and people may seem to be happy at first sight but in fact there is an underlying unhappiness hidden where there is no freedom.

Only a freeman feel really responsible for anything. For a non-freeman, all he or she needs to do is to obey the commands from top. Looking at Maslow pyramid, L5 is where the one seeks for freedom. Only a freeman can be innovative. Only an innovative organization can survive in today's competition. An organization can only be innovative if there are innovative individuals in the organization."

Orhan Kalayci, en un grupo de Yahoo

Monday, December 01, 2008

"El ultimo radical"

Interesante entrevista al famoso rector de la universidad Externado de Colombia, Dr. Fernando Hinestrosa.

Pocas veces veo una entrevista en la prensa nacional donde se refleje mi pensamiento.

Aunque me pregunto si el Dr. Hinestrosa practicara lo que dice en la universidad que dirige.

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

No hay desayuno gratis

La realidad de la medicina estatal en el reino unido, el tipo de modelo "salud universal" que quieren imponernos aquí en Colombia:

"There is a view that all treatments should be available. Unfortunately, that's not possible,'' said Peter Littlejohns, NICE's clinical and public health director. ``There is a limited pot of money.''
He said the four cancer drugs provide a ``marginal benefit at quite often an extreme cost'' and that the agency had to keep in mind that funds spent on the medicines could be used elsewhere to help others at a greater value. ``Those are the hidden patients, the ones who benefit from the things the
NHS does spend money on,'' Littlejohns said. "

Que lastima que la Corte Constitucional no entienda que los costos no pueden ser ilimitados.

Saturday, November 08, 2008

El "buen Obama"

He estado leyendo con detenimiento el programa o "plataforma" política de Obama. He encontrado buenas (o no tan malas ) ideas que vale la pena destacar teniendo en cuenta que estos son solo promesas:

1. Impuestos:El programa de Obama propone varios recortes o deducciones de impuestos tanto a personas como negocios:

  • Promete eliminar impuestos a las ganancias de capital de pequeños y nuevos negocios.
  • Promete reducir impuestos a la clase media y los trabajadores.
  • Promete reducir impuestos a las empresas que creen trabajos en Estados Unidos y no muevan operaciones al extranjero
  • Promete reducir impuestos a las empresas que inviertan en investigación y desarrollo
  • Promete reducir impuestos a las familias con hijos para cubrir los gastos de manutención
  • Promete otras deducción o reducciones de impuestos para salud, inversión en energía y otras cosas.

Lo bueno digamos es que Obama tambien tiene su lado de "recorta impuestos". Lo malo es que son recortes selectivos, distorsionadores de las actividad económica y discriminatorios. Son básicamente subsidios. Pero se le abona el interes por reducir la carga tributaria, aunque lamentablemente, no de manera igual para todos.

De todas formas, promete una reducción neta de impuestos en toda la economía acompañada de reducción de gastos:

"Obama’s plan will cut taxes overall, reducing revenues to below the levels that prevailed under Ronald Reagan (less than 18.2 percent of GDP). The Obama tax plan is a net tax cut – his tax relief for middle class families is larger than the revenue raised by his tax changes for families over $250,000. Coupled with his commitment to cut unnecessary spending, Obama will pay for this tax relief while bringing down the budget deficit. "

2. Retirada de Irak: Promete una "retirada responsable". Sin embargo, la retirada ya la comenzó Bush así que su propuesta es mas una continuación de la política actual.

3. Sistema de Salud:

  • Promete permitir la importación de medicinas desde paises extranjeros. En este tema la administración Bush ha sido proteccionista, probablemente para proteger los intereses de las farmaceúticas que le venden medicinas caras a los Estadounidenses, en teoría, para poder recuperar los costos de investigación y desarrollo
  • Promete apoyar el uso de drogas genéricas. En este aspecto parece que va a ser anti-propiedad intelectual. Excelente.
  • Promete incrementar la competencia en el sector de seguros de salud aunque no especifíca claramente como

En general en el tema de sistema de salud, Obama parece estar lejos de una nacionalización, aunque sin duda aumentará el intervencionismo. Sin embargo, al permitir la importación de medicina y reducir la protección de la protección intelectual en ese campo, se esta poniendo del lado de los pacientes y de la libertad económica. Además, esto ayudará a bajar los costos.

4. Responsabilidad Fiscal:

  • Propone que cualquier nuevo programa o adición de gasto esté acompaña de una reducción de gasto en otra parte o de un incremento de impuestos.
  • Propone reducir los gastos en "auxilios" a los niveles de hace 1993.
  • Proponer que todos los contratos del gobierno superiores a 25,000 dolares (una suma bastante baje) sean por subasta.
  • Promete reducir exenciones de impuestos a grupos especiales. Sin embargo, esto se contradice con sus políticas de impuestos (ver arriba el primer punto)

5. Relaciones exteriores: No hay mucho aquí para destacar como bueno, pero en general promete una postura menos agresiva contra Iran y no continuar la política de "secretismo" de la administración Bush.

6. "Guerra contra las drogas": Solo encontré esto:

"Expand Use of Drug Courts
Obama and Biden will give first-time, non-violent offenders a chance to serve their sentence, where appropriate, in the type of drug rehabilitation programs that have proven to work better than a prison term in changing bad behavior."

Muy pobre. Esperaba mas libertarianismo en este aspecto por parte de Obama

7. Inmigración: Solo dos promesas para destacar:

  • Improve Our Immigration System
    Obama and Biden believe we must fix the dysfunctional immigration bureaucracy and increase the number of legal immigrants to keep families together and meet the demand for jobs that employers cannot fill.
  • Bring People Out of the Shadows
    Obama and Biden support a system that allows undocumented immigrants who are in good standing to pay a fine, learn English, and go to the back of the line for the opportunity to become citizens.

Definitivamente no es anti-inmigración, creo que esta bien en este aspecto, pero esperaba un poco mas de liberalismo en este aspecto.

Por el momento, estas son las promesas o ideas de Obama que veo buenas o relativamente no tan malas .

Despues iré comentando la larga lista de malas ideas.

Wednesday, November 05, 2008

La chambonada de los semaforos

Que tal la chambonada del secretario de movilidad del distrito. Cancelaron el contrato de ETB para el mantenimiento de los semaforos en Junio sin tener un reemplazo inmediato.

Hoy estamos a noviembre y la red de semaforos presenta fallas en un 40% creando un caos en las vias.

Que no sorprenda la caida de la popularidad de Samuel Moreno.

Tuesday, November 04, 2008

Carta de un pequeño empresario a Obama

Mr. Obama,

Given the uproar about the simple question asked you by Joe the plumber, and the persecution that has been heaped on him because he dared to question you, I find myself motivated to say a few things to you myself. While Joe aspires to start a business someday, I already have started not one, but 4 businesses. But first, let me introduce myself. You can call me "Cory the well driller". I am a 54 year old high school graduate. I didn't go to college like you, I was too ready to go "conquer the world" when I finished high school. 25 years ago at age 29, I started my own water well drilling business at a time when the economy here in East Texas was in a tailspin from the crash of the early 80's oil boom. I didn't get any help from the government, nor did I look for any. I borrowed what I could from my sister, my uncle, and even the pawn shop and managed to scrape together a homemade drill rig and a few tools to do my first job. My businesses did not start as a result of privilege. They are the result of my personal drive, personal ambition, self discipline, self reliance, and a determination to treat my customers fairly. From the very start my business provided one other (than myself) East Texan a full time job. I couldn't afford a backhoe the first few years (something every well drilling business had), so I and my helper had to dig the mud pits that are necessary for each and every job with hand shovels. I had to use my 10 year old, 1/2 ton pickup truck for my water tank truck (normally a job for at least a 2 ton truck).

A year and a half after I started the business, I scraped together a 20% down payment to get a modest bank loan and bought a (28 year) old, worn out, slightly bigger drilling rig to allow me to drill the deeper water wells in my area. I spent the next few years drilling wells with the rig while simultaneously rebuilding it between jobs. Through these years I never knew from one month to the next if I would have any work or be able to pay the bills. I got behind on my income taxes one year, and spent the next two years paying that back (with penalty and interest) while keeping up with ongoing taxes. I got behind on my water well supply bill 2 different years (way behind the second time... $80,000.00), and spent over a year paying it back (each time) while continuing to pay for ongoing supplies C.O.D.. Of course, the personal stress endured through these experiences and years is hard to measure. I do have a stent in my heart now to memorialize it all.

I spent the next 10 years developing the reputation for being the most competent and most honest water well driller in East Texas. 2 years along the way, I hired another full time employee for the drilling business so that we could provide full time water well pump service as well as the well drilling. Also, 3 years along the path, I bought a water well screen service machine from a friend, starting business # 2. 5 years later I made a business loan for $100,000.00 to build a new, higher production, computer controlled screen service machine. I had designed the machine myself, and it didn't work out for 3 years so I had to make the loan payments without the benefit of any added income from the new machine. No government program was there to help me with the payments, or to help me sleep at night as I lay awake wondering how I would solve my machine problems or pay my bills. Finally, after 3 years, I got the screen machine working properly, and that provided another full time job for an East Texan in the screen service business.

2 years after that, I made another business loan, this time for $250,000.00, to buy another used drilling rig and all the support equipment needed to run another, larger, drill rig. This provided another 2 full time jobs for East Texans. Again, I spent a couple of years not knowing if I had made a smart move, or a move that would bankrupt me. For the third time in 13 years, I had placed everything I owned on the line, risking everything, in order to build a business.

A couple of years into this, I came up with a bright idea for a new kind of mud pump, a fundamentally necessary pump used on water well drill rigs. I spent my entire life savings to date (just $30,000.00), building a prototype of the pump and took it to the national water well convention to show it off. Customers immediately started coming out of the woodworks to buy the pumps, but there was a problem. I had depleted my assets making the prototype, and nobody would make me a business loan to start production of the new pumps. With several deposits for pump orders in hand, and nowhere to go, I finally started applying for as many credit card as I could find and took cash withdrawals on these cards to the tune of over $150,000.00 (including modest loans from my dear sister and brother), to get this 3rd business going.

Yes, once again, I had everything hanging over the line in an effort to start another business. I had never manufactured anything, and I had to design and bring into production a complex hydraulic machine from an untested prototype to a reliable production model (in six months). How many nights I lay awake wondering if I had just made the paramount mistake of my life I cannot tell you, but there were plenty. I managed to get the pumps into production, which immediately created another 2 full time jobs in East Texas. Some of the models in the first year suffered from quality issues due to the poor workmanship of one of my key suppliers, so I and an employee (another East Texan employed) had to drive across the country to repair customers' pumps, practically from coast to coast. I stood behind the product, and made payments to all the credit cards that had financed me (and my brother and sister). I spent the next 5 years improving and refining the product, building a reputation for the pump and the company, working to get the pump into drill rig manufacturers' product lines, and paying back credit cards. During all this time I continued to manage a growing water well business that was now operating 3 drill rig crews, and 2 well service crews. Also, the screen service business continued to grow. No government programs were there to help me, Mr. Obama, but that's ok, I didn't expect any, nor did I want any. I was too busy fighting to make success happen to sit around waiting for the government to help me.

Now, we have been manufacturing the mud pumps for 7 years, my combined businesses employ 32 full time employees, and distribute $5,000,000.00 annually through the local economy. Now, just 4 months ago I borrowed $1,254,000.00, purchasing computer controlled machining equipment to start my 4th business, a production machine shop. The machine shop will serve the mud pump company so that we can better manufacture our pumps that are being shipped worldwide. Of course, the machine shop will also do work for outside companies as well. This has already produced 2 more full time jobs, and 2 more should develop out of it in the next few months. This should work out, but if it doesn't it will be because you, and the other professional politicians like yourself, will have destroyed our countrys' (and the world) economy with your meddling with mortgage loan programs through your liberal manipulation and intimidation of loaning institutions to make sure that unqualified borrowers could get mortgages. You see, at the very time when I couldn't get a business loan to get my mud pumps into production, you were working with Acorn and the Community Reinvestment Act programs to make sure that unqualified borrowers could buy homes with no down payment, and even no credit or worse yet, bad credit. Even the infamous, liberal, Ninja loans (No Income, No Job or Assets). While these unqualified borrowers were enjoying unrealistically low interest rates, I was paying 22% to 24% interest on the credit cards that I had used to provide me the funds for the mud pump business that has created jobs for more East Texans. It's funny, because after 25 years of turning almost every dime of extra money back into my businesses to grow them, it has been only in the last two years that I have finally made enough money to be able to put a little away for retirement, and now the value of that has dropped 40% because of the policies you and your ilk have perpetrated on our country.

You see, Mr. Obama, I'm the guy you intend to raise taxes on. I'm the guy who has spent 25 years toiling and sweating, fretting and fighting, stressing and risking, to build a business and get ahead. I'm the guy who has been on the very edge of bankruptcy more than a dozen times over the last 25 years, and all the while creating more and more jobs for East Texans who didn't want to take a risk, and would not demand from themselves what I have demanded from myself. I'm the guy you characterize as "the Americans who can afford it the most" that you believe should be taxed more to provide income redistribution "to spread the wealth" to those who have never toiled, sweated, fretted, fought, stressed, or risked anything. You want to characterize me as someone who has enjoyed a life of privilege and who needs to pay a higher percentage of my income than those who have bought into your entitlement culture. I resent you, Mr. Obama, as I resent all who want to use class warfare as a tool to advance their political career. What's worse, each year more Americans buy into your liberal entitlement culture, and turn to the government for their hope of a better life instead of themselves. Liberals are succeeding through more than 40 years of collaborative effort between the predominant liberal media, and liberal indoctrination programs in the public school systems across our land.

What is so terribly sad about this is this. America was made great by people who embraced the one-time American culture of self reliance, self motivation, self determination, self discipline, personal betterment, hard work, risk taking. A culture built around the concept that success was in reach of every able bodied American who would strive for it. Each year that less Americans embrace that culture, we all descend together. We descend down the socialist path that has brought country after country ultimately to bitter and unremarkable states. If you and your liberal comrades in the media and school systems would spend half as much effort cultivating a culture of can-do across America as you do cultivating your entitlement culture, we could see Americans at large embracing the conviction that they can elevate themselves through personal betterment, personal achievement, and self reliance. You see, when people embrace such ideals, they act on them. When people act on such ideals, they succeed. All of America could find herself elevating instead of deteriorating. But that would eliminate the need for liberal politicians, wouldn't it, Mr. Obama? The country would not need you if the country was convinced that problem solving was best left with individuals instead of the government. You and all your liberal comrades have got a vested interested in creating a dependent class in our country. It is the very business of liberals to create an ever expanding dependence on government. What's remarkable is that you, who have never produced a job in your life, are going to tax me to take more of my money and give it to people who wouldn't need my money if they would get off their entitlement mentality asses and apply themselves at work, demand more from themselves, and quit looking to liberal politicians to raise their station in life.

You see, I know because I've had them work for me before. Hundreds of them over these 25 years. People who simply will not show up to work on time. People who just will not work 5 days in a week, much less, 6 days. People always looking for a way to put less effort out. People who actually tell me that they would do more if I just would first pay them more. People who take off work to sit in government offices to apply to get free government handouts (gee, I wonder how things would have turned out for them if they had spent that time earning money and pleasing their employer?). You see, all of this comes from your entitlement mentality culture.

Oh, I know you will say I am uncompassionate. Sorry, Mr. Obama, wrong again. You see, I've seen what the average percentage of your income has been given to charities over the years of 2000 to 2004 (ignoring the years you started running for office - can you pronounce "politically motivated"), you averaged less than 1% annually. And your running mate, Joe Biden, averaged less than ¼% of his annual income in charitable contributions over the last 10 years. Like so many liberals, the two of you want to give to the needy, just as long as it is someone else's money you are giving to them. I won't say what I have given to charities over the last 25 years, but the percentage is several times more than you and Joe Biden. combined (don't you just hate google?). Tell me again how you feel my pain.

In short, Mr. Obama, your political philosophies represent everything that is wrong with our country. You represent the culture of government dependence instead of self reliance; Entitlement mentality instead of personal achievement; Penalization of the successful to reward the unmotivated; Political correctness instead of open mindedness and open debate. If you are successful, you may preside over the final transformation of America from being the greatest and most self-reliant culture on earth, to just another country of whiners and wimps, who sit around looking to the government to solve their problems. Like all of western Europe. All countries on the decline. All countries that, because of liberal socialistic mentalities, have a little less to offer mankind every year.

God help us...

Cory Miller

just a ordinary, extraordinary American, the way a lot of Americans used to be.

P.S. Yes, Mr. Obama, I am a real American... www.cmillerdrilling.com

Links variados sobre la burbuja y la crisis

1. Monetary Policy and Mussaism: We Economists Were Wrong

2. Bubble of Bubbles Due to Asset Inflation:Morgan Stanley Says Bubbles Will Likely Burst Soon

3.Why the Mortgage Crisis Happened

4. Debt and Delusion

5. The Great Inflation

6. The Central (Banking) Importance of Asset Inflation

Monday, November 03, 2008

Cita preocupante del dia

"The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism, but under the name of liberalism, they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program until one day America will be a socialist nation without ever knowing how it happened."

Norman Thomas. Fuene: aqui.

Creo que esta cita da una explicación de muchos cambios en las ultimas decadas, promovidos por personas, supuestamente del centro del espectro político o supuestamente meramente intervencionistas.

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Los siete pecados capitales de la crisis

Fuente: Steve Breen

Los reyes filosofos de la FED

Brad Delong comenta la causa de la crisis:

"The current financial crisis has its roots in Greenspan's decision to keep interest rates very low in 2002 and 2003 to head off the danger of a deflation-induced double-dip recession, and his subsequent decision that the costs of cleaning up after a housing bubble were likely to be less than the costs of the high unemployment that would be generated by a preemptive attempt to pop a housing-speculation bubble. Two years ago, I would have said that Greenspan's judgment here was correct. Six months ago, I would have said that his judgment was probably correct. Today -- in the middle of the largest nationalizations in history -- I can no longer state that Greenspan made the right calls with respect to the level of interest rates and the housing bubble in the 2000s."


El articulo tambien resume la historia de la banca central y la economía política de la FED vs congreso vs ejecutivo en Estados Unidos.Lo extraño es que no veo llamados a cuestionar los poderes de la banca central. Solo piden mas regulación para los bancos, mientras reconocen que la causa estuvo en las acciones de la FED!

Que la banca central debe tener mucho poder se ha convertido en un tabú incuestionable. Y esta crisis parece que no va a cambiar eso.

Esta es la introducción al articulo:

"Ben Bernanke is the closest thing to a central economic planner the United States has ever had. He bestrides our narrow economic world like a colossus. Unelected (he was appointed by President George W. Bush and confirmed by an overwhelming majority in the Senate) and unaccountable (unless the Congress decides that it wishes to amend the Federal Reserve Act and take the blame for whatever else goes wrong with the economy), he is responsible only to his conscience -- and his open-market committee of himself, the other six governors of the Federal Reserve Board, and the 12 presidents of the regional Federal Reserve banks. The fate of the economy in the next administration depends far less on the president than on this moral-philosopher-prince to whose judgment we have entrusted a remarkable share of control over our destiny.

How did an ivory-tower academic whose specialty is the details of the Great Depression get to this position? What does he do all day? How did so much power come to rest in a single institution, a single individual? The current system is the product of a century and a half of evolution in the role of a central bank, on both sides of the Atlantic, through a series of accidents and crises. For a generation, the idea of social democracy -- with government ownership, control, and regulation of at least the "commanding heights" of the economy -- has been in retreat. But in the middle of this market economy is an immense island of central planning: the Federal Reserve.

In normal times, the Fed -- not the market -- decides what the short-term interest rate is. The interest rate is perhaps the key price in the economy. It is the price at which we trade wealth in the present for wealth in the future. When the interest rate is low, our focus is on the future: Businesses and consumers borrow and invest. When the interest rate is high, our focus is on the present because distant-future promises of cash are not worth very much in today's dollars. You might think that if there were ever a decision we would leave to the market and the aggregated preferences of millions of individuals, it would be the terms on which we trade present comfort off for future wealth. But we don't. We leave that decision to the discretion of the philosopher-prince Bernanke and his committee. And in extraordinary moments like the September Wall Street crisis, when the flow of funds through financial markets dries up, we leave the decisions of which banks to nationalize, which to close down, which to forcibly merge, and which to rescue and on what terms to our financial overlords in the Eccles Building on the National Mall."

Vale la pena mencionar que Delong es democrata, trabajo en la administración Clinton y se considera de centro o centro-izquierda. Su articulo no corresponde a la típica visión libertaria, pero estada carga del realismo político que le falta, diría yo, a la mayoría de economistas.

Termina con este parrafo:"Cicero said that the problem with his political ally Cato was that he thought they lived in the Republic of Plato while they really lived in the Sewer of Romulus. It is either our curse or our blessing that we live in the Republic of the Central Banker."

Creo que los modelos de algunos economistas seguro tambien funcionarían bien en la republica de Platón, el sistema de los filosofos reyes que planifican la sociedad.

Sunday, October 26, 2008

Graficas del dia

Declinacion de la produccion de petroleo en la era Chavez:Declinacion de la produccion de petroleo en la era Chavez:

Grafica del origen de la estructura de deuda que condujo a la crisis:












Europa y la crisis

Los europeos han quedo culpa al supuesto "capitalismo salvaje" de los gringos y su supuesta "falta de regulacion" por el origen de la crisis.

Sin embargo, se sabe ya que los bancos alemanes estan sobreexpuestos a deudas de paises como Islandia o España, fuertemente golpeados por la crisis.

Y se ha sabido que los bancos europeos tambien estaban fuertemente endeudados y eran unos de los grandes clientes de AIG.

Los derivados y la crisis

Mucho se ha escrito en las ultimas semanas sobre el uso y abuso de los "derivados" como una de las causas de esta crisis. Y naturalmente varios analistas y expertos han salido a pedir que sean fuertemente regulados.

Sin duda, los derivados de credito, una forma de seguros, conocidos como "Credit Default Swap" o CDS (por sus siglas en ingles), han sido uno de los principales elementos de esta crisis. Para un excelente resumen del tema, ver esta pagina.

Sin embargo, como lo explica este articulo, la mayoria de estos derivados de credito, excepto los relacionados con las hipotecas han funcionado bien y su rol como "gestionadores de riesgo" no deberia ignorarse:

"The amount of blame laid at the feet of the derivatives market never ceases to amaze me. True, the sheer size of the derivatives market, and the fact that it grew faster than regulators could handle, raise legitimate concerns. But financial products are not solely to blame for the current situation (severe financial crises occur without them). Further, the markets for most financial derivatives (excepting mortgage-backed CDOs) are not in serious peril. Felix Salmon wrote an eloquent defence of how the Credit Default Swap (CDS) market has functioned and continues to function quite well.
Products like CDS provide invaluable transparency for the debt market. The problem, as both Mr Salmon and Mr Merton point out, is that these derivatives hedge risk. This makes investors feel safer, and just as people wearing seat belts drive faster and those with four-wheel drive become more likely to drive in the snow, a financial safety net encourages some investors to take on more risk than might otherwise be their preference.
That's not necessarily a bad thing. It encouraged people to invest in developing countries, which gave those countries the capital necessary to build infrastructure and expand markets. Which brought many people out of poverty. But it also meant some foolish and foolishly large investments were made. Blaming the financial derivatives for the crisis is like blaming the seat belt or four-wheel drive for the accident. Should we limit automotive safety innovations, because they encourage risky driving?"


El problema de los derivados en esta crisis esta basicamente circunscrito a los relacionados con hipotecas. No deberia olvidarse que esta crisis se origina por una caida de precios en el sector inmobiliario.

No es esta una crisis de derivados. Es una crisis del sector inmobiliario, altamante dependiente de las tasas de interes, que se extendio al sector financiero y luego al sector real.

Sobre el origen de la crisis

Explica el NY Times: "The roots of the credit crisis stretch back to another notable boom-and-bust: the tech bubble of the late 1990’s. When the stock market began a steep decline in 2000 and the nation slipped into recession the next year, the Federal Reserve sharply lowered interest rates to limit the economic damage.
Lower interest rates make mortgage payments cheaper, and demand for homes began to rise, sending prices up. In addition, millions of homeowners took advantage of the rate drop to refinance their existing mortgages. As the industry ramped up, the quality of the mortgages went down.
And turn sour they did, when home buyers had to leverage themselves to the hilt to make a purchase. Default and delinquency rates began to rise in 2006"


A pesar de entender los problemas de politica monetaria relacionados con la crisis, ni el NY Times ni ningun medio masivo pide cambios institucionales en la FED.

Saturday, October 25, 2008

Hecho del día

" The most common economic criticism of the Soviet bloc has long been its failure to use incentives. This is a half-truth. As Hedrick Smith explained in "The Russians", the party leadership used incentives in the sectors where it really wanted results:
Not only do defense and space efforts get top national priority and funding, but they also operate on a different system from the rest of the economy. Samuel Pisar, an American lawyer, writer, and consultant on East-West trade, made the shrewd observation to me that the military sector is “the only sector of the Soviet economy which operates like a market economy, in the sense that the customers pull out of the economic mechanism the kinds of weaponry they want.. . . The military, like customers in the West . . . can say, ‘No, no, no, that isn’t what we want.’”"


El texto viene de este articulo sobre el comunismo.

Hay algo extraño en este argumento y es es que no queda claro porque los líderes del partido no querían realmente resultados en toda la economía.

De todas formas, lo mencionado en este texto, asumiendo que es cierto, es un hecho sorprendente.

Según el autor del articulo, los datos vienen de: "Hedrick Smith, The Russians (New York: Ballantine Books, 1974), pp. 312–313."

Aqui esta la página web del libro en Amazon. Y aquí hay una reseña del libro.

Friday, October 24, 2008

Lucha de clases en elecciones de Estados Unidos

"Voters who make $60,000 a year or less favor the Democratic party while those who make more are fairly evenly divided between both parties. Investors favor the GOP, 43% to 42%, while those who do not invest favor the Democrats, 53% to 31%.
"


y tambien de genero:

"Men now favor the GOP by a 43% to 41% margin, while women continue to show big support for the Democrats, 49% to 36%."

El dato mas interesante es este:

"Voters who work for the government favor the Democrats, while entrepreneurs support the Republicans."

Aquí esta el enlace.

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Como funcionan los bancos

y porque dependen de la existencia de un banco central en una relacion simbiotica o de dependencia total?

La explicacion esta en este articulo.

En estos tiempos de crisis financiera nada mejor que entender la raices del "problema bancario" y porque la existencia de un banco central se ha vuelto un tema de prohibida discusion.

Saturday, October 18, 2008

Cual fue el impacto de la desregulacion en la crisis?

"As for the evils of deregulation, exactly which measures are they referring to? Financial deregulation for the past three decades consisted of the removal of deposit interest-rate ceilings, the relaxation of branching powers, and allowing commercial banks to enter underwriting and insurance and other financial activities. Wasn't the ability for commercial and investment banks to merge (the result of the 1999 Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which repealed part of the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act) a major stabilizer to the financial system this past year? Indeed, it allowed Bear Stearns and Merrill Lynch to be acquired by J.P. Morgan Chase and Bank of America, and allowed Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley to convert to bank holding companies to help shore up their positions during the mid-September bear runs on their stocks.
Even more to the point, subprime lending, securitization and dealing in swaps were all activities that banks and other financial institutions have had the ability to engage in all along. There is no connection between any of these and deregulation. On the contrary, it was the ever-growing Basel Committee rules for measuring bank risk and allocating capital to absorb that risk (just try reading the Basel standards if you don't believe me) that failed miserably. The Basel rules outsourced the measurement of risk to ratings agencies or to the modelers within the banks themselves. Incentives were not properly aligned, as those that measured risk profited from underestimating it and earned large fees for doing so.
That ineffectual, Rube Goldberg apparatus was, of course, the direct result of the politicization of prudential regulation by the Basel Committee, which was itself the direct consequence of pursuing "international coordination" among countries, which produced rules that work politically but not economically. International cooperation, in case you haven't heard, is exactly what the French and the Germans now say was missing in the past few years."


CHARLES W. CALOMIRIS en el Wall Street Journal

Para una explicación mas detallada del rol de las regulaciones de Basilea II en la crisis, leer aquí.

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

El costo de los rescates....

La deuda de los Estados Unidos llega a 10.2 trillones (el PIB del pais es aprox. 14 trillones).

Escadaloso.

Como funciona el gobierno....

Paul Krugman ganó el premio nobel de economía ayer. Así que se me dió por leer su autobiografía. Dado que krugman es un economista keynesiano y entusiasta del Estado de Bienestar, los programas sociales y la regulación, nunca me imaginé encontrar esta perla:

"After a little while, however, I began to notice how policy decisions are really made. The fact is that most senior officials have no idea what they are talking about: discussion at high-level meetings is startlingly primitive. (For example, the distinction between nominal and real interest rates tends to be regarded as a complex and useless bit of academic nitpicking). Furthermore, many powerful people prefer to take advice from those who make them feel comfortable rather than from those who will force them to think hard. That is, those who really manage to influence policy are usually the best courtiers, not the best analysts. I like to think that I am a good analyst, but I am certainly a very bad courtier. And so I was not tempted to stay on in Washington."

Dada estas experiencia por qué insisten en darle mas poder y funciones al gobierno? Por qué insisten en que el gobierno es la solución a todos los problemas de la sociedad?

Friday, September 19, 2008

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Greenspan pudo evitar la crisis...

Pero no lo hizo.

Y que tal este dato? Seguro no aparecerá en alguna propaganda de Obama.

No es tan simple

Excelente columna sobre la busqueda de culpables en la crisis financiera en USA.

No es tan simple como quieren hacer creer los medios, algunos analistas politizados y la demagogía de las campañas de Mccain y Obama.

Mientras tanto, el líder de los democratas en el senado manifiesta que no saben que hacer.

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Ya se reconoce

Portafolio pública un resumen de agencias noticias: "El origen de los problemas actuales del sistema financiero están en la expansiva política monetaria de Alan Greenspan, que puso a disposición mucho dinero y ello creó la burbuja inmobiliaria que ha explotado, según Kerssenbrock."

Si esto viene de las noticias que públican esas agencias, quiere decir que ya se acepta en el público en general, que el causante de la crisis es la mala política monetaria de Alan Greenspan.

Pero entonce por qué tantos analistas y políticos insisten en que el problema fue la falta de regulación?

Thursday, September 11, 2008

El mercado funciona por el miedo a perder

Megan Mcardle sabiamente comenta:

"One of the central insights of economics is that exit matters. Markets don't do better, over the long run, because people in the private sector are smarter or well meaning. They do better because they can be fired. What's more, they frequently are: firms that don't satisfy their customers go away. Look at the businesses that people in America complain most about: cell phones, utilities, cable companies, health care. What they have in common is that the end consumers do not have meaningful right of exit--those companies have at least a temporary monopoly on their customers. Private sector firms can fail spectacularly, as many financial firms just did. But the important thing is that they fail. Schools that do to education what Bear Stearns did to mortgage bonds maybe get a stern talking to from the mayor, and in extraordinary circumstances, the principal may be fired. (Though this takes year). But the school itself keeps going no matter how bad a job it is doing.


Middle-class parents instinctively know this, because they move to places where the right of exit keeps school quality high. Scarsdale knows that if it doesn't keep the schools successful, middle class parents will leave, taking their lavish tax dollars with them. Riverdale, too, knows that it needs to keep parents happy and test scores high. The New York City public school system, on the other hand, mostly has to get butts in seats, because that's how they get their money. It's not that the teachers don't want to teach kids; it's that they don't have to. And as anyone who's ever tried to write a novel in their spare time knows, anything onerous that you don't have to do generally runs afoul of other priorities. "


Infortunadamente en los gobiernos ahora se ha puesto de moda todo tipo de programas estatales de emprendimiento o apoyo a las pequeñas empresas que usan como justificación el alto número de empresas nuevas que fracasan en sus primeros años. Entonces le proponen a las empresas una exagerada planeación y gestión del riesgo, que prácticamente tiende a convertirlas en burocracias, incluso antes que empiezen a producir.


Ignoran que el mercado inevitablemente producirá muchos perdedores y algunos ganadores, y que esa condición esta en la esencia misma de lo que hace que este mecanismo produzca mejores resultados económicos que el control estatal.

El miedo a perder, a no sobrevivir, es lo que incentiva a los productores en un mercado libre a esforzarse por escuchar a los clientes, por mejorar la productividad, por innovar, por diversificarse.

La hipocresia de Obama

Obama se opone a los vouchers escolares, y propone mas de lo mismo, mas dinero para la educación estatal. Por supuesto, de su propio dinero, prefiere enviar sus hijos a escuelas privadas. El si ejerce libre elección, pero no le gusta que los demás lo hagan

Obama critica la ambición de los bancos que ha llevado a la crisis hipotecarias en Estados Unidos. Por supuesto, no tiene problemas en ser uno de los que mas recibe dinero de unas de esas compañias que terminaron quebrando.

La hipocresía de Mccain seguro es igual o mayor. Pero Obama ha ilusionado mas a las masas con el "cambio" y resulta siendo igual a los políticos tradicionales.

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Cualquier error se paga.....

La campaña de Mccain obviamente no iba "perdonar" el lapsus de Obama, que intencional o no, fácilmente es interpretado como una burla contra Palin.

Tuesday, September 09, 2008

Esto no va ayudar a Obama

Lo que se debe saber de la nacionalización de freedie mac y fannie mae

"The claim that this represents the failure of markets is more than a tad silly. Fannie and Freddie weren't truly private companies, didn't act like truly private companies, and wouldn't have been allowed to so dominate the market if they had been. This is yet another failure of a government program."

Megan Mcardle

Obama continua moviendose a la derecha

Ya no parece tan entusiasta de eliminar los recortes de impuestos de Bush

Al paso que vamos las ideas de Mccain y Obama no serán muy diferentes, y la elección se definirá por otros aspectos.

Cita de Thomas Sowell del dia

"It is hardly surprising that young people prefer the political left. The only reason for rejecting the left's vision is that the real world in which we live is very different from the world that the left perceives today or envisions for tomorrow.

Most of us learn that from experience-- but experience is precisely what the young are lacking."

Thomas Sowell

Por qué Avanza Mccain en las encuestas?

Tal parece que se debe a los independientes

Monday, September 08, 2008

El porque del efecto Palin

"Democrats speak up for the less prosperous; they have well-intentioned policies to help them; they are disturbed by inequality, and want to do something about it. Their concern is real and admirable. The trouble is, they lack respect for the objects of their solicitude. Their sympathy comes mixed with disdain, and even contempt.
Democrats regard their policies as self-evidently in the interests of the US working and middle classes. Yet those wide segments of US society keep helping to elect Republican presidents. How is one to account for this? Are those people idiots? Frankly, yes – or so many liberals are driven to conclude. Either that or bigots, clinging to guns, God and white supremacy; or else pathetic dupes, ever at the disposal of Republican strategists. If they only had the brains to vote in their interests, Democrats think, the party would never be out of power.......


Because it was so unexpected, Sarah Palin’s nomination for the vice-presidency jolted these attitudes to the surface. Ms Palin is a small-town American. It is said that she has only recently acquired a passport. Her husband is a fisherman and production worker. She represents a great slice of the country that the Democrats say they care about – yet her selection induced an apoplectic fit.
For days, the derision poured down from Democratic party talking heads and much of the media too. The idea that “this woman” might be vice-president or even president was literally incomprehensible. The popular liberal comedian Bill Maher, whose act is an endless sneer at the Republican party, noted that John McCain’s case for the presidency was that only he was capable of standing between the US and its enemies, but that should he die he had chosen “this stewardess” to take over. This joke was not – or not only – a complaint about lack of experience. It was also an expression of class disgust. I give Mr Maher credit for daring to say what many Democrats would only insinuate.........



Little was known about Ms Palin, but it sufficed for her nomination to be regarded as a kind of insult. Even after her triumph at the Republican convention in St Paul last week, the put-downs continued. Yes, the delivery was all right, but the speech was written by somebody else – as though that is unusual, as though the speechwriter is not the junior partner in the preparation of a speech, and as though just anybody could have raised the roof with that text. Voters in small towns and suburbs, forever mocked and condescended to by metropolitan liberals, are attuned to this disdain. Every four years, many take their revenge.....


If only the Democrats could contain their sense of entitlement to govern in a rational world, and their consequent distaste for wide swathes of the US electorate, they might gain the unshakeable grip on power they feel they deserve. Winning elections would certainly be easier – and Republicans would have to address themselves more seriously to economic insecurity.

But the fathomless cultural complacency of the metropolitan liberal rules this out.
The attitude that expressed itself in response to the Palin nomination is the best weapon in the Republican armoury. Rely on the Democrats to keep it primed. You just have to laugh.

The Palin nomination could still misfire for Mr McCain, but the liberal reaction has made it a huge success so far. To avoid endlessly repeating this mistake, Democrats need to learn some respect.
It will be hard. They will have to develop some regard for the values that the middle of the country expresses when it votes Republican. Religion. Unembarrassed flag-waving patriotism. Freedom to succeed or fail through one’s own efforts. Refusal to be pitied, bossed around or talked down to. And all those other laughable redneck notions that made the United States what it is."


Esa es la mejor explicación, nada mas que decir. Estados Unidos es un pais de "rednecks", no de intelectuales liberales como Obama.

El efecto Palin

En este momento en Intrade, Obama esta en 53% perdiendo 7-8 puntos de donde estuvo muchas semanas (60-61%).Mccain logicamente avanza a 45 pasando de donde estuvo varias semanas (39%).Mccain tuvo sin duda exito en revertir el "post-convention bounce" de Obama.
El americano medio parece adorar a Palin. Y según este articulo, ahora Mccain tiene la ventaja en las mujeres blancas

Lo mas seguro es decir que vamos a tener una elección como la del año 2000,super reñida. Lo que significa que ninguno de los dos candidatos van a tener un mandato claro que los cambios que dicen que van a ser, y les va tocar, trabajar con el partido contrario e implementar reformas tímidas. Es decir, la retórica de "cambio" de ambos, no pasará de eso.


Vale la pena hacer un analisis de lo que ha venido pasando con los candidatos.

Mccain se ha movido a la derecha:

1. Hace dos o un año fue el autor de una ley pro-inmigrante con nada mes que Ted kennedy (super odiado por la derecha) que finalmente no pasó. Ahora es como mínimo menos pro inmigrante

2. No era anti-aborto ni anti-gay. Ahora por lo menos es anti-aborto.

3. Voto en contra de los recortes de impuestos de Bush diciendo que favoreciana los ricos (la misma retorica de los democratas). Ahora dice que los mantendrá y que hará mas recortes

4. Creo leyes contra el calentamiento global y era de los republicanos mas ambientalistas. Esta en contra de perforar en Alaska, ahora esta a favor.

Obama, mientras tanto tambien se mueve a la derecha:

1. Hace unos dias le reconoció a O'reilly que el "surge" (incremento de tropas) en Irak ha funcionado

2. Ayer dijo que dada la mala situación de la econonomía demoraría la eliminación de los recortes de impuesto de Bush

3. Recientemente se disculpó por unas declaraciones sobre el aborto que lo ponían como medio a favor

4. Unas personas en un pequeño pueblo de Ohio le preguntaron si iba a controlar las armas, y dijo de forma explícita que no lo haría.En temas de libre comercio, política exterior tambien se ha movido a la derecha.

Ambos corren riesgos con estas estrategias. Mccain puede perder democratas conservadores (como los que apoyaron a Reagan) y a independientes quienes pueden irse a votar por Obama o Bob Barr del partido libertario. Obama puede perder los votantes mas izquierdistas quienes pueden ir a votar por Ralph Nader.

Cada estrategia corresponde a logicas diferentes.Mccain necesitaba ganarse a las bases conservadores y cristianas del partido repúblicano que no lo veían con buenos ojos por ser demasiado liberal para su gusto y por hacer alianzas con democratas como Ted Kennedy para sacar leyes.De hecho,en el año 2000, cuando se disputo la candidatura republicana con Bush pelío con los pastores evangelicos y los llamó "intolerantes".Obama, luego de moverse a la izquierda para ganarse a las bases del partido democráta, necesitaba moverse al centro para conquistar a democratas conservadores y para ganarse a republicanos liberales/moderados y a los independientes.

Pero en esencia ambos demuestran que para el político profesional, las ideas son apenas un medio para obtener el poder, nunca la razón de ser de la política.

Finalmente cuando un político profesional llega al poder termina maniatado por todas las alianzas y apoyos de los grupos de intereses a su favor. Termina siendo, como decía John Kerry, un "sirviente" de estos grupos.

Articulo del dia

"In this crucially important era, I have focused on one point: big business was a major source of American statism. Further researches would show, I am convinced, that big business and financial leaders were also the dominant force behind America’s increasingly interventionist foreign policy, and behind the ideology of modern liberalism. In fact, by this analysis sustained research might show American liberal intellectuals to be the “running dogs” of big businessmen, to twist a Marxist phrase a bit."

Roy A. Childs en "Big Business and the Rise of American Statism" (de 1971)

No hay nada como la historia para refutar las falsas creencias que abundan en el debate público.

Sunday, September 07, 2008

Cita del dia

"And the word “ethics,” as I’ve argued at length in The Bourgeois Virtues (2006), is best seen as not exclusively about how you treat other people (by exercising the virtues of justice, secular love, and part of courage). Ethics is also about how you treat yourself (prudence, temperance, and the rest of courage) and how you treat your purposes in life (hope, faith, and transcendent love). "

Deidre Mccloskey en el borrador de su próximo libro, Bourgeois Deeds, How values made innovation and the modern world

Links variados

1. Uribe continua aumentando su poder sobre otras ramas del poder público

2. Sarah Palin no fue una sorpresa

3. Donde estará la próxima burbuja?

4. Las contradicciones de Noam Chomsky

5. La China actual se parece a la Alemania de finales del siglo XIX

"derecha"="izquierda"

Thomas Woods escribe:

"The Republican Party of 2008 is not the first political organization to adopt the slogan "country first" as its guiding philosophy. One of the intellectual fathers of twentieth-century German fascism was Paul Lensch, who wrote in his book, Three Years of World Revolution, that the philosophy of German fascism (Nazism) was expressed in the slogan "Gemeinnutz geht vor Eigennutz," which means "the common good comes before the private good." "Country first" or "national greatness conservatism" in today's vernacular.

In Mein Kampf (1943 Houghton Mifflin edition, p. 297) Hitler explained that in his "noblest form" the Aryan "willingly subordinates his own ego to the community, and if the hour demands, even sacrifices it." The individual has "not rights but only duties," said the mass-murdering dictator. The Nazis adopted a "25-Point Programme of the Party" in 1925 that was prefaced with the statement that "the activities of the individual must not clash with the interests of the whole . . . but must be for the general good." Fatherland First!"

Que tan diferente es este discurso del de la "izquierda" o incluso el centro?

El mismo colectivismo de siempre con otros colores y otro sabor.

Saturday, September 06, 2008

Las consecuencias esperadas de las políticas chinas

El economista Brad De Long comenta:

"China’s policy of export subsidies through currency manipulation was always bound to become unsustainable in the long run because it was bound to generate substantial domestic inflation."

Nada de eso lo mencionan los entusiastas de este tipo de políticas, que en su momento fueron adoptadas por nuestro pais.

La experiencia de Obama vs La experiencia de Palin

Es increíble que los democrátas hay cometido el error de críticar a Sarah Palin, por falta de experiencia, dado que esa es la principal debilidad de Obama. Se exponen a que Newt Gingrich les hablé duro:




Sarah Palin es la unica candidata en ambas campañas, que tiene experiencia ejecutiva, manejando una gobernación con un presupuesta de 11.2 mil millones dolares y casi 29,000 empleados.

Que atacar a Sarah Palin por su falta de experiencia es mala estrategia, lo comienzan a decir columnistas gringos a favor de Obama

Que he estado leyendo

"La moralidad es en gran medida un fenómeno intragrupal. De forma universal, los humanos tratamos a los desconocidos muchísimo peor de lo que tratamos a los miembros de nuestra propia comunidad. Es más, las normas morales apenas parecen ser aplicables fuera de nuestro entorno...es muy probable que la moralidad evolucionase como un fenómeno intragrupal en conjunción con otra serie de capacidades típicamente intragrupales, tales como la resolución de conflictos, la cooperación o el acto de compartir."

Lo escribe Frans De Waal, en "Primates y Filosofos", un libro sobre la evolución de la moral del simio al hombre, o mejor dicho, sobre el origen evolutivo de la moral.

Ya había leído esa teoría antes. Y creo que explica el fracaso de crear comunidades imaginarías, y el permanente conflicto que existe los unidades políticas modenas conformadas en el mejor de los casos por miles de personas que no se conocen pero a las cual quieren obligar a través del poder del Estado a que sean solidarias y actuén por el bien común.

Tarde que temprano, como dice este articulo, el Estado-Nación se disolverá:

"Like religion, the nation-state myth requires a leap of faith. Japanese scholar Yoshihisa Hagiwara argues that since it is not grounded in fact, the nation-state myth is bound to dissolve, giving way to an understanding that we are merely individuals who are part of a global community."

Sunday, August 31, 2008

Sobrevivir es una victoria para las FARC?

Daniel Lisker sostiene que algunos líderes de las FARC piensan que mantener la guerra es una victoria:

For the last couple of years, the FARC, many of whose leaders believe that they “win” simply by prolonging the conflict, has been seeking ways – for example, a humanitarian exchange and political recognition – to ease the military pressure that it has faced since Uribe came to power. The danger, then, is a failure to deliver the knockout blow at a time when the group appears to be disintegrating.

Me parece una interesantes perspectiva, pero me pregunto que ganan simplemente con sobrevivir? Sera que solo les interesa continuar su estilo de vida y tomarse el poder es solo una retórica que usan para reclutar gente y obtener apoyos políticos?

Lo de esperar

Previsiblemente, el gobierno de Osetia del Sur ya habla de anexarse a Rusia. De vuelta a los años 30 y a la guerra fría.

Los "Don Mario" a cargo de las grandes potencias vuelven a sus andadas de siempre.

Saturday, August 30, 2008

Hechos del dia

El bueno:

The digital divide is beginning to close. The flow of digital information – through mobile phones, text messaging, and the Internet – is now reaching the world’s masses, even in the poorest countries, bringing with it a revolution in economics, politics, and society.
Extreme poverty is almost synonymous with extreme isolation, especially rural isolation. But mobile phones and wireless Internet end isolation, and will therefore prove to be the most transformative technology of economic development of our time.
The digital divide is ending not through a burst of civic responsibility, but mainly through market forces. Mobile phone technology is so powerful, and costs so little per unit of data transmission, that it has proved possible to sell mobile phone access to the poor. There are now more than 3.3 billion subscribers in the world, roughly one for every two people on the planet.
Moreover, market penetration in poor countries is rising sharply. India has around 300 million subscribers, with subscriptions rising by a stunning eight million or more per month. Brazil now has more than 130 million subscribers, and Indonesia has roughly 120 million. In Africa, which contains the world’s poorest countries, the market is soaring, with more than 280 million subscribers.


El malo:

El 88% de las reservas de petróleo convencional pertenece a gobiernos y esos gobiernos invierten cantidades insuficientes en nueva producción. Por su parte, el gobierno de Estados Unidos ha restringido las perforaciones costa afuera, en tierra firme y la conversión del carbón.

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Imperialismo yanqui

De acuerdo con este sitio, el gobierno federal de Estados Unidos tiene militares desplegados(al menos uno) en prácticamente todos los paises del mundo, excepto Iran, Norcorea y un puñado de paises africanos.

Extrañamente, los paises del eje chavista, se reporta que tienen militares gringos.

Monday, August 25, 2008

Lo que se necesita saber sobre la "guerra" entre Rusia y Georgia

"When it comes to separatist movements, the American and Russian governments have no principles whatever. They take whatever side advances their political interests at the moment. When ethnic Albanians in Kosovo sought to break from Yugoslavia, the Russians sided with ally Serbia and opposed independence, but the United States backed the separatists and unleashed its bombers. Something similar happened when the Bosnians did the same thing. (The United States gave mixed signals when the Russians moved against separatists in Chechnya.) Yet when the Ossetians and Abkhazians want to be free of Georgia, the big-power roles are reversed" (link aquí)

Creo que este es el elemento mas importante en el análisis. Lo demás es retórica de los líderos de los gobiernos de las potencias, tanto de Rusia como de Estados Unidos.

Que se declare la independencia de Ossetia y Abkhazia tanto de Georgia como de Rusia. Es el único camino correcto

Sunday, August 24, 2008

Cita del dia

"Slim ha fundamentado su estrategia local en dos pilares: apostando duro con el músculo financiero que hoy tiene por cuenta de su fortuna y haciéndolo en sectores altamente regulados, donde se mueve como pez en el agua(....) En Colombia, su propuesta inicial por Telecom reveló el tipo de mercados que le gustan: donde pueda negociar directamente con el gobierno, donde hay una base amplia de infraestructura y de clientes y donde tenga asegurada la supremacía."

Link aquí

Mi comentario: no solo en Colombia sino en todas partes del mundo, Slim se "luce" en sectores altamente regulados y donde tenga que negociar con los gobiernos. Y no solo Slim. Bill Gates sería mucho menos ricos, sin la existencia de absurdas leyes de propiedad intelectual.

El espejo del colectivismo hidraúlico

En estos dias en que quieren imponernos la estatización/colectivización de la agua, es bueno conocer la realidad de paraíso colectivista por excelencia en relación con este tema:


"Hoy, los problemas debidos a la escasez de agua en la mayoría de los pueblos y ciudades de Cuba se han agudizado y empeoran debido al estado deplorable de las redes de distribución. La demanda de agua aumenta también debido al éxodo masivo, sobre todo de jóvenes campesinos, hacia pueblos y ciudades del país. No está claro si el estimado de 500,000 habitantes para la ciudad de Santiago de Cuba en el año 2000 se hizo realidad, pero la cantidad de campesinos sin tierras que arribaron allí durante las tres décadas anteriores pudo haber aumentado.

Similar situación presentaba la ciudad de Guantánamo, donde al principio de los años 90 se bombeaba el agua directamente del río Bano y se entregaba a las redes de distribución y a la población malamente tratada. Los muchos casos de gastroenteritis que se produjeron por aquella época en la ciudad se debieron a esa forma irresponsable de abastecer de agua a sus habitantes.

En los años 80 el agua que tomaban los habitantes de la ciudad de Camaguey presentaba una turbiedad evidente debido a un acueducto necesitado de urgente mantenimiento. Se mencionan solamente casos bien conocidos."

Friday, August 22, 2008

Cita del dia

"Nearly every reform proposal offered to fix "the health-care crisis" calls for increased governmental control of medicine. These proposals are the logical result of the belief that there is a "right" to medical care. But there is no such right. Rights, properly understood, do no include an entitlement to the services of others. "
— William Dale, en el libro “Free Medicine”

Claramente los que diseñaron nuestra constitución tenían una visión completamente opuesta.

Thursday, August 21, 2008

Sobre el pensamiento de Smith y Hayek

"the main insight of economists like Adam Smith and Friedrich Hayek, is that differences in the inclinations of people to do good or evil are not so large. Instead, institutional differences matter more. Conveying that insight is a challenge."

Yo agregaria tambien a Marx.

Link aqui.

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

La nación de Obama

La derecha se viene con todo contra Obama y sacan un libro que se convierte en bestseller.

Quien sabe si esto solo lo lean los anti-obamistas convencidos, pero el caso es que Mccain ha empezado a liderar algunas encuestas.

Lo unico cierto es que la carrera presidencial en Estados Unidos esta mas cerrada de lo que muchos pensaban o deseaban.

Sunday, August 10, 2008

Pensamiento liberal del dia

"En el extrmo, [el racionalismo] exalta el mas trivial o tendenciosos "estudio" por "expertos" a nivel de politica, superponiendose a la fuerza sobre las preferencias y convicciones de millones de personas. Mientras que el racionalismo a nivel individual es un llamado a mayor autonomía personal con respecto a las normas culturales, a nivel social con frecuencia es un reclamo-o usurpación- del poder para acabar con la autonomía de otros en la base de un habilidad superior con las palabras"

Thomas Sowell, en el libro "Knowledge and Decisions"

Mccain el anti-intelectual?

Dice Alejandro Gaviria: "Esta semana, John McCain acusó a Barack Obama de pertenecer al mundo ilusorio y arrogante de Paris Hilton. La respuesta de Hilton no se hizo esperar. En un video de dos minutos, que ya ha sido visto por millones de internautas, Hilton hace gala no de su juventud, no de su belleza, no de su fortuna, sino de su inteligencia. En un tono arrogante, de caricatura, Hilton se burla de McCain, exhibe sin tapujos su pertenencia a la nueva élite cognitiva. El video es una denuncia elocuente de la retórica anti-intelectual que viene promoviendo, con inocultable oportunismo, la campaña de McCain. Paris Hilton, quien lo creyera, capturó, en dos minutos, la esencia del discurso del candidato republicano."

Yo estoy en desacuerdo con la percepción que los comerciales de Mccain que intentaron mostrar a Obama como una celebridad, sea anti-intelectualismo. Todo lo contrario.

La idea del comercial era mostrar a Obama como una "celebridad", como frivolo, superficial, como alguien parecido a Paris Hilton, la socialité por antonomasia.

Tambien iba a explotar la asociación que existe en el imaginario del gringo medio derechista de que hollywood (los artistas) son izquierdistas (en realidad hay artistas de todas las corrientes politicas, pero la mayoria parecen ser izquierdistas).Y Hollywood se asocia con elitismo, pero tambien con personas sin la moral cristiana que tipicamente le importa a buena parte de la base del partido republicano.

Por otro lado, tambien explota el tremendo papayazo que dio Obama hace unos meses cuando se refirió a la gente de los pueblos de Ohio, "como amargados que se refugiaban en las armas, la xenofobia,etc". Alguien grabó esas palabras y las filtró a la prensa. Esas palabras son lo peor que ha podido decir un candidato democrata en una campaña presidencial.

Finalmente podría ser que los comerciales tuvieron exito. En la encuesta de Rasmussen de ayer, Obama y Mccain siguen empatados. Pero por primera vez veo en esa encuesta (la veo todos los dias) que Mccain le saca un punto a Obama cuando incluyen a los "leaners"(personas que se declaran indecisos pero que dicen inclinarse por alguno de los dos candidatos)

Y si lo de Georgia continua escalando, podria recomenzar una nueva guerra fría, donde no veo al gringo medio deseoso de votar por un "liberal", una "paloma" como Obama con solo dos años de experiencia en el congreso federal,ninguna credencial en política exterior. El gringo medio creería que va a preferir al heroe de guerra, al "halcon".

En todo caso, la carrera presidencial en USA esta mas competida de lo que muchos pensabamos.

Wednesday, August 06, 2008

El pensamiento politico de Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

"In the West, he liked the Swiss model of local government and spoke highly of his experiences living in Vermont. Before leaving for Russia in 1994, Solzhenitsyn spoke to his neighbors in a Cavendish town meeting and thanked the town for its hospitality and for respecting his privacy. He thought of the town-meeting type of self-government as the most suitable for Russia. He did not, however, make a god of democracy; he admired great Russian reformer Pyotr Stolypin with his strong promarket and antisocialist stand as the prime minister of the Russian Empire (1906-1911).

Solzhenitsyn believed in the individual rather than the group, party, or state. He wrote in The Gulag Archipelago, "that the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either — but through all human hearts."
Solzhenitsyn had enough courage to equate socialism and Nazism as equally evil and morally reprehensible. He condemned both Nazi and Soviet atrocities during the Second World War and he accused his fellow countrymen of masterminding their own shipwreck.

According to Solzhenitsyn, 61,000,000 people were slaughtered in the USSR in the quest for equality. Under Stalin alone, 43,000,000 were murdered. Lenin and Khrushchev are responsible for the other 18,000,000. Most of these deaths (39,000,000) were due to forced labor in gulags and during deportations."


Link

Tuesday, August 05, 2008

Por eso no somos ricos

Situaciones como esta explican porque Colombia tiene un ingreso per capita mas alto.

En teoría somos un pais "capitalista" y ultimamente dizque existe un modelo neoliberal. En la realidad, nuestra economía esta llena de rentistas, carteles, oligopolios, regulaciones. Es una economía administrada y fuertemente intervenida. No es socialismo, porque la propiedad no es plenamente controlada por el Estado. Se acerca mas bien a un corporativismo fascistoide que beneficia a diferentes grupos de intereses, entre los cuales definitivamente no estan los consumidores.

Y lastimosamente Uribe, con todo su enorme capital político, en 6 años ha cambiado mas bien poco........

Monday, August 04, 2008

10 cosas de las que no debería preocuparse

La prensa, en su afan sensacionalista con el fin de atraer mas lectores, nos vive asustando con amenazas de crisis y desastres.

Por lo menos aquí hay 10 cosas de las que no debería preocuparse, o al menos, de las que debería ser crítico con lo publican o divulgan los grandes medios.

Aqui hay mas.

El origen de la crisis financiera actual

Nouriel Roubini, uno de los pocos profetas de la crisis actual dice en una entrevista:

"The damage was done earlier, beginning when the Greenspan Fed lowered interest rates in 2001 after the bust of the technology bubble, and kept them too low for too long. They kept cutting the federal funds rate all the way to 1% through 2004, and then raised it gradually instead of quickly. This fed the credit and housing bubble."

Lo curioso es que pocas personas han pedido reformas a la FED.

Sunday, August 03, 2008

El "coco" del neoliberalismo

Joseph Stiglitz desde hace años ha buscado convertirse en el gran critico, el "coco" del neoliberalismo.

Hace algunas semanas escribió un articulo muy comentado en Internet sobre el fin del neoliberalismo. Lastima que dicho articulo no resista un análisis critico y este lleno de inconsistencias.

Pero recientemente concedió una entrevista a un periodico paraguayo en la cual se confiesa “muy, muy pro-mercado” y hasta profesa su admiración por el Cato Institute.

Y aunque Stiglitz claramente diferencia entre el corporativismo que muchas veces se le conoce como "neoliberalismo", no es clara su posición sobre el libre mercado. Como el típico intervencionista que es.

Saturday, August 02, 2008

Los importadores del castrismo

Muy interesante este articulo de Plinio Apuleyo sobre la vida de Luis Villar Borda.

Entiende uno que el origen de varios reconocidos lideres izquierdistas son señoritos bogotanos de colegios "de bien", tal vez envidiosos de los nuevos ricos("Muy pronto descubrimos que fuera de los 10 centavos del tranvía, no teníamos nunca plata para comprar una coca-cola porque pertenecíamos a esa particular categoría (a la cual se sumarían más tarde Camilo Torres y Alberto Dangond) de muchachos pobres y de buena familia. Vivíamos en viejas casas del centro de un solo piso con patios y matas de geranios y no teníamos estilógrafos Parker como los demás condiscípulos sino tinteros y plumas de poco precio, y algo me decía que él heredaba los trajes de Carlos, su hermano mayor: unos nickers café que muy pronto desaparecerían del todo.") .

Estos comentarios donde Plinio Apuleyo Mendoza se compara con sus otros compañeros de colegio que si eran ricos, me recordó este texto del economista Tyler Cowen sobre el papel del miedo a perder status en las ideologías políticas:

Take the so-called "left wing." Some of these people favor a kind of meritocracy. They feel it is unfair that money so determines access in capitalist society and they do not want the monied class to rise in relative status, certainly not above the status of the smart people and the virtuous people. It is important to fight for the principle that the desires of this monied class have a relatively low priority in the social ranking. Egalitarianism is the rhetoric of the day, and readjusting the status of other Americans to the status of this monied class often receives more attention than elevating the very poorest in the world to a higher absolute level.

Tal vez el resentimiento hacia los verdaderos ricos, causo que estos señoritos bien se volvieran izquierdistas?

Finalmente el hecho es que algunos de estos señoritos, incluyendo el mismo Plinio Apuleyo, lideraron la introducción del castrismo en Colombia:

"Ramiro Andrade, Luis y yo fundamos las Juventudes del MRL, grupo ultra castrista que veíamos como una vanguardia revolucionaria, cuyo lema era Ni un paso atrás y su distintivo unos chacos colorados con los cuales aparecíamos en lugares tan candentes como Puerto Boyacá. Enviado por nosotros, Luis se entrevistó con Fidel Castro en La Habana y obtuvo de él la oferta de entrenar política y militarmente muchachos nuestros en Cuba. De esa experiencia, quién iba a creerlo, surgió el Eln, pues muchos de los jóvenes entrenados solo creían en la guerra de guerrillas y no confiaban en la vía electoral. Se metieron al monte. Varios de ellos, hasta entonces muy cercanos a nosotros, murieron en la primera etapa de esa lucha armada. Y también, dentro del Eln, Camilo Torres."

Y despues siguen insistiendo que las guerrillas colombianas son ejercitos populares, cuando en ultimas no son mas que el resultado de las acciones de señoritos bogotanos, miembros excelsos del establecimiento que en su afan de poder importaron el comunismo y el castrismo.

Por qué nadie le ha pedido cuentas a estos tipos por la barbarie que desencadenaron al obtener de Fidel Castro entrenamiento política y militar?

Monday, July 28, 2008

Otro cientifico se aparta......

de la histeria del calentamiento global (cuyo propagandista mas celebre Al Gore):

"I DEVOTED six years to carbon accounting, building models for the Australian Greenhouse Office. I am the rocket scientist who wrote the carbon accounting model (FullCAM) that measures Australia's compliance with the Kyoto Protocol, in the land use change and forestry sector.
FullCAM models carbon flows in plants, mulch, debris, soils and agricultural products, using inputs such as climate data, plant physiology and satellite data. I've been following the global warming debate closely for years.


When I started that job in 1999 the evidence that carbon emissions caused global warming seemed pretty good: CO2 is a greenhouse gas, the old ice core data, no other suspects.

The evidence was not conclusive, but why wait until we were certain when it appeared we needed to act quickly? Soon government and the scientific community were working together and lots of science research jobs were created. We scientists had political support, the ear of government, big budgets, and we felt fairly important and useful (well, I did anyway). It was great. We were working to save the planet.

But since 1999 new evidence has seriously weakened the case that carbon emissions are the main cause of global warming, and by 2007 the evidence was pretty conclusive that carbon played only a minor role and was not the main cause of the recent global warming. As Lord Keynes famously said, "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?"


Pareciera que muchos ambientalistas y políticos de izquierda quieren hacernos creer que la idea de que el calentamiento global es causado por las emisión de CO2 es un hecho ya aceptado por la cientificos y los que se oponen son solo los lacayos del "gran capital" y las transnacionales contaminadoras.

Dado que es un "hecho" se justifica usar todo el poder del estado para detener las emisiones, sin importar las consecuencias que esto tenga sobre la economía y sobre nuestras libertades.

Por supuesto que esa no es la realidad. No esta probado que el calentamiento global es causado por la emisión de CO2. Y no existe consenso entre la comunidad cientifica sobre el tema, como lo demuestras las opiniones de este cientifico.

Pero es que se debe tener en cuenta que este no es un debate cientifico, es un debate politizado:

"The world has spent $50 billion on global warming since 1990, and we have not found any actual evidence that carbon emissions cause global warming. Evidence consists of observations made by someone at some time that supports the idea that carbon emissions cause global warming. Computer models and theoretical calculations are not evidence, they are just theory.

What is going to happen over the next decade as global temperatures continue not to rise? The Labor Government is about to deliberately wreck the economy in order to reduce carbon emissions. If the reasons later turn out to be bogus, the electorate is not going to re-elect a Labor government for a long time. When it comes to light that the carbon scare was known to be bogus in 2008, the ALP is going to be regarded as criminally negligent or ideologically stupid for not having seen through it. And if the Liberals support the general thrust of their actions, they will be seen likewise.

The onus should be on those who want to change things to provide evidence for why the changes are necessary."

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Hecho inquitante del dia

"Sadly, far less than 10% of the world's oil reserves are in countries that allow private companies to operate freely. This means that the latter and, through them, consumers, are denied access to far more than 90% of the world's oil reserves. State-owned companies control more than 65% of the world's oil reserves — e.g., in Saudi Arabia. As for the 25% left, they are mainly situated in countries such as Iran, Russia, Venezuela, etc., where, because of above-ground political factors, private Western companies have the greatest difficulties working efficiently — as demonstrated by BP's recent problems in Russia."

Esta es la fuente.

Recordar esto si alguien le achaca el alto precio del petroleo al mercado o al capitalismo.

Links variados sobre la crisis hipotecaria en Estados Unidos

1. Pobre historial de la FED como regulador

2. El origen de los problemas de Fannie Mae y Freddie Mac esta en sus incentivos y restricciones.

3. En busca de la nueva burbuja

Tambien recomiendo estos links(aqui, aqui y aqui) sobre las predicciones del economista Grek Mankiw al comienzo de esta decada (circa 2003) con respecto a Fannie Mae y Freddie Mac.

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Que he estado leyendo.....

"En el siglo diecisiete, cuando la mayoría de la gente sentía que su "situación en la vida" era determinada por Dios, la esclavitud era considerada nada mas que una calamidad personal. Ni la esclavitud y la raza estaban, al menos al principio, relacionadas. En la mitad del siglo diecisiete, un hombre negro llamado Anthony Johnson poseía una plantación de tabaco de 250 acres en la costa este de Virginia y por lo menos un esclavo. Se consideraba a sí mismo, y en gran parte sus vecinos lo consideraban, un igual. No tuvo duda en reclamar ante una corta para garantizar sus derechos cuando su esclavo se escapo, y se le garantizaron."

En "An Empire of Wealth: The Epic History of American Economic Power" de John Steele Gordon . Un interesante y ameno libro sobre la historia económica de los Estados Unidos desde la colonia hasta nuestros dias. Una historia llena de genialidades, suerte, corrupción, epocas prosperas y desastres financieros (como el de los ultimos meses)

Hacia el fascismo financiero

"In other words, we are not talking about market failure. If you have a housetop you can shout that from, please do so, because the press and the government are going to make every effort to blame private borrowers and lenders for this calamity. But the origin of both these outfits is with federal legislation. They are not market entities. They have long been guaranteed by you and me. No, they have not been socialist entities either because they are privately owned. They occupy a third status for which there is a name: fascism. Really, that's what we are talking about: the inexorable tendency of financial fascism to mutate into full-scale financial socialism and therefore bankruptcy."

Lew Rockwell comentando sobre la crisis d Freddie Mae y Fannie Mae.

Friday, July 11, 2008

Buena noticia del dia: Se aceleran las desmovilizaciones de guerrilleros de las FARC

Por ahora lo mejor de operación Jaque, ademas de la libertad de los secuestrados, quitarnos la joda de Francia, quitarle protaganismo a Chavez y Piedad Cordoba, es que parece estar acelerando las desmovilizaciones de guerrilleros.

Ojala la guerra contra las FARC haya alcanzado el punto de inflexión.

Tuesday, July 08, 2008

La "PILA" absurda

La estupidez del ministerio de protección de social de querer que personas que ganan el minimo como independientes les toque pagar salud y pensión al mismo tiempo. Este ministro es el clasico tecnocrata obtuso e indolente.

Hecho increíble del dia

"The beneficiaries of the subsidies offered by many emerging countries are overwhelmingly in upper-income groups. In India, the cost of fuel subsidies is now almost as large as public spending on education"

Fuente: Martin Wolf

Sobre las causas de la crisis de la economia mundial

"Yet, insists the report, the drivers were not so much new inventions as old errors: a long period of easy money, asset price inflation and rapid credit growth. "

Aqui

Sunday, July 06, 2008

Liberalismo resumido en una frase

Bueno no exactamente, pero la desconfianza y el escepticismo hacia el estado o gobierno es un elemento esencial del la propuesta de limitación del poder estatal del liberalismo auténtico. Esta es la frase:

"One of the biggest mistakes we can make is to assume competence and benign intent on the part of political officials when deciding how much power to give them. We ought to assume the worst about them — about their abilities, integrity and motives — and only then, based on those suppositions, should we decide how much power, and what specific powers, we’re willing to vest in them."

Es de Gleen Greenwald, un abogado opositor de las políticas de Bush