All That Glitters is not Gold

The woes of New York, Michigan and California are familiar to us now. New York has regulated and taxed itself into oblivion, Michigan's workers have priced themselves out of the global market, and California's progressive wizards have turned its gold into lead.

Only California liberalism could produce a situation where there is a surplus of empty houses while people live in tent cities. But there's trouble in the sun belt as well. Nicole Gelinas writes in the City Journal:

But during the boom times, elected officials in Arizona, Florida, and Nevada took a page out of the old states’ playbook, driving up spending at an unsustainable pace. Now that the growth of the low-tax states has hit a wall, shattering revenues, they face a tough choice: they can raise taxes to fund permanently higher costs, or they can aggressively cut spending.

This is happening in other sunbelt states as well. They are not in as deep as Michigan and California, so these states still control their own destiny, but the author is not optimistic.

But the low-tax, low-services culture is up against a potent force: the inexorable mathematics of budgets that take on a life of their own once they’ve passed the point of no return. If the way that Arizona, Florida, and Nevada are confronting the current crisis is any guide, these states will continue to grow—but they will also grow a little bit more like us.

Can we learn from the failed liberal experiments of Michigan, California and New York? Or are we doomed to replicate them in Arizona, Colorado, and Nevada?

Merctus.org - Freedom Study
CJ - Malanga
CJ - Gelinas

Home Grown Terrorists

Four pinheads from the Bronx decide they want to be terrorists

The FBI said the Muslim suspects were angry and full of hate for America.

"Hatred of the West. The leader of the group, James Cromitie was concerned about deaths at the hands of the U.S. military in Afghanistan," and also expressed anti-Jewish sentiment, Joseph Demarest the head of the New York FBI said.

But these guys were stupider than your average terrorists. You could even call them the Three Stooges of terrorism, with all due respect to Larry, Curly and Moe:

Agents and police watched Wednesday night as the suspects allegedly planted what they thought were bombs outside two Jewish community centers in Riverdale, a Bronx, New York neighborhood. In one case the suspected terrorists planted a bomb inside a parked car. However, officials said the suspects were actually using fake explosives given to them in an earlier sting operation to make sure they didn't get their hands on real bombs.

Authorities said they had the plotters under surveillance since June of 2008 and there was "no chance" the alleged scheme could succeed. They credited the work of a long time informant with keeping tabs on the group.

The four suspects were identified as James Cromitie, David Williams, Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen, of Newburgh in upstate New York, where authorities were conducting raids at their homes, sources said.

You can see the pictures of the men here.

I've been to Afghanistan, I've met Afghanis, and I can say with complete confidence that these men are not from Afghanistan.

These men are societal ass-warts, raised to adulthood in this great country, mooching and robbing all the way, only to turn and bite the hand that has fed them. And all for a far-off country that never did a damn thing for them.

They love Afghanistan? I say turn them over to that country so they can be imprisoned there. That should clear their minds and erase any romanticism they may have for Central Asia.

NBC New York