Invest Bliguru: Free to Choose- Milton Friedman: 'Cradle to Grave-Public Assistance (1980)'

Source:Invest Bliguru- Robert Lampman participating in this discussion.

"Since the Depression years of the 1930s, there has been almost continuous expansion of governmental efforts to provide for people's welfare. First, there was a tremendous expansion of public works. The Social Security Act followed close behind. Soon other efforts extended governmental activities in all areas of the welfare sector. Growth of governmental welfare activity continued unabated, and today it has reached truly staggering proportions. " 

From Invest Bliguru 

From Cradle to Grave, is referring to how people who were born onto public assistance, raised on public assistance, have kids before they are ready to raise them and live off of public assistance as adults as well, that we literally have had generations of families who’ve lived off of public assistance, because they have never gotten the skills that they need, to be able to leave public assistance. Meaning they would have the skills that they need to get a good job and not have to live off of public assistance, because they have the means to be able to take care of themselves and their kids.

A lot of this is a result of the safety net that was created in America, in the 1930s with the New Deal and the 1960s with the Great Society. Where you had all the social insurance programs that we're designed to help sustain people while they are in poverty, but not do anything to help these people to get themselves off of public assistance and out of poverty once and for all. This is what public assistance was in America, pre-1996. The TANF Law (Temporary Assistance For Needy Families) better known as Welfare to Work, changed all that.

It’s not a question in my mind and I believe many other Americans minds, of whether we should help people, who for whatever reasons can’t fend for themselves. The question is how to we do that. Do we just give them a few hundred bucks each month and expect nothing from them other then using that money to pay their basic needs, but continue to allow them to make the same mistakes, that they’ve made and while they are on public assistance, like having kids when they aren’t ready to take care of them, having more kids, when they can’t take care of the ones they already have, using their public assistance checks to buy alcohol and other drugs, or do we instead help them help themselves, so they no longer have to live on public assistance.

Do we empower people to now have the skills to take care of themselves instead of what we’ve done in that past. The first question is what we were doing pre-1996. The 2nd question is what we’ve done ever since. This is what Classical Liberal Professor Milton Friedman was focusing on in his movie Free to Choose. And interviewed people who hate the current public assistance system and want to see it ended. People who were happy with the current system and people who were speaking in favor of the reforms that happened in 1996, that Democratic presidential nominee Michael Dukakis ran on for President in 1988.  

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Calvin King: 'Ronald Reagan- Warned Us About Barack Obama'

Source:Calvin King- Then private citizen Ronald Reagan, campaigning for Senator Barry Goldwater for President in 1964.

"How Reagan summed up Obama in the first 5 minutes of a speech over 40 years ago." 

From Calvin King

If you are ignorant and just downright so dishonest, that you'll say anything, to advance your cause and hurt people you see as opponents, or even enemies, you'll say whatever you can come up with and not let the facts get in the way of a good partisan attack. And perhaps you'll say so much that isn't true, that you'll start to believe your own nonsense. 

I use to believe that people who thought Barack Obama was a Socialist, or an African, Atheist, Muslim, (how someone can both be an Atheist and a Muslim, someone needs to explain that to me) who was born in Kenya and is an illegal immigrant, who's President of the United States: I use to think these people were purely escaped mental patients. Who volunteered for the Michele Bachmann presidential campaign.

I use to believe that people who said these things, we're just straight up making this garbage up. (To be too kind) Because they knew their followers, were ignorant enough to believe them. I mean you want to know why the American education system is in bad shape right now, all the evidence you need to see to believe that is with the people who actually believe this nonsense. (Again, to be too kind) I use to believe that the people who made these claims were simply fools, who don't know any better.

I'm sure there are plenty of those people making these charges, but they aren't the only ones. We simply still have a lot of ignorant people in this country. Who simply don't know any better, which is why they are ignorant, who make up these charges and believe them as well. And yes they are a fringe in America, but the fact is they all vote and all have loud voices in American politics. And powerful enough to get other ignorant Americans behind them.

But let's put some facts on the table just for the hell of it and maybe some ignorant people will learn something. Barack Obama born in Hawaii in August 1961, has a Hawaii birth certificate to show that. He's a practicing Christian who attends church on a regular basis. If he was a Socialist, he wouldn't of bailed out the banking and auto industries, he would've nationalized them. At least until they were ready to be independent again. And he wouldn't of cut taxes by over two-hundred-billion-dollars, but would've raised them by at least two-hundred-billion.

Americans can believe basically whatever the hell that they want to and don't have to pass an IQ test in order to do that. Which is a good thing for a lot of people who believe all of this garbage (I'm too kind) about Barack Obama and they can also say practically whatever they want to. As long as they aren't threatening to hurt people or incite violence and libeling people falsely. 

But again facts are facts and you can't argue with them, because once you do that, you are arguing against reality, trying to convince people of things that are simply false. Which is what a lot of the Far-Right is doing against Barack Obama in America. 

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CATO Institute: George Will- ‘Keynotes 2010 Milton Friedman Prize Dinner’

Source:CATO Institute- Washington Post Conservative columnist George Will, speaking at the Milton Friedman Prize Dinner, in 2010.

Source:The Daily Post 

“Pulitzer Prize winner George F. Will delivered the keynote address at the dinner for the Milton Friedman Prize for Advancing Liberty. Will was introduced by Cato Institute President and Founder Ed Crane. The dinner was held May 13, 2010.” 

From CATO Institute

George Will said in an interview with Charlie Rose in October, 2008 (a future blog post that is coming up) that, there’s a Libertarian Wing and a Social Conservative Wing in the GOP. And that the Libertarian Wing, is getting larger in the GOP thanks to Ron Paul, CATO Institute, and others ,. He’s mostly correct and I agree with most of that. I would just phrase that a little differently.

There’s a Conservative Wing and I mean Conservative across the board not statist in any sense and there’s a statist wing in the Republican Party. So-called Christian-Conservatives (Christian-fundamentalist-theocrats, in actuality)  who now make up the Christian-Right, Tea Party, and people who don’t identify themselves with either of those groups.

Thats the State of GOP today which is made up of people who believe in economic freedom, except for the right for workers to organize, religious freedom for Anglo-Saxon-Protestant-Christians, and they want big government out of our wallets, so they can get in our bedrooms and living rooms to tell us how we can live our lives, who we can sleep with, who we can marry, what we can watch on TV, and what we can listen to, what bars and clubs we can go to, etc. To a certain extent even what we can do with our own money.

Unfortunately for the Republican Party, the Christian-Fascist wing of the Republican Party is winning in the Republican Party. Which is bad for them and anyone who believes in liberal democracy and doesn’t want America to become a one-party state, which is most of us.

As we move along as a country, we are getting younger, more tolerant, more liberal, and libertarian. We are becoming a country that wants big government out of our wallets and bedrooms. Generation X and Y are perfect examples of that.

But as the changes are happening, we have Christian-Fascists who are still stuck in the John Wayne-Ozzie and Harriet’s-Beaver Cleaver’s 1950s America and haven’t figured out that color TV is common and that people like to have a good time and don’t want to be told how to live their lives. That not all Americans don’t fit in with the 1950s establishment, that we are all individuals and don’t fit into the Christian-Fascist box of what Americans are supposed to be. And that if you don’t fit in that box, which is only the size of a lunch box, that somehow you are Un-American, or Socialist.

George Will, is right about the Republican Party in the sense of the two wings that make up today’s GOP. What he would call a Libertarian Wing, that he fits in, that I would call Conservative, which is different. And a so-called Social Conservative Wing (even though they don’t believe in conserving anything) that I would call statist.

There are Christian-Fascist Republicans and are unfortunately for the Republican Party, the Statists are not only coming, but are winning in the Republican Party and are on course to put the Republican Party out of business.

Arthur Brooks: 'The Occupy Movement is Right!'

Source:American Enterprise Institute- Arthur Brooks speaking to AEI in Washington.

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From the American Enterprise Institute

I agree with Arthur Brooks that corporate America has too much influence in Washington, at least with the Federal Government and has too much power with them. Corporate America, including their banks run their companies into the ground in late 2008 and then they bailed out at taxpayer expense by the Bush Administration and that Democratic Congress. While millions of hard-working Americans, including well-educated and white-collar American workers are getting laid off and haven't recovered from that experience since and even worked for some of those bankrupted companies that got taxpayer bailouts.  

So then you have this left-wing Occupy Wall Street movement emerging in the summer and fall of 2011, when the economy is barley growing, when the U.S. Government is at risk of default, saying where are their taxpayer bailouts and why can't corporate America bail out the people who lost their jobs and went bankrupt themselves thanks to the housing crash of 2008 and being laid off because of the Great Recession. 

So I agree with Arthur Brooks that OWS has a real issue to be protesting about, but I disagree with them on how they would handle these issues. We don't need more taxes and bigger government. We need more freedom for more Americans, especially Americans who are currently struggling. Government should be empowering these folks to get back on their feet. Not raising taxes on successful people simply because they have a lot of money.

Arthur Brooks: 'True Fairness'

Source:American Enterprise Institute- Arthur Brooks speaking to AEI in Washington.

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The use of third-party photos, graphics, video clips, and/or music in this video does not constitute an endorsement from the artists and producers licensing those materials. 

AEI operates independently of any political party and does not take institutional positions on any issues. AEI scholars, fellows, and their guests frequently take positions on policy and other issues. When they do, they speak for themselves and not for AEI or its trustees or other scholars or employees." 

From the American Enterprise Institute

I agree and perhaps because I'm one of them, that Americans tend to believe in earned success. That if you have a good job and you are really good at it and as a result you make a lot of money, that you are entitled to the wealth and benefits that come from being a businessperson, investor, doctor, lawyer, entertainer, whatever it might be that gives you. along with your success the ability to live very comfortably in America. 

Where I believe Arthur Brooks and I disagree is on the concept of society and even a free society, the idea of a nation state, that we're all members of this gigantic, national club, known as the United States of America and therefor all have responsibilities, including financial, to make sure this club runs as smoothly as possible and is safe for Americans to be able to live in freedom. As well as having the ability to get around the country and for businesses to move their products to market, and to protect the innocent from predators. 

For America to work as well as possible, yes, we need the freedom to be economically successful in America, but also have to pay our fair share of what it takes to make America work and keep it as safe and free as possible for as many people to be able to live freely in America. And that's what taxes are for, even for people who make a lot of money in this country and live very freely.

Invest Bliguru: Milton Friedman's Free to Choose- 'From Cradle to Grave'

Source: The Daily Hatch- Helen Bohen O'Bannon, on Professor Milton Friedman's Free To Choose, in 1979.

“Since the Depression years of the 1930s, there has been almost continuous expansion of governmental efforts to provide for people’s welfare. First, there was a tremendous expansion of public works. The Social Security Act followed close behind. Soon other efforts extended governmental activities in all areas of the welfare sector. Growth of governmental welfare activity continued unabated, and today it has reached truly staggering proportions.

Traveling in both Britain and the U.S., Milton Friedman points out that though many government welfare programs are well intentioned, they tend to have pernicious side effects. In Dr. Friedman’s view, perhaps the most serious shortcoming of governmental welfare activities is their tendency to strip away individual independence and dignity. This is because bureaucrats in welfare agencies are placed in positions of tremendous power over welfare recipients, exercising great influence over their lives. Because people never spend someone else’s money as carefully as they spend their own, inefficiency, waste, abuse, theft, and corruption are inevitable. In addition, welfare programs tend to be self-perpetuating because they destroy work incentives. Indeed, it is often in the welfare recipients’ best interests to remain unemployed.

Dr. Friedman suggests a negative income tax as a way of helping the poor. The government would pay money to people falling below a certain income level. As they obtained jobs and earned money, they would continue to receive some payments from the government until their outside income reached a certain ceiling. This system would make people better off who sought work and earned income. This contrasts with many of today’s programs where one dollar earned means nearly one dollar lost in welfare payments.”

From Invest Bliguru

When Classical Liberal professor Milton Friedman made his Free to Choose movie in 1980, he spent one of his chapters on the public assistance system. How we treat people who can't take care of themselves. Keep in mind, Professor Friedman is a Classical Liberal and went into this film with pre-conceive ideas about our public assistance system. But he not only interviewed Libertarians, but Progressives as well as professionals who work in social welfare.

And they talked about the people who collect public assistance and what their lives are like on public assistance. And what's expected from them as they are collecting public assistance. The history of our public assistance system, from when it was created in the 1930s as part of President Roosevelt's New Deal programs. And where we were as far the effects that the War on Poverty that President Johnson created in the 1960s. And the status of where we were as a country as of 1980 when this film was made.

They were talking about what happens when we take people who don't have the skills to be able to take care of themselves. Lack the education to get a good enough job that would allow them to be self-sufficient. Especially low-income low-skilled people who have kids, but lack the ability to make enough money to be able to take care of themselves. As well as the state of our education system, not producing enough people in the country that have the skills to be able to move on to college and more skills and learn a trade. So they will be self-sufficient and not end up on public assistance in the future.

Especially people with kids that they have to obviously look after, but which makes it more difficult to them to go to school. And get the skills that they need, so they can get themselves a good job and to be able to take care of themselves. And their families and not have to return back to public assistance in the future. Professor Friedman's, main point when it comes to public assistance, that I agree with, is that is you give people money, who can't take care of themselves and you expect nothing from the in the future other than spending what little money you give them to be able to take care of themselves, that they'll remain poor.

If you give people more money, to pay for their food and rent, then you are essentially rewarding them for not getting the skills that they need to be successful in life. But if you reward them to go out and get the skills that they need to be able to take care of themselves and even demand that they do, then they'll do that in return.  

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CNBC: Dick Cavett Show- William F. Buckley (1995)

Source:CNBC- Dick Cavett interviewing one of the founding father's of the American classical conservative movement in 1995, William F. Buckley.

Dick Cavett after his ABC show went off the air in the 1970s, came back in the 1990s with a new talk show, but this time on CNBC, which is owned by NBC News. And he interviewed someone who I believe is one of the founding father’s of the American classical conservative movement in William F. Buckley, who was still the publisher and contributor for the conservative Firing Line Magazine in 1995. Unfortunately there are no links or videos for that interview online right now. 

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