My commenter Marc lives in London and said that he appreciated the subsidies and wished Johnson had kept them; while I agree that they could be helpful to some Londoners, I maintain that the average Venezuelan is a lot poorer than even the poorest Londoner and Venezuela needs to help its own befere giving away handouts to others. Chavez was quite plainly and obviously trying to gain a better international image for himself and willing to use his people’s money to do it, and his various giveaways were not popular with his people back home.

Here is news out a few days ago which indicates that Chavez does, in fact, need to worry less about 11-year-olds being able to take buses in London and more worried about providing basic services to his own people with their country’s oil windfall.

Despite having some of the world’s largest energy reserves, Venezuela is increasingly struggling to maintain basic electrical service, a growing challenge for leftist President Hugo Chavez.

The OPEC nation has suffered three nationwide blackouts this year, and chronic power shortages have sparked protests from the western Andean highlands to San Felix, a city of mostly poor industrial workers in the sweltering south.

Shoddy electrical service is now one of Venezuelans’ top concerns, according to a recent poll, and may be a factor in elections next month for governors and mayors in which Chavez allies are expected to lose key posts, in part on complaints of poor services.

The problem suggests that Chavez, with his ambitious international alliances and promises to end capitalism, risks alienating supporters by failing to focus on basic issues like electricity, trash collection and law enforcement.

‘With so much energy in Venezuela, how can we be without power?’ asked Fernando Aponte, 49, whose slum neighborhood of Las Delicias in San Felix spent 15 days without electricity — leading him to block a nearby avenue with burning tires in protest.

Just next door, Carmen Fernandez, 82, who is blind and has a pacemaker, says she has trouble sleeping through sultry nights without even a fan to cool her.”

Londoners may not have as many free rides on the Tube or discounted Oyster cards, but at least they have access to electricity. Not to mention electricity to power the Tube.

That’s almost enough to make me want to vote for Ralph Nader.

Who, eight years ago, could have predicted that Al Gore’s right-hand sidekick Lieberman would be one of the biggest backers of the GOP ticket in 2008, with Powell not far behind espousing how great the Democratic nominee is? (Meanwhile, Joe Biden doesn’t know what he’s saying, as usual.)

It’s too bad that the Powell-Obama and Lieberman-McCain non-partisan lovefests have come about for the pettiest of reasons: Powell is upset that Bush made him look like a fool in front of the world at the UN. Lieberman is upset that Democrats didn’t support him in his primary race against Ned Lamont in Connecticut after he came out and supported the Iraq War so strongly. Does either really have America’s best interests at heart, or are each looking forward to their respective Cabinet appointments in Obama and McCain administrations?

(I long ago lost most of my respect for Colin Powell– who couldn’t have with his appearance before the United Nations? This is also the man keeping gays out of the military.)

If I were Obama, I would therefore be less proud about getting Powell’s endorsement and revel in the endorsement of London mayor Boris Johnson, who is a libertarian (on some issues, at least) and a former Tory member of Parliament. In other words, this is not necessarily an obvious person to stump for Obama. Johnson defeated “Red Ken” Livingstone for the office of mayor earlier this year, and that’s enough for me to love him forever. But he’s also one of those politicians I wish America had, one who can say what he really thinks and still get elected. What a concept.

Anyway, what Boris thinks now is that Obama should be elected for many of the same reasons I’ve mentioned in favor of Obama’s candidacy: the rest of the world will respect it, the Republicans haven’t earned it, McCain has offered little reason to think he can do better, and electing a black man would show the rest of the world that America is truly an accepting place. I agree these are good reasons, but none of them have to do with Obama directly. Johnson obviously respects McCain, but is mostly basing this on the current Republican administration in general. He doesn’t like Obama’s policies and says he hopes that his tax plan is blocked by Congress (I wouldn’t count on that). Melanie Phillips of The Spectator responds that Boris has succumbed to “Neocon Derangement Syndrome”:

How else to explain the fact that for paragraph after paragraph he exults that an Obama victory will be a triumph for black people because he is black – only to conclude that such a victory will demonstrate that being black is a total irrelevance?!

Johnson writes in his Obama endorsement:

It would be tough for any candidate to receive the Republican baton from Dubya, and McCain can be proud of doing as well as he is.

His chief problem is that he does not seem to offer any hope of repair to those American ideals.

Or, to put it another way, it is not clear how America under McCain would recover her standing in the eyes of the world.

Sure, Obama might be a socialist who ruins the health care landscape for aspiring medical doctors like myself. But, even if he’s really bad, it’ll be a different kind of bad than we’ve had the last eight years.

That certainly is the best reason to vote for Obama, and it’s a difficult one to argue against; Radley Balko agrees.

“The time has come for perhaps a different approach to the internet. I want to even up that see-saw, even up the regulation [imbalance] between the old and the new.”

“It is not just about copyright or intellectual property but [things like] taste and decency in the online world. The time will come to say what are the direct interventions [needed, if any].”

Hat tip to Guido.

And as soon as I post this, they’re up to something else as well: requiring ID cards to purchase cell phones.

What’s next from the UK, and when will it make its way over the pond?

Why not make it means-tested?

Why should rich people get Social Security? When I ask people this, they reply that “We all pay into it, we should all get something out of it.” But we all pay taxes and we don’t all get food stamps, day care subsidies, Medicare or government kickbacks like some people do, do we? Why should we all get Social Security even if we all pay into it?

Any time I hear an argument for keeping Social Security, it involves helping poor elderly people, not sending checks to Robert Redford or Clint Eastwood.

So why should a rich person get Social Security? They’re rich. They don’t need it. Money is going from poor kids fresh out of college– and even teenagers working hard to buy their first car, or save up for college– straight into the bank accounts of Warren Buffett and Carl Icahn and that rich kid you knew in high school’s grandma down the road. In many cases, it’s going from a middle-class grandchild straight to their affluent grandma in Florida.

If you don’t think Social Security is in trouble, take a look at one of the Democrats’ plans for fixing it that failed in 2004-2005, because people don’t want to face up to reality:

I believed Social Security wasn’t in much trouble at all–just needed a few “tweaks”–until I looked at the tweaks the Two Peters were proposing. In addition to the benefit cuts outline above, Diamond and Orszag have the current 12.4 percent Social Security payroll tax rising to 15.4 percent in 2078 and continuing to rise “slowly over time thereafter.” Even if the Medicare tax is kept at its current 2.9 percent (a seeming impossibility) that means total FICA payroll taxes in excess of 18%. You want to try to finance universal health care on top of that? I don’t.

If Democrats want to know what a benefit cut that really zings the rich looks like, they should go to Australia, where (last time I checked) the top quarter of recipients gets no benefits at all. Zero. The bottom half gets full benefits. The people in between get in between. Now that’s a means test! Not coincidentally, after means-testing was introduced in the 1980s, Australia’s pension system cost a little more than half what ours costs, in terms of GDP.

Some people are dead-set against this idea. For instance, according to the “misguided demagogue” Saul Friedman, Max Skidmore wrote in his book, Securing America’s Future:

“Means-testing Social Security would change its nature and destroy the system. Universal coverage, regardless of need, is one of Social Security’s strong points. Millionaires do receive benefits, but they also pay into the system. Their benefits represent a smaller return on what they pay than do the benefits of lower-paid workers… Building in ‘need’ as a criterion to qualify for benefits would require the majority of Americans to contribute for a lifetime to a program from which they could draw no benefits.”

In other words, they don’t get back nearly what they paid in, but if we didn’t send checks to these millionaires, the system would be destroyed? How does that make any sense?

They’re already getting a bum deal by not getting back what they paid into the system, and they already pay far more in taxes above and beyond that for things they’ll never use– Medicare, state taxes for welfare and public transit and all those things that rich people have no need for. Is Medicare destroyed by not giving it to everyone? Is public transit destroyed because more people pay for it than use it? I don’t follow this argument.

Skidmore also wants to lift the income cutoff for paying Social Security taxes and dedicate death taxes to the Social Security fund… so he wants rich people to still get their “benefits,” but pay millions more dollars more into the system. How is that more fair to rich people than just telling them they won’t get benefits at all?

Since Hillary gave up, Obama has lost his luster for me. He doesn’t bring any sort of change I or any self-respecting libertarian can really believe in. The Wall Street Journal lays out some of the reasons succinctly.

Now, of course we also come to the other side of the coin. History teaches us that George W. Bush talked a good game in 2000 (no nation-building, Americans aren’t the police officers of the world, smaller government is good, etc.) and if you went on substance rather than style and voted for the idiot, you were voting for someone who immediately jettisoned his campaign promises and increased the size of government more than any Democrat in at least 40 years. He doubled the size of some government agencies (including the Department of Education), introduced the largest entitlement program since the beginning of Medicare with the Medicare prescription drug “benefit,” and wasted trillions of taxpayer dollars using America to act as 911 for the world. Al Gore is a real small government guy compared to W.

So now, do we trust Obama- who seems like he can think through things and maybe listen to the other side, although he never actually votes that way– or McCain, whom some have called “the most reliable Democrat” in the Senate and someone who thinks we should spend 100 years in Iraq, someone who actually has reached out to the other side, even if a little bit too much.

McCain once said he didn’t know as much about economics as he should, something that is true about almost all Americans including myself; Obama doesn’t know that much about economics, either, but he doesn’t admit it, so on that respect I think McCain seems more forthright about his weaknesses and more willing to surround himself with advisers who do know what they’re talking about.

Is Obama going to “reach across the aisle” as he likes to say and give us libertarians anything to cheer about? Is McCain going to reach across the aisle too much and give us nothing?

This is why a libertarian– even in a swing state– might be better off keeping a clear conscience and voting for Bob Barr.

One thing the polished Miss Williams did buy into, something that seems to be gaining traction in the progressive hivemind, is the promise of “green jobs.” Senator Obama talked about green jobs and the promise of a new energy economy. I posited that government’s bipartisan management of ethanol, a single energy product, has been so clownish and corrupt as to bring into question goverment’s ability to manage an entire energy economy, one that will presumably have lots of products, many of them more complex than corn-gas, and most of which presumably do not yet exist. I ask if this gives Miss Williams pause. It gives her none. Her response, which is expected, is that if only we get the right people into office, government will be good at doing things that government has never been good at doing before. She really, really seems to believe this when she says it. Sen. Obama seems to believe it, too. I ask Miss Williams how the government should go about bringing us into the clear bright day of green jobs. She answers: training. I ask her if she means that the government should begin training people for jobs that do not exist. She answers in the affirmative. She smiles.

Update: Excellent article from “Reason” on the problems with Obama saying he’ll create green jobs.

Joe the Plumber is the perfect messenger: he’s not a Wall Street banker or a lawyer or even a doctor. His name is actually Joe, and he provides an important, if un-glamourous, service: plumbing. No one becomes a plumber because they want to be a millionaire, although I’m sure plumbing, like garbage collecting, can help someone earn a good living because there’s less competition in people who want to take on the job.

Those who are criticizing Joe as a wealthy man who needs to hand over his dough to other Americans (as is the case with the New York Times’ Caucus comment section seem to think Joe is making his work visits in limos and relaxing, sipping champagne while he’s fixing people’s plumbing. The man says he wants to save for his son’s college education and works 10 to 12 hours a day to do so (and by the time his son gets to college, the price tag for tuition will be so over-inflated that he might in fact need that entire $250,000 a year to pay it).

Joe the Plumber (actually Joe Wurzelbacher of Ohio) wants to buy a business, see– he doesn’t have the business now, he just wants to buy it and would be making “payments for years” on it– and he’s hoping the profits would be more than the $250,000 threshold for Obama’s tax cuts. If it is, his taxes will go up and a lot of that profit will be gone, when he’s just trying to fix people’s plumbing, make a living for his family, and save for his son’s college education. A tax increase means he won’t be able to hire other plumbers on– creating those jobs Obama is always talking about– and he won’t be able to buy a new truck– helping those American car companies Obama is always catering to in Detroit.

In other words, he might not be able to buy the business at all.

… I’m planning on purchasing this company – it’s not something I’m gonna purchase outright, it’s something I’m going to have to make payments on for years – but essentially I’m going to buy this company, and the profits generated by that could possibly put me in that tax bracket he’s talking about and that bothers me. It’s not like I would be rich; I would still just be a working plumber. I work hard for my money, and the fact that he thinks I make a little too much that he just wants to redistribute it to other people. Some of them might need it, but at the same time, it’s not their discretion to do it – it’s mine.

Joe says about himself:

you know, my big thing is the American Dream. I work hard. You know, I was poor; my mom raised me and my brother by herself for a very long time until my dad came along. So I know what it’s like to suffer. It’s not like I was born with a silver spoon… Eventually – I mean, just to sound a little silly here, but you need rich people. I mean, who are you going to work for?

You start giving people stuff, and then they start expecting it – and that scares me. A lot of people expect it now. They get upset when their check’s late, they get upset when they don’t get as many benefits as they used to, or when different government agencies are cut or spending is cut here and there for whatever reason – people get upset at that. And that’s because they’re used to getting it and they want more. I mean, everyone’s always gonna want more. People work the system left and right to get more out of welfare, to get more out of state assistance, federal assistance. And if government’s there for them, they’re gonna keep on trying to manipulate it to get more out of it. You got people that come along and say, “Hey, I wanna help you people,” I mean, they’re all ears! They’re like, “Hey, you can help me more, I don’t have to work as hard, I don’t have to do as much, and you’re gonna give me this? Man, that’s great, you’re a good guy.”

That is essentially what is wrong with our politics and the fundamental problem with a government such as the one we have– the tendency will always be towards bigger government, although that is not necessarily the best way to go for the long run.

So yeah, it goes down the socialist – His healthcare plan scares me. You know, I don’t like people going without healthcare, but it’s not my job to pay for everyone else’s healthcare. It’s hard enough paying for my own. I like the idea of deregulation as far as – nationally, you know, you only get insurance companies that can work in this state – if you deregulate that then you have more people competing and then the prices would go lower. It seems pretty simple to me. It probably isn’t that simple – but you flood the market with more products, usually they go down cheaper.

With just a few paragraphs, Joe has proven himself to be better at understanding basic economic facts than even a Nobel Prize-winning economist like Paul Krugman; he essentially expounded on many of the best and basic reasons why a free market economy, with rare exception, works better than a regulated, planned, socialist one: we need rich people because we all need to aspire to something. Ask anyone in this country if they want to be rich or not, and overwhelmingly they’ll say they do. Sure, some genuinely might not care, but if given the choice, we’d pretty much all prefer to be wealthy, and that’s what keeps us plumbing and garbage collecting and teaching and nursing and selling real estate. We all have the chance to be wealthy, if we work hard enough at something we’re good at. That’s why Joe the Plumber works 10 to 12 hours a day, and it’s why anyone would work 10 to 12 hours a day.

Regulation is usually ineffective and devastates competition, thereby decreasing choices for consumers and quality of services and products.

And what is Joe the Plumber’s idea of the American Dream?

Me personally, my American Dream was to have a house, a dog, a couple rifles, a bass boat. I believe in living life easy and simple. I don’t have grand designs. I don’t want much. I just wanna be able to take care of my family and do things with them outdoors and that’s about it, really. I don’t have a “grand scheme” thing. My American Dream is just more personal to me as far as working, making a good living and being able to provide for my family, college for my son. Things like that – simple things in life, that’s really what it comes down to for me. That’s my dream.

This guy deserves a New York Times column.

Anyway, here’s an economist’s summary of the last debate:

The debate was truly awful. The financial crisis was caused by greed (McCain) and deregulation (Obama). We need energy independence. Our priority is to do everything at once (McCain). We will cut spending by spending more (Obama). We can create jobs.

Let me ignore the rest, and focus on jobs. We can create jobs by getting rid of computers and going back to carbon paper for communication and paper and pencil for arithmetic. We can create jobs by getting rid of electric motors and going back to human power to run factories. As long as wants are unlimited, you don’t need to create jobs.

If the candidates were out to correct economic ignorance instead of pandering to it, the debate would not resemble last night’s in any way. There was no winner. Only losers.