Economic Hypochondria

I love this term used by George Will:
"Economic hypochondria, a derangement associated with affluence, is a byproduct of the welfare state: An entitlement mentality gives Americans a low pain threshold -- witness their recurring hysterias about nominal rather than real gasoline prices -- and a sense of being entitled to economic dynamism without the frictions and "creative destruction'' that must accompany dynamism. Economic hypochondria is also bred by news media that consider the phrase "good news'' an oxymoron, even as the U.S. economy, which has performed better than any other major industrial economy since 2001, drives the Dow to record highs."

The fact of the matter is, the economy is doing well. Revenues are way up. Unemployment is down. Bush's tax cuts are working. They're not working because Bush is an economic genius, but because he understands the very basic principle that lower taxes = economic stimulation. Yes, as difficult as it is for people to understand, tax cuts really DO translate into increased revenue.

Unfortunately there's this other thing going on in Iraq that is causing lots of problems and (more than) offsetting the revenue gains...

My other favorite part of Will's piece:
"Worst economy since Herbert Hoover,'' said John Kerry in 2004, while that year's growth (3.9 percent) was adding to America's GDP the equivalent of the GDP of Taiwan (the 19th-largest economy). Nancy Pelosi vows that if Democrats capture Congress they will "jump-start our economy.'' A "jump-start '' is administered to a stalled vehicle. But since the Bush tax cuts went into effect in 2003, the economy's growth rate (3.5 percent) has been better than the average for the 1980s (3.1) and 1990s (3.3). Today's unemployment rate (4.6 percent) is lower than the average for the 1990s (5.8) -- lower, in fact, than the average for the last 40 years (6.0). Some stall."

(more) Liberal Censorship

Conservatives often get accused of wanting to censor. Some of it is deserved, I guess. After all, we think it's a bad idea to make porn freely available to children, and many conservatives (not this one particularly) are intent on keeping people from burning our nation's symbol. I guess you could call that censorship. However, the stereotype of conservatives being the stronghold of censorship has outlasted its basis in any reality. See this great piece by Peggy Noonan.

YouTube Censorship

Apparently, YouTube's in no big hurry to block porn, but they move pretty quickly to remove that insidious conservative satire:

"Sexually suggestive videos were found on the site unblocked, as were entire episodes of television shows. So was a clip from a movie depicting the assassination of President Bush, 'Death of a President.'"