"Changing the 'Establishment'"

Saturday night the candidates--especially the Democrats--seemed to sing that tired song loud and long. Me? I was changing the channel back to Jags-Steelers. Anyway, here's George Will, calling it like I see it:

Huckabee fancies himself persecuted by the Republican "establishment". . . .
Huckabee says that "only one explanation" fits his Iowa success "and it's not
a human one. It's the same power that helped a little boy with two fish and five
loaves feed a crowd of 5,000 people." God so loves Huckabee's politics that He
worked a Midwest miracle on his behalf? Should someone so delusional control
nuclear weapons?

Speaking of delusions, Edwards seems unaware that the world
market sets the price of oil. He says a $100-a-barrel price is evidence of --
surging demand in India and China? Unrest in Nigeria's oil fields? No,
"corporate greed." That is Edwards's explanation of every unpleasantness.

Although Huckabee and Edwards profess to loathe and vow to
change Washington's culture, each would aggravate its toxicity.

Each overflows with and wallows in the pugnacity of the self-righteous who discern contemptible motives behind all disagreements with them and who therefore think that opponents are enemies and differences are unsplittable . . . .

The way to achieve Edwards's and Huckabee's populist goal of
reducing the role of "special interests," meaning money, in government is to
reduce the role of government in distributing money.

A Christma$ Story

From Lew Rockwell, "The Economic Lessons of Bethlehem" at LewRockwell.com:

"His inn was full, but he offered them what he had: the stable. There is no mention that the innkeeper charged the couple even one copper coin, though given his rights as a property owner, he certainly could have.

It’s remarkable, then, to think that when the Word was made flesh with the birth of Jesus, it was through the intercessory work of a private businessman. Without his assistance, the story would have been very different indeed. People complain about the 'commercialization' of Christmas, but clearly commerce was there from the beginning, playing an essential and laudable role.

And yet we don’t even know the innkeeper’s name. In two thousand years of celebrating Christmas, tributes today to the owner of the inn are absent. Such is the fate of the merchant throughout all history: doing well, doing good, and forgotten for his service to humanity."