Horning Economic Plan

While they’ve not granted me nearly as much coverage as they’ve bequeathed to entrenched-party candidates, my hat is nonetheless off to WTHR-13 in Indianapolis who, at least this once, covered one of my press conferences.  Here’s a story the other media missed (Thank you, Kevin Rader), and here’s a copy of the press conference handout that WTHR actually linked to their website:

Politicians have been protecting themselves, their cronies and their money for so long that their whole robbing-Peter-to-pay-Paul scheme is on the verge of collapse – and they’re taking us all with them.  This is not good.  But we still have time to prevent the worst.

In the 2000 gubernatorial race I said we should cut government spending by 7% per year, push back against Washington, DC’s profligacy, and restore the legitimacy and practicality of constitutional governance in order to prepare for the financial crisis now upon us.

Now we must act more quickly and aggressively.  It is perhaps too late to avoid pain, but we still have great opportunities.

Indeed, we can become the Switzerland of the USA if we only insist upon the constitutions to which every politician has already sworn an oath of obedience:

 

1. Cut property tax by at least 50%.  This would be done mostly by removing public school costs from personal property tax, as Article 8, Section 2 already requires. 
2. Forbid the foreclosures and usurious tax lien sales on residences driven by property tax (see Article I, Section 22 of the Indiana Constitution).   
3. Unconstitutional spending must stop immediately!  There will be no more corporate subsidies, as such are forbidden by Article 11, Section 12.  Article 10, Section 5 forbids most bond issues.  And Article 13, Section 1 forbids much of the state’s debts.  And instead of embracing the costly mandates and taxes from the thieves in DC, we must insist upon the federalism mandated by both state and federal constitutions.
4. Invoke the Sound Money policy described in Article 11, Section 3 of the Indiana Constitution.  We now have the technology to quickly acquire gold and silver as backing for this marketable trade currency (see http://www.goldmoneybill.org/), and to verify a sound yet profitable fractional reserve for safe lending practices.
5. We must reactivate the voluntary service organizations that were once the heart, soul and helping hands of this nation.  I would do my level best to encourage voluntary organizations (churches, Lion’s Clubs, women’s service groups) to roll up their sleeves, put out a call for new members and get busy.  Government will no longer compete with these groups, and will instead get out of the way.
6. Rule of Law.  It should now be evident that politicians must be kept to their oaths and kept on a leash.  We need politicians to concentrate on their real, valid, necessary jobs to keep peace and security.  I would focus government on the protection of our property, rights and lives as though government has no other job.

 

Our current crop of politicians has chosen to inflate the “bubble” even more, rather than to fix the problems now.  They’ve chosen to more deeply mortgage our future when we can no longer afford that.  At best, their promises have failed.  More likely, they’ve lied to us.  It’s up to voters to fix this by firing the liars, cheats and thieves, and by choosing a better, legal, proven course for this nation.

 

Andy Horning

Freedom, Indiana

We must now act quickly…

“To combat the depression by a forced credit expansion is to attempt to cure the evil by the very means which brought it about; because we are suffering from a misdirection of production, we want to create further misdirection–a procedure that can only lead to a much more severe crisis as soon as the credit expansion comes to an end.”  – Friedrich August von Hayek, Introduction to “Monetary Theory and the Trade Cycle,” 1932

 

Hayek won a Nobel Prize for his work explaining what caused, worsened and prolonged the Great Depression.  “Austrian School” economists have ever since warned us about what’s now unfolding before us as an even greater socioeconomic catastrophe. 

 

Putting this into a political perspective, Libertarians have been right and the other parties have been wrong.  Americans have believed the proven nonsense of the entrenched powers to our undoing.

 

Putting this into still another perspective; you are the victim of highly organized crime.  You’ve been robbed, and the theft will continue until you stop it.

 

OK, so now what?

 

First, as Hayek pleaded, we must stop misdirecting the markets; and by extension, we must stop voting for/empowering those who’ve misdirected the markets.  Fire the thieves/cheats/liars.  You must.

 

Next, we must prepare for some tough times.  As I’d warned in the 2000 gubernatorial bid, “We’ve had our years of plenty, and now we must prepare for the years of hard times.”  And we have far less time now than we had in 2000!

 

As an immediate measure, I propose massive budget cuts, refusal of unfunded/underfunded “federal” mandates, and reactivation of voluntary social services (churches, fraternal organizations).

 

I also propose we immediately invoke the Indiana Constitution’s Article 11 with a currency backed by gold or silver, to immunize Hoosiers against the deflation/collapse of the dollar.

 

Here’s Section 7: “All bills or notes issued as money shall be, at all times, redeemable in gold or silver; and no law shall be passed, sanctioning, directly or indirectly, the suspension, by any bank or banking company of specie payments.”

 

This Sound Money Proposal can be implemented by electronic/virtual acquisition of assets such as described at http://www.goldmoneybill.org/.

 

We’d better do this fast…

 

 

 

 

Nobody likes “I Told You So”

Here is a younger, much skinnier Andy saying pretty much the same things I’m saying today…and predicting the troubles that you see unfolding before your eyes:

http://www.c-spanarchives.org/library/includes/templates/library/flash_popup.php?pID=159324-1&clipStart=&clipStop=

If we had cut the budget by 7% per year as I’d proposed back then, we’d be in good shape today.  Now I’m afraid it’s too late for gradual cutting.

I really, really hope I’m wrong about what’s about to smack us upside the head.

I’ve never so badly wanted to be wrong.