WIN Failed, But Government Cheese Won

Losing WIN, and Feeding the Poor:
Ford, Carter & Reagan have important lessons to teach us.

Remember Gerald Ford, and his WIN — “Whip Inflation Now” — campaign?

 

It was a failure.

The two premises of that effort — encouraging increased individual savings, and reducing personal spending — were not merely ineffectual, they were also justifiably ridiculed because they did absolutely nothing to lower prices.

 

In a TRULY free market economy, not only is government allowed to compete, but prices, as others and I have continually said, are controlled by the seller, NOT the buyer. The SELLER is the one setting prices. 

 

For example, if Exxon Mobil, British Petroleum, Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell, Marathon, Valero, and Phillips 66 (in the TOP 10 largest oil companies globally by revenue) were to reduce by 25% their consumer prices of gasoline & diesel fuel (and, they could), that would significantly change, at least on some level, the volume of sales/consumption. 

 

Yet the study of economics also tells us that merely lowering prices will not always increase consumption to a certain price level. Consider bananas; if more folks ate more bananas, their prices ~might~ decline, but only modestly, and certainly not by 25%.

 

Though agricultural production has some similarities to industrial production, it fundamentally relies upon a renewable resource to satisfy demand (including an often-fickle, and increasingly angry and uncooperative Mother Nature), where as oil does not, because petroleum is a finite resource.

 

And THAT is PRECISELY WHY others and I maintain that establishing a windfall profits tax (WPT) could be used to help consumers -and- companies that rely upon petroleum for their existence, because it would return TO THE PEOPLE a ~fraction~ of the excessive portion of the rapacious profit made by Big Oil companies which are paid to their executives, overlords, and Wall Street wheeler-dealer shareholders.

 

• Congress first enacted a WPT in 1917 which ranged from

Former Vice President Walter “Fritz” Mondale Has Died

Former Vice President Walter F. Mondale, photographed at his Mill District condo on April 30, 2019, in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

In 2007, former-Vice President Walter “Fritz” Mondale (1928-2021) was asked to describe his proudest accomplishment in President Jimmy Carter’s administration.

He said, “We told the truth, we obeyed the law, and we kept the peace. It may not sound like much, but if you’ve got that, you can handle the rest.”

Fritz Mondale died peacefully in his sleep, April 19, 2021, of natural causes, surrounded by family, at his Minneapolis, Minnesota home, aged 93.

President Biden acknowledged Mondale’s passing in remarks made from the White House, and said in part that,

“Through his work as a Senator, he showed me what was possible. He may have been modest and unassuming in manner, but he was unwavering in his pursuit of progress; instrumental in passing laws like the Fair Housing Act to prevent racial discrimination in housing, Title IX to provide more opportunities for women, and laws to protect our environment. There have been few senators, before or since, who commanded such universal respect.

“He not only created a path for himself, he helped others do the same. Walter Mondale was the first presidential nominee of either party to select a woman as his running mate, and I know how pleased he was to be able to see Kamala Harris become Vice President.

“In accepting the Democratic Party’s nomination for President, he described the values he was taught to live by: “to play by the rules; to tell the truth; to obey the law; to care for others; to love our country; to cherish our faith.”

“As a Senator, an Ambassador, a Vice President, and a candidate for President, he lived and spread those values.”

Then-former Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter, LEFT, and Vice Presidential running mate Minnesota Senator Walter Mondale celebrate Democratic primary victories at Mondale campaign headquarters in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on March 13, 1984.

Walter Mondale made history by being the first candidate of any party to name a female as a Vice Presidential running mate.

He chose