Short-Term Solidarity

The labor union movement has sounded the alarm for action as a result of the spark in Wisconsin. As the public sector groups protest the proposals of Governor Walker and the GOP, many private sector unions have chosen to join them as proof of “worker solidarity.” All over the nation public and private unions are linking arms to “prevent the exploitation of the working class.” Too late. The very fact that so many workers appear at these protests is evidence of their exploitation by their leaders…the union bosses. Many of us are familiar with the socialist/communist roots of the early labor movement. Based on Marx’s “workers of the world unite” and his proletariat revolution, the leftist leanings of the movement have been suppressed but never totally extinguished. The organized labor movement has arrived at a fork in the road in Madison, Wisconsin, and neither path promises a rosy outcome for the membership.

Across the country on Saturday and in many places around the globe, the labor movement has demonstrated that it will not tolerate any attempt to deny what it demands. Whatever the leaders of the movement fail to detect is that their loud and violent protests may lead to their further decline. Imagine if you will, that a snake lays an egg, and when the egg hatches, the newly emerged baby snake consumes its mother. Perhaps you prefer the praying mantis analogy. After breeding the female chomps the head off the male. Either of these illustrations could provide the scene that may occur when public sector unions overwhelm the private sector ones. Private sector unions have long promoted increasing government’s size and reach. Primarily through the electoral process they have supported candidates and issues that have been committed to a larger more intrusive public sector. For the world-wide Marxist movement the efforts have been incrementally successful, and the domestic unions—leaders and members—have advanced the agenda with gusto.

Rough estimates indicate that around 7% of the United States’ work force belongs to private sector unions. The decline in union membership and influence has been dramatic. On the other hand, the public sector union membership has been ballooning so rapidly that it now approaches the private sector number. Accelerated growth of government at all levels leads to a massive increase in public sector union membership and power. The erosion of the private sector unions has prompted their leaders and organizers to become more aggressive with their efforts to expand and organize the public realm. Common sense dictates that if you want union efficacy, you go where the jobs are being created…of government, by government and for government. Hmmm…sounds like a speech from dishonest Abe, patron saint of government control. Union leaders understand power and how to use it. Add to their awareness the historic purpose of the labor movement, and it makes sense for the union leadership to be supportive of public sector employee organizations. For private sector union members in the U.S the issues may not be so clearly defined.

The membership of the private sector unions are people, workers. They are taxpayers. It has been noted throughout the public union protests that the “goodie packages” for them are generally much better than for their private sector cohorts. In addition there has been an immense amount of pressure on the private sector units to concede some of their earlier gains in order for their companies to survive. As their membership dwindles and their benefit packages become less gaudy, the members see the public sector…the AFSCME members, the NEA and AFT members…clamoring for more and dismissing concessions as a strategy. On the one hand the private sector members may wish to encourage the public employees, but on the other hand the private sector members realize that it’s their taxes that pay for the government employees. It is their taxes that underwrite failing schools. Their tax payments provide the funds for the indifferent and impolite clerk at the DMV. They will comprehend that as the public sector becomes larger and more powerful, it will cost them a lot more money…and more liberty.

Many thanks to Fred LeFebvre of “Fred LeFebvre and the Morning News”, WSPD-1370AM, Toledo. Fred planted the seed for this column with a good-natured rant early Thursday morning February 24^th. Also many kudos to the columnists at www.LewRockwell.com  who have nibbled on the edges of this phenomenon. The private sector union leaders will forge on in the public sector, but their members will wise up and reject their nudging, pushing, threats and promises. The union label may be fading.

Comments:  cearlwriting@hotmail.com    or   www.littlestuff-minoosha.blogspot.com

Face Book:  www.facebook.com/pages/Earl-for-Ohio/

  

Border Line

Today’s column addresses an issue that I haven’t previously written about on these pages…our southern border. As a Libertarian, I support, in the purest sense, the notion that restricting borders is antithetical to liberty. True freedom includes the right to move about without constraint as long as an individual respects the lives and property of others. Aha! There’s the rub. As a Libertarian, I believe that an individual owns his/her own life, labor and property…otherwise identified as free will. Libertarians also subscribe to the foundational precept that the initiation of force is an anathema. We do not oppose a  fast, furious and final response when we are threatened or assaulted, but we adamantly oppose the use of force to impose one’s will (see IRS, ATF, DEA and a host of others).

To get our arms around the situation on our southern border (and northern, too), I’ll arbitrarily identify four groups of illegal border crossers. The first represents those Mexicans, Central Americans and South Americans who risk arrest to enter the United States for employment and opportunity. We’ll call them…the ants. The second cluster of people sneaks into our country to take advantage of the generous social welfare system. We’ll label them …the roaches. A third element of illegal immigration includes smugglers and their mules—drugs, guns, any contraband. These are multiple lawbreakers and are potentially dangerous. (We’ll deal with the drug issue in a later column). We’ll identify this group as the tarantulas. A final group includes those from all over the world who enter the United States with the sole intent to do harm to our citizens and their property. They are the scorpions.

Now we have the new border crossing taxonomy for illegal entrants into the United States. We have two insects and two arachnids, but because they all look like bugs, that’s close enough. You’ll note that the “ant” has historically been identified as a worker whereas the cockroach is a dirty disease carrier that avoids the daylight. The tarantula and the scorpion possess lethal capacity and are never to be trusted…or fondled. For the moment I’d like to concentrate on the overview of the issue.

First, because of the tarantulas and scorpions, it is vital that our borders be secured. No “ifs, ands or buts.” For decades the federal government has been derelict in its duty of providing a national defense. When borders as large as ours are so porous that nearly anyone can sneak into the country, the Congress, the Executive branch and the federal judiciary have committed impeachable offenses given the tenor of the times. Instead, the government has focused its efforts on the general population at large by severely restricting OUR freedoms through such devices as the Patriot Act and overzealous body groping by the TSA. Clearly the government is more willing to control our citizens than it is committed to limiting the access of nefarious killers who would do us harm. These priorities must be addressed and reversed. When any of these dangerous characters is apprehended, justice should be swift and firm.

My remedy for the issue of southern border leakage is to first SECURE THE BORDER. If we would close the bulk of our military bases in some 140 countries around the world and bring those troops back home, they could be deployed with the respective state guard organizations. The re-deployed regulars could be sent to theater (another column), and the guard could come home. With the guard as the primary lead force on the border, posse commitatus ceases to be the major legal concern. Also the wall/fence/barrier must be built. Plant land mines, if necessary.

Stop the benefits…immediately. Understandably if individual states and communities wish to continue providing benefits for “undocumented aliens,” they can do so…without any federal assistance whether direct, indirect or fungible. The responsibility must remain wholly within the entity that chooses to subsidize illegals. Also, the anchor baby program should be abolished along with the ability to invite extended family members. These measures should go a long way toward addressing the issues of the cockroaches.

Finally, wait a reasonable length of time…perhaps a year or so. At that point we should re-examine the situation. If we continue to have twelve to twenty million illegal aliens in country, then more stringent measures may be necessary. If, on the other hand, the illegal population becomes much smaller and the vast majority of those here are productive contributors, then a legitimate and restrictive pathway to citizenship could be devised. The ants would be given an opportunity to participate as citizens in our free-market country.

This is not a perfect solution. In fact if government were to adopt it, they most certainly would do it imperfectly. Government is incompetent and thoughtless. But if they were to implement this plan, we might be somewhat safer and the costs for our social services could be somewhat lower. Perhaps.

Comment:  cearlwriting@hotmail.com    or    www.littlestuff-minoosha.blogspot.com

Face Book:  www.facebook.com/pages/Earl-for-Ohio/

Outsourcing Government

There is some discussion these days about the concept of privatizing government services. Government at all levels has grown too large. While never recognized as efficient, the bloated public sector has taken ineffective inefficiency to new heights of incompetency. Added to the many failures to perform are the spiraling costs associated with the government’s involvement in so many aspects of our lives. Privatization, therefore, has emerged from the closets and cloakrooms of power and is now considered a potential option for governments and taxpayers under siege. Hold your horses! Privatization as envisioned by some governmental entities is not the perfect answer. As a disciple of free market capitalism, I tremble as I make this assertion.

Do you have cable television service? Are you generally pleased with it, or are there times when you would rather go back to the forty-foot antenna with limited channels? Your cable provider usually is a private company, but they have a monopoly to provide the service within the jurisdiction of the entity who issues the contract. In other words, cable may be available from a private enterprise, but its monopolistic nature causes it to resemble a government agency in many respects. Some localities have similar arrangements for a number of other services such as water and sewer. Some states and local governments have contracted with private sector companies for the operation of jails or prisons. While personally I find these arrangements are better for the taxpayer than totally-run government agencies, they do not provide the greater level of savings that a truly competitive situation might.

Your cable company may be more responsive to your concerns than a wholly-owned government enterprise because they may be fearful about losing the contract, but their responsiveness may be merely incrementally better. If there were a private competitor who could assure you that they would provide quicker service and more channels at a similar cost, then you might change providers immediately. You would not be forced to wait until city council became dramatically disgruntled or sought a more lucrative kick-back package. Your choices, your desires are limited by the governmental unit’s deciding what is best for you and your neighbors…or for the politicians who make the decisions. So, I would argue that a private government endorsed monopoly may be marginally better than a government-run service, but falls short of the cost savings and benefits of a fully competitive environment. In addition there is the added factor of the Nanny city, the Nanny township, the Nanny county, the Nanny state, or BIG NANNY arbitrarily limiting your choices. True competition is an economic issue, but it is more fundamentally an issue of freedom.

Every act that permits government intrusion into our lives generates a further erosion of our liberty. Yes, it is important that we encourage and enable the private sector in areas that have been monopolized by government, but the true issue is liberty. If we turn over services and functions merely to save money or enhance service, we have some short-term gain to celebrate. If, however, we recapture our ability to choose for ourselves the service provider to use, then we have solidified our quest for freedom. Tiny steps, I know, but little victories can pave the way for larger accomplishments. Freedom can be regained by working from the “bottom up.” It is much easier to marshal support at the local level than it is to generate a broad-based statewide or national movement.

When you began to read this column, you probably had no inkling that cable television services and liberty would be linked without using the term “net neutrality.” My purpose was to illustrate that our freedoms have been usurped at every level of government. We should remember, however, that our Constitution specifically limits federal involvement in our daily affairs, and state and local oversights are to be decided by the citizens. The federal overreach has far exceeded its constitutional mandate, and state and local interventions have limited our liberty dramatically. It is time to return government to its designated role. It is time for the people to stand up, stand tall and stand firm for freedom.

Comment:  cearlwriting@hotmail.com   or   www.littlestuff-minoosha.blogspot.com

Face Book:  www.facebook.com/pages/Earl-for-Ohio/

Three-D

The fiasco that is taking place in Madison, Wisconsin, and to lesser extent in Ohio and other state capitols has prompted me to consider how organizations sometimes respond to adversity. Although I did take a cognate (minor) in Social Psychology in graduate school, I am not a social psychologist. My observations are rather general and based somewhat on anecdotal evidence. They also represent a somewhat visceral gut reaction to the goings-on that I have witnessed via the unreliable mass media. Those of us who are Libertarians favor small constitutional government, but are often characterized as preferring anarchy to civil order. What we see in the various national capitols throughout the world and here in the state capitols are “big government” apologists behaving as if they were French Revolutionary  anarchists.  The world is turned upside down, and contradictions reign supreme.

When groups and the people who represent them are confronted with issues that may undermine their hold on the realm of their influence, they may react with a strategy called “diffusion.” Diffusion is the tactic that seeks to spread the blame across a wide horizon so that the complaints and demands of the “aggrieved” group seem small when compared to all intervening variables that have contributed to the imbalance. If we use educators as an example for this discussion, we might hear that state funding, local funding, lazy students, uninvolved administrators and parents, and community indifference are reasons for their failures to perform. The argument continues with their demands for higher pay and greater benefits because all of the factors that impede their abilities to achieve are not their fault, and hence, the teachers should not be held accountable. Inadequate results spring from the multitude of intervening elements that conspire to limit classroom efficacy. For many decades the diffusion ruse has been successful as locales, states and national entities have responded with increases and benefits. But to many who hold the keys to the treasury, the diffusion argument has begun to lose steam. Despite the massive infusion of money and commitment, performance has diminished or stagnated.

Although similar to “diffusion,” “deflection” is more pointed, more targeted. The group that uses deflection as a blame-shifting tool usually identifies one or two specific “bogeymen” whom they accuse of being the cause of their non-performance. In the example cited above, the focus of deflection could be “the taxpayers,” the school board or the legislature. Rather than identifying multiple interveners, the deflection strategy isolates one or two as the nemeses of adequate job performance. Deflection is a direct and forceful attempt to shift blame and/or demonize an entity that may be unwilling to yield to the demands of the complainer. This tactic is similar to the one used by siblings who ride in the back seat of the family car…”she did it first” followed by “he made me do it.” It’s past time for taxpaying citizens to quote the driving father. “Do you want me to come back there?” Citizens are becoming frustrated with a government structure that is too big, too unresponsive, to manipulative and unconstitutional. The deflection maneuvers annoy the citizens who are aware, and they respond with anger.

“Detraction” is the most strident and dishonest of the defense mechanisms. Rather than attempting to diffuse or deflect blame for inadequate performance, the group seeks to undermine the credibility and reputations of its detractors. Detraction is not defensive, but is a wholly offensive approach. The campaign of detraction could result in the “truth” becoming a casualty because there are no limits, no rules. The gloves come off as the aggrieved party attacks its critics, and accuses them of numerous nefarious schemes and actions. They assume the persona of a cornered rat as they lash out at anyone who challenges them or their positions. If the challenger can hold fast and not back down, the detraction strategy is the forerunner of collapse. It is the weakest argument available, but it is delivered viciously. By withstanding the assault the challenger can prevail as the defender runs out of energy and arguments.

Three-D’s, diffusion, deflection and detraction will become more prevalent as the battle to restrain our bloated government becomes more heated. We must not waiver. We can never yield. There is too much at risk, and we must stand firm.

Comment:  cearlwriting@hotmail.com     or    www.littlestuff-minoosha.blogspot.com

Face Book:  www.facebook.com/pages/Earl-for-Ohio/

  

Serendipitous Serenity

Sometimes we float through our day-to-day lives concentrating on the little things that affect us. Dental appointments, grocery lists and children’s grade cards seem to be the most momentous issues that we face. Oh, there may be a little gnawing discontent about national or worldly matters, but all-in-all, life seems normal…and good. We busily trip along until one day….WHAMMO!... a local school board announces that it must pass a massive levy, the city hikes trash collecting fees by a huge amount, the county announces that they must have more money to meet expenses, and the state admits that the budget will be in deficit even though they are constitutionally required to be balanced. As you stagger through the news of government irresponsibility, you discover that the federal government wants to “borrow” a trillion dollars to “stimulate” the economy. That’s right…credit card spending to get out of the hole. Doesn’t make sense, does it? Meanwhile your next door neighbor loses his job, and your company implements a new austerity program.

You may feel as if you’ve been slapped with an ice-cold washcloth. That little gnawing sense of apprehension blossoms forth into high caliber anxiety. The serenity is gone. You know now that it was false…that you were unaware of the signs of dysfunction around you. The signs were there for some time, but you were immersed in your own lucky little world. Suddenly, your eyes are opened, and you realize that the nation, state and community you love are teetering on fragile legs. They’ve lost their moorings and their principles. The standards by which you’ve navigated your entire life are no longer in play. The rules have changed, and you don’t know where to find a new rulebook.

It is time for you to shed your lethargy. The moment has come for you to transform from an observer into an activist. For one to be unaware and ignorant of the compelling issues that face our communities, our nation and our globe is no longer acceptable. You must either become engaged in the salvation of a civil society, or you will become the dross of the designs of others. Drifting along in a state of ignorant bliss is no longer an acceptable option if you value your liberty and the freedom of those for whom you care. Benign neglect of the national disintegration will lead to the confiscation of your labor and your property. At some point when you finally take note of the geometric growth of government power and its devastating impact, it may be too late to reverse the trend….to stop the erosion of liberty.

Does your new-found vigilance require that you spend your time and limited funds for numerous trips to Washington, D.C. or your state capitol? Perhaps, but not necessarily. Does your awareness require that you march, organize and create new avenues of dissent? Perhaps, but not always. The new knowledge that our nation is out of balance should lead you to passionately share your facts and feelings with those you love. Do your research and master the information. Develop a rudimentary understanding of basic economics. Read, re-read and learn the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. Read the Federalist Papers or their summaries, and study synopses of the ratification process. Once you have armed yourself with the historical basis of our republic and its philosophical roots, you can be a forceful advocate at home, at work, in your local organizations and at church. Capitalize on every opportunity to share the message of limited, fiscally restrained government and freedom.

Given the type of person who reads Littlestuff-minoosha, this column is probably the ultimate “preaching to the choir.” Just as any great athlete or musician must continue to practice the basics, so too must patriots continually remind themselves to speak out and speak up. If we drop our guard or look away for a short time, our gains will erode and our energies will be sapped. We must not, we cannot assume that the new regimes in the House of Representatives and our state capitals will pick up our baton and carry the race to the finish line. They are politicians. They do what is most self-serving and expedient. Also, a number of those who are in the majority have been in office for many years and have in the past held the majority with a president from their own party. They governed poorly, irresponsibly and passed toxic legislation that undermined the fiscal integrity of our nation. They implemented legislative action that seriously undercut our personal liberties. Be wary. Be watchful. Your self-imposed session of serenity has ended.

Comment:  cearlwriting@hotmail.com   or   www.littlestuff-minoosha.blogspot.com

Face Book:  www.facebook.com/pages/Earl-for-Ohio/