Ending Entitlements

As a small-government constitutionalist (actually I prefer the Articles of Confederation), I shudder when I suggest that it may not be prudent or practical to end our federal entitlement apparatus. Entitlements represent the epitome of government theft by force. They take the wealth and property from one citizen and transfer it to another. The problem is that our entitlement mentality has become so entrenched that weaning the recipients could result in violent confrontation. The very last development we can afford in times of fiscal and social stress is to encourage or implement robust policing by the government. Neither the welfare state nor the police state is healthy for liberty.

Another factor that affects the wisdom of eliminating the major portion of the entitlement structure is the regulatory over reach of government at every level. If our goal is to remove people from government benefits, there must be a viable alternative for them to support themselves, their families and to pursue personal wealth. The present regulatory nightmare is not friendly for new startups and, in many cases, discourages creative, energetic people from becoming entrepreneurs. The same government that developed programs to create dependency status for recipients has erected innumerable barriers for those who wish to become self-sufficient.

Dismantling the entitlement and welfare superstructures is a good start towards smaller more constitutional government, but for the reasons cited above and for philosophical and constitutional reasons, the regulatory maze must be simultaneously disassembled. In many respects an attempt to develop a sensible regulatory regime will be infinitely more challenging than ending the entitlement fiasco. Layer after layer, exception after exception and rule after rule exist in a political lasagna of nanny-state oversight. The multi-layered regulatory control mechanism will be extremely difficult to unravel. As one tier or another is peeled away, some unscrupulous individuals or companies may seek to take advantage of the opening. Their schemes could cause the public and the professional political class to demand the restoration of the regulatory oversight. In addition the various agencies and departments are so over-lapped that eliminating one noxious regulation may expose another just as toxic.

Now we move back to the original premise of this column. The drastic reduction of the entitlement/direct subsidy function of the government must be drastically reduced or eliminated altogether in order to restore fiscal sanity and constitutional government. That isn’t enough however as the myriad rules and regulations lie in wait to subvert our efforts to secure our liberty. The task is monumental, but it is vital if we are to pull Nanny’s rug out from under many of our fellow citizens. Concurrent with their weaning they must have a corresponding freedom to pursue their personal prosperity. We cannot in good conscience destroy their lifeboats on which they have depended perhaps for generations without providing the life vests of freedom. Unskilled people whose motivations and dreams have been blunted by government handouts must be allowed as much leeway as is possible to develop the skills and habits necessary for survival…..and for thriving.

Our federal government has grown so large and cumbersome that an objective analysis would suggest that inefficiencies and cost overruns are standard operating procedure. One doesn’t have to be a constitutionalist to understand that our government cannot adequately perform the tasks that it has claimed for itself. Reducing the monster to a functional role is a monumental task. Shrinking the leviathan to its constitutional function requires a radical vivisection that will cause massive disruptive upheaval. The radical remedy is the only viable one because we have experienced the steady growth of government in our lifetimes. Partial solutions will result in little gain as the incremental reestablishment of big government will accelerate and overwhelm us.

We cannot simply address the looter class and their living off the largesse of productive taxpayers. We must attack and eliminate every tentacle of the big government monster in order to rebuild the dream of our Founders and Framers. Restructuring and rebuilding will be painful. The path to restoration is littered with traps and foes. We must be strong. We must be resolute. We must be victorious.

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Liberty and Community

There are two tensions that dominate our political and social living. They are individualism and community. Each has its necessary functions, but they are often at odds with one another. As individuals we often feel coerced into accepting community-wide decisions that we may believe to be unwise or too restrictive. Conversely the community may resent the iconoclast who harshly criticizes cooperative efforts. Even the most steadfast loner is aware that once in a while the group format is necessary for survival. Most community members, too, understand that there are times and circumstances that become unmanageable in the midst of the group. One must focus on the issue and complete the task alone. That is what is known as personal responsibility.

Most effective community ventures are ad hoc affairs. The people come together to resolve an issue that affects the whole area. The most common examples of ad hoc organization can be found in communities that have experienced a natural disaster such as a tornado, hurricane, massive flooding or any number of potentially devastating events. The disaster often isolates the community from the outside world, and the residents must join together to secure some degree of individual safety. The most hardened individualist will embrace the community’s collective program to survive and recover.

Government represents the most forceful and permanent aspect of a community’s attempts to work collectively. The passage of rules, ordinances and laws replace the informal organization of spontaneous unity found in ad hoc event-oriented cooperative efforts. The rule making becomes a permanent element of the community, and individual laws may extend beyond their original justification. While some may view the individualist as a contrarian, her or his heightened sense of self-purpose and self-interest generates a reluctance to accept the community restrictions. Because of the power for enforcement, all government rulemaking or legislation is by nature…tyrannical. If an individual resists the rule,….for whatever reason…the collective power of the governing unit can be forcefully used to secure her or his compliance.

Not all laws, regulations or rules are wise, nor are they necessarily fair or equitable. The community (government) believes that total compliance is necessary for order and cooperative living. The individualist chafes at what appear to be meaningless attempts to coerce conformity. The individualist swims against the stream while the communitarians choose not to make waves. The slow creep of tyranny moves unabated when people suppress their individuality and fail to stir the waters of discontent and caution.

People who love liberty and citizens who protect liberty are the original “surfers” or “wave riders.” We need more of them. In a guest editorial in the Wall Street Journal (Monday, 9/26/2011), Senator Susan Collins of Maine has called for a moratorium on regulations. She revealed that there are 4200 rules or regulations waiting to be approved that could negatively impact the economy. It’s about time. Now begin repealing the others. The community is not infallible, and the individualists must resist the oppressive tyranny of a community run amok. Stand tall, and don’t be afraid to fall.

Comment: cearlwriting@hotmail.com

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Tue. & Wed. 6-7:00pm, 1370 WSPD, Toledo.   www.wspd.com

    

Laws and Responsibility

Back in the day when I served in the state legislature, I often remarked in my speeches that the six most dangerous words in Ohio are “there ought to be a law…” We are over-lawed (new word?). In other words we have too many laws. What we need are accountability and responsibility. If you hurt someone or their property because you were negligent or intentionally destructive, then you should be held accountable. As an example, if you’re texting, drinking or under the influence of prescription drugs and you crash into another car, you should be charged with negligence and failure to maintain control.

Why is it necessary to have traffic laws that ban driving while drinking, driving while texting or any number of potential distractions or performance degraders? If they are necessary, we should include driving while drinking coffee or eating. We might also include shaving or applying makeup as tasks that should be prohibited while one is operating a motor vehicle. There are even more activities that could or should be banned while driving such as reading, talking to a passenger, adjusting the radio or CD player, or picking one’s nose. I have witnessed every one of these distracting behaviors while driving. It isn’t pretty out there, folks.

Obviously as the clever readers you are, you have discerned that I am disturbed by the proliferation of laws that our legislators and regulators have thrust upon us. It is a common practice among despotic or totalitarian governments to pass numerous laws so that nearly every citizen breaks some of them and then selectively enforce them. This bi-polar approach causes the populace to be fretful and fearful but allows the leaders to dole out favorable treatment for friendly elites. For example you may be charged for munching on an Egg McMuffin while pursuing your morning commute, but the police may have strict orders to ignore the Assistant to the Associate Deputy Secretary of Secretarial Assistants when she rabidly consumes a bowl of Frosted Mini Wheats while scampering down the freeway at 20 mph above the legal limit. Lots of laws create a maze of regulatory tape that is impossible to navigate without violating one or more of them…that is “soft tyranny.” The government doesn’t throw you in the clink for no reason, but they do create a multitude of trip wires to legitimize your incarceration.

Paranoia is not a typical condition for me, but the profusion of laws, rules and regulations that impact our behavior, our commerce and our daily lives have caused me to become extremely skeptical about our government’s commitment to individual liberty. For now…if we violate a number of the “gotcha” regulations, we are fined. If enough people systematically fail to follow the proscribed rules, it seems probable that harsher penalties may be employed. There are so many fronts where Big Government is attacking the people that this one may seem trivial, but it can lead to hard tyranny as the government and its big-government supporters and enablers seek to wield control---for our own good….of course.

Too many laws lead to confusion, so why not streamline the criminal code to identify the broad categories of unacceptable activity. The penalties, if any, could be based on outcomes rather than law enforcement personnel seeking to interdict every potential violator. If you drive and you harm someone or their property while negligently distracted, you must pay restitution, fines and jail time if appropriate for the offense and the damage. It shouldn’t matter what activity led to the negligent distraction. It’s the result of the negligence that generates the penalty. As someone who cherishes my liberty, I resent the nitpicking package of laws and regulations that have invaded our lives. As someone who believes strongly in accountability and responsibility as necessary for citizenship, my resistance to the plethora of controlling rules grows greater every day. The Nanny State mentality has drifted from our social welfare policies into law enforcement. It sickens me.

It has been thirty years since I first began uttering the line about “there ought to be a law.” Given the nature of our ineffective, inefficient and dominating government today, those six words may not be the worst…the most evil. They are still noxious and still toxic. We have too many laws. We have too many constraints on our freedom. We must be responsible for our actions, our behavior and our stupidity. When the law becomes too complex, it can become abusive. Liberal progressive socialist busybodies love laws because they narrow the parameters of our liberty. The lefties assume that we are too stupid to live without the benign intervention of the government. They do not yet realize that we may be too angry to live with it.

Comments:  cearlwriting@hotmail.com

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Labor On

There is an element of poignancy surrounding this holiday weekend. Labor Day was first celebrated as a national holiday in 1894 after President Grover Cleveland signed legislation designating the first Monday of September as “dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers.” The painful reality is that roughly 20% of our nation’s workforce is either unemployed or working part-time while seeking full-time employment. One out of 5 of our country’s workers are suffering from this devastating economy. An impact so grave and massive must radiate throughout the economy and negatively influence the lives and livelihoods of most of our citizens. Thus, even many enterprises that haven’t been directly impacted by the sputtering economy are experiencing lost business and revenues because of the huge number of workers who are not receiving their typical pay check.

Given the agenda of the Obama administration and the historic taxation and spending policies of Congress, maybe we should rename this day as Former Labor Day. A nation that works will prosper and a country “at ease” will falter. The regulatory and taxation environments in the United States are the antithesis of good policy for economic growth and by extension, job opportunities for willing workers. When everyone is working, the nation prospers. Oh yes, there are always pockets of the economy that may be in transition or decline, but active enterprise encourages innovation and development. When the government over-controls and over-regulates, the pace of the nation’s economy slows as manufacturers, distributors and retailers attempt to discern the impact of the government’s latest intervention. Rules, laws and regulations have direct influences on the producing sector, but many economists fail to detect or acknowledge the indirect aspects …. uncertainty, apprehension and frustration which, in turn, lead to a tentative approach.

It has often been stated that Government does not produce anything. I disagree. Government does produce chaos and confusion. In my rare moments of clarity I have wondered how a nation so rich, so vibrant and so innovative could allow its wealth-creation mechanism to be controlled by elected career politicians and appointed bureaucrats. They are not creators or generators of wealth and value. They are parasitic blood-sucking consumers of the labor and inspiration of others. In Atlas Shrugged the producers withdraw from the distorted market created by the insatiable government and its sycophantic corporate enablers. Scarily, we find ourselves in a similar environment today.

The ideological underpinnings of the United States’ labor movement are rooted in the “proletarian rights” movement of the late 19^th and early 20^th Centuries. These socialist/communist efforts capitalized on the glaring inequities in labor-management encounters. Local disputes were expanded to company-wide and sector-wide negotiating (demanding) units. As a result, entire sectors of the economy could be brought to a screeching halt because of some real or imaginary slight or rule violation in some plant in Peoria. The powerless worker of the 19^th Century has become the surly tail that wags the dog.

Although the increased power of organized labor has had a powerful influence in the private sector, the greatest and most ominous element is in the public sector of the United States. As the private enterprise union membership has been dwindling in market share throughout the country because of many corporations moving offshore or relying on hi-tech automation systems to control costs and enhance productivity, the public sector organizing has gained momentum. Even though fewer than one in six workers in the nation belong to either a private or public sector union or bargaining unit, their power and potential far exceed their true numerical proportion.

Their real power is based on the fact that they are organized and generally sympathetic with one another plus they have penetrated critical sectors of the economy and the government. If unions were dogs, I would compare them to Yorkies……with rabies. Certainly, organized labor has in many respects benefited workers and the nation by assuring safety and reasonable wages in the workplace. Too much of a good thing can topple the pyramid of prosperity, however as corporations are forced to downsize or move, and governments are trapped by unreasonable contractual commitments. The never-ending gravy train has run out of gravy.

Finally, this little Labor Day diatribe will conclude with my puzzled query. This is the United States of America….a nation founded on liberty and individual rights….how is it that so many of our work force have become dedicated to the collective control of our country while risking everything? At the risk of appearing calloused or insensitive, I suggest that those among you who are absolutely committed to your union under any and all circumstances are not worthy of liberty. True freedom requires responsibility, and anyone who voluntarily transfers your freedom to a union or the government deserves to be perpetually shackled in serfdom to your chosen master….and it seems that you are.

Comment:  cearlwriting@hotmail.com

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Reform School

“Reform” is a common concept in government. My experience has been that whenever government reforms something, it will inevitably be worse. The nine-letter word “reforming” coincides with the nine-letter result: Imscrewed. Big government statists cannot resist increasing government size or power. That is one stark illustration of why the so-called “War on Drugs” has been a forty-year failure. Government and its political enablers have an addiction problem that is much more harmful for the nation than any individual’s reliance on an illicit substance. The only government program that has succeeded at any measurable level is the “War on Liberty” that was begun with little fanfare one century ago.

You may recall the “Tax Reform Act of 1986.” That overhaul was a result of an agreement between President Reagan and Speaker O’Neill. The President agreed to some tax increases in the “reform” bill in exchange for sizable spending cuts in subsequent budgets.  As usual the spending cuts never materialized and a radical transform of the tax code went forward. Prior to the 1986 tax bill interest expenses were deductible, but after passage, credit card and non-mortgage, non-business interest payments were no longer allowed as tax deductions. Personally, interest deductions are not important for me. I would rather eliminate the income tax altogether and eliminate the incessant tinkering and tweaking that costs taxpayers more money while Congress rewards its favored groups or companies.

So, as a brief summary of the prologue, reform generally represents more of the same though worse. As an example, please join me in a “quickie’ review of Ohio Sub. HB 194…of the 129^th General Assembly.

This so-called election administrative reform bill is similar to many other bills under consideration by our legislative bodies. Its provisions resemble tentacles as they weave and wind around so many facets of Ohio election law, and yet….this purportedly comprehensive overhaul ignores a gorilla in the room…a gaping intentional oversight in violation of a court order. The aspect of ballot access for minor parties was never addressed, thus allowing the existing law to stand which had earlier been declared unfair by the court. Similar to Obamacare and so many legislative initiatives, Sub. HB 194 addresses several areas of concern that could result in some unanticipated problems because of the breadth of the bill.

The Ohio bill must have some merit because President Obama’s campaign is opposed to it because of its stricter provisions regarding voter identification…..could possibly limit cheating, and thus, is not Obama-friendly. The legislation covers a broad scale of issues affecting Ohio elections such as we “cannot assume that poll workers erred.” Proof must be submitted before allegations or assumptions are allowed. Clearly the Voter I.D. provision is the lightning rod of the bill as liberals, progressives, Marxists and cheaters are fearful that a photo I.D. would minimize their opportunities for stealing elections.

An omnibus bill that purports to reform a broad swath of law is inherently doomed. Unintended consequences will cling to the legislation like flies to road kill. Opponents will target one or more aspects of the legislation and may seek judicial intervention. Forecasting what some judges would do is similar to predicting when and where a first raindrop may land. Broad based initiatives allow the dedicated public servants to crow about their major accomplishments, and at the same time, condense the heavy lifting of formulating meaningful legislation. This in turn generates more free time for lobbyist-funded meals and adult beverages.

Admittedly I am a skeptic and a cynic, but I do suspect that some omnibus bills are staff-created legislative shortcuts for elected officials. If there is a sincere intent to dramatically change the status quo, the omnibus bill does provide some cover in the sense that changes that may inspire opposition could perhaps, maybe, theoretically, possibly get lost in the weeds of a broad undertaking. In addition, a huge bill that deals with various facets of state law (elections for example) has many sponsors, co-sponsors and amendment sponsors so that disgruntled citizens or groups may find it difficult to place blame for what they believe to be an egregious legislative result. While the omnibus bill may provide a cloak of anonymity for its advocates, it may also lead to glaring oversights….legislators and staff members become so enamored with the forest that individual trees lose their identities.

As the kind trusting person that I am, I will assume that the “too-broad, glaring-omission” explanation is the logical one for the failure of Sub. HB 194 to address the issue of minor party ballot access. Clearly, the elected members of the Ohio General Assembly believe in the Republic and the rights of citizens to freely elect their representatives. Obviously the members of the Ohio House and Ohio Senate would do nothing that intentionally enables a continuing duopoly of power, thought and avarice. After all, the two old parties have shared power, meals and drinks for more than 150 years so it cannot be possible that third-party competition would be seriously challenging to them. Right?

Intentional self-serving denial of opportunity in a republic is just as loathsome as a poll tax or a literacy test. When two parties hold absolute control of the election apparatus, logical reasoning would lead one to believe that power will be misapplied. Because the two old parties have controlled the election apparatus across the nation for so long, they have not been seriously challenged to account for their malfeasance, misfeasance and misdeeds. We have all been losers because of the lack of electoral accountability. Reform? Yeah, right.

Comment:  cearlwriting@hotmail.com   

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Tue & Wed, 6-7pm on 1370 WSPD, Toledo   www.wspd.com