As the Chicago area braces for a major snowstorm, it is only fitting that we discuss bracing ourselves for a storm of our own making. This storm is more serious than a blizzard, for it has in its character the ability to hamper economic recovery and growth for multiple generations. Taxes, which are a manifestation of how the public views the role and the responsibilities of government, have reached a new “low” by reaching a new high. The time has come to consider radical and permanent changes in how taxes are levied, collected, and the resulting consequences to the operations of government. Read more »
State of the Union 2011
Tonight the President of the United States will deliver a State of the Union address. There are a few things you can count on. Read more »
Cause and Effect
The best physicians will utilize every tool they have to assess symptoms and diagnose a patient’s condition. Once you have a correct diagnosis – a valuable thing, not often easily obtained – you can begin treating an illness or injury. Treating symptoms may provide short-term and temporary relief to a patient, but it is not a long-term or sustainable course of action. Read more »
Whose responsibility is it?
I was having a conversation with Board member and friend Mark just last weekend about the goals of this organization and a general observation about America in the 21st century.
I’ve said before that our broad and rather simply-stated problem is one of responsibility ambiguity. There are all sorts of things that need to get done in the world, and we’ve reached a place as a society that we don’t think critically about whose responsibility it is to see those things through to completion; and, even more alarmingly, many people are likely to default to a sentiment of: that’s someone else’s responsibility, not mine. We’re living more and more in an “I’m getting mine” type of world.
It is as if we have a nation of fully grown people, but no real adults. As an adult (and not a child), one has to deal with the harsh realities of life. We don’t, for example, always get what we want. Things don’t always go our way. We must recognize that we have duties that come before our wants. This is the world that adults live in, where there are rights and responsibilities.
Unfortunately, this quality is rare (and yes, I’m making fairly broad generalizations). Most people want to do what feels good, not necessarily what makes sense. Where I live, a number of residents attended our annual Town Meeting, the once-a-year Township government meeting, hoping to push for something called “clean elections.” While their motives may have been well-meaning (I say “may” for I cannot be certain and they didn’t divulge), the history of election and campaign reform is, put generously, less than stellar. Individuals, as readers are certainly aware, may donate $2,300.00 per individual per cycle for federal elections. PACs and labor unions are exempt from this limit, and as has been widely reported, SEIU gave in excess of $60 million to President Obama in his 2008 campaign. Lest I go too far off course – this post isn’t about campaign finance laws – the point to remember is that we live in expedient times, where critical thinking seems to be a relic of another era.
This inability to deal with the world as an adult is a problem on many levels, not the least of which is the obvious challenge in getting people to first recognize we have a serious problem; second, analyze why and how to fix it; and third making the fix into a reality.
Justice Robert H. Jackson
Which brings me to the following quote, from Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson. Justice Jackson, concurring in part and dissenting in part in the 1950 case of American Communications Association v. Douds, wrote the following:
Progress generally begins in skepticism about accepted truths. Intellectual freedom means the right to re-examine much that has been long taken for granted. A free man must be a reasoning man, and he must dare to doubt what a legislative or electoral majority may most passionately assert. The danger that citizens will think wrongly is serious, but less dangerous than atrophy from not thinking at all. Our Constitution relies on our electorate’s complete ideological freedom to nourish independent and responsible intelligence and preserve our democracy from that submissiveness, timidity and herd-mindedness of the masses which would foster a tyranny of mediocrity. The priceless heritage of our society is the unrestricted constitutional right of each member to think as he will. Thought control is a copyright of totalitarianism, and we have no claim to it. It is not the function of our Government to keep the citizen from falling into error; it is the function of the citizen to keep the Government from falling into error (citation omitted).
As people begin to understand that government’s purpose isn’t to stop citizens from making bad decisions, we’ll begin to see a more balanced approach to what “government” will be responsible for, and the interaction of every American with government will evidence that the citizen is the level of government not only charged with the greatest degree of responsibility, but the best-equipped to discharge those duties.
When Bad Government Gets Worse
One of the key ideas I try and communicate in both writing and speaking is that there are all types of government, and the most important government – self-government – is the least practiced. Distant, external government has no business getting involved in areas that are best administered closest to the people. This is what “Balanced Government” is all about.
Yet, we proceed down a dangerous path, immune, it seems, to the warning signs around us. This story today notes that there is a proposal for expanding the FHA: a Depression-era holdover that defies reason by growing in importance as we move further away from the Depression.
The most noteworthy part of the article (emphasis mine):
The plan would be a massive expansion of the Federal Housing Administration, the Depression-era mortgage insurer. FHA would take on $300 billion in new loans for as many as 1 million distressed homeowners, most of whom otherwise wouldn’t qualify for a government-backed loan.
Taxpayer dollars would be at risk should borrowers default on their new mortgages.
So, most of the homeowners in question wouldn’t qualify for a government-backed loan; yet, they’d be getting one. On top of this, defaults – when they occur – will be borne largely by the American taxpayer. Translated loosely, if you’re not getting one of these loans, you’re acting as the bank with your tax dollars (and no, you don’t get a vote in the credit committee). If we hit a recession and people default? That’s no longer the problem of Bank of America, or Wells Fargo, or Indymac Bank. Now it becomes the problem of the American taxpayer.
The complicated scheme gets worse, but the details aren’t the important point. The important point is that the federal government has no business bailing people out of private contracts they entered into in good faith. Even if one could imagine a scenario whereby having “the government” void a perfectly legal contractual agreement seems like a good idea (and I cannot), there’s absolutely no basis for having that sphere of government be the one that’s furthest away from the people. Hard hit real estate markets – such as Miami or Detroit – will be supported by people from all over the country. Their lack of caution, greed-driven speculation or simple indifference to obligations and lack of respect for contracts shall be subsidized by productive persons who manage their affairs properly and respect the law.
The bill is H.R. 5830: if by some chance you’re calling your representative, you might voice your displeasure specifically with this legislation.
And lest you think imbalance is confined to the realm of bad economics masquerading as “compassion”, there’s this story today about No Child Left Behind. It appears that the federal government is rolling out more laws to regulate the way States – and by extension, parents – educate their children.
To be perfectly clear, Mr. Madison wrote in Federalist #45:
The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce; with which last the power of taxation will, for the most part, be connected.
The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State. The operations of the federal government will be most extensive and important in times of war and danger; those of the State governments, in times of peace and security. As the former periods will probably bear a small proportion to the latter, the State governments will here enjoy another advantage over the federal government.
To Madison’s list I would add only: administration of the courts.
Amazing, then, that we’ve sunk to the condition we’re in. Will liberty be lost, crowded out by the ever-greater expansion of external government, simply because people aren’t educated on the proper role of the federal government? Or will we once again hold accountable ourselves, our neighbors, and our government?
The Tenth Amendment reads: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” The guidlines are there; the justification has been made; all we’re required to do is learn it and insist on compliance by those we send to represent us.