Who is Afraid of Big Government?
There is no reason to review all the standard reasons why the American people are terrified of an all-powerful federal or state government. The case has been made in thousands of elegant treatises and books, and is best reflected in the Constitution and the written work of the Founding Fathers.
But let me list a few other, less elegantly expressed worries, many anecdotal in nature.
1) Juvenal’s “Who will police the police?”
One of the scariest things about government is its exemption from laws by virtue of its monopoly on lawmaking and enforcement. I see this every day, from the mundane to the profound.
Go to any downtown in America, and one can see how some supposedly efficient, job-creating con-artist once promised a new hotel, stadium, or enterprise zone, then convinced the city council to steal land from some and hand it over to others (e.g., him) — and left an ungodly mess in his wake.
That power to condemn creates a real paranoia in our own lives. While we can defend our homes from the intruder, there is no remedy against eminent domain, especially once we have lost faith in the collective wisdom of those who flock to political office.
On the more mundane level, this week I saw the following examples of government exemption. A local police car randomly did a running stop at a 4-way intersection (should I have called 911?); a city bus driver (very common) cell phoning against California law (report him to the cop running the intersection?); a city garbage truck spewing trash out its top as it sped down Freeway 41 (call his cousins at the state EPA?).
We are all routinely pulled over for any of the above infractions. But the larger the government, the more its power, and so the more its employees feel that they are royal and exempt from enforcement. In other words, big government creates millions who feel the law does not pertain to themselves. Ask Tom Daschle, Duke Cunningham, Chris Dodd, or Timothy Geithner. The result is an increasingly lawless society.
2) The Power of Envy
Government service offers veritable tenure and steady wages for the price of bypassing the American dream of “getting rich” in the private sector. Most follow the odds and realize that a federal bird in the hand is better than two in the private bush.
Yet legions of government (and often union) employees by needs must audit often far richer others, whether at the IRS, the county planner’s office, the zoning authority, or the state regulator. And here the public auditor can, by virtue of his unassailable position, quite easily stymie his private sector upstart counterpart.
A few examples from my own modest experience: Going into the DMV to deal with SEIU T-shirted employees is to face petty humiliation and impediment. I watched dozens of hurried customers stand in line while bored employees at the window lackadaisically redirected them to other bored employees. The subtext was “You need my form and stamp, so calm down, take a deep breath, and wait on my time. It’s not like I have to work for your rat-race company.”
Two years ago, the IRS sent me an “urgent” letter about supposedly not reported W-2s (one thing I learned from my late mother is never, never short the IRS, and so I usually overpay). My accountant in about 2 minutes showed me how an auditing clerk (or computer) had screwed up. He wrote an explanatory letter.
I worried (I didn’t have the demanded supplemental fee) for about 3 months. And then matter-of-factly, 90 days later another letter arrived — admitting the matter was now resolved and I need not pay anything. No apology or explanation. In other words, a single government official was able to try to extort thousands (I am sure many thousands who get such letters are terrified and just pay the bogus supplemental) without explanation. No one in private business can quite get away with that. (I am sure the employee, who hits a button to print such form letters demanding more money, never has his pay docked when the request is shown to be invalid). When the inanimate gasoline pump claims we must pay for 20 gallons for an actual 10 pumped, the gas station owner goes to jail.
I am all for codes, building inspectors, and plant regulators, but an excess of such investigators quickly creates a priestly class who take their own frustrations out on supposedly better off others.
PJM Home
A War Like No Other How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War
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Mexifornia : A State of a Becoming
Why the West Has Won: Nine Landmark Battles in the Brutal History of Western Victory
Between War and Peace: Lessons from Afghanistan to Iraq
The Western Way of War: Infantry Battle in Classical Greece (Paperback)
Wars of the Ancient Greeks (Smithsonian History of Warfare) (Paperback)
Who Killed Homer: The Demise of Classical Education and the Recovery of Greek Wisdom
Fields Without Dreams : Defending the Agrarian Ideal (Paperback)
The Soul of Battle: From Ancient Times to the Present Day, How Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny
The Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide to the Peloponnesian War (Paperback)
Mr. Hanson—
That is the essence of it all. That is the key to it all. That is the siren’s call to the “Progressives” of the world: “I can be greedy in the name of compassion and equality. Therefore I am not really greedy. And people who don’t put on the mask that I do must really be bad people despite their actions.”
It’s all about the masks. The idea that it might really just be all about what the mask conceals is a disturbing concept to them.
1. The “two Americas” theme is more keenly evident in the example of government employees vs. everyone else.
In Omaha, the police and fire department chiefs retired at age 50 with $100,000 annual pensions. Even if one doesn’t make chief, the pension is equally lucrative.
I can guarantee that neither the City nor the employee invested over $1,000,000 over 30 years to fund each individual pension. So – as usual – the taxpayer ends up footing the bill.
The real laugher is how government employees wages are set. There is no discount for job security.
If I were king of Nebraska, I’d eliminate defined benefit plans for government employees and cut their wages by 10% due to their job security.
2. The VDH proposed 10% tax on currency transfers should apply to *all* money transfers under $10,000; regardless if the sender is a US citizen or has health insurance. Much easier to enforce and apply.
Better still, it has the benefit of keeping US currency in the country and helps the balance of payments issue.
3. Nebraska and many other states dealt with the problem outlined in #1 and the US Supreme Court “Kelo” decision by completely outlawing the taking of private property in order to benefit cronies.
These “Kelo response” laws are really encouraging in that they have been effective responses to government over-reaching and judicial fiat.
And the real estate development that Kelo fought and was proposed in New London, CT has been abandoned by Pfizer and sits empty.
Victor Davis Hanson is saying something taken for granted by most Americans only a hundred years ago. It was the Progressive movement that successfully argued government is inherent benevolent and trustworthy. Our Founding Fathers instead feared the normal sinfulness of human beings. A trust but verify attitude was deemed nonnegotiable with dealing even with our most virtuous fellow citizens. Progressives believed that well meaning elected officials and government employees possessing advanced degrees behind their names could never go astray. Regrettably, I am not exaggerating. In their heart of hearts, this is what they truly believed. The same, of course, holds true for today’s Obama administration. Our “elites” are supposedly incapable of sinning. These individuals are our secular saints.
I didn’t know it was this bad in the US, but the description of Greece is accurate and recognizable. I’m from the north of Europe and thrift still means something here as does battling corruption. Nevertheless in my country, The Netherlands, the highest tax rate of 52% kicks in at 80.000 Euro. The ruling government party wants to raise it to 60% because ‘the rich are to blame for the crisis’. The rich are those that make more than 80.000. We all know that the crisis originated on Wall street, which is 5.000 miles away from my country, but it was those that make 80.000 in the Netherlands that made that disaster happen.
After we northern Europeans have already bailed out Iceland, we now are supposed to bail out Southern Europe. For those that think there is something like Europe, wake up because there isn’t. Southern Europe is the same as South America. It is like you have the same currency as Argentinian or Mexico. Which American would want that? Europe consist of very different nations, which political systems have commonalities in socialism and corporatism. that’s it. The European Union will fall off a cliff because of the financial crisis and the tensions that will now erupt. The European elite will try to keep it whole, but this union is dead.
Didn’t Ronald Regan say that we could eliminate the whole Department of Education?
I’d bet if we lobbed off 25% of each governmental organization the USA would be OK.
It used to be us against the rich. Now it’s us against the unions.
And it’s a shame what they’re doing to Toyota. It isn’t like the Pinto or the Corvair. More like the Audi.
I think there is an even bigger problem with Big Government that I’ve never seen discussed.
Risk.
No private enterprise, not a family, the most poserful executive, the biggest corporation, or even an industry consortium of corporations can approach the influence of the federeal government, and within a state, of the state governments.
That means that every single decision of government is many times riskier than any decision any other enterprise can make, by far.
There are hundreds of examples, but take the welfare state and the Community Reinvestment Act as examples. The government has destroyed the Black Family. It’s hard to imagine a more destructive series of actions to millions of people. And every single step was well-meaning. It’s a tragedy that simply would not have happened without Big Gov.
Likewise for Drooling Barney’s little fiasco with home mortgages. It destroyed 20% of the wealth in the country, and has put us in a Depression. There is no way private businsess would have ever gone in such an insane direction.
And don’t tell be that the rare execption of good actions by Big Government outweighs horrors of that magnitude.
Freedom to experiment is what creates value. Unilateral decisions by all-powerful government might get a lucky strike once in a while, but the results are almost always disastrous.
Risk
Greetings:
I also leave in the formerly Golden State. Several years ago, I received a notice from the Franchise Tax Board(FTB), which collects income taxes for the state, that they were withholding about $50 worth of my tax refund based on an instruction from the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). The notice indicated that I should not contact the FTB about the matter rather I should address any inquiry to the DMV. I sent off my inquiry to the DMV. No response. I wrote to my state Assemblyman. Again, no response. I wrote to my State Senator. Once again, no response. I wrote to the FTB indicating the DMV’s failure to respond and making a Public Document request. No response-a-mundo.
Our future’s so bright, we’re going to need shades.
“When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is the beginning of the end of any nation.“– Anonymous
“In other words, big government creates millions who feel the law does not pertain to themselves. Ask Tom Daschle, Duke Cunningham, Chris Dodd, or Timothy Geithner. The result is an increasingly lawless society.”
Al “No Controlling Legal Authority” Gore.
I’ve never heard a more baldfaced statement of “who’s gonna make me obey the law” than that statement. That Gore has since been transformed into a high priest/prophet by the left is telling.
Last year I received a notice from Ohio that a business tax form was not received. I supplied copy of form indicated. Several months later received 2nd notice with $200 penalty added. Agains sent copy of previous form. Continued to get dunning notices until January 2010. Call Oho Department Taxation and was told “we don’t answer letters” and we send out form letter that covers all sorts of things and the form we demanded in the letter is not really the form that is missing. Conversation ended with ” we have lots to do and can’t particularize the message.” Wound up paying the $200 penalty since there is no winning against such logic. Sent letter of complaint to governor which ws referred to same department that is too busy to answer.
I can attest to #4.4.
I had a corporate job where ti took them ~2 years to “fire” you. And even then they offered you a buy-out option to quit and avoid any chance of a wrongful termination suit.
That was coupled with the fact that anyone at my pay grade had 0% chance of promotion.
I did nothing but The Minimum for 3 years in that position. I tried to do a business on the side, but with such a comfortable 1st job it was hard to get up the motivation (that and my wife fighting against every idea I had).
Finally, I realized I had to get out of there, even for less pay, as my The Minimum attitude was slowly killing me (both in terms of self-respect and in terms of ultimate career potential). Fortunately, 75% of the other people in my pay grade also hit the road that year. It took me a good 2 years before I re-kindled the fire-in-the-belly that I used to have.
Western civilization seems headed toward a collective (no pun) “Weimar Republic” reckoning. Here in the US, the Tea Party movement seems to be the only chance to head it off. When it comes for the Euros, it ain’t gonna be pretty and we can only hope we’ve insulated ourselves a bit from the consequences.
A true conservative as president would eliminate all czars, and the Dept.s of Energy, Education, and Agriculture, for starters. Almost forgot EPA and EEO.
Thank God for blizzards, as it appears that no one in Washington has the cahonies to do the right thing and stop this coup on our Freedom.
Think Mexifornia could be next for “global warming” by the foot?
Where is Epaminondas when you need him….
Please knock off the hostility towards government employees. In the “Go-Go” period roughly between 2002 and 2007, not to mention the seriously “go-go” period of 1994-1999, those of us who were employed by the government in useful work (yes, it happens) watched while the so-called private sector took off. Salaries for, oh, let’s say “technical professionals” far outpaced those in the public sector. My own research showed (just assume I am not making this up) a $10k – $20k delta between public and private tech pros. Some of us like our jobs, too…
Now during the bad times, the private sector technical professionals who impugned our abilities during the good times are now pulling a sour grapes because we aren’t experiencing massive layoffs.
What VDH and others have apparently discovered is the high salaries of upper management, “directors” and other positions of authority. It does seem alarming that these folks have increased their numbers quite a bit over the last five years, but instead of challenging those individuals (after all, “directors” get out into the public) you attack “schmucks” like me who actually work for a living – and for less money, less buying power, less saving power, etc. than our private sector counterparts. For every Brownie who’s “doing a great job” there are grunts actually performing useful work. Work that shouldn’t stop because the principal of the engineering firm wants to renegotiate a contract just because the bare minimum he wants to do is still too much.
Just an anecdote…
A Vietnam veteran, I was attending college on the GI Bill. I dropped a course, putting me below the full pay level (I didn’t know that at the time).
Some time later, I got a letter from the VA ordering me, in most impolite form, to pay what I owed or else! I had violated their sacred rules, and owed them $13, and they were going to get me.
Yeah, thanks for serving your country, bud, now pay up or we sick the cops on you.
Bureaucrats are dangerous (and necessary). However, Masters of the Universe, which the Obama administration is full of, are much more dangerous.
America will never be Greece, not ever, nor any other socialist hell. I offer you anecdotal stories to cheer your heart.
While in Rome I saw gypsy kids lift a wallet in clear view of Italian police. It took a group of American students to run down the miscreants and return the purloined cache to its rightful owner.
While in Bern I discovered an addict shooting up heroin in my dorm. The hostel manager complained that the government forced him to take in such people. Addicts are thieves, everyone of them, and under all circumstances. The American contingent backed by resolute Aussie allies evicted him bodily from the hostel.
While in Marseilles the Americans in my group swept a park of garbage before we settled to picnic. The French declared that no one asked us to, so why bother? A fellow from New Jersey informed them that Americans do what needs doing. No one has to ask. We left the French students perplexed.
I met an American lad in India who drove a bus across the highest road in the world minus the assigned driver. About twenty minutes into the trip the passengers realized the Indian behind the wheel was drunk. The Europeans protested, but did nothing. A doughty Brit finally tossed the driver. An American finished the job bringing her home safely into Leh.
While in Thailand I raced a bamboo raft down an unnamed river while on a trek to the hill country. It wasn’t some sort of official race. Our very experienced Thai guide offered the following: “When you have Americans in the group, it’s always a race.” Indeed.
I reckon readers know where I’m going with this. America is a very special place, and the American character is as strong as ever. Believe it. We are a righteous and resolute people. Socialism is a cheat and a lie. The American people love liberty today and for all time. Because that’s just the way it is. Count on it.
My experience in local government in California, as a contract City Attorney (part time not full time), taught me much. The employees, under civil service rules, are secure in their positions absent egregious error. Wages are automatically raised each year regardless of merit. With union representation there are demands each year for increase in salary and retirement benefits, not to mention sick leave. Most civil service rules allow the accumulation of sick leave benefits as a result of which many employees arrive close to retirement age with accumulated sick leave benefits which enables them to retire early at full salary after which retirement benefit benefits begin in an amount based on their last (e.g. three) years of employment. City councils depend on electoral support from city employees hence it is not difficult for an elected councilman to find justification for meeting demands of employee unions in exchange for electoral support.
#15 Govt Employee:
Cry me a river; I pay for your food. You don’t like the complaints from this boss? Then stop taking my money.
The Obama Years:Like Getting robbed by a crackhead… every single day.
“[A] lie,” said Ayn Rand’s fictional character Hank Rearden, “is an act of self-abdication, because one surrenders one’s reality to the person to whom one lies, making that person one’s master…The man who lies to the world is the world’s slave from then on.”
The hypocrisy of self-congratulating socialist tax cheats may emanate from serflike incomprehension of freedom itself.
JFK got the ol’ labor-union ball rolling down at City Hall:
From Dan Henninger’s article in WSJ:
In 1962, President John F. Kennedy planted the seeds that grew the modern Democratic Party. That year, JFK signed executive order 10988 allowing the unionization of the federal work force. This changed everything in the American political system. Kennedy’s order swung open the door for the inexorable rise of a unionized public work force in many states and cities.
Link to the whole thing:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704320104575015010515688120.html
DISMANTLE PUBLIC EMPLOYEE UNIONS NOW!!!
Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Public-sector-unions-bleed-taxpayers-to-help-Dems-83652517.html#ixzz0f0BnVHaV
“[A] lie,” says Ayn Rand’s fictional character Hank Rearden, “is an act of self-abdication, because one surrenders one’s reality to the person to whom one lies, making that person one’s master…The man who lies to the world is the world’s slave from then on.”
The hypocrisy of self-congratulating socialist tax cheats may well emanate from a serflike incomprehension of freedom itself.
Seems a good place to mention “The Law of Obstructive Conformity”:
Given any sufficiently large body of rules, sufficient contradictions exist that any undesired course of action can be deflected, however necessary.
Amen concerning the prevalence of government workers in California with numerous cousins also in government. Some seem to think of State employment as a lucrative welfare program meant primarily for their own family and friends.
There are two main kinds of destructive bureaucrats: the aggressive ones and the ones who do as little as possible. Both types usually have lots of friends and relatives in the system, who protect each other when one of them does something wrong. This mutual protection can lead to brazen forms of embezzlement and other forms of graft.
There are also government workers who work hard and conscientiously. They are often abused and treated almost like slaves by those with lots of cousins and powerful friends in the system – expected to do their own work plus the work of others with better connections.
Or, productive workers may be treated as threats because of the contrast between what they and someone’s cousins accomplish. It’s harrowing to experience the hostility that hard work in such circumstances can bring.
#15 Government Employee – Yours is the attitude that infuriates us, and which supports the direction of the article.
You didn’t like getting paid less than your peers in the private sector during the boom years? Why, then, DIDN’T YOU QUIT? You, too, could’ve gone to work for the private sector.
Oh, wait, you’d have to give up your security and comfy benefits. Perhaps, your resume wouldn’t have gotten you hired to those other jobs. Perhaps, you lack sufficient motivation (not hungry enough). Perhaps, it never even occurred to you!
You are always free to quit your stinking job serving the ingrateful public, and go out and compete with the adults of the world in the private sector, but that would require hunger, and you’re just too damned well-fed.
#2. Cornhead: “In Omaha, the police and fire department chiefs retired at age 50 with $100,000 annual pensions. Even if one doesn’t make chief, the pension is equally lucrative.”
You pikers! California leads the nation in overpaid officials who retire early with whopping pensions. Last I heard, the number of retired state, county, or city officials retired from California with six digit pensions was in the range of 15,000. The winner had several jobs (we allow unlimited double-dipping with pensions, and often the time in job required to get the pension is only 6-8 years) with the city of Vernon, CA, and he collects an annual pension of just under $500,000.
I’m frankly for unilaterally cutting pensions for these individuals, on the logic that most of them hired on and then were given larger pensions, after they were hired. By that logic, the state could *lower* their pensions, also. They could presumably claim that lowering the pension was a violation of a contract or something…but the increase in pension is a violation of the contract with the state’s taxpayers, who are being screwed by the public officials every day. Some of them are cops or firefighters, but many are administrators or officials on these boards that VDH mentions. One fellow retired from a board where he got a $130,000 annual salary, and another part-time one where he earned $9,800. This latter one generated a pension (for a part-time job!) of $5,000, but at the time if you retired from *two* jobs on the same day, they took the larger pension you got and *doubled* it. So his salary was $130,000, but his pension was $212,000. He then ran for reelection to the $130,000 job, because of course you can collect the pension and the salary if you work it right.
I am a US citizen (59)who has spent most of his life overseas. I have come to the conclusion that corruption is the cancer of the developing world and socialism is the cancer of the developed world. Both suck the lifeblood out of the economy and society.
The only way to combat these is enternal vigilence by the citizenry. Paules says that he can not imagine the US trending Socialist – I would rebut that the Brits and Germans would have felt the same 100 years (or less) ago. It can happen and will unless the populace defends against it – a la the tea parties of today. Would that we could set a limit of federal govt. size, like 18% of GDP. Unfortunately I fear that this will never happen.
Re. the remittance tax proposed in an earlier post and seconded somewhere above, while the sentiment is right, the unintended consequences would be significantly negative. Two examples:
1. I own a house in Maine, another in Manila and currently work & reside in the UK. My retirement funds and investments are in the states and are also used to fund my various expenses (not huge as I am not rich, unfortunately)on three continents. The proposed tax would have me pull all of my investment portfolio out of the USA into a more efficent safe haven. There are lots of other people who would do the same for similar or other reasons.
2. The US is the recipient of many billions from capital flight in failing economies, eg. Argentina and Venezuela. This money would simply find another home.
Of course both of these examples are conditioned on the US Dollar remaining as THE global currency – something at increasing risk.
Jim Treacher could explain #1 pretty well to anybody who doesn’t get it.
#15 Govt Employee
I suspect you’re comparing apples and oranges. In the private sector during the late 1990s and the 200x’s there were very high salaries paid to technical people with abilities and skills that very nearly do not exist in government service.
Government Employee@15, the public scector is susceptible to abuse of expenditures and inefficient allocation of public resources due to the structure of government. It’s insulated from market forces and subject to election forces. The former in real time, the latter over the course of years.
And yes, distortions exist in the forces in both arenas. One egregious result does not justify another.
Take this personally if you want, but the wise approach is to seriously address this imbalance to ensure legitimate professionals in the public sector can indeed continue rather than be subjected to the impossibility of keeping such positions due to public insolvency.
The extreme example is Greece right now. And America is on the same
path, with less time horizon than the majority may believe.
“Law that is sufficiently complex is indistinguishable from no law at all.”-Charles Murray
Not much difference between a racket or a shakedown and the behavior of the goverment employees described in your article, Professor.
Big government or small government, the problem is always PEOPLE who are greedy, lazy, ignorant, inflexible and corrupt.
This also happens in the corporate world. How many people get their jobs because of who they know rather than what good they are?
All you can do is fight the worms.
It’s been said the greatest threat in our world is cynicism. It effectively results in the resignation of oneself from striving and the pursuit of goals and objectives.
Taxation without represenatation. Apply public resources with disregard to the will of the people, in a deceitful manner, and with devastating long term consequences that outweigh only potential and uncertain short term gains.
Most Americans have experienced financial loss and a downward lifestyle shift. The S&P off 35% from October 2009 highs and average house prices having declined (and maybe still declining), and 15million unemployed/jobless/sucking financial bad air. These are ingredients for change – because theres little hope right now, and people are going to take corrective actions to survive, and work at getting to neutral, and eventually to prosper again.
Along the way, threats of high inflation, tax increases, and drains on income will be met with very little patience, and a lot of resistance.
Let’s hope that way overwhelms the alternative quagmire of cynicism.
Any policy that hinders the efforts to recover is being met with rejection. Let’s hope for more of that.
It is a perfect example of “haves” (government and select pals) and “have-nots” (all the rest of American citizens). Old Irish saying, “…..BE FAIR AND FEAR NOT…..” Keep our powder dry as the time is coming and it is coming soon. As a light weapons infantryman I can assure one and all that neither the Army soldiers or Marines will support the annointed elite in a confrontation with the American citizens. If the elections are stolen by illegals, Chicago Obama gangsters, Acorn activists, crooked pukes at the polls the people will not let that stand. Go Conservatives! Go Republicans! Go America!
FYI rank & file federal government employees have been off the old Civil Service Retirement System with its defined benefit plan since 1983. All feds hired since then participate in Social Security.
Addicts are thieves, everyone of them, and under all circumstances.
I’m addicted to Camel Filters, and have never stolen a damn thing. But I might turn to it… if my habit were to be made illegal….
As a (retired) government employee myself (law enforcement subset), the most intelligent things I’ve heard said about government (other than the incisive observations of Dr. Hanson) came from science fiction writers. Such as this commentary by Lazarus Long, from “Time Enough For Love” by Robert A. Heinlein, in response to a question by Ira Weatheral regarding the honesty of “business” politicians vs “reformers”;
“Use your head, Ira. I don’t mean that a business politician won’t steal; stealing is his business. But all politicians are nonproductive. The only commodity any politician has to offer is jawbone. His personal integrity- meaning, if he gives his word, can you rely on it? A successful business politician knows this and guards his reputation for sticking t his commitments- because he wants to stay in business- go on stealing, that is- not only this week but next year and years after that. So if he’s smart enough to be successful at this very exacting trade, he can have the morals of a snapping turtle, but he performs in such a way as not to jeopardize the only thing he has to sell, his reputation for keeping promises.
“But a reform politician has no such lodestone His devotion is to the welfare of all the people- an abstraction of very high order and therefore capable of endless definitions. If indeed it can be defined in meaningful terms. In consequence your utterly sincere and incorruptible reform politician is capable of breaking his word three times before breakfast- not from personal dishonesty, as he sincerely regrets the necessity and will tell you so- but from unswerving devotion to his ideal.
“All it takes to get him to break his word is for someone to get his ear and convince him that it is necessary for the greater god of all the peepul. He’ll geek.
“After he gets hardened to this, he’s capable of cheating at solitaire. Fortunately he rarely stays in office long- except during the decay and fall of a culture.”
-Heinlein, “Love”, p.130
And here, of course, the Old Man was assuming that the reformist was honest to begin with, as opposed to being a “reformist” because he sees it as the best way to punish people he regards as less “enlightened” than himself, for their “crime” of … being different from him. The ranks of our own “social reformers” today are, however, replete with those with precisely that mindset. (Think, the sort of people who found Audi’s “Green Police” Super Bowl ad an appealing vision of how society should “deal with” those they regard as “environmental criminals and/or backsliders”.)
Frank Herbert also had words on this subject. Simply put, he believed that the more power that is given to government, the more care must be taken in the method by which the leaders of same are chosen. The society described in his novel “Dune”, as well as its sequels by other writers, repeatedly fails this basic test, with catastrophic consequences in the long run however “good” the results seem at the time of the offense, so to speak. (No, Paul Muad’dib was not an improvement over Shaddam IV, the Navigation Guild, or the CHOAM Company, sorry to state.)
Our society seems to be determined to ignore Heinlein’s warnings, and perpetuate the same sort of mistakes as Herbert’s characters do. The long-term prospects are not good.
clear ether
eon
Mr.Hanson has just described what happened to the old Soviet Union. If you were in the party, life was easier for you than if you were a serf. We saw how that ended.
#16 “Bureaucrats are dangerous (and necessary)”.
Yes they are and no they are not!
VDH: You made the case. All of big government is unnecessary. Small government, local, state and federal and in that order of importance is useful.
Weep and howl all you parasites the money is going to run out.
Essential vdh
We all have our individual “stories” that are rationalized to make sense to us–who ever we are, or whoever we have been made to be. That only goes so far.
I think our concern should be on “who we are being made to be”. America is not a static society, but it could easily become one if new Americans are not like the old Americans that of course get replaced–no one gets out of this world alive.
The questions for voters now is “Who do you want Americans to be”? Like BHO? A BHO is a person who has been made in America by PC, and AA and a Utopian indoctrination used for revolution purposes and fundamental change only. The result for America is a growing disaster and the destruction of America in the making. It could be argued the destruction of the World. What would happen without America in the world?
Being a BHO means; No Integrity, No individual responsibility, The end always justifies the means. A Marxist, a socialist, a progressive who does not even blush when he spouts off about the Utopia he sees for all of us just to gain power and votes.
A situation that requires American weakness and fear and class warfare for voters to buy into. Who and what is making these kind of Americans?
Voters who have to be made in his likeness. A self centered idiot who is totally dependent on others made by an America that he is trying to destroy.
A parasite that does not even understand he is killing his host. America fought a bloody revolutionary war and an even bloodier civil ware to eliminate his fundamental ideas from American soil.
The question now for Americans is— What created him (BHO) and his cronies and how do we get ride of it? How does America stop making marginal human beings? Human beings whose ideas are the very reasons previous Americans fought and died for to eliminate.
vdh, Thomas Sowell, Walter Williams, Rush Limbaugh, now Glen Beck, now Sara Palin and all true conservatives— all have a proper view of what America was and what Americans should be and once were. How do we go back to go forward?
How do Americans take back their country from the idiots from hell, the parasites that includes most of the current political office holders.
How about voting the bastards out of office. Does it all come down to one simply sentence. I hope so.
I just read an article about Obama’s ideas for the small business loans through the SBA and community banks. Though I would not hold out much hope for them helping much I was shocked how clueless this President continues to be.
His brainstorm is that the banks can use these new loans to bail out small businesses who can’t pay their commercial real estate loans…..like loaning money to a company who already can’t make their payments IS GOING TO HELP.
But, it gets better…you won’t be eligible for the loan if you haven’t been on time with your paymnents for the last 12 months.
So, the money that was supposed to be for small businesses to create more jobs will now be given to companies who can’t make their commercial real estate loan payments…but you can’t be behind…..AND THIS IS SUPPOSED TO CREATE JOBS.
VDH, the time has come, in fact, it is long past due…that people of conscience begin to stand up and be counted.
I’m not sure that fear should be the motivator. And it’s not “big government”, but bloated government that is the issue, it seems to me.
I don’t mind a government with muscle, cut and buff from exercising restraint and pumping iron into the infrastructure.
I don’t mind a government that doesn’t gorge on the empty calories of a tonnage of pork and religiously trims the fat from its budget.
Size matters, of course. But it’s not merely the size of government, but rather, the shape of government that matters most.
However, VDH, the Ministry of Truth has a different resonance with me.
The red diaper babies who run Newsweek and the fellow travelers who run CNN, the NYTimes, ABC, CBS, MSNBC have engaged in an orchestrated deprivation of objectivity, fairness and in far too many instances, truth…and have worked against the principles of ethical journalism for decades.
It is time to declare such behavior unacceptable. It’s time to pick a side.
I have nothing but the utmost respect for Charles Krauthammer. I think his writing is brilliant and concise. But he works for an organization that has lost its moral compass, in my opinion.
If we look the other way, if we engage in a passive acquiescence by accepting a “filtered truthiness” in our information stream, we actively assist in depriving ourselves of the very facts upon which we must rely to self-govern this land of ours.
I humbly suggest that any person who still has a conscience and works for an institution that is engaged in a conspiracy to deprive our countrymen of truth, in order to arrogate to themselves what they believe should be the truth…they need to stand up and be counted.
If one works in the entrenched media, and you still have a moral compass, a conscience, ethics, and your institution is engaged in a conspiracy of unfairness, you need to pick a side.
If one works in Hollywood or entertainment, you need to pick a side.
If one works in academia, you need to pick a side.
The tea party movement is not just about taxes. It’s about honor, integrity, truth.
It’s not about Republicans and Democrats, it’s about self-governance of this land of ours, through representatives who don’t cook the books at Fannie and Freddie, it’s about an information stream that doesn’t steal and hide the truth, it’s about fairness and decency.
It is time to take stock of where we wish to go as a nation, as opposed to being blindly dragged by a nose ring, by the aging revolutionaries of the Woodstock Nation.
It’s time to stand up and be counted. Are there good, honest and decent people left in the entrenched media, who see that right is right, wrong is wrong, fair is fair? In academia? In Hollwyood and entertainment? They must not shrink from their conscience, if they exist today.
Pick a date, pick a site…and ALL men and women of conscience must stand up and be counted. The only way to overcome fear, is to take a stand for truth. To ask, at long last…merely for honor, integrity, and decency.
This is a request from all the independents, who are really behind much of the energy in the current movement. Just stop lying to us. Stop stealing from us. Stop talking down to us. Stop hiding the facts from us. And, if you work for someone who engages in that behavior…how does that make you feel?
it is the race to the bottom …a program where everyone loses.
good essay VDH
I recall being in a meeting several years ago with a number of military officers and Federal Government civilians.
An issue came up about how to apply a policy. Should we apply it to some specific circumstances? Should we clean up a contaminated site on Federal property, one that had no possibility of ever hosting a day care center or becoming public park?
We asked the government civilian expert. His answer was brutally frank and astonishingly honest. “If you ask me, I am going to tell you yes, clean it up. This is what I do for a living. The more of it that gets done the better the justification for my job, the more people in my organization, and the higher a chance I have of being promoted.”
Earlier in my Air Force career I was discussing with another officer the issue of shutting down a program, which would disband a certain military organization. He argued that we should have other alternatives, other ways of keeping the unneeded program going and the military unit operational. I pointed out to him the flaws in the only possible alternatives.
His response was also honest. “Your problem is that you are trying to deal with this in a logical manner. We are talking about people’s jobs here.”
And perhaps that is the worst aspect of big government, of more people on the government payroll. Trying to deal with the results logically is a problem. Big government creates its own version of logic.
Government jobs seem to attract the lazy and the entitled. That the average gov’t employee earns 70K for doing work that is either inefficient or unnecessary, paid by money that is extorted from the taxpayer, versus an average of 40K for private sector employees who must actually produce a needed service or product, or face firing or layoff, is a national travesty. I contend that most public sector employees would never make it in the real world. Consider our current president. Mr. Obama would have no place in the private sector other than just another sleazy lawyer, or as a run of the mill overrated liberal socialist law professor. Other than that, I don’t think he could handle the fry cook job at McDonald’s. As for Mr. gov’t employee #15, enjoy it while you can. If the adults ever return to Washington, they will be forced to trim the fat from our bloated government. If they don’t, or if the liberal statists manage to stay in power, the country faces economic collapse that will take you out of your comfortable useless jobs anyway.
The mere fact that lawmakers would exempt themselves from the very laws they make should be reason enough to fear government.
This should be illegal.
15 Government Employee — All due respect, but I would not miss your hard work if your government job was eliminated. In fact, the net affect of cutting your job and 75% of the rest of the government jobs would be a net plus to the country. Government is too damned big and your in it. Get used to the scorn from those of us who have to pay for bloated government, including your salary.
And, while we’re talking, if you were getting so screwed during the boom times in the private sector, why didn’t you go out into the private sector? Apparently you were not getting screwed. So quit looking for sympathy.
“The Greek Four-Step” is a PERFECT description of San Francisco “liberals.” I lived there for five years and discovered a large city which regularly voted socialist, LIVED on cash-under-the-table, and took every penny of “welfare” they could. One real, human example was the “partner” of a gay man who came to clean my apartment for cash-under-the-table: this guy was a professional student until his mid-thirties. When his parents insisted on him getting a job, well, he went BACK to school — nursing school. He began actually WORKING as a male nurse in his early forties, and, five years later, he “threw his back out” and filed for every disability in sight. He told me this story with satisfaction, not embarrassment. A man nearing 50, who had only done productive work for FIVE YEARS.
In his post, number 4, vandenberg says he’s been suckered in by the canard the monetary problems facicing his own and others of the sorry satellite states of the Euro-peons’ Neo-Soviet are the fault of “Wall Street.”
Not true.
America has its monetary problems, too. (Although they’re relatively tiny beside those of the Eurabian “union” — and the total colapse headed China’s way) But like those of every other Western Nation and/or facsimile and/or cheap Xerox copy thereof, the Netherlands and Greece among them, the problems were created and are being sustained and aggravated by corrupt politicians, by hapless bureaucrats and — especially — by the insane Keynesian capers and scams of central bankers!
Or how about the time my fiance (now my wife) and I finished the basement. The building inspector failed the work because of some strange insulation rule, so of course, he had to come back and re-inspect, he failed it again, and on the third inspection he asked my fiance out on a date…of course, she works from home and during each of these inspections she was home alone during the inspection…creepy don’tcha think?
Keeping my name anonymous for reasons that will shortly be made clear.
I once dreamed of becoming a college professor in one of the physical sciences. I was disillusioned to discover in graduate school how much of my professors’ time was spent milking the federal government. I could probably have lived with that, as knowledge is a public good, but the deep sense of entitlement with which they went about the milking was too much for me.
I figured that, if I was going to suck the government teat, it might as well be doing something that was reasonably clearly a legitimate function of the federal government. I went to work for a weapons laboratory.
And discovered that I and the brilliant Ph.D. scientists I worked with were being bossed around by the kids who got Cs and Ds in the basic math and science courses we aced in school. We call it the revenge of the C students.
Even when it’s something the government should legitimately be doing, they manage to do it badly. Perhaps because too little human capital is being spread over way too many areas that the government to be leaving to others?
Dr. Hansen. But remember. All of that happens with the active cooperation of journalists and major media. While many reporters are eager to expose corruption among conservatives, none want to talk about corruption among democrats, liberals or unions. The current levels of government incompetence and corruption could not long exist if America had major newspapers that were even lightly committed to using investigative journalism to expose fraud, corrupt and waste in government. But the owners, publishers and editor and everyone in the television field are loyal democrats, obedient to the party line. So they leave it to bloggers to find and expose corruption such as the IPCC, climate-gate, Al Gore’s deals with carbon credit traders, etc. Therefore Americans have no reason to trust the media and no reason to trust our government.
re: #1, who will police the police? You managed to omit Nifong… among others, like Martha Coakely, and Ted “the swimmer” Kennedy himself… Meaning, the police aren’t the only ones, and there are more egregious names to be listed.
I am a government slug. I wish I worked in the government jobs you all are so knowledgeable about.
I will be able to retire in my mid 50s. That will be at 50% pay. If I can find a second job that makes up the difference I might do that.
You are right that complaints filed against employees are very very difficult to push through. On the other hand if one gets a bad yearly review there is no recourse so no, it is not a bulletproof sinecure.
Maybe if the rest of the governments of these United States ran the same way people wouldn’t be so angry at government workers.
Also no, you probably wouldn’t miss me if my job was eliminated. However I work in a crime lab and there are those unfortunate ones who would miss me very much if I were gone on the day of a trial or on the day of no trial because my job wasn’t done.
My point is, do not have mindless rage against all but be enraged by the specific instances. Vote the bastards out who let waste and corruption exist.
David Sheedy said, “It’s been said the greatest threat in our world is cynicism.”
Don’t worry David. Michelle Obama said Barak Obama will demand that you shed your cynicism. So, there ya go – so no worries.
Here’s her comments:
http://campaignspot.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NjljYjA3YTYzMjU2ZjA5Yzg1MmM2YjIzZjEyN2ZjZjk=
Why Fear Big Government?
@ 38. eon: SF critique of Govt.
Once the PC Left gained power (1970?)
Sf was the only place one could publish
cautionary tales concerning government;
There are plenty of us out here who are
tracking the ongoing economic/political
collapse in terms of analogies from Analog.:)
The silver lining to those gloomy tales
is that US exceptionalism will give us
a narrow window between public panic and
the final collapse to try for reform;
Wait for it.
#53 Number Six – This is the reason the MSM is on the way out. Eventually, the laws of economics catch up with you. People “go Galt”. Of course, this is only possible, necause we have the Internet… so of course, they want to regulate the Internet.
The dishonest lie, by nature. Their lies are not effective, however, unless they have a complicit, trusted Media. So, they gained control of the Media, and they have made great strides towards their goals. The Internet, however, has revealed the lying Media. It is no longer trusted, so the lies are no longer effective.
To accomplish their goals, they must now gain control over the Internet. Red China is trying. The lying Libs here are dreaming and scheming of it. The Fairness Doctrine is all about controlling the information stream. Without that control, their lies are ineffective, and their power is broken.
They will be coming after us. Power demands it. The liars demand it.
It is interesting that Power seems to come from two sources: Pure Lies; or Pure Truth. The Devil or God. Half-measures won’t do.
If We The People (“a nation of dodos, too dumb to thrive”) would just STFU and accept our place as We The Peasants, the new liberal aristocracy could get about mopping up on our behalf and all will be well in the best of all possible worlds.
The Great Peasant Revolt of 2010
And like the jizya required of those infidels allowed to survive under Islam, We The Peasants will of course be responsible for supporting the Aristocracy through oppressive taxation.
In the LA Times last summer, I read of some CA state pensioners who draw yearly stipends in excess of $500,000 from you the taxpayers.
Since when is the American dream “get rich” ?
There is no logic in that notion. The American working class dreams of steady work, my friend, and I am sorry that that has to be a dream.
55. And we must also see to it that there is accountability for government employees. Take the Army for instance, the Army has been promoting men to Captain 39 months after commissioning (verses 48-49 months for the Marine Corps). Since several MOSs require advanced training, these men could become company commanders with barely a year of experience as a platoon commander. Then we rush to promote them to major. This results in officers who not only lack the experience to command as many troops as they are being asked to command, but also prevents us from filtering out those that are incompetent at any level from being promoted to field-grade.
Question for Dr. VDH:
1) Has the USA crossed the “tipping point” where we have become slaves to the self-serving government ? 2) Will only a violent revolution become necessary to turn things around ? 3)When and how can those who work and pay taxes rebell against the 50% plus who freeload including the government freeloaders ? There is no salvation thru electing the opposite political party as they belong to the same club. Your answers and solutions would be appreciated in your next article. Thanks ??????
OK, I know this may not be the right question at the right time–but who are the republican in congress that we need to get rid of?
I other words, who are the pork barreling corrupt scum that make us all look like hypocrites and give the liberals the fig leaf of an argument that they have?
What I worry about with terms like “RINO” is that it can gloss over fiscal conservatism and basic honesty so long as the member of congress answers survey questions right about gun control and abortion.
Who are they? What are their names and how do we replace them?
Lily @56. … oh that’s right. How easy it is to forget Michelle Obama… or is that me being cynical.
Please DO NOT tell any of this to Greg Rodriguez at the Los Angeles Times. A historically ignorant man even for the Times, he thinks fear of government is a neurosis that started with King George III. He thinks we need to “get oevr it.” The Romans? The Greeks? The midevial church? Hitler? Stalin? None of those has left any imprssion on Greg. Checks and balances be damned! Let the Government grow!
55: “I will be able to retire in my mid 50s. That will be at 50% pay.”
You would be extremely luck to find a private sector job that allowed you to retire at 50% of pay at 65, no matter in the mid 50’s.
That’s exactly what we are complaining about.
Now, if you risk your life to protect the public, that’s another matter.
Finally a treatise that states a case without ranting and raving about the left or the right. This one gets my “kudos” because it simply rales against the inefficiency of government which is something we can all do without.
I have been commenting for years that regardless of party, the methods we use for establishing government and empowering the state, needs a complete review. The voting system is clearly broken for one thing. The taxation system is impractical, particularly in the U.S. The use of a constitution is of course an essential document of laws, I believe to enable us to govern ourselves, but it needs to be updated to meet that need, on a more frequent basis, and not be viewed as some sacred unchangeable document, written somehow by ‘divinely’ inspired men? That is how the bible and the koran became the unquestioned “laws of god” for so many early millions of ignorant people, who still to this day remain bamboozled by them, and follow them to the letter, even though it is clear they were never meant to be so. (That is if one uses common sense and reads them from a modern viewpoint).
The human species consistently appears to enjoy the deifying of this ancient expression of intelligent thought, as “God like” and subsequently creates a society that ultimately becomes dysfunctional and dogmatic or “gridlocked” in it’s belief systems. We called those early mystical institutions “religions”. Look what they have become in retrospect as to how they began, and were originally intended? Likewise anyone who aspires to be like those originals, and to offer themselves up as servants for the cause, in some ‘priestly’ need to be above the normal ebb and flow of life, we have honored and also apparently now deify. As with todays Politicians, who are nothing more than the priests and ministers of the political system, mired in an already ancient dysfunctional tradition of left versus right! This in a world where communication has become instantaneous and trade and travel are thought of in Global terms.
This is not to say there are not those with genuine desire to do good, for the people and society that elects them. But the system is so stuck, with some established hell like “credo” of rules and barriers to common sense, that with each passing generation of followers, it becomes ever more deeply mired in the muds of bureaucratic contradiction to that common sense, and thereby easily destroys any form of good intent. This certainly describes the current body politic of several nations on the planet, with the most glaring example being the great United States Of America ….. Gridlocked beyond any common sense!
The growth of government is not in and of itself an evil, but when it grows as a result of it’s inefficiencies and it’s inability to adjust a bureaucracy to modern themes, then it becomes a burden and an unnecessary barrier to a healthy community and society. The nation then begins a decline as a result, until some form of upheaval, either at the polls, or in the embodiment of some movement or individual arrives, to completely overturn the ineffective system. Anarchy is also present in some form or other. Nations, empires and systems inevitably die from within.
Hopefully with the blessing of Law, but not a necessity as has been witnessed in the past with the arrival of dictatorial regimes. The American drama continues to unfold. Is there a Weimar republic similarity, that can be drawn? Certainly, if one does a genuine comparison, as well as other historical examples, and especially given the loss of stature on the Global stage, as well as declining economic wealth, increasing poverty and unemployment…………. but not the loss of force of arms?……. Frightening thought. But I am just postulating a possible thesis/scenario and am probably wrong…….right? We shall see!
regards
james
Disabusing Theo-political Utopian Fantasies
By Robert Winkler Burke
Of inthatdayteachings.com
Copyright 2/9/10
How did the world get to be so mind-enslaved,
And in such a money mess?
Well, let’s peel away the layers of false utopias,
And you’ll see God’s truth best!
The big Orwellian false utopia,
Is a century of hidden progressive reign,
The liberal’s destruction of all known,
Western Enlightenment and truth’s gain.
But how could a world,
Be blind to all this?
False Christian doctrine,
Helped evil’s bliss!
Four false Christian utopian schemes,
Enabled progressive political lies!
Broadcast Christian errors of supine ease,
Enabled liberal, mind-shackle jive!
The first false Christian utopian scheme,
Is prosperity’s give-to-get lie,
Wealth comes from goods and services,
Not the Ponzi-schemer’s cry!
The second false Christian utopian scheme,
Rapture’s selling of great fear!
The doctrine is infantile and plain crazy,
To mature: is why we’re here!
The third false Christian utopian scheme,
Is slouch-doctrine selling great laziness,
Rome wasn’t built by this: but how lost!
To do nothing: makes people penniless!
The fourth false Christian utopian scheme,
Is intellectual, emotional jabberwocky blindness,
The kind that demagogues use shamelessly,
To make sheep worship their behind-ness!
Thus with these popular four doxies,
Shepherds for one-hundred years raped sheep!
While politicians enslaved minds,
To progressive’s hidden-slavery power sweep!
That’s why the Twenty-First Century,
Looks so bleak!
Theo-political ministers,
Makes us weep!
The Orwellian people in charge,
They get by well!
But woe to the sheep-citizens,
They live in hell!
Antichrist rapture causes fear, and fear makes hell, not utopia!
Antichrist prosperity causes greed, and greed makes hell, not utopia!
Antichrist slouch-doxie causes immaturity, and immaturity makes hell, not utopia!
Antichrist demagoguery causes mind-slavery, and mind-slavery makes hell, not utopia!
Antichrist liberal progressivism causes destruction, and destruction makes hell, not utopia!
Thus clerical tyranny combines,
With political tyranny,
To disavow Western Enlightenment,
Unbeknownst: enslaving many!
Liberal concepts of utopia,
Destroy Western Enlightenment’s good,
Transparency, check and verify,
Beware self-interest and idols of wood!
Rapture, prosper, slouch, emotion ministers,
And progressive politicians are all Pharaohs!
Awaken to In That Day Teachings,
Get free from enslavement! From them: fly like arrows!
Well then, that’s a large concept to swallow,
Un-confessed, insidious, hidden clerical and political tyranny,
Is the reason the world is financially fallow,
But In That Day, God’s indwelt spirit and truth sets you free!
Yes, In That Day,
Multitudes shall see!
What trapped them and,
What sets them free!
I think the answer to the Progressive movement is to start to follow their plan of infiltration. While the ideas of big government are much more easily pushed under the guise of “caring for our fellow Americans” or “helping the less fortunate” or what ever emotion-evoking slogan of the day then are the ideals of working hard and acquiring property through personal effort and responsibility. Education is the key. I think that with the far reach of cable television and the internet, combined with the real sentiment of American’s who still believe in personal accountability and hard work, we can begin to infiltrate the education, and higher education system and re-educate future generations of the lessons the past and the principles of freedom.
The problem is corruption, or more correctly our acceptance of corruption.
Check out the blog.
We must battle corruption. It is corrupt people in our government who are pushing for bigger government. It is easier to hide their corruption the bigger the government is.
Remember power does not corrupt, corrupt people seek power.
So, Doc, I take it that you’re leaving. Is the raisin ranch for sale?
Years ago I remember standing in line at the Post Office. The postal worker was, shall we say, less than enthused seeing the long line forming. Inevitably someone yelled out, “can this line move any slower” and was slapped with this response from “our civil servant”: “you don’t like it, leave. HaHa, we’re the only game in town”. Got that? That was the quickest move he had made. Can you imagine that attitude if you need to care for YOUR health problem??? Another thing I observed: when the civil servant is in a position to hold power over the citizen supplicant you get a real chance to see the fraud of that left wing shibboleth: minorities have no power. Yeah? Every time I have encountered a truculent public employee with an attitude problem, they are invariably a member of some protected minority who, when put in charge, seems to get a great thrill over lording it over those needing their cooperation. Never fails, in my experience.
James M. Convey, the US Constitution is the closest to a sacred document that we have. It is changeable but not easily and that is by design.
If change is easy we get Obama with Czars everywhere unaccountable to anyone. Yes I say many of Obama’s policies are unconstitutional and designed to dodge his constitutional obligations. The Supreme Court should be brought to declare it so.
There is no one in government or academia that I would trust to monkey with our constitution now. They all have axes to grind or power to seize. So I say that if a change is important then they better make a good case for it and take it to the States.
#55
Break out the tiny violins.
I’ve been in the private sector all my life (except for a short stint in the military). I am 62 and could retire on only my savings and social security, except I can’t get medical insurance at any price.
So my heart bleeds.
It used to be that civil “servants” routinely got less pay than us civilians, which was made up for with generous benefits and retirement. Now, civil servants usually get paid more than in the private sector, and still have their juicy benefits and retirement.
As more baby boomers retire, and find themselves living off their savings while their taxes are supporting fat retirement benefits for government workers, the tide will turn, and the guaranteed retirement benefits will be reduced, as they should be.
#43 CFBLEACHERS is dead on. This is now down to honor, integrity, and decency. Stand up and be counted if you still believe these qualities mena anything.
I surely hope this author is advising the next president.
The truth of this matter, of exploiting the government, while at the same time praising humanitarianism and welfare by the government is a very ugly seed. People see it and run away screaming. At least, that’s what I did.
It seems we are having great trouble in eluding the position where the people with any brains and morals are not running the show.
Enjoyed #17. . . .Gives me a little hope for some of America’s youth. . . .
Though in general I agree with Dr. Hanson, in one example he’s listed on this post I take strong exception. In fact, if what he says is true I think he’s become a pantywaist. I hope it isn’t true.
7. 11B40: When I was with DMV that even $ amount was almost always an old unpaid parking ticket fee DMV was required by law to collect for some other entity or city. We seldom had such even-amount fees. This is no help to you, obviously, but DMV may have passed your letter on to the proper agency and it is THEY who failed to respond. As a manager I ran into that frequently. It was not fun for us, either.
15. Government Employee: Your point is valid but under-appreciated by the citizenry. The overpaid 10%, the ones who don’t do any work, have puked in the punchbowl the other 90% like you – who are probably still slightly underpaid – need to drink from. Sorry, that’s life.
26. Marc Malone: Most lower level government employees do their work because they know they fulfill a need, not because they dream of a cushy job. Yes, up to about 20% are total flakes. GE doesn’t sound like that type. She/he makes a valid point. Some of the “adults of the world” need a few of us around to clean up their messes. But that’s probably not you.
30. Smoking Frog: I think you’re spot on.
31. David Sheedy: Spot on.
46. Chris: You are generalizing in the worst possible way. Up to 20% of the GE’s may be as you say, but the other 80% are usually hard, conscientious workers. Yours is a philosophically lazy argument, imo, and doesn’t take much brain power to spout off about. There are lots of bad examples, yes, but many, many more exceptions you seem to ignore. In my view.
48. TL: If #15 were a drawbridge tender and you were the skipper of a tugboat on his river, your statement would be “hot air”. In general you may be right, but in specific cases you could be full of malarkey. Just saying.
55. Michael: You must be talking about Federal employees. Not true with state and locals. Complaints at those levels get resolved. Fast. (in most but not all places, of course).
#43 cfbleachers Eloquently said. I wish to thank all those who have contributed to this discussion for your civility and decency. It is highly unusual on most discussion venues. You all have given me food for thought.
What a shame that folks here didn’t seem to notice that 55. Michael works in a CRIME LAB. Certain public servants such as cops, firefighters and yes people like him who basically work behind the scenes don’t get paid nearly enough.
Micheal may be offered the CHANCE to retire at 50% pay, but would still have to work to make up the difference. So obviously, retiring at 50% alone isn’t gonna get him a retirment home in Palm Beach or perhaps any kind of livable retirement at all.
By the way, our troops are public servants too.
Be carefull who you lump together here. You’re including some pretty amazing, hard working, courageous people who don’t deserve to be included in your generalizations.
#55. Michael: “Voting the bastards out” does not work, because the members of the Two-Party Duopoly have so thoroughly stacked the deck in their own favors that your only “choice” is between the Red Bastard and the Blue Bastard. Independent non-bastard candidates, non-bastard members of Third Parties, or anyone else who is not a Red Bastard or a Blue Bastard need not apply.
So regardless of which Bastard your vote for, it is still a guaranteed certainty that the winner _will_ be a Bastard, who will be in favor of a bigger, more intrusive, more omnipresent government that they can use to award more perks to themself and their favored cronies.
The only difference between the Red Team and the Blue Team is which part of the FedGov they want to grow first, who they want to steal from first, and which of your few remaining inalienable natural rights they want to take away first. No matter who “wins,” the FedGov will get bigger, the lawbooks will get thicker, more things will be taxed, and more of your rights will be stolen — and all “For The Good of The People.”
Voting to replace Coke with Pepsi will not change the fact that either way you’re going to be stuck with the bill for an overpriced cola.
The lesser of two Evils is still Evil.
It’s time to say “NO. I _REFUSE_ to hand one of you bastards the appearance of a fake `mandate’ to steal from me and enslave me.”
Vote N.O.T.A.: None Of The Above Candidates Is Acceptable.
cfbleachers – What kind of delusion are you living in. Do you actually think most everyone in this country is a liar? Do you think your pathetic appeal for “truth” will convert American independants into your camp?
The future of America has nothing to do with the truth. It has everything to do with what I think is the truth and what my administration thinks is the truth.
You and your weak minded, intellectually challenged tea baggers are the virus. Progressive Americans are the cure! Get used to it!
# 17
Thank you.
#84’s comment is unintelligible – I think perhaps pretending to be a socialist to inflame readers. So that just leaves one troll so far by my count, the predictable Vivo at #33.
It must be hard to read this if you are a believer in big socialistic government because not only does it ring so logically true but also because there are so many supporting examples.
Vivo thinks that it is all the same because “.. the problem is always PEOPLE who are greedy, lazy, ignorant, inflexible and corrupt”. This is exactly why government must be limited – because they do not check or penalize such people – in fact they thrive there. In the private sector there are mechanisms to limit such types to a manageable level: greedy (contract law and competition), lazy (you can be fired), ignorant (you don’t get to touch the controls and you don’t earn very much), inflexible (you go out of business) and corrupt (you go to jail).
#84 comment is unintelligible – I think perhaps pretending to take the other side to inflame. So that just leaves one troll so far by my count, the predictable Vivo at #33.
It must be hard to read this if you are a believer in big socialistic government because not only does it ring so logically true but also because there are so many supporting examples.
Vivo thinks that it is all the same because “.. the problem is always PEOPLE who are greedy, lazy, ignorant, inflexible and corrupt”. This is exactly why government must be limited – because it does not check or penalize such people – in fact it allows them to thrive. In the private sector there are mechanisms to limit such types to a manageable level: greedy (contract law and competition), lazy (you can be fired), ignorant (you don’t get to touch the controls and you don’t earn very much), inflexible (you go out of business) and corrupt (you go to jail).
The coasting thru stop signs by police officers that an earlier poster described is so commonplace that it is often know as the “cop-stop”. I had a cop go by me the other day at about 80 only to see him parked in his driveway a few minutes later — he was on his way home for lunch.
@Brian Richard Allen. Thanks for your eloquent and thoughtful insight. One question though. If Greece, birthplace of the Western civilization and The Netherlands, birthplace of Western Capitalism, are a cheap Xerox of a Western Nation. Than what is according to you a Western nation?
‘dyed in the wool.’ not die-in-the-woool. Other than that, magnificent article.
The IRS has put out a bid to buy 60 assault shotguns, presumably to help us pay our taxes:
http://www.mccookgazette.com/blogs/1461/entry/32975/
“Big government or small government, the problem is always PEOPLE who are greedy, lazy, ignorant, inflexible and corrupt.”
Government (and the courtiers who wish to remain on its good side) shields the greedy, lazy, ignorant, inflexible, and corrupt, and we have no choice but deal with the government; it FORCES us to do so. If a company’s practices annoy me, I can choose not to do business with them.
Czarist Russia became a “victim” of its sinecured bureaucracy, which grew to maximum inefficiency and size and fell. Unfortunately, the communist state which followed was even worse and deadlier. All of us who knew the cold war, who read books like 1984, who saw ominous signs in the ’60’s antiwar movement, and who thus felt a horrible chill in Obama’s election see the looming death of America – unless we stop it, and we will. That the global warming/ Copenhagen central plan for the planet crumbled at the last minute, followed by providential blizzards and record-setting winter temperatures RIGHT IN DC, where today, this moment, a new bureaucracy of climate change was set to be announced is a true sign of hope. It is cool to make fun of global warming (as in Demint’s The snow will stop when Al Gore cries uncle), a sign of its death knell.
Get rid of the right to collectively bargain or strike for all sniveling servants. All of them. Then erase the CS Code.
This will end when it comes down to whether we and our family eats or the bureaucrats eat. Until then, we’ll let them abuse us as they do, with some individual resistance. It is the nature of sheep. (Don’t believe me? Ask yourself if anyone knows the current curriculum being taught your kids in public school.)
However, when the herd finally has had enough we’ll either knuckle under for the final time, or we’ll start kicking people out right and left. The “administrative government” promoted by the socialists knows this and it is a race against time for them. They want more control, before the control they have slips.
Right now, I’m mulling over how how we can exile politicians. Since there is no new world for us to flee to and start over, the only action remaining is to make them leave. For a second I imagined Pelosi, Reid and Frank being hustled onto a plane headed for Havana or China. Then reality set in when I realized if we did it to them, we’d have to do it to the rest of them. And we don’t have enough planes.
69. Nice poem, get behind me Satan! Yo rightly condemn greed and being lulled into a stupor, and then you use this condemnation to condemn the Resurrection as fear mongering. Do not be deceived- the Rapture is the Resurrection of the dead, without which, there is no salvation. If you deny that the dead shall rise, you deny also that Christ is Risen. Poisoning the Truth with lies is the Devil’s work. You call the Rapture infantile? Did not the Lord say, “No one may enter the Kingdom of God except like a little child?” And if this doctrine is plain crazy, what is salvation by the Cross and Resurrection of Christ? Or for that matter, the Virgin Birth. God became man to die for our sins; that sure sounds crazy, but if you believe that, why would you doubt His promise to return and resurrect the dead and transform the living, who long for His Coming?
As for fear mongering- does talk of the Second Coming strike fear in the hearts of men? Of course it does, what of it? If you are an unbeliever, it ought to make you tremble! For the Second Coming is Wrath and Destruction to them that hate the Lord, but to those that long for His Coming, it is salvation and escape from death.
Government fears us Patriots, bet on it. Before long they are going to get their due, count on it
I’m a “certified” right-wing conservative gun-nut who retired to “the outback” 13 years ago.
And, over my lifetime, I’ve seen many examples of “entitled” employees, government and business.
But, don’t paint all government employees “as bad folks sucking at the public teat”.
My rural area has grown a lot, as people try to find a safe haven from government excesses.
A new and MUCH larger Post Office was built 8 or 10 years ago. And, was “overwhelmed” immediately.
I recognize all the employees who deal with the “always a line, often long”.
And, they are ALWAYS friendly and cheerful and helpful, each and every one.
They all earn and deserve their pay. And, all seem to enjoy their “very busy” jobs.
I don’t know who “manages” the place. But, I suspect he/she does a good job too.
This is NOT true at the P.O. of the MUCH larger town (actually, a “little city”) 25 miles to the south.
The “standard stereotype” universally applies to these “public servents”.
#82 sms; Thank you, well said.
Sorry, folks, if you’ve seen this comment in other pages. I’m not too familiar with the technical details of blog participation; but this is the page where I want this comment to appear, because the topic is “big government” and publicly sponsored or managed health insurance has undoubtedly something to do with it.
Mr. Hanson, I’m a French-Canadian living in the province of Québec and I wonder why there is so much opposition from Americans in general to a government or publicly sponsored universal health insurance program in United States. A lot of Western states have such programs, including Canada, and we would never go back to laissez-faire in these matters. Of course, these programs cost a fortune and there are abuses, either form users (regular folks) or providers (psysicians, among others) but the universal coverage is a treasured feature and we certainly don’t envy uninsured Americans who are ruined by health fees when they have to assume such costs. In all due respect to courageous thinkers like you, Hitchens, Thornton, Steele and others whom I admire. Daniel Fournier, Montréal, Qc, Canada
What truly worries me about the continued bloating of government is strangely enough the lower level pukes themselves. All governments are democracies–you get just as bad a government as you’ll tolerate. But what happens when governments (like California) begin to crash for real? Democracy becomes mobocracy, and somebody has to get the blame. Who better to blame than government employees, especially in unions, who robbed the state to the bone out of pure greed, adding nothing and taking everything?
There are plenty of government parasites who deserve that level of scorn. But most of them don’t. But it won’t be the former state representative double-dipping on the Commission for Studying the Study of Studies who gets dragged into the street and lynched. It’ll be some poor teacher or garbage collector or postal worker who may have been a bit too arrogant but didn’t really cause the problem, or even add much to it.
You can say all you like that it can’t happen here, but I’m a Mormon and it’s already happened here lots of times in lots of places for lots of reasons. Whether the race riots in NYC during the civil war, the Lawrence massacre just before, Rosewood in the 1920s or the Extermination Order in 1838 mob violence has been a bigger part of the American experience than most care to consider. It can happen again and probably will, because the end result, perhaps even the desired result of the massive expansion isn’t a police state–not immediately. First comes anarchy and destruction, poverty and desperation, so that we’ll all be begging for a man on a horse to come and save us.
Dr. Hanson is surely more familiar than I am with Aristotle’s cycle of governments and Machiavelli’s update of the idea. Our republic is becoming more a democracy every day, and with 60% of the people receiving more from the government than they pay in taxes or service we’re sliding closer to the anarchy that always follows democracy every day. We may be amazingly lucky and get another George Washington instead of a Hitler or Napoleon–but George Washington is stands out so starkly against all the other revolutionary leaders in history that I wouldn’t bet on it.
I personally won’t be dragging any IRS agents into the street and I won’t be participating in any mob whatsoever. And I’ll keep a good supply of ammo to fight when the strong man’s goons come calling. But I do think it would be better to prop up our sagging republic in any way possible. Better to hurt a little now than find out first hand how the mind fades to nothing in a mob situation. There simply isn’t any way to recover without pain to lots of people–so instead of lynching meter maids I suggest we just outlaw unions for all government employees. It’s simply not right for them to treat the rest of us as greedy managers trying to wring the last ounce of labor out of them. It’s about time they became citizens again.
This guy is absolutely correct:
“It used to be that civil “servants” routinely got less pay than us civilians, which was made up for with generous benefits and retirement. Now, civil servants usually get paid more than in the private sector, and still have their juicy benefits and retirement.”
And why is this??? Because we were all sold the Globalism bill of goods while we threw our borders wide open for any non-citizen to take our jobs. Perot’s “Giant sound sound” lead us all the way to China for the sake cheap consumer goods while we outsourced ourselves into oblivion. The finance shell game has run out of steam and all that is left are those gov’t jobs that weren’t so good not that long ago. Unfortunately those Gov’t people are the only ones left in the firing line. But who is left to pay their wages?
I wish VDH would tell us how we get out of this one. We know what his prescription is but those kinds of things will never happen. Find someone else too blame? Look elsewhere for something to demonize?
99. BBG You’re welcome, and thank you.
In a republic, a constitutional democracy such as ours, freedom is truly a zero-sum game. The founders knew this all too well, hence our system of checks and balances which is all too often traduced, even ignored by the elites in all three branches. If one needs a convenient, pocket-sized, lightweight understanding of the concept, this might suffice: Each and every jot, tittle and iota of power that government takes unto itself is a jot, tittle and iota of freedom taken from the individual–every individual. Its corollary is: Freedom lost, in any amount, is seldom fully regained, and never without substantial cost.
Daniel Fournier@100, respectfully, as a Canadian, there are more serious problems with healthcare in this country than benefits.
Too long a subject to cover here, but I thought it worthwhile commenting for those south of the border, that this is not a “universally” held conclusion.
Without going further, I can provide countless examples of shameful and atrocious experiences in our hospitals, unbelievably long wait times for peadiatricians, specialist that are long gone, and many more examples of dysfunction – and that’s without even doing research to look beyond examples drawn upon from my own observations as a non healthcare professional and one who uses the system, but has no other affiliations.
Yes, those in need of medical attention, ought to be able to get it without having to mortgage their lives, but the Canadian model is a disaster.
The optimal solution is a mixed system of both public and private care. And there’s no easy answer to achieve this set up. But medical care in this country was until the late 80’s, the envy of the world. It’s been in decline since, principally due to the elimination of the private element to shift to a pure public system.
Now, that example, is specific to Ontario, but other provinces had a mixed system, and opted to go public in a political manouvre to gain more federal transfer money at the provincial level, but it is possible to analyze the state of healthcare in Canada and get to a conclusion that it has significantly declined, and is at a low in its current state.
…. and all this said, while I was trying to be brief. LOL … it’s a tricky issue infused with challenges to compassion and riddled with passion, but standing back, Canada’s delivery of health care is a 4 our of 10 as an overall grade.
To say otherwise is misleading and unsupported by facts.
Free trade isn’t the problem. The problem is that we tax and regulate our businesses to death, so they escape to fairer skies, where the workers are less productive, but the government is much less hostile.
One of the comments earlier (#40) noted Bureaucrats are dangerous and not necessary. I generally agree with dangerous, but allow me to counter point “not necessary” with an explaination.
When we talk of the Constituton, “Bureaucrats” and “administrators” are not included. The founding documents relied on the power and work of private individuals basd on natural laws respecting property and personal rights. In large part this stems from the agriculture society that was the basis of much of the world in the 18th century. The key to the constitution was the checks and balances. States versus federal, executive versus legislative vs judicial, etc.
Industry resulted in changes to the social fabric. It also created a crack that was in time used by progressives to begin to sideline the Constitution and many natural law beliefs. Early in the 20th century, governments developed administrators to administer regulations. Regulations for “health and welfare” which resulted in limits on private freedoms.
What they left out was the check and balance. Who has the power to say no more, who speaks up for the citizen. Who or what balances the administrator who makes rules and governs beyond the limits of the constitution?
But to my point, the need for bureaucrats. For my example, lets take the case of a volunteer fire department. Free men and women who band together to protect themselves. When houses were wood and the volunteers used water, life was simple, neighbors could work together. But today, a volunter fireman may have to respond to a chlorine spill on the highway, over the road radioactive materials, or a natural gas fire, or a number of complex and dangerous situations. Many of these require more than just “put water on the fire” knowledge. All of these require complex training and tools.
I still belive volunteers can do the job, but they need to be trained and certified. Tools, training and certification bring forms of administration into play for the protection of the volunteer and the citizens. So how do we balance the cost or training volunteers to be safe with the rise of regulatuons that impact fireman, truckers, builders, and any number of persons who firemen may come into contact wih. Or do we just create government agency with Bureaucrats to “fix” the problem? (not my recommendation)
This was one simplified example, but it can be extended into zoning and planning, construction, environmental issues, etc. I maintain we can achive an appropriate level of administrative bureaucrats. But we first need to re-establish the principals of private rights based on natural laws and then add a means of checks and balances to the imposition of regulators. Not to mention, reset the checks and balances in the state and national goverments.
For the record I am an engineer in private practice. In the past I have also served in the public sector. I also believe we have allowed regulators and administrators to go unchecked for too long, we need a means of check and balance.
The biggest tax cheats I’ve known were all the most liberal people I’ve known. I’m glad to hear that I’m not the only one who has observed this phenomena. Apparently whole countries play this game!
It must take a special form of insanity or cynicism to vote for higher taxes and then cheat to avoid the very taxes you voted for. One of the reason I don’t have that many liberal friends any more.
Mr. Hansen’s description of Greece does not apply exclusively to the “Socialism with the human face” of Western Europe. It also sounded like a description of the country I grew up in – the former Soviet Union. And that is where such policies lead when taken to their logical conclusion.
Eric.
Sung to the tune of it’s a Wonderful World
I see taxes real high employment real low,
Everyone’s sad, it,s really bad,
And I say to myself it’s an Obama world.
I’ll get my health care, I know it’s not fair,
But we’ll ram it through, you know that’s it due,
And I say to myself, it’s an Obama world.
I see Rahm Emanuel calling voters retards,
His language so awful, his tactics so hard.
And the EPA shutting down industry,
We need energy while they’re hugging trees.
The country’s decline the fault is not mine
It’s been just a year, so let’s have a beer
And I say to myself it’s an Obama world,
And I say to myself , it’s an Obama world.
Where’s Louis Armstrong when you nee him? Rick the Brick