Category: too much government

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national politics & policies Tenth Amendment federalism too much government

Idaho’s Healthy “No”

By hook and by crook — ignoring the constitution and twisting parliamentary rules — the president and his congressional allies are succeeding in imposing command-​and-​control health care on all Americans.

If the new law is allowed to stand, the scraps of freedom we still enjoy in matters of health care will dwindle as provisions of the bill kick in. And that’s only the prequel. Pelosi and other Democrats promise to introduce even more constrictive legislation once Obamacare Round One has been rammed through.

Friends of freedom aren’t giving up. There’s an election in 2010, for one thing. But many state governments aren’t waiting for that. The Idaho legislature just passed the Idaho Health Care Freedom Act, which states, in part, that “every person within the state of Idaho is and shall be free to choose or decline to choose any mode of securing health care services without penalty or threat of penalty.” Governor Otter is signing the Act because, in his view, health care laws should treat people as individuals “rather than as an amorphous mass whose only purpose in this world is to obey federal mandates.”

Idaho is the first state to pass such a measure, but similar legislation has been proposed in 22 others. Such declarations will most likely have only symbolic significance if Obamacare remains in effect and other legal challenges on the grounds of federalism get beaten down. But those are two big ifs. Americans aren’t ready to surrender to the health care commissars just yet.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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free trade & free markets too much government

Keystone Cops in Philly Folly

This March, armed Pennsylvania State Police bravely raided three popular bars in Philadelphia. 

They confiscated liquors that allegedly had not been properly registered with the state Liquor Control Board. Brewers and importers must pay a $75 registration for each separate potable they sell in the state.

Some unnamed concerned citizen had complained. The three bars were affiliated, so maybe a resentful competitor had something to do with it.

According to the owners, many of the confiscated ales had been duly registered. But when the state police couldn’t instantly confirm this, they just grabbed cases and kegs and towed them away. 

Even in the case of unlicensed ales, what is the virtue of raiding a bar to sloppily “check” their status and then steal supplies? Especially when it’s not the bar owners who are legally obligated to register the brands? 

Some clerk could have just dropped by, inspected the booze, asked a few questions. Or just called the brewery and said, “Hey, you forgot to register such-and-such.”

Of course, the whole idea of requiring separate registrations of each separate beverage is silly to begin with. 

Further, the state police could have, and should have, simply declined this wrongheaded mission.

Apparently we can’t count on better lawmaking and better, more sensible regulations. But we do count on our police.

This is Common Sense. (Let’s practice it.) I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
Accountability free trade & free markets too much government

Krugman’s Crazy Crotchets

Paul Krugman is getting sillier and sillier these days. He’s supposed to be an economist, and not long ago some people in Sweden gave him an award for his economic work. So why would he suggest that economic incentives just don’t matter?

The New York Times columnist bashed Republican Senator Jon Kyl for stating that generous unemployment benefits can reduce the incentive to look for new work. Krugman says that this isn’t the textbook view of things shared by himself and the Democrats. “What Democrats believe,” Krugman says, “is what textbook economics says.”

Gee. So what does textbook economics say? 

James Taranto of the Wall Street Journal actually checked a textbook in economics. According to this textbook, “Public policy designed to help workers who lose their jobs can lead to structural unemployment as an unintended side effect.… In other countries, particularly in Europe, benefits are more generous and last longer. The drawback to this generosity is that it reduces a worker’s incentive to quickly find a new job.”

Interesting. So who wrote this textbook? Yes, that’s right: Paul Krugman.

This partisan fellow, Krugman, often seems to go out of his way to be contradictory as possible. Does he believe his own babbling? Or is he just trying to get a rise out of us?

Or is it to please his editors over at the Times?

Call it an economic incentive.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
government transparency national politics & policies too much government

How to Find Out What’s In the Health Care Bill

When I heard what Nancy Pelosi said about the health care bill the other day, I did a double-​take. And had to double-​check the press release issued by Pelosi’s own office.

Yikes! She really said it! Then published it on her website to the accompaniment of bugles and trumpets! 

Okay, maybe I invented the bugles and trumpets. But not the words:

“Prevention, prevention, prevention — it’s about diet, not diabetes. It’s going to be very, very exciting. But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy.”

Ah yes, the “fog of the controversy”! The way critics of this 2000-​page legislation have exposed the regimentation, price controls, new taxes, and choked-​off choices we’ll all suffer if the bill passes. How dare we!

Terrible that there’s actually debate about whether we should permanently lose more of our freedoms. Can’t we all agree to be trampled and then find out what it all means? After it’s too late to stop it?

No. Let’s dispel the fog right now. Let the government mail a copy of the bill to every voter. 

And let Congress agree that every voter must pass a 500-​question multiple choice quiz on its contents before Congress moves forward. 

Let’s dispel the fog before we’re saddled with this thing.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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free trade & free markets too much government

The Color of Boom and Bust

You’ve heard of “green collar jobs.” But what about “glass collar jobs”?

The Heartland Institute just put out a handy little pamphlet called The Cap and Trade Handbook, by James M. Taylor. It debunks various aspects of today’s obsession with fixing the global climate by laying on new restrictions, regulations and taxes. On page 5, Taylor addresses, colorfully, the “green jobs” issue.

Would cap-​and-​trade create new jobs? The handbook says, “sure, forcing people to buy expensive alternative energy means some new jobs would be created in the wind and solar industry. But even more jobs would be destroyed in the more efficient conventional energy sectors.…”

True — new jobs would come at a cost. The pamphlet then considers what would happen if the government hired thugs to break our windows. Sure, “such a program would create a lot of new ‘glass collar’ jobs in the window repair industry.” But employment would not increase on net, and we’d obviously be worse off, not better.

Unfortunately, the big headline on the page insists that “There will be no employment boom in the ‘green collar’ jobs sector.” Not true, as explained. 

Just as subsidizing mortgages led to a housing boom this past decade, cap-​and-​trade policy would likely create a new boom industry that also would not sustain itself. And then explode. Spectacularly. Disastrously.

Financial bubbles break. That’s bad, no matter what color.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
too much government

It’s the Spending

When running for governor of Virginia, Bob McDonnell said, “The worst thing you can do during a recession is try to tax yourself to prosperity,” and that Virginia has “a spending problem more than we have a taxation problem.” To this I would add only that it would be best if government were fiscally disciplined in both good times and bad.

Virginia’s state government is facing a shortfall of $4 billion over the next two years. A few weeks after reaching the governor’s mansion, McDonnell submitted a list of budget proposals to the legislature. These include mandatory furloughs, staff reductions, financial aid cuts, park closings, and hundreds of millions in cuts to spending on health and human services and K‑12 education.

Like Chris Christie in New Jersey, Virginia’s new governor is facing fervent opposition to any spending cuts. Unlike Christie, Governor McDonnell is less able or perhaps just less willing to act on his own to make any spending cuts, saying he is eager to collaborate with lawmakers.

Virginians must express their support for fiscal common sense and hope for the best. They could do a lot more if the state had a statewide initiative and referendum process; then they themselves could pass restraints on taxes and spending, at the ballot box. Unfortunately, when it comes to citizen initiative rights, Virginia gets an F.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.