Category: too much government

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ideological culture too much government

We Can Do With Less When Less Is More

With congressional approval ratings at the lowest ever, it’s evident: the sclerotic old institution needs new blood.

But note what I’m not saying — that “Congress doesn’t do enough.”

As A. Barton Hinkle points out in a column, yesterday, complaints about the 113th Congress hail from “CNN to McClatchy to NPR to the L.A. Times,” one lamentation dominating: “the 113th makes ‘the infamous “do-nothing Congress” of the late 1940s look downright prolific.’”

But, as he makes clear, the complaint is witless.

Producing more bad legislation is certainly no improvement. And, as Hinkle observed, the most talked-about recent congressional responses to apparently real problems have been widely judged worse than the problems themselves. Almost everybody was glad that SOPA — the “Stop Online Piracy Act” — didn’t pass; vast majorities opposed and now regret Obamacare.

So, why is most new legislation bad? The reasons are legion, but one stands out: Congress doesn’t even have time to read the laws it debates and passes. 

A British economist explained it like this:

[E]ven Members of Parliament find the burthen of reading through the multitudinous and mazy provisions of the Bills issued day by day . . . too heavy to be borne by mortal man.

That was over a hundred years ago. It’s worse in this new year of 2014, both in Britain and America. Today’s laws are cooked up in back rooms by legislative assistants and lobbyists. When such is “more,” less is better.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment too much government

IRS Returns Money It Stole

A year after the IRS seized their bank account, Terry Dehko and his daughter have gotten their money back, thanks to a lawsuit they undertook with the help of the valiant Institute for Justice.

The IRS had looked at how the Dehkoses deposited revenues from their Fraser, Michigan store and decided, without further inquiry, that they were illegally “structuring” the deposits so that their bank would not have to submit currency transaction reports.

The reporting threshold is $10,000; most of the Dehkoses’ deposits were indeed less than $10,000. However, $10,000 is also the maximum loss that their insurance policy would cover in the event of theft! How hard would it have been to simply ask the reason for the deposit pattern?

Nor did the folks at the IRS ever show evidence of tax evasion or other illegality.

The Dehkoses have their money back. But they’ve lost a year. And lost any profits they might have earned by investing those unavailable funds, as well as any profits they might have earned by spending the time on their business that they instead spent trying to get their money back. Of course, the IRS will not be required to compensate the Dehkos for either psychic pain or lost opportunities.

There’s plenty more wrong with the agency’s conduct than is suggested by this case. At the least, though, it should be illegal to seize bank balances absent any showing of wrongdoing. And IRS officers who perpetrate such arbitrary seizures should be punished.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
too much government

Against Innovation in Ohio

Why so many things are made in China, or Taiwan, Singapore . . . or Mexico?

I have no beef with foreign trade, mind you. Just as I don’t want government to favor one business over another here in the U.S., I don’t really want that to happen across borders, either. I know what comparative advantage means.

But one reason we rely so heavily on imports is that we don’t have a free market in the states. Too much regulation favors some businesses at the expense of others.

Tesla Motors is trying to sell its cars direct to the public. But, in most states if not all, the market for automobiles is heavily regulated. Direct, factory sales are prohibited by law. Why? To protect dealerships.

So, after the Ohio legislature failed to make a special deal to keep Tesla’s electric car out of the state, a number of special interest groups, including Midwestern Auto Group and Ricart Automotive Group, have sued Tesla, the Ohio Department of Public Safety, and the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles. The idea is to get Tesla’s license to sell cars in the state revoked.

Forget competition and the innovation it brings. Instead, businesses conspire with governments to keep out upstarts, competitors. You know, the innovators.

Tesla’s electric sportscar may be way out of my price range, but it would be interesting to see an electric car actually make a go of it. I hope the suit fails, and we get to see whether Tesla can make it on the open market.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
ideological culture too much government

The Christmas on War

There’s a war on Christmas, I’m told. But I say, “Let’s declare Christmas on war.”

After all, Christmas is about giving, while war is about breaking and taking. Christmas is about love, about celebrating life. War is about hatred and counting the dead.

Thankfully, nobody’s actually being killed in the many very un-merry public Christmas controversies.

Just joy.

Who’s at fault for this clash of Christmas trees against Festivus poles made of beer cans and Nativity scenes versus symbols to Satan?

Whoever turned their Christmas over to government, that’s who.

Don’t governments have enough to do, and a difficult enough time doing it? Who had the bright idea of letting politicians run Christmas?

Let’s not vote on it.

We can and should stand on our own feet, celebrating Christmas on our own property, at our own churches, civic clubs, businesses, wherever, and at our own cost, carrying our best Christmas cheer into the public arena, but without asking for any public assistance or subsidy for our holiday.

They can’t declare war on Christmas if we keep the peace of Christmas by not giving even the merest piece of it to government.

What’s more, what a great gift should this attitude last past the season and be more widely applied. How many other controversies could be changed from wars — on drugs or poverty or what-have-you — to challenges increasingly addressed by peaceful private — and voluntary community — action.

This is Common Sense. Merry Christmas. I’m Paul Jacob.

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local leaders national politics & policies too much government

Best Obamacare Prescription

Is non-compliance the answer?

I recently discussed how sheriffs in Colorado and elsewhere are refusing to cooperate with oppressive new laws, in their case farcical gun-control laws. Can we find similar inspiration in other fields?

Yes. Consider the medical industry.

Despite the Supreme Court decision okaying some of Obamacare’s key unconstitutional assaults on commerce, judicial battles over the new law are still being fought. More to our point, many doctors scheduled to be manacled by Obamacare have been refusing to slap on the cuffs.

A survey by the New York State Medical Society finds that 44 percent of respondents won’t work with Obamacare clients; another third are unsure what they’ll do. The doctors perceive the chaos and uncertainty of the new regulations and expect low fees.

Dr. Sam Unterricht, president of the Society, says, “This is so poorly designed that a lot of doctors are afraid to participate.” Others are participating only because obliged by organizations that employ them. Perhaps those doctors loath to becoming cogs in the galumphing Obamacare bureaucracy will find ways to extricate themselves from their organizations. Maybe they will emulate the respondent who says that from now on he will accept only cash for his services.

Another survey respondent says: “The solution is simple: Just say no.”

Are these non-cooperating docs motivated by fear of Obamacare’s destructive impact? Or are they moved mainly by uneasiness about the color of ink at their bottom line? Or, just possibly, are they expressing principled concern for their rights and freedom?

All of these, I hope.

Whatever the case, though, they’re following the right prescription.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
free trade & free markets general freedom too much government

You Ignorant Fool

About the title  —  that’s the FDA talking, not me. It’s their apparent attitude toward people who dare learn about their genes.

For $99, 23andMe analyzes your saliva and tells you about your DNA. Their site includes plenty of caveats about the possible emotional impact of the information, the possibility of errors, the limits of what one can infer about health tendencies, the advisability of taking no remedial action without further testing and consultation.

Nevertheless, the FDA has sent a WARNING LETTER to 23andMe co-founder and CEO Ann Wojcicki expressing concern that customers may, for example, rush to have dangerous prophylactic surgery like breast removal if they learn about some genetic risk factor. The company must stop marketing its product until it satisfies FDA regarding false positives, recipients with no common sense, etc. Otherwise, the agency just may have to seize 23andMe and impose penalties.

Yet, as Harry Binswanger notes, “A false positive does not force you to obey it.”

Wojcicki has now spoken up about the FDA’s letter, allowing that 23andMe is “behind schedule” in providing FDA with information, calling the bullying agency a “very important partner,” and in general speaking very carefully while stressing that new technology is not per se a bad thing.

What she doesn’t say is that any FDA interference with our ability to buy and evaluate information about our DNA, and Wojcicki’s right to discover and sell it to us, would be a very bad thing.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
ideological culture too much government

Unlimited Entitlement

“The political problems of liberal populism are bad enough,” Jon Cowan and Jim Kessler of the “centrist” group Third Way wrote last week in The Wall Street Journal. “Worse are the actual policies proposed by left-wing populists.”

They’re warning Democrats not to push policies promoted by Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and newly elected New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio.

Cowan and Kessler aren’t exactly Tea Party activists. Before Third Way, Cowan was Democrat Andrew Cuomo’s chief of staff at both Housing and Urban Development and then as Governor of New York. Kessler worked for Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and as director of policy and research for Americans for Gun Safety.

Still, Warren and de Blasio are faulted for having a “‘we can have it all’ fantasy,” believing that, “If we force the wealthy to pay higher taxes (there are 300,000 tax filers who earn more than $1 million), close a few corporate tax loopholes, and break up some big banks then — presto! — we can pay for, and even expand, existing entitlements. Meanwhile, we can invest more deeply in K-12 education, infrastructure, health research, clean energy and more.”

It’s “reckless” to ignore the looming financial insolvency of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid (which is being dramatically expanded) warn these Third Way authors: “Sen. Warren and her acolytes are irresponsibly pushing off budget decisions that will guarantee huge benefit cuts and further tax hikes . . . in a few decades.”

In response, groups like Social Security Works, Progressives United and Progressive Change Campaign Committee are threatening any politician associated with Third Way not to dare challenge their hankering for unlimited entitlements forever.

Delusions die hard.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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national politics & policies too much government

Ending Obamacare

Getting rid of Obamacare has proved not so easy.

The GOP House majority, won in late 2010, voted dozens of times to get rid of the program, but without Senate support to pile on (much less override a presidential veto), they could vote to repeal every day of the year and still nothing would happen.

Besides, the Supreme Court has ruled that it’s okey-constitutionally-dokey to compel custumers to buy insurance or pay a fine — or a tax that’s not a tax.

And then there was the 2012 presidential election, in which the Romneycare candidate lost to the Obamacare candidate.

But laws imposed by men are not laws of nature. Gravity cannot be annulled; Obamacare sure can.

The New York Times reports that the thinking of “conservative and libertarian theorists” at the Cato Institute, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the American Enterprise Institute and elsewhere has informed several lawsuits challenging the Obama Administration’s attempts to unilaterally redraft provisions of the law as passed.

A key point is that the IRS has no authority under Obamacare to award tax breaks or subsidies to persons who buy insurance through the federal exchange rather than a state exchange. Ability to impose penalties in turn depends upon the availability of such subsidies. All this matters because many states have fought Obamacare by refusing to set up state exchanges. Some of these states are among the plaintiffs in the lawsuits.

Meanwhile, Congress is holding hearings on how the Obama Administration has repeatedly amended the Affordable [sic] Care Act despite lacking legislative authority to do so.

Our freedom, wealth and health are too important to surrender to government dictocrats. Thankfully, many advocates of medical freedom remain in the trenches.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
national politics & policies too much government

The Website is Fixed?

At Monday’s White House briefing, a reporter challenged Press Secretary Jay Carney, “if you . . . hit the ‘login’ button . . . it does take you to that screen where you’re asked to leave an email and come back later. That seems to be coming up . . . all day long. . . . is that going to be acceptable if that’s the norm for a lot of people for an extended period of time?”

“What I think is important to note,” Carney responded (repeating himself and blathering a bit) “. . . is that we have a queuing system made for a better user experience so that individuals could get in that queue, could be notified when was the best time to return to healthcare.gov and enroll, if they so desired.”

Desired? We’ve been legally required to purchase insurance. Obamacare-supporting politicians keep talking about all the “demand,” but when folks are forced by law to buy a product, penalized for not, that’s hardly true demand.

After writing that “the functionality of the site does appear to have improved considerably,” the New Yorker’s John Cassidy admits, “However, I didn’t get the opportunity to submit an application, or even to choose a plan. After filling in forms and fiddling around for about forty minutes, I reached a screen that said, ‘You have started an application for health coverage, but our verification system is temporarily unavailable.’”

For those who somehow miraculously navigate the website, the Washington Post reports, “errors cumulatively have affected roughly one-third of the people who have signed up for health plans since Oct. 1. . . .”

Also revealed this week: security was not built into the site, and retrofitting it in could take years.

It turns out that Big Government 3.0 is no more advanced than Web 1.0.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
free trade & free markets national politics & policies too much government

The Woman Who

The good news? Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke is getting the boot. The bad news? His replacement looks no better.

Last Thursday, the Senate Banking committee voted to place Janet Yellen as head of the Federal Reserve. The full body of august solons is expected to confirm this nomination, electing her as head honcho and chief cook (kook?) at the nation’s quasi-private/quasi-public central bank.

I am sure there are folks who look on this passing of the baton with a sort of patriotic piety. I know there are Democrats who rejoice in a banker referred to by Reuters as “a monetary policy dove who puts more weight on driving down high unemployment than the risk this will ignite future inflation. . . .”

Of course, the Fed has already pumped trillions into the system. A burgeoning employment boom has not resulted. To say the least.

Reviewing the current situation, and the likely appointment, economist Gerarld P. O’Driscoll, Jr., reminds us of the big truth about those who push at the Veil of Money: “the Fed is not capable of stimulating job creation, at least not in a sustained way over time.” What the Fed has succeeded in doing, in recent years, is prop up our benighted federal government’s continuing crisis of over-spending: “Congress and the president have been spared a fiscal crisis, and thus repeatedly punted on fiscal reform.”

Problem is, no one really believes debt accumulation or monetary back-up make for a sustainable policy: at some point, O’Driscoll tells us, rising interest rates will “precipitate a crisis.”

I wouldn’t want to be in charge at the Fed when that happens.

So, some sympathy for Ms. Yellen.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.