Category: folly

A Vapor’s Chance in Hell

vape, vaping, smoking, law, regulation, unintended consequence, illustration, photo

There is a big difference between government designed to protect our rights and a government tasked with protecting us from ourselves.

You couldn’t find a better example of this than the current Federal Drug Administration and its regulation of vaping.

Vaping is the imbibing of water vapor laced with nicotine and other ingredients. It is designed to replace the smoking of tobacco cigarettes. It is much, much less harmful than smoking. The genius of this innovation is that while it looks a lot like smoking, it involves no smoke. But it does involve inhaling, and blowing out wisps of . . . well, vapor.

It’s safer than smoking because smoking tobacco involves burning organic (and inorganic) matter, which puts tars and other chemical substances into one’s lungs.

But the competing companies that make the product are not allowed to tell us about its advantages.

New regulations of the e-cigarette industry from the FDA prohibit a lot of truth-telling in advertising. “Even if a few companies survive the shakeout caused by the FDA’s onerous regulations,” Jacob Sullum writes in Reason, “they will not be allowed to tell consumers the truth about their products.” It appears that “any intimation that noncombustible, tobacco-free e-cigarettes are safer than the conventional, tobacco-burning kind” places them under a category that simply must “be marketed only with prior approval.”

The legal judgments Sullum quotes will make you sicker . . . than your first cigarette puff.

Paternalistic government designed to save us from our vices ends up blocking us from actually lessening the bad effect of those vices.

Some help.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Photo credit: micadew on Flickr

Tags anti-smoking, regulation, regulations, smoke, unintended consequences, unintended effects, vape, vaping

education and schooling folly ideological culture nannyism national politics & policies too much government

Toiletarianism

toilet, bathroom, trans, transgender, sex, gender, law, folly

President Obama and other politicians are taking a wide stance over the nation’s public restrooms. Important bathroom policy will finally be determined at the highest levels.

Last week, public educators nationwide received a legalistically-worded letter from the Departments of Justice and Education explaining how to legally treat transgender students under Title IX of the Civil Rights Act. CNN boiled it down to “Fall in line or face loss of federal funding.”

Friendly federal “guidance” comes after dueling lawsuits between the Feds and North Carolina over that state’s House Bill 2, which establishes statewide restroom regulations. Those regs require that transgender folks use the bathroom appropriate to the sex listed on their birth certificate (whether Kenyan, Canadian or other).

Obama wants Americans to choose the restroom matching their self-chosen “gender identity.” Conservatives seem most worried that his policy is so loosely defined as to allow non-transgender male persons to simply claim to be transgender in order to shower with the girls volley-ball team or lurk in the powder room.

“Have we gone stark raving nuts?” questioned Sen. Ted Cruz, proclaiming: “Grown adult men, strangers, should not be alone in a bathroom with little girls.”

In California, there’s legislation to force businesses to make “all single-stall public restrooms” gender neutral. “Let’s make a clear statement that, if you want to go pee, by all means help yourself,” argued the proposal’s author.

Transgender people should be treated with care and respect, as should every person. But do we really need a national bathroom policy designed for maximum division in an election year?

Before politicians solve today’s glaring non-problem in public restrooms, they should solve a real problem first.

Just one.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags bathroom, folly, gender, law, sex, toilet, trans, transgender

Accountability folly general freedom media and media people moral hazard nannyism national politics & policies

The Senator Intrudes

Sen. John Thune, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook, fairness doctrine, censorship

We know that the media in general, and Silicon Valley, too, have strong anti-conservative biases — even if, in another sense, the Fourth Estate serves as almost the embodiment of one understanding of the conservative impulse: relentlessly upholding established institutions, against all attacks. The American media strongly defends the modern state; every program, it seems, is sacrosanct: the only thing wrong with Big, Intrusive Government is that it is not as Big and Intrusive as it should be.

This week, several ex-Facebook news curators alleged systemic “political bias” in how stories receive the top spot in Facebook’s Trending news section. So Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) intrudes. He wrote to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, in his official capacity on the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Communication. Thune says that if Facebook is, in effect, promoting stories by means of a hidden political agenda, this amounts to something like a public fraud, which lies within this committee’s purview.

I don’t see how. And I really would like such biases and pseudo-frauds to be dealt with by consumer pressure rather than government whip. And that should be without regard to the partisan stripe of the bias — or the whip.

Anthony L. Fisher, over at Reason, notes that the senator has a logic problem: he rests his case for government oversight of Facebook rules and consumer relations on the infamous “fairness doctrine,” which is not operative at this time, and which Thune has previously and repeatedly opposed.

And for good reason: the doctrine produced government-enforced muting of speech, not fairness.

But this all may mean almost nothing. I’d never even noticed Facebook’s Trending section.

Have you?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Photo of Sen. John Thune credit: Gage Skidmore on Flickr

Tags censorship, Facebook, Fairness Doctrine, Mark Zuckerberg, Sen. John Thune

Accountability folly free trade & free markets general freedom ideological culture nannyism too much government

Failure and the Five-Day Weekend

Post author By CS Admin
Post date May 6, 2016
3 Comments on Failure and the Five-Day Weekend

Venezuela, socialism, failure, work day, illustration

Socialists often brag how their activism — through unions — gave the modern world its five-day workweek. One could spend a book picking at this boast, but no need: it’s overshadowed by the latest.

A socialist country has just reduced the workweek to two days! Hooray for socialism!

Or, no cheers at all. For this epochal move occurred in Venezuela, the “world’s worst performing economy,” with an inflation rate soaring to 720 percent and an absence of food, toilet paper, and . . . electricity: “President Nicolás Maduro will furlough the country’s public employees,” Nick Miroff writes in the Washington Post, “who account for a third of the labor force — for the bulk of the week, so they can sit through rolling blackouts at home rather than in the office.”

It’s only government employees who get the five-day weekend. And this is not a sign of socialist efficiency (heh heh), ushering in a Marxist utopia.

Another nation ruined by socialism and technocracy!

But not just any nation. Venezuela can boast one of the largest oil reserves in the world. If Norway and Alaska and desert sheiks can milk their underground deposits and distribute goodies to their people, why cannot Venezuelans manage it?

Because they extended socialist planning beyond a kleptocratic sharing scheme. Experts had advised them decades ago to build the world’s largest hydroelectric dam, live off low- or no-priced electricity as well as oil sales. Today, oil goes cheap . . . and there’s a drought, too little water behind the dam.

Now Venezuelans are trying to burn oil to generate electricity — mostly without success. Socialism has it all — rampant corruption and catastrophic inefficiency.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags government failure, socialism, unions, Venezuela, Venezuelans

Accountability folly moral hazard too much government

When in Rome

Italy, housing, corruption, government, bureaucracy

Americans concerned with government corruption really should study Italy.

Why?

“You know Italians,” septuagenarian Elio Ciampanella was quoted in the New York Times last week. “If there is a law, they will try to find ways to go around it!”

But it is not just ordinary citizens — the people — who are evading bad laws. It is government workers who won’t do their jobs, and who engage in a wide range of corrupt deals and shady incompetence.

I know, this seems awfully unfair to the Italians. What I’ve said is the case with governments around the world. But not equally. (Scandinavian countries have a long history of government worker probity, if not ultra-competence.) And Italians do have a well-earned reputation for government corruption.

Arguably, it’s the form freedom takes in Italy.

Be that true or not, Mr. Ciampanella’s story, as related in the Times, is a fascinating one. He asked for a government-subsidized apartment, and had to wait ten years to get one . . . only to discover the problem wasn’t a lack of apartments, but a surfeit.

Yes, the government owned too many apartments to keep track of!

And so they didn’t.

And gave special deals to “special people.”

In other words: incompetence and corruption as a way of life.

Market institutions that behave so chaotically and with so little attention to efficiency go out of business. But government? That’s “necessary,” so: too big to fail. And so, commonly excused.

No wonder, then, that the common-sense approach to government is to limit it.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags bureaucracy, corruption, housing, Italy

folly free trade & free markets meme moral hazard national politics & policies

Trump’s Dangerous Idea

Donald Trump, trade, protectionism, Donald Trump, war, borders, Bastiat

A lot of people were impressed by the reasonableness of Donald Trump’s foreign policy speech yesterday . . . despite the usual hyperbolic promises of “best” and “great” and “beautifully.”

Its general tenor? Refreshing. Rejecting post-Cold War foreign policy for a return to “national interest” and “America first”? Long overdue. Like Trump, I think we should eschew nation building.

But still there is that one big problem: Trump is a mercantilist. He believes in protectionism. He thinks that trade has to be “fair” in order to benefit both participants. He thinks NAFTA and similar trade agreements (which generally promoted trade while still reserving a lot of room for government futzing about) are what hurt American industry. Trump is always blaming the “bad deals” made with Mexico and China, rather than placing the blame where it squarely belongs, on

America’s world-high corporate income tax, and
chaos of regulatory excess, and
impenetrable tax code.

But protectionism makes sense to a lot of people. They are incredulous when they hear the (well-established) idea that free trade — even unilateral free trade — is a benefit to the people who live under it.

Surely, they snort, when you target aid or protection to some industries, you are doing good, right?

Wrong. Oh, yeah, of course protectionism protects the chosen few, the advantaged. That’s what it obviously does. But it doesn’t protect the general interest – consumers pay more and producers allocate resources to less valued uses.

You have to look beyond the obvious (“the seen”) to get the full picture (“the unseen”).

Trump’s at his most dangerous right here — forget his loose talk — by continuing to pretend that protectionism helps America.

We cannot afford another Smoot-Hawley.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags 2016 Presidential race, Bastiat, borders, Donald Trump, Presidential campaign 2016, protectionism, trade, war

Accountability folly ideological culture incumbents moral hazard political challengers

What’s Principle Got to Do with It?

Post author By CS Admin
Post date April 26, 2016
1 Comment on What’s Principle Got to Do with It?

Maryland Primary, Chris Van Hollen,Donna Edwards, super PAC, the National Rifle Association, NRA

Today’s Maryland Primary features a competitive race to replace Democrat Senator Barbara Mikulski, a 30-year veteran. Two House members, Chris Van Hollen and Donna Edwards, are seeking the Democratic nomination.

“[T]his is a contest between two candidates,” National Public Radio’s Kojo Nnamdi notes, “who agree on 99 percent of the relevant issues.”

The campaign got interesting, however, with an attack ad first run by a super PAC, Working for Us, and then by Rep. Edwards’s campaign. The ads hit Van Hollen for a special deal he had made trying to get his 2010 DISCLOSE Act passed. The legislation aimed to force non-profit groups to disclose their donors to the government.

Fearing the hostility of the National Rifle Association, Van Hollen cut a backroom deal exempting the gun rights group, along with several other powerful liberal organizations.

Whatever one thinks of the DISCLOSE Act — and I’ll proudly disclose my contempt — shouldn’t we all agree that drafting laws that apply to most groups except those with political clout is flat-out wrong?

Rep. Donna Edwards, an original co-sponsor of the DISCLOSE Act, wasn’t amused by Van Hollen’s sell-out. She withdrew her support.

I don’t agree with all her principles, but I am glad she has some.

In Washington, it’s lonely for the principled. President Obama came to Van Hollen’s defense. So did the Washington Post, praising Van Hollen (editorially) as a “leading champion of gun safety,” and via Glenn Kessler’s Fact Checker column, which twisted logic to award the Edwards ad three Pinocchios. Democratic congressional leaders, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, also lauded Van Hollen and attacked Edwards.

Washington: city of celebrated sell-outs.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags Chris Van Hollen, Donna Edwards, Maryland Primary, NRA, super PAC, the National Rifle Association

Accountability folly free trade & free markets general freedom moral hazard nannyism national politics & policies

Bailed — Before Bailout

health insurance, experts, obamacare, insurance, costs, illustration, meme

Last Wednesday, UnitedHealthcare Group Incorporated (UNH) announced that it will drop coverage of plans under Obamacare in all but a few states by 2017.

The market signaled a thumb’s up: UNH stock prices shot up over 2 percent.

The company, described in the news, somewhat vaguely, as the country’s largest insurer, is sending us a signal: the Affordable Health Care Act and its “Obamacare”?

Not affordable.

An insurance policy must make sense to both parties, the insured and the insurer. The insured gets peace of mind . . . and coverage when the rare events insured-for take place. The insurer has written enough insurance contracts out there, prices based on actuarial risk, to allow it to make a profit even with payouts.

The problem with the ACA is that it raised costs (in part by forcing insurers to take on patients with pre-existing conditions) while regulating terms of policies offered . . . and prices, too.

Plus, face it: the idea that one should insure for regular checkups is just one of the many absurdities built into the system.

It’s just too much meddling to work, in the long run. Bailouts and subsidies of those insurance companies that stick with the plan will then make the program unaffordable . . . for America’s taxpayers.

Over-regulated and over-subsidized, Obamacare suffers from the preposterous idea that a bird’s eye view of the economy from the politicians’ perch gives enough information to run complex systems servicing millions of people with diverse needs.

Expect more big stories with tags lines ballyhooing a “serious blow to Obamacare.”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags Affordable Healthcare Act, experts, health insurance, ObamaCare

Accountability crime and punishment folly ideological culture media and media people national politics & policies

Story, Story, Story

David Brooks, dichotomy, dualism, false, minimum wage, crime, illustration

David Brooks has a story to tell you.

His New York Times op-ed, yesterday, “The Danger of Single Story,” builds on a good premise: “each individual life contains a heterogeneous compilation of stories. If you reduce people to one, you’re taking away their humanity.”

Brooks puts a political edge on what otherwise might sound like a lesson in manners with his next sentence: “American politics has always been prone to single storyism — candidates reducing complex issues to simple fables. This year the problem is acute because Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders are the giants of Single Storyism.”

Brooks then asserts that Trump and Sanders share a similar story that they beat to death, “the alien invader story.”

You can see how it applies to Trump, a staunch opponent of illegal immigration. Aliens invade!

But Brooks recognizes that Sanders’s story is about “the evil entity called ‘the banks.’” Not exactly alien. This menace is home-grown.

Then our pundit moves on to issues not in the single-story vein of Trump and Sanders, and how what seem to be opposite stories (incarceration prevents crime; too much incarceration is a moral horror) can both be true.

Crime is low right now, but Brooks devotes most of this putative paean to multiple crime stories. The third Bernie story he takes a bite of, the $15 minimum wage, belies the Single Storyism charge. That is, the point of his essay.

Way to go, sophisticate.

He also draws a complete non sequitur: “Raising the minimum wage to $15 may make sense in rich areas.” Nothing he wrote gives any credibility to that. At best the hike would do nothing.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags Bernie Sanders, David Brooks, dichotomy, Donald Trump, dualism, story

Accountability folly government transparency ideological culture moral hazard national politics & policies

Money Means Nothing to Her

Post author By CS Admin
Post date April 18, 2016
2 Comments on Money Means Nothing to Her

Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, campaign finance reform, big money, illustration, angel, Saint Hillary

Campaign finance reform is surely dead . . . if Hillary Clinton is elected president.

Which would be good.

Not Clinton being elected, mind you. What would be good is the death of so-called campaign finance reform — the kind supported by Democrats, including Sen. Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton. They insist on a constitutional amendment to partially repeal the First Amendment’s freedom of speech protection and give Congress awesome new powers to regulate their own and their opponents’ campaigns.

But wait — if Mrs. Clinton supports campaign finance reform, why would her election kill this seriously bad proposal?

Well, Hillary Clinton made it abundantly clear at last week’s Democratic presidential debate, as I explained this weekend at Townhall: large campaign contributions do not influence her in any way. Even a fat $15 million from Wall Street interests to her super PAC — or $225,000 a pop speeches paid by Goldman Sachs and their ilk — registers no corrupting effect whatsoever.

And those millions deposited in Clinton Foundation accounts from foreign governments?

They couldn’t possibly sway the steady former Secretary of State. Not even the smallest smidgen.

Just like there has never been corruption at the IRS.

Don’t believe Hillary? Then trust President Obama, who also gobbled up major Wall Street funding when he ran in 2008 and 2012. But again, according to her, “President Obama was not at all influenced when he made the decision to pass and sign Dodd-Frank, the toughest regulations on Wall Street in many a year.”

Not. At. All.

So the solution to government corruption is simply to elect trustworthy, incorruptible candidates . . . like Hillary Clinton.

Well, call her half right.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags 2016 Presidential race, Bernie Sanders, campaign finance reform, Hillary Clinton, Presidential campaign 2016