If we learn from history, we might be able to avoid some mistakes:
When a professional academic economist and poverty specialist like Prof. Robert Plotnick defends a radically higher minimum wage law, as has been put in place in SeaTac, Washington, and was just enacted (with elaborate postponement/implementation periods) in Seattle, I raise an eyebrow. What am I missing?
But then I read what he actually said: “People aren’t going to stop flying out of Sea Tac [airport] because it costs a little more to buy a hamburger or a beer,” he says.
No. They won’t.
But that’s irrelevant. With prices higher for fast food, there’s certainly going to be no increase in fast food purchases. People will still go to the airport, but more often avoid the fast food joints, in SeaTac or Seattle.
And, over time, as businesses struggle with reduced revenue, or at least reduced profits, fewer of those businesses will survive. And folks with better qualifications — say, better language skills, better people skills, or a higher work ethic — will move in to the forced higher-wage area (the $15/hour minimum in both Sea Tac and Seattle is the highest city rate in the nation) and will replace less skilled workers.
Increasing poverty, not decreasing it: stultifying progress, both personal and in general.
Already the horror stories are piling up: check out the stories in the Seattle Times. (See economist David Henderson’s discussion on EconLog.)
One of the problems was inadvertently suggested by our president, who recently intoned, “Let’s declare that in the wealthiest nation on Earth, no one who works full-time should have to live in poverty.”
Great. We’ll have fewer low-income workers working full time.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Isaiah Berlin
Everything is what it is: liberty is liberty, not equality or fairness or justice or culture, or human happiness or a quiet conscience.
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Reset the Net?
I don’t know on which version the current Internet is said to be. Internet 4.0? Web 3.1? HTML something-or-other? (You may notice: I’m not a tech guy.)
But it’s changing. Streaming video and the fast development of cloud computing are revolutionizing the way we think about the “common space” beyond our computers.
Oh, and then there are all the “post-PC” devices — smart phones and tablets and the like — metamorphosing with Ovidian avidity.
Nevertheless, there’s one big element that outshines them all: government surveillance.
Shhh. This is just between me and you, but … this is not just between you and me. The NSA and other branches of our government insist on listening in.
In the past year, since Edward Snowden’s NSA leaks began hitting the news stream, we’ve learned more and more about how intrusive our government spies not only want to be, but can be; not only can be, but are.
So, to celebrate the first anniversary of the beginning of the Snowden Era, folks at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, in co-operation with good netizens everywhere, have proclaimed today, June 5, “Reset the Net” Day.
A day of protest? More a day of preparation. What can you do to make your Internet presence a bit more secure?
Well, according to the EFF activists, and according to Snowden himself, there are many things you can do. Encryption is one of them.
My advice? Don’t ask me about it. Consult the experts. Let’s think more carefully about life under the eyes of our overlords.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Isaiah Berlin
The fundamental sense of freedom is freedom from chains, from imprisonment, from enslavement by others. The rest is extension of this sense, or else metaphor.
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The Unknown Citizen
No one knows his name. Or whether, when he was whisked away by several people who suddenly appeared in the square, he was rushed to the safety of friends or into police custody.
He’s “Tank Man.” His claim to fame is largely symbolic, blocking a whole line of People’s Liberation Army tanks for several minutes as they were taking a victory lap through Tiananmen Square mere hours after crushing the encampment of protesters. Tank Man stood in front of these massive treaded war machines, moved with them when they maneuvered to go around him, and, once the tanks stopped, he climbed on top of the one in front, banging on it and yelling at the driver.
For seven weeks, protests had taken over much of Tiananmen Square in the heart of the Chinese capital. Students began the demonstrations, which were then joined by working folks. They spoke truth to power and crowds swelled to hear calls for press freedom and individual liberty and basic democratic rights to control government.
But on this day 25 years ago, the Chinese communist leaders, the Butchers of Beijing, ended this Springtime burst of life and liberty by ordering the military to fire on civilians* and roll their tanks over people to clear the square. The Chinese government acknowledges that hundreds died; others put the death toll as high as 6,000.
Tank Man and the pro-freedom movement lost.
An obviously emotional ABC reporter told American viewers that “the voices of those who died calling for freedom and liberty are likely to be remembered long after the sound of the gunfire that attempted to silence them has faded away.”
Tragically, to this day, the Chinese government imprisons pro-democracy activists who speak out, blocks Internet searches for “Tiananmen Square protests,” and uses a massive police presence and arbitrary detention of “radicals” to prevent any commemoration of what happened a quarter century ago.
Still, the image of that lone Chinese worker, satchel in hand, serves as a symbol of the desire for freedom, for the defiance of tyranny. It is forever etched in the minds of liberty lovers everywhere.
We cannot bring freedom to the Chinese people. They will have to continue to struggle to achieve that on their own.
What can we do?
We can remain inspired by the bravery shown by Tank Man — and by bloggers and activists in prisons throughout the world. Working through non-governmental organizations, such as the Human Rights Foundation, we can assist the cause of individual freedom by bringing attention and pressure against tyrants trying to eliminate those who agitate for it.
And we can let these courageous people know they aren’t alone against the tanks and truncheons.
The most important thing we can do is to make certain that our freedoms, the rule of law, and citizen control of government through constitutional limitations and democratic checks on power continue to be defended, protected and expanded.
That really begins when responsible, caring, freedom-loving individuals come together with their neighbors, online, in social networks, at the workplace, through civic groups, at church or school to stand up for our right to be free.
This is Common Sense … and helping to inspire, inform and organize for freedom is our mission. I’m Paul Jacob … and working together I believe we can make a difference.
If you’re moved to support our effort to block the advance of Big Government please give generously … keep the Common Sense coming (and growing).
On the 25th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, why not contribute $25 today?
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Magna Carta, Clause 46
We will appoint as justices, constables, sheriffs, or bailiffs only such as know the law of the realm and mean to observe it well.
Lots of unanswered questions about the prisoner swap of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl for five Taliban detainees held at the Guantanamo Bay military prison.
Will negotiating this swap cause more Americans to be taken prisoner?
Did Sgt. Bergdahl desert his unit five years ago? Was he responsible for the deaths of other soldiers who had to search for him in dangerous terrain?
“[Bergdahl] served with honor and distinction,” National Security Advisor Susan Rice told the media.
How dangerous are the five released prisoners? Can we be confident they won’t return to the battlefield?
Only one question has been clearly answered: the Administration broke the law.
By law, the president must notify Congress 30 days before the release of anyone held at Gitmo. Obama didn’t do so.
“Oh I think he clearly broke the law,” said CNN Legal Analyst Jeffrey Toobin. “The law says 30 days notice. He didn’t give 30 days notice.”
George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley concurred, telling CNN, “I don’t think there’s much debate that they’re in violation of the law.”
Gov. Bill Richardson (D-NM), a former Ambassador to the United Nations, admitted as much, but called the law “impractical,” asking, “What is [Obama] supposed to do, give them 30 days?”
Well, yes.
The law, after all, was passed by a Republican House and Democratic Senate, and signed by Obama himself.
The president added a signing statement, at the time, expressing his view that Congress didn’t have the power to so limit him. Obama, like his predecessor, ignores the law, pretending that a president’s signing statement is an all-powerful pocket veto.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Magna Carta, Clause 20
For a trivial offence, a free man shall be fined only in proportion to the degree of his offence, and for a serious offence correspondingly, but not so heavily as to deprive him of his livelihood.
Mike Rowe is used to seeing people suffer almost insufferable things on a daily basis.
But as blogger Justen Charters puts it, “eight years hosting Dirty Jobs couldn’t prepare” Rowe for his encounter with Staff Sergeant Travis Mills. The veteran of the war in Afghanistan got half his body torn off by an improvised explosive device; he is a quadruple amputee.
On his Facebook page, Rowe tells what it was like to meet Travis at a convention. “He wanted to tell me how much he and his buddies appreciated that show while on active duty. He wanted to know what it was like to work in so many ‘difficult and dangerous situations.’ . . . I’ve seen a lot of things over the years, and I’ve gotten good at pretending there’s nothing unusual when there clearly is. But I was completely unprepared for this.”
When he expressed sympathy, Travis shrugged it off. “No big deal. It’s been two years now. I’m good. Tell me something though — are you gonna do anymore Dirty Jobs?” The show has been cancelled, but Rowe managed to report that he is working on a sequel.
“Hey, that’s great! I got new legs and you got a new show! Tell me all about it!”
There are real victims in this world, and there are people who assume the mantle of victimhood when they have little to complain about. I’d say Travis Mills has a reason to complain. But he doesn’t.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.