A good program on over-regulation:
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December 07, Marquis de Lafayette
On December 7, 1776, the Marquis de Lafayette arranged to enter the American military as a major general. On the same date in 1787, Delaware became the first state to ratify the United States Constitution.
The 1941 date marks, of course, “the day that will live in infamy,” when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor.
Few have known the political prestige and power held personally by Nelson Mandela, who passed away yesterday in his 96th year.
Mandela’s behavior as the first black president of a multi-racial South African electorate (1994–1999) reminds me of George Washington’s approach to power. Washington showed restraint in stepping down from his position after two terms, steering clear of any sort of pseudo-monarchy.
In terms of uniting a disparate population, Nelson had a much tougher task than George. Mandela met the task by promoting an election system called proportional representation — PR, for short.
During Apartheid, elections for the whites-only legislature had been winner take all. Mandela and the ANC knew (upon his release from 27 years of imprisonment) that with voting rights for the large black majority they would win big. Less than one percent of the country’s 700 districts contained white majorities.
So Mandela opted for a PR election system where even a tiny segment of the vote could gain representation in the National Assembly.
At GlobalAdvocacy.com, Andrew Reynolds emphasizes
the importance of South Africa’s choice of a List PR system for these first elections. Many observers claimed that a PR system, as an integral part of other power-sharing mechanisms in the new constitution, was crucial to creating the atmosphere of inclusiveness and reconciliation which has so far encouraged the decline of the worst political violence, and made post-apartheid South Africa a beacon of hope and stability to the rest of troubled Africa.
A group I work with, the Center for Voting and Democracy — or FairVote, for short — works on election reforms we in the USA could use to create greater participation and competition and, ultimately, better representation. In honor of Nelson Mandela, I’m going to make a contribution today.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Vladimir Nabokov
Literature was not born the day when a boy crying “wolf, wolf” came running out of the Neanderthal valley with a big gray wolf at his heels; literature was born on the day when a boy came crying “wolf, wolf” and there was no wolf behind him.
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December 06, 13th Amendment enacted
On December 6, 1865, the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified, banning slavery in all states and territories. On 1917 on this date, Finland declared independence from Russia.
Vladimir Nabokov completed his controversial novel “Lolita” on this date in 1953, and would soon find himself embroiled in censorship and related publishing difficulties, though with no trouble in the United States when it was eventually published by G. P. Putnam’s Sons in 1958.
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December 05, Prohibition
On December 5, 1933, nationwide alcohol Prohibition in the United States ended after Utah became the 36th U.S. state to ratify the 21st Amendment to the United States Constitution, thus establishing the required 75 percent of states needed to enact the amendment that overturned the 18th.
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.
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Karl Kraus
War: first one hopes to win: then one expects the enemy to lose; then, one is satisfied that he too is suffering; in the end, one is surprised that everyone has lost.
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.
When one gets in bed with government, one must expect the diseases it spreads.