Common Sense with Paul Jacob

Our Constitution begins with the words “We the People.” Was that just a typo?

I ask because David Broder, the Washington Post reporter, has written a book attacking the right of voters to enact laws directly through the initiative process. Broder argues that the process destroys representative government, has no constitutional restraint, and is corrupted by special interests.

Should we fear initiatives? Our Constitution protects us from laws that abridge our rights whether passed by voters or imposed by politicians. But in reality, initiatives are regularly struck down by the same courts that regularly give a free pass to acts of the legislature.

What about corruption? There’s a long, ugly history of legislators taking bribes and doing the bidding of special interests. But can special interests pay off an entire city, an entire state? Get real, Broder. Power corrupts men, but an initiative, a piece of paper, cannot be corrupted.

So why the antagonism for initiatives? Broder, like most of elite Washington, opposes term limits and tax reforms that have come about almost exclusively through the citizen initiative process. If you don’t like it when people regain control over their own lives and their own government, you won’t like initiatives.

Broder doesn’t think much of the average voter. Let career politicians decide all. Dane Waters of the Initiative & Referendum Institute admits that no lawmaking process is perfect, but asks, “If the people can’t be trusted, who can?”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

You may have seen the article in your local newspaper, unless of course you’ve been too busy to read the paper because you’ve been rummaging through old receipts and struggling with various tax equations in order to get your federal income taxes filed. Well, the message from Congress on paying your taxes may be “Why bother?”

You see, the IRS just reported that members of Congress and their staffs owe about $10.5 million dollars in unpaid taxes, “one of the highest rates of delinquency in the federal government” and higher than that of the general public.

I guess they can’t say they gave at the office. You’d think that since members of Congress get to spend all the money, they’d be more willing than the average citizen to pay their share. But apparently no.

I’m troubled, but I’m also sympathetic. You know, the tax bite is huge. Federal income taxes alone are monstrous. But add those state and local taxes, sales taxes, property taxes, the tax on this and the tax on that, and the total bill is tough for anybody to pay. How come we gotta pay all those taxes? Oh, a little thing called “unbridled spending” by greedy career politicians in collusion with greedy special interests.

We have met the enemy and it’s the career politicians in Washington. It is a shame that politicians in Congress must be burdened with so much tax debt. But don’t worry about them. The next time they want to spend more money on some program, they’ll just get it from you.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

The NCAA tournament known as “March Madness” excites millions of fans. Every year the competition is fierce and produces at least a few stunning upsets. The University of North Carolina had one of its worst records in memory. Yet they beat the number one seed in their region and advanced to the Final Four. It just goes to show that you don’t know for sure how a contest will end until you play the game. That’s why they do play the game instead of asking a bunch of self-proclaimed experts to pick the winner in advance.

There’s a lesson here for our political system. People have been arguing about whether the independent or third party candidates should be allowed in the presidential debates. The supposedly non-partisan Commission on Presidential Debates, which incidentally is chaired by former Republican and Democratic Party chairmen, says that only candidates who poll 15 percent support will be invited to participate.

Hold on. Most Americans don’t even think about the candidates until the debates. So it doesn’t make sense to first arbitrarily decide who’s going to win and then disqualify those players that the pundits say can’t win. Of course they can’t win if they don’t even get a shot at the title! In 1992, Ross Perot had less than 10 percent support before the debates. But on Election Day he captured 19 percent.

The Demo-publican power brokers want to kill off political competition. Let’s hope they never get interested in basketball.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Recently President Clinton begged the wealthier countries of the world to provide help to the poorer countries, so that they too could expand their economies and improve the lives of the people.

Now that sounds like a nice charitable sentiment until you think about how the good ole US of A grew from a poor nation into the wealthiest people in the history of the world. We did not become rich because of charity from Great Britain or France. Our ancestors built this country with their bare hands, and their dreams. We had what so many countries did not have: freedom.

If you want a country to be rich, encourage it to be free. Of course, a lesson in free-market economics is probably not a lesson your typical dictator wants to hear. They’d rather have the handouts. The kind that are easy to divert to Swiss bank accounts.

Al Gore shares this same welfare mentality when he calls Internet access “a fundamental right.” Thanks Big Al, but in a free country we’re getting on line just fine on our own. The people who started this country embraced freedom and individual responsibility.

As James Madison said, “We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government, far from it. . . . [but] upon the capacity of mankind for self-government; upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves . . .”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Tim Johnson’s recent victory in Illinois’ Republican primary for Congress didn’t get much notice outside of the Washington Beltway, but it’s important.

Johnson overcame the congressional establishment and hereditary succession by convincing voters he was not just another politician. Too often our next congressman moves back from Washington to run for office. Or goes to Washington to get the blessing and funding of the DC crowd in order to run. Where does that leave the voters of the district? Do we get to choose only after the power elite in Washington make their choice?

House Speaker Dennis Hastert picked his candidate for Illinois’ 15th congressional district State Rep. Bill Brady. He put the enormous power of his congressional office behind Brady. The other candidate against Tim Johnson was Sam Ewing, son of the current congressman Tom Ewing. It’s not rare for congressional seats to go from father to son, but it reminds me of the days when political power followed family bloodlines from king to prince.

Tim Johnson is different. He seeks to represent his district, not join the Washington club. He pledged to return home after three terms, while the others wanted a career in Congress. Said Johnson, “The seniority system in Congress hurts all of us because it rewards those who put their own reelection concerns above all else. I will enter Congress knowing full well the date upon which I will leave. I will focus entirely on the good of my district and my country.”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Tell you what. Let’s have the kind of politics in which you support the candidate you actually believe in.

Is electability important? Sure it is. But it’s not an end in itself. Yet too often, folks who crave a seat at the table sacrifice principles to politics. They throw all their weight behind one guy Mr. Electable and throw everyone else to the wolves.

The Democratic primaries were pretty discouraging. Despite all the baggage that comes with Al Gore, most potential contenders bowed out of that contest. Why? Because Gore is an incumbent vice president.

Take the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League, for example. Also known as NARAL. What does it tell us when NARAL endorses Al Gore over the only major alternative candidate, Bill Bradley…even though Bradley is the more consistent supporter of their issue? Bradley gets a 99 percent rating from the group, and Gore clocks in at only 61 percent. But NARAL was betting their chips, not promoting their principles.

We’ve seen too much of the same blind calculus in the Republican primaries. A lot of folks who might have preferred McCain, Forbes or Keyes went with the anointed front-runner instead. They made a political calculation, based on the fact that all the support of the Republican establishment was being funneled to one guy, George W. Bush.

Something is wrong in a political system when expediency wins out over principles, as a matter of routine. It’s time for a change.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Last summer gas got down to 59 cents a gallon. Today we’re paying a buck-fifty.

Now come the politicians to save the day. Low gasoline prices are nearly a constitutional right, they tell us, and they’ll fix everything. Uh oh. The idea of politicians swooping in to save us is scarier than high oil prices. Am I the only guy who remembers the long gas lines of the 1970s, caused by price controls of the politicians?

Of course, one thing the gang in Washington could do is get rid of the gas tax. There’s a direct 18.4-cent federal tax on every gallon. The latest gas tax increase of 4.3 cents is called the “Gore Gas Tax” by the Republicans. You see, Vice President Al Gore broke a tie in the Senate to pass the increase.

So are Republicans rushing to repeal this tax they’ve long been complaining about? No sir. Long-serving incumbent Republicans now argue that we can’t possibly repeal the tax. It would mean the end of the world as we know it, obstructed highways, roads that lead to nowhere, blah blah blah. At least, that’s what the pork-barrel king and Transportation Committee Chairman Bud Schuster says.

Once again Republican incumbents attack Democrats on taxes, but it’s just lip service. They want to spend our tax money just as much as Mr. Gore does. Even with their big surpluses, we’re going to hear a whole lot of hot air from politicians about why they won’t give us back even one lousy cent of our own money.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

It happened. It’s hard to believe, but it actually happened. An incumbent was defeated in his party’s primary by a challenger.

The last time it happened the incumbent was wearing a monitoring bracelet on his ankle so the feds could keep tabs on him. Yes, it is a bit tough to hit the campaign trail when you’re a convicted felon.

This time, the defeated incumbent was 10-term Rep. Matthew Martinez of California. A local columnist says Martinez was a “dull, plodding back-bencher . . . the kind of politician who makes me wonder if term limits aren’t such a bad idea.” Now voters have sent him packing.

Some may say that an incumbent losing at the polls shows we don’t need term limits. Well, if an incumbent being defeated every time Halley’s comet meanders by the earth is your idea of a vibrant democracy, maybe so.

Turns out Martinez lost his seat precisely because of term limits on the state level. This incumbent congressman was defeated by state Assemblywoman Hilda Solis, herself an incumbent. But unlike so many incumbents, Solis didn’t enjoy a lock on her seat. In term-limited California, no one can stay in the Assembly for more than 6 years or in the Senate for more than eight.

Thanks to term limits, more challenges are being made to incumbents. Term limits are livening up campaigns not only state and local races where limits are the law but also for those pampered professional politicians in Congress. Every little bit helps.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Folks in Washington get pretty good at not practicing what they preach.

Case in point. A Republican fundraising letter complains about the “pure pork spending” perpetrated by those evil big-spending Democrats. One item mentioned was a sewer repair project in Salt Lake City. Except that the Republicans backed this pork project, not the Democrats. Republican Senator Robert Bennett of Utah was a big backer of the sewer bailout. So was the rest of Utah’s GOP congressional delegation.

Oops! Suddenly the Republicans have egg on their faces, to go with the pork they’re dishing out. What to do? Well, how about admitting that Republicans are as guilty of pork-barrel spending as Democrats? And that our entire current system of infinite incumbency is deeply flawed? That the desire for power at any price is polluting the principles of both parties? How about a little frankness, honesty, and rededication to purpose?

Not our heroes. A spokesman for Senator Bennett said, “Looks like another direct mail mistake.” “A typical direct mail snafu,” echoed a spokesman for the Republican National Committee.

Get the picture? Just a typo, really. Don’t worry about it. Go back to your TV show. The next time you hear about another Washington scandal, don’t blame the politicians or the bureaucrats. Blame the dimwitted proofreaders who allowed inconvenient facts to reach the ears of citizens like you and me.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

You might recall the case of Walter Polovchak, a Russian boy who came to our country in the 1980’s. His parents tried to force him to return to what was then the Soviet Union, but Walter resisted. He’s now a 32-year-old office manager in Chicago, and says he’s living the American Dream.

Now comes the case of the Cuban boy, Elian Gonzales. His relatives in the U.S. say his father has privately told them he wants his son to stay in freedom, but he cannot publicly say so in Castro’s totalitarian paradise. This case, when it first hit the news, saw Republican congressional leaders flex their vocal muscles and state with what appeared to be some sort of sincere conviction that they would take action to protect him and keep him in this country.

But after all their tough talk and posturing, Republican congressional leaders backed off. What happened? Well, they took a poll. In polls, most Americans want the child reunited with the father.

The point here isn’t one’s stand on this issue. We can respect those with whom we disagree. But how can we respect our so-called leaders who throw their convictions out the window based on the latest tea-leaf reading of the American psyche? If our leaders make decisions that affect our lives not on the basis of strongly held beliefs, but rather on their desire to cover their political hineys, who needs ’em? We deserve better and so does Elian.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.