Assad was supposed to be gone already.
President Obama thought it would be just another âregime changeâ operation and perhaps Assad would end up like Saddam Hussein or Yanukovych. Or maybe even Gaddafi. But he was supposed to be gone. The U.S. spent billions to get rid of him and even provided weapons and training to the kinds of radicals that attacked the United States on 9/11.
But with the help of his allies, Assad has nearly defeated this foreign-sponsored insurgency.
The U.S. fought him every step of the way. Each time the Syrian military approached another occupied city or province, Washington and its obedient allies issued the usual warnings that Assad was not liberating territory but was actually seeking to kill more of his own people.
Remember Aleppo, where the U.S. claimed Assad was planning mass slaughter once he regained control? As usual, the neocons and the media were completely wrong. Even the UN has admitted that with Aleppo back in the hands of the Syrian government, hundreds of thousands of Syrians have actually moved back. We are supposed to believe they willingly returned so that Assad could kill them?
The truth is Aleppo is being rebuilt. Christians celebrated Easter there this spring for the first time in years. There has been no slaughter once al-Qaida and ISISâ hold was broken. Believe me, if there was a slaughter we would have heard about it in the media!
So now, with the Syrian military and its allies prepare to liberate the final Syrian province of Idlib, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo again warns the Syrian government against retaking its own territory. He tweeted on Friday that: âThe three million Syrians, who have already been forced out of their homes and are now in Idlib, will suffer from this aggression. Not good. The world is watching.â
President Trumpâs national security adviser, John Bolton, has also warned the Syrian government that the U.S. will attack if it uses gas in Idlib. Of course, that warning serves as an open invitation to rebels currently holding Idlib to set off another false flag and enjoy U.S. air support.
Bolton and Pompeo are painting Idlib as a peaceful province resisting the violence of an Assad who they claim just enjoys killing his own people. But who controls Idlib province? President Trumpâs own special envoy for the Global Coalition to Counter ISIS, Brett McGurk, said in Washington just last year that, âIdlib province is the largest al-Qaida safe-haven since 9/11, tied to directly to Ayman al Zawahiri, this is a huge problem.â
Could someone please remind Pompeo and Bolton that al-Qaida are the bad guys?
After six years of a foreign-backed regime-change operation in Syria, where hundreds of thousands have been killed and the country nearly fell into the hands of ISIS and al-Qaida, the Syrian government is on the verge of victory. Assad is hardly a saint, but does anyone really think al-Qaida and ISIS are preferable? After all, how many Syrians fled the country when Assad was in charge versus when the U.S.-backed ârebelsâ started taking over?
Americans should be outraged that Pompeo and Bolton are defending al-Qaida in Idlib. Itâs time for the neocons to admit they lost. It is time to give Syria back to the Syrians. It is time to pull the U.S. troops from Syria. It is time to just leave Syria alone!
As a nation under the U.S. Constitution we are 230 years old. It may surprise readers to learn that for the first 124 of these years the country had no federal income tax and handled its expenses quite well. Today the 55% who pay federal income taxes, and the 77.5 million who do not, pay nearly a fifth of their income to the federal government. Before 1913 they would have kept what is now taken from them.
How would you spend it, if it was not taken? You would spend the extra fifth of your salary on thousands of items that are made by others as well as services you might like. This missing income not only would enrich your life, but it would provide jobs for others making those items or providing those services. Many middle class folks could purchase a new car every other year with what they are forced to give to the federal government.
Would you spend it more wisely than the federal government? Certainly. Most of the money taken by the federal government is spent on perpetual war, foreign aid, grants to privileged portions of our society and endless unconstitutional subsidized programs; the last two categories of which basically take the money of those who produce and redistribute it to those who do not. Even some non-tax payers get income tax refunds â so corrupt is the system.
Of course, those receiving and benefiting from these programs will defend them. But the fact remains that tax monies provide largely government jobs, which are almost entirely consumption jobs, that is, jobs that consume the production of society but produce little consumable. Such jobs cannot produce for public consumption a potato, a carton of milk or even a can of hairspray. They bring another person to the table to eat, but not another to produce something to eat.
What largely brought about the give-away programs of the 20th century was the now 106-year-old 16th Amendment â the federal income tax. All three 1912 presidential candidates Teddy Roosevelt, William Howard Taft and Woodrow Wilson, and their respective parties, wanted this financial water faucet that they could turn on at will. With it they could purchase anything â even people.
Before 1913, the federal government remained mostly faithful to her grants of power in Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution, which left them with only four powers: to tax, pay the debts, provide for the general welfare and provide for the common defense. Because the federal government has the inclination to maximize their authority the last two power grants, general welfare and common defense, each had eight qualifiers to harness them more fully. Outside these qualifiers the federal government had no power to tax or spend.
General welfare meant everyone equally or âgeneral,â as opposed to âspecific welfareâ or âprivileged welfareâ as it is today, targeting those to forfeit and those to receive monies. The Constitution did not deny states, counties or cities from having such programs, only the federal government. But politicians soon learned that the more they promised to the people from the money of others, the easier it was to get elected and stay elected.
The problem with the federal government going off the list and funding things clearly not on it was that each time they did so the stronger was their inclination to do so again. One minor departure begets another until one notices that what the federal government does has little or no relationship to the list. I ask my students what would happen if they took to kindergarten a lollipop and gave it to one child? What would the others say? Where is mine? Try taking away long provided benefits from a privileged group, as for example food stamps, and see how popular you are with that voting group in the next election.
So why does the government now need a fifth of everything people make, and it is still not enough? Answer: Because we went off the listed powers of the Constitution, and every departure required more taxpayer funding. The solution to less tax is less government. A side benefit is more freedom. The productive classes would not be hurt. Seldom do they qualify for the federally subsidized programs anyway.
The fifth taken from the productive classes would be spent by them creating a haven of jobs for those who wished to work. The cycle of dependency would be drastically reduced. The federal government would no longer be an enabler to those not working. States would decide for themselves what assistance programs they could afford with some states offering more and others less as the 10th Amendment mandates.
So, how did we cover the expenses of the federal government â even wars â our first 124 years? Products coming into the country were assessed a fee to market in the U.S. called a tariff. We got product producers in other countries to cover our national expenses, and thus we were able to spend on ourselves every cent of what the federal government now takes, which inadvertently stimulated the economy. No one should be able to argue that our exceeding $22 trillion national debt is fair, has really worked for any of us and is a better plan. I personally like the idea of being able to purchase a new car every other year.
Libertarian
boosted
The Second Continental Congress, having been convened for six months, had been engaged in the wrestle for or against independence, the vast majority of delegates being decidedly against such drastic action most of this time. Surely there should be a way of reconciling their differences with Great Britain instead.
This was so, even after the battles of Lexington, Concord, and Bunker (Breeds) Hill and the British occupation of Boston. We were at war. King George III had already rejected the colonistsâ Declaration of Rights and Grievances, arguing the violation of their rights under British law, and the pacifist Olive Branch Petition, which reaffirmed colonial loyalty to the king and blamed their problems upon Parliament alone. Moreover, he had declared the colonists in open rebellion. A full six months prior to the signing of a declaration of independence, Parliament had removed the colonies from the protection of the British military, ended all British trade with them, and authorized the confiscation of any American vessel on the seas. Still, delegates could not bring themselves to separate from their âmother,â the British Empire.
On July 1, 1776, the patriots finally risked âputting the questionâ to a tentative count but were numbingly shocked by the result. Four colonies â New York, South Carolina, Delaware and Pennsylvania â did not support declaring independence from Great Britain. The patriots needed to show solidarity. A vote of only nine colonies would show disunity.
This is where the brilliance of John Adams, from Massachusetts, and Richard Henry Lee, from Virginia, came into play. They got Edward Rutledge to use his influence to persuade South Carolina, for the sake of unity, to join those supporting independence, if Pennsylvania and Delaware could be persuaded to do likewise. Convinced that that could never happen, Rutledge agreed. Next, Adams and Lee worked on Delaware, which had three representatives, one for and another against independence, and a third, Caesar Rodney, who was pro declaration but was recuperating from health problems at his farm 80 miles away and probably would not be able to be there to vote the next day. Apparently he had skin cancer and a sore on his face the âsize of a large apple.â The Delaware delegate favoring independence sent a messenger to Rodney to try to get him to the Convention for the vote. This necessitated an 80-mile all-night ride by the sick delegate.
Now they needed to change the vote of Pennsylvania with seven delegates, four of who were against independence. Amazingly Adams and Lee convinced two of these to be absent for voting the next day. This would place Pennsylvania in the camp of the Patriots, three to two. New York, without instructions to vote for independence, remained neutral, refusing to vote at all. The gamble was that in these agreements in South Carolina, Pennsylvania and Delaware there existed too many ifs, and would everyone do as promised? They needed a âlittle miracle,â perhaps three.
Sometime after lunch the next day, July 2, 1776, Caesar Rodney, âcaked with mud from head to foot,â having ridden though a severe thunderstorm and torrential rain âentered the assembly room, and when his name was called for Delaware he rose with difficulty but in a clear voice stated: âAs I believe the voice of my constituents and of all sensible and honest men is in favor of Independence and my own judgment concurs with them, I vote for Independence.â (from âDeclaration of Independence: The Keepsake Album of its Creation,â by Joseph P. Cullen, American History Illustrated p. 34).
This âlittle miracleâ made Delaware the 10th colony for a declaration that these colonies were free and independent states. The two lesser âmiraclesâ followed. Pennsylvania followed as planned when the two âconâ delegates did not show to vote as promised, leaving a simple majority for independence, and Rutledge kept his word and persuaded South Carolina to become the 12th colony for the sake of unity. With New York abstaining, the Patriots could announce to the world that the vote had carried without an opposing vote. All this happened within 26 hours, when the day before, at 10 a.m., only nine colonies supported independence.
A draft of The Declaration of Independence had been written, reviewed by committee, and tabled on June 28, until after an affirmative vote for independence. This achieved, its finalization by the whole house followed on July 4, 1776, passing 12 to 0, again with New York abstaining. But could all this be vindicated on the battlefield, as war with Great Britain was certain to follow as a result? That seemed just as improbable an outcome, perhaps needing additional âlittle miracles,â or these men would merit only the gallows, but that is a story for another day.
The Second Continental Congress, having been convened for six months, had been engaged in the wrestle for or against independence, the vast majority of delegates being decidedly against such drastic action most of this time. Surely there should be a way of reconciling their differences with Great Britain instead.
This was so, even after the battles of Lexington, Concord, and Bunker (Breeds) Hill and the British occupation of Boston. We were at war. King George III had already rejected the colonistsâ Declaration of Rights and Grievances, arguing the violation of their rights under British law, and the pacifist Olive Branch Petition, which reaffirmed colonial loyalty to the king and blamed their problems upon Parliament alone. Moreover, he had declared the colonists in open rebellion. A full six months prior to the signing of a declaration of independence, Parliament had removed the colonies from the protection of the British military, ended all British trade with them, and authorized the confiscation of any American vessel on the seas. Still, delegates could not bring themselves to separate from their âmother,â the British Empire.
On July 1, 1776, the patriots finally risked âputting the questionâ to a tentative count but were numbingly shocked by the result. Four colonies â New York, South Carolina, Delaware and Pennsylvania â did not support declaring independence from Great Britain. The patriots needed to show solidarity. A vote of only nine colonies would show disunity.
This is where the brilliance of John Adams, from Massachusetts, and Richard Henry Lee, from Virginia, came into play. They got Edward Rutledge to use his influence to persuade South Carolina, for the sake of unity, to join those supporting independence, if Pennsylvania and Delaware could be persuaded to do likewise. Convinced that that could never happen, Rutledge agreed. Next, Adams and Lee worked on Delaware, which had three representatives, one for and another against independence, and a third, Caesar Rodney, who was pro declaration but was recuperating from health problems at his farm 80 miles away and probably would not be able to be there to vote the next day. Apparently he had skin cancer and a sore on his face the âsize of a large apple.â The Delaware delegate favoring independence sent a messenger to Rodney to try to get him to the Convention for the vote. This necessitated an 80-mile all-night ride by the sick delegate.
Now they needed to change the vote of Pennsylvania with seven delegates, four of who were against independence. Amazingly Adams and Lee convinced two of these to be absent for voting the next day. This would place Pennsylvania in the camp of the Patriots, three to two. New York, without instructions to vote for independence, remained neutral, refusing to vote at all. The gamble was that in these agreements in South Carolina, Pennsylvania and Delaware there existed too many ifs, and would everyone do as promised? They needed a âlittle miracle,â perhaps three.
Sometime after lunch the next day, July 2, 1776, Caesar Rodney, âcaked with mud from head to foot,â having ridden though a severe thunderstorm and torrential rain âentered the assembly room, and when his name was called for Delaware he rose with difficulty but in a clear voice stated: âAs I believe the voice of my constituents and of all sensible and honest men is in favor of Independence and my own judgment concurs with them, I vote for Independence.â (from âDeclaration of Independence: The Keepsake Album of its Creation,â by Joseph P. Cullen, American History Illustrated p. 34).
This âlittle miracleâ made Delaware the 10th colony for a declaration that these colonies were free and independent states. The two lesser âmiraclesâ followed. Pennsylvania followed as planned when the two âconâ delegates did not show to vote as promised, leaving a simple majority for independence, and Rutledge kept his word and persuaded South Carolina to become the 12th colony for the sake of unity. With New York abstaining, the Patriots could announce to the world that the vote had carried without an opposing vote. All this happened within 26 hours, when the day before, at 10 a.m., only nine colonies supported independence.
A draft of The Declaration of Independence had been written, reviewed by committee, and tabled on June 28, until after an affirmative vote for independence. This achieved, its finalization by the whole house followed on July 4, 1776, passing 12 to 0, again with New York abstaining. But could all this be vindicated on the battlefield, as war with Great Britain was certain to follow as a result? That seemed just as improbable an outcome, perhaps needing additional âlittle miracles,â or these men would merit only the gallows, but that is a story for another day.
This week, Congress passed a budget calling for increasing federal spending and adding $1.7 trillion to the national debt over the next ten years. Most so-called âfiscal conservativesâ voted for this big-spending budget because it allows Congress to repeal some parts of Obamacare via âreconciliation.â As important as it is to repeal Obamacare, it does not justify increasing spending and debt.
It is disappointing, but not surprising, that the Obamacare repeal would be used to justify increasing spending. Despite sequestrationâs minor (and largely phony) spending cuts, federal spending has increased every year since Republicans took control of the House of Representatives. Some will attribute this to the fact that the Republican House had to negotiate with a big-spending Democratic president â even though federal spending actually increased by a greater percentage the last time Republicans controlled the White House and Congress than it did under President Obama.
The history of massive spending increases under unified Republican control of government is likely to repeat itself. During the presidential campaign, President-elect Donald Trump came out against reducing spending on âentitlements.â He also called for a variety of spending increases, including spending one trillion dollars on infrastructure.
One positive part of the infrastructure proposals is their use of tax credits to encourage private sector investments. Hopefully this will be the first step toward returning responsibility for building and maintaining our nationâs infrastructure to the private sector.
Unfortunately, the administration appears likely to support increased federal spending on âshovel-readyâ jobs. Claims that federal spending helps grow the economy rely on the fallacy of that which is not seen. While everyone sees the jobs and economic growth created by government infrastructure projects, no one sees the greater number of jobs that could have been created had the government not taken the resources out of the hands of private businesses, investors, and entrepreneurs. Despite what some conservatives seem to think, this fallacy applies equally to Republican and Democrat spending.
President-elect Trump has criticized the past two administrationsâ reckless foreign policy, and he has publicly shamed the powerful Lockheed Martin company for wasting taxpayer money. Yet, he continues to support increasing the military budget and has called for increased military intervention in the Middle East.
The fact is the United States already spends too much on militarism. Not only does the United States spend more on the military than the combined military budgets of the next eight highest spending countries, but Pentagon waste exceeds the total Russian military budget.
America can no longer afford to waste trillions of dollars on a militaristic foreign policy. Donald Trump should follow-up his attacks on wasteful military spending by dramatically changing our foreign policy and working to cut the Pentagonâs bloated budget.
If the new administration and Congress increase spending, they will need the Federal Reserve to monetize the growing debt. The need for an accommodative monetary policy gives the Federal Reserve and its allies in Congress and in the deep state leverage over the administration. This leverage could be used, for example, to pressure the administration to abandon support for the Audit the Fed legislation.
Fed action can only delay the inevitable day of reckoning. Raising levels of federal spending and debt will inevitably lead to a major economic crisis. This crisis is likely to be reached when concerns over our national debt cause more countries to reject the dollarâs status as the worldâs reserve currency. The only way to avoid this crisis is to stop increasing spending and instead begin reducing spending on all aspects of the welfare-warfare state.
Dark times are coming.
Americans seem to be dealing with the US collapse by having cognitive dissonance. Watching Americans use mental gymnastics to explain their hypocrisy and narratives is difficult to watch.
The very same Americans who scream Obama was an evil monster for embracing wars, debt, and tyranny then turn around and insist Trump is a holy god for supporting wars, debt, and the police state.
Nazis who insist they love freedom then swear unconstitutional NSA wiretapping is just fine.
Americans say that they love free speech, but then become batshit insane when anyone suggests flag burning and protests should legal.
Americans who scream that they love the free market say the US needs a trade war.
Fascists who insist that they love gun rights say they would immediately surrender their firearms when Trump bans guns because Muslims are dangerous.
Nazis love when the Gestapo arrests niggers for wearing baggy pants, but Fascists are shocked when the Gestapo arrests racists for using hate speech.
Americans also seem to be dealing with the collapse by changing history to meet their point of view.
Americans either say the USA was always a police state or is the most free country in the world. No one says the US used to have freedom, but lost it.
Americans insist that the US always had seatbelt checkpoints and food stamps.
Racists scream that the US never had negroes before today.
Nazis and Commies scream no one died during WWII.
Nazis say that the Jews started the Revolutionary War to divide up white people, but even if the UK and the US were united now the USA and the UK would still be Socialist shitholes with fags and illegal immigrants.
As the US declines, Americans will need to chose what roles they will play.
Will you be one of the enemy globalists who is destroying the USA?
Will you be a traitor who is trying to become of the elites by giving campaign donations to politicians so you can get a bailout, subsidy, or grant to start a business?
Will you be a traitor who becomes a puppet for the elites as a politician, reporter, actor, government worker, soldier, or joins the Gestapo?
Will you be a coward who keeps your head down, works, and pays taxes that fund wars, debt, and tyranny?
Will you dropout and become dependent on government welfare?
Will you be a hero and risk being arrested or killed to become a dissident educating others on freedom and how to resist or fight the elites by firing on checkpoints and flying planes into government buildings?
Will you dropout and buy a sailboat or travel the world as a nameless and stateless nomad?
Will you dropout and start a commune or join a monastery?
Those who are able, do what they can.
Those who can't, do what they must.
Libertarian
boosted
@dcjogger
I mistake
The USðºð¸ was never a DEMOCRACY
Republic
Otherwise I agree
Americans are so retarded today that they say the US government only spends money on welfare.
Americans scream tyranny is wonderful if you live in a society.
Americans say anyone who loves freedom is a Commie.
Americans scream tyranny is wonderful because the US is a republic.
Americans say anyone who hates Trump is a Fascist.
Americans swear unconstitutional NSA wiretapping is fine because Jesus watches you, too.
Americans insist freedom would never work in the USA and Communism made the Soviet Union successful.
Americans say anyone who loves freedom should leave the US.
http://forum.thegamblingforum.com/index.php?/topic/50767-tgf-master-political-thread/page-141
Americans swear that the Gestapo would never confiscate guns.
Americans have become so batshit insane now that Americans say higher oil prices are not a problem because the USA has unlimited oil.
Americans swear Libertarians who oppose giving the death penalty to panhandlers are beggars.
Americans insist Nazis shouldn't have free speech rights.
Americans scream the colonists fought the British because Americans are greedy not because Americans loved freedom.
Americans say anyone who supports legalizing cocaine thinks people should be addicted to cocaine.
Americans insist problems should be solved with nuclear bombs.
Libertarian
boosted
The US used to be a moral, peaceful, and free country with a balanced budget. Now the USA is an immoral bankrupt warmongering police state. Saying nothing just seems wrong.
The US government is no longer legitimate.
http://www.newsandsentinel.com/uncategorized/2017/02/is-our-government-legitimate/
The USA is no longer a democracy. Why obey the law or pay taxes when Americans have no control over what laws are made or what the tax rate should be?
http://blog.pennlive.com/capitol-notebook/2015/03/adios_land_of_the_free_-_new_s.html
How can you obey the law when everything is illegal?
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/opinion/columnists/george-will/2015/04/09/will-everything-crime/25478695/
Why should Americans obey the law when the government and illegal aliens donât?
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/sep/12/why-equal-justice-matters/
How can you obey the law when our overlords donât even tell you what the law is?
https://www.bendbulletin.com/opinion/editorials/3987223-151/editorial-oregon-law-should-not-be-a-mystery
The US used to be a moral, peaceful, and free country with a balanced budget. Now the USA is an immoral bankrupt warmongering police state. Saying nothing just seems wrong.
The US government is no longer legitimate.
http://www.newsandsentinel.com/uncategorized/2017/02/is-our-government-legitimate/
The USA is no longer a democracy. Why obey the law or pay taxes when Americans have no control over what laws are made or what the tax rate should be?
http://blog.pennlive.com/capitol-notebook/2015/03/adios_land_of_the_free_-_new_s.html
How can you obey the law when everything is illegal?
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/opinion/columnists/george-will/2015/04/09/will-everything-crime/25478695/
Why should Americans obey the law when the government and illegal aliens donât?
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/sep/12/why-equal-justice-matters/
How can you obey the law when our overlords donât even tell you what the law is?
https://www.bendbulletin.com/opinion/editorials/3987223-151/editorial-oregon-law-should-not-be-a-mystery
Libertarian
boosted
One of the most insidious ways politicians expand government is by creating new programs to âsolveâ problems created by politicians.
For example, government interference in health care increased health care costs, making it difficult or even impossible for many to obtain affordable, quality care. The effects of these prior interventions were used to justify Obamacare.
Now, the failures of Obamacare are being used to justify further government intervention in health care. This does not just include the renewed push for socialized medicine. It also includes supporting new laws mandating price transparency. The lack of transparency in health care pricing is a direct result of government policies encouraging overreliance on third-party payers.
This phenomenon is also observed in foreign policy. American military interventions result in blowback that is used to justify more military intervention. The result is an ever-expanding warfare state and curtailments on our liberty in the name of security.
Another example of this is related to the reaction to President Trumpâs tariffs. Many of Americaâs leading trading partners have imposed âretaliatoryâ tariffs on U.S. goods. Many of these tariffs target agriculture exports. These tariffs could be devastating for American farmers, since exports compose as much as 20 percent of the average farmerâs income.
President Trump has responded to the hardships imposed on farmers by these retaliatory tariffs with a $12 billion farm bailout program. The program has three elements: direct payments to farmers, use of federal funds to buy surplus crops and distribute them to food banks and nutrition programs and a new federal effort to promote American agriculture overseas.
This program will not fix the problems caused by Trampâs tariffs. For one thing, the payments are unlikely to equal the money farmers will lose from this trade war. Also, government marketing programs benefit large agribusiness but do nothing to help small farmers. In fact, by giving another advantage to large agribusiness, the program may make it more difficult for small farmers to compete in the global marketplace.
Distributing surplus food to programs serving the needy may seem like a worthwhile use of government funds. However, the federal government has neither constitutional nor moral authority to use money taken by force from taxpayers for charitable purposes. Government-funded welfare programs also crowd out much more effective and compassionate private efforts.
Of course, if government regulations such as the minimum wage and occupational licensing did not destroy job opportunities, government farm programs did not increase food prices and the Federal Reserveâs inflationary policies did not continuously erode purchasing power, the demand for food aid would be much less. By increasing spending and debt, the agriculture bailout will do much more to create poverty than to help the needy.
Agriculture is hardly the only industry suffering from the new trade war. Industries â such as automobile manufacturing â that depend on imports for affordable materials are suffering along with American exporters. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka (who supports tariffs) has called for bailouts of industries negatively affected by tariffs. He is likely to be joined in his advocacy by crony capitalists seeking another government handout.
More bailouts will only add to the trade warâs economic damage by increasing government spending and hastening the welfare-warfare stateâs collapse and the rejection of the dollarâs world reserve currency status.
Instead of trying to fix tariffs-caused damage through more corporate welfare, President Trump and Congress should pursue a policy of free markets and free trade for all and bailouts for none.
One of the most insidious ways politicians expand government is by creating new programs to âsolveâ problems created by politicians.
For example, government interference in health care increased health care costs, making it difficult or even impossible for many to obtain affordable, quality care. The effects of these prior interventions were used to justify Obamacare.
Now, the failures of Obamacare are being used to justify further government intervention in health care. This does not just include the renewed push for socialized medicine. It also includes supporting new laws mandating price transparency. The lack of transparency in health care pricing is a direct result of government policies encouraging overreliance on third-party payers.
This phenomenon is also observed in foreign policy. American military interventions result in blowback that is used to justify more military intervention. The result is an ever-expanding warfare state and curtailments on our liberty in the name of security.
Another example of this is related to the reaction to President Trumpâs tariffs. Many of Americaâs leading trading partners have imposed âretaliatoryâ tariffs on U.S. goods. Many of these tariffs target agriculture exports. These tariffs could be devastating for American farmers, since exports compose as much as 20 percent of the average farmerâs income.
President Trump has responded to the hardships imposed on farmers by these retaliatory tariffs with a $12 billion farm bailout program. The program has three elements: direct payments to farmers, use of federal funds to buy surplus crops and distribute them to food banks and nutrition programs and a new federal effort to promote American agriculture overseas.
This program will not fix the problems caused by Trampâs tariffs. For one thing, the payments are unlikely to equal the money farmers will lose from this trade war. Also, government marketing programs benefit large agribusiness but do nothing to help small farmers. In fact, by giving another advantage to large agribusiness, the program may make it more difficult for small farmers to compete in the global marketplace.
Distributing surplus food to programs serving the needy may seem like a worthwhile use of government funds. However, the federal government has neither constitutional nor moral authority to use money taken by force from taxpayers for charitable purposes. Government-funded welfare programs also crowd out much more effective and compassionate private efforts.
Of course, if government regulations such as the minimum wage and occupational licensing did not destroy job opportunities, government farm programs did not increase food prices and the Federal Reserveâs inflationary policies did not continuously erode purchasing power, the demand for food aid would be much less. By increasing spending and debt, the agriculture bailout will do much more to create poverty than to help the needy.
Agriculture is hardly the only industry suffering from the new trade war. Industries â such as automobile manufacturing â that depend on imports for affordable materials are suffering along with American exporters. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka (who supports tariffs) has called for bailouts of industries negatively affected by tariffs. He is likely to be joined in his advocacy by crony capitalists seeking another government handout.
More bailouts will only add to the trade warâs economic damage by increasing government spending and hastening the welfare-warfare stateâs collapse and the rejection of the dollarâs world reserve currency status.
Instead of trying to fix tariffs-caused damage through more corporate welfare, President Trump and Congress should pursue a policy of free markets and free trade for all and bailouts for none.
Libertarian
boosted
In an act of integrity that also proved to be politically shrewd, future President John Adams served as defense counsel for British redcoats involved in the Boston Massacre of 1770.
Adams was a prominent advocate of the Patriot cause. His cousin Sam was one of its top leaders. Still, John Adams insisted that the soldiers deserved legal representation. He also recognized that if they didnât get a fair trial, whatever âjusticeâ got meted out by a Boston mob would harm rather than help the Patriotsâ case for self-government.
During the trial, Adams offered a defense not only of the presumption of innocence and the right to counsel but also for seeking truth wherever it may be found.
âFacts are stubborn things,â he said, âand whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.â
Modern politicians sometimes quote this passage solemnly before making a political point. But do they really practice what Adams preached? Or, if I may be so bold, do you?
Politics is a team sport. It always has been. As another American founder, James Madison, famously explained, the origins of political faction are âsown in the nature of man.â Humans can approach the same question with wide varieties of information, perceptions and objectives.
âAs long as the reason of man continues fallible, and he is at liberty to exercise it,â Madison observed, âdifferent opinions will be formed.â These differences, in turn, have âdivided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to cooperate for their common good.â
Neither Adams or Madison thought it possible to wish political factions away. Nor do I. As regular readers surely know by now, I have strong opinions on political questions.
I want government at all levels to be smaller, less costly and less intrusive. I think competition is superior to monopoly in both the private and public sectors. I donât think government should try to engineer âsocial justice,â whatever that means, because it requires inflicting injustice on specific individuals.
Regardless of whether you agree with me on these and other political propositions, however, it ought to be possible for us to come to some level of agreement on basic facts. We may well continue to disagree about what these facts mean, of course. But at least weâd be talking about the same thing. Weâd truly be arguing rather than just bickering with each other.
This is, alas, much harder to do than to describe. When trying to answer a question of fact, we tend to follow the lead of sources, of âexperts,â whose political views we share. When someone from the âother teamâ offers a factual proposition, we frequently discount it. Indeed, we donât just tend to discount their factual claims about political issues. As the authors of a new study in the academic journal Cognition discovered, thereâs a strong tendency to let politics influence judgments on matters far afield from public policy.
The researchers called this effect âepistemic spillover,â which they detected in a creative set of online experiments that blended political questions with a geometric-puzzle test. They found âparticipants falsely concluded that politically like-minded others were better at categorizing shapes and thus chose to hear from them.â
Cognitive biases are tricky things. Be honest: when you hear about the kind of behavior I just described, do examples from the âother teamâ come more quickly to mind? If you are a Trump critic, do you see MAGA hats on those subjects? If you are a Republican, are social-justice warriors making the mistake?
The truth is that we are all prone to the same errors. We face the same temptations. I believe being a good citizen requires that we lean against our biases â that we do our own homework and be skeptical (though not cynical) when listening to political leaders. If you agree, perhaps that gives us a good place to start.
- Libertarian
- https://neinchan.com/pol/
Joined May 2019
