Econ 101

Smaller or Larger Government? Equality or Prosperity?

Published by Papa Giorgio

For context:

The following comes from a discussion elsewhere on the Web, and should serve as a great reminder to the deleterious effects of larger (more regulatory) government vs. a smaller form of it:

The main point is that one party has people in it that are for small government — people like Ron Paul, Larry Elder, and the late Milton Friedman (a libertarian “god” of sorts). In the other you have people who want to grow government larger, and larger, and larger. California is a microcosm of the effect this has on businesses and regulating people’s lives. However, this drive to regulate people and their lives and to grow government, has, in every case, increased the possibility of government intrusion by force into the lives of ordinary people, which increase the risk (again, this is provable in history) of detention and death.

Which is why most libertarians vote Republican, they want smaller government. A great example is the housing market crisis. Some people are under the impression this was caused due to an easing of regulation. Not true. In fact, it was government-regulating banks to loan to people it would previously not. Why is this? Because the left wants [material] equality, the right wants people to prosper. One offers the most freedom, the other forces one person to pay for another. Here is an a small sampling of 2012 regulations from California that is helping businesses make the choice in moving to other states:

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  • In addition to mandatory insurance coverage, eligible female employees can take four months pregnancy disability leave, under provisions of SB 299.
  • The independent contractor law, SB 459, is worth discussing with a legal or h/r expert, because the rules are so tough and potentially expensive. That $5,000 to $25,000 fine is PER INCIDENT.
  • Employees can take up to 30 business days in a year for donating organs or bone marrow. SB 272 clarifies the law a bit.
  • Company dress codes must accommodate transvestites and cross dressers under AB 887.
  • Companies operating in multiple states must offer the same insurance coverage for same-sec couples and domestic partners as they do married couples in California.
  • Five new laws change workers compensation insurance. Check with your insurance carrier.

(Orange County Register)

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Everything the growth in government touches (which is typically from the left… or, the right embracing the foundational thinking of the left [like Bush working with Kennedy to increase the size and focus of the Dept of Education]). This regulation causes friction between government and regular people. As more and more regulations are added, the increase in the possibility of armed persons coming to your door increases — like this example of natural foods markets being raided: REASON TV Rawesome Foods Raided… Again!

So persons that *REALLY* want to effect the political spectrum and possibly decrease the size of the government the most would want to vote Republican (like Milton Friedman, Larry Elder, and Rand Paul [Ron Paul’s son]). And this decreases the abrasive aspect of government and the regular Joe meeting. Congress — for instance – should meet for 3-months during the year, and do less of this:

“Federal agencies publish an average of over 200 pages of new rulings, regulations, and proposals in the Federal Register each business day. That growth of the federal statute book is one of the clearest measures of the increase of the government control of the citizenry…” James Bovard, Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty (St. Martins Griffen; 1994), 1.

“All forms of the liberal agenda interfere with the rational relationship between human action and the conditions of life by disconnecting outcomes from adaptive behavior. Government welfare programs of all kinds disconnect the receipt of material benefits from productive behavior and voluntary exchange, and from those normal developmental processes that lead to adult competence. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and all other federal and state welfare programs divorce an individual’s material security and emotional well being from his economic and social connections to his community, and replace them with a marriage to government officials. In particular, welfare programs disconnect the individual’s security and well being from two of his most reliable resources: his own initiative in producing and exchanging with others, and his social bonds to members of his family, church, neighborhood or village. The liberal agenda’s takeover of countless individual and community functions, from early education to care of the elderly, has had the effect of alienating the individual from his community and robbing both of their essential mutuality. In the economic sphere, especially, the liberal agenda’s rules have become strikingly irrational. Countless restrictions dictate what the ordinary businessman and professional may or may not do regarding hiring procedures, sales and purchasing, health insurance plans, retirement plans, safety precautions, transportation policies, racial and ethnic quotas, immigration matters, liability rules, and provisions for the handicapped. Endless paperwork adds to the already crushing burden of confiscatory taxation. Licensure requirements needlessly prevent workers from entering new fields in which they are willing to work hard and risk much in order to make life better for themselves and their families. Unnecessary and unjust restrictions in the freedom with which individuals can run their economic lives are the hallmarks of the liberal agenda. But the social pathology of collectivism extends well beyond the economic realm. While children can be happy in dependent relationships with parents, adults cannot be happy in any mature sense in dependent relationships with government welfare programs, no matter how well intentioned or administered. The reasons for this are developed more thoroughly below and occupy a major portion of this book. Stated briefly, however, the large-scale dependency of the adult citizen on governments is always inherently pathological and always profoundly detrimental to…” Lyle H. Rossiter, The Liberal Mind: The Psychological Causes of Political Madness, p. 71.

Cal Watchdog adds to the idea with the most recent businesses leaving:

Waste Connections, a Folsom-based garbage hauling and landfill company, said last week it is busting a move for Texas. Santa Barbara-based Superconductor Technologies Inc., which develops advanced superconducting wire, also confirmed this week it is leaving for the Lone Star State.

After California’s ongoing budget imbroglio, there is arguably no greater crisis facing our once Golden State than the continuing exodus of homegrown companies like Waste Connections and Superconductor Technologies. Yet, lawmakers in Sacramento are doing next to nothing about it.

In fact, Waste Connections CEO Ron Mittlestaedt actually warned state officials back in August that his company was thinking about relocating to another state. Those officials failed to step up and dissuade the Sacramento region’s largest publicly traded company from leaving.
Higher Taxes

Mittlestaedt echoed the lament of all too many California CEO’s that the state is inhospitable for business. It “has the highest tax rates in the nation,” he told the Sacramento Bee this week, “and they’re going higher.” And California is not only fiscally broke, he said, but also “structurally.”

By that, he was referring to the state’s hostile regulatory environment. As when the Legislature this year neglected to pass a measure that would have made it easier for Waste Connections and other landfill operators to move trash around the state, while doing no harm to the environment.

Superconductor Technologies CEO Jeff Quiram said in a statement that the company’s goal of becoming “a leader in the superconducting wire industry recently reached the inflection point where it was time to make a move.”

Translation: The cost, the hassle of doing business in California has risen to such a level that aspiring companies like STI cannot grow their businesses the way they can in competing states….

…read more…

Other posts referencing these issue worth checking out:

A Keynsian End ~ Conservative MEP for South East England, Daniel Hannan

Published by Papa Giorgio

I have been a fan of Daniel Hannan for a while, but I think with the looming failure of the E.U. enterprise of borrow-borrow-borrow (similar to ours), this is a fitting post from him:

We are approaching end-game. Greece is supposed to pay off its next tranche of debts on 17 October, and the markets are now expecting what this blog has long predicted: a large-scale default. It is conceivable that another rescue package will be put together, and the collapse deferred for a few more months. Either way, though, Europe’s banks are staring at a Lehman moment. This is the tempest long foretold, slow to make head but sure to hold.

All the options now are bad. The least bad is a swift and orderly unbundling of the euro, allowing Greece and the other peripheral countries to devalue and begin exporting their way back to growth. The worst is to deny reality, to stagger on as now, and so to ensure that the catastrophe is all the more terrible when it comes. No prizes for guessing which option Brussels wants.

Shakespeare, as I never cease to remark, has something to say about every subject, including the way Eurocrats have brought this calamity upon themselves:

The plague of Greece upon thee, thou mongrel beef-witted lord!

I do wish to show one of his “tags” for his posting of the video (thumbs up): ,

GOOD NEWS! Fairness Doctrine No More

Published by Papa Giorgio

This is somewhat related to my newer posts such as:

Democrat Camille Paglia notes the undemocratic nature of Democrats — via CAN I JUST FINISH MY WAFFLE:

“I don’t get it.  I don’t get it.

The essence of the 1960’s was about free speech.  That’s what Lenny Bruce and Berkley were about.  It was about free speech.

And not for one second should the government be wandering into the surveillance or montoring of the ideological content of talk radio.

They have betrayed the soul of the democrat party to even mention this.

Every true liberal democrat should be standing up in defense of talk radio no matter how heinous they may think what is being said is.

This is immature — immature for people of one party to try to squelch or erase the thoughts of another.

Liberals have a strangle hold on the major media and have had for 50 years.

What more do liberals want?

Talk radio rose as a counter to that fact. And I talk as a democrat…

Here is some HERITAGE FOUNDATION background:

The fairness doctrine’s constitutionality was tested and upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in a landmark 1969 case, Red Lion Broadcasting v. FCC (395 U.S. 367). Although the Court then ruled that it did not violate a broadcaster’s First Amendment rights, the Court cautioned that if the doctrine ever began to restrain speech, then the rule’s constitutionality should be reconsidered. Just five years later, without ruling the doctrine unconstitutional, the Court concluded in another case that the doctrine “inescapably dampens the vigor and limits the variety of public debate” (Miami Herald Publishing Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U.S. 241). In 1984, the Court concluded that the scarcity rationale underlying the doctrine was flawed and that the doctrine was limiting the breadth of public debate (FCC v. League of Women Voters, 468 U.S. 364). This ruling set the stage for the FCC’s action in 1987. An attempt by Congress to reinstate the rule by statute was vetoed by President Ronald Reagan in 1987, and later attempts failed even to pass Congress.

As an independent regulatory agency, the FCC has the power to reimpose the doctrine without congressional or executive action. So far, the Commission has taken no position on the Hollings-Hefner legislation or expressed an interest in reregulating on its own. Current FCC Chairman James Quello, though, has stated that, “The fairness doctrine doesn’t belong in a country that’s dedicated to freedom of the press and freedom of speech.” (Doug Halonen, “Twelve to Watch in 1993,” Electronic Media, January 25, 1993, p. 66.) The Clinton Administration has not taken an official position on the legislation.

Supporters of reviving the fairness doctrine base their argument on the very same three faulty premises that the FCC and most judicial rulings have rejected.

Faulty Premise #1: The “scarce” amount of spectrum space requires oversight by federal regulators.

Reality: Although the spectrum is limited, the number of broadcasters in America has continuously increased.

Supporters of the fairness doctrine argue that because the airwaves are a scarce resource, they should be policed by federal bureaucrats to ensure that all viewpoints are heard. Yet, just because the spectrum within which broadcast frequencies are found has boundaries, it does not mean that there is a practical shortage of views being heard over the airwaves. When the fairness doctrine was first conceived, only 2,881 radio and 98 television stations existed. By 1960, there were 4,309 radio and 569 television stations. By 1989, these numbers grew to over 10,000 radio stations and close to 1,400 television stations. Likewise, the number of radios in use jumped from 85.2 million in 1950 to 527.4 million by 1988, and televisions in use went from 4 million to 175.5 million during that period. (“The Fairness Doctrine,” National Association of Broadcasters, Backgrounder (1989).)

Even if it may once have been possible to monopolize the airwaves, and to deny access to certain viewpoints, that is impossible today. A wide variety of opinions is available to the public through radios, cable channels, and even computers. With America on the verge of information superhighways and 500-channel televisions, there is little prospect of speech being stifled.

Faulty Premise #2: “Fairness” or “fair access” is best determined by FCC authorities.

Reality: FCC bureaucrats can neither determine what is “fair” nor enforce it.

The second fallacy upon which the doctrine rests concerns the idea of “fairness” itself. As defined by proponents of the doctrine, “fairness” apparently means that each broadcaster must offer air time to anyone with a controversial view. Since it is impossible for every station to be monitored constantly, FCC regulators would arbitrarily determine what “fair access” is, and who is entitled to it, through selective enforcement. This, of course, puts immense power into the hands of federal regulators. And in fact, the fairness doctrine was used by both the Kennedy and Nixon Administrations to limit political opposition. Telecommunications scholar Thomas W. Hazlett notes that under the Nixon Administration, “License harassment of stations considered unfriendly to the Administration became a regular item on the agenda at White House policy meetings.” (Thomas W. Hazlett, “The Fairness Doctrine and the First Amendment,” The Public interest, Summer 1989, p. 105.) As one former Kennedy Administration official, Bill Ruder, has said, “We had a massive strategy to use the fairness doctrine to challenge and harass the right-wing broadcasters, and hope the challenge would be so costly to them that they would be inhibited and decide it was too expensive to continue.” (Tony Snow, “Return of the Fairness Demon,” The Washington Times, September 5, 1993, p. B3.)

Faulty Premise #3: The fairness doctrine guarantees that more opinions will be aired.

Reality: Arbitrary enforcement of the fairness doctrine will diminish vigorous debate.

Of all arguments for the reinstitution of the fairness doctrine, the most inaccurate and insidious is that it will permit a greater diversity of opinion to be heard. By requiring, under threat of arbitrary legal penalty, that broadcasters “fairly” represent both sides of a given issue, advocates of the doctrine believe that more views will be aired while the editorial content of the station can remain unaltered. But with the threat of potential FCC retaliation for perceived lack of compliance, most broadcasters would be more reluctant to air their own opinions because it might require them to air alternative perspectives that their audience does not want to hear.

Thus, the result of the fairness doctrine in many cases would be to stifle the growth of disseminating views and, in effect, make free speech less free. This is exactly what led the FCC to repeal the rule in 1987. FCC officials found that the doctrine “had the net effect of reducing, rather than enhancing, the discussion of controversial h of public importance,” and therefore was in violation of constitutional principles. (“FCC Ends Enforcement of Fairness Doctrine,” Federal Communications Commission News, Report No. MM-263, August 4, 1987.) Even liberal New York Governor Mario Cuomo has argued that, “Precisely because radio and TV have become our principal sources of news and information, we should accord broadcasters the utmost freedom in order to insure a truly free press.” (Mario Cuomo, “The Unfairness Doctrine,” The New York Times, September 20, 1993, p. A19.)……

Here is a classic example of the debate in the 80’s:

 

Paul Ryan Takes Sen. Reids Fiscal Plan to Task

Published by Papa Giorgio

A great example of this comes from when Bush was President.

Draconian Cuts
During Bush’s last run, I heard a lot of politikal talk about Bush cutting veteran benefits by 2-million dollars. “Bush is putting these vets in the poor house, “ or, “Bush doesn’t care about the military veterans.” What is a person suppose to think if Bush is cutting 2-billion dollars out of veteran benefits? Well, as you can see from the graph below, this is merely a play on words/deeds. Bush was originally going to raise the benefits by almost 5-billion, but decided to trim the proposed increase for the next fiscal year by 2-billion. The opposing side took this decrease and used it as if Bush was actually cutting benefits, when in fact he was increasing them by 3-billion. In fact, as shown, Bush seems more compassionate about the veterans than do the opposing sides “cigar aficionado.”

In His Own Words~Obama

Published by Papa Giorgio

This nugget comes from Sweetness and Light via Gateway Pundit.

Mission Accomplished. Obama told the “Today” Show back in 2009 that if the $787 billion stimulus failed he would be a one-term president.

President Barack Obama acknowledged Monday that the fate of his re-election four years from now likely rests on the success of the proposed $825 billion stimulus package.

“A year from now, I think people are going to see that we’re starting to make some progress. But there’s still going to be some pain out there,” Obama predicted during an interview on NBC’s “Today Show.”

“If I don’t have this done in three years, then there’s going to be a one-term proposition.”

In acknowledging that his political fortune hinges on the state of the economy, Obama urged the country to be patient in waiting for the stimulus to take effect.

Experts agree that America destroyed 1,000,000 private sector jobs with the failed stimulus.

And now we have this: