"The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined." --James Madison in Federalist No. 45

What would James think today?

There has been a lot of news coverage lately about the new federal mandate that all street signs must adhere to a new federal standard. This new standard effectively obsoletes almost every street sign in the country because it mandates all street signs must now be a particular font, only the first letter may be capitalized and how reflective the sign is now is specified . If you look around you will notice that almost all street signs are capitalized and that is because the old federal mandate said street signs had to be capitalized. So the new federal mandate makes it necessary to replace all the signs designed for the old federal mandate (about 7 years ago). Now adhering to the new federal law will not come cheap, New York City alone estimates 27 million dollars to replace existing signs. Although I did a great deal of research no where could I find an estimate of the total cost of the regulation but it must be in the hundreds of billions country wide.

But the purpose of this blog is not to expound on the insanity of this kind of spending of tax money but to examine just how this law came to be. If there is any example of the slow non stopping creep of federal control into every area of our lives this is it.

Up to about 1927 there was no uniform code for street signs. As you can imagine this led to an array of signage that was confusing. In 1927 the, American Association of State Highway Officials or AASHO began work on a uniform standard for all highway signs. AASHO is an organization of state and local highway officials that set standards for all kinds of transportation issues. In 1935 AASHO released the Manual of Traffic Control Devises (MOTCD) and up until 1966 that defined road signs nationwide. So we basically have a group of local and government officials banding together in a nonprofit organization to standardize street signs.

But the federal government seems to have a need to get involved in everything. In 1966 Congress passed the Highway Safety Act. That act mandated among other things that states develop highway safety programs as well as for the first time regulating the design of street signs. Now the MOTCD is written by the Federal Highway Administration and every few years as the bureaucrats see necessary, this document is updated.

And how would the federal government enforce such a mandate? Why with your tax money of course! The federal government collects taxes from citizens in each state, and then if your state does not do the federal government bidding they withhold sending some of that money back to your state.

So the citizens of a state are obligated by law to provide the federal government with the club that the federal government uses to beat the states into submission.

Once again we have an army of federal bureaucrats setting codes and standards that spend our tax money and control our lives, that army get bigger and bigger unless we say enough.

Today is the 237th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party, when "radical" members of a secret organization of American Patriots called Sons of Liberty, boarded three East India Company ships and threw 342 chests of tea into Boston Harbor in protest of unjust taxation and tyranny.

237 years ago the Sons of Liberty said “enough”, when will we?

And how do they justify this?

enough said!

You can't think for yourself when you work for the Federal government

Several hundred National Guard troops were flying back home from Afghanistan when they ran into the TSA at Indianapolis. As one of the soldiers described it, "That's where the stupid started."

The soldier said, "It's probably important to mention that we were ALL carrying weapons. Everyone was carrying an M4 Carbine (rifle) and some, like me, were also carrying an M9 pistol. Oh, and our gunners had M-240B machine guns. Of course, the weapons weren't loaded. And we had been cleared of all ammo well before we even got to customs at Baghram, then AGAIN at customs."

Any sane person would be reasonably sure this contingent didn't include any would-be terrorists. Not the TSA.

One soldier had a Gerber multi-tool confiscated, and a TSA agent insisted that another turn over his finger nail clippers. According to the soldier reporting the story, "The conversation went something like this:"

TSA Guy: You can't take those on the plane.

Soldier: What? I've had them since we left country.

TSA Guy: You're not suppose to have them.

Soldier: Why?

TSA Guy: They can be used as a weapon.

Soldier: [touches butt stock of the rifle] But this actually is a weapon. And I'm allowed to take it on.

TSA Guy: Yeah but you can't use it to take over the plane. You don't have bullets.

Soldier: And I can take over the plane with nail clippers?

TSA Guy: [awkward silence]

Me: Dude, just give him your damn nail clippers so we can get the f--k out of here. I'll buy you a new set.

Soldier: [hands nail clippers to TSA guy, makes it through security]

This might be a good time to remind everyone that approximately 233 people re-boarded that plane with assault rifles, pistols, and machine guns -- but nothing that could have been used as a weapon.

There, don't you feel safer?

Its not that the people at TSA don't want to do a good job. Its not that they are trying to do stupid things. Its just that you can't have anything as big as the Federal government of the United States and do anything with any degree of efficiency. So we end up with a one size fit all approach for the 300 million people that live in this country.

And that is why we have to keep the federal government as small as possible. That is why the founding fathers limited the government with the restraints in the Constitution.

And we wonder why it take 3.5 trillion dollars to run the Federal Government.

There are 30 million Christmas trees sold in the U.S. each year and if a small group of Christmas tree growers get their way soon the federal government may be tacking an extra 15 cents on to the cost of every one of those trees sold.

You say you did not notice anything about Congress passing a new Christmas tree tax? You have not heard anything about a Christmas tree tax for the same reason you have not heard about the tax on eggs, or pork or milk or 18 other agricultural products. These are not taxes approved by Congress, these are fees requested by industry trade groups, assisted by the USDA (United States Department of Agriculture) and enforced by the Federal Government in a USDA program called Check-off programs

In 1996 Congress decided it would be a great idea to get involved in promoting agricultural products when it passed the COMMODITY PROMOTION, RESEARCH, AND INFORMATION ACT OF 1996. Basically this bill gives the USDA authority to create programs (referred to as Check-off programs) that are administered by a board appointed by the USDA. This board can assess fees on a agricultural product and the money collected is used to promote that defined product. Recently there was flurry of news interest when reported that Dominos Pizza had joined with the innocently named “Dairy Management” to promote Dominos new pizza that uses three times as much cheese. “Dairy Management” is the USDA check-off program to promote dairy products.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. In 2003 The Pork Board’s brochure reported: “Check-off funds were used by McDonald’s nationally to market The McRib pork sandwich.” And through the Pork Check-off program, pork items are added to menus at Taco Bell, T.G.I. Friday’s, McDonald’s, Burger King, Applebee’s and other restaurants across America.

We are talking about some real money; a 2008 CRS (Congressional Research Service) report listed over 700 million dollars worth or check-off fees collected in the last calendar year.

• Beef, $80.4 million

• cotton, $83.6 million

• dairy products, $278.7 million

• eggs, $20.2 million

• fluid milk, $107.1 million

• peanuts, $6.7 million

• pork, $60.8 million

• potatoes, $8.7 million

• soybeans, $82.8 million

$700 MILLION DOLLARS!!

So basically here is how it works. A group of citizens decides the products they sell needs a generic marketing program. This group petitions the USDA to create a Check-off Program that will collect a mandatory fee from producers of that product. The fee is used by a board - appointed by the USDA - to run advertising and promotion campaigns for that product. Remember the “Got Milk ads”? How about “Pork the other white meat”? That’s right - paid for with Check-off fees (or taxes depending on how you want to look at it).

The supporters of Check-off programs say “it’s not a tax, it’s just a mandatory fee,.” A fee collected and enforced by the federal government, that’s a lot different than a tax I guess. The supporters say “it’s not paid for with tax payer money”. Well where the heck did the money come from? Does it fall from heaven? Does it grow on trees? Of course it is tax payers money, if it costs an extra 15 cents to grow a Christmas tree, that cost is going to be passed on to the consumer. Those 700 million dollars of check-off fees collected come directly from the tax payers just like sales tax or federal excises tax. All money at the start is tax payer money. And if you are foolish enough to think government taxes are paid for by a business and not passed on to the consumer, well even then it is being paid for by a tax payer. Christmas tree farmers are tax payers too. So they can call it a fee all they want to but it doesn’t change the fact that it is a tax, a ghost tax.

What a perfect program - No worrying about that pesky congressional oversight of spending or tax collection, no worries about budget overview or executive branch oversight. Although there is no vote among anyone but a few people in the USDA to start a check-off program the bill does mandate that at some time period, 3-7 years generally, a referendum will be held to determine if the producers of that product want to continue the Check-off program. Apparently no one thinks it is a good idea to ask the producers if the like the idea until it has been collecting fees (taxes) for a few years.

If a group of like producers want to voluntary get together and pool their money to promote their product I say go for it. But what business is it of the federal government to be promoting live Christmas tree sales at the expense of citizens making artificial trees? Or what about Pizza Hut having to compete against Dominos latest campaign when they have funding from the USDA? Why should a department of the federal government be collecting these ghost taxes to be used to determine winners and losers in our economic system? And how much money is really spent setting up administering and tracking these systems, someone is paying for reports like the annual CRS report.

I am not always sure what exactly the USDA is supposed to be doing, but I am positive putting the artificial Christmas tree manufacturers out of business is not it.

"We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt." --Thomas Jefferson

"On Thursday the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) announced the federal budget deficit for 2010 will exceed $1.3 trillion. This is already on the heels of a 2009 budget deficit of $1.2 trillion and on top of a national debt of some $13.3 trillion. The word 'trillion' seems to have, almost overnight, crept into our standard economic parlance and by the looks of it is here to stay. And with the CBO's forecast of more than $6 trillion in federal budget deficits accruing over the next nine years from 2010 to 2019, many are logically wondering if the United States has effectively crossed, or is fast approaching, a virtual economic point of no return -- an economic Rubicon if you will." --columnist Matt O'Connor

This can only happen if we let it. This can only happen if we are too lazy or to disinterested to hold our elected officials responsible for their actions. Speak to your friends, speak to your neighbors, and write to your elected representatives. We have to convince those in Washington that if that will not return the government to a fiscally responsible path and back to a proper constitutional mandate we will find someone who will. This recent election was a good start but we cannot go back to our normal lives and just hope this congress will do the right thing.

“All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for enough good men to do nothing”, we cannot afford to be do nothing citizens.

11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month

On this day in 1918, at 11 am a cease fire was signed that ended WW1. Veterans day (originally called Armistice day) was founded to celebrate all the service members who sacrificed in that terrible war.

Please take a minute to thank a veteran, their sacrifice is what allows us to live in a country where we can have the freedom to express our views in forums like this blog.

And a special thanks to the Marines of 2/2 CAAT Black.

The more I listen to explanations from people supporting the so called heath care reform act the more I am confused. I have been following and recently blogged about an email exchange between a Wyoming group, Wyoming's Furture  (WyominghealthFreedom.org) and an official of the Wyoming Democratic Party. The exchange is concerning Wyoming's Future attempt to get a state constitutional amendment guaranteeing Wyoming residents the right to make their own health care decisions. Below in red are the democrat’s thoughts on why a citizen being able to make their own health care decisions is a bad idea. As usual I have interjected my thoughts to his thoughts (or maybe his lack of thought).

As a side note anyone concerned about health care freedom and especially those people in Wyoming should check out www.WyomingFreedom.org, an impressive grass roots organization with some really great ideas.

Our liberal friend writes (in red italics).

The troubles with Wyoming futures stated belief “that Wyoming citizens will make the decision that is best for them and for Wyoming” are at least three:

1. It assumes they have the information to make these decisions in ways that are best for themselves and Wyoming. Few people have time to read each insurance policy on offer from the insurance companies, or even if they have the time, have sufficient legal skill to parse the legalese and know what they’d be getting and what dangers lurk.

The #1 rule of anything Liberal, you’re just too stupid to do the right thing. So I cannot read my insurance plan and even if I could, I could not understand it? I have no way of knowing what danger lurks!! So if I am too stupid to read my insurance plan how will I know what to do under Obama care? Who will help me? Who will choose my health insurance? THE GOVERNMENT of course!

The government is smarter; the government understands the things that are really beyond our comprehension! The government always has your best interest at heart!

If I can’t understand my insurance policy obviously I have no chance of understanding the 2600 page Obamacare Bill? Apparently no one in the Congress has actually read the bill since Nancy Pelosi said ”we will have to pass it before we know what’s in it” and yet these are the people I should trust with my families health care decisions?

2. It assumes that they have the power to make these decisions in ways that are best for themselves and Wyoming, that isn’t actually the case. They’ve been at a substantial power disadvantage to their insurance companies and their choices are limited by what a few companies offer, which in many respects has been the same from company to company. If they want insurance from what is the best company they could choose, they have to accept the contract the company offers---what the law sometimes characterizes as a “contract of adhesion”.

2nd rule of anything Liberal, Some other group of evil citizens are conspiring to do something dastardly against you (the rich, Wall Street, business owners, bankers). Class warfare is the liberal’s best friend. Does it really make much sense that a business would do what is bad for its customers? That a business would do what would make its customers mad? Do you stay in business by not pleasing your customers? Now it is true that there is not much competition in the health insurance business but that is because of government regulations that stifle competition, Obamacare actually decreases the options for Medicare recipients(2), the law prevents insurance companies from offering more options, and the government’s argument is ”too many options are too confusing” (see liberal rule #1). So I am at a power disadvantage to my insurance company? Ever try talking to the federal government? I often ask my good liberal friend Rich how it is that all the evil people ended up running businesses and apparently all the benevolent people ended up working in the government? (see “if men were angels” in my last blog). A “contract of adhesion” (1) would most accurately describe almost all interaction with the federal government.

Free enterprise works wonderfully to increase quality and decrease prices. Why is it that the liberals apparently thinks it’s not effective with insurance? If a single or restricted insurance provider is a good idea then why not a single car company, or single grocery store, single source for TV’s? When you look at it as any other consumer good, the idea of a single source or limited source provider sounds so foolish is hard to see how anyone supports it.

3. It assumes that a decision that’s best for an individual is best for others in Wyoming. In fact, many Wyomingites and other Americans choose to remain uninsured, gambling that they won’t get sick or injured. When they do get sick or injured, the rest of us often end up paying, directly or indirectly, for their care. It’s reasonable for the rest of us, through government---which in a democracy is us, or at least our representatives---to require that they be insured, just as we do before allowing someone to drive a car. Of course, some people legitimately can’t afford health insurance for one reason or another---God knows it is expensive enough these days. But the new law provides them help. (Contrary to a lot of things I see repeatedly asserted, furthermore, this and other costs of the health reform are fully paid for and more by the bill. This Congress, unlike the one that passed the drug benefit for Medicare, made a good-faith effort to make it budget-neutral or better, as the President demanded. They held their breath to see whether the neutral arbiters at the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office would agree. They did, saying that the bill would on net add to Federal revenues over the first ten years, then add to them much more significantly in later years.

#3 rule of anything Liberal, Some individuals must be sacrificed for the good of the collective, (and the government will decide which individual)

# 4 rule of anything Liberal One bad rule justifies another.

First # 3, I don’t think any conservative ever assumes what is best for one individual is best for another. It is the liberals who seem to take a one size fits all approach for so many things. Getting to select the health insurance that is best for me in no way impacts another citizen getting to pick what is best for him. Only when the government gets involved do we get in the trade offs, For instance, the employees at the company I work for must give up their HSA accounts so we can have a 2600 page heath insurance bill.

And # 4, the government passed laws that say, if my neighbor makes bad health care decisions, I must pay for it. And that is justification that I now lose my right to make my own health care decisions? If my neighbor does not change the oil in his car and the motor blows up; do I need to pay to replace his motor? If my neighbor falls asleep smoking and burns his house down; do I need to pay to rebuild his house? Explain to me again why I must pay for his poor health care decisions? If I don’t pay my taxes, the government puts me in jail, if I don’t pay for my health care the government says “no problem we will just have your neighbor pay for it”.

And finally the most laughable of all the liberal propaganda related to the health care bill, we will have more, better health care for less money. How does that work? Using the same doctors, the same hospitals somehow we are going to provide health insurance to 30-40 million people that do not have it now, provide the other 260 million people in the country with better insurance than they have now, and it will cost less! Now it is true under Obamacare health care providers are going to get paid a lot less in many instances(3). And under Obamacare insurance companies profits will be controlled by the government but how in the heck do we give 40 million people insurance with no cost increase? And think about this, if your boss walked in and said “we are cutting your pay 30% and we might need you to work a few more hours”. Do you think you will work harder or not quite as hard? Well that is exactly what the government has said to our health care providers.

The CBO report used by liberals to support the financial viability of this bill is a perfect example that you can prove anything with statistics. The study looks at the budget impact over the next 10 years. Only problem is Obamacare does not go into effect for 3-4 years even though many of the taxes and fees that are going to be used to help pay for it start now. So for the next 3-4 years the government collects money that will be used to pay for the bill but pays nothing out. Then starting 3-4 years from now it actually starts spending, of course the next 10 year look budget neutral because they have 3-4 years of funds to dip into to offset some of the expense. But try looking at the next 10 years. It is kind of strange that the bill that was so urgent Congress needed to rush it through without even reading it does not need to go into effect for four years. It is one thing to use the statistics that help your argument; it is another to intentionally miss lead the public to support your agenda.

In short, what WyominhFuture believes has the virtue of ideological purity, but is far removed from the realities of our actual lives. When those realities are taken into account, the actual freedom and security of Americans will be greatly enhanced by this new law. Wait and see.

And finally liberal rule of anything # 5 Trust me, it will be better, you’ll see. Actually what the writer describes as “ideological purity” is actually constitutional legality.

The constitution is not an ideology it is the law. I don’t need to wait to see the effects on my freedom; it is plain to see right now. As for enhancing my security, that has been the excuse for tyranny throughout history.

I would rather take my chances with freedom.

(1) Adhesion contract (contract of adhesion) n. a contract (often a signed form) so imbalanced in favor of one party over the other that there is a strong implication it was not freely bargained.

(2) http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory?id=11475251

(3)http://www.prweb.com/releases/MedicareSupplementPlans/7-22-09/prweb2656764.htm

(4)http://cbo.gov/ftpdocs/108xx/doc10868/12-19-Reid_Letter_Managers_Correction_Noted.pdf

Another bill another lie.

If you are one of the 45 million Americans that uses a Health Savings Account (HAS) or a Flexible Spending Account (FSA) to pay for a portion of your health care expenses, as of January 1, 2011, you lose a key benefit of those plans. Before passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obomacare for short) you could use the money contributed to these accounts to pay for over the counter medicine. After January 1st this will no longer be the case. For example - you have arthritis that you managed with an over the counter medicine, if you want to use your HSA money to pay for it, you will now have to go to the doctor and get a prescription.

For readers not familiar with health savings accounts, here is a short explanation. Unlike a traditional health insurance plan, the health insurance plan tied to a HSA or FSA has a very large deductible, at least $5000. To cover this large deductible, the government allowed a pre tax savings account that could be used only for health care. So you (the employee) and in most cases your employer would contribute money to this account and your day to day health care costs were paid out of this account. If your health expenses went over the deductible, your health insurance kicked in and it paid 80-100% of you expenses over that depending on the plan. It was a great plan that eliminated the day to day hassle of arguing with the insurance company for the vast majority of your health care needs. The company I work for instituted a HSA and we have been able to hold our health insurance cost far below the national level and the employees love the program.

Our company is the very people the President was addressing when he said “If you like your health plan you can keep it”. In fact he said that time and time again. And now we find out that was a lie. The President either lied or had absolutely no idea what the heck was in the bill. Whichever it was, we were told we can keep our health care plan if we liked in and now this bill makes that not possible.

I am still waiting for someone who supports this ridiculous bill to explain to me how this helps in any way. How forcing me to go to a doctor for a prescription for a medicine that I could purchase over the counter helps make my care more “affordable”. How reducing the freedom I have to spend my health care dollars as I see fit “protects” me.

If that is not bad enough over the next four years, Obamacare slowly reduces the amount that a employer can contribute to these plans to the point that they no longer will be economically feasible. One of the key provisions of this bill is to destroy any kind of heath care savings accounts. So what has been one of the best ways to reduce health care cost, and what has been one of the best ways to truly give consumers control over their health care dollars that takes that control away from insurance companies - - is destroyed by this bill.

I am still waiting for an explanation……

If men were angels.

"If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place, oblige it to control itself." --James Madison, Federalist No. 51, 1788

12/08

•  The president-elect declined to say Sunday how much his economic stimulus plan would cost. Obama called it the largest public-works program since the creation of the interstate highway system in the 1950s.The plan includes spending on what Obama called "shovel-ready" projects to rebuild roads, make buildings energy efficient, modernize schools and upgrade hospital technology. President Elect Obama, Meet the Press

12/08

•  President-elect Obama wants a proposed economic stimulus package to include billions of dollars for infrastructure improvements. Mr. Obama maintains states have projects that are "shovel ready. The Missouri Department of Transportation says with federal money, it could start $510 million of highway and other construction projects within six months. NPR

1/09

•  On “Meet the Press,” fill-in host Tom Brokaw wants to know how quickly Barack Obama can create jobs, and the president-elect promises to move fast. After all, he says, he’s met with a bunch of governors “and all of them have projects that are shovel-ready.”

2/09

•  As Congressional negotiators worked to reconcile competing versions of the economic stimulus package, President Obama today visited Fairfax County to stump for the plan.Joined by Virginia governor and Democratic National Committee Chairman Timothy M. Kaine, Obama showed off one of the "shovel-ready" projects that would be funded by the stimulus plan: a 1.3-mile segment of the Fairfax County Parkway Washington

3/09

•  WASHINGTON, March 3 (UPI) -- Shovels already are hitting the ground in just the two weeks since the $787 billion stimulus package was signed, U.S. President Barack Obama said Tuesday.

3/09

•  President Barack Obama claimed today that 150,000 jobs will be created or saved by the end of next year with the road-building provisions of the $787-billion economic stimulus that he signed."We are seeing shovels hit the ground,'' Obama said in an appearance this morning at the Department of Transportation.

3/09

•  President Barack Obama claimed today that 150,000 jobs will be created or saved by the end of next year with the road-building provisions of the $787-billion economic stimulus that he signed."We are seeing shovels hit the ground,'' Obama said in an appearance this morning at the Department of Transportation.

3/09

•  Infrastructure, or "shovel-ready," projects are set to get underway almost immediately after President Obama signs the $787 billion stimulus bill on Tuesday, his senior adviser said Sunday. "There will be signs of activity very quickly," David Axelrod told "FOX News Sunday," fox News

3/09

•  President Obama said Tuesday that the country already is "seeing shovels hit the ground" on the first infrastructure repair project funded through the Transportation Department's share of the $787 billion stimulus bill. CNN

10/10

•  With unemployment hovering near 10 percent nearly two years after President Obama signed his economic stimulus package, Mr. Obama is acknowledging that, despite his campaign promises, "there's no such thing as shovel-ready projects." New York Times

I am willing to assume that the President was not lying when he made his claims about shovel ready jobs. But if he was not lying, then he must have been ignorant to make that claim week after week. So in typical political fashion say anything to sell your political agenda, in this case to justify spending $787 billion with no idea if it will help the short term problem. Makes me wonder what else he is trying to sell us that he has no idea what he is talking about.

We are not governed by angels……

I see a new line of thinking.

To me, I see a new line of thinking from liberals who now refer to themselves as progressive. They believe that since the Constitution was written by man, it is fallible and prone to mistakes and that in order to do what is really morally correct, we need to kind of ignore it - - sometimes.

In a large part I absolutely agree with some of this thought pattern. In fact I made a very similar argument when I first started this blog. The Constitution cannot infringe upon the basic human rights defined in the Declaration of Independence.(1) Throughout history we have amended the Constitution a number of times because of flaws in its construction, things that were contradictory to “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” . Some of these amendments have added to our collective freedoms, like the 13th ,15th and 19th that ended slavery, and remove race or gender from voting restrictions, some like the 18th banning the sale of alcohol drinks actually restricted freedoms. Lucky for me the 18th was later repealed.

I truly believe our progressive friends think they have what is best for the country at heart. Unlike many of the class warfare liberals I do not think the people on the other side of the discussion are bent on destroying the world, they just apparently have a problem reading and understanding history. And what history tells us is if we do not have some limits to government that government will continue to expand its power until personal liberty is all but eliminated. So we cannot just ignore the one devise that restrains the government, we cannot say we will take the dog off his leash and hope we can get him back on later.

It may sound like perfect sense to say “don’t worry about that dusty old Constitution. Let’s just take tax money and give it to these citizens who need it”. But the money is not the governments to give; it belongs to the citizens it was taken from. Taking money from one citizen to just hand to another is not legal. The Constitution does not assign that power to the Federal government.

To use an analogy: your neighbor is hungry, your other neighbor owns a grocery store, you decide to rob the one neighbors grocery store and give the food to the hungry neighbor. It may seem morally right to do that but is it legal? What about the neighbor who owns the grocery store – is it right that you decided who to give his food to? Now, instead of you being the house in the middle – insert “the government” into this scenario. Now you have exactly what is happening in our government right now – and it is called “wealth re-distribution” and it is wrong AND illegal according to OUR Constitution. Whether they are the majority or minority does not matter, our Constitution prevents the majority from discriminating against a minority. Otherwise what would stop a majority of Republicans from saying “let’s take all the property belonging to Democrats and distribute it among ourselves”? If there is no restrictions on the government seizing and distributing it citizen’s wealth, what is to stop them?

It is a slippery slope when we let the government have the power to decide who “needs” our property worse than we do. The huge expansion of federal entitlement programs continues to use up a larger and large percentage of our federal tax dollars. Yet, the only thing we hear from Washington is that it is never enough - - and it will never be enough.

We have taken the dog off the leash - - -

(1) See post “ Federal Laws 8/2/10

I wonder if people even think about what they are saying?

I have a friend that has organized a citizens group in Wyoming. His group is attempting to get a state constitutional amendment passed that would guarantee a citizen’s right to make their own health care choices, basically making the Obamacare law illegal in Wyoming. He forwarded me an e mail exchange from someone who opposed their initiative. The gentleman who wrote against allowing people to have the right to their own health care decisions basic argument was “I think this is a good idea for everyone so the government should be allowed to do it”. Just to make sure I did not mis-intrepid his argument I have directly quoted him below (in red).

“I feel you're driven by some deep-seated, Libertarian, freedom creed run amok. In order for society to function, we must live co-oerativel This is the basic flaw, in my opinion, of Libertarianism. Just one simple example; there would be no National Parks in a Libertarian world.

I think the auto analogy holds up quite well; we want to require that people have health insurance so that they don't do harm to our local hospitals and the entire health care system by becoming a burden on all of us when they require expensive care. I don't ever plan to smash into someone in my car and cause them $300,000 worth of hospital care, yet I carry insurance for such an eventuality - as I should. As everyone should. As everyone must.

Yes, there are some preventive care things that would be covered by Health Care Reform. This is simply good economics (never mind the humanitarian side of the issue). My electric co-op hands out FREE compact florescent light bulbs because it makes good fiscal sense. We should do the same with preventive care for the same reason. We're trying to manage costs here. Auto insurance companies rewards safe drivers (lower premiums), so in a sense they are paying for preventive care if you maintain your vehicle.”

I had to really think on how to frame an argument with a person who thinks we have to much freedom.

Also how do you explain that nothing is free. His electrical co-op pays for light bulbs it gives to it's members. He is a member so he paid for the bulbs. We can hide the cost or pass it on but in the end the citizens pay for everything.

My first problem with his e mail has nothing really to do the health care decision but might explain why his logic is so flawed. Like so many liberals he just assumes his view is correct. He points out that in a more free society that there might not be any federal parks, like it is a absolute given fact that no federal parks is a bad thing. Now I like federal parks as much as the next person, I have yearly passes to the federal park system, my father has a life time pass to the federal park system, I support the federal park system with a donation every time I visit one but I am not arrogant enough to think everyone hold my view or interest. I am sure there are many people who have no use for the federal park system and think it is a complete waste of tax money, money that could be better spent on say providing health care.

My real disagreement to his line of thinking is where does the federal government get its power to mandate that citizens must purchase a particular product? Is there anything that restrains the federal government and if so what is it? In my view the only thing that restrains the federal government is the US Constitution. That document definitively calls out exactly what power the federal government has.

If you think the general welfare clause (1) gives the federal government unlimited power to do whatever it thinks is best then the government has no restraint, why did they even bother writing the rest of the constitution? Why not just say “the federal government can do whatever it thinks is best”? If this view is correct, the government could use the general welfare clause to say “we have decided it is best if all black citizens sit in the back of the bus”.

If you think the laws written by Congress and signed by the President are what limit the government, then there are no restraints: the government can write laws that give them the power to do any anything they want. If this view is correct, the government could pass a law that says “all black citizens must sit in the back of the bus”.

If you think majority elections limit the government’s power then there is no restraint. The majority can elect people who can do anything they want to the minority. The majority could elect representatives that go to Washington and pass laws that say “the majority want all black citizens to sit in the back of the bus”

The thing that prevents any majority from discrimination against any minority, even a minority of a single citizen is the Constitution and I see nothing in the constitution granting the federal government the power to make me buy health insurance. Now if you believe the government has no restraints what so ever then you can easily justify any behavior by the government. That line of thinking works well in Cuba. (Actually didn’t Castro just admit that it didn’t?)

My second disagreement from our liberal friend is the auto insurance analogy is weak. First, auto insurance is mandated by the state governments not the federal; state governments have more leeway to enact personal protection laws. Second, auto insurance protects me from being harmed by someone else, mandatory health insurance protects me from myself, big difference. States have an obligation to protect me from being harmed by another citizen. It is true that we have laws that make hospitals provide healthcare to anyone, and that is used to justify support of mandatory health insurance. The argument being that people who do not buy insurance are a burden on everyone, but if a person cannot afford health insurance so we have to pay for their insurance aren’t they still a burden on society? If the government has the right to protect me from myself, what is to prevent the government from banning sports like football or skiing or anything that the government deems bad for me personally.

As the writer correctly points out to have a functioning society we must cooperate. Co-operation is me donating to the United Way, co-operation is me paying my taxes to support the government, and co-operation is stopping on the side of the road to help a person with a flat tire or giving someone a ride. Co-operation is even supporting chartable programs through state, county and local government and private institutions. The federal government, with no constitutional authority, ordering me to contribute to the United Way or buy a product I do not want with the threat of going to jail if I don’t is coercion, and that is exactly what any government wealth re-distribution system or personal protection law is doing.

Even if the citizens were to pass an amendment to the constitution that gave the government the power the liberals seem to think it gets from the general welfare clause, I would still oppose this health insurance bill because it will not have the desired effect.

The President has now admitted after a recently released CBO report that the bill will not lower health care cost as we were told. (2)

Already we have seen a number of instances where the new health insurance bill has hurt the availability of health insurance.

We now know that HAS type polices will be much less affordable for employees because the new bill restricts the amount the employer can contribute to the plan. Think about that for a minute, the government now says the employer is not allowed to pay for as much of an employee’s heath insurance as they used to!! This is helping? Here at the company I work for this will cost the employee thousands of dollars a year in out of pocket expenses.(3)

McDonalds now says it will be forces to drop its lower level health care because it does not provide the list of required features the federal government mandates and the company cannot justify the higher expense for entry level and part time workers.

All major insurance companies have now discontinued their child only policies. You can no longer buy health insurance for just your child because the insurance industry research shows that people will not worry about purchasing insurance until a child gets sick, they can just sign them up then and the insurance company must provide coverage. After the sickness is over you could just drop the policy and sign up again when you need it. The fines for not having insurance are lower than paying for the insurance so you are money ahead. (4)

The Presidents insistence that you if you like your insurance you be able to keep it is an absolute lie. HAS programs are being legislated out of existence, federal mandates are driving many policies out of existence and most of the mandates are not even in effect yet. This year hundreds of thousands of Medicare subscribers will be force to switch policies because the new health care law restricts how many plans an insurer can offer to subscribers. Somehow choice has become a bad thing. (5)

People are willing to trade away their liberty for the government provided security of health insurance, or protection from the unknowns of the free enterprise system. But how many more liberties are we willing to give up? The thirst for a problem free existence and perfectly safe existence provided by daddy government in the end will leave us with no security at all unless we do exactly what daddy government tells us to do. We will have traded freedom for tyranny, traded the chance to be anything or do anything in exchange for the mandate to be or do whatever daddy government demands.

So many people today see liberty as some kind of an intellectual excessive, something that does not really exist. We have lost the connection that liberty is a very real thing.

(1) We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

(2) http://www.cbo.gov/publications/collections/health.cfm

(3) http://www.nationalreview.com/critical-condition/248846/ten-tax-increases-obamacare-avik-roy

(4) http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/HealthCare/health-insurance-providers-administration/story?id=11701760

(5) http://www.foxnews.com/us/2010/08/25/new-medicare-rule-means-m-seniors-switch-drug-plans-year/

I wonder if anyone really thinks about where the government derives its authority.

"The instrument by which [government] must act are either the AUTHORITY of the laws or FORCE. If the first be destroyed, the last must be substituted; and where this becomes the ordinary instrument of government there is an end to liberty! "--Alexander Hamilton, Tully, No. 3, 1794

I think Mr. Hamilton about hit the nail on the head with the above quote. So when does the citizen stop being the master of the government and become the slave? When does the citizen cease to be served by the government and instead be forced to serve the government?

In so many instances in today’s federal policies it is hard to see the law that grants the government the authority for its actions, and if that authority does not exists then the action is instituted with just the force of the government and as Hamilton said liberty is lost. Once the force of the government is the only justification needed for an action then any action can be justified by the government. Let me say that again – once the force of the government is the only justification needed for an action - - - then ANY action can be justified by the government.

It is very easy to confuse the government with the country and both with the constitution. But they are not the same. When a person joins the military they do not swear an oath to “protect and defend the government” or even the county. They swear to “protect and defend the constitution”.

That is because the constitution is the law that all government authority flows from. The constitution is the law that protects us FROM the government. It lays out the exact duties of the government to prevent the government from taking on other duties that will surly decrease our liberty. The founding fathers understood from history the very nature of governments. They slowly take over more and more control of society until the only reason the citizen exists is to serve the government itself.

In the past I have talked about federal spending for education. In this case money that originates from the states flows to the federal government only to have some portion returned to the states. Does this system serve the cause of education? Or does it just supply the tools for the federal government to control education? Is the citizen being served by the government or the other way around? We pay federal taxes that are then used to assist states in highway construction and maintenance. Again we have the federal government collecting money from the states then re-distributing a portion back to the very state it collected it from in the first place. Then if the states do not do the federal governments bidding on highway safety laws, the federal government withholds the money. Things like mandatory seat belt use would never fall under the constitutional mandate of the federal government. But using our own taxes dollars as a club to enforce the governments will, most certainly falls under the force of government if we let it.

The constitution gives the government the authority to collect income taxes but does it give it the authority to force business owners to do the tax collecting for them? So many federal actions we just accept today would be unheard of when the country was founded and unfathomable to our founding fathers. But that’s the way tyranny is, most times it does not happen in one big dramatic event. In most cases, it is a slow loss of one small liberty after another until the people are living in chains and poverty and wondering “how the heck did we get here”.

I wonder if anyone really thinks about how much 3.5 trillion dollars is?

The main theme I have tried to follow for this blog is the inherent unconstitutional nature of so many of the well meaning but miss guided programs and laws coming out of the US federal government. But the often ignored crime of this continued infringement on our civil liberties is not only don’t they work as intended but many times they do more harm than good.

We see examples every day of money wasting government programs. A few weeks back we talked about the vast amounts of money poured into the department of education yet we see no tangible evidence it has done anything to raise the level of education in the US. Today I got an e mail from my oldest son. He is a US marine serving his second tour in Afghanistan and on his way to his new duty station he spent a couple of days in Kabul. He was fairly shocked to see the lack of improvements even in the capital city. When serving in the southern part of the country he was not surprised that there was not much evidence of improvement but with the billions of dollars spent over the last 8 years in aid he thought he would see some improvement in the capital. It is not for lack of trying or people who do not care; it is the problem that gigantic bureaucracies are inherently inefficient.

The government ignores the basic rules of the free enterprise system; there is no reward for success and no punishment for failure.

As designed, elections should be the thing that forces people in government to be accountable but the government has grown so big I bet that 95% of the personnel do not change even if the administration changes. Vast seas of federal workers perform most of the tasks that consume your tax dollars and they operate with no fear of job or income loss if their particular department or program is ineffective. There is no worry within the Department of Energy that the department will go under and they will lose their jobs if the department is not responsive to the needs of the customer (the tax payer). The only answer is to keep the federal government as small as possible to limit the level of inefficiency.

My good liberal friend Rich often accuses me of being uncaring because I don’t support federal tax dollars used as a form of charity. But even if I could get past the issue of the government redistributing the citizens wealth (which I can’t) I cannot get over the total lack of success or accountability of the vast majority of these programs.

Trillions of dollars have been spent since 1968 on the “war on poverty”. After impressive reductions in the poverty rate 4-5 years after President Johnson lunched the initiative, the poverty rate has stabilized and the trillions spent in the last 35-40 years has done nothing to reduce the % of people in poverty (3). What if all that money had been left in the hands of the people? What if every citizen had more money to contribute to private charities? What if small business had more money to expand their business and hire more employees? What if the money used to provide office space to the thousands of federal workers who administer the billions of dollars allocated to poverty programs was just used directly at the local level to actually help those living in poverty? Would the country and its citizens be worse off or better?

The Department of Energy was originally started to promote energy independence after the energy crisis in the 1970’s (2), yet after billions of dollars spent by the department, the country is more dependent of foreign energy than at any time in history. (4)

The examples go on and on, want to have some fun? Take the Social Security statement you receive from the government, look at the money you have been forced to ”deposit”, then calculate how much money you would have if you invested that money at even a modest return. If the government did not force you to put 12% of your income in the government program the money would be yours. If you died, it would go to who you want it to go to, die before you retire now and all the money you contributed to SS goes to the government. I know, I know, people depend on that money to retire. I read the other day where a guy said he could not afford to pay in to a retirement account and it is a good thing he had social security when he retired. Maybe if the government had not seized 12% of his income he would have had the money to save for his retirement. I think we are going to make SS a whole post in the next couple of weeks. That system is so poor it needs its own topic.

Even if you could make an argument that every program and department is of vital national interest, why is it never enough? There was a time federal spending would ebb and flow with federal income, not any more. Since 1955 federal spending has always increased. Never in the last 55 years has federal government spent less money than the year before (1).

At some point you would think it would be enough.

(1) http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy05/hist.html

Summary of receipts outlays surpluses 1789-2009



(2) http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=7097



(3) http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/data/incpovhlth/2009/pov09fig04.pdf



(4) http://willbrownsberger.com/index.php/archives/656

I wonder if anyone really thinks about what the liberals are saying Part 2

The debate on extending the Bush tax cuts gets more and more surreal. Not only do we have the president insisting keeping the tax cuts in place would be“ giving” money to the wealthy, now Ms Pelosi tells us that they are actually the “Obama tax cuts”!

To quote madam speaker during her weekly press briefing:

"What I believe the American people deserve is a tax cut for the middle class, And without getting into procedure and timing and process, what we're going to do is to say at the end of the day, the extension of the Obama middle-income tax cuts will take place, and that's what I have to say on the subject."

Yes you read that correct. The very tax cuts the democrats voted almost unanimously against almost a decade ago are not only GOOD now but if the congress votes to extend these cuts (maintain what is already in place) they will actually be Obama tax CUTS!.

Of course none of this yet explains how the democrats told us 7-8 years ago these very same tax cuts were “tax cuts for the wealthy” but now they want to keep the 97% that were for the middle class. In 2001-2003 they along with their media minions sounded like parrots……

tax cuts for the wealth!

tax cuts for the wealthy!

Tax cuts for the wealth!

I remember my good liberal friend Rich standing in my office screaming about Bush’s “tax cuts for the wealthy”. And today our liberal friends in the same harmonious fashion cry …….

tax cuts for the middle class!

tax cuts for the middle class!

THESE ARE THE EXACT SAME TAX CUTS!!!!!!

Don’t get me wrong, I am glad the democrats finally admit tax cuts (in particular the BUSH tax cuts…opps… sorry I mean the OBAMA tax cuts) are good things but I have to ask are they lying now or were they lying before?

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Now we move from how much of your money the government should take to how they are doing at spending it. From an internal report from the LA city controller we have the following.

More than a year after Congress approved $800 billion in stimulus funds, the Los Angeles city controller has released a 40-page report on how the city spent its share, and the results are not living up to expectations.

"I'm disappointed that we've only created or retained 55 jobs after receiving $111 million," said Wendy Greuel, the city's controller. "With our local unemployment rate over 12 percent we need to do a better job cutting red tape and putting Angelenos back to work.” According to the audit, the Los Angeles Department of Public Works spent $70 million in stimulus funds -- in return, it created seven private sector jobs and saved seven workers from layoffs. Taxpayer cost per job: $1.5 million.

The Los Angeles Department of Transportation created even fewer jobs per dollar, spending $40 million but netting just nine jobs. Taxpayer cost per job: $4.4 million. Greuel blamed the dismal numbers on several factors:

1. Bureaucratic red tape: Four highway projects did not even go out to bid until seven months after they were authorized.

2. Projects that were supposed to be competitively bid in the private sector went instead went to city workers.

3. Stimulus money was not properly tracked within departments

4. Both departments could not report the jobs created and retained in a timely fashion.

Imagine that, red tape and politics screwing up a project in the government. I can absolutely guarantee that if the federal government decided to hand the small company I work for 1.5 million dollars to create jobs we would have been hiring a lot more than one person. Hey but let’s give the city of LA the benefit of the doubt., I am sure there were some outside jobs created by LA spending 111 million dollars, they must have had to buy something with the $111 million. Let’s say they created 10 jobs for every 1.5 million, see how well that works out, now they only paid $150,000 per job!

Which brings me back to one of my central themes, that not only are federal government wealth re-distribution and make work programs unconstitutional, but they DON”T WORK! (At least not nearly as good as just leaving the money in the hands of the citizens to start with).

This is the same as my talk about the department of education a while ago. The good citizens of LA sent their tax money to Washington, Washington used a lot of it to pay the salaries and expenses for people whose only job is to send some of that very same money back to LA.

I wonder if anyone really thinks about what the liberals are saying?

The two quotes below from our President explain the real difference how the liberals and conservatives look at tax policy and the citizen’s money.

"We can't give away $700 billion to folks who don't need it." --Barack Obama promising to raise taxes on those earning $250,000 or more a year

"You can't have Republicans running on fiscal discipline that we're gonna reduce our deficit, that the debt's out of control, and then borrow tens, hundreds of billions of dollars to give tax cuts to people who don't need them." --BO repeating the class warfare rhetoric

First, only a true liberal can look at a tax policy that lets someone keep some portion of their own money and say that is giving that person something. ("We can't give away $700 billion”) In other words the fact that the government has not taken your money yet means the government gave it to you. Only to a liberal would not raising your taxes be the same thing as the government giving you money.

To a conservative all the money you earned is yours, and we are obligated to send some to the government so the government can perform its constitutional duties. To the liberal all the money is the governments and if you get to keep any it is because the government bestowed it upon you.

The second difference between liberals and conservatives is that to a conservative it is not the government’s job to decide who “needs” the money they earn. The continuing class warfare aspect of the liberal argument is frightening. The liberal attempt to turn one group of citizens against another for political advantage is the tactic of tin pot dictators in third world countries.

Even implying that the amount of money to be seized by the federal government is somehow set by a government determination of a citizen’s “need” of that money is startlingly similar to the basic ideals of socialism.

Had a discussion with a very good friend of mine over the weekend

Had a discussion with a very good friend of mine over the weekend. Although she likes the basic content of what I was writing, she was concerned that the overall tone of my blog made me sound very anti government. This concerned me because one of the criticisms that my liberal friend Rich always has for me when we were discussing the ever expanding federal government is that I want no government at all. He suggests that I want the USA to be “just like Somalia” with no federal government what so ever. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The Federal government performs a number of very vital and necessary functions. It has very defined duties and responsibilities which without would allow not only the country but the world to descend into anarchy. But saying I believe the federal government should provide for the common defense or regulate state commerce does not mean I think it should have control of everything in my life. The limited scope of our federal government is what makes this country great.

Why is it that the United States is so successful? Why is the economy of the US four times larger than the next largest economy? The US is not the largest country; it is not the country with the most land or the most natural recourses, or the largest population. What could explain the growth of wealth and power of such a young country? Why is the economy of the US as large as all the EU (European Union) countries combined?

Are the Italians or Germanys or English who immigrated to the US somehow smarter than their fellow countrymen who remained in their home country? Are the Mexicans or Brazilians who are now US citizen’s harder working or more gifted than natives of their homelands? Does the land here in the US hold some magical power that allows its citizens to have personal success like nowhere else on earth? Does the Cuban who escapes to freedom in the US gain some superhuman power that allows him to have a life far beyond anything possible in Cuba? If not, why is this country so much more prosperous? What makes the USA so special?

The one thing that allows such personal achievement in the US is liberty, in no other country has a person been freer to accomplish whatever their skill and labor will allow. The difference is our constitution and system of government that historically has provided the most level and unrestricted playing field for its citizens. A system of government that allows a poor immigrant with a 4th grade education like Andrew Carnegie to become the richest man in the world. As I travel around the world I meet people who are as hard working, as smart, and as educated as people in the US. I visit countries with vast natural resources and histories that dwarf anything in America, the difference is that people in America have not been weighed down by an intrusive government that saps the fruits of their labors and punishes their success.

Every attempt by the left to “spread the wealth around” (1), every attempt by the federal government to collect higher and higher taxes that is needed to support an ever growing government, decreases the chance for personal prosperity. A government that attempts to regulate every part of our lives in an attempt to protect us from everything draws us further and further from what made us great in the first place.

(1)Barack Obama quoted 10/12/2008

"We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt." --Thomas Jefferson

"On Thursday the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) announced the federal budget deficit for 2010 will exceed $1.3 trillion. This is already on the heels of a 2009 budget deficit of $1.2 trillion and on top of a national debt of some $13.3 trillion. The word 'trillion' seems to have, almost overnight, crept into our standard economic parlance and by the looks of it is here to stay. And with the CBO's forecast of more than $6 trillion in federal budget deficits accruing over the next nine years from 2010 to 2019, many are logically wondering if the United States has effectively crossed, or is fast approaching, a virtual economic point of no return -- an economic Rubicon if you will." --columnist Matt O'Connor

This can only happen if we let it. This can only happen if we are to lazy or to disinterested to hold our elected officials responsible for their actions. Speak to your friends, speak to your neighbors, we have to convince those in Washington that if they will not return the government to a fiscally responsible path and back to a proper constitutional mandate we will find someone who will.

We must be the "irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds" that Sam Adams talked about.

I wonder if anyone ever thinks about how fast the federal government is growing.

USA Today did two very interesting articles in the last couple of months. The data in these reports is staggering. While unemployment continues to be at a catastrophic level and small businesses are struggling to keep their head above water, while home sales are at the lowest level in decades, home foreclosures remain at record high levels and tax revenues are dropping, the federal government continues to expand!

Not only is the federal government expanding its average pay, it is outpacing private sector jobs. Does anyone else find this reprehensible! Does anyone else wonder what this administration can be thinking! At a time when the small company I work for is laying off workers for the first time in its 22 year history, at a time when my company is instituting pay cuts and benefit reductions, the federal government is increasing its size and increasing the pay of its employees!

Some of the startling finds of the USA Today report:

• According to a USA TODAY analysis of federal salary data, the number of federal workers earning six-figure salaries has exploded during the recession,

• Federal employees making salaries of $100,000 or more jumped from 14% to 19% of all civil servants during the recession's first 18 months — and that's before overtime pay and bonuses are counted.

• Federal workers are enjoying an extraordinary boom time — in pay and hiring — this during a recession that has cost 7.3 million jobs in the private sector.

• Paychecks from private business shrank to their smallest share of personal income in U.S. history during the first quarter of this year, a USA TODAY analysis of government data finds.

Obviously no one would dispute the individual worker earning as much as their skills will allow but, how does their employer (the Federal government) justify a massive increase in payroll while their income is falling?

A new address

Wanted to let everyone know they can now reach "The Second Ride" blog at

http://www.governmentvsliberty.info/


spread the word to all your liberal friends!!!

I wonder if anyone ever thinks about how big the federal government has become.

Unless you live in Washington DC, for most of us the Federal government is kind of abstract. We all think about it when we fill out our tax forms and if you are retired you have interaction with the Social Security department and Medicare but day to day I don’t think most of us are thinking about the government. Heck, when it was shut down during the budget impasse a few years ago, a majority of Americans would not have even noticed if it were not for the hysterical media.

How big is the Federal government? Well it’s the biggest employer in the country with almost 3 million employees (1) counting the postal service. With an annual budget of over three trillion dollars in 2010 it is almost 22% of the country’s GDP (3).

Now it makes sense that the federal government would always be getting bigger. The country’s population and economy is growing so the government would have to expand to perform the same function for a larger economy. To make some sense of it, we must compare the size of the government with something else in order to get a feel for how much the government really is expanding. As I said, federal spending is equal to almost 22% of GDP and if we look back to say, 1913, we see that Federal spending was just 2.5% of GDP.

Another way we can look at federal spending is to compare it to the population. In 1960 the population was 180 million people and 2010 it is about 300 million, an increase of about 60%. Federal spending in 1960 (numbers converted to 2005 dollars) was $628 billion and in 2010 $3300 billion so an increase of over 400%. Yes you read that correctly 3300 billion dollars!!! A 400% increase!!!! (2)

“But wait” my liberal friends tell me, “think of all the good the government does”. We don’t have space in one blog to look at the total federal budget, so let’s take a quick look at just one department to see “how much good they do”.

The Department of Education was founded in 1979. Going back to my first blog it is hard to figure out how education can ever be thought of as a “Federal responsibility”. It would appear to be the whole thing is absolutely unconstitutional. But liberals don’t really worry about that, so let’s just concentrate on what the department is really doing.

To think about this historically, the United States put men on the moon without a department of education, we won two world wars without a department of education, we created the largest most productive economy in the world…without a department of education. Today the Department of education has a work force of 4200 and not one of them is a teacher. The budget for this department is 63.7 billion. My liberal friends tell me this department provides vital dollars to help the states pay for education, but where do those dollars come from in the first place? FROM THE STATES!!

So here is how it works. The federal government takes tax money from the citizens of a state, it uses most of that money to pay for the payroll, benefits, insurance, office, desks, chairs and bottled water for the 4200 employees in Washington and then it sends some of the same money back to each state and acts like it is doing you a favor! Here is a thought, if we just left that 63 billion dollars in the states and let them use it to hire teachers how many teachers could we get? That might be close to an extra 1 million teachers.

So what do you really think would do the most for education, an extra 1 million teachers or 4200 federal employees sitting in an office building in DC?

1)http://www.opm.gov/feddata/HistoricalTables/TotalGovernmentSince1962.asp


2) http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BUDGET-2011-TAB/pdf/BUDGET-2011-TAB.pdf

3) GDP is a measure of the “gross domestic product” of our country. GDP is basically a number that includes all economic activity that happens in the U.S. If my company hires a new worker for $40,000 that adds $40,000 added to the GDP, if that employee then helps produce product that we sell for $10 that adds $10 to the GDP.

I wonder if anyone ever thinks about why we have all these laws?

Let’s just expand a little on my entry about the continuing expansion of federal control over our lives. In the first post we looked at trying to analyze if we as citizens wanted to support or oppose a new federal law, rule or regulation.

Now let’s talk about the motivation of the government, or more correctly the people within the government for purposing a new law. You can’t really be sure what some individual member of congress might be thinking when they put forward a new law. Even their stated reasoning might be hidden or clouded by political rhetoric. I think there might be only three reasons a new law or regulation would be brought up.

It helps the government better carry out its constitutional duties.

The Patriot Act might be a good example of this. After totally missing a large group of people in this and other countries planning to fly airplanes into buildings the federal government though it was too restricted in carrying out proper intelligence gathering. The congress passes a law to help the government do a better job. (As a side note the liberals cried like babies about the end of democracy when a Republican president signed the law but have been completely silent when a Democrat President continues it. But liberal hypocrisy is a topic for a week of blogs.)

Buying votes.

The recent bailout to state governments (called a jobs bill by the left) that was passed this week could be a fine example. The same week the federal government slashes over 7000 defense jobs it hands out 26 billion to states to mostly pay school teachers. Maybe I am just paranoid but that sure looks like a payoff to the teachers union, especially when you decrease food stamps to pay for it, (well that and the usual tax increases.)

It pushes some social agenda the person thinks is important.

This is the area that includes the most un-constitutional and anti liberty laws. Most are written by well intending government officials who forget the famous quote “the road to hell is paved with good intensions”. Some group of people is suffering some real or imagined social injustice, in rides the federal government to right the wrong. The problem here is the federal government has no money except the money it has taken from the citizens. So now we have the federal government taking money from Peter to give to Paul, as if Paul deserves that money more than Peter who earned it. No matter how well meaning or even successful a program there can be no constitutional defense of this wealth transfer of citizens personal property.

How can anyone indorse this? Who wants to trust some person in Washington to decide who keeps their income and who does not? What is to stop the majority (say lower to middle class citizens) from voting themselves all the property of the minority (say the rich)? The constitution was the instrument that was written expressly to protect the citizens and states from the federal government and protect the minority from the majority. This sadly has apparently been forgotten.

I wonder if anyone really thinks about the Declaration of Independence?

I really love the Declaration of Independence,


I have to look up the big words and I stumble over the old King’s English. But when you read it slowly, the ideas set forth are so revolutionary that, to me, it is the best hope in all history for the human race.

First is the concept that all peoples’ basic human rights are “endowed by our creator” (whomever you might think that is). For the first time in the world’s history, a group of people declared that human rights are not handed down by some government, or person, or secured with some piece of paper. But they are “unalienable” (this is one of those words I had to look up). “Not to be separated, given away, or taken away” the dictionary says. What an amazing and forgotten concept. You are not free because the government says you are free, or the Constitution says you are free. You are free because you were born! A government may deprive you of your human rights but they cannot grant them.

Then the basic rights themselves, listed in order of importance, “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” The right of life is obvious. Liberty has many interpretations but I like Webster’s “state of being free.” And last, “the pursuit of happiness.” Notice they said “pursuit,” not just happiness. Being happy is not a right but something to be pursued!

And last, the solemn declaration that, should a said government interfere with these basic rights, or as our better educated and learned founding fathers said “when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism,” not only do we have the right but we have the DUTY to throw off that government to secure these rights. Pretty heavy stuff, even scary. But that is the importance these brilliant men attached to liberty. Thankfully they were willing to risk their futures, their fortunes and their very lives to secure these rights for future generations. We would be negligent if we let these rights to slowly be eroded by a well-meaning but miss directed political class just because we were not willing or too lazy to provide for our own personal security.

In 1776, to “throw off such government” meant picking up arms and standing against an occupying army whose purpose was to suppress the people’s rights at the direction of a king. Today, I think that means continuing pushing back against laws, rules, regulations and the growth of a government. We must push back against a government that, with every expansion, results in the decrease of the liberty that allows us the opportunity to be so happy and productive.

After the Revolutionary War, the founders set about laying out a system of government that would allow for an organized society, but avoid infringing on the peoples’ basic rights. The Constitution dictates the powers of a central government, powers that are limited by design and ripe for abuse by officials that think providing for our happiness is their job.

But that is a subject for another day.

in response to http://www.debatepolitics.com/blogs/4776/29-we-must-put-power-back-belongs.html#comment113

It is not who has the power that is the major problem, it is the federal government has been handed too much power. The majority of new federal law is not constitutional we blindly except every feel good wealth redistribution act by the government because we are afraid of being assaulted by the well meaning but miss guided left. If we think the federal government should not be in the business of dividing up the fruits of its citizens labor we are greedy. If we think the government should not be picking the winners and losers in a free capitalist system we are uncaring. I disagree with the government seizing any person’s wealth just to hand it out to the citizens that the government has decided are more worthy.

Federal Laws

                        I wonder if anyone really thinks about the never ending list of federal laws, rules and regulations that flow out of Washington year after year?(1)

     Now obviously, to have a civilized society we need some laws to set a level playing field for all the citizens. But you would kind of think that at some point, say after a couple of hundred years, you would have all the laws you needed to structure a free and functioning democracy. My concern is that, in most cases, every new law, regulation or rule decrease our freedoms. Take for instance the new health insurance laws, over 2000 pages of new rules that did not exist before passage of this law.

      Before this law, you had the right to decide if you wanted to spend your money on health insurance. You no longer have that right. Before this law, you had the right to decide exactly what options were included with the health insurance you bought. You no longer have that right. Before this law, you had the right to decide if you wanted to have your insurance cover your adult children. You no longer have that right. And the list goes on and on. A 17-year-old college student used to have the right to a credit card without a co signer, no longer. A long time ago you had the right to decide for yourself if you wanted auto insurance, no longer. No longer can you decide if you want to wear a seatbelt, or own a establishment that allows smoking.

 I am not saying that some of the rules don’t have a positive effect.  What I am saying is we are a lot less free than we were 20, 30 or 100 years ago. And our freedoms continue to be infringed upon with every new addition to federal law. It’s a little scary when I think about where it all will end.  

So, I started to think about what we really should consider when we are deciding, as citizens to support or oppose any new federal law and I came up with three basic areas that we should consider when considering some new law.

1.       Is it constitutional? No matter how much good we think a law will do, no matter how much we want a particular regulation to be enacted, it must adhere to the constitution.

The founding fathers were very familiar with the problems of an un-checked government. Heck, they had a king appointed by God. One can’t really disagree with his decisions. So they set out to write a constitution that protected our basic human rights, as laid out in the Declaration of Independence, and limited the power of the federal government to a very basic area of control. They stated very clearly that any powers not granted to the Federal government in the constitution are reserved for the states.  Now, the first few laws passed were pretty easy to understand.  We needed a law against murder because to murder someone deprived them of their basic human right to life. Same thing with stealing, an infringement on you right to liberty. Things get a little cloudier with laws that seize you income so the government can distribute it to someone else.  This type of law now gets the government picking the winners and losers on our system Government give a tax break to people buying hybrid cars, winner, people who buy hybrid cars, losers everyone who paid taxes so it could be given to hybrid car owners. Think about this, this is not the government collecting taxes to support the government, this is the government seizing your property (income) just so the government can distribute it to people the government has decided are more deserving of the fruits of your labor than you are. Thinking of it another way lets say you have 3 TV sets and your neighbor has only one, the government decides that’s not fair, comes to your house, takes one of your TV’s and hands it to your neighbor. No matter how well meaning these wealth redistribution type laws are it is pretty hard to find the power granted in the constitution to allow your property to be seized and distributed as our elected officials see fit.

2.       What are the intended consequences? Will the new law or regulation really accomplish our intent? The new health care bill is expected to improve health care. Yet, in the over 2000 pages, there is almost nothing about health care, only health insurance. Is the only problem with our health care caused and related to our health insurance? Does limiting you options for health insurance and benefits really improve your chances for good health? Will the trillions of new tax dollars spent really improve most people’s health?

3.       What are the unintended consequences? In 1963, the government started mandating seat belts in new cars. No longer did you have the right to decide if you wanted this feature, the government mandated it. As the years went on this mandate expanded from just the front seat to all seats, then to mandatory seat belt use (enforced by the federal government withholding federal tax money to states that did not enact mandatory seat belt laws). So, the government collected taxes from all states, then used that collected money as a bribe to get states to do as the federal government wants but really did not have the power under the constitution to enforce. Then the government, seeing that people still were not behaving like the federal government wanted, enacted laws to make air bags mandatory. “Sorry you don’t get a choice, the people in Washington know what is good for you.” And then we find out that the new federal mandated safety device forced on us actually kills people, from 1993-1996 alone 32 people died from air bag related injuries including 21 children (2). So then we get more laws and now it is not legal to put your child in the front seat of your car. We actually have safety warnings in new cars (another new law) telling you to be careful because your federally mandated safety device could kill you. Now that is what I call an unintended consequence.

We are slowly trading our liberty for the security of mommy government, protecting us from the challenges of life. We are slowly trading away our personal freedom, the one real thing that makes this country great and unique. 

(1)   How Many Federal Regulations are There?
According to the Office of the Federal Register, in 1998, the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), the official listing of all regulations in effect, contained a total of 134,723 pages in 201 volumes that claimed 19 feet of shelf space. In 1970, the CFR totaled only 54,834 pages.

(2)   The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reports that since 1990, airbag deployment has killed 227 people in low-severity crashes, including 76 drivers, 10 adult passengers, 119 children between the ages of 1 and 11, and 22 infants. Of the 76 adult drivers killed, 28 were women under 5 feet 2 inches tall, and 4 of the 10 adult passengers killed were females smaller than that height