Things That Don't Work In The Country

A few days ago we talked about how members of Congress are wasting their time and our tax dollars on such trivial matters such as regulating the sound volume of TV commercials, forbidding the televising of erectile dysfunction commercials, creating new tax deductions for pet owners, and legislating regulations on college football playoff formats. It was mentioned that, according to the Tax Foundation, the average American family works until the end of April every year to pay their tax burden, a burden that is then wasted on inane efforts such as those listed above. Today let's look at a few more political class responsibilities that fall far short of being effective:

• In mid November, you may remember that a glitch in the nation's air traffic control system caused hundreds of flights and tens of thousands of airline passengers to deal with massive delays. According to an article reporting the problem on Earthlink's news page, the glitch was caused by a single bad circuit board at an FAA center in Salt Lake City. Think about it, a single circuit board blows and the country loses untold thousands of hours in productivity due to the delays and thousands of flyers are inconvenienced. This glitch happened despite a multi billion dollar overhaul of the nationwide system for air traffic control. The most pathetic part of the whole endeavor is that the political class jumped into the story to show off their indignation to the voters. Senator Charles said the aviation system was in shambles (despite the current multi billion dollar renovation effort, a Senate aviation panel was going to hold hearings as was a House aviation committee. As always, the politicians get involved AFTER the disaster. If they were doing their job, they would have been involved before things fell apart. Again, all of this anxiety because of a single circuit board in a billion dollar government system.
• In the November 2, 2009 Businessweek issue, the magazine quoted a Bureau Of Labor Statistics study that found 49% of households used their 2008 economic stimulus check to pay off debt, 18% saved it, and 30% spent it. Thus, from an effectiveness perspective, 70% of the stimulus effort was wasted as measured against its intent, get spending started to get the economy going. Not a very efficient way to spend taxpayer dollars if only three dollars out of every ten are going towards what you want them to go towards. Nevertheless, some members of the political class want to do another stimulus package, in all likelihood wasting another seven out of ten dollars spent.
• In the Briefing section in the December 4, 2009 issue of The Week magazine, a thorough review of the U.S. Post Office was given. Bottom line: it is going down hill very quickly. With the popularity of instant messaging, email, online social networks, cell phones, fax machines, cell phone texting, etc., the nation is producing less and less mail every year. In 2009, according to the article, mail volume was off almost 13% (25 billion fewer pieces) on a year over year basis, more than double any decline in the history of the Post Office. It is expected to decline another 11 billion pieces in 2010. The Post Office will lose almost $4 billion this year alone and by the end of next year will be $13 billion in debt. The article goes on to say that efforts to streamline postal operations is likely to be thwarted by the political class, members of which have come out against the closing of money losing branches, phasing out Saturday deliveries, and offering other services. Bottom line: the reality of the market will make Post Office losses grow while the political class will refuse to make the hard, courageous choices to reduce financial losses. As a result, the U.S. taxpayer is likely to pay more and more going forward to support/subsidize a dinosaur of a government agency.
• A big deal was made of President Obama's speech in Egypt many months ago and his attempt to start bringing peace to the Mideast. Since then, nothing has happened. I was intrigued by a NY Times article that was summarized in the November issue of The Week magazine. It was written by Thomas Friedman who had the unique idea of just saying adios to the Israelis and Palestinians and to have them call us when they are serious about peace. This administration and many administrations before Obama have not been effective in negotiating a real peace between these two parties, namely because they are not ready to make the mutual sacrifices to get it done. Thus, Mr. Friedman's suggestion that we ignore the problem until the two parties are ready for peace. Nothing else has worked form the American political class who has tried to solve the problem so why not try something radically different like this?
• President Obama pledged to close Guantanamo but that has not happened yet.
• President pledged to give fuller rights to the gay community but initiatives such as allowing gays to openly serve in the military, which has been successfully executed in many other countries, has not yet happened.
• President Obama campaigned to get us out of Iraq but we are still there and will probably have troops stationed their in the tens of thousands for an unknown future, doing no better than Bush in this area.
• And finally, a small blurb in the November 20, 2009 edition of The Week reviewed a recent Rasmussen poll. The poll found that only 4% of Americans believe that politicians keep their campaign promises, 45% believe that politicians intentionally lie about their promises, and 83% do not want their children to run for office someday.

As outlined in several sections of the book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government,", nothing works in this country anymore wherever the political class is involved. The politicians only get involved after a disaster and then only to add bluster and very little worthwhile to the solving of the problem. Social Security is going bankrupt, Medicare is going bankrupt, the Post Office is going bankrupt, public schooling is a failure, the drug culture is bigger than ever, we have no national energy strategy, air traffic control is hostage to a single circuit board to move planes around the country, we are no closer to solving our international problems with North Korea, Iran, and the the whole Middle East than we were thirty years ago, our bridges and roads are falling apart, etc., etc., etc. But the political class is hard at work on the major issue of regulating the sound volume on TV commercials and working out tax deductions for pet owners.

Many of the steps outlined in "Love My Country, Loathe My Government" would address many of these issues. The most important step, however, would be the passing of term limits so that we could get rid of the current batch of politicians and get new ones into office to solve real problems. Until then, government functions and processes will continue not to work since the same types of people in office now are the same ones that were in office forty years ago and look where it has gotten us.

Visit our website at www.loathemygovernment.com to order an autographed copy of the book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government -Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom and Destroying The American Political Class" and to sign up for the cause. The book is also available online at Amazon and Barnes And Noble.
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