September, 2016, Part 4, Political Class Insanity: Moldy Government Buildings, More Chciago Violence, and More

It is the beginning of another month which means it is again time to review the latest political class insanity from Washington and around the world. Political class insanity takes many forms including the wasting of taxpayer wealth, criminal fraud within government programs, inane and stupid political quotes and actions, the inability to create and implement effective and efficient government programs, stupid and ill performing economic policies and strategies, and other forms of insanity that continue to evolve and surprise and shock us.

The current monthly record for the number of days needed to cover one month's worth of insanity is ten. We almost equaled that record last month when we needed nine days to cover one month’s worth of political class insanity. There is a very good chance that the ten day record could fall this month since as we get closer and closer to the election, the volume of ineptness grows almost exponentially. 

But today and for all of the posts this month, let’s start off with a welcome piece of honest political dialog. It comes from a State Department spokesperson.Mark Toner, who is about to start the daily State Department press briefing. In a joking matter, he makes the following quote: "Welcome to the State Department. I think we have some interns in the back. Welcome. Good to see you in this exercise in transparency and democracy." 

He then burst out laughing at his own quote, indicating he also knew what a joke the Obama administration has been, especially Mr. Toner’s State Department, when it comes to cover ups, lack of transparency, denial of Freedom of Information Act requests, the prosecution of whistleblowers, etc. But at least it was a little refreshing to finally hear some actual honesty out of Washington as we see from the actual clip of the news conference:

http://www.againstcronycapitalism.org/2016/08/when-even-the-state-department-spokesperson-cant-keep-a-straight-face-about-things-anymore-video/

With that context of honesty, let’s see what other insanity has been going down:

1) Unfortunately, every month we have to check in on the gun violence insanity of Chicago. Chicago, which has some of the strictest gun control laws in the country, also has one of the highest gun violence rates in the country, violence that happens at a high rate every day of every month. 

This month is no exception. According to a Breitbart article on August 29, 2016 by Awe Hawkins, 57 people were shot and wounded and 10 were killed during the previous weekend in Chicago. One of the dead was 32-year-old Nykea Aldridge, a mother of four and cousin of Chicago Bulls’ star Dwayne Wade. She was shot and killed Friday while pushing one of her children in a stroller. And these shootings were not over an entire week, they all occurred between 4 pm Friday and 1 am Monday.

The Chicago Tribune reported that with the latest shootings, the year to date total of Chicago gunshot victims is 2,818 and the number who have died as a result of these shootings is 464. For all of 2015, the number of shooting victims was 2,988 and the number who have died was 490. Needless to say, this year’s violence will overwhelm last year’s total year totals.

And as always, the political class has no solution or creativity in resolving this horrific situation. They cannot call for much more gun control because they have already maxed out that failed strategy. 

Any successful strategy has to involve a re-examination of our lost war on drugs since we have previously reported that at least two Mexican drug cartels are violently operating in the city and nothing about the violence will be resolved until the war on drugs is stopped and replaced with something that works. This approach would require a multi-dimensional thought process from Washington, something that has never happened.

2) How dissatisfied are Americans with the current set of American politicians, a set that we assert are the worst set of politicians to ever serve this country? According to the latest Quinnipiac public opinion poll, 62% of Americans want the Presidential debates to include Libertarian Party candidate Gary Johnson in addition to Clinton and Trump. And even more amazing, 82% American millenials want Johnson to be allowed into the debates.

Obviously, Americans, especially younger Americans, are searching for alternatives to the same tired ideas and people that the two major parties have continually served up. Unfortunately, these same two tired parties have made the bar for getting into the debates quite high. Johnson would have to attain at least a 15% rating in a set of opinion polls to be considered, which creates a catch-22: he cannot get enough exposure to attain the needed poll ratings to get into the debates and by not getting into the debates he cannot get enough exposure to get the higher poll ratings.

But as the poll results show, hopefully America is finally waking up and realizing that something radically different needs to be done to destroy the current political class elitists who are in the business of politics for themselves, not the people they are supposed to represent.

3) Here are another set of depressing numbers from the political class. Hillary Clinton, who wants to be President of the United States, has given only one interview to the New York Times political reporting staff during her ENTIRE campaign. Donald Trump has given over 70 interviews to the Times.

Which raises the obvious question: what is she scared of or what is she hiding? The New York Times is more than likely going to give her favorable treatment despite whatever she says, given the paper’s heavy liberal leaning so what gives? Shouldn’t she be more accessible to the press in order for Americans to find out what she is really all about? Again, what is she hiding or afraid of, democracy?

4) Another interesting and depressing statistic comes to us from the website:

www.fivethirtyeight.com

According to the site, only 37 out of 435 House Of Representative seats are considered to be competitive, i.e. both Republicans and Democrats have a decent chance of winning them. Which means that a whopping 398 House seats are a sure lock to be won by either a sitting Republican or a sitting Democrat. This is because current politicians have rigged the electoral process by gerrymandering Congressional districts and setting themselves up to receive overwhelming financial support as a result of their incumbency, drowning out any alternative options.

Thus, if you are a Republican in a Congressional district that has a Democrat representing that district, your vote likely has no value, given how rigged the system is. Conversely, if you are a Democrat in a Congressional district that has a Republican representing that district, your vote likely has no value. And thus, democracy dies because of the rigging of the system.

We had a number of solutions for this idiocy and disgrace in our book, “Love My Country, Loathe My Government,” which would fix the gerrymandering problem and the problem of incumbents getting too much money from outside interests which overwhelms alternative voices. Visit our website for purchase details or buy it on Amazon:

www.loathemygovernment.com

5) The following insanity and wasteful spending comes to us from the Convention of States website:

• In 1997, the Federal government paid a Pensacola builder $10 million to build a courthouse for the U.S. Court of the Northern District of Florida.
• From the beginning, the building has been plagued with a toxic mold problem that made the building uninhabitable.
• As a result, the General Services Administration (GSA) of the Federal government has had to spend almost $11 million to relocate Federal employees to other locations who would have normally been quartered in this moldy courthouse.
• This extra relocation expense is expected to exceed $20 million before the problem is fixed.
• To fix the mold problem, the GSA says it expects to spend $31 million to fix what is a $10 million building, i.e. it will take three times the amount of money to fix a building than what it cost to build it in the first place.
• Pensacola Congressman Jeff Miller summed up this ineptness quite nicely: “This is a situation where the facility itself has had problems from the very beginning. Poor design problem, poor construction, and GSA, unfortunately, has been trying to sweep the problem under the rug.” 
• This court’s top judge, Chief Judge M. Casey Rogers, also chimed in: “Incredibly, GSA has never answered to anyone, much less its tenants, for its failure to properly address, and competently resolve, the situation.” 

But do you want to bet that no one in the GSA or anywhere else got fired for such incompetence.? This is what happens when government spends our money: it is not their money so they do not take care to be efficient and effective with it, there are no ramifications for not safeguarding taxpayer wealth. And as the Federal government and associated bureaucracy gets bigger and bigger and more bloated, the wasteful and careless spending expands exponentially. And no one is accountable.

That will do it for today’s insanity: paying for moldy buildings, destroying democracy via gerrymandering and too much money in elections, preventing alternative voices to debate, and more death and violence in Chicago. No wonder people are looking for alternatives to what we are stuck with now in office. More insanity tomorrow.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

Retro 3: The American Freedom Pyramid: Where It Should Be Vs. Where It Is Today

Note: Given the Thanksgiving holiday this week and the resultant preparations, family visitors, and other commitments, we will be rerunning the top rated and most popular blog posts from the past five years. These posts cover a wide variety of political class insanity, wasteful spending, inane quotes, and other idiocy and are the discussions that most resonated with our readers. We will be back next week with fresh material, starting with our monthly update on "Political Class Insanity."


Thursday, November 18, 2010

The American Freedom Pyramid: Where It Should Be Vs. Where It Is Today 

 
An important part of the book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government," is the understanding of what I call the Freedom Pyramid. The Freedom Pyramid tries to imagine what our founders had in mind when the put the U.S. Constitution, the Bill of Rights and a government based on individual freedom together. The ideal American Freedom Pyramid fits together as follows:

• The base and foundation of the pyramid is the Constitution and the Bill Of Rights.
• Sitting on top of this base level is the government structure that the founders defined to implement the liberty principles and concepts of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution in a limited government manner.
• This government structure serves all of the country's citizens equally in guaranteeing each person's rights and freedoms as defined by the base level documents.
• And finally, the pinnacle of the Freedom Pyramid is our own individual rights, freedom, and liberties. 

These concepts are graphically illustrated below:
 

 There are a few important characteristics of this pyramid. The power in the pyramid flows up from the Bill of Rights and U.S. Constitution to our individual freedoms which is the pinnacle of our country. Government exists to serve the citizens and the country and is just the mechanics for implementing the tenets in the Bill of Rights and Constitution. Finally, the political class appears nowhere in the Freedom Pyramid structure.

This structure has served the country and its citizens quite well over the past two centuries. Americans were usually the freest people in world, which allowed the country to grow into the most prosperous ever. The Freedom Pyramid concept placed individual freedom above all else, including the government and the political class, whose sole purpose should be implementing the concepts and principles of the Constitution and the Bill Of Rights.

However, over time, we have allowed the American political class to pervert this original Freedom Pyramid concept:

• Today, individual citizens and their freedom and liberties are no longer at the pinnacle of the pyramid, having been replaced by a self serving political class.
• This political class uses government functions and institutions to enlarge, entrench, and enrich itself. Examples at this level abound and include earmark abuse, favorable campaign finance laws, Congressional voting district gerrymandering, excessive Congressional benefits and perks, confiscating large amounts of citizens wealth and income via taxes, and a general low priority for the needs and desires of the country's citizens.
• The political class uses their increased power to divide the country into various and competing tribes and voting blocks of citizens, "energizing their bases" as needed and demonizing those not in their bases or tribes.
• This increased power of the political class and their abuses of power results in diminished individual rights and freedoms.

 These concepts are illustrated in the current day, perverted Freedom Pyramid below, where the only Americans with the freedom and power tend to be our politicians:
 

 As you can see in this pyramid, the Bill of Rights and Constitution are no longer vital to this pyramid's structure since the often act as an obstruction to the needs and desires of the political class rather than their original intent, the foundation of the country. Also, the power is driven down from the political class and is imposed on American citizens and their freedom.

We need to recognize how far we have deviated from the concept of the first Freedom Pyramid. The reality of America today is that we no longer live in a free country. We do not get true freedom in our election processes since the political class has rigged the voting process to favor existing officeholders and existing political parties. 

We do not get true freedom while under our excessive tax burden. When an individual is forced to pay more than 30% of their annual income to all levels of government, that individual's freedom to send his or her kids to a better school or to start a business or to save for retirement or to go on a vacation is severely limited: you cannot have political freedom without financial freedom. We do not get true freedom when politicians call individual citizens racists, Neanderthals, un-American, smelly, and other derogatory names just because they dare to disagree with a politician's programs.

If we ever want to get back to the right Freedom Pyramid, where individual citizens are in charge and the political class and the government the run are subservient, we need to implement most, if not all, of the steps laid out in "Love My Country, Loathe My Government." Some of the most important steps include:

1. Step 1 - reduce the size and budget of the Federal government by 10% a year for five years.
2. Step 6 - allow only individual American citizens to contribute to election campaigns, forbidding unions, corporations, PACs and other organizations from flooding the election process with money. The Bill of Rights guarantees freedom of speech to individual Americans, not organizations.
3. Step 7 - allow only citizens that are affected by an election to contribute to election campaigns within that election. For example, political parties would not be allowed to accept campaign contributions from someone in Kansas and send/funnel that money to be used in an election campaign in New Jersey. 
4. Step 14 - stop gerrymandering Congressional voting districts to almost guarantee the re-election of incumbents.
5. Step 17 - eliminate the Democratic Party's "Super Delegate" process which has the potential of voiding the votes of all voters who voted in Democratic Party Presidential primaries.
6. Sep 34 - hold politicians sitting on Congressional committees accountable for their respective government areas of oversight and remove them from their committee positions if that committee falls short of serving the country, e.g. all members of Congressional Intelligence committees should have been removed from those committee posts on September 12, 2001 for their inability to foresee the 9-11 terror attacks. 
7. Step 39 - institute term limits for all Federal political seats.

 Many of the other 50 steps are also important but implementing these listed above would go a long way to getting us back to the true and rightful Freedom Pyramid concept for this country.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

 

The Freedom Pyramid: Where It Is And Where It Should Be

Given that we are going to the polls on Tuesday in a major election, I thought it would be worthwhile to review one of our most popular posts of all time. The concept of the Freedom Pyramid seems to have touched a nerve relative to the fear that our democracy, and the liberties associated with our country, are endanger of fading away forever.

Please consider this post and the concept of freedom, however you personally define it, when voting next week. Our democracy may depend on it.

*******************************

An important part of the book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government," is the understanding of what I call the Freedom Pyramid. The Freedom Pyramid tries to imagine what our founders had in mind when the put the U.S. Constitution, the Bill of Rights and a government based on individual freedom together. The ideal American Freedom Pyramid fits together as follows:

1.The base and foundation of the pyramid is the Constitution and the Bill Of Rights.

2.Sitting on top of this base level is the government structure that the founders defined to implement the liberty principles and concepts of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution in a limited government manner.

3.This government structure serves all of the country's citizens equally in guaranteeing each person's rights and freedoms as defined by the base level documents.

4.And finally, the pinnacle of the Freedom Pyramid is our own individual rights, freedom, and liberties.

These concepts are graphically illustrated below (double click on the picture for a larger view):

There are a few important characteristics of this pyramid. The power in the pyramid flows up from the Bill of Rights and U.S. Constitution to our individual freedoms which is the pinnacle of our country. Government exists to serve the citizens and the country and is just the mechanics for implementing the tenets in the Bill of Rights and Constitution. Finally, the political class appears nowhere in the Freedom Pyramid structure.

This structure has served the country and its citizens quite well over the past two centuries. Americans were usually the freest people in world, which allowed the country to grow into the most prosperous ever. The Freedom Pyramid concept placed individual freedom above all else, including the government and the political class, whose sole purpose should be implementing the concepts and principles of the Constitution and the Bill Of Rights.

However, over time, we have allowed the American political class to pervert this original Freedom Pyramid concept:

1.Today, individual citizens and their freedom and liberties are no longer at the pinnacle of the pyramid, having been replaced by a self serving political class.

2.This political class uses government functions and institutions to enlarge, entrench, and enrich itself. Examples at this level abound and include earmark abuse, favorable campaign finance laws, Congressional voting district gerrymandering, excessive Congressional benefits and perks, confiscating large amounts of citizens wealth and income via taxes, and a general low priority for the needs and desires of the country's citizens.

3.The political class uses their increased power to divide the country into various and competing tribes and voting blocks of citizens, "energizing their bases" as needed and demonizing those not in their bases or tribes.

4.This increased power of the political class and their abuses of power results in diminished individual rights and freedoms.

These concepts are illustrated in the current day, perverted Freedom Pyramid below, where the only Americans with the freedom and power tend to be our politicians:

As you can see in this pyramid, the Bill of Rights and Constitution are no longer vital to this pyramid's structure since the often act as an obstruction to the needs and desires of the political class rather than their original intent, the foundation of the country. Also, the power is driven down from the political class and is imposed on American citizens and their freedom.

We need to recognize how far we have deviated from the concept of the first Freedom Pyramid. The reality of America today is that we no longer live in a free country. We do not get true freedom in our election processes since the political class has rigged the voting process to favor existing officeholders and existing political parties. We do not get true freedom while under our excessive tax burden.

When an individual is forced to pay more than 30% of their annual income to all levels of government, that individual's freedom to send his or her kids to a better school or to start a business or to save for retirement or to go on a vacation is severely limited: you cannot have political freedom without financial freedom. We do not get true freedom when politicians call individual citizens racists, Neanderthals, un-American, smelly, and other derogatory names just because they dare to disagree with a politician's programs.

If we ever want to get back to the right Freedom Pyramid, where individual citizens are in charge and the political class and the government the run are subservient, we need to implement most, if not all, of the steps laid out in "Love My Country, Loathe My Government." Some of the most important steps include:

•Step 1 - reduce the size and budget of the Federal government by 10% a year for five years.

•Step 6 - allow only individual American citizens to contribute to election campaigns, forbidding unions, corporations, PACs and other organizations from flooding the election process with money. The Bill of Rights guarantees freedom of speech to individual Americans, not organizations.

•Step 7 - allow only citizens that are affected by an election to contribute to election campaigns within that election. For example, political parties would not be allowed to accept campaign contributions from someone in Kansas and send/funnel that money to be used in an election campaign in New Jersey.

•Step 14 - stop gerrymandering Congressional voting districts to almost guarantee the re-election of incumbents.

•Step 17 - eliminate the Democratic Party's "Super Delegate" process which has the potential of voiding the votes of all voters who voted in Democratic Party Presidential primaries.

•Step 34 - hold politicians sitting on Congressional committees accountable for their respective government areas of oversight and remove them from their committee positions if that committee falls short of serving the country, e.g. all members of Congressional Intelligence committees should have been removed from those committee posts on September 12, 2001 for their inability to foresee the 9-11 terror attacks.

•Step 39 - institute term limits for all Federal political seats.

Many of the other 50 steps are also important but implementing these listed above would go a long way to getting us back to the true and rightful Freedom Pyramid concept for this country.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at www.loathemygovernment.com. It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

http://www.cato.org/
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://realpolichick.blogspot.com
http://www.flipcongress2010.com/
http://www.reason.com/

The Public Sector, Our Grandkids And The Failure Of Our Political Class

An article by Mark Shields entitled, "The Public Sector And My Grandchildren," appeared in the December 26, 2010 issue of the St. Petersburg Times. In the article, Mr. Shields tries to make the case that government at all levels has and will make  sure that his grandchildren have a better life as a result of government, and the politicians running that government, are on the case, effective, and looking out for their well being. To prove his point, he lists out what he perceives to be the good that government and politicians bestow on us everyday.

I certainly respect Mr. Shield's perspective that government and politicians are dong a good job. If that is his opinion and feels that his grandkids will have a better life as a result, then he probably sleeps better at night than many of us. However, using Mr. Shields' own examples, many of us end up with a diametrically opposite view, namely that government and the current political class that operates it will not create a better future for our grandkids:

- Mr. Shields asserts that his grandkids "will get an excellent education at superior public schools." What is interesting is that in the same section of the same paper on the same day, another article shows that United States teenagers, the vast majority of which went to these same public schools, ranked 31st relative to other nations when it comes 15 year olds performing at the advanced level in math proficiency. Only 6% of U.S. students perform at the advanced level compared to 28% of students in Taiwan that perform at advanced level in math proficiency. The top ten nations all had at least 15% of their kids performing at the highest levels compared to our meager 6%.

The article also broke down the United States performance state-by-state, which may help explain Mr. Shields' high opinion of our public schools. However, the very best state, Massachusetts, only has 12% of its 15 year olds at high proficiency in math, trailing seventeen nations. In fact, only two states had a proficiency at least 10%, the other 48 states were in the single digit range.

Not to kill a dead horse, but recent news reports showed that the United States trails trails dozens of nations in math, reading, and science and the Defense Department recently reported that almost a quarter (23%) of potential enlistees cannot pass the basic reading and math entrance examinations. A May 11, 2010 Associated Press article stated that about a third of incoming U.S. college students need to take at least one remedial course according to the U.S. Department of Education. The results of a survey that was published in the July 16, 2010 issue of The Week magazine showed that 26% of Americans did not know that the United States won it's independence from England, with some people in that 26% naming Mexico, France and China. I am sorry I do not share Mr.Shields view of our public schools but based on hard results and experiences, they are anything but superior.

- Mr.Shields maintains that our national safety and defense is protected by the brave men and women of our armed forces, an assertion I cannot disagree with. However, an important follow on question is needed: at what cost? The Defense Department budget is now in excess of over $800 billion or so, more than 20% of the entire Federal budget. We have hundreds of thousands of U.S. troops stationed all over the world, many serving a purpose that no longer exists. We have tens of thousands of troops in Europe to protect against a Communist military strike. However, that potential is now zero but we spend billions of dollars a year guarding against it.

We have tens of thousands of troops in Japan to guard against what? I have no idea but it is still billions of dollars wasted. We have almost 30,000 troops in South Korea, despite the fact that a vibrant South Korean economy is strong enough to provide the men and resources to protect itself. More billions of dollars wasted. We still have 50,000 troops in Iraq despite the fact they never should have been sent there in the first place and the current President campaigned to get them all out long ago. More billions of dollars wasted annually.

Yes, Mr. Shields,I am thankful for the brave men and women in our armed forces. I am not thankful for the politicians that refuse to stop fighting the wrong and/or non-existent threats and potentially bankrupting the nation the process with an over sized and inefficient  military budget process.

- I would agree with you Mr. Shields that the air with breathe and the water we drink is cleaner and healthier than it probably was several decades ago. This is probably one of the few Federal government areas, pollution control and monitoring, where discernible progress has been made. However, just how good is the EPA from a pollution mitigation perspective? An April 16, 2010 article in Newsweek magazine asserted that over 720 U.S. companies have been in "continuous violation" of air pollution laws for years. Does not sound like the government is really do all that great of a job if hundreds of air pollution violators can go unpunished for years.

And what about the BP oil spill disaster earlier this year? The government was caught totally unprepared to cope with such massive water pollution. Government employees responsible for oil rig safety have been shown to be preoccupied searching for pornography on their government computers, they did not conduct the required number of safety inspections, many of them admitted to drug addiction habits and usage while on the job, and many were so preoccupied with getting a private sector oil industry job that they may have been derelict in their safety job requirements. As a result of this faulty government oversight, we now have a likely ecological disaster for years to come that may have an impact on Mr. Shields' grandkids down the road from a food safety and recreation perspective.

- I agree that current government employees and politicians do accomplish many worthwhile activities such as food safety, building safety, air travel safety, libraries, police protection and fire protection. However, they are supposed to to these kinds of activities, they should not be singled out for extraordinary commendations for simply doing their jobs.

- I also agree on many other points brought out in the article but Mr. Shields gives government credit for acts that took effect long ago. Ending segregation, passing ant-discrimination laws, maintaining copyright and patent processes, etc. were all done by past generations of government and politicians, not today's political class. This is what today's government and political class has given us:

• A political process that is riddled with earmarks and the corruption of money from unions, PACs, and corporations, money that overwhelms the needs and desires of ordinary American citizens.
• Gerrymandered Congressional districts and primary processes designed to do what is best for the major political powers and the political incumbents, regardless of what is best for the voters in those Congressional districts.
• Dozens of SEC employees that have been shown to be totally preoccupied with on-the-job Internet pornography searching as the financial infrastructure of the country melted down into the Great Recession.
• A Federal Reserve Board, a Treasury Department, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, HUD, FHA, numerous Senate and House Of Representatives committees and subcommittees and droves of government economists that never saw the coming of the Great Recession until it hit them in the face, resulting in high levels of unemployment, the destruction of retirement wealth for millions of Americans, and the systemic destruction of the housing and mortgage industry.
• A failure when it comes to the war on drugs as a violent, lawless state, consumed by the drug cartels, evolves just south of our borders.
• A failure when it comes to developing a comprehensive and rationale energy policy, more than thirty years after the oil crises of the 1970s showed how much such a policy was needed.
• A failure when it comes to national security, resulting in over three thousand civilian deaths on 9-11, years after such a threat was obvious from terrorism due to the first World Trade Center bombing, the African embassy bombings, and the U.S.S. Cole attack.
• A failure when it comes to secure borders and a rationale immigration policy.
• Extremely high taxation rates, rates that inhibit freedom of choice in this country. When a citizen is paying over 40% of their earnings to all levels of government in taxes and fees, the ability to start a new business, send one's kids to better schools, save for retirement, contribute to a favorite charity, etc. is severely limited. There cannot be political freedom without financial freedom and Mr. Shields' grandkids are heading into a future in this country where freedom is more or less a distant memory.
• And worse of all, especially when it comes to Mr. Shields' grandkids, an ever growing and ever dangerous national debt has been thrust upon their future. Before his two grandkids hit second grade, they already are responsible for over $42,000 of the Federal government's national debt (dividing the $13 TRILLION of national debt by the 308 million or so current U.S.citizens). It does not matter how safe the Federal government makes our food or our drugs or our air safety. Unless skyrocketing the national debt is tamed, all other government functions become moot. At the point where the financials of the nation collapses, I am sure that patent protection and copyright protection and the like will not be pressing issues.

And what is our government and political class doing about all of these crises? Apparently not much. Consider a quote from President Obama that appeared in the August 10, 2009 edition of the New York Times: "I've got a lot on my plate and it's very important for us to sequence these big initiatives in a way where they don't all just crash at the same time." Obviously, those running the country now do not see any great urgency if they plan to tackle the major issues one at a time. Unfortunately, for Mr. Shields' grandkids, and the rest of us, these problems will get worse and worse before the political class ever gets to them, reducing our freedom and financial stability going forward.

We have truly entered into an era, of what David Brooks called in a recent New York Times article, of "immobile government." An era where incompetence, bureaucracy, and partisan politics results in a public sector whose successes get fewer and less impactful going forward. This is not due to the hard working government employees but to the insular and out-of touch political class that leads them. So, with all due respect to Mr. Shields position, I am less thankful "what government does for those whom we love." I am more scared by what government does not do or does wastefully or inefficiently for those whom we love.

Note: Before I get in trouble with any government employees, including the ones in my family, please consider the following excerpt from "Love My Country, Loathe My Government:"

"In any human endeavor, whether it is in the corporate, athletic, or government world, leadership is the key to success. Having talented and hardworking employees or teammates is great, but it takes strong and intelligent leadership to integrate that effort and talent to be successful. Thus, while most government employees are working just as hard as those in the private sector, the lack of leadership by the political class is wasting their talents, insights, and energy. Their efforts and dedication are appreciated, and they should not be held in the same low esteem that the country currently holds for the political class."

To explore ways to fix the ills listed above and leverage the talents of current government employees, consider reading the fifty steps outlined in "Love My Country, Loathe My Government."








Our recent book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at www.loathemygovernment.com. It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.


Please visit the following sites for freedom:

http://www.cato.org/
http://www.robertringer.com
http://realpolichick.blogspot.com
http://www.flipcongress2010.com/
http://www.reason.com/
http://www.repealamendment.org

Almost A Good Idea To Fix The Congressional Gerrymandering Problem

Definition: Gerrymander - to divide a state, county or city into voting districts in order to almost guarantee the reelection of one party.

Step 14 in "Love My Country, Loathe My Government" is a critical step to regaining our freedom in that it sets down the reasons and the remedies needed to stop ensuring that House Of Representative politicians will almost always get reelected. By rigging the borders of the Congressional districts, politicians can configure Congressional districts that are predominately Republican or predominately Democrat, ensuring that that party will almost always get elected in that district.

The tragic outcome of this manipulation is that if you are a voter in a Congressional district that has been configured for the other major party, your vote will usually be meaningless since you have been lumped together with members supportive of the other party. For example, if you are a Democrat that happens to live in a Republican configured district, your Democrat leaning voting tendency will almost always be wiped out by all of the Republican voters you have been lumped together with. The converse holds true for a Republican in a Democratic district. When your vote is rendered useless by gerrymandering, your freedom has taken a significant hit.

Besides loss of individual freedom, the art of compromise and give and take in governing is lost. If you are a politician from a predominant Republican district, you are probably going to be a little more to the right than average in order to not alienate the large number of Republicans in your district. Any sign of weakness or giving in to the Democrats may signal that another Republican might better represent your district. Thus, "compromising" in order to find a solution is now viewed as "giving in" to the other side so compromise be damned. That may be one of the reasons why nothing is ever accomplished by the political class, the art of compromise has been gerrymandered out of existence.

Although I could not find the article online, I distinctly remember an article from a number of years ago that appeared in the Newark Star Ledger. The article laid out how the two wings of the New Jersey political class had gotten together and remapped the Congressional districts in order to guarantee that six of the thirteen districts would almost always be represented by a Republican and seven of the thirteen would almost always be represented by a Democrat. If you look at the map of New Jersey on page 55 of "Love My Country, Loathe My Government," you will see the contortions they went through to accomplish their goals and disenfranchise a large number of New jersey voters (i.e. Democrats in Republican districts and Republicans in Democratic districts).

• District 5, a Republican district, starts in the upper northeast corner of the state, continues all the way across the top of the state where it makes a left hand turn and comes down the western edge of the state, almost half down the entire length of the state.
• District 12, a Democratic district, crosses five New Jersey counties (almost 25% of all counties) and runs from the Delaware river on the western border all the way across the middle of the state to the Atlantic Ocean. During its journey across the state the district borders meandering up and down, left and right, all in order to get enough Democrats concentrated in that one district.
• Other districts, especially in the more populated northern part of the state, are just as illogical and contorted. The only logic being to guarantee that the incumbent party always wins.

I am not the only person who holds these views. In an article in the May 16, 2010 issue of Parade Magazine, "Making Elections Less 'Safe'", there was ALMOST a good idea for eliminating this encroachment on our voting freedom and rights. A Democratic Congressman, John Tanner, and a Republican Congressman, Michael Castle, have proposed the Redistricting Transparency Act. This legislation would require each state top establish a website through which citizens could track and comment on proposed redistricting before plans and maps are finalized. Sounds like a great idea but it will not work because:

1. Congressional district mapping has always been a state level responsibility so it is likely that some incumbent politician or group of incumbent politicians somewhere would take this Federal bill to court and argue state rights and that would tie up the issue for years in Federal court. The sad part is that they would probably win even though this is a noble attempt to get some visibility into the process.
2. The other reason it would fail is that there is no requirement that the existing set of office holding politicians do anything different than they have been doing for decades. Given their arrogance, it is highly doubtful that these people are going to listen to or obey any input that comes through the website, they are going to do what they want in order to preserve their political career and fiefdoms in office.

What is needed is the enactment of laws, not websites, that accomplish the following and which were laid out in "Love My Country, Loathe My Government":

• Voting districts should not include more than two counties unless two counties do not have enough population. This is to address the likes of District 12 in New Jersey that we discussed above.
• The widest geographic diameter of a district should be no more than three times the length of the smallest geographic dimensions. This would address situations like District 5 above where districts are stretched and twisted in order to get the right mix.
• Finally, no member of the political class, past or present, should be involved in drawing up the districts. Several suggestions on who should do this are listed in the book, but any former or current member of the political class has to be left out of the mapping function.

All votes in America should carry the same weight, something that does not happen today with the loaded Congressional districts we have allowed to happen.

I close this posts with two quotes, the first of which neatly summarizes the problem we have in America today relative to gerrymandering and the loss of voting rights and freedom: "The idea is to encourage more fairly drawn, competitive districts so that voters choose their politicians, rather than politicians choosing their voters." - Gerald Heber, Campaign Legal Center as quoted in the Parade Magazine article.

On a less optimistic note, consider this quote form Matt Bai in the New York Times Magazine as it appeared in the March 19, 2010 issue of The Week Magazine: "Most of the 535 Senators and members of Congress are forced to choose, constantly, between their constituents and their own self-preservation. Is it really so outside the bounds of human nature to expect Congressman to serve the interests of voters, even when their own re-elections are in jeopardy? The political system is imperiled mostly because too many politicians just can't seem to imagine any worse fate than losing an election. A lot of lawmakers still cling to their seats at any cost to conscience or to constituency, as if it were the only job they could ever see themselves holding." That is why the Redistricting Transparency Act is ALMOST a good idea. As Mr. Bai elegantly points out, sitting politicians will do anything to hang onto their jobs and gerrymandering is the primary way to satisfy that need. They are not going to easily give up that tool in their re-election kit, it will have to be taken from them forcibly.

Our new book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at www.loathemygovernment.com. It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.