Plunging Towards Gomorrah
Posts tagged Big Government
Semi-Daily Fizz: Wasting Crises and the Bumper Sticker Paradox
Jul 28th
The Crisis Lobby: The Obama administration’s mantra – never let a crisis go to waste – has turned the normal news cycle into an Orwellian nightmare. Now, whenever anything bad or seemingly bad happens, we’re faced with some new federal regulation, tax, bureaucratic agency, or all of the above, to respond to the “crisis” and prevent its ever happening again. Take the Gulf oil spill… Instead of putting every effort into capping and cleaning the spill, the Obama administration put most of its energy into denouncing the oil industry and placing a moratorium on future deep water offshore drilling. Why are we drilling so far offshore in the first place? It might just be all the environmental restrictions that don’t allow us to drill closer to shore, in other areas up and down America’s coast or in ANWAR. So it’s ironic that “saving the environment” actually destroyed it, but that’s how unintended consequences work. The Unintended Consequences Factor ratchets up exponentially when the federal government strays farther and farther from its limited Constitutional mission. So when you hear a lot of bad news about obesity, be afraid. Be very afraid.
Dueling bumper stickers: I was driving to Target the other day to partake in some rampant consumerism. Before I did my little part in destroying the planet, I noticed a car with two bumper stickers. One read, “Obama ’08,” the other, “I love my country but fear my government.” This puzzled me, because if one fears their government, is it prudent vote for the candidate who promises more of it? The problem with voting for more government is that, eventually, some right-wing fascist will be in power and abuse the hell out of the behemoth you helped create in the first place by voting for big-government guy (or gal). George W. Bush, for instance, would have been less likely to constantly violate our rights had the federal government been limited to begin with. It’s not a good idea to create an infrastructure that allows the next Hitler unfettered access to almost unlimited power.
Santa Claus and the Democratic Party
Mar 18th
It’s been awhile since I’ve written about party mascots here at The Daily Plunge. With support for ObamaCare well over 40% it means one thing: the average Democratic voter has lost touch with reality. They believe so strongly in the idea of health care that they’re willing to accept anything the State gives them. It’s odd that the party of liberal condescension would fall so hard for such an intellectually shallow thing as partisan loyalty.
The symbol for the Democratic Party shouldn’t be a Donkey. To be fair, it’s insulting to Donkeys. At least a Donkey is real animal. The Democrats want to believe in imaginary worlds. A world where man isn’t flawed. A world where we live in a Utopian state. In other words, it’s not a rational world. The Democrats love to cite the Canadian health care system; the same health care system that forces many of its citizens to come to the United States for adequate health care.
It’s not really the Canadian system progressives admire, it’s further North than that. It’s in the mythical world of the North Pole. You see the Democrats believe in Santa Claus State. Except the reality is that the State doesn’t give us anything, but instead takes everything we have. The intellectual giants on the left have listened to Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’” too many times. Now they’ve held onto that feeling. They can’t tell you why they’re in favor of ObamaCare. No rational person can, but it’s feels right. That’s why Santa Claus is the perfect mascot for the Democratic Party.
In many ways Santa Claus is the Anti-Uncle Sam. Uncle Sam “wants you.” In other words he wants you to get up off your ass and do something. Uncle Sam is skinny and angry. Santa Claus is fat, he only works one day a year, and he only wants you to “be good.” No wonder the man is so jolly. In other words you don’t have to do a damn thing and Santa Claus will give you something. Sounds like a fair deal. Don’t bother the Democrats with the details on how this is implausible; it just “feels right.”
Separation of Health Care and State
Mar 18th
Many generations ago many of our forefathers sought the New World to escape the heavy hand of the State. Eventually, those great pioneers (or perpetrators of environmental and cultural damage if you’re a Progressive) created the United States of America. The spirit of the United States was that the government wasn’t involved in every aspect of your life.
If President Obama and the leaders of Democratic Party get their way this week the State will make it law that everyone must get health care. It will be against the law to “choose” not to have health care. If you’re a healthy 28 year old the heavy hand of the government will force you to purchase health care you do not need to pay for someone else’s health care. So when President Obama says if you like your current health care plan, you can keep it, he’s not telling the truth. What if I like not having health care insurance? Can I keep that plan? No!
It is for this reason that I call on our inspirational ancestors and declare than I am firmly in favor of the separation of health care and State. It’s not the government’s responsibility to tell its citizens to get health care. Safety nets are already in place in this country. No one is dying in emergency rooms because they’re not insured. This entitlement mentality already grips most of the left. If this bill passes this cancer will spread.
Where’s My Bailout?
Mar 3rd
I suppose this will be the Climate Change Project Manager's office. Nice six-figure BS job if you can get it.
With the economy still in the tank and unemployment continuing to hover around ten percent, a lot of people are starting to wonder, “Where’s my bailout?” Well, if you look at the salary and employment stats in the public sector (city, county, state and federal government) you’ll see exactly where your bailout went.
Your bailout – or at least your hard-earned tax dollars that are partially funding the corporate fat-cat bailouts (the other portion being financed by the Chinese, among others) – is also being used to create make-work six-figure nonsense jobs, such as Climate Change Program Manager at the National Park Service. This ridiculous job, with a pay scale between $103,000 and $155,000, is just the tip of the iceberg (pun intended). According to the Dec. 11, 2009 edition of USA Today:
Federal employees making salaries of $100,000 or more jumped from 14% to 19% of 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 — during a recession that has cost 7.3 million jobs in the private sector… When the recession started, the Transportation Department had only one person earning a salary of $170,000 or more. Eighteen months later, 1,690 employees had salaries above $170,000.
Moreover, the New York Times reported in August of 2009 that while the private sector lost 6.9 million jobs, state and local governments added 110,000 new jobs. All of this data – and it goes on and on and on, if you care to look into it – strikes me as horribly backwards.
I’m no economist, but if deficits are skyrocketing and companies are looking for relief so they can begin hiring again, wouldn’t logic dictate that government cut jobs, siphoning those people into the private sector, while providing tax incentives to individuals and private sector companies?
In December of 2009, 382,758 federal employees were making $100,000 or more annually. That’s more than $38 billion in what is largely bureaucratic largesse. Last I checked it’s the private sector that actually produces our GDP, not government jobs that essentially produce nothing. That’s a lot of nothing we’re getting for our billions.
Why we’re headed down the same road as western Europe, California, Massachusetts, New York, etc., etc., which ultimately leads to economic crisis and bankruptcy, I’ll never know. Or, maybe I do know…
It’s all about power and payoffs. The more the private sector and citizens cede to the state, the more power and money that’s funneled to the state and its dependants. It’s simple mathematics with the additional wild card of human nature (it’s corrupt, by the way).
While some see this as a Utopian system, rational people recognize that an all-powerful, controlling state destroys liberty and freedom. The explosive growth of public sector payrolls and jobs is simply another data point in a trend line that shows America headed toward the abyss. If you’re not concerned about it, you should be.
The Cost of Goverment
Feb 9th
Government work is good if you can get it. Carpe Diem has a nice looking graph that shows that government employees makes 45% more on average than private sector employees.
As I was saying a few days ago. There’s a lot of fat in government than can be cut but no one in Washington is serious about it. I’m not exactly sure what the President is doing. I’m starting to fear that Obama is just completely in over his head. Presidents can either lead or they can’t. For all their faults Bush and Clinton were able to get things done. Americans are growing weary of Obama’s long speeches and inability to accomplish anything popular.
Obama’s biggest problem is that his ideas are not popular. The President must realize that he was elected because people were fed up with Bush, not because we were ready for big government solutions. Many on the left haven’t learned this lesson. Have the Republicans learned anything after being tossed out? I won’t hold my breath.
president profile: grover cleveland
Feb 23rd
I have been reading a little about Grover Cleveland, the nation’s 22nd and 24th president. Cleveland was one of the few Democrat presidents elected in the second half of the nineteenth century. After the Civil War the Republican party held a stranglehold on the White House. Cleveland was able to win as a Democrat and is the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms. He lost his first bid at a second term after winning the popular vote; however, Cleveland fell short in the electoral college. Some historians believe that voter fraud in Indiana helped Benjamin Harrison win. Four years later Cleveland ran again and won.
Cleveland was known as honest politician who took on corruption and cronyism. He also believed in limited government and low tariffs. It’s fascinating to read what past presidents thought about the federal government’s role in our lives. The philosophy has changed a lot in the past eighty years. Here’s a quote about charity sheds some light on federal aid.
“The friendliness and charity of our countrymen can always be relied upon to relieve their fellow citizens in misfortune. This has been repeatedly and quite lately demonstrated. Federal aid in such cases encourages the expectation of paternal care on the part of the Government and weakens the sturdiness of our national character, while it prevents the indulgence among our people of that kindly sentiment and conduct which strengthens the bonds of a common brotherhood.” – Grover Cleveland
Can anyone imagine a modern president making this statement? Federal assistance is so engrained into the national consciousness that every misfortune is greeted by aid from the federal government. I believe Cleveland was right. Federal aid encourages people to look to the government for the solution to every problem. Is it really surprising then that liberals give less to charity and volunteer less time for community service? The liberal ideology is all about outsourcing all these good intentions to someone else, namely some well intentioned bureaucrat who’s more concerned with wasting money to get reelected than helping anyone. This idea that corporate America is evil and people in government are looking out for us is naïve. Both of these groups are the same. CEO and Senators both look out for their inherent self interest. Americans should quit acting surprised that Congress is inept and quit outsourcing our problems to the federal government. True liberty is not possible if a majority of the population is unwilling to live without risk. Grover Cleveland was a great president and he’s best remembered by this quote from Mark Twain.
“Your patriotic virtues have won for you the homage of half the nation and the enmity of the other half. This places your character upon a summit as high as Washington’s. . . . When the votes are all in a public man’s favor the verdict is against him. It is sand, and history will wash it way. But the verdict for you is rock, and will stand.” - Mark Twain
