Calling John Galt

The Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) is set to go into effect in stages, beginning Feb 10th.  This Act protects Americans from the horror of products that haven’t been completely tested, certified and documented.  All great and dandy…  After all, who isn’t a fan of safety?

However, the law of unintended consequences bites quickly and painfully.  As with the Luxury Tax that put the domestic boat building industry out of business, as will CPSIA do for small manufacturers of products for kids under 12!  There will be a lot of businesses going under, with people losing their jobs, and we will only be more dependent upon foreign manufacturers than we are already.

Common sense is one thing, but this is ludicrous.  Are we supposed to believe that we are going to be any more safe?  That we are going to feel that much more secure about the products that we are using for our children?

The Federal Government needs to take a long hard look at all the programs and laws that have been enacted and do away with most of them.  Get back to the Constitution, free markets, and free peoples.

Otherwise it is only going to get worse.

It’s a good thing Bob Herbert isn’t a doctor. He might prescribe sugar for diabetics.

Proposing a tax on financial transactions is not a smart idea when the issue is frozen credit. Money that doesn’t move freely moves inefficiently.

Patrick McGoohan, the star and visionary behind “The Prisoner,” passed away at the age of 80.

The show is one of the most brilliant pieces of art ever made for television, and its genius is the way it weaves the struggle between Man and the State through so many layers and treatments.

McGoohan’s protagonist, the un-named Number 6, gives us maybe the greatest rallying cry for a modern age of oppressive government with unchecked growth:

“I am not a number — I am a free man!”

Prescient, indeed.

Today the AP relayed an interesting story about the hazards of government interference, and the negative unintended consequences that typically make the solution worse than the problem.

The small Australian island of Macquarie had a problem in the late 1990’s. Feral cats were killing the native seabird population.  Parks and Wildlife bureaucrats decided to take action. They removed all the feral cats, thus ensuring a less hazardous life for the birds. Right?

Wrong. The feral cats had also been keeping the non-native rabbit population in check. With the cats gone, the rabbits multiplied profusely.  The higher population of rabbits laid waste to the islands vegetation.

Conservation groups maintain that the problem wasn’t too much government intervention, but too little. They claim that the parks service also should have removed all non-native rabbits, rats and mice.  So the plan now is to remove all non-native species within seven years by dropping traps from helicopters. Afterward, on the ground teams will clean up any non-native survivors. The cost? An estimated $16 million. That amounts to $250,000 per square mile of the tiny island.

Was this really a problem in need of a solution? It is estimated that 3.5 million seabirds arrive at the island annually to breed, and feral cats were killing about 60,000 a year, or about 1.7% of the total. The government’s solution did more harm that good. The new solution claims to address the previous solutions shortcomings, except for one: it’s being thought out and executed by the same government bodies that initiated the first plan.

Brian H, a fellow contributor suggested that we begin to refer the them as Leftists.  After all, their socialist approach to markets, larger governments, loss of personal freedoms, resistance to small businesses, and much more.

Socialist policies simply don’t work.  Europe is often looked upon as a model of Socialist policies, however there are major issues in respect unemployment, the inability of entrepreneurial businesses getting off the ground, and high taxes that crush the individual.

When it comes to the loss of personal freedoms, regulating free speech in any capacity is anathema to Liberal philosophies.  The Fairness Doctrine is anything but.  It is simply the attempt to control what people are saying, especially if they disagree with Leftists.

Small businesses are the powerhouse of every economy.  I can speak from personal experience how higher taxes, increased beuracracy, the difficulty in hiring and firing people have made the process too hard and too difficult.  It should be as easy as possible.  What can be more free than being one’s own boss, that determing one’s own destiny?

Believing anything else is illiberal.  From now on, all Liberals are refered to as Leftists.  Who would have guessed that in this day and age, Lbertarians are the real Liberals?

More of New Orleans has been rebuilt with duct tape than with red tape.

You would assume that the rich, especially those that have built up their wealth on their own would be supporting free markets and the rights of individuals to determine their own future.  The free market was responsible for their being able to create their wealth, they should encourage the same type of opportunity for others.

However, we haven’t seen that.  Warren Buffett, William Gates, Celebrities, and many others have all come out in support of policies that sound similar to the “Anti-Dog Eat Dog, “Anti-Greed Act, “Equalization of Opportunity Act, and others.  These are anything but free market.  Fortunately, the socialist policies being enacted are nothing as scary as those mentioned above, though they are far more sinister…

Who was it that said “Freedom dies not with a bang, but with a whimper?”  The same can be said for the free market.  Who really notices when something slips aways oh so slowly?  That is how most freedoms are lost.

We will be focused on bringing these losses to freedom to the forefront.  Our goal is to get to where we can reverse these losses.  Hopefully the rich will follow in our footsteps.

All of the below will be senior officials in the Obama administration.  The ones in bold have nothing whatsoever to do with “Change”

Vice President – Senator Joseph Biden, an eternity in the Senate…
Chief of Staff – Rahm Emmanuel, Clinton Administration

Department of Agriculture – Governor Tom Vilsack
Department of Commerce – Governor Bill Richardson (now withdrawn), Clinton Administration
Department of Defense – Robert Gates, Bush Administration
Department of Education – Arne Duncan
Department of Energy – Steven Chu
Department of Health and Human Services – Tom Daschle
Department of Homeland Security – Governor Janet Napolitano
Department of Housing and Urban Development – Shaun Donovan
Department of the Interior – Senator Ken Salazar
Department of Justice – Eric Holder, Clinton Administration
Department of Labor – Hilda Solis
Department of State – Senator Hillary Clinton, Clinton Administration
Department of Transportation – Ray LaHood
Department of the Treasury – Timothy Geithner
Department of Veterans Affairs – Gen. Erik Shinseki

Those who publicly clamor and beg for Congress to rein in a given industry should not be surprised to see that industry spend whatever it takes to rein in Congress.