On Tuesday The Nationreleased audio recorded by a victim of police harassment and abuse under New York’s Stop and Frisk program. The officers in the recording behaved as brutish thugs lording their power over the populace, instead of servants of public. Listen to the 2 minutes of audio for yourself here, or for an even better look into the issue (which includes the audio) watch this short documentary:
The Nation also provided this description of the encounter:
In the course of the two-minute recording, the officers give no legally valid reason for the stop, use racially charged language and threaten Alvin with violence. Early in the stop, one of the officers asks, “You want me to smack you?” When Alvin asks why he is being threatened with arrest, the other officer responds, “For being a fucking mutt.” Later in the stop, while holding Alvin’s arm behind his back, the first officer says, “Dude, I’m gonna break your fuckin’ arm, then I’m gonna punch you in the fuckin’ face.”
New York continues to lead the way down the path toward tyranny, with petty bureaucrats running up to any business they can find and saying “That’s a fine small business you have there, shame if something were to ‘appen to it:”
The city continues to blitz merchants with ridiculous fines — raking in cash for scuffed cutting boards, too-short napkins and failure to recognize the medicinal properties of ChapStick.
“It’s not about protecting the consumer or the food. This is a money racket for the city,” said Declan Morrison, owner of Blackwater Inn in Forest Hills, Queens.
A Health Department inspector recently spent several hours looking for ticket-worthy violations, before spotting five thermometers in the pub’s refrigerator.
“The inspector said, ‘This is way too many thermometers,’ and docked me points,” said Morrison, who also owns the nearby Tap House.
But on paper, the offense read, “Accurate thermometer not provided,” a fine of $300. The charge was later dropped, but Morrison said he has forked over about $20,000 in fines in the past year.
…Leslie Barnes, owner of London Lennie’s in Queens, said he was fined $300 for having too many marks on his cutting boards. Now he spends $2,000 on backup boards each year.
Consumer Affairs Department inspectors charged a Ditmas Park barber $650 this year for using an antique register that didn’t print receipts and for posting different prices for men’s and women’s haircuts.
Can we end now the fiction that large regulatory states exist to protect the people? They do not. They exist to enrich the coffers and enhance the power of government officials.
This sort of behavior is nothing more than legalized gangsterism – pay your masters or something bad will happen to you. It has no place in a free society.
Drivers in Southern California awoke Friday to find that their gasoline prices had spiked by nearly 20 cents a gallon overnight as a result of fuel shortages caused by a series of refinery disruptions in recent weeks.
Supplies of refined petroleum products on the West Coast are now at their lowest levels since 2008, while national inventories are about normal.
The immediate cause of the California price rise was a power failure at Exxon Mobil’s Torrance, Calif., refinery on Monday that shut down some production units at the 150,000-barrel-a-day facility. The company on Friday said the refinery had resumed normal operations. Supplies on the West Coast had already been tight because of an Aug. 6 fire at Chevron’s 245,000-barrel-a-day Richmond, Calif., refinery, which has still not been restored to full production.
Fires and power outages, surely I can’t be blaming the government for that, right? Well, no, but keep reading:
California typically has substantially higher gasoline prices than most of the country because of its tough environmental regulations and high taxes. Gasoline supplies are traditionally tight this time of year as refiners do maintenance work to switch from summer to fall gasoline blends mandated by the California pollution-reduction regulations. But this year, energy experts say, the local gasoline market is particularly chaotic because of the refinery shutdowns.
So here’s the thing. Supply disruptions happen in lots of industries. A localized disruption in a single state wouldn’t normally cause such shortages, but in this case, government is both contributing to the disruption itself – through the alternating mandated blends – and the inability for it to be resolved through reallocation of supply. Specifically, the reason California is seeing no relief from the rest of the country, which is not experiencing any shortage, is because California’s government says those supplies aren’t good enough.
Perhaps they are right and the costs are justified, but Californian’s should understand that this is the price to be paid for their environmental regulation. They aren’t just abstractions or imposed only on evil oil refiners, but instead place real burdens on ordinary Californians struggling to fill their tanks to get to work each day.
Small government and free-market capitalism are about to get put to the test in Honduras, where the government has agreed to let an investment group build an experimental city with no taxes on income, capital gains or sales.
Proponents say the tiny, as-yet unnamed town will become a Central American beacon of job creation and investment, by combining secure property rights with minimal government interference.
“Once we provide a sound legal system within which to do business, the whole job creation machine – the miracle of capitalism – will get going,” Michael Strong, CEO of the MKG Group, which will build the city and set its laws, told FoxNews.com.
Strong said that the agreement with the Honduran government states that the only tax will be on property.
“Our goal is to be the most economically free entity on Earth,” Strong said.
The only restriction is a requirement to employ a minimum proportion of native Hondurans, which seems a small price to pay for what will otherwise be yet another model example for how free markets promote prosperity.
It’s not exactly like we lack such evidence now. Hong Kong was created as a trade colony and become very prosperous under a free market system that emphasized low taxes, limited regulation and free trade. The Heritage Index of Economic Freedom, led by Hong Kong, is topped by economic success stories.
Granted, I’m not saying the Honduran city is guaranteed to be an economic success. That will depend, among other things, on how soundly they implement their legal system. But if they adhere to the principles of limited government and free markets, prosperity will likely follow. Though there’s always a risk that Honduran politicians see it starting to succeed and try to raid the cookie jar, because if there’s one thing that’s universally true about politicians, it’s that they’ll eventually try grabbing anything and everything within reach of their greedy little hands.
When it comes to taxes, Republicans really do play the stupid party to the Democrats’ evil. If Democrats propose raising taxes, Republicans trip over themselves to offer to sharp contrast by offering to raise taxes a bit less. CF&P President Andrew Quinlan highlighted the latest example of this strategic brilliance in Forbes:
[I]t’s not just those on the left pushing for the tax. A few conservatives and Republicans are also quixotically jumping on the bandwagon.
The American Enterprise Institute, for instance, has recently hosted a series of events designed to brainstorm ways to sell the public, and in particular small government conservatives, on the idea of a tax on carbon. Former GOP Congressman Bob Inglis, who proposed a carbon tax bill while in Congress before he was defeated by a Tea Party primary challenger, has teamed up with supply side economist Art Laffer and created a new institute to push for carbon taxes.
The motives of the left in pushing for a tax are easy to understand, they want more “revenue” to spend. …The conservatives, in contrast, claim to want only a revenue neutral tax, trading carbon taxes for reductions in other, more economically destructive, tax rates, such as on income. In theory this is not a bad argument, but in practice it is rather naive.
If the political climate was such that cap-and-trade or other big government carbon regulations were on the horizon, proffering a more economically efficient carbon tax as an alternative might not be a bad strategy from a do-the-wrong-thing-in-the-least-destructive-fashion perspective. But that is not the case. Cap-and-trade is currently a nonstarter, and if the legislative will existed to undo destructive EPA carbon regulations – such as a proposed cap on carbon emissions for new energy plants – then it wouldn’t be necessary to even offer an alternative. After all, none on the left who otherwise support these EPA regulations are going to trade them away, even for a new tax.
More generally, the very idea of offering a new tax in exchange for lower rates elsewhere is flawed. Even if leftists agree to lower taxes on income to keep a new carbon tax revenue neutral, there’s nothing to stop them from raising rates in the future. On the other hand, given the love politicians have for taxes, eliminating an entire tax would be much harder…
He goes on to explain how the logic for a carbon tax doesn’t work even if you assume high-end estimates for the costs of carbon emissions, a point bolstered now by a new study in the journal Nature Climate Change:
A typical export from Western countries to developing giants is machine tools, which are then used to make products such as toys.
These machines are made in the West using comparatively low-carbon industrial techniques.
But when they are plugged in and used, they are usually powered by coal-fired electricity, the dirtiest of the main fossil fuels.
In such conditions, a carbon tax would be counter-productive.
To do so could prompt the developing country to make its own machines, which are likely to be more energy-intensive. This in turn would drive up the carbon tax on what was manufactured.
That is likely just scratching at the surface of the unintended consequences a carbon tax would produce. Though its intended consequence – raising the price of energy – is bad enough by itself to warrant rejecting this latest foray into bipartisan economic destruction.
The trailer has been blamed for inciting violence in Libya, Egypt and Yemen. Obama administration officials said Thursday that they have asked YouTube to review the video and determine whether it violates the site’s terms of service, according to people close to the situation but not authorized to comment.
Some media observers predict that the incident will prompt calls for Google Inc.’s YouTube to play a more active role in curating the billions of hours of videos found on its site. One prominent 1st Amendment lawyer even suggested that YouTube should seek a judge’s ruling about whether to remove potentially incendiary content.
Other digital media experts, however, cited the technical limitations of scouring the torrent of videos that are uploaded to the site every minute and making value judgments about those likely to incite anger, hate or murder.
YouTube is a private company, so of course has the right to accept or reject videos as they see fit. Though in turn they can be criticized for it if people perceive the process to be arbitrary or biased, which could provide an opening for a potential competitor. But for the government to make such a request is downright sinister and clearly violates the principle of free speech.
The Obama administration request may not have had an explicit or even intended threat of force behind it, but that’s largely irrelevant. The government is too big and too powerful for any request ever to just be a request. When a mafia boss asks you to do something, he doesn’t need to make a threat. Everyone will perceive it to be there just the same, even in the unlikely event that he didn’t intend any punishment for refusal. With the government antitrust goons sharpening their knives and practically drooling over the prospect of subjecting YouTube-owner Google to the same witch hunt they launched at Microsoft in the 90’s, it would be hard for YouTube not to see the potential repercussions for refusing this “request.” That they have so far not bowed to the pressure is a point in their favor.
The quoted article goes on to cite “technological limitations” to policing user submitted content in a vain attempt to protect delicate sensibilities from any potential umbrage. But what about the philosophical limitations? Why is it Google’s responsibility to keep unwanted content from people’s eyes? If not ever being offended is so important to people, then they can go live in a cabin in the woods and hide from the outside world – as that’s the only way to accomplish it.
That the LA Times couldn’t find any potential objection, other than practical considerations, either to the administration’s behavior or the imagined “calls for Google Inc.’s YouTube to play a more active role in curating the billions of hours of videos found on its site” says as much about their quality of journalism as the whole affair says about this administration’s respect for fundamental First Amendment rights.
The United States is under attack. The attacks have taken place in both Egypt and Libya. The Egyptian attack, where a mob stormed the US Embassy in Cairo, tore down the US flag and replaced it with a black flag with the phrase ‘There is no god but God and Muhammad is his prophet,’ was believed to be in response to a film that portrayed Muhammad in an unflattering light. Prior to the violence, the US Embassy in Cairo preemptively apologized for the speech of a private US citizen with the following outrageously obsequious statement:
The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims – as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions. Today, the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, Americans are honoring our patriots and those who serve our nation as the fitting response to the enemies of democracy. Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy. We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others
That this statement was made by an official representative of the US government is an embarrassment. How dare they apologize for the speech of a US citizen, as if hurt feelings are somehow to be avoided at all costs. To do so in this manner on 9/11 just adds insult to injury.The Embassy then took to twitter to defend its obnoxious statement, while also issuing more, only to later memory hole the entire episode.
The Embassy is clearly confused about American values. Respect for religious beliefs is required by our government, which is not supposed to choose sides on the topic, but not at all of the people. Our people are free to express themselves about religion as they are any other topic, and that includes the ability to criticize – as many frequently do in the US about every major religion – and the appropriate response if you are offended is more speech of your own. That’s what sensible, emotionally stable people do in the US every day, because the real cornerstones of our democracy are respect for the rights of others, such as that to life, liberty and property. The Egyptian mob reflected no such respect, and an American embassy that thought it more important to immediately condemn private US citizens for the hurt sensibilities of a violent and explosive mob culture is an utter embarrassment.
Freedom, the single most important cornerstone of American democracy, means tolerating the ideas of others even when you find them offensive. If we really believed in aiding freedom’s spread throughout the world, we’d be vigorously defending it in the face of those who neither understand nor respect it.
The sickness and cultural backwardness witnessed in Egypt and Libya is easy to see and call out. There is something fundamentally wrong with a culture that erupts so easily into violent furor over every minor slight or insult. But we already knew this. What is striking is how the events reveal our own culture sickness – a debilitating self-doubt that makes it impossible for our representatives and intellectual class to condemn the easily condemnable.
Now there’s a second angle to the story, and it’s why I haven’t yet brought up the more violent nature of the attacks in Libya on a US consulate, which included the death of a American ambassador. Signs point in this case to a preplanned, terrorist attack, which seized upon the mob response to the film as a cover. If true, this attack demonstrates the ongoing danger posed by Islamists, and it draws into question the entire approach our government has taken to the “Arab spring,” once thought to be a democratic revolution but now looking like just a radical Islamist resurgence.
The US response to such an attack on our sovereign territory and the murder of our citizens must be sensible, but it also cannot afford to be weak. The preemptive apology to Egyptian thugs did not prevent their riot, and bending over backwards now to respond to these attacks will not prevent future attacks – it will likely encourage more of them. I don’t envy the President for having to navigate these waters, of needing to respond strongly but not excessively, but so far the actions of this government – and of the President who skips more than half of his daily intelligence briefings – have utterly failed to demonstrate the leadership necessary to quell this growing crisis.
A lot of folks are talking about the declaration that “government’s the only thing that we all belong to,” with many responding with various forms of an argument denying our status as the property of government. And they should be talking about it; it’s a repugnant statement. Just not necessarily for that particular reason.
The verb belong, like many in the English language, can have multiple meanings. One implies ownership; another membership. The video quite clearly is intending to use the latter definition. Should the producers have seen the obvious meaning behind the statement using another common definition of belong – that we are owned by government? Probably, and it probably says something about their sensibilities that it either never occurred to them, or they didn’t care. But that’s a minor point.
I believe that the most powerful arguments are ones that, when an opponent’s statement is ambiguous, avails the other side the benefit of the most favorable, reasonable interpretation possible. Defeating a stronger argument is a more significant feat, after all. In this case, I think it is clear the video is attempting to say that we all have membership in government, and therefore concludes that it is a binding and unifying force. That is the interpretation I am sure they intended, so it is the one I prefer to address. And it’s more than sufficiently disagreeable to warrant heavy criticism.
The Left was in the middle of shrieking that the video wasn’t saying the government “owns” us; it was saluting the government as the collective expression of our combined will, justified in anything it wants to do – or make the rest of us do – because we sanctify it every few years through the ritual of voting.
Even this benign-sounding apologia for “government is the only thing we all belong to” is incredibly wrong-headed. We most certainly do notbelong to the government. We are all members of the electorate, which is a very different thing. Each of us lives beneath several distinct governments – federal, state, city – empowered to protect our rights, not act as the almighty executor of some “collective will” that exists only in the totalitarian fantasies of liberals. There are very few areas of government action that command anything like overwhelming majority support from Americans, let alone nearly unanimous approval.
But it’s the idea that government brings us together that I find must detestable. Although the video did not say “big government,” that is what we have today so in context that is what it is defending. And big government is anything but unifying. Here’s what I wrote on the subject way back in 2008, at a time when both Presidential candidates were promising to heal all that which socially divides us:
Despite the modest downsizing after the end of the Cold War, by 2000 the federal government employed almost 3 million people, and government employment at the federal, state and local level now combine for 16% of the total national work force. There are ten additional cabinet positions compared to the beginning of the 20th century. So in addition to spending more, they are also doing more.
We have all these bureaucrats to manage the regulations covering every aspect of our lives. Government tells us what we can eat, where we can smoke, what medicines we can use and what insurance we can purchase. It even tells us who we can marry and where we must send our children to school, along with what they must be taught.
This intrusion of government has sparked the “culture war.” It exists because government, by design, requires one-size-fits-all solutions on issues on which there is no one size that fits all. As an example, when parents cannot choose where to send their kids to school, they must fight within the political system to see that the schools teach what they want. Different parents have different ideas, often mutually exclusive, on what they want their children to learn. Because they must fight over control of the same system, some must inevitably lose.
When issues of importance to the people must be fought over, it’s understandable that the fighting can be intense. A lot is at stake in every election. Repeat this process again and again, on issue after issue, and it is little wonder why Americans are polarized today. Government has pit us against our fellow citizens in a battle for control of our own lives. It’s a battle we can only lose, and which the new administration’s big government programs can only make worse.
Government is inherently divisive, which is something I think our Founders understood and is one reason why they tried, though sadly failed, to severely limit its scope. But there are actually things which unify us. One is our understanding of our inherent rights as human beings. Our united belief in those rights – of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness – is what led first to our rejection of unjust rule, and then eventually to the formation of our specific government. But that’s a far cry from saying that government itself is that unifying force.
The video contrasts our common government with the fact that we belong to different churches and clubs, implying that those individual choices are the things which divide us. This is exactly backwards, and betrays a dangerous affinity for collectivism. Yes, people go to different churches and belong to different clubs, but the option to associate freely with the groups that we choose, without one person or group of people’s preferences for association being imposed on all others, is exactly what makes it possible for us to live together without constantly being at each other’s throats. Voluntary cooperation is the most unifying force of all.
But what if we did all belong to one church? Would that unify us? Obviously not, as that would require first forcing us all into the same church despite our individual preferences. And if we look at history, that’s exactly what Europe was like when our ancestors left for the new world. We have the freedom to do our own things, to lead our own lives, to associate with the people we choose, and to trade with the people we choose; those freedoms are what have historically unified our communities and allowed us to get along. On the other hand, thrusting upon us ever more one-size-fits-all government “solutions” to every problem, big or small, will continue to rip at the strained social fabric of our nation, dividing us ever more into mutually exclusive, non-cooperative camps.
The Department of Labor cites Labor Day as “dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers,” adding that “it constitutes a yearly national tribute to the contributions workers have made to the strength, prosperity, and well-being of our country.” Celebrating the hard work of Americans with a yearly day off is fine with me, but there are additional forces contributing to the “strength, prosperity, and well-being of our country” also worthy of recognition. Perhaps the time as come, for instance, for a Capital Day.
Hard work is important. Americans have long considered a strong work ethic a virtuous quality, and this has been to our advantage. But hard workers are all over the world, and the US hardly leads the world in average hours worked. Yet America is consistently at or near the top in worker productivity. What accounts for this discrepancy? Simply put, capital.
Another way to look at American prosperity is this: hard work is a necessary, but insufficient, condition for achieving prosperity. Give even the hardest worker a spoon, and it will take a long time to build a ditch. Give that same worker a shovel, and it will take less time. Now give that worker an expensive digging machine and that ditch will be completed exponentially faster. That is where growth in worker productivity comes from.
The mixing of capital and labor is where the true magic happens, and American prosperity is due to our once unique devotion to an economic system – the free market – that most efficiently matches these two ingredients. Unfortunately, America today is no longer the most devoted to economic freedom, and the trend is heading in the wrong direction. A less free economy, generally speaking, will mean more inefficient distributions of capital and labor, resulting in a less productive workforce and thus a less prosperous economy.
In order to invest capital in our workers, we first need capital to invest, and that means savings. Unfortunately, neo-Keynesian economic thought can be reasonably accurately summed up as “savings = bad; spending = good.” Just consider the examples of politiciansasserting that unemployment checks or food stamps boost economic growth because the recipients are more likely to spend it. And then there’s the many government policies which reduce or inhibit capital formations, like direct taxes on capital such as the capital gains tax or death taxes, financial regulations and laws which discourage US investment, and other costly burdens on business – such as Obamacare.
So while we celebrate the contributions of hard working Americans of all stripes, we should keep in mind the importance of capital in achieving prosperity, a fact all too often forgotten by policymakers. Perhaps a yearly reminder in the form of a Capital Day is needed to do the trick.
This week, during its quadrennial national convention, the Republican Party released its 2012 platform. The platform is yet another indicator of how conservative leaders are reapplying basic conservative principles to criminal justice. For example, the new platform contains language explicitly emphasizing the importance of prisoner reentry, a notable change from the 2008 platform which contained none. The new platform urges that “[p]risons should do more than punish; they should attempt to rehabilitate and institute proven prisoner reentry systems to reduce recidivism and future victimization.”
Similarly, the new platform contains language emphasizing the importance of restorative justice, yet another element that did not appear in the 2008 platform:
“Government at all levels should work with faith-based institutions that have proven track records in diverting young and first time, non-violent offenders from criminal careers, for which we salute them. Their emphasis on restorative justice, to make the victim whole and put the offender on the right path, can give law enforcement the flexibility it needs in dealing with different levels of criminal behavior. We endorse State and local initiatives that are trying new approaches to curbing drug abuse and diverting first-time offenders to rehabilitation.”
Also very welcome is the language highlighting the serious threat of over-criminalization, particular regarding the federal criminal code.
The starkest change in the party platform from 2008 to 2012 is the inclusion of new – and relatively detailed – language criticizing overcriminalization:
“The resources of the federal government’s law enforcement and judicial systems have been strained by two unfortunate expansions: the over-criminalization of behavior and the over-federalization of offenses. The number of criminal offenses in the U.S. Code increased from 3,000 in the early 1980s to over 4,450 by 2008. Federal criminal law should focus on acts by federal employees or acts committed on federal property – and leave the rest to the States. Then Congress should withdraw from federal departments and agencies the power to criminalize behavior, a practice which, according to the Congressional Research Service, has created “tens of thousands” of criminal offenses. No one other than an elected representative should have the authority to define a criminal act and set criminal penalties. In the same way, Congress should reconsider the extent to which it has federalized offenses traditionally handled on the State or local level.”
Now party platforms don’t generally have much if any impact, but this is a welcome reflection of shifting GOP attitudes toward 1) Beginning to undo the labyrinth of federal criminal laws which are threatening basic freedoms and, 2) finding more effective and cost efficient solutions to certain crimes.
I serve as Vice President of the Center for Freedom and Prosperity, a non-profit think tank dedicated to preserving tax competition and free markets. This site features my personal views, which are not reflective of CF&P.
I serve as Vice President of the Center for Freedom and Prosperity, a non-profit think tank dedicated to preserving tax competition and free markets. This site features my personal views, which are not reflective of CF&P.