Government's Folly

By Andrew P. Morriss, William T. Bogart, Andrew Dorchak and Roger E. Meiners

Myth 1: Everyone understands what a “green job” is.
Fact 1: No standard definition of a “green job” exists.

According to the studies most commonly quoted, green jobs pay well, are interesting to do, produce products that environmental groups prefer, and do so in a unionized workplace. Such criteria have little to do with the environmental impacts of the jobs. To build a political coalition, “green jobs” have become a mechanism to deliver something for members of many special interests in order to buy their support for a radical transformation of society. Committing hundreds of billions of dollars to promoting something lacking a transparent definition cannot be justified.

Myth 2: Creating green jobs will boost productive employment.
Fact 2: Green jobs estimates in these oft-quoted studies include huge numbers of clerical,
bureaucratic, and administrative positions that do not produce goods and services for
consumption.

These green jobs studies mistake any position receiving a paycheck for a position creating value. Simply hiring people to write and enforce regulations, fill-out forms, and process paperwork is not a recipe for creating wealth. Much of the promised boost in green employment turns out to be in non-productive – and expensive – positions that raise costs for consumers. These higher paying jobs that fail to create a more eco-friendly society dramatically skew the results in both number of green jobs created and salary levels of those jobs.

Myth 3: Green jobs forecasts are reliable.
Fact 3: The green jobs studies made estimates using poor economic models based on dubious assumptions.

The forecasts for green employment in these studies optimistically predict an employment boom that will take us to prosperity in a new green world. The forecasts, which are sometimes amazingly detailed, are unreliable because they are based on:

a) Questionable estimates by interest groups of tiny base numbers in employment,
b) Extrapolation of growth rates from those small base numbers, that does not take into consideration that growth rates eventually slow, plateau and even decline, and
c) A biased and highly selective optimism about which technologies will improve.
Moreover, the estimates use a technique (input-output analysis) that is inappropriate to the conditions of technological change presumed by the green jobs literature itself. This yields seemingly precise estimates that give the illusion of scientific reliability to numbers that are actually based on faulty assumptions.

Myth 4: Green jobs promote employment growth.
Fact 4: By promoting more jobs instead of more productivity, the green jobs described in the literature actually encourage low-paying jobs in less desirable conditions. Economic growth cannot be ordered by Congress or by the United Nations (UN). Government interference in the economy – such as restricting successful technologies in favor of speculative technologies favored by special interests – will generate stagnation.

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by Hans-Hermann Hoppe
Copyright by Hans-Hermann Hoppe

This essay was originally published in The Free Market in April 1993.

It’s true that the U.S. health care system is a mess, but this demonstrates not market but government failure. To cure the problem requires not different or more government regulations and bureaucracies, as self-serving politicians want us to believe, but the elimination of all existing government controls.

It’s time to get serious about health care reform. Tax credits, vouchers, and privatization will go a long way toward decentralizing the system and removmg unnecessary burdens from business. But four additional steps must also be taken:

1. Eliminate all licensing requirements for medical schools, hospitals, pharmacies, and medical doctors and other health care personnel. Their supply would almost instantly increase, prices would fall, and a greater variety of health care services would appear on the market.

Competing voluntary accreditation agencies would take the place of compulsory government licensing – if health care providers believe that such accreditation would enhance their own reputation, and that their consumers care about reputation, and are willing to pay for it.

Because consumers would no longer be duped into believing that there is such a thing as a “national standard” of health care, they will increase their search costs and make more discriminating health care choices.

2. Eliminate all government restrictions on the production and sale of pharmaceutical products and medical devices. This means no more Food and Drug Administration, which presently hinders innovation and increases costs.

Costs and prices would fall, and a wider variety of better products would reach the market sooner. The market would force consumers to act in accordance with their own – rather than the government’s – risk assessment. And competing drug and device manufacturers and sellers, to safeguard against product liability suits as much as to attract customers, would provide increasingly better product descriptions and guarantees.

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Progress Rachel Maddow gives a scaving report on the continuation, and even going one step beyond Bush/Chenney, the regimation of the holding indefinately without cause policy.  She  focuses on a speech given in front of the original constitution in which Obama metephorically rips that piece of paper apart, stomps on it, and then lights it on fire.

“This is a bueatiful speach by President Obama today with patriotic, moving, even poetic language about the rule of law and the constitution, and one of the most radical proposalls for defying the constitution that we have ever heard made to the American People.”

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by Russell D. Longcore
Copyright by Russell D. Longcore
russlongcore@gmail.com

Special to The Libertarian Enterprise

The Memorial Day 2009 weekend is upon us. Many will use this weekend as the first short vacation of summer. Picnics, boating, traveling, family gatherings, and dedication to enjoyable activities are the rule this weekend.

But Memorial Day is meant to honor the men and women who died in military service to the United States of America. Formerly known as “Decoration Day,” it was first established in 1868 to decorate the graves of the Civil War (War of Northern Aggression) dead.

This weekend, there will be memorial services and parades across America in town squares, churches and at cemeteries. Flowers will be strewn and American flags will be in grand display. Politicians will walk the route, and veterans will don old uniforms and walk with them. Twenty-one gun salutes and taps will echo among the headstones. Impassioned speeches will be delivered to patriotic crowds on the goodness of America and the honor and bravery of the fallen soldiers and sailors.

And Americans will be remembering all the wrong things.

How about a reality check?

Those who fought and died (over 364,000) in Lincoln’s Army died invading another sovereign nation, the Confederate States of America. The CSA, who lost over 139,000 soldiers, was defending itself from the aggression of a foreign nation. It would have been no different morally if the Northern Army would have invaded Canada. So, Northern mourners should remember the shame of the North, not just that their loved ones died in battle. And Southerners should forever laud their sons who valiantly died in an attempt to thwart a foreign invasion and protect their homeland.

The 3,500-plus military personnel who fought and died in the Spanish-American War of 1898 died invading Cuba and the Philippines against Spain. Last time I checked, neither country was a state of the Union and did not require defense from a foreign aggressor. The war was perpetrated by the McKinley Administration and an expansionist Congress, assisted by Theodore Roosevelt and fomented by propaganda in the Hearst newspapers.

The American war dead of World War I (1914-1918), numbering over 116,000, died fighting a war between European nations. America had absolutely no business becoming involved, but as George Washington predicted, our treaty obligations dragged us into war.

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Everyday I see another stupid thing that the government does and I think that it would probably be better without governments at all. One just needs to separate the ides of anarchy and chaos. Of course there are some practical obstacles to not having a government, and I have been reading up on non-government alternatives to usual government services like police, roads, courts, etc. I now have found an interesting series of YouTube videos that goes over some practical alternatives to these government services. You can find the Issues of Anarchy playlist here where the he has videos on many objections to Anarchy. Now, don’t think of this as mere theory, the YouTube user also has videos with historical examples of Anarchy.

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Does the sheriff’s reaction against the D.A. suggest the “code” is a bigger problem than cops let on?
by Steven Greenhut

The lady sheriff doth protest too much, methinks. So too doth the union boss, who unleashed the dogs of war against the district attorney. Forgive my bad Shakespeare imitation as I write about the latest law enforcement dispute. Let’s just say the Bard of Avon and the sheriff’s department of Orange County have something in common: a large trove of drama, tragedy and farce.
Sheriff Sandra Hutchens and Association of Orange County Deputy Sheriffs President Wayne Quint were both furious – Wayne had steam coming out of his ears, according to one associate – at District Attorney Tony Rackauckas, and more specifically at his press spokesperson, Susan Schroeder, for a few matter-of-fact comments she made after a recent mistrial. When asked why the office was not going to retry the excessive force case against a deputy who used a Taser on a handcuffed suspect, she gave an honest answer: “We argued in closing arguments that we felt there was a code of silence – what is it? A thin blue line. We’re very disappointed. … It’s very important for the District Attorney’s Office to have ethical and law-abiding law enforcement officers.”
The D.A. believes OC deputies had “blue amnesia” – they lied, or conveniently “forgot” critical facts – when testifying in a case involving one of their own. It’s the latest incident in a string of cases involving sheriff’s deputies who allegedly covered up for their misbehaving colleagues, ranging from the D.A.’s allegations of departmental perjury and witness tampering following the John Chamberlain jail murder in October 2006 to the possible cover-up by sheriff’s officials of a deputy, Gerald Stenger, accused last year of child molestation.
The jury voted to acquit the Taser-happy cop, Christopher Hibbs, by an 11-1 verdict. According to Rackauckas, speaking at a press conference on May 12, it did so because the key witnesses changed their stories.
Deputies painted a clear picture of Hibbs and his Taser abuse in an internal investigation and before the grand jury. But they told differing accounts of the event once the trial got under way. The public knows that cops frown on “ratting out” one another, even though this undermines the rule of law. While a “code of silence” is no surprise, the sheriff’s overreaction to a few words certainly is surprising.

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Every man, woman, and responsible child has an unalienable individual, civil, Constitutional, and human right to obtain, own, and carry, openly or concealed, any weapon — rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything — any time, any place, without asking anyone’s permission. ~L. Niel Smith, The Atlanta Deceleration, 1987

That is the right that the Second Amendment of the Constitution of the United States Guarantees. Notice, I did not say that the second amendment gives this right. Governments cannot give rights, because if you can give a right you can take a right away. Governments also cannot license a right, because if you have to ask somebody’s permission to do something it is not a right.

Now, I never used to think much about open carry. I was more worried that I couldn’t keep a handgun in my home in one of the most violent cities in this country, let alone carry a concealed handgun with me wherever I went. I figured all I would have to do is move out of the city to have a handgun in the home. Then it was just a matter of getting this draconian excuse for a state to stop trampling my constitutionally guaranteed rights, and not arrest me for excessing my right to carry a concealed weapon if I want to.

I didn’t give much thought to open carry because I thought I would get harassed too much from all of the irrational people who have irrational fears of guns, despite the fact that they kill less people per capita than bathtubs, and nobody would get scared if you openly carried a bathtub around.

Despite the fact that over the past few years the general state of gun control has been towards less gun control, it is still not nearly enough, and more than likely that trend will be reversed soon. I mean, if you are being tortured on the rack, if the guy decides to undo one turn of the rack, it hardly means you can walk around freely. Some of you might say that not having guns is hardly equivalent to torture. You are right, it is worse. How many people must be robbed, mugged, beaten, raped, and murdered before people will wake up and realize that by taking guns away from the decent people (which is all gun control does) you have the blood of all of these crimes on your hand.

I hear people blathering on about how more guns means more crime but the evidence just doesn’t show it. Well, look at what John Lott has to say about the National Academy of Sciences Report on Gun Control. This panel was set up during the Clinton Administration, and of its members whose views on guns were publicly known before their appointments all but one had favored gun control.

Based on 253 journal articles, 99 books, 43 government publications, and some of its own empirical work, the panel couldn’t identify a single gun control regulation that reduced violent crime, suicide or accidents.
– John Lott, commenting on the National Academy of Sciences report (PDF) on gun control laws

There are plenty of studies that show a positive correlation between more gun control and more crime, and even though correlation doesn’t prove causation, lake of correlation does disprove causation. It is as simple as that. Gun control does NOT reduce crime. Period.

Since it is only because of irrational fears that gun control laws are kept on the books, the only option is to get people used to the idea of ordinary people carrying guns around. The only way to do this is to get open carry laws passed in every state, county, and locality in this country and to start openly carrying guns around as much as possible. There will be people screaming and moaning that we should think of the children, or other such vague statements, but when people are used to guns being everywhere and when the level of violent crime rate lowers, and those children are safer, gun control laws will take care of themselves.

The problem of course is how to get there. I will leave that up to smarter people than me. How about taking some pointers from Smith’s Blueprint for Ending Gun Control.

Someday to demonstrate that principle — before I’m lying on my deathbed in a hospital with green plastic tubes up my nose, before arthritis sets in and I have to do it on crutches — I intend to walk the length of Manhattan Island with a handgun openly on my hip, unmolested by any freelance or official parasite. ~L. Niel Smith, The Atlanta Deceleration, 1987

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Illinois reform: Mayor Richard Daley says he’s ‘leading by example

This is one funny article the Chicago Tribune had today. According to Mayor Daley, there is no need for tougher ethics laws in this state because he is “leading by example.”

“We’ve done everything here. We’re leading the way with our inspector general, office of compliance, all the things we’ve done,” Daley said. “We’re more transparent than any other government. Look at it.” Daley claims.

Daley must be completely insane if he actually believes that. He needs to be in an Asylum where he can no longer hurt the residents of this city. The worst part is that if you look at the comments on this article they are overwhelmingly in support of the “Daley must be insane if he believes that” position, yet he still keeps getting voted into office.

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This is interesting testimony to the Pennsylvania House Health Council by Neurosurgeon David McKalip, M.D. that exposes the many myths involved with the  Single Payer Healthcare that Obama loves so much.

The Trouble With “Single-Payer Healthcare”

By David McKalip, M.D.
Published 05/12/09

Pennsylvania HOUSE Health Council TESTIMONY
David McKalip, M.D.
Chairman, Council on Medical Economics, Florida Medical Association
President, Florida Neurosurgical Society
Chairperson, Florida Taxpayers Union

“Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.” — Benjamin Franklin

“Was the government to prescribe to us our medicine and diet, our bodies would be in such keeping as our souls are now.” —Thomas Jefferson: Notes on the State of Virginia, Query XVII, 1782.

Thank you for bringing me to testify before the Pennsylvania House Health Care Policy Task Force. I am a private practice neurosurgeon from Florida and for over ten years, I have practiced in academics, small group and solo settings taking care of patients from all walks of life. While in my first practice at San Francisco General Hospital, I saw the many shortcomings of a government run hospital.  Even with dedicated professional health care staff, the constant budget shortfalls, debt and politically motivated regulatory burdens drained the hospital there.  Patients waited weeks to go to rehabilitation units while patients in private systems went in days.  Repeat patients never took responsibility for their own health — always assuming that the public system would be there for them.  I went to San Francisco a young liberal and left two years later a disillusioned doctor.  After about two years in private practice I began to realize that only the private sector could deliver high quality affordable health care in the most fair and equitable way without rationing.  That is not to say that the current structure of private health care is perfect — it is encumbered by a complex and odd system of financing that few economists would design: third party financing of first dollar coverage. Nevertheless, the care patients receive through private health insurance is far better than that received by those with government funded health care.  Better than private or public third party payment is the results produced when patients spend their own money from a health savings account backed by a catastrophic health plan.  (But I will discuss that more later).

I saw Medicaid patients for seven years by choice even though Medicaid in Florida pays only 56% of Medicare rates and each patient entering my practice was the equivalent of me writing them a check. I couldn’t blame other neurosurgeons who were not taking these patients and I saw patients drive hours to see me.  Finally I opted to see Medicaid only for hospital emergencies — not in my office.

Another publicly run health system also has neglected some of our most valued citizens: The Veterans Administration.  Layers of stifling bureaucracy and limited resources have lead to long waits for advanced medical care. At multiple V.A.’s I saw Veterans wait months for a spine surgeon while living with crippling pain or slowly evolving paralysis, get put on another waiting list for surgery and have their surgery cancelled at the last minute simply because there wasn’t enough staff to keep working after 3 pm or any interest of the employed physician staff to work harder.

I have seen Medicare patients denied advanced spinal surgical techniques or subject to overnight stays when others go home the same day due to arcane rules.  I have had to perform two surgeries on Parkinson’s patients for dual brain stimulator pacemakers since Medicare won’t pay for the single pacemaker at the same price! I have seen how Medicare patients wait over an hour to see a Nurse Practitioner for 10 minutes and their doctors for 3 minutes and leave confused only to enter the mill again.  I have seen referrals to specialists from Nurse Practitioners that a primary care physician could have avoided.  But the number of primary care doctors has dropped as Medicare has artificially controlled the amount of payment for their services. I also routinely see able-bodied patients inappropriately granted disability for health care and disability benefits.

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If there was one improvement that I still thought Obama would have over Bush was in transparency of government torture. It turns out, just like the Wars in the Middle East, I was wrong. Salon’s Glenn Greenwald wrote a good article about how Obama and Bush are more and more indistinguishable everyday on the subject of transparency of the government’s crimes.

Obama’s latest effort to conceal evidence of Bush era crimes
(Updated below – Update II – Update III)
It’s difficult to react much to Obama’s complete reversal today of his own prior decision to release photographs depicting extreme detainee abuse by the United States.  He’s left no doubt that this is what he does:  ever since he was inaugurated, Obama has taken one extreme step after the next to keep concealed both the details and the evidence of Bush’s crimes, including rendition, torture and warrantless eavesdropping.  The ACLU’s Amrit Singh — who litigated the thus-far-successful FOIA lawsuit to compel disclosure of these photographs — is exactly right:
The reversal is another indication of a continuance of the Bush administration policies under the Obama administration.  President Obama’s promise of accountability is meaningless, this is inconsistent with his promise of transparency, it violates the government’s commitment to the court. People need to examine these abusive photographs, but also the government officials need to be held accountable.
Andrew Sullivan, one of Obama’s earliest and most enthusiastic supporters, wrote of today’s photograph-concealment decision and yesterday’s story of Obama’s pressuring Britain to conceal evidence of Binyam Mohamed’s torture:
Slowly but surely, Obama is owning the cover-up of his predecessors’ war crimes. But covering up war crimes, refusing to prosecute them, promoting those associated with them, and suppressing evidence of them are themselves violations of Geneva and the UN Convention. So Cheney begins to successfully coopt his successor. . .
From extending and deepening the war in Afghanistan, to suppressing evidence of rampant and widespread abuse and torture of prisoners under Bush, to thuggishly threatening the British with intelligence cut-off if they reveal the brutal torture inflicted on Binyam Mohamed, Obama now has new cheer-leaders: Bill Kristol, Michael Goldfarb and Max Boot. . . .
Those of us who held out hope that the Obama administration would not be actively covering up the brutal torture of a Gitmo prisoner who was subject to abuse in several countries must now concede the obvious. They’re covering it up – in such a crude and obvious fashion that it is actually a crime in Britain.
John Aravosis said Obama’s logic was “a bit Bushian.”  Steve Hynd observes that “Obama Trades Our Principles For Cheneyism.”  TPM declares:  ”Obama falls back on Bushisms.”  Dan Froomkin writes:  ”Obama Joins the Cover-Up.”  I’ll just note a few points for now about Obama’s efforts to keep these photographs concealed:

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