MOMENT OF CLARITY: They Lie

MOMENT OF CLARITY: They Lie

They Lie

One of the advantages of writing an opinion blog is that opinions are never inaccurate, even when they are wrong.  But we should expect better from government agencies who publish statistics that policy makers, businesspeople, academics, journalists, and citizens rely on to make decisions and draw conclusions – like the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), for example.

Recently, the Bureau named Wisconsin as the state with the worst job loss in November, with a decline of 14,600.  This came on the heels of 9,700 jobs BLS reported lost in October.  The Badger State’s two-month total of 24,300 jobs lost led the nation in workplace suckage; and opponents of Wisconsin Governor Walker eagerly jumped on the November BLS presser to bolster their sagging effort to recall him.  

One anonymous commenter on my blog site asked me (ok, taunted) what I had to say about those BLS numbers, since I had just written a piece opposing the recall.  Instead of reading the BLS press release, I visited the underlying data tables (http://www.bls.gov/news.release/laus.t03.htm) and discovered a slightly different story. 

The BLS data show that Wisconsin’s workforce dropped from 3,057,800 in September to 3,055,200 in November, while the number of unemployed in Wisconsin fell from 238,600 to 223,800.  Since the workforce is only made up of two parts – the employed and the unemployed – simple subtraction reveals there were 2,819,200 people working in September and 2,831,400 in November. 

Do you see what’s wrong with this picture? 

That’s right – the BLS data shows an increase of 12,200 jobs during those two months, not the loss of 24,300 reported to the press by the union humps who run the joint.  I asked them for an explanation – two bucks says I will hear from Dick Clark again before I get any response from the humble public servants who work for me.  Five bucks says no journalist will even bother to ask.             

The BLS data reconciles perfectly; unemployment drops by 14,800 because 12,200 jobs are added and 2,600 leave the workforce (retire, move out of state, go back to school, etc.).  On the other hand, I could find no combination of numbers that can be tortured into a computation of a 24,300 job loss in October/November.  If you can crack the code, I will be happy to print the recipe here at Moment of Clarity. 

So, what do I think about the BLS report of Wisconsin’s job losses in November?  I think they lied; that’s what I think.  It would not be the first time.  

My doctoral dissertation in 2006 (late bloomer) was a study of government contract bundling and its impact on small businesses.  The conventional wisdom at the time was that 34,221 illegal acts of contract bundling had caused the failure of over 15,000 thousand firms since 1990.  My thesis was that the problem was actually far worse than the government was reporting, particularly among minority businesses, and I constructed a study which expected to prove how much worse it really was.

What I discovered, without boring you to tears, is that less than two dozen actual cases were reported by contractors victimized by the practice. The whole issue was bogus – a complete fabrication to increase funding for an agency put on the block during Clinton/Gore’s reinventing government initiative.  The government’s data did not support the headlines trumpeted by its agency heads – sound familiar?

I was invited to Washington to brief the heads of procurement for all of the national security agencies, was received begrudgingly at Small Business Administration, and was invited to testify at Senator Kerry’s committee on small business.  The Senator apparently had misunderstood my research findings, because when his staff was informed that I had disproved the contract bundling myth, he cancelled my testimony.  No hard feelings, Mr. Kerry.     

My work was honored internationally for its methodology, and I published a couple of journal articles to scrutinize my findings through academic peer review and publication.  From time to time someone still contacts me, as my research is still the most recent academic literature on the subject. But it is not my life’s work; I have a company to run, a family to love, friends to laugh with, and a blog to write.     

So I am not surprised that the BLS data does not support its agency heads’ pressers.  It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to guess at possible reasons why Obama appointees at the Department of Unions might want to propagandize against the nation’s top union buster, Governor Walker.  Or perhaps it was just a simple error – two months in a row.  Yeah…yeah, that’s the ticket.       

And don’t even get on your high horse, Demski’s; it’s not about you.  I don’t care if they are Republican, Democrat, or just members of the Permanent Government Workers Party, they say whatever they want if it serves their own interest. If my Libertarian party ever took control, we would soon be corrupted too; human nature does not grant waivers to humans.   

That’s why we need to shut it all down; all but the 18 essential services authorized by the Constitution.  Put the Department of Labor and its Bureau of Labor Statistics high on the list of first to go.  If you want accurate labor statistics, buy them from Manpower; they are a private sector firm that makes their living by accurately assessing job markets.  They are not too big to fail, so they have to get it right. 

Profit is the cure for the sloth that makes government worse than useless.  Of course, that is just my opinion.  And thank you, Anonymous, for asking.

 
“Moment Of Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D.  Visit Tim’s website http://www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.    

Libertarian Island

Alone on an island, one has no choice but to be libertarian; self-sovereignty is the only kind there is. 

The question of where rights come from is answered definitively, as our island dweller is endowed with a complete set of natural rights even though there is no one else to grant them. Freedom is complete, and the self-owned islander who produces in surplus can not possibly be considered greedy, heartless, selfish, or evil for his extraordinary productivity.   

It is only when a second person arrives on the island who demands to live off the surplus of the first that the libertarian’s self-sufficiency is suddenly called selfishness.  The irony of envy is that greed is always assigned by the demander, and selfishness is the accusation hurled by those who insist their own needs must be tended at the expense of others.         

When a third person arrives on the island armed with laws and guns and chains, he taxes the property of the first to give to the second under terms imposed by force of law and the threat of imprisonment at gunpoint.  We call him government.

The amount to be confiscated from the first is determined by vote of all three.  This is what democracy looks like.  The admonition “no man is an island” is most urgently advocated by that third guy on it, the one whose livelihood depends on convincing the second guy he cannot survive without the looting of the first.      

The island of three – one to produce, one to depend, and one to regulate – is the prism by which both our modern-day Republicans and Democrats view the world. They fuss over who gets to be the third guy on the island, differing only in how much they will take and what they reward and punish with the takings. 

Neither abides by the Constitution they have sworn to defend, and both use the law as a weapon against the people.  Both embrace a crony corporatism that defeats free market capitalism’s liberation of the human spirit.   

Dependence is an unnatural state.  It is created by excessive government and perpetuated by the continued expansion of government power.  America has been turned into a nation where that first person on the island is vilified, the second is canonized, and the third is revered.  That is the twisted morality we call progressive.    

A libertarian Island of Three would be different; all would be self-sufficient, self-owned, and self-governed equals.  Our vision for America is not just three, but three hundred million free first persons, to whom dependence is a temporary and episodic condition. 

We would prefer a government small enough to exist unseen; with laws few enough that we could actually know them and abide by them.  Anarchy can also be millions of laws and regulations so complex that none of us could possibly be law-abiding.

We believe that markets regulate better then men; not because we read it somewhere, but because we have lived with our eyes open.  We believe that government is necessary only to protect individual rights; not to herd people into groups to be collectively gifted or punished by force.  We believe that freedom is the natural state of mankind; that volition is what is meant by the “image of God”.  Many conservatives share our vision of America; many more say that they do. 

Government and Liberty are two opposite destinations; it is not possible to seek one without leaving the other behind.  Libertarians and liberals divide over which way to go; libertarians and conservatives divide over the length of the journey.  We are about to begin the New Year 2012, a year when critical elections will decide both direction and length of the journey we will take as a nation.

Be informed, be involved, and be invested in liberty. Choose your island.

“Moment Of Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D.  Visit Tim’s website http://www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.    

Going Stag

The best thing about being a libertarian is that you can do it all by yourself. 

Liberals need someone else to pay for all the things they promise to other people. And naturally, they need those other-people to be dependent on the government, which is just more other-people who spend most of the someone-else’s money on themselves and then let what’s left trickle down to the first group of other-people that they made dependent on them in the first place.  Follow? 

You need even more people than that to be a socialist.  Theoretically, you need everybody, but in reality someone still has to make the money to redistribute so you need almost everybody, except a few to tax the bejeesus out of and hope they don’t leave your country.  Keith Richards’ lawyers should have argued that he could not possibly have been a drug burnout since he had the presence of mind to flee England with its 90% top tax rate.  And unless you think sober billionaires are less able than Keith to make correct economic choices, don’t think they will just sit there when we come at them with forks.          

Conservatives come in lots of flavors, but nearly all of them need a crowd of some sort.  The NeoCons need people to invade.  The TheoCons need slackers and degenerates to convince the nation that they could make government be our moral compass. The FauxCons need a whole bunch of regular conservatives to dupe – preferably good-hearted folk long on principle and short on memory.  All of them will need lots and lots of cops, judges, and prison guards to throw everybody in jail if they ever get their way; making the objectionable criminal is labor intensive. 

Fascists need someone to order around and bully; that is not nearly as much as fun to do to yourself.  Communists aren’t very good at anything, so they need a whole lot of people to build up the things they swoop in to confiscate in the name of liberation.  Plus, there has to be a proletariat before you can claim the dictatorship of it.  The gulags and killing fields need to be filled with intellectuals and bourgeois, and the bourgeois need communists because otherwise they do not even know who they are.  So you can’t even be the enemy of the people without people.  

Theocrats need a great unwashed mob to impose their Godly laws upon.  Unemployed and undereducated brutes are ideal – it doesn’t take much to convince them to hide the missus under a burqa and use the wardrobe savings to buy themselves a leather club jacket.  Slightly off topic, but Barney Frank’s recent casual day fashion statement made burqas for men seem like a very, very good idea, don’t you think?     

Internationalists need more other-people than anybody.  Can’t have a World Bank without a world.  The IMF needs half a world of suckers to fleece in order to come up with the money they give to the tyrants who rule over the other half of the world.  The real internationalists don’t need too many other people – a handful of central bankers to print all the money and drown us in debt will do…and somebody to polish the Bentley.  

You can’t be a Democrat or a Republican by yourself; what kind of convention would it be when you are the only one there?  Who do you wave your sign at?  And how do you explain it to your wife when all the hookers show up?  “Must be somebody’s niece” only works when there is a flock of other old goats roaming around wearing buttons. 

But you can be a libertarian, or I should say be libertarian, without forcing anyone else to come along for the ride. Not initiating force or fraud is something you do all by yourself; natural rights are the ones you can exercise all on your own.  Tolerance only requires a tolerator, and volition – the exercise of free will – needs only one actor.  Free exchange only needs one more. 

Free market capitalism is based on voluntary exchange with only two parties to the trade – one to sell and one to buy.  Crony capitalism needs many more than those first two parties;  add one to regulate, one to tax, one to lobby for preferences, one to sue, one to unionize the buyer, another to unionize the seller.

Libertarians do not compel, we persuade; and persuasion only needs one persuader.  No one can force you to believe anything anyway; they can only force you to comply – that’s the thing that takes so many people.  Good ideas are readily adopted, and popular beliefs spread quickly on their own merits.  We only need to force compliance with unpopular beliefs; and government is the enforcer of choice when the belief is unpopular.  Its size is inversely proportional to the merits of the ideas it imposes; the worse they are, the more government it takes to impose them. 

Our present government is entirely too big and getting bigger by the day; so what does that tell you about the beliefs it is imposing upon us?  Our Founding Fathers had a much different idea – a small and limited government charged with defending our rights, protecting our liberty, and insuring that each of us could live  according our own conscience and beliefs.  That was the original American Dream. 

Self-sovereignty requires only a self.   It takes a village to smother a dream. 

“Moment Of Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D.  Visit Tim’s website http://www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.    

Christmas Clarity

To all of my Moment of Clarity readers, I wish you a sincere Merry Christmas. 

Whether you are liberal or conservative, socialist or libertarian, Democrat or Republican, Christian or non-Christian, Tea Party or Occupy, activist or apathetic, I have nothing but love in my heart and good will to offer in this week’s MOC post, the last as I head out to spend Christmas with my family. 

This is not the time to focus on our differences; rather to celebrate our common humanity and contemplate our shared redemption made possible by the birth of our Savior that we celebrate each December 25.  Like the song says, let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with me… 

…and then let it end at 12:01 AM on December 26th, so I can get back to sass-typing and butt-rippin’ before the deluge of stupidity that will be visited upon us by our politicos over the next week makes my head explode.  Truce for one week; that’s the best I can do. 

Oh, lighten up; it’s just a blog.  Merry Christmas everybody! 

Dr. Tim

Recall Them All

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Another winter in Wisconsin,and another round of primal scream therapy for our unionists hell bent onputting the entire state through another round of failed recalls.

The leftist diehards are helping us to celebrate Christmasby shoving annoying recall petitions at us while we shop.  When given the opportunity to tell me their singlemost convincing reason to recall Governor Walker, the two that I encountered todayyelled “recall Walker”very loudly.  So there you have it – the reasonthey are doing this to us is that they want to do this to us.  Loudly.

That is what I suspected all along, but I hate to speculatewhen it comes to the motivations of others; you never know when a principlemight break out by accident like a pimple on an airbrushed photo in a ProActivead. 

Now, I have several reasons for opposing their recall ofGovernor Walker.  Chief among them is mypreemptive opposition to whatever freedom-hating, bubble-wrapped  tax lamprey the Union Party of Dane Countyand Most of Milwaukee – a.k.a. the Wisconsin Democrats – will serve up toreplace him.  

Because any candidate the UPDCMM decides to run as theAnti-Walker will be a communist disguised as a raving socialist, the latterbeing their idea of center-right.  The Anti-Walkerwill represent the broad spectrum of shared values of Wisconsinites from East Washington Avenueall the way to…West Washington Avenue and every part of the Isthmus in between.  

They must have someone exceptionally awful in mind, as theywon’t even tell us who it is until after the petitions have been signed.  As you may have surmised, my name won’t be onone of them.   

Many libertarians and tea partiers, myself included, havebeen disappointed with Governor Walker over his acceptance of ObamaCare funds,his watering down of Constitutional Carry, his strong-arming of Roll Your Ownstores, his undermining of micro-breweries, and his foot-dragging on Right ToWork, raw milk, and smoking ban repeal.

But my friends, if you want to go out and sign that recallpetition, then bring your new concealed carry permit with you, along with yourlower tax bill, your voter ID card, and your application for one of thosehigh-wage jobs in the mining industry. You won’t have any use for them when he is gone so you might as well asturn them in to the drum people now.

And after you sign your petition you can kiss your jobgoodbye, as Wisconsin’semployers will understand the clear message being sent and will move elsewhere.We have work to do and there are lots of other places that would love to haveus come there with our jobs. And no, we don’t owe you jack squat.  We paid the taxes, we built the parks, weendowed the universities, we funded the charities and populated their boards.  We can do that anywhere; so don’t worry aboutus, we will be just fine.

I don’t know why it is so difficult for the Walker-haters toget the signatures needed to force a mulligan on the elections that brought himin to office.  They only need half of themillion people who voted against him the first time to say they didn’t do so byaccident.  Why is that taking sixweeks?  That they are still out theredoes not bode well for the Mulligan Movement.  

Of course, it doesn’t matter whether they have enoughlegitimate signatures or not.  They willjust have the guy who already admitted to signing 80 times sit down with a bigpile and go for the world record.  Mightas well, since the Government Accountability Board has publicly promised itwill not check for duplicates and will not even disqualify the names of AdolphHitler and Mickey Mouse.  How fitting fora Mickey Mouse protest against a guy they compare to Hitler.     

We have all seen the tape of Democrat hustlers tradingcigarettes for petition signatures of minors in Milwaukee’s inner city, and the screenshotsof people on FB telling their friends how to sign multiple times when they comein from out of state.  We have all hadtrolls type obscenities in comments to our blogs when we don’t set our brainson “follow” and call for Walker’s head on a platter.  

We have seen the clips of protesters harassing theGovernor’s family at their private residence.  We know about the death threats and assaultsthey have committed upon opposition party officials.  We were not surprised to see charges dropped;respect for the law does not come easily for those with no respect forthemselves.

It is clear to anyone with working eye and a functioningbrain that the UPDCMM does not care about the integrity of the process, thefairness of the outcome, the rights of citizens to have their votes count, orthe rule of law.  They do not even havethe common decency to leave a family alone, or to prosecute criminals whencrimes are committed by their own party activists.  

They care about one thing and one thing only: forcing thestate to collect dues for them again. AndI should also like to make one observation about the notion that the endsjustify the means; over the years, I have come to recognize that only assholesbelieve that.  Pardon my word choice;there is no suitable alternative.

This is not about forcing a recall of Scott Walker; thisabout accelerating the recall that was already scheduled for November of2014.  That’s how we do it in thiscountry – we recall them all on a regular cycle.   All of them.

This present union tantrum is all about cutting in line, notwaiting your turn, disrespecting others. It is about assholes willing to win at all costs, and then laying those costsoff to others who had no dog in the fight. The UDCMM will not reimburse townships, towns, cities, and counties forthe costs of their do-over.  They don’tcare how much they cost us; they never have. 

The taxpayers will pick up the tab for the recall, alongwith the costs of the recounts and court challenges, plus the security andcleanup costs for the inevitable protests that will erupt after they get their headshanded to them AGAIN – for the fourth time in a row.

And the best reason they can give me for why they will putus all through this?  “Re-call Walk-er”.  A year to think up a reason, and that was thebest they can do.  They want to recall Walker because recall Walker. Good luck with that.   

“MomentOf Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D.  Visit Tim’s website www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.     

Game On

Well, this Presidential race just got a whole lot less complicated. 

The Democrats have unveiled their keen new strategy for re-electing the most unpopular incumbent President in history; the game plan is to convince us that our American system of limited government and free markets has never worked.  It is hard to imagine how the Republicans could find a way to lose to that – but never underestimate the Party of McCain’s capacity for epic fail when victory comes knocking .    

For reasons which escape logic unenhanced by chemistry, the Republicans have stonewalled Gary Johnson, ignored Ron Paul, and decapitated Herman Cain, marginalizing the three candidates who generate the most enthusiastic grass roots support in its base.  Using contrived televised debates and juiced polls, the GOP establishment has tried in vain to shape its nomination race into a Newt/Mitt battle of the insiders.  Too bad that quirky little fellow from Texas foiled their plans, and I do not mean Rick Perry.           

Like most Republican standard bearers going back to the days of Richard Nixon, Mitt Romney’s chief qualification for the nomination is that it is his turn.  Newt Gingrich has risen to first among his rivals by scolding the media and remembering things.  Neither man suffers from chronic consistency or principled position.  And while either would be preferable to going over the falls with Obama, neither excites the passions of the liberty movement who rolled Washington in November of 2010. 

Narrowing the field to a contest between the richest man (Romney) and the whitest man (Gingrich) makes for bad optics in a party suspected of caring only about rich white men.  But what is more problematic for my Republican friends is that neither of those two guys is the anti-Obama; that would be the afore-mentioned Ron Paul.  From where he stands on nearly every major issue, Paul must look past both Romney and Gingrich to get a glimpse of the President’s position.

I am a libertarian, so naturally I’m a Paulie; have been ever since he ran as our party’s standard bearer in 1988 against Bush the Elder.  My conservative friends like Ron Paul but get all hinkey about his libertarian views on the drug war and his aversion to real wars of the undeclared variety.  I remind them that their beef is with the Constitution, not with the cranky Texan baby doctor who stands steadfast in its defense.  And besides, he’s in pretty good company on these matters – Washington, Jefferson, Goldwater, Buckley, and Will, to name just a few.   

Let’s cut to the chase: only 33% of Americans self-identify as Democrats with another 33% calling themselves Republicans.  And don’t kid yourself; none of those folks are going off the reservation unless their team springs Charles Manson from prison to head the ticket with Octo-mom as his VP.  Whoever’s name is followed by (D) or (R) respectively is getting their chad punched by the straight-party-line voters.

Which means the next President of the United States will be the one who can get the most members of the last 33% – the independents – to get up off the couch and stand in line in the rain to vote for him.  Do you think Romney can do that?  Gingrich?  When is the last time you even saw a bumper sticker for either one of them?  No seriously – those guys are not setting off an epidemic of leg tingles. 

A great number, if not a majority, of that independent 33% are conservative on economic and fiscal issues, neutral on social issues, and non-interventionist in foreign affairs and military matters.  Does that sound like Newt, Mitt, or Barry?   No, but I just described Ron Paul – and that’s why he would wipe the floor with President Obama in the general election.  As he says, Freedom Is Popular and we are about to find out how popular in less than a year.      

I wish Ron Paul really were a raving bat-stuff-crazy nutcase, because then all the things he has been warning us about for the past three decades would not be unfolding right before our eyes.  Warrantless wiretaps, indefinite military detention, drones used on North Dakota farmers, confiscation of Gibson Guitar inventory, Fast and Furious, the Fed’s secret trillions, the housing bubble –  do I have to keep going?     

Ron Paul has been liberty’s best friend for decades.  He has often been its only friend, at those moments when the passions of the day led even good conservatives in Congress to trample on the Constitution they swore an oath to defend.       

Ron Paul is the real deal.  His economic plan cuts spending by $1 trillion; Mitt Romney has 59 points on a PowerPoint. He could forget two of the cabinet departments he will abolish and still be ahead of Rick Perry by 50%.  He called out the Federal Reserve before Herman Cain ever joined a Fed board.  He doesn’t have as many kids as Michelle Bachman (who does?), but he has delivered a few thousand more.  He has voted alone against more Bills than Newt Gingrich co-sponsored with Nancy Pelosi. 

With Gary Johnson pondering a Libertarian Party run, there is a real danger of a third-party challenge splitting the anti-Obama vote and re-electing the worst President in history on a plurality.  A Ron Paul GOP ticket forecloses that possibility and unites conservatives, libertarians, GOP moderates, and liberty-minded voters from across the political spectrum.  Ron Paul’s Supreme Court appointments alone will be worth the price of admission. 

It is ironic that the oldest candidate in the race – Ron Paul – engenders the most enthusiasm among young people.  Ron Paul rocks on campus, and his supporters turn out at straw polls, conventions, and rallies in large numbers.  As he says, freedom is popular, and a freedom candidate would enlist a new generation of freedom lovers in the movement to take our country back.

He was Tea Party when it was a party of one.  He had the drop on Wall Street before it was Occupied.  He’s a pro-life libertarian and an anti-war conservative, the fly in everyone’s ointment.  If you are looking for the anti-Obama, there is only one choice that will satisfy – Congressman Ron Paul of Texas.     

“Moment Of Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D.  Visit Tim’s website http://www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.    

For The Poor

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You can’t be for the poor and against the things that endpoverty.

You can’t be against the corporations who create the jobsthey need to care for themselves.  Youcan’t be against the Walmarts and Targets who sell quality goods at prices theycan afford.  You can’t be against thedrug companies who treat their chronic diseases. 

You can’t be against the mining projects that will liftwhole communities out of economic depression.  You can’t be against the pipelines and energy projects that powerprosperity for everyone.  You can’t beagainst the liberation of industry from smothering regulations that limit theirjob opportunities.  You can’t be againsttheir Right to Work.  Not if you are forthe poor.

You can’t be against parental rights.  You can’t be hostile to the religioustraditions that keep poor families strong. You can’t be against school choice that gives them a chance to beeducated and equipped with life skills. You can’t be against alternative education opportunities that deliver vocationalskills.   

You can’t be for a political philosophy that celebratesdependence and need.  You can’t be for aprohibitionist drug war that incarcerates fathers and empowers gangs.  You can’t be for a bloated government thatsiphons off resources earmarked for poor families and breeds corruption.  You can’t be for a caste system of ineffectivegovernment programs that assign stations for life based on race.   Not ifyou are for the poor.

You can’t hate the rich and be for the poor.  It is not your place to tell another how manysteps forward out of poverty you will allow before you punish the next – nobodymade you Simon.  Each person decides forhimself/herself how much is enough, how much to give back, who to give it backto, and in exchange for what.  If you areunhappy with how your sister spends her millions, make millions of your own anddo with them as you see fit. 

We all started out equal – naked, crying, totally ignorant, and100% dependent.  We came into this world fullyvested with a complete set of natural rights endowed by God and protected by ourConstitution.  Equal at birth and unequalat death; what separates us at the end is the lifetime of choices we have madefor ourselves.  Money, friends, love,knowledge, wisdom, faith, humor, charity, kindness, skill, joy – our wealth inall of its forms is acquired over a lifetime bit by bit.   

Good fortune is not announced with cameras rolling and EdMcMahon at our doorstep presenting a six-foot check for millions ofdollars.  It sneaks into our lives unannounced- disguised as the stern parent, the tough class, the demanding coach, the disabilitywe overcame, the bad job that inspired us to go back to school, the infatuationthat turned to lifetime love, the precious child that made us put our childishways behind us, the business that failed so we could learn how to do it rightthe next time, the bad break that turned out to be the best thing that ever happened.   

Bad fortune doesn’t bother with a disguise.  It is the bad marriage we saw coming, the addictivedrug we knew we should pass on, the debt we knew we could not afford, thedrunken drive we could have avoided, the investment our spouse told us was toogood to be true, the bad crowd we were warned against, the classes we skipped,the diseases we brought onto ourselves with unhealthy lifestyles, the job wetook despite the bad feeling we had at the interview.  

Poverty is not a birth defect or a life sentence.  For most of us, it is a curable and transientcondition; most everyone I know has tasted it while only a few have acquiredthe appetite.  Longitudinal studies showthat over a lifetime, most people born into households below the poverty linerise two income quintiles or more.  Youcannot be against capitalism and its signature upward mobility if you are forthe poor who most benefit from it.

Libertarians do not hate poor people; we hate the thingsthat keep them poor.  One of those thingsis an oversized activist government that breeds dependence.  Our goal is not to make poverty bearable; ratherit is to make it temporary.    

     

“MomentOf Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D.  Visit Tim’s website www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.     

China Trade

Everybody has an opinion about trade with China, and here is mine:  let’s trade ‘em Ben Bernanke for Fu Ying.  Throw in a minor league pitcher if we have to – President Obama comes immediately to mind.

Fu Ying is China’s Vice Foreign Minister, who Friday announced that China would not use its foreign exchange reserves (i.e. dollars) to rescue other countries (i.e. Europe).  She explained that “foreign reserves are akin to savings” and not to be squandered by governments.  Whoa.

While the U.S. and European central bankers have all promised to infuse defunct European governments with as much cash as it takes for them to become even more defunct, Ms. Fu has decided to “follow market economy principles” instead, which she listed as “safety, liquidity, and proper profitability.”   Yes, the “P” word!  

Her explanation in China Daily reads like the Daily Paul. She does not believe that Europe can be saved by bankers; she does not believe economic decisions should be driven by political considerations; she does not believe that foreign investments should be made to gain power and leverage over another nation’s affairs.  She does not see debt as a pathway to prosperity.  Have mercy.

Ms. Fu makes the gibberish spewed by Fed Chairman Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Geithner sound like…gibberish.  Our money men lobby the Chinese to strengthen their Yuan to assist us in weakening our dollar, and then we call them currency manipulators when they refuse to play along.  We lecture China about lack of transparency while Bernanke is pumping unknown trillions into the western banking cartel in secret.    

While the Chinese decided not to risk a nickel on Greek debt, they invested almost $400 million into Hungarian factories in just the past few months.  Not because they particularly love Hungary, but because they make stuff at a profit in those factories. Those are the “market economy principles” that the Chinese seem to understand completely and we seem to have forgotten entirely. 

They bet on winners while we bet on the losers’ banks. That is why their economy is growing and wages are rising, while our economy is stagnant and our wages are falling.  China’s economic growth has “cooled” to 9.2%; that is suckage here. 

Winning is why the tone of a China Daily article on the burgeoning yacht market here was so prideful; a nation that could not even feed itself a generation ago is now buying yachts.  The Chinese are not ashamed of prosperity; they are grateful for it, and to the people who have brought it to them.  We take our far-greater abundance for granted.

The Chinese people have actually lived the squalor of atheism and communism.   They know what it is like to be equal – equally starving.  They tried “We are the 100%” for half a century and it left them as the collective owners of nothing worth occupying.

And they learned first-hand how unlimited government power turns to mass murder; they cry on the graves that taught them.  They don’t need a lecture from Ben Bernanke about central banking or central economic planning or central anything else for that matter.  While we make noise, they make things. They don’t theorize about free trade here in China; they trade. 

The Mayor of Zhengzhou City joined us for dinner on Sunday night after a long day of work.  “Us” is a group of Canadian, American, and Chinese firms doing a deal without the assistance (or should I say interference) of our governments.  All of us were working yet another Sunday at the end yet another 80-hour work week while our own President was calling us lazy on his way out a 17-day vacation from doing nothing about our nation’s problems.  Eat your own peas, Mr. Obama. 

The President also had the gall to tell a high school audience that market economies have never worked.  Perhaps he should order his Department of Teleprompters to cook something up for him since that thing the capitalists invented must be an illusion.  Or try this: come to the border of the Koreas, look North then South and tell me which one works – markets or government.  The trouble with things plainly obvious is that they can’t be seen by people whose heads reside deep inside the orifice. 

President Obama’s singular achievement in the realm of industrial policy was to commandeer General Motors and deliver them to his union patrons.  We now have to recall 40,000 Government Motors Volts before they blow up and explain the 653,000 cars sitting in dealer inventories built to make GM appear profitable after the government bought it.  He is half-right: market machinery doesn’t work when he is the operator.  And it was not the market that gave us 15,000 abandoned windmills when the government subsidies and tax breaks dried up; it is going to take a boatload of carbon and scads of dollars to tear them all down and dispose of all that metal.   Thank you again for saving the planet.

That’s exactly the kind of nonsense Mao used to do over here – build a mountain of unneeded tractors according to the 5-year plan just to prove the 5-year plan was genius.  It is the sort of thing that makes sense to people who spend other people’s money for a living and know nothing else.  In case you have learned your history in a government school, here’s what comes next – censor anyone who questions the pile of tractors (or wind turbines, or Chevrolets), detain the ones who won’t shut up about it (just passed that law), and eventually start killing en masse when the prisons fill up. 

Talk to an ancient Chinese person and they will tell you that they never dreamed it could ever come to that in China, either.  No one ever does until the relatives start to go missing.       

Socialism’s apologists will bemoan the income gap in China just as they do in the United States, and just like Chairman Mao did here when he forced his capitalists out of the country and took their property 75 years ago.  But according to the World Bank, only 4% of Chinese live below the world consumption poverty line now, down dramatically from over 65% when economic liberation began in the 1990’s. 

Poverty was not cured by Mao’s government-imposed equality; he made it lethal.  Poverty was eradicated in China when they rejected the socialist ideology and turned to wise leaders – like Fu Ying and Mayor Hu – who were committed to “follow market economy principles” and let their new 1% lift a whole nation out of despair.  Maybe President Obama can find some time on his vacation to read a little Friedman or Hayek; or maybe Mayor Hu would lend the President his autographed copy of “Capitalista!” to start him off gently.      

Shared sacrifice is only a noble goal if your aim is to be sacrificed in the first place.  They have had their fill of the collectivist lie in China, and they are putting it in their rear view mirror by adopting American’s gift to the world – free enterprise.  Bring on the yachts.   

“Moment Of Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D.  Visit Tim’s website http://www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.    

On Your Own

Speaking at a fundraiser this week, President Obama tried to frighten Americans with the grim warning that if he is not re-elected in 2012, “you will be on your own.”  Promises, promises.

Fear not, wards of the State; on January 21 of 2013, the only part of government that we will be rid of is the current occupant of the White House.  There will be another President, and he or she will preside over the same unmanageable leviathan that Mr. Obama would like us to believe will simply vanish into thin air if he is not re-employed to run it for four additional years.   If only it were that easy. 

There is no question that this is now a nation divided, and the President’s dire warning brings the line of separation into clear focus.  To the dependent class, the idea of being left “on your own” is terrifying.  To the producing class, it is liberating.   Pick your side. 

What is wrong with being on our own?  That was our #1 priority growing up.  As teenagers we could not wait to graduate from high school, to get our own car, to get the heck out of our boring little mining town, to get out from under our parent’s stupid rules, and to go out and find our place in the world.  

Some of us went into the service, some of us went to college, some of us went to work in the big cities, some of us went to California or Arizona or Las Vegas or Alaska, and some of us stayed home.  We discovered that the world had not reserved a place for us to “find”; we discovered how to make our own way in the world.  And we did – on our own.

We became doctors, lawyers, architects, executives, professional golfers, radio personalities, business owners, teachers, firemen, pastors, airline flight attendants, career military, casino dealers, accountants, public administrators, nurses, salespeople, artists, welders, loggers, firefighters, mechanics, beauticians, tavern owners, and every other profession and trade imaginable.   We wanted to make our friends and family proud of us and we did – on our own.

We became parents, spouses, volunteers, advocates, investors, philanthropists, community leaders, chaperones, mentors, coaches, bloggers, advisors, board members, deacons, council members, scoutmasters, carolers, big brothers and sisters, fundraisers.  We wanted to make a difference and we did – on our own.

We did not do all those things because government made us; we would not stop if there was no government to give us its permission.  And “on our own” does not mean alone – we were taught by our mentors, encouraged by our friends, supported by our families, strengthened by our congregations, inspired by great leaders, challenged by our adversaries, and developed by our bosses, paid by our customers, made great by our competitors. 

If President Obama is not re-elected, we will not be alone; we will still have our mentors, friends, families, congregations, leaders, adversaries, bosses, customers, and competitors.  But according to him, we will be on our own; and thank God if he is right.  Because that’s what freedom is – being on your own. 

The President encourages his constituency to think like children – afraid to be on their own, jealous of the other kids’ toys, coveting the bigger allowances of the neighbor kids, angry at their own parents for not giving more, frustrated that life is unfair.  They hate the rich for being rich, the pretty for being pretty, the happy for being happy, and the winners for winning.  They demand a world of stickers and hugs and do-overs; they don’t like bedtime and they don’t like to get up and they don’t mind pitching a fit in public so we can all be unhappy with them.

And Mr. Obama has also burdened his opponents with the unwanted responsibility to be the parents of his beloved dependent class.  We resent having to care for our shiftless and surly teenagers; we tire of their sass, their ingratitude, their eye-rolling certainty that we are stupid and uncool.  We have tired of paying their way, fixing the car they crash over and over, apologizing for their rude behavior in public.

All of us have been teenagers, and many of us have now raised teenagers, so we can see a bit of ourselves in both caricatures.  And we know what it took to put the rancor and resentments that builds between parents and children behind us and to start again to treat each other with respect.  What it took was for the teenager to move out and live on their own.  That is when we got along.  

When our son went out on his own, it was my proudest day as a parent.  We knew he would struggle, as we did; we knew he would make bad choices and suffer painful consequences, as we did; we knew that he would become responsible when he had to; as we did.  And we trusted him that he would succeed on his own terms, taking care of himself and his family and helping others in their hour of need.  The rebellious youth became a man – on his own.  Same as it ever was.

Need is not an acceptable lifestyle choice; dependent is not a career.  If we cannot live on our own, who are we supposed to live “on”?   Who is it that owes us our existence at their expense?  Why is it our neighbor’s obligation to fend for us when we will not fend for ourselves?  Who will keep us when all of our brothers are kept?

The President has done us the great service of presenting his vision for American with rare and remarkable clarity – a nation of stunted-development dependents incapable of living on their own.  And he has revealed to us the full measure of his ego – the entire nation of wards could not possibly survive without him as our President. 

Mr. Obama, you can spend the rest of your life dependent on the government and its pension – being President is a tough job and you have earned it.  But the rest of us would be thrilled to live on our own, to make this the land of the free again.  Thank you for telling us what we need to do to bring that dream to reality.        

“Moment Of Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D.  Visit Tim’s website http://www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.