FOUND WANTING

Posted on February 20, 2012 by

When Britain was faced with either going to war to protect Czechoslovakia or giving in to Hitler’s demands, they chose appeasement.[i]  The cheering throng welcomed Britain’s Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain home and rejoiced in his promise that by giving in they would have “Peace for our time.”  Instead they got World War II.

Winston Churchill, the great war-time leader who replaced Neville Chamberlain as Prime Minister, made the most damning indictment he could of Chamberlain’s sacrifice of Czechoslovakia to appease Nazi Germany.  In speaking to Parliament upon Chamberlain’s return he said:

“We have suffered a total and unmitigated defeat . . . . the terrible words have for the time being been pronounced against the Western democracies: “Thou art weighed in the balance and found wanting.”  Churchill prophesied that only with “a supreme recovery of moral health and martial vigour, [could Britain]  arise again and take our stand for freedom as in the olden time.” [ii]  That is precisely what Britain did!

Why did this incredibly gifted speaker choose to phrase his condemnation, so pointedly meaningful for his audience, with the words: “Thou art weighed in the balance and found wanting?”

How many in this generation could even comprehend what Churchill was saying?  Churchill’s wording is an exact quote from an even more damning warning given through the Old Testament prophet Daniel to Belshazzar, King of Babylon.  How far has Western culture strayed from its Biblical foundation since Churchill’s time so that now, due to Biblical illiteracy, few understand the powerful Biblical reference used by Churchill—a reference he expected to resonate with all listeners in his day.

Churchill was reminding Parliament of what happened at a huge feast in ancient times when King Belshazzar was wining and dining the lords of his kingdom using vessels the Babylonians had plundered from Solomon’s temple in Jerusalem.  During the feast a hand appeared and wrote on the wall.  No one could interpret until Daniel, the Jewish prophet, was called.  He told Belshazzar:

“And this is the writing that was written, MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN.  This is the interpretation of the thing: MENE; God hath numbered thy kingdom, and finished it.  TEKEL; Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting.  PERES; Thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians. (Daniel 5:22 – 31)”

The prophesy was fulfilled that night.  The Medes and Persians overthrew Babylon which has been a ruin to this day.

This story is the common heritage of Jews and Christians.  For century after century Judeo-Christian scriptures informed the thinking of leaders of the Western world.  It was part of that powerful faith that lead the Founding Fathers to proclaim so boldly that there was a Creator who endowed us with life, liberty and the right to pursue happiness.  How can a nation, ignorant of that foundation, hope to preserve the institutions they created?  How can those who believe mankind is no more than the accidental effusion of a hostile planet protect the Constitution crafted on such religious premises?

A tidal wave of secularism has swept over Europe and America since Churchill’s day.  Those who claim all religion is a superstitious search for meaning where there is none now dominate much of academia and the media.  Religious literacy has plummeted.  How many of this generation, visiting the magnificent cathedrals of Europe, can tell the stories displayed most beautifully in stained glass windows?  In ages past, everyone could.  Expressions of belief in God, and theories premised on there being an intelligent Creator, are excluded from schools and civic functions with the rigor once reserved for witch hunts.  Lost to our political culture is the fact that it was their belief in a Creator that empowered the founders of this nation to craft the Declaration of Independence and our marvelous Constitution.  It was Thomas Paine’s call to Biblical precedents in Common Sense that lifted a nation from an attitude of subservience to one fighting for independence.  Can we pass that that most precious heritage onto our posterity if we do not also pass on the religious beliefs upon which it is based?

Atheism is essentially and unavoidably pessimistic.  If mankind is no more noble than germs—just another branch of evolving life—then the death of mankind in a nuclear holocaust is no more meaningful than the death of billions of bacteria each time someone washes their hands.  Atheists claim that mankind keeps turning to religion/superstition because of some frantic need to find meaning for life amid its inevitable challenges.  They are wrong.  Rather we are religious because we know, innately, that there is a deep, abiding significance not only to life generally, but to our individual lives—that there is something perfectible about every human being.  We know we do not live just to die and disappear.  It is that outlook, that religious outlook, that underlies our country’s greatness, not some federal program or bureaucratic regulation.  It is the scriptures that deal with the truly great problems of life— and provide the great solutions.

Believers should not submit to the ignorant demands of those who, through inadequate religious education or outright rejection, have no spiritual roots.  We want religion to be independent of government control and government to be neutral on religious issues.  But we do not want our country or our culture to become a religious vacuum as many atheists so ardently demand.  Such a moral vacuum will collapse on itself, destroying the religious foundation of this country.  If we permit that to happen then it will be said of this generation: “Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting!”

[i]  See post on “Appeasement”, January 9, 2012 in truthtofreedom.com

[ii]  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munich_Agreement

Posted in Defending Freedom, Freedom of Religion, Political Culture | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

OBAMACARE

Posted on February 13, 2012 by

Our society, as all others have, must face the question: what level of care should we provide to those who are unable to care for themselves?  Sometimes that inability is due to conditions beyond anyone’s control—such as ill health or accident.  Sometimes it is due to bad choices—out of ignorance, or defiant choices made willfully.  These individuals—and even more so their children—will suffer severely if others do not provide what they cannot.

Imagine a child with an unknown father and a single mother on drugs.  The child falls down the stairs and breaks his arm.  Should our society stand by and say: “Because of the abysmally bad choices made by your parents (who have neither health insurance nor funds to pay for hospital care) your broken arm must go untreated!”  Of course not!  This shared belief, held by almost all Americans—that no one should be denied essential health care—is the root issue dealt with by Obamacare.  If we as a society are going to insist that everyone get health care, we also as a society must determine how it will be paid for.

Our insistence that no one be denied essential health care is embodied in the EMTALA.  As stated in Wikipedia:

The Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA) is a U.S. Act of Congress passed in 1986 [Reagan’s second term] . . . requires hospitals to provide care to anyone needing  emergency healthcare treatment regardless of citizenship, legal status or ability to pay.  THERE ARE NO REIMBURSEMENT PROVISIONS.  [emphasis added]  [In other words, Congress required that everyone receive emergency medical care but provided no funding]. . . .  In practical terms, EMTALA applies to virtually all hospitals in the U.S.

The cost of emergency care required by EMTALA is not directly covered by the federal government.  Because of this, the law has been criticized by some as an unfunded mandate.  Similarly, it has attracted controversy for its impacts on hospitals, and in particular, for its possible contributions to an emergency medical system that is “overburdened, underfunded and highly fragmented.”  MORE THAN HALF OF ALL EMERGENCY ROOM CARE IN THE U.S. NOW GOES UNCOMPENSATED.  [emphasis added]  Hospitals write off such care as charity or bad debt for tax purposes.  [Which means they pass the cost, at least partially, on to taxpayers].  Increasing financial pressures on hospitals in the period since EMTALA’s passage have caused consolidations and closures, so the number of emergency rooms is decreasing despite increasing demand for emergency care.  There is also debate about the extent to which EMTALA has led to cost shifting and higher rates for insured or paying hospital patients, thereby contributing to the high overall rate of medical inflation in the U.S.[i]  [Which means they pass the rest of the cost on to those who do pay for hospital care by charging them more].

An emergency room doctor tells me of a young couple bringing in their baby with diaper rash because they didn’t want to pay to go to a doctor and apparently because they had never heard of Desitin.

Obamacare appears to be a genuine attempt to get all of those who are free-loading on the health care system to help pay for it.  President Obama, however, was terrified of being accused of raising taxes on the middle and lower economic classes, so Obamacare doesn’t do the obvious: simply compel everyone to pay extra taxes to reimburse hospitals for their care.  Instead it compels everyone to purchase health insurance or be fined.  The result for the hospitals is the same.  They will now get reimbursed by this compulsory insurance.  The result for all of the free-loaders is the same.  Instead of being compelled to pay a tax, they are compelled to purchase health insurance.  Either way it is a compulsory payment.[ii]

The odd fall-out of this political strategy is that President Obama really is taxing those he promised not to tax but refuses to admit it.  The cost of this deception to the country is that Obamacare’s compulsory health insurance can only be justified as a constitutionally authorized regulation of interstate commerce—an extension of the already hyper-extended federal power into an area never dreamt of by the drafters of the Constitution.  They were very specific in creating a federal government with enumerated powers listed in the Constitution.  To make it emphatically clear that nothing should be added, the Tenth amendment to the Constitution states: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

The difference between “Romneycare”—a compulsory health insurance program adopted by the state legislature of Massachusetts—and Obamacare— federally mandated health insurance for the nation—is the Tenth Amendment.  Romneycare in no way conflicts with the U.S. Constitution.  Obamacare contradicts it.  The dangers of using Congress’s power to “regulate commerce . . . among the several states” as the far-fetched justification for Obamacare is that, if upheld, it will (unfortunately, once again) prove that the Supreme Court has erased the concept that the federal government should be one of limited powers and that all residual powers lie in the states and individuals.

All debate over national healthcare should focus on the real issue: Who is going to pay for health care, particularly emergency room care, for those who either cannot or won’t pay for it themselves?  When debating Obamacare two things should be emphasized: (1) it really is a tax on the middle and some of the lower class; and (2) it is a quintessential example of federal power being extended far beyond any reasonable reading of the Constitution.  There is no debate over whether or not we are going to provide at least emergency room health care for all.  Even Reagan believed in that.  He just didn’t find a way to pay for it.  That is what we should be debating.  Is it the role of the constitutionally limited federal government to fund it—and if so, how—or is it one of those issues left to the states by the Tenth Amendment?

 

[i]  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_Medical_Treatment_and_Active_Labor_Act

[ii] Except that, like current income taxes, the poor pay none.  Medicaid is vastly expanded to cover low income individuals.  Illegal immigrants must still be cared for my hospitals without compensation.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patient_ Protection_ and_Affordable_Care_Act

Posted in Unfair Taxation | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

PAYING OFF THE PRAETORIAN GUARD

Posted on February 6, 2012 by

As Rome changed from a Kingdom to a Republic and finally to an Empire, individual political rights steadily declined.  In the Empire, the Emperor ruled autocratically, arbitrarily killing any who opposed—or who were suspected of opposing—him.  The legislative powers held earlier by the Roman Citizen’s Assembly and then by the Commoner’s Assembly were stripped and transferred, ultimately to the Emperor.[i]  Emperors, in turn, learned they had to pay off the military to stay in power.  That strategy lives again today as some of those seeking re-election promise ever-more generous benefits to those who vote for them.

Illustrative is the tale of Commodus (161-192 A.D.), son of the venerated Marcus Aurelius, and his successor.  Upon his becoming Roman Emperor, Commodus promptly withdrew the army from a difficult campaign—much to the disgust of his generals.  He gave each of the plebians (free citizens of Rome) the unprecedented gift of 725 denarii each (1 denarius = $20).[ii]  He had coins minted naming himself “Munificentia Augusta”.  Commodus obtained the funds for this munificence by taxing the Senatorial Class—taxing the richest one percent more so he could distribute largesse to the plebeians.  “While the Senate hated Commodus, the army and the lower classes loved him.”[iii]  He was unrestrained in his own personal behavior and merciless to any who opposed him.  He put so many of the nobility to death that hardly any of the former leaders of Rome survived.[iv]  His generosity left Rome broke.  Gibbons, in his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, reports: “Though every measure of injustice and extortion had been adopted, which could collect the property of the subject into the coffers of the prince; the rapaciousness of Commodus had been so inadequate to his extravagance, that, upon his death, no more than eight thousand pounds were found in the exhausted treasury to defray the current expenses of government and to discharge the pressing demand of a liberal donative, which the new emperor had been obliged to promise to the Praetorian Guard.”[v]

Why did even the almost bankrupt new emperor have to “discharge the pressing demand” for a money donative to the army?  In an empire, or tyranny of any sort, the tyrant can only retain power with the support of the army—just as in a democracy the president can only retain power with the support of the voters.  Roman emperors quickly learned that they had to buy-off the Praetorian Guard both to obtain and to stay in power.  The Praetorian Guard were allowed within the City of Rome and provided the real muscle to enforce the emperor’s whims.  That is why the emperor who followed Commodus had to promise to pay off the Praetorian Guard even though Rome was broke.  After only 86 days of rule, however, the Praetorian Guard got rid of the new emperor and put the emperorship up for auction.  Didius Julianus outbid Sulpicianus at the gates of the Praetorian camp and was promptly crowned.  He, in turn, lasted only 66 days, but that is another story of the army replacing one tyrant with another.[vi]  Donativum[vii] to the soldiers and Congiarium[viii] to the plebians—both gifts of money—were routine parts of the Roman political process.

They are also a routine part of the American political process.  Pay-offs to likely voters are pandemic in America: the Earned Income Tax Credit, exemptions from taxes and fees and ever more grants of free services and benefits to those who are in the favored group, and the opposite for those who are not.  This generosity has become an essential part of the electoral process—even when everyone acknowledges the country is already broke and must borrow money just to meet current debts.  Analyze each re-election speech you hear and make a list of how many promises it contains of even more benefits to voters.  For example, the recent State of the Union speech promised: more money for school teachers, extending reduced interest rates on student loans and the tuition tax credit, amnesty for illegal immigrants in school or military, funding for universities doing research, subsidies for new energy sources, more tax credits for clean energy and cutting energy use in business buildings, vastly increased construction projects (using half of the savings from pulling the army out of Iraq and Afghanistan),  cutting the payroll tax by $40/person, and tax credits for businesses that hire veterans.  Who couldn’t like that stuff?  Just like who could turn down 725 denarii?

The Praetorian Guard should have been protecting Rome, not auctioning off the emperorship.  Now whole sections of the electorate seem willing to auction off the presidency, heedless of the competence of who they are electing or re-electing.  Don’t doubt that the promises in the State of the Union are a donative.  Were they legitimate proposals for legislation, they would have been made three years ago when the president had total control of Congress, not now—so tardily—in an election year.

We need voters who value the priceless right we have to pick the leaders of our country, not as something to be sold to the highest bidder, but rather as a privilege to choose who will make America prosperous and great.  That is our great challenge in this election year.

[i]    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_assemblies

[ii]    http://dougsmith.ancients.info/worth.html

[iii]   http://www.roman-emperors.org/commod.htm

[iv]  Will Durrant, Caesar and Christ, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1944), 447

[v]   Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Emnpire, Abridged and Illustrated,  (New York: Gallery Books, 1979), 39.

[vi]    Id, 41-42.

[vii]   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donativum

[viii]  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congiarium

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NABOTH’S VINEYARD

Posted on January 30, 2012 by

The Old Testament tells the story of Ahab and his wife Jezebel and how they got Naboth’s Vineyard.  (Ahab was the king of Northern Israel around 850 B.C.)  Naboth had the misfortune of having a vineyard next to the palace.  When Naboth turned down Ahab’s offer to buy the vineyard—refusing to sell because it was his family’s ancestral land—Ahab was so distraught that he lay down on his bed, looked away, and wouldn’t eat.  His wife, Queen Jezebel, asked, in effect, “Aren’t you king of Israel?” and promised to get Naboth’s vineyard.  Why should Naboth’s right to keep his property stand in the way of Ahab’s greed?

Jezebel sent instructions to the “elders and nobles” instructing them to hold a public meeting and to set Naboth in a high place.  Then they should get “two Children of Belial”— that is men who were personifications of evil[i] — to accuse Naboth of blasphemy.  Blasphemy was a capital offense in ancient Israel and two witnesses were required to convict.[ii]  The plan worked; the crowd was enraged by the accusations against Naboth; he was stoned to death; and at Jezebel’s behest Ahab got up and took the vineyard.  It is an illustrative story of a ruler ignoring property rights, turning public opinion against those who resisted his claims to their property, and the political success of using false accusations—even 2,800 years ago.[iii]

Rulers always want the property of others—sometimes merely for self-aggrandizement, often so that they can hand it out to their supporters to gain their loyalty.  In our day, it is common for those in power to use those in control (of the media) to find Children of Belial to demonize the intended victim so the rulers can take their property with impunity.  In our country rulers don’t actually take the money of others to deposit into their own bank accounts; they take it to hand out to voters who will re-elect them.  Don’t be fooled into seeing a difference where there is none: in Ahab’s day they simply plundered the property; today they call it taxes.  Plundering and taxes have the same effect—they both result in private property being taken by force from its legitimate owners.[iv]  It is done on a massive scale by the federal government.

Jezebel’s strategy only works if you pick the right accusation.  Jezebel’s choice of accusation against Naboth was brilliant.  She knew that blasphemy was so detested that it would inflame the passions of those present to carry out her selfish will.  Rulers, and those seeking to be rulers, do the same today.  They artfully choose accusations that will demonize those who oppose them.  These accusations are a crystal clear indication of what politicians—whose great talent is diagnosing exactly what will resonate with voters—believe will turn the electorate against their foes.  There is no point in making an accusation unless you expect it to work.

So what accusations do today’s politicians believe will be effective?  How do you get the country so upset that they will demand that the property of others be grabbed and given to the rulers for redistribution to the compliant crowd?  What about accusing today’s Naboths of not contributing their “Fair Share?”  Why should anyone be permitted to keep a vineyard when others want a “Fair Share” of it?  Of course in our day it is a particularly unjustifiable demand, when the Naboth’s of America (that is the wealthiest ten percent—measured by adjusted gross income) are already paying 70 of the income taxes.  If there is anyone not contributing a Fair Share, it is the fifty percent of Americans who pay almost no income taxes.[v]  But a false accusation worked so well for Jezebel 2,800 years ago, why not try it today?

[i]  http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02408a.htm

[ii]  Leviticus 24:16 and Deuteronomy 17:6

[iii] 1 Kings 21.  The story foretells a really bad ending for Ahab and Jezebel because God was very displeased.

[iv]  Admittedly plundering and taxes are different because taxes are imposed by a legislature elected by those taxed.  But see my posts of September 9, 2011 on “Representation without Taxation” and September 16, 2011 on “Compulsory Charity.”

[v]  http://ntu.org/tax-basics/who-pays-income-taxes.html

Posted in Defending Freedom, Unfair Taxation | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

FAIR SHARE vs. PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS

Posted on January 23, 2012 by

I want a “Fair Share.”  Anything less would be—by the very definition of the term—less than “Fair.”  A society where some do not receive a “Fair Share” is—again by definition—not “Fair.”  It follows from the definition itself that, because all of us want both to be “Fair” and to receive a “Fair Share” that we should vote for candidates promising a “Fair Share” to everyone.

The Declaration of Independence, however, says nothing about a “Fair Share.”  The Founding Fathers did not include that in the list—along with Life and Liberty—of rights we have been endowed with by our Creator.  In fact, they believed governments were instituted among men only to guaranty a right to the “Pursuit of Happiness.”  Pursuit means to seek after something.  Whatever share we get is the result of the pursuit.  A government seeking to guaranty the outcomes of the pursuit is one whose fundamental principles will be opposite to one seeking only to provide an environment where free people can pursue happiness.

One great benefit of limiting government’s role to encouraging the pursuit—rather than guaranteeing a “Fair Share” of the results of that pursuit—is that people have very different ideas of what happiness is.  There are some gifted athletes who consider winning an Olympic medal the proper goal for their efforts.  With great sacrifice and skill some have attained that remarkable goal.  They have been permitted to pursue happiness as they chose.  If our national goal, however, is to insure that everyone has a “Fair Share” of what is good, then it would be the government’s obligation to step in and find some way to reallocate Olympic medals so that everyone got a “Fair Share” of them.

Even if one accepted that this all-controlling role for government was proper, it is obviously impossible to achieve.  Only if there were an almost infinite number of Olympic medals, great paying jobs, nice houses, good neighborhoods, excellent schools, competent doctors, cruise ships, nursing homes, etc. could everyone have a “Fair Share” of everything.  That is not true and never will be.  Social Security is a perfect example of government trying to provide a “Fair Share.”  Would anyone freely choose to live on the meager pensions provided by Social Security?  Even at such a minimal level, Social Security is going bankrupt.  So much for a government provided “Fair Share.”

The government has an important and essential role in our society.  But it cannot provide a “Fair Share” of the good life to everyone.  Much of the good life results from the choices we make—and demand the right to make—as individuals.  Many (not all, but many) of those suffering from an obviously skimpy share of the good life can trace the cause of that not back to governmental failure, but rather to family failure.  The institution best at promoting strong families is religion.  Yet, if anything, our government seems determined to short-change its role.

To digress briefly, we need to better identify the roles we expect from the various sectors of our culture.  Corporations, for example, have one purpose: to organize and combine capital, labor and management for the purpose of producing a profit.  Companies that fail to make a profit go out of business.  The purpose of corporations is not to help the poor or maintain people in unprofitable jobs.  In fact it can be argued that it is improper for corporations to be charitable.  Rather than some board of directors giving away the profits of the company to their favored charity, the board should distribute those profits as dividends to the shareholders and let them decide who should receive charity.  Another example: churches have a completely different role from government or corporations.  They are very good at providing charity.  But they would not be good at running a car company.  For a church to be running GM would ruin both the church and GM.  Asking government to fill the roles of both corporations and churches is like using a hammer to drive in a screw.

The point is, corporations, churches, the government and other institutions have different roles and capabilities.  To demand that government guarantee an equal outcome despite all of the disparate choices people make in life is not only completely outside the intended role of our government, it is also a role government is incapable of filling.  The role of the federal government is well defined in the U.S. Constitution.  There is not a word, or a suggestion of a theory, in that document that the federal government’s job is to insure we all get a “Fair Share.”  The proposal that the federal government should do so would require a basic transformation of our country—for the worst!

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REPUDIATE!

Posted on January 16, 2012 by

Rise Up, Teenagers of America!  Cast off your chains!  Escape from Debtor’s Prison!  Break off the iron band of debt your government is clasping around your necks.  Young men and women of America, wake up!  Your federal government is at war with you.  They are sacrificing your future to pay for their selfish political goals.  Your generation will be crushed under a huge national debt because the federal government is ever increasing that debt with no practical plan for paying it off.

Right now the federal government is in debt over $15,000,000,000,000.[i]  (That’s fifteen trillion dollars!)  At the minimum wage of $7.25 per hour you (and your friends) would have to work over two trillion hours at McDonald’s to pay it off.  The national debt has increased $4 trillion dollars in the last three years under President Obama so the debt is not going up slowly—it’s skyrocketing![ii]  How much of it do you owe?  If you divide the national debt by the total population of the United States each person—every man, woman, child, illegal immigrant, etc.—would have to come up with over $48,500  to pay it off.[iii]  The real number is far worse—the amount the federal government has promised to pay but doesn’t have the money for (unfunded liabilities) is over $1,000,000 per person.[iv]

Why is the federal government so much in debt?  It is because the federal government spends far more money than it takes in.  In fact, of every dollar the government spends, 43 cents is borrowed.[v]  Why haven’t you heard about this?  It is because many of your government leaders are deceiving you.  First and foremost, they do it by silence.  Every day you will hear them anguishing over some emergency or tragedy unless the huge federal government spending level is continued—or increased.  But they rarely speak about the elephant in the room—the national debt.  It is amazing how little it is discussed by politicians seeking re-election.  All they talk about is how some group won’t get federal (your) money if they aren’t re-elected.  It is a constant chorus of how they need to spend money, but rarely a whisper about the fact that the government doesn’t have any.  Everyone admits the country is heading for a Debt Wreck but few are doing anything to prevent it. [vi]

How can the federal government keep borrowing so much money?  It is because people who lend the money to the government trust the government.  But governments gets almost all of its money by taxing.  It really means lenders expect you to pay it off.  Nothing is more obvious than that the President and Senators who make these bad decisions cannot restrain spending.  It is like a drug habit for them.  They are buying votes with your money and your future.  This is not hyperbole.  If the time came when the government couldn’t pay its debts, if others refused to constantly be loaning it money, all federal programs—including tuition grants, Medicare, Social Security, even the defense that protects us from tyrants—would be crippled.  It would be a disaster.

The government borrows money by selling bonds.  Someone with money loans it to the government and gets a bond—which is a promise to pay back what is loaned plus interest.  The largest lender to the U.S. is the government of China.[vii]  Obviously the Chinese and others wouldn’t loan money to the federal government, the debt wouldn’t keep increasing, unless the Chinese expected to get their money back in the future.  The federal government is doing nothing to even pretend they are going to come up with the money to pay it back now.  Instead they just keep borrowing more to pay off past debts when they become due, but never decreasing the amount owed.  That means one thing:  all of that debt will either have to be repaid by you or you will witness national bankruptcy first hand!  Yes, all of the foolhardy expenditures of the federal government are going to end up in your lap.  How can they get away with it?  It’s easy.  YOU DON’T VOTE.  They buy votes by giving money and benefits to people who do vote and then dump the requirement of paying off the national debt on the next generation, who can’t vote yet.  It is Taxation without Representation in its worst form.  This generation of voters is setting you up to pay huge taxes you never agreed to.  Remember the Patriots revolted because of such unfairness.

Here is what you can do.  First, make it clear to your parents that you are upset that they are being so careless about your future!  It really is outrageous.  It would be like them giving you a credit card as you went off to college, and then discovering in your first monthly statement from the bank that your parents had charged $48,500 to your account before giving you the card!  Second, demand in school that you learn about this very real threat to your future—the national debt.  They teach in school about how to respond to natural disasters: tornadoes, earthquakes, hurricanes.  You hold fire drills so you can safely escape from burning buildings.  But is anyone teaching you about the impending fiscal disaster and the total absence of any plan to save you from it?  Every State school board should require even elementary school classes to be taught about the foolhardiness of federal spending and how it will impact you when you become adults.  You’re being set up to be blindsided!

There is something real that your generation can do.  Repudiate the debt!  Refuse to pay it!  Use your cell phones and social media to agree among yourselves, even now in your youth, that you will not pay off the huge national debt incurred by your parents.  Sign pledges firmly committing that when you reach voting age you will elect only representatives and vote only for a president who will repudiate the repayment of any debt incurred before you could vote.  Publicize that intention so that the Chinese and everyone else will stop lending money you are expected to pay off.  Anyone foolish enough to loan to our government knowing that all young voters are planning to repudiate all federal loans once they reach voting age will get what they deserve—nothing.  That gives the government 18 years to pay off the national debt.

If there is any political fact that is undeniable, it is that our federal government cannot restrain itself from spending your money.  There is no reasonable hope that this administration will change.  They will keep borrowing until the country goes bankrupt—at which point all debts will be repudiated.  You need to stop it.  Voters of this generation have failed you by electing and re-electing leaders who care little for your country’s fiscal future.  Let everyone know that you will not be responsible for any debts agreed to by a Congress you did not elect.  Repudiate now!  Save yourselves and save the country!

[i]  http://www.usdebtclock.org/

[ii] http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20095704-503544.html

[iii] http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/

[iv] http://www.usdebtclock.org/

[vi]  The Congressional Budget Office recently reported: “Without significant changes in government policy, those factors will boost federal outlays sharply relative to GDP in coming decades under any plausible assumptions about future trends in the economy, demographics, and health care costs.”  http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/122xx/doc12212/2011_06_22_summary.pdf

[vii] http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/moneymatters/ss/How-Much-US-Debt-Does-China-Own.htm.  The government pretends that Social Security and the Federal Reserve are the largest debt holders—but that is really money it owes to itself and doesn’t have money to repay.

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APPEASEMENT

Posted on January 9, 2012 by

Britain faced a terrible dilemma in 1938.  Nazi Germany was preparing for war, threatening all of the countries around it.  The immediate threat was that they would attack Czechoslovakia, a much smaller country bordering on Germany.  England and France wanted to protect Czechoslovakia, but it appeared to do so would mean war with Germany.  There were two roads ahead: one was to prepare for war; the second was appeasement—agree to the demands of the German government, sacrifice Czechoslovakia, and trust in German promises that it would not seek further conquests.

Congressional leaders, and the voters of America, face their own dilemma today.  The federal government is borrowing 43 percent of every dollar it spends. [i]   The national debt now exceeds the gross national product of the country.[ii]  Continuing on this road, the country will go bankrupt.  At first individual programs like student loans, Medicare and Social Security will have to be drastically reduced.  Even more threatening will be America’s inability to fund its very powerful but very expensive military defense.  The wishes of the country’s enemies will come true.  Some will argue the U.S. can avoid this by simply printing money, and paying back all of its loans with near worthless paper money.  Unfortunately as soon as those who loan to the country perceive that is our country’s strategy, future borrowing will be difficult or impossible—plunging a country that depends upon loans into bankruptcy.

We could declare war on this debt.  We could pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting Congress and the President from spending so recklessly.  We could begin a dramatic effort to cut back federal spending now and at least head in the direction of paying down the national debt.  But doing this will require serious sacrifice and cost votes.  In fact, it could cost politicians so many votes they won’t get re-elected.  Their political enemies pounce whenever anyone suggests cutting federal spending—describing the poor families that will lose their homes, the veterans who will go uncared for, the children who will be hungry—if spending is cut.  These politicians, elected by those who take money from the government but many of whom pay no taxes, care little for America’s fiscal future.

Others, more responsible, speak against the debt and were elected in the hopes that they could restrain it.  But, ultimately, they face the dilemma.  If they take strong steps to cut federal spending, they and their party may lose the next election.  Given this political reality, they choose to do what Britain did in 1938—Appease!  It is so pleasant to rely on the hope that surrender to threatening political demands now will somehow lead to a better future.

Britain’s Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, met with the leaders of Germany, France and Italy (but not Czechoslovakia!) in September 1938 just as Germany was threatening to invade that little country.  Relying on Germany’s promise of future good behavior, Chamberlain agreed to German demands, coming home to cheering crowds proclaiming: “My good friends, for the second time in our history a British Prime Minister has returned from Germany bringing peace with honour.  I believe it is peace for our time.”

His political opponent, Winston Churchill, had a more accurate view:

“We have suffered a total and unmitigated defeat…you will find that in a period of time which may be measured by years, but may be measured by months, Czechoslovakia will be engulfed in the Nazi régime. We are in the presence of a disaster of the first magnitude…we have sustained a defeat without a war, the consequences of which will travel far with us along our road…we have passed an awful milestone in our history, when . . . the terrible words have for the time being been pronounced against the Western democracies: “Thou art weighed in the balance and found wanting”. And do not suppose that this is the end. This is only the beginning of the reckoning. This is only the first sip, the first foretaste of a bitter cup which will be proffered to us year by year unless by a supreme recovery of moral health and martial vigour, we arise again and take our stand for freedom as in the olden time.”

The cost of appeasement was great.  German officers, who would have overthrown Hitler, backed down.  Russia, realizing how undependable Western leaders were, aligned itself with Germany, which in turn led to Germany’s invasion of Poland and World War II.[iii]  British public opinion turned bitterly against the appeasers.  Germany’s leaders despised them.  They have been vilified for generations.  Bowing in appeasement to the unreasonable and unsustainable demands of your enemies only strengthens them and weakens you.  It does not prevent the war.  There will be a political war over the national debt.  All of the talk, all of the promises, all of the baseless hopes that the big spenders now in charge in Washington will somehow relent in their rush to Debt Wreck are worthless.  Vote for those who are willing to fight now!

[ii]  http://www.usdebtclock.org/

[iii] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munich_Agreement

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