Category Archives: Government

Government Begat Government Which Begat More Government

Government, Intellectual Property Rights, Regulation, War

Myron Pauli on the malignant, metastatic cancer known as government.

Government Begat Government Which Begat Government
By Myron Robert Pauli

My friend at the Federal Trade Commission is assigned to fight “monopoly” in the field of laser eye surgery. The Food and Drug Administration approved ONLY “laser A” and “laser B” for doing eye surgery [of course, WHY did the FDA get to approve lasers and why should ONLY these two lasers be approved over other capable lasers???]. It seems that the Patent and Trademark Office then gave patents (e.g. virtual monopolies) to the companies holding these two lasers (something of which Jefferson and many libertarians disapprove). Then the FTC claimed that these two companies “colluded” in making a monopoly which was, in fact, created by the state power of the FDA and the PTO. In other words, the solution to government-created-problems is, of course, more government.

And then there is a recent article in The Atlantic for government reparations for black Americans – after all, one had government slave codes, government Fugitive Slave Laws, banishment of free blacks, franchise denial, Jim Crow Laws, racist FHA, racist Agriculture Department, racist zoning laws, racist licensing restrictions, racist closed shop laws. Social Security transfers money from black men [who die at age 65] to white/Asian women who live near 90 years. Reparations were given to wealthy widows of 9/11 stockbrokers [another obscenity]… and thus, government should now extract money from Vietnamese refugees in the form of taxes to compensate descendents of people victimized by government in 1850 … and government begat government.

Speaking of Vietnamese refugees, it was the government which sent millions of warfighters (many conscripted with the draft) to fight in senseless wars of nation building in Vietnam, Cambodia, Somalia, Haiti, Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan …. where these veterans return with chronic injuries, addictions, and mental problems. The solution, of course, is not to allow them to seek private health care but to dump them into a VA system [chronicled in the movie “Born on the Fourth of July”] which, being government, is an unaccountable, uncompetitive, sovereign monopoly. The solution to problems in the VA or the DC schools or public housing or Amtrak or anything is, naturally, to increase the budget. In the beginning, there was government … and government begat more government … which begat more government. If X fails, try 2X and 3X and 4X. American Dream Downpayment Act begat Housing Bubble begat Wall Street Bailout begat more Income Inequality … solution – more government, of course!

And if Bush#1 is bad, the solution is Clinton#1. If he seems bad, try Bush#2 followed by Obama#1 followed by either Clinton#2 or Bush#3. Plus ca change plus c’est le meme chose (the more things change, the more they remain the same). Tired of the same old routine, folks, then try the New Freedom, the New Deal, the New Frontier, or the New Nixon. The new Messiah will solve the problems of the previous incompetent with “compassionate conservatism” or “hope and change” and “a more responsive government” and “more transparency” which amazingly always means: more laws, more arbitrary secretive government, more debt, more inflation, more drones, more spindoctors, and less liberty. As that noted ‘American-hating extremist’ Thomas Jefferson, observed: “The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground.”

To Americans, most of whom have Orwellian memory holes, it has always been this way. Government has ALWAYS regulated X and Y and Z and provided for old people or college educations or health care or what not. I listen to the debate on voter ID – since you need a government ID to board a bus or have a drink, then you must have a photo ID to vote (can someone name which signers of the Declaration or the Constitution had photo ID’s ???). If photo ID’s are good enough for Mohammed Atta and the 9/11 hijackers, then they are good enough for everyone…. And so these arguments go … One loss of liberty leads to more. One actual terrorists leads to government reading all our mails and logging in all our phone calls. If government does A to us, then of course it should also do B and C and D …. – government begats government. And the people shout AMEN!

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Barely a Blog (BAB) contributor Myron Pauli grew up in Sunnyside Queens, went off to college in Cleveland and then spent time in a mental institution in Cambridge MA (MIT) with Benjamin Netanyahu (did not know him), and others until he was released with the “hostages” and Jimmy Carter on January 20, 1981, having defended his dissertation in nuclear physics. Most of the time since, he has worked on infrared sensors, mainly at Naval Research Laboratory in Washington DC. He was NOT named after Ron Paul but is distantly related to physicist Wolftgang Pauli; unfortunately, only the “good looks” were handed down and not the brains. He writes assorted song lyrics and essays reflecting his cynicism and classical liberalism. Click on the “BAB’s A List” category to access the Pauli archive.

Memorial-Day Message (2014)

Foreign Policy, Government, History, Homeland Security, Israel, Liberty, Military

Robert Glisson, a veteran and a longtime reader, was once asked to write an op-ed for Barely A Blog about the “Patriot Guard Riders.” The op-ed, entitled “For The Love of A Brother-In-Arms, And ‘Big Brother’ Be Damned,” was prefaced with this comment: “I do not identify with the military mission, but who can fault the humanity of the effort?”

It is the habit on the Memorial Day weekend to thank uniformed men for their sacrifice. And it is the annual custom on Barely A Blog to extend sympathies to the Americans who fight phantoms in far-flung destinations. I’m sorry they’ve been snookered into living, dying and killing for a lie. But I cannot honor that lie, or those who give their lives for it and take the lives of others in America’s many recreational wars. I mourn for them, as I have from day one, but I can’t honor them.

I am sorry for those who’ve enlisted thinking they’d fight for their countrymen and were subjected to one backdoor draft after another in the cause of illegal, unjust wars and assorted informal attacks. My heart hurts for you, but my worshipping at Moloch’s feet will not make you feel better, deep down.

I honor those sad, sad draftees to Vietnam and to WW II. The first valiant batch had no option; the same goes for the last, which fought a just war. I grew up in Israel, so I honor those men who stopped Arab armies from overrunning our homes. In 1973, we came especially close to annihilation.

I can legitimately claim to know of flesh-and-blood heroes who fought so that I could emerge from the bomb shelter (in the wars of 67 and 73) and proceed with my kid life. I always stood in their honor and wept when the sirens wailed once a year. Wherever he is, every Israeli stops on that day and stands still in remembrance. We would have been overrun by Arabs if not for those brave men who defended the homeland, and not some far-away imperial project.

But can we Americans, in 2014, make such a claim? Can we truly claim that someone killed an Iraqi, Afghani, Yemeni or Libyan so that we can … do what? Remind me?

“What I learned growing up in a war-torn region is that a brave nation fights because it must; a cowardly one fights because it can.”

How fast the so-called small government types forget that the military is government. As explained in “Your Government’s Jihadi Protection Program”:

“When Republicans and conservatives cavil about the gargantuan growth of government, they target the state’s welfare apparatus and spare its war machine. Unbeknown to these factions, the military is government. The military works like government; is financed like government, and sports many of the same inherent malignancies of government. Like government, it must be kept small. Conservative can’t coherently preach against the evils of big government, while excluding the military mammoth.”

“Classical Liberalism And State Schemes” further suggests how the military, as an arm of the state, can become antithetical to the liberty of its own citizens and the world’s citizens:

We have a solemn [negative] duty not to violate the rights of foreigners everywhere to life, liberty, and property. But we have no duty to uphold their rights. Why? Because (supposedly) upholding the negative rights of the world’s citizens involves compromising the negative liberties of Americans—their lives, liberties, and livelihoods. The classical liberal government’s duty is to its own citizens, first.
“philanthropic” wars are transfer programs—the quintessential big-government projects, if you will. The warfare state, like the welfare state, is thus inimical to the classical liberal creed. Therefore, government’s duties in the classical liberal tradition are negative, not positive; to protect freedoms, not to plan projects. As I’ve written, “In a free society, the ‘vision thing’ is left to private individuals; civil servants are kept on a tight leash, because free people understand that a ‘visionary’ bureaucrat is a voracious one and that the grander the government (‘great purposes’ in Bush Babble), the poorer and less free the people.”

Waiting To Die On the Government’s Watch

Government, Healthcare, Military, Socialism, Taxation

“Waiting To Die On the Government’s Watch” is the current column, now on WND. An excerpt:

Why would a talented, dedicated cardiologist choose to be coffined in a medical gulag, weighed down by incompetents, his wages capped; his rewards incommensurate with his drive and dedication? He wouldn’t. Surprising as this seems to some, the best and brightest do not work for the state. Increasingly, government workers are carefully selected for the color of their complexion, for their sex and sexual or political orientation, not for their competence.

In a policy statement, the VA commissioner for Connecticut, a woman of course, crowed that applicants to her department are screened to ascertain “minimum qualifications.” “Maximum qualifications” are not required in this killer of a system. “Applicants who meet the essential level of preparation,” writes the woman, “are not excluded. The Human Resources Administrator must work to bring as many protected members into the system.” Her words. Once recruited, the needs of these precious, “protected-group members” are jealously guarded.

If “diversity” trumps talent in government hiring; so too is job security a legislated article of faith. In order to set in motion a termination or two—pursuant to public outrage over the scandal in the Phoenix Veterans Affairs facility, where as many as 40 gravely ill veterans died while waiting to be treated—Congress has had to convene to pass “The VA Accountability Bill.” In the unlikely event of a layoff, seniority is given priority over the quality of the worker. A good healthcare provider will be terminated before a tenured provider.

Layoffs are as scarce as hen’s teeth. A man has to commit mass murder before he is sacked. I wager that Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan—the Jihadi who committed fratricide at Fort Hood—is still on the government’s payroll. Courtesy of The Immigration and Naturalization Service, the 9/11 assassins retained valid student visas, long after their demise. For his part, Hasan worked at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, where he terrified the patients entrusted to his care. By necessity, a private hospital (to the extent that such a thing still exists in post-Obamacare America) would have done its utmost to fire problematic personnel for fear of litigation.

It is becoming crystal clear that the rot pervades the “1,700 hospitals, clinics and other facilities” operated by the command-and-control federal government. “A common language of bureaucratic corruption” is how The Daily Beast described the routine exchanges between VA staff in several states, so far, in the course of conspiring to lie to the auditing VA inspector general, to “forge appointment records,” and to secrete away lists of soldiers who believed they were waiting for care, but were in fact waiting to die. …

… Read the complete column. “Waiting To Die On the Government’s Watch” is now on WND.

NSA: ‘Collect IT All, Sniff It All; Know It All, Exploit It All’

Government, Homeland Security, Intelligence, Military, Natural Law, Terrorism, The State

“Collect it all, sniff it all; know it all, exploit it all.” That’s the motto of the National Security Agency, as quoted by the genius Glenn Greenwald. Greenwald doesn’t resort to legalism, as does Prof Alan Dershowitz, who advocates that the NSA strike a balance between freedom and its violation. The charismatic, brilliant Greenwald, speaking without notes, defines exactly what it is that The Surveillance State consists of, and how terrorism has served as a pretext for the violation of rights stateside and abroad. In comparison, Dershowitz and NSA chief Michael Hayden sound like petty bureaucrats.

The real debate over the NSA starts, for some reason, 42 minutes in. “Live from Toronto, Canada, watch The Intercept‘s Glenn Greenwald team up with Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian to debate state surveillance with former NSA and CIA chief Michael Hayden and Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz. Greenwald and Ohanian will argue against the motion ‘be it resolved state surveillance is a legitimate defense of our freedoms.'”