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Economics, Education, Elections, Governance, Politics 2024, Representation, Taxation

The Handshake of History

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Prudence feels that no one is making the right speeches that Americans should be considering and learning from. Consequently, it seems Prudent to construct one and give it to those who might benefit. A person who is receiving widespread attention should recognize his or her unusual opportunity to EDUCATE the populace. In the case of America, it is an opportunity to describe how the government is designed and the IDEAS that our Constitution embodies. Then follows the extraordinary opportunity to explain to the people how the person speaking will make the ideas of the Constitution come to life, guaranteeing the liberty and opportunity that are the inheritance of every citizen.

There are concepts of the Constitutionality and of the Declaration of Independence that should be clear and alive in the heart of every citizen. The first is that the principles of INDEPENDENCE from tyranny applies not merely to our governing entity, but to each of us, individually. That is, that the government has only as much influence over our lives AS WE PERMIT. In other words, the power that our federal government has must be GRANTED to it by we the people. It is done in stages by a process of REPRESENTATION. This means that we can select those we respect and who are honest and committed to OUR INTERESTS and not the interests of the government, any of its agencies or any political party. Thus, the lines of communication from “We, the People” should be short and unpolluted by the interests of those we elect to represent us or of those with whom he or she may be friendly. The interests of a political party should have no means of limiting or distorting the liberty, responsibility or legitimate economic opportunity of any citizen. There is work to be done to correct the sloppy intrusion of political parties into our freedoms and rights.

The concept of LIMITED TERMS for those we elect to any office, should be enshrined in law including amendment of the Constitution. The weaknesses common to all humans should be kept from increasing the power of governments to limit the liberties of citizens. In conjunction with limiting terms, the sources of campaign moneys should be limited, as well. Candidates running to REPRESENT the interests of a delineated, geographic group of citizens, should be limited to raising money ONLY IN THAT DISTRICT OR IN THAT STATE, if representing an entire state. The nature of representation would change abruptly if these strictures were in place. Imagine if a candidate for Congress could spend only that money raised in his or her district: no money from other states, no money from huge PAC’s, no money from foreign actors. That winning Representative would care very distinctly about the views and interests of the citizens who live in his or her District. How refreshing!

Regarding the Constitution, no one has spoken of its status as a COVENANT between the People and the federal government they were creating by adoption among the States. Essential to its role as a solemn agreement to do certain acts and to never do certain other acts, is the honesty of representation, individually and legislatively. Therefore, it seems far more Prudent to guarantee regular replacement of men and women serving as Representatives, than to merely allow the possibility of regular change. In order to effect elective change of representation requires challengers to expend huge amounts of money to overcome the “built-in” advantages of incumbency; this path leads to corruption of purpose.

As a COVENANT between peoples: those who are selected to govern and those who grant them limited authority and power, the Constitution is a PARTNERSHIP, as described in the Preamble: “We the People of the United States, [which is to say, Citizens] in order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, [which is to say peace and safety inside the country] provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain [a most solemn and unshakable contract] and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

Clearly the Constitution was devised to enhance the lives OF U. S. CITIZENS! At no point does it convey a power to change governments in other countries, to involve the nation in over 150 military actions around the world, or to conflate the money of citizens with that of other peoples and nations. Nor, does it grant power to government types to transfer money from some Citizens to other citizens, or to transfer the money of Citizens to non-citizens, or to grant the benefits of citizenship – including Constitutional guarantees – to non-citizens, or to contract DEBTS burdening “the People” that exceed the financial possibility of prompt repayment.

How would the proper PARTNERSHIP work? Foremost, it seems Prudent, would be balanced, detailed budgeting of the people’s federal expenditure’s and revenues. We have not had that for decades. Every “budget” and “continuing resolution” to “avoid a government shut-down” has mainly been a mendacious attempt to buy votes for the benefit of those seeking re-election. That is not a partnership. Deficit spending creates inflation – period. Inflation (of the money supply without corresponding production of wealth) is a slightly obscure TAX on every citizen-taxpayer. Inflation dilutes the value of money by measurable and significant degrees. Fairly quickly, the “dilution” of dollar strength causes prices of commodities and final products to rise. What used to cost $5.00 now cost $6.00 or even more. In effect, a consumer has been forced to pay a $1.00 “TAX” on a $5.00 item. But… but… no one passed tax-raising legislation!

Inflation, it turns out, is a federal government program! The government gets to spend the money first, and at essentially the current, undiluted value. Hardly anyone else in the economy gets to spend the diluted dollars at their “original” value. Pretty soon, productive workers are feeling the effects of inflation by not being able to maintain their previous standard of living at their current pay rates and pressure for wage/salary increases starts to build. The employer has to respond but must also retain a profitable rate of gross margin. He or she must raise prices to stay in business. It is a vicious – and cruel – process. People in government who have BORROWED money to spend more than the government’s income would allow (also committing taxpayers to pay the INTEREST on the borrowing) will talk about “fighting” inflation as if they have nothing to do with it (after all, they don’t set the price on vanilla pudding). It is all a big vote-purchasing lie. What sort of “partnership” is that? Where in the Constitutional Covenant did “We the people” grant such a cruel power to “our” government?

Two admonitions pretty-well cover good government and the nature of government as a partnership: 1) Thou shalt not STEAL; and 2) Equal application – and protection – of the LAW. We have a few, but very, very few, opportunities to vote ourselves away from perdition.

Culture

Strangers in a Strange Land

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The United States is in a strange place, and rather suddenly it seems. Prudence instructs that our disenchantments are the result of a fourth “civil war” and no less. Our first was the “American Revolution” in which we effectively seceded from England. Indeed, the fact that we so eloquently justified our right to do so left those states that seceded from the Union in the second Civil War, convinced of their right to do the same when they judged that their government had become tyrannical, too.

Our third civil war followed World War One and the foolish financing that led to the second president Roosevelt. His “New Deal” changed the nature of U. S. citizens’ relationship to government and he expanded that socialist framework to a global vision for every nation and people in a platform he called the “Four Freedoms.” Along with the freedoms of speech and worship he proclaimed freedoms from “want” and from “fear.” It was heady stuff for an administration whose policies had failed to cure a decade of depression, by January of 1941. Roosevelt was justifying a new world order and a global “United Nations” that would somehow enforce the American-inspired four freedoms. The United States was “neutral” in the face of the “gathering storm” in Europe and F. D. R. wanted us to straighten things out for everyone by changing that stance.

And there’s nothing like a good war to strengthen one’s industries – if one is lucky enough to not risk being bombed to rubble. The U. S. that emerged from World War Two was a vastly different place, sporting a new consciousness about its essential, police-like and perpetually meddlesome role on the planet. What Hitler, Tojo and Mussolini desired by starting WW II, the United States achieved by winning it: global dominance. And it’s expensive.

Like Vietnam, our next war may be lost at home. Despite our winning every significant battle and thousands of small ones, Americans were told we were suffering embarrassing defeats and doing little else but burning children with napalm. The narrative of the war was not one of incredible victories by the toughest of soldiers, but was controlled by America-lasters who wanted us out of it, and they got their wish. Which is not to gloss over the fact that, Vietnam was the dirtiest war we’ve ever fought and possible the most corrupt. The flow of heroin, primarily, increased phenomenally, facilitated by our own military operations and the CIA. It meshed perfectly with our fourth civil war, watched, voted for and barely resisted through the sixties, the consequences of which are now eroding our innate strength as a nation and as a culture.

It took 100 years for our first civil war to manifest in people’s hearts; 84 years to manifest a second, the Civil War; about 70 years for the socialist civil war to start; and only 25 years for the fourth: sex, drugs and rock’n’roll. It has been fifty years since then. Fifty years of gaseous economics, destruction of religion, derelict government and near severance from our own history – thank you, educators. Is there a fifth civil war coming? Where there will be another upsetting of social order? Will we become stronger? More licentious? Purer of heart and strong in character? Will we clean up marriage and families? Strongly encourage two-parent families having seen the failure of core social groups with single or government-parent families?

Or will we slide farther and farther away from what America means, into a drug-addled globalism where “America” was but a chapter of diversion from global tyranny? Or, maybe we’ll clean up pornography… ehh, probably not. We’ll tax it.