Archive for the ‘Current Events’ Category

Here in Virginia, there is a state-run monopoly on the sale of hard liquor. I find this carry-over from the dismally failed era of prohibition to be reprehensible. Not only should government not have a monopoly on things, but they should not be in charge of the sale of consumer goods in general, for a variety of reasons.

The obvious reason is, of course, that it is a manipulation of what should be a free market. Even the calls from the anti-alcohol crowd are nonsensical at this point due to the history of attempts to control vices and, more notably, to the fact that liquor is still being sold. The fact that the state is doing it really does not change much other than that alcohol is only available at certain shops and at state-set pricing. It really comes down to being a set revenue stream for the state. Profits from alcohol go to the state treasury.

Our current governor (Bob McDonnell) is proposing privatizing the ABC (liquor) stores. His primary motivation is because the state needs a large chunk of money and the sale of the ABC businesses would certainly provide that. This is certainly not the right reason to make this change, but, well, if it makes the change happen, then I am all for it. Then I found out a particular detail of McDonnell’s plan, and it has me pretty angry.

Obviously, the sale of the liquor stores, while supplying a chunk of cash, will result in a reduced income stream in the future, an income stream of nearly $250 million per year. There are to be licensing fees and taxes and so forth, so the income will not dry up completely, and it is likely that more stores will open or have liquor added to their current list of items for sale, thus increasing the license income for the state. Still, the total income will drop.

I have no problem with this, as far as I am concerned, the state already gets too much money from its citizens, and it most certainly spends too much. McDonnell, however, in true politician form, wants to have his cake and eat it too. His plan, it turns out, includes a tax of 4% levied on businesses that sell alcohol, not just the liquor stores, but bars and restaraunts as well. This is not acceptable.

Not only does the governer think that we the people are ignorant enough to think that the tax on “businesses” will not affect the prices we pay, but he is trying to tax institutions not involved in the liquor store transaction at all. An increase in taxes will lead to an increase in prices. It does not really matter that the tax was not levied directly on the consumer, of the consumer pays it, then it is a tax on the consumer.

Now, it is entirely possible that consumers will not even notice the change. This is because, it is quite possible that liquor stores will drop their prices once competition is introduced to the market once again. Furthermore, current ABC policy dictates that bars and restaurants pay a premium for liquor, whereas any decent private store would be likely to offer discounts for bulk purchases and larger volume customers. As a result, the prices for the bars will likely go down. This means that, even with an added tax, prices may not go up for the consumer, indeed they could even still end up being lower.

The reason this has me so angry is that it is an attempt to pull the wool over people’s eyes and hide a tax. The state could, if they wished to maintain their income stream, levy the taxes directly on the sales of liquor bottles. While I am no fan of any sort of taxes, and consider the tax of a business to just be a disguised tax, it would still be more above board than the plan McDonnell has.

Why is he doing it? Because if he adds the tax directly to the sale of liquor in bottles, then he is affecting the profit margin of the liquor stores. Liquor stores will not be able to do as much with pricing as they otherwise would, thus making the business less profitable overall, and making competition more difficult. If he monkeys around with the profit margins of the stores, then the potential buyers will not pay as much for the stores and licenses. That means the state’s chunk of up-front money will be smaller. So, he is taxing a different business that is still part of ABC regulations but is not involved in this transaction so that he can keep his income up in the future and still make more up front.

I am sorry, that is not acceptable. I want a transparent government with a clear and simple system of taxation so that people can see what their government is really costing and what they are really up to. These games are tiresome, and they are insulting.

We are not putting up with this junk anymore Governor, we are awake, and we care what is happening. If you cannot do the hard stuff and cut spending rather than play games with our money and manipulate ways to get more money from the consumer, then we will find someone who can. Get the State out of the liquor business and leave us alone. If you find yourself with a budget shortfall, then start cutting state services. We don’t mind, we have been trying to get that to happen for years.

I know I am late to this, but I figured after 30 years I could make a statement on the Gulf oil rig spill. Oh, you were expecting the BP spill? I was thinking of the Mexican rig, the IXTOC 1. The third largest spill of all time, an exploratory rig that blew out and leaked for nearly a year.

Seriously tho, there are a couple of major issues I have with the hullabaloo around the BP oil spill. For one thing, while it is a huge oil leak, it is still smaller than the intentional spill in the Persian Gulf caused by the Iraqi government under Sadaam. It is less that twice the size of the IXTOC1, which has had no notable long-term effects in the gulf. There are reports of small spills like the Exxon Valdez spill, less than 4% of the size of the BP oil spill that the worst long term effects on the coastal environment is the temporary city that was made to house the cleanup crew. The cleanup crew was, in fact, very inneffective. There are concerns that the dispersion efforts in the BP spill will be more harm than good.

The most mind blowing part of all of the fuss about environmental impact is the numbers on natural oil seepage. Natural well seepage is more than half of all petroleum pollutants entering the ocean. The vast majority of human-caused petroleum pollution is from runoff and contaminated rain. Spills and transportation account for only a small percentage, and the Deep Horizon spill barely makes a dent in those numbers. Does this mean we should ignore it? No, but it does mean that we are making too much of it. It also means that the earth can handle this thing better than we can.

As for our efforts to handle the issue, however, chew on this: We were offered assistance and refused it because the EPA regulators did not like that the cleaning technology offered, while far more efficient and effective than our own process, did not meet certain standards. So, instead of having the oil removed mostly and quickly, they remove only a small percentage of it completely, and the rest is just left to run. Net effect? Way worse than the process that did not meet their “standards”. Idiotic to say the least.

In all the government has handled this with blunder after blunder, using the catastrophe to gain power and generally screw up everything as much as they can. BP has not been much better, finger pointing and pandering instead of getting serious and making it known how badly their hands are being tied by the EPA.

Bottom line? Get over it, the earth can heal. We need to keep drilling, and we need to do it closer to land. We need to improve our drilling safeguards. We need to drill on land in places like ANWR. We need to tell the EPA how much they are destroying the earth and get rid of them. That will do a lot more to help the planet than any drilling restrictions ever will.

Those who valued Freedom above Safety.

Those who committed Treason against Tyranny.

Those who died free, winning freedom for others.

Those who tried to build a free nation no matter the cost, the risk, or the lack of precedent. They pushed on based on their philosophy of what was right and what was needed, they did not need to copy others.

Those who forged the foundations of this nation in debate and patient explaination.

Those who spread the word to others.

Those who beleived in the cause even tho they were not part of “the founders”. In a way all who fought England for independence were founders.

Those who tried to come to a peaceful solution. They exhausted all means they had before taking up arms. Something we have not nearly done.

Those who helped to improve our nation by amending errors in our constitution, making all men and women equal under the law.

Those who fought and lived to rebuild this nation.

Those who took this great free nation and through work and innovation made it the greatest power on the planet.

Those who still hold those values today, let us come together an uphold those United States of America that once were and could be again.

Actually there are two I will discuss today. And I do mean fake dichotomy, not false dichotomy. A false dichotomy is when you are presented with only two choices, when in fact there are more than two to choose from. A fake dichotomy, at least the way I am using the term today, is when there are two options, or sides to an argument, and in fact the two are no different, they are on the same side.

The two key ones I will touch on today are being used as tools to manipulate the entire population. The first many people are aware of, or are becoming aware of. Many, unfortunately, are aware of it but still fall prey to it. It is the two primary political parties.

Republicrats and Demoblicans (US), LibLabCon (Britain), LibCon or ConLib (Canada), all terms representing what for more and more people is a glaringly obvious fact: The Parties are not very different, and they all end up leading us in the same general direction. They fight over nearly irrelevant issues, calling attention to small things that, even if they mean a lot to some people, certainly pale in comparison to the direction of the whole country, our freedom, our economic success and the quality of life in general.

The fact that people are not aware of the fake battle, and really believe there is a difference between the parties is a tragedy of observation and of people really caring enough to educate themselves about what is really going on. A greater tragedy is when people are paying attention, but are so biased and emotionally or sentimentally attached to “their party” that they judge the actions of their leaders based on who does the action, rather than on the substance of the action itself. Bush, for instance, started the bailouts, Obama continued them. Partisan critics had glaring differences in how they judged those actions, even tho they were essentially the same. The greatest tragedy, however, is that many people actually recognize that the parties have little difference, yet fall prey anyway. They talk about how both sides are a problem, how both are full of corruption, both spend too much, both take away freedom, both grow the government, both are incompetent. But on election day, they vote for one or the other anyway. They get all sucked into this issue or that. They get all up in arms about how bad the one “side” is, even tho they know there are no distinguishable “sides” to start with. They vote for one or the other, knowing that their choice is irrelevant, and will only lead to more of the same, only not quite as much of it as the other guy. Maybe.

I am not, of course, advocating not voting as some would recommend to you. This does nothing either, it is just quitting. If you want to step away from the system, however, it is better than perpetuating a broken one. I would rather see someone do nothing with their brains turned on than do something stupid when they should, or do, know better. The key here is to recognize that there is not only a fake dichotomy in American politics, with the parties working together behind the scenes, or at least moving toward a generally similar goal, but there is also a false dichotomy. The two parties are not the only choices we have.

The other fake dichotomy is less obvious, but is perhaps more sinister, since I think it is more purposeful. Also, this fake dichotomy does not include all players in the categories I speak of. (This also applies to the first fake dichotomy, not all Republicans and Democrats are the same, nor all they all on an evil path, but the majority, at least at the national level, certainly are.) The false battle I speak of is business versus government. Large corporations and the Government/Union alliance seem to fight constantly. There is some real fighting, to be sure, but in a lot of cases, the large corporations fight the regulations and laws for a while, and do so quite vocally, pointing to the costs and profit losses, but in the end they are not really that bothered by the regulations. Why? Because massive regulations cement their place at the top of the food chain. In a free market, every business must fight to the top and continue to fight and innovate to stay there. If you are a leader in your industry, you have the advantage of capital and brand recognition and infrastructure, but you are generally very hard to manage and innovation tends to slip. Structure, required for a large business to function, tends to eclipse innovation and flexibility. In most markets, if you fail to innovate, you will be outmoded and outrun. If you do not change your ways, you will eventually fail, beaten out by a better competitor, even one smaller than you. You may only lose market share in one region, succumbing to a smaller, but better competitor, but when that happens in enough regions, you are no longer the leader of the pack.

So why do the businesses actually welcome costly regulation? It raises the cost of entry into the market. Think about it. How many times do you say that you could do a better job at a given service provided by super large corporations? Most of the time, those companies are not operating at the best they possibly could because they do not have to. There are no viable competitors. The more regulations and restrictions are in place, the more licenses you need and the more you have to “know people” to get your company started, the better off existing competitors are. They can lose money to government regulations or taxes, but make it up by paying less or trimming quality or squeezing suppliers or whatever they want to do. They can steamroll their customers and employees alike and not lose a bit of business, because customers have no better options. They have no better options because no one is able to afford to start a business or get the approval for it.

Thus the power of big business is cemented with the current business leaders. They, in turn, support the politicians that slapped them with regulations and ensure that the unholy alliance continues. Power for the leaders, both corporate and political, with some thrown to union leaders to keep the workers from grumbling and we are stuck with a badly functioning market. More incompetence, bred by this manipulation of a supposedly free market allows justification for more regulation. Unhappy customers welcome the promises of a “fix” for the problem. A fix that only enslaves them further and entrenches the incompetent, lazy business leaders even further. Any real sense of business vision or ethics is lost, and we have a country run by crooks. Sound familiar?

Its not business versus government, it is government and SOME business leaders teaming up against the rest of business, insulating themselves from the market so that they can rest on their laurels and take advantage of the populace. It is a lie. There is no battle between business and government, there is a battle between the free market and a controlled market, between freedom and restriction. We need a separation of business and state like we are supposed to have for religion and state. Laws must still be followed that protect freedoms, such as laws against fraud and theft. Separation of business and state does not mean lawlessness, only a removal of the temptation for power to team up with wealth and run the world. The corporation and other government business constructs should be abolished. Business licensing and other restrictions should be removed. If you want to be in business, then do so. There should be no hoops or fees for innovation and entrepreneurship.

No more fake dichotomies, pretend battles, etc. Pay attention to what happens when the two sides fight. If either side “wins” but nothing really changes, either way, then the battle itself was false. One side pretending to be two sides must be attacked at the root, a proper opponent must be found. Its not just that there are more than two choices, its that the two choices presented are really only one choice.

Find another option.

So I have been meaning to do this for a while. A friend of mine and I have had extensive discussion on the recently passed and implemented restaurant smoking ban in Virginia. While he is generally a supporter of freedom and opposed to regulation, he supports the ban. He knows it is an inconsistency, but feels that it is a case where people and the market would not make the right choice on their own, and that it was ok for the government to step in. I told him that if a regulation should be passed, and there are some compelling arguments for such a thing, then it needs to be written in a different way so as not to violate the rights of business owners and the use of their property. Read the rest of this entry »