Government

The ideal government would be a wise, benevolent dictator.
 
There is no such flawless person. So, a wise, freedom-loving group of people can create a paper benevolent dictator.
 
 
THE COMMUNIST/SOCIALIST TRAP
Rather than that, some believe that communism/socialism--from each according to ability, to each according to need--is the most fair and compassionate form of government.
 
But this idea assumes that people are inherently selfless and content with minimalist living. We aren't.

Early American Jamestown settlers tried communism. The result was a famine that dropped the population from 500 to 60. To solve this, leaders gave everyone a piece of land and permitted them to sell or barter what they produced--capitalism. The result was bounty so great that they exported the surplus.
 
 
COMMUNISM HAS TOTALITARIAN RULERS
People are inherently lazy and want what they don't earn.
 
Recognizing and pandering to this, communistic politicians and dictators emerge promising free stuff and care for every need. But in practice, the cruel hand of communistic rulers has resulted in mass murder of over 168 million from just 1900 to 1987.
 
It's easy to be a communist in a free country; it's impossible to be free--or safe--in a communist one.
 
 
DEMOCRACY
Democracy seems like a fair idea. But 51 percent of the people could vote to do away with the other 49 percent.
 
A democracy not limited by a constitution cannot create a viable society. 

A democracy with a constitution must require that voters pass a constitution literacy test, just like they have to pass a test for a driver's license. Voting people into office who offer free stuff will destroy a country.
 
 
ECONOMIC FREEDOM IS ESSENTIAL
People should be able to exploit their talents and enjoy the spoils thereof.
 
On the other hand, just existing does not entitle people to anything.
 
This is not to deny that help should be extended to people who find themselves in an impossible and hopeless situation. But that help should be given by fellow citizens exercising conscience, not by government stealing and redistributing through taxes.
 
Moreover, the priority should be helping people pull themselves up, not dragging the achievers down.
 
 
TAXES
Revenues for constitutional government functions can come from tolls, tariffs, and a sales tax.
 
But politicians enacting tax laws see them as an opportunity for unconstitutional, socialist policies and vote-getting.

​Taxing people to pay for unjust wars is unethical.

THE TAX OF FIAT MONEY
Printing fiat money inflates currencies and increases the cost of goods. It's a clever hidden tax that leads to economic destruction.
 
 
INCOME TAXES
The right to earn, "pursue happiness," should not be taxed.
 
How much someone earns is their personal business.

POLITICIANS, LAWYERS, AND JUDGES NEED TO BE LEASHED
Politicians should not be able to serve more than one 4-year term.
 
Employing a lawyer should not be required to bring a legal action.
 
Judges should be any citizen who can pass a constitutional literacy test. They must be voted in, limited to a four-year term, and can be removed by a citizen jury.
 
 
GLOBALISM
The idea of a one-world government is ideal. The dream is that it could put an end to this.

One world where fairness rules, resources are properly managed, the environment is protected, and everyone has freedom and a fair chance in the pursuit of happiness is utopian. Particularly does it seem a distant dream when in a free society, such as America, government panders to ideas of multiculturalism—a hodgepodge of hyphenated Americans with no unified language.

But why not a one-world ideal? Can our conscience ever be at peace while there are those in the world who have no chance of a decent life just because they were born behind the wrong border or under the thumb of a tyrant?
 
Which brings us to the question of what free nations should do about despotic and oppressive regimes? Being a pacifist is the easiest thing in the world to be. But reason and ethics dictate that our hearts must be tempered with reality. We can't turn a blind eye toward, sidestep, or accommodate torture, murder, and other unspeakable crime while we sit comfortably in our homes excusing our inaction with responses born of moral smugness like, "we can't police the world," or "killing is a sin." That amounts to taking a leave of absence from ethics, not taking charge of it. Permitting suffering we could prevent in this life, in order to secure our place of bliss in the next life, is cause for shame, not moral pride. Until we have a new world where all nations, leaders, and peoples lead moral and just lives, those who are moved by conscience have no choice but to intercede to save those who are oppressed. However, if battles are fought, it is morally obscene to send primarily young innocent people who have no mature understandings, or played any part in politics, to be killed and maimed.

⌕ Click to enlarge

Not only must nations be held accountable, but so, too, must individuals. Rules and laws mean nothing if they cannot be adjudicated and enforced. Justice within society should not depend upon expensive lawyering, and the innocent should not be behind bars due to overly aggressive prosecutors trying to make a name for themselves. The legal and criminal system as it stands generates huge economic incentives, and, as we have seen repeatedly in this book, all it takes is money to nail bad ideas in place.
 
Let's consider the dilemma of what society is to do with criminals. Since prison populations are growing at three times the rate of the general population, this is no small problem. Certainly dangerous criminals must be secured safely away until such time as there is reason to believe they are no longer a threat. That, of course, is the theory behind the present penal system. But how does it make sense to lock people away in expensive facilities providing for their every physical need by sending the bill to society? Meanwhile, the victims of the criminals are left with their injuries and abandoned. Why does the criminal not have to repair the damage to victims or those left behind bereaved?

⌕ Click to enlarge

A secured restitution work farm would be a rational alternative. Criminals would be employed producing useful labor or goods in order to pay for the victim's medical bills, lost work, and incapacities. Moreover, the criminal must pay all the costs to society for investigations, trials, and room and board while incarcerated (a great motivation for those guilty to admit it and reduce the legal costs).
 
This is not to suggest a chain gang, but rather passable work and living conditions with the product of labor going where it should, to the victims and society. U.S. companies are always looking for a labor force. Well, here it is, right on our own shores, and numbering over two million.
 
The time it takes for economic restitution would by and large dictate the length of the term, unless the person is a clear threat to society. For example, if you attack another, incapacitating them, then you have to spend whatever time is necessary earning the money to take care of them. Those who take another's life must substitute their own life with a lifetime of productive work to repay society and the victim's family.
 
How can discipline be maintained on the restitution farm? Well, a hard day's work will leave little energy for much more than rest. As it is now, prisoners lollygagging in cells all day have nothing to do with their energy other than scheme more wrongdoing. Discipline could be maintained with the threat of an extension of stay and longer work shifts. As it stands, life in prison is cozy enough that many criminals prefer life there.
 
Such a system based upon restitution would both deter crime and offset the damage created by it. Unlike the death penalty, the restitution farm would not have the potential of unjustly taking the life of another since time would be provided for proof of innocence.

⌕ Click to enlarge

---

POLITICS AND COWS

Liberal - You have two cows. Your neighbor has none.  You feel guilty for being successful. Instead of giving your neighbor one of your cows, you cry and then write to your congressman, demanding that he pass legislation for government programs to help your neighbor get a cow. You convince a pop-star to put on a concert to raise awareness for the cow-less, who couldn't attend because ticket prices are so expensive that only people with 3 or 4 cows come.  You wear a pin that signifies that you care about cow-less people and condemn those who have more than one cow—but you are careful to keep your cows.
Conservative - You have two cows.  Your neighbor has none.  So?
Religious Right - You have two cows. Your pastor finds a Bible verse that proves you have a right to them.  Your pastor has an affair with the milkmaid who has no cows.  You send a donation.
Socialist - You  have two cows. The government takes one and gives it to your neighbor.  You form a cooperative to tell him how to manage his cow.
Communist - You have two cows. The government seizes both. You wait in line for hours to get your cows milk.  It is expensive and sour.
Capitalism - You have two cows.  You sell one, buy a bull, and build a herd.
Democracy (American Style) - You have two cows. You vote for politicians who promise to give cows to everyone.  Government taxes you to the point you have to sell both to pay for all the cows being given away and to support a man in a foreign country who has only one cow, which was a gift from your government.
Bureaucracy (American Style) - You have two cows.  The government takes them both, shoots one to prevent overpopulation and grazing on wetlands, milks the other, pays you for the milk, and then pours the milk down the drain.
American Corporation - You have two cows. You sell one, lease it back to yourself and do an IPO on the 2nd one. You force the two cows to produce the milk of four cows.  You are surprised when one cow drops dead. You spin an announcement to the analysts stating you have down sized and are reducing expenses,  Your stock goes up.
American Non-profit Corporation - You have two cows but don't admit it. You run television ads and send mailings pleading for people to send more cows to you. You raise your salary so all the donated cows do not create a profit and you retain your non-profit status.
American Unionized Corporation - You have two cows. The union has a meeting and demands one employee per teat plus longer breaks and more vacation. One of the cows doesn't get fully milked and its udder explodes because all the milkers were having a grievance committee meeting. OSHA fines you for unsafe working conditions and the union goes on strike because you sent your other cow over seas to get milked at a fraction of the cost. You're picketed with "Milk American" signs and demands that you retrieve the exported cow and divide it and the exploded-udder cow among the workforce to cover pensions. You go bankrupt, the workers are out of work, and there are no more cows.
Politically Correct Corporation - You have two bulls. You must rename them bovine Americans and treat them equally with the female. Employees are regularly maimed and killed attempting to milk them.
French Corporation - You have two cows. You go on strike because you want three cows. You go to lunch and drink wine. Life is good.
Japanese Corporation - You have two cows. You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce twenty times the milk. They learn to travel on unbelievably crowded trains. Most are at the top of their class at cow school.
German Corporation - You have two cows. You engineer them so they are all blond, drink lots of beer, give excellent quality milk, and run a hundred miles an hour on paths with no speed limits. Unfortunately they also demand 13 weeks of vacation per year.
Russian Corporation - You have two cows. You have some vodka. You count them and learn you have four cows. You have some more vodka.  You count them again and learn you have eight cows. The Mafia shows up and takes over however many cows you really have.
Taliban Corporation - You have all the cows left in Afghanistan, which is two. You don't milk them because you cannot touch any creature's private parts. Then you kill them and claim a US bomb blew them up while they were in the hospital. You send radio tapes of their mooing.
Californian - You have a cow and a bull. The bull is depressed. It has spent its life living a lie. It goes away for two weeks. It comes back after a taxpayer-paid sex-change operation. You now have two cows. Only one makes milk. You try to sell the trans gender cow. Its lawyer sues you for discrimination. You lose in court. You sell the milk-generating cow to pay the damages. You now have one rich, transgender, non-milk-producing cow. You change your business to beef. PETA pickets your farm. The Rainbow Coalition makes a speech in your driveway. Socialists call for higher farm taxes to help "working cows." An aspiring presidential candidate calls for the nationalization of 1/7 of your farm "for the children." Illegal immigrants demand a law giving your farm to Mexico. The L.A. Times quotes five anonymous cows claiming you groped their teats. You declare bankruptcy and shut down all operations.The cow starves to death. The L.A.Times' analysis shows your business failure is a Republican president's fault.

--(Adapted from Internet circulated e-mail.)

---