Producers and Looters

They are a vanishing breed. Those who produce provide the jobs and the wealth for a growing nation and economy. Their numbers have diminished for a number of reasons. The government that should encourage them to thrive often hinders or harasses them. The regulatory environment has morphed into a maze of unfathomable and ill-conceived barriers. Attempts to legislate sound business practices have transformed into insurmountable hurdles that limit the producers’ flexibility and progress. Risk for their huge entrenched competitors is minimized by government preferences, sweet-heart deals and “too-big-to-fail” bailouts, handouts and subsidies. Every where they turn, they find obstacles. Every direction they look, they see an unreasonable regulator. They become frustrated and discouraged, and many of them abandon their dreams.

Others fail to produce because they have lost the initiative, the drive, the purposes for creative self expression that develops when one is a productive contributor to the community.  They observe that others who lack their imagination or their ambition are riding the coattails of those who labor and risk to develop and create. While they are battling stringent unnecessary limitations, they note that others are living well playing by “who-you-know” rules. While they resist government efforts to identify their most productive cropland as wetlands, others receive grants, subsidies and low-interest government loans for questionable technologies and shaky enterprises. As they attempt to develop sound business models to map their ascendency to prosperity, they witness others who receive benefits and favoritism for flim-flam scams. While waiting for government approvals and sign-offs, they see their competitors establish cozy crony relationships with venal career politicians and receive special consideration and expedited approvals. Potential producers, their ideas and dreams are sacrificed on the altar of regulation and cronyism while the schemers and scammers are enriched through their inside knowledge of “how the game is played.”

Looters come in all sizes and hues. Some are merely n’er-do-wells who languish on the sofas of sloth and draw their sustenance from the taxpayers who continue to labor. Others manipulate the system to place their competitors at a disadvantage while reaping the benefits of traveling on the inside track. Another class of looter is the government worker….the staff member or bureaucrat who implements the foggy legislation passed by an out-of-touch Congress. Bureaucrats have no “skin in the game,” thus they can arbitrarily decide which laws, rules or regulations to ignore and which to emphasize. Combined with the distasteful (and usually unconstitutional) Executive Orders, the selective enforcement and uneven treatment by government is an indicator of the potential for tyranny. Those in power generate rules and laws that overwhelm the populace, and selectively enforce them to penalize opponents and reward friends. It is rather apparent that not all looters are unkempt and lazy. Many wear the latest fashions and diligently pursue their wrongfully-gotten gains. Looting the taxpayer, looting the Treasury and looting the nation are generally full-time jobs.

It is not unusual for people to be confused about producers and looters. Some ingenious producers may wear greasy clothes, have a limited vocabulary and lack the glibness we often associate with successful people. On the other hand there are many looters who are clean and  verbally agile, but contribute to the overall good of the community or the nation in a manner reminiscent of a tic… a blood-sucking parasite that spreads sickness wherever it lands. Looters drain the resources, the lifeblood and the spirit from a nation. They take, consume and demand while providing little for the good of the country. If they find themselves in positions of power, they command and insist with no regard for the impact of their actions on the producers and the people. Looters are takers, and producers are their prey.

Producers and looters are not personality types that have recently emerged. They have been integral elements of the human scene since the beginning. There is an element about the relationships between producing class and the taking class that informs us about the state of a nation or society. When the producers are dominant and influential, the community prospers and grows. If the looters assume the pinnacles of power and the strength of numbers, the nation regresses….and either collapses into chaos or fades into obscurity. It should be noted that nations that succumb to the law of the looters are often overrun and conquered, but their defeats were begun much earlier through their own decay. Nations that encourage, nurture and legitimize looters at all levels are well on the road to oblivion…. and death. Societies that celebrate and enhance producers will grow, flourish and live. The time has arrived for the United States of America to choose a path. Will it be life or death?

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Crisis Management

In my previous column I explored some of the ways that government either creates a crisis or makes it worse. Government by its very nature always seeks to grow larger….similar to water always seeking its own level. So, when you merge the natural inclination of government with an ideological mindset that believes that government is the source of all that is good, wise and compassionate, you are facing an entity with an insatiable appetite for power and control. Clearly, the first line of defense against the monster is to prevent the election of those who have the ideological bent for an all-encompassing governmental apparatus. So far for the past 100 years or so, the voters of the United States have not been as diligent as they should be when electing their leaders. In fact, it appears that U.S. voters prefer the Nanny State and the corresponding loss of freedom. Of all the crises that we face today, the mindset of a large portion of the voting populace may be the most destructive and difficult to overcome.

While we do indeed have politicians who are wedded to big government solutions and the attendant power that accompanies them, they would not succeed in their election races if the people in their districts were not enamored with large government and the benefits that they reap from other people’s money. Indeed, the primary beneficiaries of the government goodie game are the most powerful impetus for our current fiscal situation. If the people were unanimously committed to small constitutional government, that is what we would have. Our leaders are followers and will flow to where the votes are. The fact that a significant portion of our populace belongs to the looter class has resulted in a political class determined to satisfy them. The looters have captured the power and force of government to coerce the producers, undermine liberty and violate the sacred nature of personal property. One of obvious management devices for the fiscal crisis is to correct or neutralize the moral crisis. When one capable person expects to live and benefit from the labor of others, the policy crisis arises from the immorality of the recipient’s expectations and the government’s willingness to loot the producer.

The most effective management tool for averting a crisis is to anticipate it. A preemptive move to mitigate the danger can transform a potentially dangerous situation into a nearly routine action.  So how do we translate this precept into the political and governmental realm?  As Thomas Jefferson warned,” the price of freedom is eternal vigilance.” We cannot do as we have done before. We cannot cavalierly select our political class and hope that they will be true guardians of our liberty. We definitely cannot elect and continually re-elect those who have failed their fiduciary responsibility to protect and defend the liberty of the citizens. We cannot return politicians who legislate or administer without regard for the integrity of the nation….no matter what they claim as justification for overspending or overreaching actions by government. We cannot persist in supporting candidates who insist on banging the drums of war against every tin pot despot on the planet. Our border security, our national defense, our fiscal obligations and our valuable young men and women are too important for adventurous politicians to squander. If any politician at any time violates these understandings or the oath of office, their political careers should end. Vigilant voters should call them out and vote them out.

Historically, our management of crises has been to elect the political class and step aside while expecting them to operate the government with honor. They have failed…miserably, and we have failed by providing minimal oversight. Crisis aversion is the best form of crisis management. Certainly not every crisis can be preempted or averted, but diligent public servants who take their oaths seriously can minimize the kinds of manufactured crises that we have experienced for much of the last century. When citizens begin to understand that most of our crises were the result of government’s incompetence, inattention or cowardice, we can begin to send people to represent us who are responsible and accountable. Managing a crisis begins with the proper manager and continues with the proper strategy to minimize the crisis before it becomes too large. As Woody Hayes often said, “You win with people.” We have been too lazy to select winners. We have elected self-serving, job-protecting place-holders who have allowed our country to slide into the abyss while we have been willfully distracted.

Time’s up. As citizens we can no longer afford to blissfully trip through life and hand the keys of control to career politicians who lack the courage and the wisdom to preserve our republic and our liberty. The new model for crisis management involves our individual and collective commitments to holding our representatives accountable….for every vote, every day. We cannot risk waiting for two- or four-year cycles to suddenly awaken and analyze the records of our “public servants.” Their jobs, their positions should be at risk from the moment they first take their oaths of office. We must avoid the risk, and we must manage our own affairs.

Comment:   cearlwriting@hotmail.com      or   www.littlestuff-minoosha.blogspot.com