Participatory Fascism

Robert Higgs once referred to the economic system of the United States as “participatory fascism.” As I listen to the candidates’ proposals this election season, I’m beginning to realize just how accurate that phrase really is. Before getting started, of course, it is necessary to define our terms. Contrary to what those in the media and other left-wingers seem to think, “fascism” does not mean “Anything conservatives do that I don’t like.” Believe it or not, the term does have a very specific definition.

According to www.dictionary.com, fascism is defined as a governmental system led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, etc. The Economics dictionary on www.babylon.com expands upon this definition, emphasizing the economic component that characterizes a fascist regime:

“…Strict regulation and control of the economy by the regime through some form
of corporatist economic planning in which the legal forms of private ownership
of industry are nominally preserved but in which both workers and capitalists are
obliged to submit their plans and objectives to the most detailed state
regulation and extensive wage and price controls, which are designed to insure
the priority of the political leadership's objectives over the private economic
interests of the citizenry.”

With election season in full swing, you are no doubt wringing your hands and wracking your brain over whether to for McCain or Obama. It’s a big decision, and you certainly don’t want to make the wrong choice. If you haven’t do so already, cruise on over to the candidates’ websites and review their platforms with the dictionary definition of fascism in mind. Here are summaries of McCain’s and Obama’s plans for making life in America even more wonderful through the blessings of Big Government (pulled from each candidate’s website).

John McCain plans to:

• Offer a $300 million prize for a better car battery.
• Act immediately to reduce the pain of high gas prices.
• Provide robust, timely and targeted help to those hurt by the housing crisis. Under his HOME Plan, every deserving American family or homeowner will be afforded the opportunity to trade a burdensome mortgage for a manageable loan that reflects their home's market value.
• Form a Justice Department Mortgage Abuse Task Force. The Task Force will aggressively investigate potential criminal wrongdoing in the mortgage industry and bring to justice any who violated the law. The DOJ Task Force will offer assistance to State Attorneys General who are investigating abusive lending practices.
• Propose a student loan continuity plan. Students face the possibility that the credit crunch will disrupt loans for the fall semester. John McCain calls on the federal government and the 50 governors to anticipate loan problems and expand the lender-of-last resort capabilities for each state's guarantee agency.
• Reform Social Security. He will fight to save the future of Social Security while meeting our obligations to the retirees of today and the future without raising taxes.
• Have a single, seamless approach to job transition assistance. The unemployment insurance system must be more effective in helping those who have lost a job. John McCain will modernize and transform our current programs by consolidating redundant federal programs, strengthening community colleges and technical training and giving displaced workers more choices to find their way back to productive and prosperous lives.
• Reform the UI system so that a portion of each worker's unemployment insurance tax is deposited into a Lost Earnings Buffer account (LEB). If an individual becomes unemployed, the LEB may be used to cover needed expenses, with a backstop of traditional UI if the account is exhausted before 26 weeks. Workers will have an incentive to preserve their LEB by getting back to work quickly, and may be eligible for a re-employment bonus if they get a new job quickly. The LEB will be portable, and upon retirement, the property of the worker.
• Reform training programs to provide quick assistance to workers needing new skills. Workers will have access to a flexible training account that permits them to pay for training at a community college and use leftover funds to keep their health insurance.
  Provide special, targeted assistance for older workers. Because training is often inefficient for older workers, those 55 years of age and older who have built up an LEB will be eligible for a Lost Earnings Supplement. The supplement of up to 50 percent of their earnings loss (up to a maximum of $10,000) for two years will be rewarded for those who find work inside 26 weeks.
• Provide access to health care for every American. He has proposed a comprehensive vision for achieving that. For too long, our nation's leaders have talked about reforming health care. Now is the time to act.
• Work with states to establish a guaranteed access plan. As President, John McCain will work with governors to develop a best practice model that states can follow - a Guaranteed Access Plan or GAP - that would reflect the best experience of the states to ensure these patients have access to health coverage. One approach would establish a nonprofit corporation that would contract with insurers to cover patients who have been denied insurance and could join with other state plans to enlarge pools and lower overhead costs. There would be reasonable limits on premiums, and assistance would be available for Americans below a certain income level.
• Promote proper incentives. John McCain will work with Congress, the governors, and industry to make sure this approach is funded adequately and has the right incentives to reduce costs such as disease management, individual case management, and health and wellness programs.
• Lower Drug Prices. John McCain will look to bring greater competition to our drug markets through safe re-importation of drugs and faster introduction of generic drugs.
• Provide quality, cheaper care for chronic disease. Chronic conditions account for three-quarters of the nation's annual health care bill. By emphasizing prevention, early intervention, healthy habits, new treatment models, new public health infrastructure and the use of information technology, we can reduce health care costs. We should dedicate more federal research to caring and curing chronic disease.
• Promote coordinated care. Coordinated care - with providers collaborating to produce the best health care - offers better outcomes at lower cost. We should pay a single bill for high-quality disease care which will make every single provider accountable and responsive to the patients' needs.
• Expand access to health care. Families place a high value on quickly getting simple care. Government should promote greater access through walk-in clinics in retail outlets.
• Use information technology to reduce costs. We should promote the rapid deployment of 21st century information systems and technology that allows doctors to practice across state lines.
• Promote the availability of smoking cessation programs. Most smokers would love to quit but find it hard to do so. Working with business and insurance companies to promote availability, we can improve lives and reduce chronic disease through smoking cessation programs.
• Bring transparency to health care costs. We must make public more information on treatment options and doctor records, and require transparency regarding medical outcomes, quality of care, costs and prices. We must also facilitate the development of national standards for measuring and recording treatments and outcomes.
• Develop a strategy for meeting the challenge of a population needing greater long-term care. There have been a variety of state-based experiments such as Cash and Counseling or The Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) that are pioneering approaches for delivering care to people in a home setting. Seniors are given a monthly stipend which they can use to hire workers and purchase care-related services and goods. They can get help managing their care by designating representatives, such as relatives or friends, to help make decisions. It also offers counseling and bookkeeping services to assist consumers in handling their programmatic responsibilities.
• Combat autism in America. John McCain is very concerned about the rising incidence of autism among America's children and has continually supported research into its causes and treatment.
• Establish a market-based system to curb greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, mobilize innovative technologies, and strengthen the economy. He will work with our international partners to secure our energy future, to create opportunities for American industry, and to leave a better future for our children.
• Propose a cap-and-trade system that would set limits on greenhouse gas emissions while encouraging the development of low-cost compliance options. A climate cap-and-trade mechanism would set a limit on greenhouse gas emissions and allow entities to buy and sell rights to emit, similar to the successful acid rain trading program of the early 1990s. The key feature of this mechanism is that it allows the market to decide and encourage the lowest-cost compliance options.
• Promote the innovation, development and deployment of advanced technologies. John McCain will reform federal government research funding and infrastructure to support the cap and trade emissions reduction goals and emphasize the commercialization of low-carbon technologies.
• Open foreign markets to American farmers. America’s agricultural industry is the best in the world. John McCain will expand access for U.S. agricultural producers to foreign markets, providing a great and lasting benefit to American farmers. He will work tirelessly to ensure our farmers receive fair prices for their products. As president, John McCain will engage the agricultural community and international leaders to move forward a trade agenda that expands access to overseas markets and promotes American agricultural exports.
• Support a risk management program for farmers. When a farmer suffers from a natural disaster such as droughts or floods, we should assist them – this is a commitment we have made to our farmers and John McCain will honor it. As president, John McCain will fight on behalf of family farmers to enact reasonable reforms to our crop insurance program and our system of countercyclical and direct payments.
• Base our farm policy on the common good, with policies that help our small farmers to succeed, and our rural communities to survive and flourish once again. John McCain opposes providing billions to subsidize large commercial farms—those farms with an average income of $200,000, and an average net worth of $2 million--while American workers and taxpayers struggle to buy food due to rising prices. As president, McCain will seek to cap subsidies to farmers whose adjusted gross income exceeds $250,000. This will ensure that small farmers are provided with a reasonable safety net, while protecting the taxpayers from subsidizing lucrative corporate farmers. He will fight to put an end to flawed government policies that distort the markets, artificially raise prices for consumers, and pit producers against consumers.
• Restore rural prosperity and improve quality of life. John McCain believes that Rural America can best be served by lower taxes, strong markets, a vibrant economy, high tech connectivity, protection from natural disasters, better choice and availability of health insurance, better quality education, and retirement security.
• Fund food and nutrition programs and carry out a robust Emergency Food Assistance Program at a time when high food prices are hurting the neediest among us. He supports indexing food stamps to reflect the current cost of living and he would fill shortfalls in the Emergency Food Assistance Program. Senator McCain also supports providing marketing tools for the fruit and vegetable industry focused on promoting healthier American diets.

This is by no means a complete list of John McCain’s many central plans, but at this point I’m sure you’re as bored as I am. Let’s move on to Barack Obama’s proposals to live your life better than you can:

• Fight for Fair Trade: Obama will fight for a trade policy that opens up foreign markets to support good American jobs. He will use trade agreements to spread good labor and environmental standards around the world and stand firm against agreements like the Central American Free Trade Agreement that fail to live up to those important benchmarks. Obama will also pressure the World Trade Organization to enforce trade agreements and stop countries from continuing unfair government subsidies to foreign exporters and nontariff barriers on U.S. exports.
• Amend NAFTA: Obama believes that NAFTA and its potential were oversold to the American people. Obama will work with the leaders of Canada and Mexico to fix NAFTA so that it works for American workers.
• Improve transition assistance: To help all workers adapt to a rapidly changing economy, Obama would update the existing system of Trade Adjustment Assistance by extending it to service industries, creating flexible education accounts to help workers retrain, and providing retraining assistance for workers in sectors of the economy vulnerable to dislocation before they lose their jobs.
• Support job creation: Barack Obama believes we need to double federal funding for basic research and make the research and development tax credit permanent to help create high-paying, secure jobs. Obama will also make long-term investments in education, training, and workforce development so that Americans can leverage our strengths - our ingenuity and entrepreneurialism - to create new high-wage jobs and prosper in a world economy.
• Invest in U.S. manufacturing: The Obama comprehensive energy independence and climate change plan will invest in America's highly-skilled manufacturing workforce and manufacturing centers to ensure that American workers have the skills and tools they need to pioneer the first wave of green technologies that will be in high demand throughout the world. Obama will also provide assistance to the domestic auto industry to ensure that new fuel-efficient vehicles are built by American workers.
• Create new job training programs for clean technologies: The Obama plan will increase funding for federal workforce training programs and direct these programs to incorporate green technologies training, such as advanced manufacturing and weatherization training, into their efforts to help Americans find and retain stable, high-paying jobs. Obama will also create an energy-focused youth jobs program to invest in disconnected and disadvantaged youth.
• Boost the renewable energy sector and create new jobs: The Obama plan will create new federal policies, and expand existing ones, that have been proven to create new American jobs. Obama will create a federal Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) that will require 25 percent of American electricity be derived from renewable sources by 2025, which has the potential to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs on its own. Obama will also extend the Production Tax Credit, a credit used successfully by American farmers and investors to increase renewable energy production and create new local jobs.
• Deploy next-generation broadband: Obama believes we can get broadband to every community in America through a combination of reform of the Universal Service Fund, better use of the nation's wireless spectrum, promotion of next-generation facilities, technologies and applications, and new tax and loan incentives.
• Protect the openness of the internet: Obama supports the basic principle that network providers should not be allowed to charge fees to privilege the content or applications of some web sites and Internet applications over others. This principle will ensure that the new competitors, especially small or nonprofit speakers, have the same opportunity as big companies to innovate and reach large audiences.
• Invest in rural areas: Obama will invest in rural small businesses and fight to expand high-speed Internet access. He will improve rural schools and attract more doctors to rural areas.
• Ensure freedom to unionize: Obama believes that workers should have the freedom to choose whether to join a union without harassment or intimidation from their employers. Obama cosponsored and is strong advocate for the Employee Free Choice Act, a bipartisan effort to assure that workers can exercise their right to organize. He will continue to fight for EFCA's passage and sign it into law.
• Fight attacks on workers' right to organize: Obama has fought the Bush National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) efforts to strip workers of their right to organize. He is a cosponsor of legislation to overturn the NLRB's "Kentucky River" decisions classifying hundreds of thousands of nurses, construction, and professional workers as "supervisors" who are not protected by federal labor laws.
• Protect striking workers: Obama supports the right of workers to bargain collectively and strike if necessary. He will work to ban the permanent replacement of striking workers, so workers can stand up for themselves without worrying about losing their livelihoods.
  Raise the minimum wage: Barack Obama will raise the minimum wage, index it to inflation and increase the Earned Income Tax Credit to make sure that full-time workers earn a living wage that allows them to raise their families and pay for basic needs.
• Crack down on fraudulent brokers and lenders. He will also make sure homebuyers have honest and complete information about their mortgage options, and he will give a tax credit to all middle-class homeowners.
• Ensure more accountability in the subprime mortgage industry: Obama has been closely monitoring the subprime mortgage situation for years, and introduced comprehensive legislation over a year ago to fight mortgage fraud and protect consumers against abusive lending practices. Obama's STOP FRAUD Act provides the first federal definition of mortgage fraud, increases funding for federal and state law enforcement programs, creates new criminal penalties for mortgage professionals found guilty of fraud, and requires industry insiders to report suspicious activity.
• Mandate accurate loan disclosure: Obama will create a Homeowner Obligation Made Explicit (HOME) score, which will provide potential borrowers with a simplified, standardized borrower metric (similar to APR) for home mortgages. The HOME score will allow individuals to easily compare various mortgage products and understand the full cost of the loan.
• Create fund to help homeowners avoid foreclosures: Obama will create a fund to help people refinance their mortgages and provide comprehensive supports to innocent homeowners. The fund will be partially paid for by Obama's increased penalties on lenders who act irresponsibly and commit fraud.
• Close bankruptcy loophole for mortgage companies: Obama will work to eliminate the provision that prevents bankruptcy courts from modifying an individual's mortgage payments. Obama believes that the subprime mortgage industry, which has engaged in dangerous and sometimes unscrupulous business practices, should not be shielded by outdated federal law.
• Create a credit card rating system to improve disclosure: Obama will create a credit card rating system, modeled on five-star systems used for other consumer products, to provide consumers an easily identifiable ranking of credit cards, based on the card's features. Credit card companies will be required to display the rating on all application and contract materials, enabling consumers to quickly understand all of the major provisions of a credit card without having to rely exclusively on fine print in lengthy documents.
• Establish a credit card bill of rights to protect consumers: The Obama plan will:
  - Ban unilateral changes
  - Apply interest rate increases only to future debt
  - Prohibit interest on fees
  - Prohibit "universal defaults"
  - Require prompt and fair crediting of cardholder payments
• Cap outlandish interest rates on payday loans and improve disclosure: Obama supports extending a 36 percent interest cap to all Americans. Obama will require lenders to provide clear and simplified information about loan fees, payments and penalties, which is why he'll require lenders to provide this information during the application process.
• Encourage responsible lending institutions to make small consumer loans: Obama will encourage banks, credit unions and Community Development Financial Institutions to provide affordable short-term and small-dollar loans and to drive unscrupulous lenders out of business.
• Reform bankruptcy laws to protect families facing a medical crisis: Obama will create an exemption in bankruptcy law for individuals who can prove they filed for bankruptcy because of medical expenses. This exemption will create a process that forgives the debt and lets the individuals get back on their feet.
• Expand the Family and Medical Leave Act: The FMLA covers only certain employees of employers with 50 or more employees. Obama will expand it to cover businesses with 25 or more employees. He will expand the FMLA to cover more purposes as well, including allowing workers to take leave for elder care needs; allowing parents up to 24 hours of leave each year to participate in their children's academic activities; and expanding FMLA to cover leave for employees to address domestic violence.
• Encourage states to adopt paid leave: As president, Obama will initiate a strategy to encourage all 50 states to adopt paid-leave systems. Obama will provide a $1.5 billion fund to assist states with start-up costs and to help states offset the costs for employees and employers.
• Expand high-quality afterschool opportunities: Obama will double funding for the main federal support for afterschool programs, the 21st Century Learning Centers program, to serve a million more children. Obama will include measures to maximize performance and effectiveness across grantees nationwide.
• Expand the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit: The Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit provides too little relief to families that struggle to afford child care expenses. Obama will reform the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit by making it refundable and allowing low-income families to receive up to a 50 percent credit for their child care expenses.
• Protect against caregiver discrimination: Workers with family obligations often are discriminated against in the workplace. Obama will enforce the recently-enacted Equal Employment Opportunity Commission guidelines on caregiver discrimination.
• Expand flexible work arrangements: Obama will create a program to inform businesses about the benefits of flexible work schedules; help businesses create flexible work opportunities; and increase federal incentives for telecommuting. Obama will also make the federal government a model employer in terms of adopting flexible work schedules and permitting employees to request flexible arrangements.
• Cap and Trade: Obama supports implementation of a market-based cap-and-trade system to reduce carbon emissions by the amount scientists say is necessary: 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050. Obama's cap-and-trade system will require all pollution credits to be auctioned. A 100 percent auction ensures that all polluters pay for every ton of emissions they release, rather than giving these emission rights away to coal and oil companies. Some of the revenue generated by auctioning allowances will be used to support the development of clean energy, to invest in energy efficiency improvements, and to address transition costs, including helping American workers affected by this economic transition.
• Confront deforestation and promote carbon sequestration: Obama will develop domestic incentives that reward forest owners, farmers, and ranchers when they plant trees, restore grasslands, or undertake farming practices that capture carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
• Invest $150 billion over 10 years in clean energy: Obama will invest $150 billion over 10 years to advance the next generation of biofuels and fuel infrastructure, accelerate the commercialization of plug-in hybrids, promote development of commercial-scale renewable energy, invest in low-emissions coal plants, and begin the transition to a new digital electricity grid. A principal focus of this fund will be devoted to ensuring that technologies that are developed in the U.S. are rapidly commercialized in the U.S. and deployed around the globe.
• Double energy research and development funding: Obama will double science and research funding for clean energy projects including those that make use of our biomass, solar and wind resources.
• Invest in a skilled clean technologies workforce: Obama will use proceeds from the cap-and-trade auction program to invest in job training and transition programs to help workers and industries adapt to clean technology development and production. Obama will also create an energy-focused Green Jobs Corps to connect disconnected and disadvantaged youth with job skills for a high-growth industry.
• Convert our manufacturing centers into clean technology leaders: Obama will establish a federal investment program to help manufacturing centers modernize and Americans learn the new skills they need to produce green products.
• Clean Technologies Deployment Venture Capital Fund: Obama will create a Clean Technologies Venture Capital Fund to fill a critical gap in U.S. technology development. Obama will invest $10 billion per year into this fund for five years. The fund will partner with existing investment funds and our National Laboratories to ensure that promising technologies move beyond the lab and are commercialized in the U.S.
• Require 25 percent of renewable electricity by 2025: Obama will establish a 25 percent federal Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) to require that 25 percent of electricity consumed in the U.S. is derived from clean, sustainable energy sources, like solar, wind and geothermal by 2025.
• Develop and deploy clean coal technology: Obama will significantly increase the resources devoted to the commercialization and deployment of low-carbon coal technologies. Obama will consider whatever policy tools are necessary, including standards that ban new traditional coal facilities, to ensure that we move quickly to commercialize and deploy low carbon coal technology.
• Deploy cellulosic ethanol: Obama will invest federal resources, including tax incentives, cash prizes and government contracts into developing the most promising technologies with the goal of getting the first two billion gallons of cellulosic ethanol into the system by 2013.
• Expand locally-owned biofuel refineries: Less than 10 percent of new ethanol production today is from farmer-owned refineries. New ethanol refineries help jumpstart rural economies. Obama will create a number of incentives for local communities to invest in their biofuels refineries.
• Establish a National Low Carbon Fuel Standard: Barack Obama will establish a National Low Carbon Fuel Standard to speed the introduction of low-carbon non-petroleum fuels. The standard requires fuels suppliers to reduce the carbon their fuel emits by ten percent by 2020.
• Increase renewable fuel standard: Obama will require 36 billion gallons of renewable fuels to be included in the fuel supply by 2022 and will increase that to at least 60 billion gallons of advanced biofuels like cellulosic ethanol by 2030.
• Increase fuel economy standards: Obama will double fuel economy standards within 18 years. His plan will provide retooling tax credits and loan guarantees for domestic auto plants and parts manufacturers, so that they can build new fuel-efficient cars rather than overseas companies. Obama will also invest in advanced vehicle technology such as advanced lightweight materials and new engines.
• Set national building efficiency goals: Barack Obama will establish a goal of making all new buildings carbon neutral, or produce zero emissions, by 2030. He'll also establish a national goal of improving new building efficiency by 50 percent and existing building efficiency by 25 percent over the next decade to help us meet the 2030 goal.
• Establish a grant program for early adopters: Obama will create a competitive grant program to award those states and localities that take the first steps to implement new building codes that prioritize energy efficiency.
• Invest in a Digital Smart Grid: Obama will pursue a major investment in our utility grid to enable a tremendous increase in renewable generation and accommodate modern energy requirements, such as reliability, smart metering, and distributed storage.
• Create new forum of largest greenhouse gas emitters: Obama will create a Global Energy Forum — that includes all G-8 members plus Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa –the largest energy consuming nations from both the developed and developing world. The forum would focus exclusively on global energy and environmental issues.
• Re-engage with the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change: The UNFCCC process is the main international forum dedicated to addressing the climate problem and an Obama administration will work constructively within it.
• End tax haven abuse: Building on his bipartisan work in the Senate, Obama will give the Treasury Department the tools it needs to stop the abuse of tax shelters and offshore tax havens and help close the $350 billion tax gap between taxes owed and taxes paid.
• Close special interest corporate loopholes: Obama will level the playing field for all businesses by eliminating special-interest loopholes and deductions, such as those for the oil and gas industry.
• Help Americans grab a hold of and climb the job ladder: Obama will invest $1 billion over five years in transitional jobs and career pathway programs that implement proven methods of helping low-income Americans succeed in the workforce.
• Create a Green Jobs Corps: Obama will create a program to directly engage disadvantaged youth in energy efficiency opportunities to strengthen their communities, while also providing them with practical skills in this important high-growth career field.
• Improve transportation access to jobs: As president, Obama will work to ensure that low-income Americans have transportation access to jobs. Obama will double the federal Jobs Access and Reverse Commute program to ensure that additional federal public transportation dollars flow to the highest-need communities and that urban planning initiatives take this aspect of transportation policy into account.
• Reduce crime recidivism by providing ex-offender supports: Obama will work to ensure that ex-offenders have access to job training, substance abuse and mental health counseling, and employment opportunities. Obama will also create a prison-to-work incentive program and reduce barriers to employment.
• Expand the Earned Income Tax Credit: Obama will increase the number of working parents eligible for EITC benefits, increase the benefits available to parents who support their children through child support payments, increase benefits for families with three or more children, and reduce the EITC marriage penalty, which hurts low-income families.
• Create a living wage: Obama will raise the minimum wage and index it to inflation to make sure that full-time workers can earn a living wage that allows them to raise their families and pay for basic needs such as food, transportation, and housing.
• Provide tax relief: Obama will provide all low and middle-income workers a $500 Making Work Pay tax credit to offset the payroll tax those workers pay in every paycheck. Obama will also eliminate taxes for seniors making under $50,000 per year.
• Promote responsible fatherhood: Obama will sign into law his Responsible Fatherhood and Healthy Families Act to remove some of the government penalties on married families, crack down on men avoiding child support payments, and ensure that payments go to families instead of state bureaucracies.
• Support parents with young children: Obama will expand the highly-successful Nurse-Family Partnership to all 570,000 low-income, first-time mothers each year. The Nurse-Family Partnership provides home visits by trained registered nurses to low-income expectant mothers and their families.
• Expand paid sick days: Today, three-out-of-four low-wage workers have no paid sick days. Obama supports guaranteeing workers seven paid sick days per year.
• Create an affordable housing trust fund: Obama will create an Affordable Housing Trust Fund to develop affordable housing in mixed-income neighborhoods.
• Fully fund the Community Development Block Grant: Obama will fully fund the Community Development Block Grant program and engage with urban leaders across the country to increase resources to the highest-need Americans.
• Establish 20 Promise Neighborhoods: Obama will create 20 Promise Neighborhoods in areas that have high levels of poverty and crime and low levels of student academic achievement in cities across the nation. The Promise Neighborhoods will be modeled after the Harlem Children's Zone, which provides a full network of services, including early childhood education, youth violence prevention efforts and after-school activities, to an entire neighborhood from birth to college.
• Ensure community-based investment resources in every urban community: Obama will work with community and business leaders to identify and address the unique economic development barriers of every major metropolitan area. Obama will provide additional resources to the federal Community Development Financial Institution Fund, the Small Business Administration and other federal agencies, especially to their local branch offices, to address community needs.
• Invest in rural areas: Obama will invest in rural small businesses and fight to expand high-speed Internet access. He will improve rural schools and attract more doctors to rural areas.

If you’ve made it this far, you’ve probably noticed at least two things:

1. the amazing similarity of the two candidates’ positions, and
   
2. the blatantly unconstitutional nature of at least 95% of all the proposals listed.

Just compare the sheer volume and breadth of these (condensed) policy descriptions to the executive powers outlined in Article II, Sections 2 and 3 of the U.S. Constitution:

• The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States;
• He may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any Subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices,
  He shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.
• He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur;
• He shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.
• The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the End of their next Session.
  He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient;
• He may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper;
• He shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers; he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the Officers of the United States.

That’s it. That’s all the President is constitutionally authorized to do. Can someone please explain where McCain’s $300 million car battery prize fits into the powers delegated to the President by the Constitution? Where does Obama find the authority to promote responsible fatherhood?

There is no justification whatsoever for any of the policies listed by either candidate, yet you will never hear a single reporter challenge any of these proposals on basic constitutional grounds. The concept of the imperial presidency has been so firmly cemented in the minds of most Americans that we are now officially off the map.

So as you go to the polls this November, agonizing over which candidate’s central plan to run every nook and cranny of the economy you prefer, keep in mind that all centrally planned economies fail miserably. This was one of the key lessons that most people (with the notable exceptions of McCain and Obama) learned from the history of the second half of the twentieth century. The United States spent roughly fifty years fighting the totalitarian impulses that both Republicans and Democrats now offer as their platforms. Although there may be some minor differences in their policy prescriptions, there is one key issue on which John McCain and Barack Obama completely agree - that limited, constitutional government should be replaced by their own brands of participatory fascism.

The Neocons' Faustian Bargain

Civil libertarians are getting all torqued up again over the warrantless wiretapping provision about to pass Congress. I don't see what the big deal is. After all, National Review Online's Andrew McCarthy wrote an article last week which clearly explains that the Constitution does not require a probable cause standard for wiretaps:

"There are two core flaws in our surveillance law, namely, the “probable
cause” trigger for monitoring and judicial oversight. The compromise leaves the
former unaddressed while exacerbating the latter.Probable cause is a courtroom
standard, the quantum of proof ordinarily required to justify government
intrusion on the privacy of an American’s home or private papers. It means the
government must have strong indications that a crime has been committed before conducting such a search.

The standard has no place in national-security surveillance against foreign threats. If you have probable cause, you already have strong indications that someone is a threat. That’s too late. The challenge in today’s threat environment, dominated by international terror networks that embed sleeper cells among us to carry out mass-destruction attacks, is to figure out who is a threat. That cannot effectively be done on a probable cause standard. The Constitution does not require one — it mandates only that searches be reasonable — and hence most security searches (such as those occurring as one enters the country or tries to board an airplane) do not require probable cause, much less a judicial warrant." (Emphasis mine).

Just to make sure, I checked the text of the Fourth Amendment, which states,

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." (Emphasis mine – again).

Granted, those who are unfamiliar with the nuances of Constitutional law might read the term "probable cause" to mean "probable cause," but clearly they would be mistaken. If McCarthy isn't worried about this, then why should we be? After all, National Review is a conservative publication, and as we all know conservatives are for limited government. Umm...right?

I seem to recall conservatives frequently bemoaning Bill Clinton’s ability to “compartmentalize.” That is, to file away and seal off any inconvenient pieces of information so that they didn’t distract him from doing whatever it was he had already decided to do. Surely McCarthy in particular and neoconservatives in general are doing exactly that when they seek to expand the government’s police powers while continuing to pay lip service to the principles of limited government.

This is yet another example of the schizophrenic nature of today’s GOP. One the one hand, they still cling to some dim notion that government should be limited. On the other, they believe the Constitution can and should be ignored whenever “national security” is involved. When it comes to increasing the police power, the GOP jettisons its usual skepticism of government programs and adopts the belief that in this case the government will limit itself to just “going after the bad guys.” And yet if one were to ask a conservative to name a single government program that has ever remained within its original scope, he would immediately respond that there has never been one.

In this sense, the Democrats have an advantage over the Republicans. Democrats believe that government exists to manage every aspect of human existence, so whatever idiotic proposal they come up with only serves to further that belief. Granted, their philosophy is deeply corrupt and harmful, but it is at least internally consistent. The GOP, on the other hand, has to grapple with the inherent conflict between its limited government rhetoric and its big government reality.

By cheering on their preferred big government programs in the realm of surveillance, Republicans imply that expanding the police power somehow doesn’t “count” as expanding government. Nevertheless, they quickly object when that very same police power is inevitably used against individuals and businesses in the economic sphere.

In this regard they are not alone. The Democrats likewise believe that they can spend decades feeding this government monster so that it may bestow innumerable benefits on the populace, but then express shock and horror when that same monster goes overseas and eats some villagers. Neither group seems capable of understanding the link between the welfare state and the warfare state. One begets the other, and the nature of government is such that it cannot be expanded in only one direction.

With regard to the immediate issue of warrantless wiretaps, even if you believe that the current administration has only used them to listen in on suspected terrorists, do you also believe that all subsequent administrations will show similar restraint? Keep in mind that the current FISA requirements allow the government to begin surveillance first, and then request a warrant up to 72 hours later – with a 99.97% probability of success. Under the new bill winding its way through Congress, this time period will be extended to seven days.

If the contributors to National Review had their way, though, this already low barrier would be eliminated altogether, and there would be no judicial check over the executive branch at all in this regard. With no possibility of review, there would be nothing whatsoever to prevent wiretaps from being used against American citizens residing in this country who are not suspected of any criminal activity. Given that all government programs tend to grow beyond their initial scope (think income tax, the RICO act, FHA loans, etc.), domestic surveillance of any and all American citizens would be virtually assured.

There are plenty of people who have no objection to that. After all, I don’t have anything to hide, so why should I care if someone is listening in on my phone calls? I care because a free society is one in which the government is constrained and where individual privacy is respected. A police state is one in which the people are constrained and have no such expectation of privacy. In a post-9/11 world, the cries for expanding the police state may well drown out the calls to defend freedom, in the mistaken belief that there is a trade-off between liberty and security. Unfortunately, though, by expanding the scope of domestic surveillance, the likely outcome is less security, not more. With so much electronic noise in the air, trying to keep tabs on everyone’s communications would serve only to dilute efforts to deter terrorists. If, on the other hand, we were to protect individual liberty by requiring some degree of scrutiny over the executive branch, our intelligence agencies would be more likely to focus their efforts on actual threats to our safety.

Giving up essential liberty for a little security is a Faustian bargain. It is not necessary. It will not deliver the expected results. It should be rejected.

On the Lighter Side

A cowboy named Bud was overseeing his herd in a remote mountainous pasture in Montana when suddenly a brand-new BMW advanced out of a dust cloud towards him. The driver, a young man in a Brioni suit, Gucci shoes, RayBan sunglasses and YSL tie, leans out the window and asks the cowboy, “If I tell you exactly how many cows and calves you have in your herd, Will you give me a calf?”

Bud looks at the man, obviously a yuppie, then looks at his peacefully grazing herd and calmly answers, “Sure, Why not?”

The yuppie parks his car, whips out his Dell notebook computer, connects it to his Cingular RAZR V3 cell phone, surfs to a NASA page on the Internet where he calls up a GPS satellite to get an exact fix on his location which he then feeds to another NASA satellite that scans the area in an ultra-high-resolution photo. The young man then opens the digital photo in Adobe Photoshop and exports it to an image processing facility in Hamburg, Germany. Within seconds, he receives an e-mail on his Palm Pilot that the image has been processed and the data stored. He then accesses an MS-SQL database through an ODBC-connected Excel spreadsheet with e-mail on his Blackberry and, after a few minutes, receives a response. Finally, he prints out a full-color, 150-page report on his hi-tech, miniaturized HP LaserJet printer and finally turns to the cowboy and says, “You have exactly 1,586 cows and calves.”

“That's right. Well, I guess you can take one of my calves,” says Bud. He watches the young man select one of the animals and looks on amused as the young man stuffs it into the trunk of his car.

Then the Bud says to the young man, “Hey, if I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you give me back my calf?”

The young man thinks about it for a second and then says, “Okay, why not?”

“You're a U.S. Congressman,” says Bud.

“Wow! That's correct,” says the yuppie, “but how did you guess that?”

“No guessing required,” answered the cowboy. “You showed up here even though nobody called you; you want to get paid for an answer I already knew to a question I never asked. You tried to show me how much smarter than me you are; and you don't know a thing about cows...this is a herd of sheep. Now give me back my dog.”

(This post is by no means my original material. This joke was forwarded to me by some friends in Alabama).

The Myth of Market Failure

So now the socialist from South Central, Maxine Waters, wants to sociali… - er, I mean…well, that is to say…um… Ah, screw it! She wants the government to takeover and run the oil companies. Well, at least she had the guts to (almost) say what she’s really after. And you thought gas prices were high now! Just wait till Ms. Waters is running the show!

Like most Americans these days, Representative Waters is upset about the price at the pump. The difference, of course, is that unlike most Americans, Maxine is not afraid to send armed men to take ExxonMobil’s property from them by force if need be, whereas you or I would probably just decide to ride the bus or maybe work from home once in a while. But then again, you and I understand a thing or two about supply and demand. “Marxine” Waters, on the other hand, relies on a number of simplistic economic fallacies to get her through the day.

Clearly, Ms. Waters believes that “the people” have “a right” to gasoline at what she considers to be a “fair price.” I’ve covered the positive rights nonsense in this column before, so I’ll just skip ahead to today’s lesson. Although I’m not sure she would be able to use the term in a sentence, what I think “Marxine” is really saying about the high price of gas is that it reflects what is known in anti-capitalist circles as “market failure.” (Somebody check with Guinness – I think I just set the record for most sarcastic quotation marks ever used in a single paragraph…but I digress).

According to Wikipedia, the term “market failure” refers to the condition in which the allocation of goods and services by a free market is not efficient. The Economist offers an even better definition:

“When a market left to itself does not allocate resources efficiently.
Interventionist politicians usually allege market failure to justify their
interventions.”

That’s really what we have here – just a mindless, thuggish politician alleging market failure in order to justify a destructive power grab. And it’s not exactly the first time this has happened, either.

Take the subprime mortgage crisis, for example. Just a few years ago, government bureaucrats like now former HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson were claiming market failure because mortgage companies weren’t lending to people with bad credit, little savings, or very low income. Clearly, this was a problem that demanded a government solution! And what was the solution? To force mortgage companies to lower their lending standards and to encourage the Fed to pursue a policy of loose money. Now that the whole house of cards has come crashing down hard on those people who were "helped" by the government "solution," though, all talk of the previous government intervention that sparked the crisis in the first place has been quietly swept under the rug, and is not mentioned in polite society. Had the market been allowed to operate freely, of course, the people least able to afford adjustable rate mortgages would not have received them in the first place. They would have remained renters until they were able to shore up their finances, and would not now be in danger of losing their homes and whatever little equity they might have.

Another example is the Katrina disaster, which began with the federal government and the Army Corps of Engineers trying to tell the Mississippi River what to do by constructing a levee system in Louisiana. For what should have been obvious reasons, private insurance companies refused to issue homeowners' policies to homes built in the 9th Ward and other low-lying New Orleans districts. The government naturally claimed market failure and proceeded to issue taxpayer-subsidized policies which encouraged people to build homes in a bowl located just below Lake Ponchartrain. We all know what happened next. Had the market been allowed to operate freely, of course, residential development in New Orleans would have followed a safer and more rational course, and the Katrina disaster might have been nothing more than a really big storm.

Given these and countless other examples, I’m convinced that “market failure” may be one of the most misleading terms in the English language. It certainly ranks up there with “small-government Republicans,” “government aid,” or “the Fed’s management of the economy.” At the very least the listener should be suspicious whenever politicians allege that the market has failed to provide a particular good or service. In most cases, there’s probably a very good reason why. Perhaps a better definition for market failure would be, "the condition in which free market actors know a hell of a lot more than government flunkies; a signal that there is a pretty good reason not to do what the politicians want."

Libertarianism Made Easy

So at this point you're probably saying, "All this libertarian stuff sounds great, but how can I break out of the statist paradigm that has plagued me all my life? It probably requires a large down payment, right? What if I have less than perfect credit? Is there any chance for someone like me to become a principled libertarian?"

Not to worry, my friend. You've come to the right place. For a limited time only, I'm offering my patented two-step Libertarianism Made Easy program for the low, low price of nothing at all. That's right - no money down and zero dollars a month. Good credit, bad credit, no credit - everyone is approved! But act fast, because an offer this good can't last!

Those readers who have the time and inclination can certainly dive into any one of the many heady libertarian tomes available. If that’s your cup of tea, you can find a pretty good list right here. But we don’t call it "A Beginner's Guide to Freedom" for nothing. Libertarianism Made Easy is designed for those of you who just want to cut to the chase. By focusing on just two simple yet profound concepts, the LME program can guide you down the straight and narrow path of principled libertarianism.

Step One – Understand That Government Is Force
The first step is to understand that behind every law, mandate, or regulation stands someone who is willing to use physical violence to force you to behave in a certain way. It will begin with threats of fines or imprisonment, but will escalate from there if need be. As that long-haired hippie radical George Washington once said, “Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master.” Since physical force lies at the core of any government action, we should resort to government only in those instances in which the use of force is morally justified – that is, in self-defense.

This is why the concept of limited government is so important. Whenever government is used for purposes other than simply protecting its citizens from fraud, theft, or violence, it becomes the aggressor it was created to restrain. So before you say, “There ought to be a law!” ask yourself, “Do I feel so strongly about this issue that I would personally be willing to point a gun to my neighbor’s head in order to make him do what I want? Would I be justified in threatening him, taking his money, jailing him, or even killing him if he wouldn’t go along with my master plan?” If the answer is no, then turning to government to accomplish the same end must be just as illegitimate. Using the ballot box to force one’s neighbor to behave in a certain way is ethically no different than more direct methods of coercion.

Sadly, there are many who, after carefully considering the ethics of majority-sanctioned force, simply shrug their shoulders and say, “So what?” These people will never become principled libertarians. They may be convinced to accept the libertarian position on this issue or that, but they will never adopt the libertarian philosophy fully or consistently. Nevertheless, it is conceivable that even these individuals will be able to comprehend Step Two of the Libertarianism Made Easy program.

Step Two – Recognize What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen
Shocking as it may seem, government has nothing but that which it first takes from its citizens by force. As a result, government cannot create wealth. It can only reshuffle whatever wealth happens to have been created already by individuals acting in the free market. Usually, this is done in order to gain political advantage. Government programs take money from certain individuals and redistribute it to others, creating an obvious benefit for the minority while hiding the true cost to the majority. Of course, overall societal wealth or well-being has not been improved in the slightest. To paraphrase Robert Higgs, it’s like taking a cup of water from the deep end of the pool, pouring it into the shallow end, and expecting the overall water level to rise.

This is not to say that government cannot do anything at all. As I have said before, if Caesar wants the Coliseum, the Coliseum will be built. People can walk by the site and see construction workers busy at work. They say to themselves, “Oh, look – so many people hard at it! It’s a good thing the government has decided to invest in this project, because it’s created so many jobs that wouldn’t otherwise exist.” This is what is seen. What is not seen are all the goods and services that would have been demanded by the citizens had the government allowed them to keep their money in the first place - goods and services that were clearly preferred to the Coliseum. How do we know that the Coliseum was not the preferred use of scarce resources? Because it had to be financed through taxation. Had the taxpayers actually wanted the Coliseum, then no government coercion would have been necessary – they would have simply banded together, created a business plan, and raised the funds via voluntary means from people who were looking for a profit opportunity.

The free market consists of millions or billions of individuals who all have different subjective valuations based on their own goals and resources. The government, on the other hand, consists of just a handful of bureaucrats whose combined knowledge of the optimal allocation of those scarce resources cannot possibly match that of the market as a whole. Wealth is created in voluntary free market transactions because each party exchanges something of lesser value for something of greater value. This mutually beneficial exchange is what creates wealth. Government redistribution of wealth only serves to disrupt the mutually beneficial nature of free trade, and must necessarily deliver sub-optimal results.

Of course, you will never hear this from Washington. Instead, you will hear how “we” need to “invest” in education, alternate sources of energy, health care, sunshine and rainbows, etc., etc. Despite the flowery rhetoric, this boils down to nothing more than the idea that a small group of bureaucrats knows how to spend your money better than you do (and if you disagree with the way in which they spend your money, kindly refer back to Step One). Anyone can recognize the obvious benefit associated with wealth redistribution schemes – that which is seen. It takes a bit of critical reasoning to identify the hidden costs – that which is unseen. An LME grad can do both.

And that, my friend, is the Libertarianism Made Easy program. It may not be comprehensive, but it will put you well on your way to becoming a principled libertarian - no longer trapped in a false left/right, liberal/conservative paradigm. And if for whatever reason you are not completely satisfied with the program, your entire tuition will be refunded.

And if after completing the LME program you still think that libertarianism is not for you, then I wish you the best of luck in your attempt to make the world a better place through violence and coercion. Who knows? Maybe you’re just the person with the skills needed to turn millennia of centrally-planned failure into the government-sponsored success we’ve all been dreaming of.