Monthly Archives: February 2014

Harry Reid and the Real Nuclear Option: Bringing A Kiloton Yield to A Megaton Fight

28 Friday Feb 2014

Posted by in Constitution, judicial activism, nuclear option, Personal Freedom, prop. 209, tyranny

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By Greg Smith

Harry Reid may go down as the man who killed judicial review. By instituting what was known as the “nuclear option” he has begun a partisan arms race that should leave Republicans planning a response that would blunt both the ability of politicians to appoint loose constructionists, and judges to replace the Constitution with their personal opinions.

Nowhere does the Constitution give the courts the right to judicial review of laws for constitutionality. The only mention of courts in the Constitution provides for a supreme court. Judicial review was a right assumed by the Supreme Court 14 years after the Constitution was approved, thus it can be altered or removed with a law of a single sentence.

Senate rules, until changed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, required at least 60 votes to close debate and allowed a vote on federal judges nominated by the president. During the Bush years Democrats used this requirement to their full advantage, not allowing votes on judges to whom they wanted to keep off the federal judiciary. Republicans, who then held the Senate threatened Democrats with a rule change so they could vote with a simple majority. Democrats protested this idea as an affront to the dignity of the Senate, Republicans never implemented the threat.

In 2013 the two parties were each in the opposite position, Democrats went through with the rule change they had previously assailed. This was a tactical victory for Democrats who want complete latitude to place judges on the federal bench, and some judges who believe the ends justifies the means. It will prove to be a strategic blunder if Republicans retaliate in the future.

No occasion of a judge ignoring the democratic process is more memorable than in the case of Proposition 209, a voter referendum approved by 54% of California voters in 1996, the principal wording of which said “The state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting.”

A color-blind society should aspire to this level of equality.

Soon after passage Chief U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson issued a temporary injunction against enforcement of Prop 209 saying it was likely to be found in conflict with the 14th Amendment. Now, the 14th Amendment contains the following: “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” This is known as the Equal Protection Clause in the 14th Amendment, which doesn’t mention race or gender. It did not need to.

According to an article on cnn.com Henderson wrote in his order: “Courts must look beyond the plain language of an enactment.” Exactly the problem. If judges look beyond what is actually written in the laws and Constitution they can find any right or prohibition they desire, negating the very Constitution they swear to uphold.

Judicial oversight should be a good thing, and for about 160 years, it was. Courts closely followed the Constitution and protected citizens when those who governed strayed beyond their rights. No more. Judges to an astonishing degree think themselves the arbiter of good and bad, like some type of robed superheroes regularly installing their personal opinions disguised – poorly – as legal arguments.

This is not an argument against judicial review. A judge simply following the Constitution as it is written is a bulwark against tyranny and a friend of freedom. A judge overriding the democratic process is tyranny itself. Citizens of all political outlooks should agree this enfeeblement of the peoples’ power be slapped down like a rabid dog.

This is an argument against judges making up law where none exist. It is against unelected judges who think they know best ignoring the democratic process on which this nation was built. A judge has no right to institute what he or she thinks is right in place of what is constitutional. The judiciary today has crossed that line too many times to be left in place without either a major overhaul of process or personnel.

A higher court eventually reversed Henderson’s injunction against Prop 209, allowing it to take effect. Opponents of Prop 209 predicted it would have a enormously deleterious impact on minorities in the state university system. So how bad was it? According to a report by the National Association of Scholars in the ensuing eight years after Prop 209 minority enrollment and graduation rates had both increased.

The reason is simple: California voters put the kibosh on social engineering which had previously made choices based on perceived fairness, not on the needs of the individual, proving the most efficient and effective system of allocation is the market, not the magistrate.

Americans no longer have the respect for the courts they had when FDR tried to pack the Supreme Court in 1937, but court packing is still not the answer. The courts need an overhaul and if Republicans were willing to do this fairly and quickly, they would do themselves, the nation, and even the courts a favor. ©

Greg Smith is a freelance writer and political consultant who lives in Bantam, CT. His blog is found at http://www.betterfatthanfascist.com.

Andy Cuomo: “Mom, The Other Kids Won’t Do What I Want to Do, They’re Extremists.”

27 Thursday Feb 2014

Posted by in Extremists, Personal Freedom

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By Greg Smith

Why is being against gay marriage equate to being anti-gay, and why does disagreeing with New York Governor Andrew Cuomo make someone an extremist? These are but two questions Cuomo needs to answer in the wake of his explanation that those who are not moderate enough to unquestioningly follow his agenda “have no place in the state of New York.”

Cuomo, speaking on The Capital Pressroom, defined as persona a non grata in New York “extreme conservatives who are right-to-life, pro-assault weapon, anti-gay. . . they have no place in the state of New York. Because that is not who New Yorkers are.”

This constant desire to marginalize others as ‘extremist’ may be personally comforting, but it is the oratorical equivalent of saying “You’re a jerk.” This is for the lazy and shallow who don’t want to or cannot explain the value or their own positions. Kierkegaarde said “Once you label me, you negate me.” In modern American politics, when you label someone an extremist you also negate yourself.

Defining New Yorkers is as easy as coming up with a single color that describes a 120-count box of Crayolas. In a state that includes one of the capital cities of the planet and the remote hermitage of Noah John Rondeau hidden away between the Seward and Santanoni ranges in the Adirondack Mountains, the diversity of belief and lifestyle is staggering. The state has a string of urban centers upstate surrounded by abundant rural areas in the Adirondacks, Tug Hill Plateau and Route 17 corridor that include areas with a population density of less than two persons per square mile. At night one can drive through valleys and not see a light.

New York state is probably more diverse than 80% of the world’s nations. Yet the governor of this anthropological curiosity views New Yorkers as a homogenous majority of like-minded good people, and a minority of radicals who are politically and socially backward. Cuomo tried to explain away his statement, but “extreme” is a pejorative used to discredit others without ever having to engage in debate, and drawing on a canvas of such contrast is unrealistic. He cannot explain that away.

The political divide in the state is obvious: As a generalization, New York City and downstate tend to be Democratic and liberal, upstate tends to be Republican and conservative. In the wake of the 2001 terror attacks did the powers that be check the political and religious beliefs of the New York National Guard members and first responders from upstate New York? What of the New Yorkers who fought and are fighting the nation’s post 9/11 wars to keep New York City safe from another attack?

Cuomo also seems to forget the Democrats who fall under his label of extremist. State Senator Rubén Díaz for example, is a staunch critic of abortion, even comparing it to the Holocaust. Are the pro-choice Democrats and liberals who have expressed trepidation at the fact 40 percent of pregnancies in New York City end in abortion also extremists?

And unless one accepts anything and everything associated with homosexuality, apparently Cuomo defines that as anti-gay. This slothful reasoning is equivalent to saying that because the governor pushed through legislation placing some new restrictions on firearms he is opposed to the U.S. Constitution in its entirety.

There are many liberals and Democrats in New York who are very much pro-Second Amendment, though few live in Manhattan. Years ago I spoke with an upstate Democratic Party official about his party’s stance on the Second Amendment. He was quite proud of a new rifle recently purchased, one that if not considered an “assault weapon” under the state’s recent ban it is because the people who wrote the law know very little about firearms. His response to a query of whether the Democratic Party was pushing to greatly restrict private firearms ownership was “Not on my watch!”

If being “pro-assault weapon” is not who New Yorkers are, Cuomo and his allies needed not push the New York Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement Act of 2013 through with so little public comment or consideration. Many Democrats and liberals see government in America becoming a danger to our civil liberties. There are many Democrats and liberals in New York who see the so-called assault weapons ban for what it is: an unnecessary limitation of individual liberty that will not save one life.

Cuomo’s comments show him for what he is and is not: A politician, not a leader. The SAFE Act can’t stop Cuomo from shooting his mouth off, which is our best defense against his political career going any further.  ©

Greg Smith is a freelance writer and political consultant who lives in Bantam, CT. His blog is found at http://www.betterfatthanfascist.com

Judicial Activism: Polygamists’ Best Friend

26 Wednesday Feb 2014

Posted by in gay marriage, judicial activism

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By Greg Smith

“If God did not exist it would be necessary to invent him.” – Voltaire, 18th Century French philosophe

Over a century after it was banned by federal law, polygamy in Utah may well soon make a comeback in the Beehive State – ironically thanks to a federal judge’s belief he is more rational than the American voter.

U.S. District Judge Robert J. Shelby’s recent ruling in Kitchen v Herbert found the voter-approved amendment to that state’s constitution “demean the dignity of these same-sex couples for no rational reason.” The nebulous nature of ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ in gay marriage makes defining what is “rational” a purely emotional opinion on both sides. Seems like many thousands of years of evolutionary social practice is more than can be wiped as irrational by a 43-year-old judge.

Laws against gay-marriage are obviously based at least in part on religious teaching, but to dismiss them as irrational dictates of pure faith is to ignore religious precepts were and are based on — through evolution or divine intervention it matters not – practices generally good for the individual and society. Of the Ten Commandments, the last six could easily be taken from a modern law code. One more, keeping holy the Sabbath, coincides with reforms Progressives in America correctly advocated over a hundred years as good for both employer and employee. How many people would argue avoiding sex before marriage is bad for an individual or society? Correlating modern American health and prosperity statistics to religious beliefs would show what a positive the latter are to society.

One of the most relevant quotes heard recently on moral issues comes from The Simpsons when Homer showed up at his son’s Catholic school and tells the priest “I’m Bart Simpson’s father and I’m sick of you teaching my son your time-tested values!” It is sad when a loutish, caricaturized cartoon character displays slightly more understanding of the relevant relationship between religious beliefs and secular life than a sitting federal judge.

Shelby’s decision ignores millennia of human social and physical development rendering us beings with exceptionally complex mental make-up. For him to pretend he truly understands how the human psyche and gay marriage could impact society is a sad folly. Anyone who pays attention to America’s economy constantly sees problems exacerbated by government action. The sphere of economics – especially the law of unintended consequences — is far more predictable and yet government action regularly causes the opposite of its intended result.

Advocates of gay marriage have pointed as precedent to the rare instances of homosexual unions recognized by societies over thousands of years, but that actually is at odds with Shelby’s ruling in Kitchen v Herbert because gay marriage has been tried many times. Why did it not become as normalized as heterosexual marriage if there is no rational reason for gay marriage to be excluded by societies? Surely social evolution would have, over thousands of years, rendered it a non-issue if there was no reason.

The meaning of Voltaire’s quote is still debated; to me it recognized the positive attributes religious beliefs provide to secular society. Put another way, even if one considers belief in God and related religious edicts irrational, the benefits to society and the individual are real.

Among the many reasons cited in favor of laws against gay marriage is the ever-present slippery slope, meaning “then, what’s next?”  Shelby’s ruling unambiguously calls into question laws against polygamy. What rational basis is there to prohibit group marriages? All of the reasons Shelby gave in his ruling could apply to three persons, but does anyone aside from those who live in what television news would call “a compound” believe polygamy should be legal?

Shelby’s ruling cited previous laws which prohibited inter-racial marriage which were invalidated by the courts. To compare gay marriage to inter-racial marriage and the related societal effect is to compare apples and lawnmowers. The fact they are both marriages does not make them interchangeable. The differences between a white man being married to a black woman is considerably smaller than marriage of two men.

This is not an argument against gay marriage. There are powerful arguments for it, and maybe it should be legal. However, lacking a clear constitutional argument for a judge to overturn laws prohibiting gay marriage other than there is “no rational reason,” the decision is up to voters or elected legislators, and they have made their decision over and over all around the nation. This is a political question for which the system of government was set up to decide.

Those in Utah who oppose the federal court’s decision should immediately have three people go apply for a marriage license. Then, when the application is denied, sue and let a judge – hopefully Judge Shelby — either apply some tortured logic why government can stop two women and a man from marrying but not two women, or let him rule polygamy is protected by the constitution and voters can see exactly where the arrogance behind judicial activism leads. ©

Greg Smith is a freelance writer and political consultant who lives in Bantam, CT. His blog is found at http://www.betterfatthanfascist.com.

GW Bridge Scandal Endemic of Government

26 Wednesday Feb 2014

Posted by in Personal Freedom

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By Greg Smith

“. . .Absolute power corrupts the best natures.” – Alphonse De Lamartine

If Republicans across the country are wise, they will use the recent politically motivated closure of a portion the George Washington Bridge to their advantage. Though this wasteful, childish and foolish act was borne from a Republican governor’s administration, abuse of power – often mixed with idiocy — is a bipartisan pastime which grows concomitantly with the size of government.

How many Americans have never dealt with a police officer, revenue official, department of motor vehicle or child welfare worker, postal employee or anyone in the government monopoly who has blatantly abused his or her authority, safe in the knowledge there was almost no recourse to the arrogance? These encounters differ from instances of government bureaucracy in which the bureaucrat is simply following the rules, silly or frustrating as they may be, and enter the realm of petty tyranny. These are two constants in the mathematical equation that equals government.

The more government grows, the more ‘lane closures’ the average American faces. Beyond just annoyances these actions have a cost. An article at Time.com estimates if the artificial slowdown the week of September 9 doubled the average commuter’s drive then it cost drivers an added $7 million.

While a lot of money, on a per person cost maybe that isn’t a great deal. So consider the case of Michael Choate, who was arrested and charged with DUI by Utah Highway Patrol trooper Lisa Steed, who was fired from the force in November 2012 after courts found her testimony unreliable and a co-worker decided Steed’s arrests showed a pattern of dubious cause.

According to an Associated Press article from Feb. 22, 2013, Choate was wearing a Halloween costume when pulled over by Steed. Choate was charged with DUI despite three Breathalyzer tests showed a blood-alcohol level of .00. The arrest cost Choate almost $4,000 to get the charge dismissed.

While reviewing 20 of Steed’s DUI arrests, a supervising trooper reviewing the reports found what he referred to as a “pattern” – alluding to what looked like misconduct by Steed, who in 2007 had been the state’s trooper of the year. The supervisor then reviewed the report of an arrest Steed made two days prior. Her report said the suspect’s hand’s were shaking, but the supervisor actually had assisted in the arrest and knew while the suspect’s blood was drawn on the side of the road he sat “calmly.”

Steed charged with DUI numerous drivers who had no alcohol or drugs at all in their systems, but her reports gave the same stock entries concerning personal observations that could not be verified. Often those charged in these cases feel obligated to try to plea bargain, but even when charges are dropped drivers incur expenses from towing, legal fees, missed work, not to mention public embarrassment.

In 2009 alone Steed arrested 400 people for DUI. She told a Deseret News reporter “. . .you make a ton of stops, and you’re going to run into” people driving under the influence.

The ever increasing list of laws and regulations provides a parallel opportunity for abuse. And while police protection is not something that should be managed by the private sector, operating a bridge easily could. If a private company had been running the George Washington Bridge under a contract that rewarded traffic flow and punished delays, simple financial incentive would have nixed the foolish decision to close off a portion of the capacity of the bridge.

Private entities do not possess higher morals than government, but they do possess a more dependable motive, the profit requirement. Private enterprise faces competition, government does not. This is why the former is always striving to offer more for less, while the latter generally offers the same for much more.

For the ideologues ready to chalk the bridge lane closure to somehow endemic of Republicans: “Spitzer!” A list of people in the public realm who have involved themselves in such extremely unethical behavior – who would act in private as they would never dare in public – would be voluminous and show sleaze, graft and criminality to be a truly bipartisan arena.

For Republicans this is an opportunity to show a forthrightness generally lacking in politics and perhaps finally – finally – learn how to deal with a scandal. The American public recognize and value intellectual honesty in politics, rare as it is. Hoping the scandal is forgotten may help one Republican who probably doesn’t need it. Discussing the scandal and the ramifications of over governance will help many Republicans who do need it.

Society causes itself undue economic, social and political harm through the constant increase in the power of government over the people. Republicans who just want this scandal forgotten miss out on an opportunity to acknowledge the maxim “government that governs least governs best” applies to all government, not only when it is convenient. ©

Greg Smith is a freelance writer and political consultant who lives in Bantam, CT. His blog is found at http://www.betterfatthanfascist.com.

It Is Always Morning in America

24 Monday Feb 2014

Posted by in American Resurgence

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By Greg Smith

“Well the eagle’s been flyin’ slow, and the flag’s been flyin’ low, and a lot of people sayin’ that America’s fixin’ to fall.” – Charlie Daniels, “In America”, May 1980.

Concerned about America’s future? It is high time for some positive thinking and strategizing for the country we want in a decade and beyond. This nation has faced great problems since its inception. Examining the nation’s history provides perspective into the American capacity for growth and development when properly governed. Fact is, we can overcome. We always have.

Through history most societies changed little over seven generations. Even when there was progression instead of regression, advances were generally minimal and marginal. A time traveler from nearly any period of human history going back 140 years usually would have noticed little difference. But even with industrialization factored in, considering the metamorphosis of 1803 to 1945 should make any American confident we can face any challenge, solve any problem.

In 1803 the U.S. population was about 6.5 million, mostly clustered on the East Coast. New York City, by far the largest city by population, still had less than 100,000 residents in 1810 — there were farms in Manhattan into the 20th Century. The amount of land in the U.S. that could have been considered ‘developed’ would have been measured in the hundreds of square miles against the 3.79 million square miles the nation would eventually encompass. And when President Jefferson completed the Louisiana Purchase he had to send a military expedition from 1804-1806 headed by Meriwether Louis and William Clark to explore the heart of the continent just to find out what lay west of the Mississippi River.

The ensuing 139 years included the burning of Washington in 1814, substantial contentions surrounding slavery and a brutal civil war, Indian wars, Southern Reconstruction, labor riots and robber barons, construction of the Panama Canal, several shorter and one Great Depression and the attack on Pearl Harbor. There were plenty of problems along the way.

By 1939, by choice, the U.S. was a nation with an army smaller than that of Rumania — yet still lacking for basic amounts of materiel. Six years later the United States was the world’s leading military power. Even while fielding massive armies of young men – workers – in the European and the Pacific theaters America’s economy fed and sustained its own and much of its allies’ militaries. The U.S. Navy was larger and considerably more powerful than the combined navies of the rest of the world. U.S. air forces had been supplied with thousands of the then highly sophisticated B-29, along with almost two hundred thousand other combat aircraft that eventually ruled the skies, plus nearly another ninety-five thousand support aircraft.

The U.S. was the only nation able to fight large, sustained campaigns in both hemispheres. And in 1945, the massive $2 billion investment in the Manhattan Project paid off making the U.S. the only atomic power.

An argument these were merely causes of industrialization ignores the fact all the other industrializing nations completely existed in 1800. The United States which by 1914 was producing over one-third of world industrial output – roughly equivalent to the next three nations of Germany, Britain and France combined – by and large did not exist at the beginning of the 19th Century. Americans overspread a continent creating new political entities and societies while almost simultaneously turning wilderness into an economic engine of unprecedented magnitude. The Census of 1890 was the first to find the American Frontier no longer existed. This was less than a decade before the U.S. Navy, using modern warships that were antecedents of the battleship, defeated the Spanish at Manila Bay.

If you need a slightly more recent example, consider the period of 1981 to 1991. In January 1981 Iran still held 52 American hostages. The U.S. military was considered a “hollow” force while the Soviet and other Warsaw Pact militaries enjoyed considerable advantages in size, especially in armor and artillery. Aside from air power American military technological advantages had eroded. Inflation and unemployment were rampant – the misery index reached 21.98% in mid-1980. Inflation from 1970 to 1981 was 112.4%. “Rust Belt” became a household word. The U.S. economy and international influence appeared in freefall.

Only a decade later, a U.S.-led coalition squashed the world’s fourth-largest military in the most lopsided fashion imaginable. Shortly thereafter America was left as the only superpower. The U.S. economy had long-since healed and was in the midst of a transformation focusing more on technology and services. In the ensuing years U.S. military and economic dominance caused some to label America a hyperpower and hegemon. Between the reforms and bold actions of the Republican Congress from 1995-99 and President Clinton’s willingness to work with them the budget was balanced and national debt actually began to be retired. Unemployment reached a low of four percent, considered to be full employment. In short, it was one hell of a turnaround.

This is not empty nationalism but facts that illustrate of what America – what any nation in which individual social, political and economic liberty prevails — is capable. Today the largest challenge we face is our debt and deficit. The federal debt-to-GDP ratio is now roughly 1-to-1. It actually reached 1.2-to-1 shortly after the end of World War Two. According to an article by Matt Phillips in The Atlantic, the U.S. was able to push the debt-to-GDP ratio down to pre-war level of about 0.43-to-1 by 1962.

The path back to long-term prosperity is simple: Less government, more personal and economic freedom. Cut regulation, slash the tax code, get out of the mortgage business – in essence stop trying to make the world perfect. Government has long since passed the point where its intervention causes more problems than it solves. History has provided the recipe for success, we need only follow it. ©

Greg Smith is a freelance writer and political consultant who lives in Bantam, CT. His blog is found at http://www.betterfatthanfascist.com.

China and the New American Century

22 Saturday Feb 2014

Posted by in Global Economics

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By Greg Smith

The tea leaves of history – 1956 to be specific — tell us the Asian Century will in the near future be downgraded to the Asian decade, and the 21st Century will be a continuation of the last American Century if only the United States can recognize its inherent strengths and step up to the plate.

Since the turn of this century, fear has been focused on China’s rapid industrialization and commensurate rise in military spending. History has covered this ground before.

While still dealing with the legacy of Stalinism, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev in November 1956 boldly said, “We will bury you!” in a speech to Western ambassadors. His prediction seemed unsettling accurate, as annual economic growth of the Soviet Union in the 1950s averaged about 8%, far in excess of the 3.3% annual average in the U.S. In the 1960s it was about 7% for the Soviets, 3.9% for the U.S.

Serious predictions the Soviet Union would overtake the U.S. as the world’s largest economy in the 1980s were down right preposterous by the time they were supposed to come to pass. Why?

By the 1980s we had a new economic bogeyman to fear, as Americans fretted Japan Inc. would succeed economically where it had failed militarily. But in 1990 the supposed juggernaut of Japan went into recession and never came out. China’s economic growth will soon be severely curtailed by a combination of the reasons that caused the Soviet Union and Japan to falter.

Economies of the Soviet Union, Japan and China share one component: Heavy government involvement. These top-down models placed great power in the hands of bureaucrats to make decisions that had and will have long-term consequences. The greatest problem with involving bureaucrats and politicians in economies is they are most concerned with short-term performance. Their interference is akin to putting out every small forest fire as quickly as possible. You just wind up with a forest full of dry tinder and, in the future when conditions are right massive, uncontrollable forest fires instead.

Japan’s economic bubble in the late 1980s was created largely by its Ministry of Finance, which had a considerable say over capital allocation. Bureaucrats do not risk their own money and receive no greater compensation for wise decision-making. Their greatest stake is in keeping their job, which causes them to postpone tough decisions as long as possible, regardless of economic consequences. In Japan this led the MIF to allow banks and corporations to engage in all manner of paper transactions that propped up the books without providing long-term economic benefit. In effect Japan became a sovereign equivalent of Enron.

In the 1980s Japan’s Ministry of International Trade and Industry made big decisions on the future technologies of computers and television. Because of the incestuous centralization of Japanese industry, when these decisions — a fifth generation computer project and analog high definition television — turned out to be wrong Japanese industry was already far down dead-end paths.

At about the same time the U.S. government was looking to set a standard for HDTV. A competition was set up for private sector companies to develop and enter a system that was digital, analog or a combination. General Instruments, a company that had little association with television put together a small team of engineers who managed to build a working prototype for a fully digital HDTV system. This last minute, dark horse entry led to the adoption of a fully digital format, providing American companies with the most advanced HDTV system and a lead on related technology. U.S. companies also went on to lead the world’s computer industry because of the marketplace wasn’t led down a single path for the sake of uniformity.

In economies such as Japan’s and China’s, the U.S. HDTV competition would have been by invitation only and General Instruments would not have been on the guest list. Needless to say the outcome would have been as mediocre as Japan’s economy post-1990.

Recent news headlines shouted the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has handed a “death sentence” to three quarters of Chinese firms that produce solar power components. The MIIT decided there are too many firms in that particular industry, decided on criteria to choose winners and losers, and to the latter is denying access to financing and other benefits critical to survival in a largely state-run economy. This veritable ‘venture capitalism by the DMV’ goes on all over the world’s second largest economy. Its affects are accumulating.

Apparently Chinese bureaucrats are head and shoulders above Soviet bureaucrats at picking winners and losers. They must have a crystal ball which allows them to avoid choking the life out of the few companies that will produce the important advances that move mankind forward.

Economics is considered a soft science, but its basic laws are as iron as any of the hard sciences. Immature economies like the Soviet economy in 1945, Japanese economy in 1960, and Chinese economy in 1980 are very easy to ‘goose’ with government intervention. The basics are generally easy. As economies grow and mature they become far too complicated for any level of central planning to be effective. That is when economic law catches up.

The rapid rise in China’s economy was had through artificial means: Preferential treatment for the well-connected, considerable subsidies, a rapidly accumulating public debt load, little intellectual property protection, currency manipulation, unnaturally low interest rates and extraordinarily low wages. These macroeconomic equivalents of diet pills have long-term negative consequences. China’s economy cannot permanently exist as it is and has not shown it can highly function as a mature economy.

China’s annual economic growth rates largely mirror those of the post-war Soviet Union, but its economy more closely resembles that of an export-driven Japan 30 years ago. Barring a massive shift toward a free market, China’s next recession will drive her to ever more government intervention in an attempt to continue the post-1980 miracle. The ensuing vicious Keynesian catch-22 will fail, as it did in Japan and is in the U.S. The subsequent period may be the most dangerous time for Taiwan, though China’s military build up will taper off, leaving the Middle Kingdom a regional military and economic power hemmed in by weary neighbors.

Business has flocked to China for cheap manufacturing, which has fostered the growth of a middle class. This has permanently raised China’s economy above where it humbly sat in 1980, but Chinese exceptionalism is better explained by the Easter Bunny. Oh wait, he can’t because he doesn’t exist either.

In contrast, America’s economic growth was made possible by personal and economic freedom. When the U.S. Constitution was written in 1787, it was not intended to create an economic superpower. The intent of the framers was to create a workable government that ensured individual liberty and prevented tyranny. There was a basic assumption that economy would follow as citizens were able to pursue it; there was no thought of creating an economic colossus. No Department of Commerce, yet economic growth was considerable and sustained. No Department of Education, but fine colleges flourished; primary and secondary education became more common and advanced. Growth and development were organic so the firmest of foundations were established.

American commerce was dominant in the 20th Century precisely because individual actors were quite free to invest in divergent ideas, products and technologies. If the U.S. simplifies its tax code, and stops attempting to make the world a perfect place through the constant additions and alterations of rules and regulations with which businesses must comply, American commerce will once again offer us its greatest advantage: Employment and opportunity for anyone willing to work. That is the foundation of the American Dream, and it can be done!

Leave people be and they will produce long-term economic growth. Another reason why we are better fat than fascist. ©

Greg Smith is a freelance writer and political consultant who lives in Bantam, CT. His blog is found at http://www.betterfatthanfascist.com

Note from the author: There is no intent to disparage China. The intent is to encourage fellow Americans to abandon the big government that is steadily eroding freedom as well as economic opportunity. GS

http://asia.nikkei.com/Politics-Economy/International-Relations/Has-China-s-military-expansion-peaked