Give Me Liberty

Here’s a simple quiz that might be a real eye-opener for those of us who don’t often consider the question.

1. Do you believe that education is extremely important, both for our children and for “society”?

I certainly do (and in the interest of full disclosure, I attended government schools exclusively, including several state universities).

2. Do you believe that socialism/communism/facism offers a viable economic system for any society?

Some folks apparently do, although the 20th century (or as I like to call it, the Century of Socialism) certainly saw such systems fail categorically, across cultures, nationalities and socio-economic circumstances. And that’s not to mention the over 100 million souls murdered for the “greater good”.

3. Finally, based on your answers to 1. and 2. above, please explain (in 2 words or less) how it is that the largest and most successful economy in the world, based on free market capitalism, insists on educating its children in schools owned by the government (pure socialism), funded on the basis of “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs” (pure communism), and enforced by compulsory attendance (pure facism).

I can’t.

Dennis Byrne had a column in the Chicago Tribune this morning entitled “Keep Kids in School”. (Read it here) He was challenging the protest being waged by Rev. James Meeks against supposed disparities in the funding between Chicago Public Schools and suburban school districts. While I agree with Mr. Byrne that the protest is ill conceived, I don’t even come close to agreeing with his proposed solution, that “truant officers ought to round them up and take them back to school where they belong”. Since when did the government become the owner of our children? Unfortunately Mr. Byrne appears to be just another compliant, brain-washed product of our socialist “public” school system. He automatically accepts that our children “belong” in public schools, no matter how dysfunctional, ineffective and crime-ridden those schools might be.

If polled, I think that the vast majority of Americans would say that socialism is a failed economic system, with no hope of ever succeeding. Yet asked if children should be sent to “public” schools, a similar majority would probably say “yes”. Why the disconnect? Our public school system is completely socialist, pure and simple. As such, it cannot possibly succeed in providing a quality education to our children. Yet like Mr. Byrne, we are almost all products of that system, which has been with us so long that we no longer question it.

The answer is not protesting the higher amounts spent on students in suburban schools. Quite frankly, the lower amount spent in the city schools is still substantially higher than the cost at which private schools could provide a much higher quality of education. I don’t claim to know how to run a school, but then I’m not a central planner, so I don’t need to. Like Mr. Byrne, I am a firm believer in the value of education. But I have complete confidence that private schools, competing for our tuition dollars in a free market, could quickly replace our current socialist system with far better schooling at much lower cost.

This is not a book review, because I wouldn’t want to spoil the ending. Michael Crichton is, after all, a master story teller (The Andromeda Strain, Jurassic Park, etc.), and this one is just as exciting. But it’s the factual background research worked into the story that makes this one an absolute “must read” for anyone who has ever heard the term “global warming”. Without detracting from the excitement of the story, Mr. Crichton conveys more factual information on the subject than you’ll ever see in the main stream media, and puts it into a much more realistic perspective.

He also makes some useful observations about the state of the debate, a couple of which I’ll repeat here:

* We know astonishingly little about every aspect of the environment, from its past history, to its present state, to how to conserve and protect it. In every debate, all sides overstate the extent of existing knowledge and its degree of certainty.

* I think for anyone to believe in impending resource scarcity, after two hundred years of such false alarms, is kind of weird. I don’t know whether such a belief today is best ascribed to ignorance of history, sclerotic dogmatism, unhealthy love of Malthus, or simple pigheadedness, but it is evidently a hardy perennial in human calculation.

You can find other interesting insights from Mr. Crichton on his website. In particular, check out his comments on complexity theory, which inspired State of Fear.

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof”
-1st line of the 1st Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America

“Religious beliefs and practices must be respected, but only so far as they abide by state and federal laws.”
-The Washington Post, June 6, 2008

If you can reconcile these two statements, you’re cleverer than I. The Washington Post made this statement at the end of an editorial (here) defending the seizure of 468 children by Texas law enforcement officials in April. The state purportedly acted on a single tip from a 16 year old girl, a tip that ultimately proved to be bogus. Thankfully, it didn’t turn out like Waco this time, but 468 children? The Post is certainly correct in stating that had they not acted, the officials would have faced harsh criticism. But overreaction also deserves harsh criticism.

Only in a fascist state could mass kidnapping be equated with “protecting the children”. I am no fan of religious cults, but judging from the muted response by the main stream media, including editorials like this one, who are we? When I went to law school, the Constitution trumped state and federal laws. According to The Washington Post, that is no longer the case.

In an excellent column on global warming, Charles Krauthammer puts the “cap and trade” debate into much better perspective than we usually get from the mainstream media. Environmental activists would have us accept that “the debate is over”, but as Krauthammer points out, Newton’s Laws of Motion stood up for over 200 years, until they were proven wrong by Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. And climate is far more complex and less understood than Newton’s Laws. So before we destroy our own economy, and trap billions of third world citizens in continuing poverty, let’s make sure there will be a corresponding benefit. Cap and trade has been a complete failure in Europe, and the environmentalists’s own studies show only a minimal reduction in global temperatures even if carbon emissions were reduced to ZERO! And remember that scientists were still warning us of the coming Ice Age in 1977, 8 years after temperatures bottomed (in 1969) and reversed their 35 year cooling trend. We’re now 10 years past the warming peak in 1998, so it’s about time we reconize the hoax for what it is.

The global warming hysteria is truly amazing to anyone who steps back and views the issue objectively. We all learned in childhood that “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”, but when did it become mandatory that the government “do something” about every issue that comes along? I’m sure most of us have heard the chain of causation whereby a single butterfly flapping its wings over the Rocky Mountains might trigger a hurricane over the Atlantic. It’s an interesting mental exercise, but I doubt that anyone would seriously suggest government regulation of wing flapping by every butterfly in the world. Far fewer resources would be much better spent preparing for the inevitable hurricanes which would strike even if butterflies were eradicated. But this is America. We let our federal government provide subsidized flood insurance in places where no private insurance company would write coverage, encouraging people to build in harm’s way and maximizing damage when the inevitable occurs.

Getting back to global warming, many people are convinced that the government must “do something” about that too. The big villain is supposedly carbon dioxide, and we are supposed to “cut emissions” regardless of the economic cost. One recent study concluded that if we reduced emissions to ZERO, it would reduce global warming by a fraction of one degree Fahrenheit over the next hundred years. The people calling for such drastic reductions have no idea what they are asking for. We are already paying dramatically higher prices for food and energy, but that is nothing compared to what they are asking for. Zero emissions would essentially return the economy to living in caves, BEFORE the discovery of fire. If we do that, we’ll need a lot more global warming!

Damaging the economy to “do something” is not just giving up our SUVs, or drinking fewer lattes at Starbucks. We are condemning hundreds of millions of the world’s poorest people, those most at risk of the predicted dire consequences of warming, to remaining in abject poverty and unable to adapt if any of those predictions actually come true. Is that the socially responsible thing to do?

Objective risk-benefit analysis is almost completely lacking from the entire debate. Skeptics are vilified as flat earthers, Holocaust deniers, or believers in the stork bringing babies. Projected consequences are grossly exaggerated, while the economic costs are minimized. Even Al Gore and the IPCC admit that the “20 foot sea level rises” of An Inconvenient Truth are well beyond the realm of probability. Yet they persist, apparently in the belief that people must be terrified into demanding action.

But why? What is it about global warming that exempts it from rational, factual discussion and resolution? Could it be - a hoax? Most people with facts on their side welcome debate. Certainly on an issue as serious as they say this is, we need all of the ideas and input that we can get. Yet the alarmists want no part of debate. Apparently they think they not only have all of the facts, they have all of the solutions. Even if I had no skepticism on the science, I would have to be skeptical of anybody who thinks that they know how to control the weather. Not even the weatherman is that arrogant!

Why must we use “the environment” to justify every argument under the sun? The New York Times invoked the environment this morning to argue against the border fence to stop “illegal” immigration. (Editorial, Michael Chertoff’s Insult) I happen to oppose the fence, because I believe in open borders. I believe that sovereignty of the individual trumps national sovereignty. If you want a “liberal” argument, the fence is racist. And experience has shown that fences keep more “illegals” in than out. So why does the NYT have to resort to the environment? I’ve been to the Mexican border. It runs through some of the most desolate wasteland in the world. Frankly, an atomic bomb along most of it wouldn’t constitute an “environmental disaster”. So why can’t we just debate the issue on its merits? The environment is not a justification for immigration any more than global warming is a justification for fascism (Al Gore notwithstanding).

Dennis Byrne’s column in yesterday’s Chicago Tribune (Feeling the Heat, Todd?) raised an interesting opportunity. Legally, it is possible for Illinois townships to secede from their counties, and given the shenanigans in Cook County government, I’m sure the idea might appeal to a number of townships there. The problem under current law is that voters across the entire county would have to approve the secession, and why would they vote to let others escape the misery that they cannot?

A bill in the legislature would allow the township to decide for itself on secession, without requiring the rest of the county to approve. Unfortunately, without strong citizen support, the bill is likely to die in committee. I think that many of us have a somewhat negative reaction to the idea of “secession”. We tend to think that the French Canadians in Quebec would be crazy to secede from Canada. And of course our own Abraham Lincoln took a dim view of the secession movement that led to the Civil War.

But let’s go back a little further in our history, to 1776. Our own Declaration of Independence was the ultimate secession document ever written, and probably marked the apex of freedom for all of humankind. George Washington and Thomas Jefferson did not consult with the voters of England before declaring their independence from King George, so why should the voters of Palatine need to persuade the rest of Cook County before freeing themselves from His Majesty Todd Stroger?

The Revolutionary War should have established once and for all time the right of any people, aggrieved by their government, to secede and establish their independence. Even if we are quite content with our situations in Lake County, or DuPage County, or any other county, it’s our freedom too. If we don’t support the principle for our unfortunate brethren in Cook County, we are forsaking our own birthright as well. It would be hard to read the Declaration of Independence again and reach any other conclusion.