When Money Doesn't Help

It was reported this morning that, despite the massive spending by the federal government, the U.S. jobless rate has continued to increase and now stands at nearly 10%. More than 250,000 jobs were lost in September, more than the 200,000 that were lost in August as joblessness reached its highest rate since 1994, under the Clinton Administration. The government's response to this increase in joblessness is to extend the government stimulus package (aptly named since it seems to be doing little more than stimulating the government), and spend even more than than the nearly $800 billion already spent to rescue the economy. Evidently, the administration believes that if spending vast sums of money and increasing the government's role in the economy doesn't work, the solution is to spend even more money and increase the government's role in the economy even further; a sure way to reduce the deficit.

Amidst these grim statistics, it was reported that the health care industry added 19,000 jobs over that period. It is of note that one of the few bright spots in the economy is the major target of the Obama administration and the one that is claimed in most in need of reform.

The government doesn't create wealth, it absorbs wealth. I recall reading once that a definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing and expect different results. While this definition was a source of amusement when I first heard it, it is no longer so. The private sector is the primary source of wealth in the economy, and it is being threatened with more regulation and increased taxes. But, I'm sure a man as gifted and intelligent as Obama, has figured out a way to expand the government, increase regulation, and raise taxes, while stimulating the economy at the same time. At least, let us hope so.

Why the Second?

The Second Amendment is the one amendment to the Constitution that the Supreme Court and many on the left have been inclined to read narrowly and in context. The Court, over the decades, has been willing to take an expansive interpretation of constitutional rights and overlook intent and context. The right to privacy, for example, was found hiding in the Constitution. The right to abortion, in turn, was found lurking in the right to privacy. Federal intervention to end segregation was originally found constitutional under a broad interpretation of the interstate commerce clause.

Over the years, many have cheered as the Court looked beyond intent, precedent, and context, to extend constitutional rights and liberties where none had existed before. Many hope that such an expanded an enlightened approach to the Constitution will continue, with one exception; the Second Amendment right to "keep and bear arms." The Second Amendment has been mired in strict literalism for years. For some reason, even the most expansive and liberal interpreters of the Constitution seem to stick at the Second Amendment.

Those inclined to urge a broader view of the rights provided under the Constitution, often insist on a narrow and parsed interpretation of the Second Amendment. "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed" is claimed to only be applicable in regards to militias, not a right possessed by individuals. We are told by the occasionally strict constitutionalists, that the people's right to keep and bear bear arms is entirely predicated on the necessity of a well regulated militia. Where there is no militia, there is no right to keep and bear arms. Under that narrow reading of the Second Amendment, the individual, qua individual, has no constitutional right to keep and bear arms. Where there is no specific mention of an individual right to keep arms, despite what it says in the Constitution, none is inferred.

Many modern constitutional rights have been inferred and deduced from an expansive reading of the Constitution. Penumbras and emanations over the years have flowed from the Constitution like water from a fountain. Why the insistence on a literal and parsed interpretation of the Second Amendment? Why is a document construed to be flexible enough to include rights unimaginable and inconceivable to the Founders interpreted so narrowly on this one issue? This is not a rhetorical question. I really would like to know.

Economic Bulldozer

In an editorial in this morning's Dallas Morning News, the author takes issue with recent attempts to control immigration and penalize those here in the country illegally. In defense of the Dream Act, William McKenzie makes the common economic argument concerning the economic benefits of immigration, both legal and illegal. But in places like Texas and Arizona, we are not talking about computer programmers, engineers, or doctors. We are primarily talking about uneducated and unskilled workers whose chief benefit to the economy is to keep wages low.

He also cites the common, and, in, my opinion, flawed argument that laws against illegal immigration do not stop it and therefore it is near worthless to try and improve, let alone enforce those laws. The merit of this argument is beyond me. Are laws against robbing banks worthless because they do not stop people from robbing banks? Does that mean we should give up and legalize bank robbing?

There certainly is room for compassion regarding the plight of illegals living in the U.S. But there is room for irritation as well. Not everyone who enters the U.S. brings valuable skills with them. Those who do not do little to increase the productivity of the U.S. and actually, in many cases, provide a net loss where social, governmental, and educational services must be expanded and tailored to meet the needs of immigrants.

There is also the argument that, even if many immigrants lack the skills and education to contribute to the U.S. economy, their children will acquire the skills lacking on the part of their parents and become productive and contributing members of the U.S. But much of this argument is speculative. It is assumed, or perhaps just hoped, that the children of illegal immigrants will grow up to be engineers, doctors, architects, etc. Maybe they will, maybe they won't. Allowing millions of undocumented immigrants into to the U.S. on the statistical probability that some of them will, someday, acquire useful and needed skills and add to the economic vitality of the U.S. is a gamble. Because it is a gamble, the public should be made aware of the odds and the costs involved and decide if it is one they want to take. Unfortunately, the public is usually excluded from decisions regarding immigration.

Economics should be only one consideration in the debate over immigration. There are other considerations involved as well, e.g. the cultural, political, and social costs of immigration; and at what point does immigration become migration. But, as is increasingly common in the U.S., the economic considerations of policy are used to bulldoze all others. Perhaps the U.S. should consider altering its immigration laws to accommodate illegal immigrants trying enter the U.S. Perhaps we should also consider examining policy reforms to not only consider the aspirations of illegal immigrants, both those already here and those who want to come here, but to assess the ability of immigrants' to achieve those aspirations once they are here. Many people want to be doctors or architects. Few become doctors and architects. Regardless of one's opinion on the matter, the costs and benefits of immigration, economic or otherwise, is a discussion worth having.

There are many costs to immigration on the scale we are witnessing today. The economic cost is just one of them. Because it is the most "objective" and "scientific" analysis, the economic measurement has become the preferred one. The social, cultural and political costs are just as real. But, because they involve less quantifiable and "scientific" concerns, they are avoided, even shunned. Nevertheless, those costs are real, and we ignore them at our own peril.

Immigrants?

In the debate over immigration, it not uncommon for some to refer to the Pilgrims and those who followed them as immigrants. They were not immigrants. An immigrant is one who moves to a foreign nation to take up residence. A colonist is someone who moves to a foreign land to take up residence. The difference is colonists seek to retain their identity and allegiance to their mother country. The original Europeans who landed here in North America were not immigrants, despite the popular slogans to the contrary. They were colonists. They had no interest in assimilating with those who inhabited this land or learning their language and customs. While on occasion it proved useful to know the customs and beliefs of those who originally lived here, there was little effort to adapt to them. The settlers and colonists lived apart from the natives and had no desire to live amongst them. In time, they supplanted the natives through numbers and force and eventually took the land for themselves. It is unlikely the Iroquis and Choctaw viewed Europeans as immigrants any more than the Romans viewed the Gauls as immigrants; though no doubt we would.

Obama on the Watch

Even in the midst of his battles for health care reform, peace in the Middle East, containing Iran's nuclear ambitions, rebuilding Iraq, and stabilizing the U.S. economy, and other national crises and concerns, Obama recently found time to address the problems facing the U.S. from under performing school children. Obama has recently discerned that American school children are spending too little time in school compared to other nations and not learning as they should. Obama says he "just wants to level the playing field."

Apart from the fact that this isn't true, (it was reported that U.S. children spend more hours in the classroom than most, 1,146 in the U.S. against 1,005 in Japan), Obama has taken it upon himself to address the problem. Clearly, state and local governments are failing us by neglecting the problems caused by under performing school children. One might as well add parents to that list as they are, at least in theory, somewhat responsible for their children's education. Clearly, federal intervention is required

Education Secretary Duncan chimed in by criticizing that our school year is based upon an outmoded agrarian economy and should be brought into line with the modern, high tech economy. As is typical in the modern approach to economic and social problems, the fault, the lay in an incorrectly structured or poorly supervised institution. The solution, therefore, requires new policy to improve structure and better supervision to oversee its management. Enlightened policy with efficient supervision, management, and implementation is the solution to all problems.

History, customs, and traditions are often obstacles to progress in the minds of reformers, because they adhere to non "scientific" approaches. Traditions and customs, although comfortable and meaningful to the people who participate in them, operate in ways resistant to the rational, scientific approach of cause and effect. The horrors of Mao and Stalin trying to wrench their people from their traditional beliefs and practices were, in the minds of the reformers, more a testimony to the recalcitrance of the ignorant and malcontent than to any flaw in the idea.

Increasingly, here in the U.S., opposition to the plans and ambitions of progressives to reform and enlighten the public is viewed as a product of ignorance and the machinations of counterrevolutionary elements. The laudable motive of making our children more competitive by manipulating curriculum and attendance is not, in and of itself, objectionable. What is objectionable is that the plan being proposed is being proposed by Washington and based on the economic calculus of international trade. The Soviets, in their prime, would collect and analyze statistics to determine where their economy was under performing and allocate political and economic resources to address the shortcomings determined to exist. Data was collected and analyzed and solutions were proposed, and plans were implemented; and things just got worse.

Things will be different here, it is believed, because we are able to collect better data and so able to create better plans. Furthermore, our planners, unlike the Soviets, are beneficent and our public more enlightened and willing to accept the plans. This is likely to be so until the public concludes that the plans don't work and actually make things worse. How much further our educational system will have to decay before the public begins to realize this is any body's guess.

Is an Error Better Than a Lie?

There was an editorial in today's Dallas Morning News regarding when a misstatement by a politician represents a lie. A lie, according to the author, is "a willful misstatement of fact, uttered with the intent to deceive." The case in point was, once again, President Bush's claim that Iraq was developing weapons of mass destruction. After the war, it was concluded that there were no such weapons, and no plans to produce or acquire them. Although prior to the war there was some plausible evidence that Iraq was actively pursuing, and perhaps even possessed such weapons, there was also considerable evidence that this was not the case. For whatever reasons, Bush chose not to take that evidence into account and demand more information. He was content with the information he had. Therefore, either President Bush lied about the existence of such weapons as a pretext to invade Iraq, or that he allowed himself to be misled into believing that such weapons existed or were actively being pursued. This leaves one with a choice; either Bush knew and lied about it, or he did not know, and was being misled. In short, either he lied or he acted in error.

I have long been uncomfortable with the assertion that President Bush was misled and so acted in error. It is the job of the president to know such things and Bush didn't. If it wasn't deceit, it was incompetence, either on the part of Bush, his staff, or the intelligence community. Why we should be more comfortable with incompetence than deceit eludes me.