Don't Blame Capitalism!!!

In 1869 the Central Pacific Railroad and the Union Pacific Railroad met at Promontory Point, Utah. What a celebration!!!!! But did you know.......

*In the beginning, in order to 'encourage' railroad construction, Congress granted 44 million acres of land and $61 million in federal loans to the transcontinental railroad project.

*Congress paid incentives for every mile laid and even bigger incentives for track laid on difficult terrain. As a result;
--Tracks were built meandering all over the place to increase mileage. Some were even built on ice and had to be totally reconstructed.
--Quality was sacrificed for quantity--both railroad companies were planning reconstruction before the Golden Spike ceremony.

*Congress mandated the railroads had to sell their stock for $100 par value.

*When stock prices dropped, the Credit Mobilier was a credit arm founded by Railroad owners solely to buy up railroad stocks, and get railroad contracts. In short, the railroad was awarding it's own contracts to itself and buying its own stock through the Credit Mobilier arm. This allowed them to over bill the government for the railroad and make double profits off of government subsidies.

*Several congressman were being paid off by Credit Mobilier to ensure that the government continued to fund the railroad projects.

*Though many people were suspicious of shoddy railroad construction no one questioned it because the government was financially backing the whole thing--they trusted the gov't to oversee it.

*Great Northern Railroad and the Milwaukee Railroad were transcontinental railroads built with private capital.

*The private railroads made investments in communities to ensure their railroads had customers. They also arrived at national standard measurements for the tracks amongst themselves without gov't mediation.

*These private lines held up in financial recessions and panics when the government subsidized railroads failed.

*Politicians blamed the waste, the corruption and the Credit Mobilier scandal on unbridled capitalism and cried out for--you guessed it--more government 'oversight' and regulation.

"Far from laissez-faire capitalism necessitating government regulation, it was government intervention that caused the corruption and fed it. People acted no better, or worse, in the 1870's than they did in George Washingtons' day. What had changed, however, was the opportunity for graft combined with the incredible profits to be gained from corruption. Such corruptions tracked precisely with the expansion of the federal bureaucracy."

~Larry Schweikart

Property rights = Responsibility = Liberty

"Property rights brought people to America because property ensured you could become someone. Secure property rights established a climate of competition that rewarded skill, talent, and risk taking."

~Larry Schweikart


I believe secure property rights are also about accountability. When I know what belongs to me, I know what I am responsible for--and so does everyone else.

I know what I can risk, and I risk it because I know I reap the rewards when I succeed. And when I fail, I answer to myself.

This is the problem I see in the government owning (or running) something; Public land and services belong to everyone--and no one--all at once. We all pay for them, but whose accountable for them? Bureaucrats? But bureaucrats do not have an immediate personal interest in public properties, they have a bureaucratic interest in public properties. They spend money that belongs to no one imparticular, no one imparticular reaps the rewards and no one imparticular is accountable for the failure. Perhaps this is why no one seems to be able to track down where all the bail out/stimulus funds have gone.

Secure property rights are about more than ownership of material goods. They are about me owning my successes and my failures. It is about me owning me--and that is liberty.

Character Counts. Virtue comes first.

~ An excerpt from A Patriots History of the United States by Larry Schweikart

Honor counted to founding patriots like Adams, Jefferson, Washington, and then later, Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt. Character counted...virtue came first.

These giants knew that their actions of character mattered far more to the nation than mere temporary political positions. The ideas they fought for in 1776 and debated in 1787 were paramount. And that is what American history is all about--ideas.

Character was tied to liberty; and liberty to property. All three were needed for success, but character was the prerequisite because it put the law behind property agreements, and it set responsibility right next to liberty.


And the surest way to ensure the presence of good character was to keep God at the center of one's life, community, and ultimately, nation.

"Separation of church and state" meant freedom to worship, not freedom from worship. It went back to the link between liberty and responsibility, and no one could be taken seriously who was not responsible to God. "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." They believed those words.

Vocabulary

histrionic - adj. - overdramatic or theatrical; affected

histrionics -n. - exaggerated emotional behavior

Sometimes I wonder if my own histrionics are my biggest problem.

Words of Wisdom

"Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond it's limits is deciding to protect us from ourselves."

~Ronald Reagan

Patrick Henry--A Patriot for All Times

Patrick Henry is most known for his proclamation, 'Give me liberty or give me death!' But his speech, delivered to the Virgina Convention of Delegates 3 weeks before the first shots of the Revolutionary War, is full of other tidbits of wisdom that transcend time.

~"...it is natural of man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth...Are we disposed to be of the number who having eyes, see not, and, having ears, hear not, the things which so nearly concern our temporal salvation?...For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst and to provide for it."

~"I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided; and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging the future but by the past. And judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the conduct of the British ministry for the last ten years, to justify those hopes with which gentlemen have been pleased to solace themselves?"

~"They tell us, sir, that we are weak, unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger?....Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs, and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies have bound us hand and foot?"

~"The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave."

~"Gentlemen may cry 'peace, peace', but there is no peace--the war is already begun!...What is it gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!"

Slavery--Freedom from Choice

'A Southern farm is the beau ideal of Communism; it is a joint concern, in which the slave ... is far happier, because ... he is always sure of support.' ... 'The best governed countries, and which have prospered the most, have always been distinguished for the number and stringency of their laws,' ... 'liberty is an evil which government is intended to correct.'"

~Sociology for the South 1854 by George Fitzhugh-a socialist.

Mr. Fitzhugh argued that slaves were better off because they were free from decision making. His book asserts that Liberty only leaves people free to destroy themselves. The government must be the 'master' that keeps people safe (from themselves) and provides for them so they need not be burdened with working in an unfair and unjust world--they aren't suited for it.

If being free from choice is truly the ideal situation as Mr. Fitzhugh believed, then I can't imagine how oppressive it would be to have to make choices for everyone! I am left to marvel at the benevolence of those willing to be the government that is burdened with making the decisions for all of us. That, by Fitzhugh's argument, would be the most unfree, oppressive job ever. We should be grateful for those willing to do this for us. Those who seek to be our masters are making a great personal sacrifice. They truly are benevolent.

Of course this is the great idiocy of Fitzhughs premise. He criticizes the free market and capitalism for its harsh unfairness; it's corruption and greed (too much liberty, you see. This is what happens when you give us liberty). But he talks about government as if it is a God-like entity with selfless love and charity for all--government is above human folly--well, as long as the right people are running it--the elite class. (Would the elite class step aside and let God run the show? Not likely, God has proven himself to be too harsh and unfair. They are better than God. They are the only ones charitable enough to take on the burden of government and make it fair for all.)

(I just had a random thought about Barack Obama--where did that come from? That was wierd.)

If We the People are too incompetent to handle liberty are we competent enough to know what restraints our benevolent, all controling government should operate under? Certainly not. We will just have to leave that to them. It's a good thing we have 'them', the elite, above-human-folly, more-fair-than-God, superhumans among us that know all that stuff. What good fortune. And what a blessing for the rest of us--to be free from making choices--just like slavery.