Constitution of Convenience

Democrats who couldn’t be bothered with the Constitution while nationalizing health care have now discovered it is a useful thing to beat Arizona over the head with.  

While it is encouraging to know that some liberals have embraced the 4^th Amendment, it is disappointing that they skipped over the 1^st and 2^nd to get there, and then stopped reading before the got to the 9^th and 10^th. 

Am I the only one that sees the irony in liberal outrage over non-citizens possibly being asked to produce identification, while at the same time they (Senator Chuck Schumer) propose mandatory implants of bio-chips into citizens to track our financial and health histories?        

This is the kind of bizarre contradiction that is created when power replaces principle and representation turns to rule. It’s not that Libertarians object to protecting individuals from their government; we have been driving that bus for 40 years.  It’s just that we haven’t seen Democrats riding shotgun for quite some time.

But there is no high principle motivating the socialists here. This has nothing to do with concern for the welfare of illegal immigrants or with respect for the Constitution; it is all about power and control.   

Don’t be fooled - what the D.C. socialists are really outraged about is that a state (Arizona) had the audacity to act on its own rather than take its marching orders from Washington.  Not just any state, but one with a woman governor who isn’t a Democrat, if we want to be honest about what really gets under their skin. 

Will the liberal Democrats go berserk if Wisconsin passes a law enforcing mandatory health insurance when that kicks in?  Oh, no…..that’s different.  Would they forego their 16,000 new IRS agents to beef up border security so that states don’t have to take matters into their own hands?  Dream on. Will they call for a boycott of any state that checks concealed carry permits?  Oops, wrong Amendment.         

Empires can not allow their colonies to assert sovereignty, and we have lapsed back into empire.  The capital has moved from London to Washington, but both are light years removed from the reality imposed on us subjects out here in the hinterlands.  They take more and more of our money, and they give us more and more rules to follow.

King Barack and Queen Nancy are trying to stomp out a growing rebellion among the colonies – opting out of health care, tackling illegal immigration, rejecting federal drug laws, setting marriage criteria, protecting gun rights, organizing tea parties, and other unthinkable acts of insubordination.  

To all those rebellious states and uppity citizens, I say “good on ya”.  And to all the liberals who have come around to the idea that government should stay out of the illegal immigrants’ business, I say “congratulations”.  Now just add citizens and legal immigrants to your list, and you just might be a Libertarian.  

The first American Revolution was fought with bullets and blood; the second is being fought with ballots and blogs.  Arizona is just a skirmish along the way to restoring our Constitution and replacing our empire with a representative republic once again.      

“Moment Of Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D.  Visit Tim’s website www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.

Immigration Reform

We have seen this movie before: Congress is rushing to vote an unread bludgeon of an immigration reform bill that does nothing to reform immigration. 

This is getting predictable, tedious and boring.  Neither party has had an original thought on the immigration issue in decades – the Republicans would send the National Guard to the border, while the Democrats would send Rev. Al Sharpton to Phoenix. 

It is easy to criticize Arizona’s decision to enforce federal immigration law when you don’t live in Arizona.  Libertarians are conflicted: property rights and personal safety need to be protected - indeed that is the first and only rightful purpose of government. On the other hand, we oppose restrictions on the free flow of labor across borders.   

But this dilemma is not resolved by the false choice between amnesty and deportation; neither approach will solve the problem off illegal immigration.  That will only be solved by making immigration legal.

The reason we have millions of illegal immigrants in this country is that the process to admit them legally is totally broken down.  That is the problem that needs to be fixed – that is why people come here illegally.  Neither party has addressed this fundamental problem in its reform proposals.

It can take several years to get a visa to come here work legally; the system is full of quotas, loopholes, preferences, restrictions, corruption, and at the end of the day, decisions are arbitrary, political, and irrational.  NAFTA was supposed to facilitate labor migration among the three North American countries - it has made things more complicated and difficult. 

Labor is like any other over-regulated market - prohibitions and quotas create black markets and criminal enterprise whose effects on the community are much worse than the underlying free market effects the government originally sought to dampen.

In an unregulated labor market, where it would be easy to immigrate and emigrate legally, people would come and work for a while, save some money, and then go home.  The inflow and outflow of labor would be managed by supply and demand, not by armed criminal gangs. 

Labor moves around the world every day; Americans are up in the Oil Sands of Alberta, setting up factories in China, running banks, building roads and bridges, mining coal, and teaching in Universities all over the world – we work there for a while and then we come home.  We are not unique – transactional labor is commonplace.

It is ridiculous that 3^rd world countries can figure out how to admit, welcome, and track temporary foreign workers routinely while our own government continues to dork it up year after year. 

In recent years, we have kicked the insanity up a notch:  while we have made it nearly impossible to come here legally and work, we offer generous welfare benefits to people who come here illegally and don’t work.  And our minimum wage laws drive the illegal immigrants and business owners into a criminal underground economy.  Lastly, our drug laws add violence and gangs into the mix.   

None of these are immigration problems; they are the consequences of welfare, economic interventionism, and prohibition policies.   

These ill-advised government programs are not only attracting undesirables from abroad, they are producing home-grown undesirables in far larger numbers.  They should be dismantled for the good of citizens and non-citizens alike. 

Securing the border does nothing to alleviate the perverse incentives that welfare, tax, economic, prohibition, and our newly minted health care entitlement policies create.  And amnesty for those here now will only encourage more to come tomorrow.   

Immigration is a good thing, and open borders are a good thing.  We are a nation built upon the character, drive, and idealism of people from all over the world who came here to work, to own property, to start a business, to live in Liberty.  We need many more of them, and we need many less of the deadbeats who come for a handout.    

The only real solution to illegal immigration is to make labor migration legal, to dismantle the welfare state magnet for undesirables, and then to let free markets manage the flow of documented workers across borders.

“Moment Of Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D.  Visit Tim’s website www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.

Profits Cure Disease

If you were told you have cancer, would you want Congress to: a) eliminate taxes on companies developing a cure, or b) eliminate their profits?   

That strips the great debate right down to the nubs, now, doesn’t it?  Are you a free market capitalist or a state socialist? 

Choose now, because once you are diagnosed with a potentially fatal disease it will be way too late to change your mind.  As for me, I’m betting on Team Profit. 

Because the sure cure for cancer is not going to be discovered; it does not exist.  It must be created through someone’s hard work; and it will be the rightful property of those people who develop it. They, not society, will own it.

The opportunity to profit from what you own is what makes people work harder, smarter, and most importantly when it comes to cancer cures, faster.  Taxing those profits diminish the incentives to work hard, smart, and fast.

In a free market, whoever gets there first with the sure cure for cancer will become wealthy beyond comprehension – and well-earned would be an understatement.  But when that happens, the state socialists will start whining about the income gap. 

So here is question two - are you better off with: a) an income gap and your cancer cured, or b) pay equity and early death?  Welcome, defectors from Team Tax.     

Now at first, only rich people will be able to afford the sure cure for cancer.  It will be just like cell phones and microwaves and hip replacements, where rich people will use their money and influence to be first in line. 

At that point, the state socialists will be going berserk - outraged that only the rich are getting cured while the poor continue to die.   They will demand that we tax the rich to even the playing field, and put a new “windfall profit” tax on the cancer cure providers. 

If the world were a caring contest, that would be a good idea; but the world is a paying contest, so it’s a stupid one.

The high profits from selling the first units of the cure to the rich provide the investment capital needed to expand production and lower unit costs, making the cure for cancer available to less-wealthy people.  If you tax those profits, there is no money to reinvest and the cure will be only for the rich forever. 

Question three - how do you get more money out of rich people: a) giving them a cure for their cancer in return, or b) increasing their marginal tax rate?  Team Tax is mow losing members faster than John Wayne Bobbitt. 

The profit/investment/cost reduction cycle repeats and accelerates, so very soon the sure cure for cancer will be accessible to even the poorest members of our society.  The fun will really begin when Walmart starts selling it – poor people will be doing cartwheels into the stores, while the millionaire talking heads on MSNBC will still be whining about the greeters not getting benefits.

Risk and reward, profit and loss, producing things people want at prices they can afford – this is how free market capitalism works; more importantly why capitalism works. 

Profits, not taxes, will bring the sure cure for cancer to the whole of society, along with all the other products and services that improve living standards for everyone.  If we want to raise living standards, it is foolish to tax profits.    

If you Team Tax people would rather see people die than see someone make more money than you, then please do not lecture me about morality.  If you hate profits, then you hate poor people, and it’s about time somebody called you out.       

In our tax-and-grant, government-run medical research industry, the only guys making a profit are the folks selling those lapel ribbons we have been wearing for the past 30 years for all the diseases that the all the non-profits haven’t cured yet. It is taboo to criticize non-profits because they Care for a living, while we are just amateurs at it.  Yeah, well.   

Personally, I would rather cure a disease than show everyone how much I care by wearing a ribbon. That is why I am a free market capitalist; that is why I am a Libertarian.  That’s why you should be, too.  Now, before you contract a fatal disease.

“Moment Of Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D.  Visit Tim’s website www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.

Tim's 2010 LPWI Convention Speech

My name is Tim Nerenz, and I want to be your Congressman.

Not your mommy, not your daddy, not your doctor, banker, car salesman, landlord, insurance agent, teacher, pastor, union steward, or weather forecaster.   

I don’t care whether you are a Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Independent, or only vote on American Idol, I want to represent you in Congress. 

Represent, not rule.  Whether you are senior citizen or a senior at the University of Wisconsin, you do not need my permission to live your life.  Why should that change just because you elect me to Congress? 

Most of us want a few basic things from government – keep us safe, protect our rights, and then leave us alone. 

Leave us alone to go to work, raise our families, grow our businesses, build our communities, educate ourselves, practice our faith, pursue our interests, and take care of each other as we see fit. 

We are tired of other people telling us what to do, what to say, and what to think. We don’t need government’s approval to be who we are.

We are weary of endless wars and interventions into the internal affairs of other sovereign nations.  We believe in strong national Defense, not perpetual deployments abroad.  

We have had it with moralist hypocrites – in both parties - using the power of the state to shove their beliefs down our throats.

Your Creator gave you a brain of your own and a heart of your own; mine can’t possibly know better than yours what is best for you.  Neither can Tammy’s, Chad’s, or Peter’s.    

I don’t believe in the public good; I believe in the individual better.  I believe that each person is a unique and exceptional being, not a helpless member of a herd. 

I believe that you alone are entitled to make your own choices in this world, and that you alone are responsible for the choices you make. 

Liberty is the absence of government in choice.  Government is the absence of liberty in choice.  Tyranny is the absence of choice in government. 

I choose Liberty.  That is why I am a Libertarian.  We are not the party of “yes, you must” or the “party of no”; we are the party of “hell, no!.”  

Less government and more choices:  that’s my answer, what is your question? 

What is important to you – the economy, education, environment, health care, energy, employment, drugs, guns, taxes, trade, currency, markets, foreign relations, transportation, lifestyle, pensions, unions, social issues?   Getting the government out of the way is the first step in fixing each of our nation’s problems. 

Limited Government - this was once the unifying principle of this nation.  It is what we stood for in the world. 

Limited Government was the reason our ancestors risked everything to come here.  We have not just taken it for granted, we have taken it apart.   

In my own lifetime, government spending at all levels has tripled from less than 20% of GDP to over 60% of GDP if you include the cost of mandates on the private sector. 

Conversely, our economic freedom has been cut in half.  We have gone from 80% free to 40% in just over 50 years.

And we are unwilling to pay for all the government we have.  Taxes pay for only 58% of what government spends; we steal the rest from our children, our grandchildren and their children. 

This is not simply bad economics, it is not a question of right or left; it is a question of right and wrong.    

It is wrong to force Americans not even born yet to pay for benefits that we are unwilling to purchase with our own money.

It is wrong to force Americans not even born yet to bear the costs of wars we are unwilling to fund ourselves.

It is wrong to deny Americans not born yet the freedoms that were entrusted to us by our parents.

We are not the owners of Liberty; we are its tenants.  The only freedoms that will be passed to our children and our grandchildren will be those that we are willing to fight for now.  Each freedom we allow to be taken is gone forever.

Economic liberty and personal liberty are two sides of the same coin.  It is foolish to think we could give away heads and somehow keep tails.

Both parties act like rights are favors granted by the state to groups who supported their campaigns.  They believe that wealth belongs to society, not to the individuals who created it.  They claim both heads and tails of the liberty coin belong to them.

Ayn Rand called it the great inversion: when the state can do as it pleases, while we must ask its permission.

The socialists in both parties who run our government believe that individuals exist to benefit the state. 

Libertarians believe the opposite – we believe the state exists only to benefit its individual members. 

We know that all rights are vested in individuals, an endowment from our Creator. We understand that wealth is like art, or music, or an athletic achievement - it is the rightful property of the individual who created it or acquired it in voluntary exchange. 

We believe that the government must be constrained by the people, not the other way around.  George Washington called our Constitution the “immunization of citizenship”.  We have disregarded it, and now wonder why we are sick.

Government is not our master; it is our servant, our Cabana Boy.  The Cabana Boy doesn’t tell us what to do – he cleans up and he shuts up. 

So shut up and go fix a bridge, Cabana Boy – and keep your hands off our money, our guns, and our stash.    

Congress is supposed to represent us, not lord over us. We need to elect Representatives who understand that.  Tammy Baldwin doesn’t, but I do.

Next November, vote for Tim.  Tim, Not Tammy.   

Tim Nerenz is the Libertarian Party candidate for U.S. House of Representatives from Wisconsin's 2nd District.  Check out Tim's campaign website at www.timnerenz.com

Hate Speech

The socialists have finally given us a definition of hate speech we can use:  they hate it when we speak.

Before the ink was dry on the health care bill, liberals were already on the name-calling offensive, describing anyone who opposed their socialist agenda as racists, homophobes, white supremacists, fascists, or domestic terrorists.

I have yet to hear a single voice in the Liberty movement call for violence or for the overthrow of the government by force.  I can’t recall hearing a single racist remark at any of the political events that I have been invited to attend.  Have you?  

Last week the FBI added “sovereign citizens” to their list of hate groups in a bulletin sent to local law enforcement around the nation.  Imagine that: it is now considered hateful to believe in the first principle of the Constitution – individual sovereignty.  The media buried that story in the back pages, if they reported it at all.   

It is a sad state of affairs when the defense of Liberty is considered hate speech; when belief in the Constitution puts you on a government watch list.  It’s a good thing government is incompetent, or we would be in grave danger.     

Personally, I think the most vile and dangerous form of hate speech is when a self-appointed elite claim to know better than us what is good for us.  It places their contempt for us and their hatred for our values on full display.      

They are telling us that we are too stupid to decide for ourselves what is good, that we are incapable of attaining goodness independently from them, and that we can’t be trusted to think and act of our own volition.  That is some hateful stuff.

And who is it that is hurling hateful epithets upon black libertarians and conservatives, especially those who dare to speak at “tea party” events?  They are cheered by the so-called angry white mobs; it is the liberal left-wing bloggers that call them “oreo”, “uncle tom”, and “spray paint nigger”.  And yet the media reports it just the opposite; tea partiers are the noisy racists and liberals the innocent victims. 

The hatred directed at black libertarians and conservatives is not about race; it is about success.  The socialists hate it when anyone excels without their permission, but especially minorities and women who must be kept dependent upon the state for the socialist left to remain in power.  They can not tolerate the sight of a black man or woman who has made it on their own; it exposes the lie.   

That’s what this hate-speech fuss is all about - keeping the socialists in power.        

Democrats get hysterical when we call them by their rightful names – liberals or socialists as the case may be.  I myself have been called a racist for simply using the term “socialist” in my speeches and writings. 

One journalist recently went so far as to make up a racist quote, attribute it to me, and then criticize me for the message in his words – I guess he could not find anything suitably hateful in anything that I have actually said or written.     

My comment correcting his fabrication was immediately deleted from his online article; and my complaint to his publication was returned undeliverable.  That is the state of free speech and journalistic integrity on the left these days.    

It is not hate speech to call me a libertarian; that is what I am.  And it is not hate speech to call a socialist a socialist; that is what they are.  The difference is that I am a member of the Libertarian Party; we actually named ourselves after what we stand for, while socialists hide from their proper name.  On the political spectrum, we are polar opposites.   

We oppose socialism because it is dehumanizing, and its legacy is war and genocide.  When the economic policies of the socialist philosophy fail – which they inevitably do – regimes must use force to retain power of the people they have impoverished.  Over 100 million were killed in the 20^th century at the hands of the socialists.  To this day, the left will not own up to that - they are the ultimate holocaust deniers.

Look back at the last 100 years of our own American history.  Who took us to war?  Wilson, Roosevelt, Truman, Johnson, Clinton, two Bushes – five liberal democrats and two liberal republicans.  Seven big spenders who expanded the size and reach of government.  Not one of them ran for office promising war; that came later.    

It is ironic that our socialists call anyone who opposes them “Nazis”.  The German National Socialist Party came to power promising hope and change and economic recovery.  Its first initiatives were gun control, health care, minimum wage, taxing industrialists, nationalizing energy, and demonizing the banks and insurance companies.  Does that sound vaguely familiar?    

If you think it could not happen here, you are wrong.  It is happening here right now; the power of the state is being expanded daily and liberty is being diminished daily.  President Obama has expanded the very wars he ran against; into Pakistan, Yemen, and likely soon into Iran. Where is the tipping point of socialism?  Why on earth would we want to find out?  Each step toward the brink is a bad move.           

It is not hate speech to stand up against hateful things; it is hate speech to remain silent in the face of hateful things.  And socialism is a very hateful thing.  

Tim Nerenz is the Libertarian Party Candidate for U.S. House of Representatives from Wisconsin's 2nd District. To support Dr. Tim's campaign, please visit the campaign website at www.timnerenz.com.