Some not-so-random thoughts on something we did not write

Instapundit aka Glenn Reynolds (or is it the other way around? Man, all these interwebs/social media protocols have us wrapped around the axle) penned an excellent piece a couple of days ago in USA Today regarding the breakdown in trust in our nation's institutions and which has been exacerbated of late by the spate of scandals that has hit Washington D.C. and which all point to the integrity of our elected officials and the people those folks appoint to operate our governing infrastructure.


We're not here to argue the legitimacy of what should be more properly termed crisis... we have made our case(s) on an individual basis in other posts. Perception is reality, gang, and, of late, you don't have to be a conspiracy theorist to conclude that perhaps the NSA has reached beyond their original charter and scope with their domestic data gathering operation, to trot out just one example.



We forgot where we saw or read this but we felt the following was profound:

People will stop participating in society when they feel that society has nothing to offer them.

If you are regular reader of this blog then you are savvy enough to realize what is being offered is nothing monetary nor societal-provided benefits in the way of, say, a government safety net.


This is about a social contract that says not only will being a law-abiding and productive person be its own reward, it will be rewarded in turn by a law-abiding and productive society in which that person lives. Our betters in government are not holding up their end of this contract, however, and things are breaking down. A government that lacks transparency and integrity will soon lose the trust and confidence of the citizenry and that is precisely what we are seeing now.


A cynical and increasing disengaged citizenry only invites more bad acting by its government and you wind up in a constitutional republic death spiral.


We have always believed that a going-in assumption that your governing authorities are incompetent and/or over-reaching in their authority is not an unhealthy one.


This is not borne of paranoia or any extremist "rugged individualism" rather the inevitability of the frailty and fallibility of mankind. Perhaps to say it another way: You cannot forever bury your head in the sports section because someone, somewhere is going to screw up and/or screw you over and it will have negative consequences so you need to pay attention. This is an unavoidable fact.


We have stated several times in the past and as the Figurehead would suggest, we had fully intended to make Beers with Demo primarily a sports blog but the campaign for President in 2008 changed that forever. This coincided with our cracking open the front page and local section of the fish wrap before we got to the sports section, a sequence never before exercised.


There just seemed to be too much at stake and that is something that should never ever be said with respect to politics/governance. We shouldn't have to care so much. We should not have to pay this amount of attention. This only speaks, then, to the amount of authority we have granted to those aforementioned flawed human beings.


Do we wish we could revert BwD to a sports blog? You better believe it. And though ignorance may be bliss, if we are indeed being led to slaughter, we'd prefer it done eyes wide open so we can get a few wacks in on the way down.


Again, do yourself a favor and check out Reynolds' article at the link.



Update #1: Thanks for the Instalanche, Glenn. #Grateful #humbled. If you like, I can be followed on Twitter @deanriehm.


Also, for opinion and views from a libertarian/conservative perspective, check out the SLOBs (San Diego Local Order of Bloggers). Really nice people with excellent insights.



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Some thoughts on what's been going on lately

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If you are still a big government liberal, you probably aren't paying attention.#IRS #Obamacare #Pigford #AP#EPA#Benghazi

— Dean R. Riehm (@deanriehm) May 16, 2013

That wasn't meant as an admonishment to our liberal friends who follow us on Twitter (and whom most likely pay no never mind to our politically-themed tweets) rather an invitation to discuss just what the unfolding scandals represent in the broader context of things. And to provide, perhaps a counter-balance to that if it was taken as an admonishment, we offered up this:

Hey, conservatives, keep big picture in mind:this isn't D v. R, this is DC/Political Class v. you.#AP#IRS

— Dean R. Riehm (@deanriehm) May 16, 2013

We used "Ruling Class/Political Class" in the context of Angelo Codevilla's phenomenal essay from the American Spectator, "America's Ruling Class - And the Perils of Revolution" written nearly 3 years ago. (It's a lengthy piece but you would be doing yourself a huge favor to take the 20-30 minutes to read it)


To look at what has been happening in Washington through a partisan prism would be a big mistake and would be missing the larger point of assessing the role of government and how and in what manner its power is wielded.


Put simply, the scandals of the IRS, the Justice Department secretly obtaining Associated Press phone records and Pigford, are all symptomatic of a federal government that has become so large and intrusive that the inevitable result is contempt and corruption.


Attorney General Eric Holder's testimony yesterday before Congress provided excellent examples of this. When asked about how many or how often his department seized the phone records of media outlets, he claimed he couldn't quantify a number... he could not even ballpark it. He gave every impression that seizure of private records was standard operating procedure at the Justice Department.


We won't apologize for saying this exchange did not cover our constitutional republic in glory.


And when pressed for details specific to the Associated Press case, he claimed he recused himself from that case so he knew nothing of the details. He recused himself but couldn't recall specifically when he did and he did not recuse himself in writing and further, never informed his boss in the White House that he had recused himself. For an operation as serious in nature as it relates to the 1st amendment, civil liberties and privacy concerns, there is no record of him recusing himself other than him verbally telling his deputy that he had done so. (And it turns out the justification for these phone record seizures as being a matter of national security may be bogus). Unreal.


We use Holder as an example because he has been a favorite whipping boy of ours over the years as he personifies the complete contempt and quite possible corruption for which he has never been held accountable.


Accountability. A leviathan the size of our federal government will quickly lose accountability as that size becomes structured in a byzantine maze of agencies, bureaus and departments. To date, only one person has been axed as a result of the IRS debacle and that person, the head of the agency was going to be stepping down in June, anyway. The two "low level" employees in Cinncinnati whom we were told were responsible for the effective harassment of conservative groups have been "disciplined", or so we've been told. End of story, correct?


In reality, these abuses have been going on for years with the knowledge of senior IRS officials who did nothing to stop it. That hastily arranged presser last Friday was pure kabuki theater designed to get out ahead of and play damage control in front of the Inspector's General report that was to drop shortly thereafter on Friday. Even the IG report blandly labeled the wrongdoing as "mismanagement" when all indications point to the politicization of the tax-exempt application process.


Tea party and other conservative groups simply gave up in the light of overburdening and outrageous lines of questioning or for fears they might perjure themselves for not knowing the nature of any of their future activities as had been asked of some of the groups as part of the application process. And it only took 3 or 4 years of banging on their dinner plates to see any action taken on this. No accountability so the harassment and intimidation was allowed to continue, again, with the full knowledge of higher-ups within the IRS.


As Marco Rubio pointed out the other day, these are the sort of things you see in the 3rd world or failed state republics. This sort of stuff should not be happening here. But this is where we are because of our fool's errand of replacing a healthy skepticism of government and a desire to limit its power to a mindset that the government's good intentions as advertised by our betters in the Ruling Class justified an ever-increasing expansion of government powers... and as our Founders knew, we also know what is paved with good intentions.


These abuses, harassments, intimidations and lack of accountability are simply part and parcel to a government that grows so large, it simply gets drunk on its own power and starts running amok and trampling its original and intended charter.



* That quote in the image is from our President a couple weeks back at the graduation ceremony at the Ohio State University.

We forgot where we read it first but someone claimed that these scandals have all been making a better case for conservatism than all our leading conservative thinkers as we have seen the practical application rather than the theoretical and rhetorical.

Graphic image of the day

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Courtesy KT over at the Scratching Post:

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Which was inspired by these words from The One at a campaign stop in Roanoke, Va., this past Friday:

There are a lot of wealthy, successful Americans who agree with me -- because they want to give something back. They know they didn’t -- look, if you’ve been successful, you didn’t get there on your own. You didn’t get there on your own. I’m always struck by people who think, well, it must be because I was just so smart. There are a lot of smart people out there. It must be because I worked harder than everybody else. Let me tell you something -- there are a whole bunch of hardworking people out there. (Applause.)

If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business -- you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet.

(italics, ours)

We're baffled. It's such a completely different mindset that frames everything in such a context. A context that even beyond paying taxes for basic government services that delivers the mail, paves the roads and defends the coast (we could go on... they sure would like to will), there can be no individual success outside that which is defined by your relation to the government.

If you doubt us, recall it's this administration that claims as a success how many people they can put on food stamps and further, how unemployment benefits are somehow an economic stimulus.

It's no wonder these people are economic illiterates when, in a sense, they are moral illiterates as well. Yeah, we said it - because a philosophy whereby individual success is defined by the extent by which the government provided it, is immoral. And fealty to anybody beyond yourself and your Creator is inherently immoral as well.

As we recall, it is a government of the people and by the people and not the other way around. They seem to have flipped the script, wouldn't you say?

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Maryland: a state of firsts so to speak

The following is to read with the appropriate breathlessness:

In an historic vote today, the Maryland State Board of Education provided specific guidance to all public schools to require that each student be environmentally literate before he or she graduates from high school.

The vote cements Maryland as the first state in the country to approve a graduation requirement in environmental literacy, a credit to Governor O'Malley, to board members, and to Dr. Nancy Grasmick, State Superintendent of Schools.

"This is a momentous day not only for Maryland but for educators across the country who are watching what Maryland does, and hoping to increase outdoor learning in their states," said Don Baugh, Director of the No Child Left Inside Coalition (NCLI). "Governor O'Malley and Dr. Grasmick deserve our profound gratitude. For years they have put Maryland at the forefront of the environmental education movement."

The state school board vote clarifies for schools that each child must receive a comprehensive, multi-disciplinary environmental education that meets the approval of the State Superintendent of Schools. Regulations given final approval by the board provide critical flexibility and oversight for school systems as they develop effective environmental literacy programs aligned with the Maryland State Environmental Literacy Standards.

... Yada, yada, yada.



Of course, we'd settle for merely literate but in quite possibly related news:

Maryland has earned yet another dubious distinction: The lowest-ranked state for personal freedom in the country.

A recent study, "Freedom in the 50 states," from the market-oriented Mercatus Center at George Mason University faults Maryland's strict gun control laws, extensive automobile regulations, tight gambling laws, burdensome home-schooling laws and high drug arrest rates for our state's low ranking.

Maryland -- nicknamed "The Free State" -- is also ranked 28th in economic freedom and 43rd in overall freedom.

The study faults Maryland for "severe" labor regulation, high health insurance coverage mandates, eminent domain abuse and smoking bans.

And the state has been getting consistently less free since 2007, the study states.

Horrible ideas and bad government would appear to travel in pairs, it would appear.

Change we will not believe in

Look at what came in the mail the other day: Our updated Blue Cross/Blue Shield coverage plan with an important note regarding coverage for dependant children.

Let's go straight to the money paragraph:

Starting this year and continuing on through 2014, the Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare) will continue to be implemented through federal regulations. As the regulations for its various provisions evolve, some timetables and details may change. Members should check our website www.fepblue.org for the latest information on timeframes and implementation details.

(Parantheticals and italics, ours)

Forgive us for thinking that having to check a website to see which and whether laws have evolved portends bad things. Forgive us for believing that is not how you run a constitutional republic.

This is how dictatorships, or at least, kleptocracies happen: bit by bit and piece by piece.

Having seen how his own soup kitchen socialism has failed, Hugo Chavez, using natural disasters as the excuse, has asked the Venezuelan congress for new powers that would allow him to pass laws by decree for one year.

Never let a crisis go to waste.

The Department of Health and Human Services has currently granted 222 waivers to companies and unions from ObamaCare covering 1.5 million people precisely because "We have to pass the bill so you can find out what's in it." Governing by waivers and exemptions is no way to govern. It reeks of cronyism and corruption. And if you do seek a waiver from that thug, Kathleen Sebelius, you had better do it quietly and with hat in hand, or else...

During this past election cycle there was some buzz over here on the right regarding getting behind Mickey Kaus, a Democrat, for Senate. As good as Kaus is on many issues, he supported ObamaCare. Sorry. That was grounds for automatic disqualification. That's how toxic we believe ObamaCare is and we are seeing the results of it before it's even been implemented.

Evolve...? Change...?


That's not a governing philosophy we will abide by.

With Christmas out of the way, we can drop the goodwill and cheer and get on with the airing of grievances. For some related subject matter on the current distressed state of the Union, please see B-Daddy's fine post here and Leslie at Temple of Mut airs it out here.

Hey, whaddya want from me, huh?

Possibly the most important event of the vice president's day Tuesday is to meet at 2:15 with Earl Devaney. Everyone knows him as chairman of the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board -- the top guy monitoring the gazillion-dollar stimulus and the overdue economic recovery, and ensuring that the taxpayers financing same know all about it.

However, no one outside the room will know what goes on in that Biden-Devaney meeting. That's because the government meeting on government transparency has been closed.

We know, we know. Way too easy.

Moving towards the Bell curve

What's this? People demanding accountability and transparency from their elected leaders?

Several hundred angry residents from a modest blue-collar Los Angeles suburb marched Sunday to call for the resignation of the mayor and some City Council members in a protest sparked by the sky-high salaries of three recently departed administrators.

The residents of the city of Bell marched to Oscar's Korner Market and Carniceria, owned by Mayor Oscar Hernandez, then to his home, demanding that he reduce his own six-figure compensation or quit.

They then did the same with some members of the City Council, with many marchers wearing T-shirts that read "My city is more corrupt than your city."

"I don't think they are taking it seriously. And we're serious," event organizer and longtime Bell resident Nestor Valencia, 45, told the Los Angeles Times. "They need to resign."

This after the L.A. Times broke the story that Bell's city manager, police chief and assistant city manager were being paid annual salaries of hundreds of thousands of dollars, most egregious among these was city manager Robert Rizzo who pulled down $787,637. All three resigned on Friday.

But proving that not all protestors demanding accountability, transparency and responsibility of their elected leaders are created equal, we've noticed a definite difference in the tone of the media coverage for the outrage expressed by the good citizens of Bell with that of some other protestors who will remain un-named.

It's all good. We're with the residents of Bell and we hope this sparks a revival of civic interest and activism there in Bell and beyond. What is playing out there represents a microcosm of the ruling class vs. the country class in Codevilla's essay. It's high time for this push back.

Soft tyranny and Tony the Tiger

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Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Kathleen Sebelius said today that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is developing a new regulation that would require food manufacturers to display nutritional information on the front of packages.

This would mean that the front of a Wheaties box, for example, would display not only the smiling face of a famous athlete but also declare how many calories from fat are in each serving.

“Busy shoppers will be able to go into grocery stores and have some easy to understand information on the front of packages giving them quick data on what is a healthier choice,” said Sebelius at the U.S. Capitol.

“The Food and Drug Administration right now is working with food manufacturers to not only update the nutritional labeling on the back of packages, which right now is written in small bar codes and pretty indecipherable and hasn’t been updated in 20 years, but to move to a front-of-package labeling strategy,” said Sebelius.

To prove just how completely ridiculous this all is, do a quick survey of the food packaging in your kitchen or pantry. Where's the nutritional labeling? Our survey revealed that fully 2/3rds to 3/4ths of the labeling was on the side panels.

And written in small bar codes? That's the price code, Sebelius, you idiot.

And indecipherable? Maybe that's the key. The ratio of ingredients in a product that cannot be pronounced is inversely proportionate to the healthiness of that product.

Monosodiumglu... eh, pass.

Water, Yeast, Hops, Malt, Barley... now, we're talking.

But all this speaks to the dangers of letting people, particularly the government, act on your behalf because they claim it's good for you.

Sebelius, in one paragraph, proved she doesn't have a stinking clue as to what she's talking about. Yet, she is going to subject food manufacturers, grocery stores and other retailers to the added expense and inconvenience of these new completely unnecessary rules.


* See. 10 vitamins and minerals right on the front panel.





You want these cute kids crowded out by labeling?

Singing the tarmac blues

As ones you have just recently returned from a vacation that involved 4 separate flights we feel the pain of those who have been stuck on the tarmac for hours at a time because of flight delays.

And just as we can sympathize with those stuck in a crowded, stuffy cabin, we can also see how the inevitable government intervention into this inconvenience can and will actually make the problem worse.

The nation's recent onslaught of flight cancellations is a harbinger of what passengers can expect from airlines looking to avoid new multimillion-dollar fines for leaving people stranded on grounded planes in bad weather, according to federal data and aviation experts.

The government announced in December it would fine airlines $27,500 per passenger for long tarmac delays — or $2.75 million for a 100-passenger flight.

Cancellations cost far less than a huge fine, especially since seats are routinely prepaid and airlines save fuel cost.

These fines were a result of something called the Airline Passengers' Bill of Rights enacted by the FAA designed to protect passengers, however when one starts extending bills of rights beyond what is in the constitution, the law of unintended consequences kicks and and you have airlines cancelling flights and leaving passengers in the lurch which is cheaper than having passengers stranded on the tarmac for more than 3 hrs.

This rule does not go into effect until April 29th but airlines such as JetBlue have already begun cancelling flights just to get into the swing of things (those learning curves can be a real bitch, sometimes).

All this is a shame and could've been avoided if the airlines had just followed BwD's advice and rolled out the cart in order to serve up some of these to tired and cranky passengers

We won’t get into broad, sweeping over-generalizations

... we'll let you do that.


Transparency International released their wildly anticipated annual Corruption Perceptions Index report this week. The report measures perceived levels of public sector corruption in 180 countries, drawing on surveys of businesses and experts.


The bad guys:

1. Somalia

2. Afghanistan

3. Myanmar

T4. Sudan

T4. Iraq

6. Chad

7. Uzbekistan

T8. Turkmenistan

T8. Iran

T8. Haiti

T8. Burundi

T8. Guinea

T8. Equatorial Guinea




The good guys:

1. New Zealand

2. Denmark

T3. Singapore

T3. Sweden

5. Switzerland

T6. Finland

T6. Netherlands

T8. Australia

T8. Canada

T8. Iceland


The U.S. checks in at #19 on the good guys list.

Two things jump out at us immediately with respect to the two lists.

To the good: Western democracies.

To the bad: … as we stated previously, a respectable blog like this does not want to get into the unsavory business of stereotyping. We've got enough issues on our hands.

Oops...

Support for the economic recovery plan working its way through Congress has fallen again this week. For the first time, a plurality of voters nationwide oppose the $800-billion-plus plan.
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 37% favor the legislation, 43% are opposed, and 20% are not sure.

Forget about any quibbling with the absolute numbers or the legitimacy of a phone poll… it’s all about the trend and for a bill that was supported by 45% (vs. 42% against) just two weeks ago, it’s apparent that the public, having had a chance to digest more and more of the stimulus package is becoming more and more skeptical.

We believe this speaks to not only a poorly conceived and written bill but also to the electorate’s view of the role of government. Safety first, right? Above anything else, the government’s primary role is to protect us and our property from threats both foreign and domestic. And as the midterm election results of ’06 bore witness and now a sober reading of the stimulus package after the initial euphoria is now indicating, “minding the purse strings” may well yet take 2nd place in the voters’ mind as to what precisely is the role of government in America.

For genuinely post-partisan reasons, this is cause for encouragement.

Things that may interest only us Pt. II

The class in large-scale manufacturing we are taking is coming along quite nicely. As this particular type of manufacturing is one we've worked in for 18 years, the knowledge we are receiving is more of the fill-in-the-gaps variety but there are subjects like progressing and labor management/tracking that we are soaking-up as we have not had much previous experience, therein.

One of the instructors is a director at a mid-tier manufacturing facility on the Great Lakes who does a significant amount of business with the government. He's a really nice guy but we couldn't help but think he was using his time at the lectern as a bully pulpit to make his case regarding some of what he saw as the non-sensical nature of government contracting and accounting rules... much to the chagrin of the government types in the audience. To illustrate his frustration with the current rules of the road in government contracting, Beers with Demo is proud to present a play in one act, "Foxtrot!"

(curtain rises)

Government: "O.K. As you are aware, as a condition of our contract with you, you will be required to maintain a project management system for tracking physical progress and labor hours, 'Method A'."

Contractor: "Uhhhh, sure. But please know that we don't use 'Method A' as it doesn't fit our business practices... its arcane, cumbersome and in actuality does not provide an accurate picture of how the project is progressing or how many labor hours we are burning for individual work items let alone the project as a whole. We use 'Method B' which provides a much more accurate accounting of physical progress and labor hours used."

Government: "Thanks for sharing. Please provide us with figures on a quarterly basis using 'Method A'".

Contractor: "We'll do that but it will require us to then maintain two separate project management methods - one for the government and one that is actually of value to us."

Government: "Whatever."

(a short time later in the middle of the project)

Government: "It has come to our attention that you are using two separate project management methods. That is in direct violation of government accounting rules. We hereby revoke your project accounting certification which puts your participation in this entire project in jeopardy."

Contractor: "Whiskey, Tango.......?"

(curtain drops)

Your Sunday Morning Homily

A while back we mused on the possibility of this guy base-jumping into the Republican National Convention if there was not a clear-cut front-runner by summertime. (Sigh). Anyway, vid here buoys the spirits a bit in that there are still some folks out there that can speak common sense in a clear and concise manner without demagogue-ing the issues.

H/T: Ogre