I don't hate to see her go

Maybe this comes from my libertarian nature. Or maybe it comes from my lifelong fascination with, and my formal education in, history. Perhaps it's the synthesis of the two: My morbid interest in the evil men of the world. The serial killers, corrupt big-shots and, especially, the tyrants.

I've read thousands of news stories about criminals, and I've written a few. I've studied scores of books about hundreds of peoples and their actions over the course of all human history, from man's climb out of the swamp to his leap toward the stars. I took a hefty load of courses devoted to the study of how people have behaved and why. And I've followed politics and government's activities for as long as I can remember.

I am not the sole authority on human behavior, nor am I singularly or even uniquely qualified to discuss sociological occurrences. But during my education, such as it is, I've noticed something important.

Of all the serial killers, corrupt big-shots and tyrants there have been (and there have been a lot), the very very worst of them are always in government.

Adolf Hitler could have neither killed 6 million Jews nor invaded Poland from any job other than Chancellor of Germany.

Joseph Stalin was never all that friendly, but the Purges, the Pogroms, the forced collectivization of farms and the famine-by-policy were never possible until he became General Secretary of the Soviet Union.

There is little record of Idi Amin's exploits before he seized the office of "His Excellency, Presient for Life, Field Marshal Al Hadji Doctor Idi Amin Dada." His exploits while in office are more well known.

But for the authority granted him as a leader, Pol Pot would have been unable to murder one-fifth of Cambodians.

There are many kinds of human criminals on many scales of severity. Some bad, bad people never held a job higher up than chocolate-maker. But Jeffrey Dahmer's death toll was less than 20; Stalin's was at least 20 million.

Certainly, Sarah Palin's name does not belong on any list with the names above. She's never been convicted of so much as swiping a candy bar from a grocery store (though she's been accused of much). But she has been a member of government, with far more authority than most normal people would ever seek. A governor of a state or another chieftain in government can, if she so chooses, destroy innocent people.

I don't know why Mrs. Palin decided to resign. My sense is that she did not seek fame, that, rather, duty called her into every campaign she ever entered. My other sense is that she does not deserve the lies that have been told about her or the hatred she has attracted. In whatever she chooses to do next (and I am not at all convinced that she will run for president, though I am entirely convinced she'd do a better job than Barack Obama is) I wish her well.

In larger terms, maybe my thoughts come from my deep well of mistrust for government. (If you trust government -- even ours -- any further than you can throw it, then you are a gullible, sad, pathetic excuse for a human being.) Maybe it's because I saw what the Ayatollahs did to Iranians after their recent election. Maybe it's because, for all of my short life and for all the history of human beings, governments all over the world have been guilty of (at best) waste, fraud and abuse, and (at worst) of outright theft, rape and murder.

From what I know, from what I've seen, from what I've experienced and learned, there is one thing -- maybe only one thing -- that a government potentate can do at any time in their career and almost never be wrong for doing it.

They can quit.

There are significant exceptions, of course. The retirement of Ronald Reagan in 1981, Abraham Lincoln in 1862, or George Washington in 1776 would have sent the world down a road to darkness. But the scarcity of such men is barely finite.

Almost every time a person with power relinquishes it, humanity wins.

Even Al Gore rejects global warming

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has been caught in a farce.

The Associated Press reports that, despite that city's new anti-idling law, the mayor's government-owned SUV's are frequently operated in neutral for great periods of time. For every second, gasoline purchased by taxpayers is burned for no purpose; and this situation is instructive about the attitudes held by leaders in the global warming hysterics movement.

Bloomberg fancies himself a savior of the anti-global warming/the ice age is coming/climate destabilization is a tragedy/climate change is the greatest threat America has faced since World War II/whatever the left is calling it this week movement. And his own actions, the actions of his mayoral administration, contradict the notion that there is any threat whatsoever posed by carbon dioxide.

Oh, to live in a world where Mr. Bloomberg was an isolated anomaly.

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has long insisted on greater energy use restrictions. He also has long driven a fleet of gas-guzzling Hummer SUV's.

Britain's Prince Charles and our own "prince" Robert F. Kennedy Jr. have, for quite some time, traipsed all over the globe demanding that people reduce their energy use and carbon emissions. This traipsing has been done, by each of them, in private jets.

Former Vice President Al Gore (who won a Nobel Peace Prize for his anti-global warming crusade) lives in a house that consumes more than 20 times as much electricity than the average American home.

Mr. Gore's spokesmen insist that he really is a believer, that he has no carbon footprint (because he "purchases carbon credits"). But if he were as convinced as he lets on that carbon dioxide emissions are ruining the world, he would continue to purchase those credits, and he would stop burning so much electricity.

His actions speak a lot louder than all the words ever uttered. Even Al Gore doesn't believe in the threat of global warming. And neither do Messrs. Kennedy, Schwarzenneger, Bloomberg, and Charles.

One of two things is occurring. Either these environmental advocates know that human activity and carbon emissions are not destroying the earth, or they think they ought to get one set of rules, and the rest of the world should get another.

Shining the light on stupidity

There's a simple, important reason why the Obama Administration and the Congress of leftistas have so often passed laws before letting Americans read them. In more than one case, Congress has voted so swiftly to enact legislation entailing thousands of pages that it was physically impossible for any member to have read the bills before voting.

They do this because, if Americans knew what Congress and the president were up to, Congress and the president couldn't get away with it.

For example: The Treasury Department recently ran a 'help wanted' ad for a cartoonist to help add humor to the government's portrayal of its indefensible deficits and corrupt, unconstitutional spending habits. It took a simple link on the Drudge Report (with no further comment) to shame Treasury into canceling that advertisement. Once an idea that stupid is put to into public consciousness, politicians know they'd better end it if they want to get re-elected.

When he was running for office, asking for Americans to vote for him, President Obama vowed to publish all legislation on the White House's Web site for a minimum of five days — so as to allow citizens to review it and make comments — before he would sign anything. What Mr. Obama didn't say was that he had no intention of keeping that vow, or even of pretending to.

The "economic stimulus" bill passed in February is the most egregious example of legislation in the darkness. That bill was thousands of pages long, and it was passed by Congress just a few hours after it was written. Mr. Obama signed it forthwith. Today, Vice President Joe Biden explains the bill's failure by saying "everyone guessed wrong" or everyone "misread the economy." Mr. Obama insists that "we had incomplete information."

And now these same buffoons, the ones who used "incomplete information" to justify tossing a trillion dollars down a stinking pit, are demanding the passage of a massive, game-changing government takeover of the nation's health care system. In the next 14 days.

Their urgency is explained by the upcoming summer congressional recess. If Congressmen have to go back home and visit their constituents, those constituents will demand that the health care takeover be killed.

An idea to reduce health care costs

Coming from a man who will begin law school next month, this might seem peculiar.

But logic applied to the law of supply and demand (which, by the way, is more binding than any statute or regulation that I'm aware of), dictates a simple step to reducing health care costs in America. State governments across the country could do it today, and it would begin improving the health care market in just a few years.

States could dramatically reduce tuition at public medical schools, and replace lost revenue by dramatically increasing tuition at public law schools.

It doesn't take a brain surgeon to realize America has too many lawyers. But it'd be hard to imagine a world with too many doctors. Likewise, nurses are in short supply, and their shortage also weighs on the lagging supply of medical care.

There are a variety of factors contributing to this market imbalance. Among them is the exorbitantly expensive malpractice insurance that doctors must carry to protect themselves against all the attorneys with too much time on their hands.

Another factor is the expense of medical school, especially compared to other professional schools. A cost-benefit analysis of law school vs. medical school would send all but those most-committed to medicine towards a law degree. At the University of Kansas, where I will enroll in August, law school tuition will be about $15,000 for the academic year. At the KU Medical Center, on the other hand, tuition is about $24,000 a year. Law school lasts three years, medical school lasts four.

So youthful Kansans intent on post-graduate education and a professional career see a bill of $45,000 over three years to become a lawyer. Then they see $96,000 over four years to become a doctor. Add, say, $60,000 in lost income for the fourth year, when the lawyer will practice and the doctor will pay tuition.

My brother (an engineer) and my sister (a math teacher) both far exceed my skills and enthusiasm at mathematics. But even I can add that one up.

We could have the libertarian discussion about whether or not social engineering is moral. (It is not.) But at the end of the day, it is not the goal of public universities to act as charity towards all men, so that each can pursue whatever whim might fancy him. It is the goal of public universities to provide the education for the new generation, in accordance with the needs of the taxpayers that are funding them.

At the moment, those taxpayers need more doctors than attorneys.

A better approach to 'stimulus'

The government's methods of choice for battling this recession have included bailouts and nationalization of the financing industry, modest tax rebates and credits, and spending projects on an unprecedented scale. At least thrice, Congress and two different presidents (of near polar opposition) have spent money by the barrel-full to end the recession.

First, with unemployment near 5 percent (a healthy baseline, according to nearly all economists) last February, President Bush insisted on a $152 billion rebate and aid program. Congress acquiesced. Next, with unemployment at about 6 percent last September, President Bush demanded a $700 billion bailout of irresponsible banks. Congress agreed. Unfortunately, as Ronald Reagan put it, "the more the plans fail, the more the planners plan." So finally, with unemployment at about 7 percent this February, President Obama promoted a $787 billion rebate and aid and infrastructure spending extravaganza. Congress nearly peed itself with glee, and then piled on even more.

Today unemployment is pushing 10 percent, and almost nobody thinks things will get better soon.

All in, the federal government has spent more than $1.6 trillion to fight this recession. And each time the government has acted, the recession has grown more severe.

In 12 months, these economic stimulus/aid/rescue plans have added nearly 20 percent to the national debt (the rest of which had been accrued over two centuries). They have bred resentment and division. And they have failed miserably.

Today, the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11's triumphant launch, I suggest a different course of action would have been preferable.

During the 1960s, the United States spent less than $20 billion (adjusted for inflation, about $140 billion, or 7 percent of what's been wasted in the name of "stimulus" since last February) to achieve lunar exploration. Prior to the Apollo project, no human had ever left low-earth orbit. None has done so since.

The United States caught up to the Soviet Union in the space race, and left the USSR in the vapor trails. Before the Apollo program, the Soviet Union had won every significant "first" (first satellite, first man outside earth's atmosphere). After Apollo, the Soviet Union was far behind with no hope of ever catching up. Astronauts planted Old Glory and played golf in places Cosmonauts are still dreaming of.

It is no small thing that the excitement of the lunar mission ignited ferocious interest in engineering throughout the country. That's economic stimulus. Children in math and physics classes had interesting reasons to pay attention. That's economic stimulus. Inventiveness was cool. That's economic stimulus. More than 20,000 companies and universities, and more than 400,000 people worked directly for the Apollo program (those are high-tech, high-paying jobs). That's economic stimulus. (The difference is, these jobs actually built things and improved people's lives.)

The nation had a rallying point to work towards. Now that it's ended, we have something to be proud of.

Consider: The American space program was in its infancy when the first Soviet cosmonaut left the bounds of Earth. Six weeks later, President John F. Kennedy challenged our space-novice nation to go to the moon. Eight years later, Neil Armstrong took his giant leap for mankind. All for $20 billion.

Now consider the improvements we've made in fuel economy, communication equipment, computing power, lightweight materials and aerodynamics. Consider the improvements in our knowledge of human health in adverse conditions (and in climate control systems). Consider our vast industrial and technological upgrades.

Who doesn't believe Americans could have taken that $1.6 trillion that was just frittered away and instead employed it to land a human on Mars in the next 25 years?

We are left to wonder what new technologies we would have invented along the way. It is sadly possible that they will never be invented, now.

President Kennedy will be forever remembered as the visionary who inspired his nation to reach the moon. The "stimuli" of Presidents Bush and Obama will be treated far less kindly by history, and rightfully so.

It's somebody else's fault

Here's one that ought to be laughed out of court.

Teenager Alexa Longueira was zoned into her cell phone, texting, as she walked down the street. It surprised the heck out of here when she fell into a manhole and suffered minor cuts and bruises.

Unfortunately, it doesn't surprise the heck out of anyone that her parents intend to sue New York City and cash in on their daughter's lack of self-preservation.

This story shows relation to a pilot program in the United Kingdom, in which tax money is being used to wrap padding around lampposts for the protection of walking texters.

I'm not a taxpayer in Britain or in New York. Neither issue affects me in any way. I'm not annoyed at the sight of the idiot-pads on the poles, nor am I distressed at having involuntarily paid for them. If a jury awards Ms. Longueira a billion dollars, not a cent of it will come from me. But if I were, I'd be asking the following questions, and asking them as loudly and as often as I could:

Why can't people walk without injuring themselves? Why must I pay for someone else failing to watch what they're doing? Why in the hell is their lack of responsibility my problem?

The tyranny of hurt feelings

Interesting that on Independence Day, a handful of cops showed up on the property of Vito Congine Jr. and stole his American flag.

Mr. Congine is attempting to open a restaurant in Crivitz, Wis., but the town's council has vetoed his move to acquire a liquor license. So, to protest, the would-be entrepreneur decided to fly Old Glory upside down on his flagpole. He says he faces the distress of probable financial ruin without the city's permission to sell booze.

His monthlong protest was interrupted July 4, when police officers came on scene and swiped the flag. Evidently, neighbors were offended by the gesture and feared it would ruin their Independence Day parade. (The flag was later returned, and Mr. Congine has resumed his protest.)

In this brutal recession, there is some irony that flunkies on a city council rejected one man's plans for opening a new business. The events since are even worse.

Mr. Congine has been subjected to the culmination of an overbearing town council, a busybody district attorney with a severe lack of respect for the Constitution, a thuggish sheriff, and stupid deputies who are far too willing to follow orders. For this incident, every one of them deserves to be fired or defeated in the next election.

And the worst ingredient of all is a group of Americans who think they can call the authorities every time they see something they don't like. Those authorities only add to the problem when they do the mob's bidding.

For some reason, too many Americans think they have the right to never hear anything they disagree with. Too many think they have the right to never be offended. They think they can dial 911 because McDonald's is out of chicken nuggets. They're acting like idiot children badly in need of a spanking.

I don't like the smell of the feedlots near my hometown but I hardly assume the right to close them down. I don't own the world, and neither do the people of Crivitz.

The abused businessman is a veteran of the war in Iraq. His comment on the matter is simple, harsh and appropriate: "It is pretty bad when I go and fight a tyrannical government somewhere else, and then I come home to find it right here at my front door."

However angry Mr. Congine is, it's not nearly enough.

Having solved other issues, G-8 votes on weather

The G-8 Summit in Italy has a plateful to address. The world faces the following atrocious conditions:

• About 1 billion adult human beings are illiterate. (There are only about 7 billion human beings in the world.)
  
• Daily, about 16,000 children die from starvation.
• Iran -- the nation whose leading export is terrorism -- continues to develop a nuclear weapon, which it insists it will use to destroy Israel.
• North Korea -- the nation whose leading export is nuclear weapons technology -- continues to illicitly sell military material and to launch long-range missiles, in violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions.
• According to figures from 2005, about 1.4 billion people are in poverty and are forced to live on about $1.25 per day.
• The most severe economic contraction since World War II is underway and raging, making some of the above figures worse by the day.
• Shortages in electricity, oil and other energy sources are emerging and becoming more severe. In days to come, this will only grow more serious.
• Cuba holds hundreds of people prisoner for political differences. Some other countries in the world are worse.
  

Leaders of the world's richest, most powerful and most influential countries are meeting in L'Aquila, Italy, and they could choose to discuss and act on some of these items, items that can be alleviated by human beings, and items that are genuine, terrifying problems facing the world. But the G-8 leaders are more interested in altering the weather.

I guess truth really is stranger than fiction.

Well, at least it's all 'free'

Why Congressman Brian Baird and a handful of colleagues needed to visit the Galapagos Islands, we may never know.

When the Wall Street Journal analyzed Congressional members' travel patterns over the last 14 years, they discovered a tremendous spike in spending on official trips. Since 1994, members of Congress have elevated their own travel outputs 10 times, to $13 million in 2008.

Baird and other members spent more than $20,000 on food and lodging in a four-day stint in the islands. When the Journal sought an explanation, he declined to answer.

The analysis shows why so many Americans don't trust government to do things correctly or efficiently, and it shows how little respect for their positions (and how much self-importance) many elected officials carry.

Compared to other outlays, the $13 million spent on official travel is less than a drop in the ocean. But in real-world thinking, $13 million is $13-freaking-million. And this is money that's been spent by a government that doesn't have it.

Some Congressional Delegations make legitimate, beneficial journeys across the world to arrange for trade opportunities, massage allied feelings, find facts in war zones and represent our country to other nations. But the $260,000 that was spent in New Zealand and Australia seems a bit over the top. Ditto the $250,000 in Austria, the $140,000 in Italy, and the $920,000 spent in the U.K, France, Germany and Poland. And Switzerland ($163,000) is neutral -- what are we gonna negotiate away from them?

These numbers are bipartisan and they include just food, hotels and incidental expenses. Travel arrangements -- often at the expense of the government -- cost even more.

Such thriftlessness in days of budget surplus are one thing. But our government almost always runs a massive deficit. It's not worth it.