Whither Conservatism

The election verdict is in. No blue wave, but the Democrats took the House of Representatives. Conservatives have some homework to do if they want to retain the White House and the Senate, not to mention re-taking the House.  Doing so will require conservatives to modify or to shed some ideas that may once have appealed to most of the American electorate, but no longer do so.

The Republican Party is widely viewed as the party of war.  While national defense is clearly a core function of government, it does not necessarily follow that every budget item labeled “national defense” is a good idea, nor does it necessarily follow that the United States must get involved in every trouble spot around the world.  At the risk of stating the obvious, armed forces are not free. Tanks, guns, warships, and warplanes do not grow on trees.  Unfortunately, there are some people who call themselves conservative who are eager to be skeptical of Democrat social engineering schemes, but who will give a free pass to anything that is even vaguely related to national defense or law enforcement.  This attitude needs to go.  It’s time to return to the wisdom of President Eisenhower, who took seriously the threat from the Soviet Union and yet limited military spending.  President Eisenhower’s farewell address warned about the growth of the military-industrial complex.

The next problem is Prohibition. True, alcohol prohibition ended with the 21st Amendment. I’m referring here to the prohibition of drugs, the prohibition of commercial sex, and the restrictions on abortions and contraceptives.  Let’s look at all of these.

Drug prohibition is a failure.  Despite the establishment of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), many counter-drug units in state and municipal law enforcement agencies, and many, many busts large and small, drugs keep coming in.  This is because many people want drugs, and will go to great lengths to obtain them.  We can say that drug use is self-destructive until we are blue in the face, but that doesn’t make any difference. When the government prohibits the open sale of something that people want, guess who supplies it? That’s right – gangsters. This is exactly what happened during the Prohibition Era.  Al Capone would probably not be a household name today if it wasn’t for Prohibition.  The drug war has led to the corruption of officials in the United States and in other countries. The chaos caused by the drug cartels, who are the bastard offspring of drug prohibition, does not serve the security interests of the United States. Furthermore, the chaos of the drug war is a driver of illegal immigration.  Want to cripple the drug cartels and secure the border? Make all drugs legal. It’s the price premium that prohibition places on drugs that gives drug cartels the power to buy their weapons and buy off officials.

Certainly, the open sale of alcohol comes with problems – namely, that many innocent people are killed and maimed thanks to drunk drivers, and that some people commit crimes, or just make asses of themselves, because they won’t stop drinking.  However, notice the problem we don’t have: shooting in the streets over the production and sale of alcohol. Because alcohol can be openly produced and sold, there is no need to fight over it. The alcohol trade is handled by peaceful entrepreneurs. No one needs to fear violence caused by alcohol sales.  Furthermore, government levies taxes on the consumption of alcohol. In other words, the government makes money from the open sale of alcohol instead of wasting money on futile efforts to interdict alcohol.  The same can be true on drugs. It’s time for government to broaden the tax base instead of wasting money on warrantless surveillance and the militarization of law enforcement.  My fellow conservatives, the drug war is not limited government. It is bloated, out-of-control government.

Next is the prohibition on commercial sex, aka prostitution.  No, prostitution is not and will never be the same as a real relationship.  However, the demand for sex without a relationship isn’t going to go away, just like the demand for drugs and alcohol isn’t going to go away. And just like with drugs and alcohol – attempts to drive it underground mean that the demand will be supplied by gangsters, who really do abuse women. Let’s have an end to the anti-sex puritanism of the feminists and the religious fanatics alike. (Where do these people think they came from?) Away with euphemisms such as “escort services” or “massage parlors.”  Instead, let there be brothels, openly established in properly zoned areas, where the workers have all the protections that workers in any other job would have. Let these establishments be regularly inspected to ensure a safe environment for workers and customers alike.  Women might even own or manage some of these establishments, just as Christie Hefner managed Playboy for a long time.  Again and again: take away the prohibition, and you take away much of the danger and violence. 

Last is the complaining about the availability of abortion and contraceptives. I ask religious conservatives the following questions: If God hasn’t bothered to stop war and crime and fraud, what makes you think that God cares about abortion and contraceptives? (The same question could well be asked about the legalization of commercial sex and of drugs.)  How come abortion providers or contraceptive manufacturers haven’t been turned into pillars of salt, or into something of more strategic value, such as platinum or uranium? Furthermore, making abortions and contraceptives easy to get at home and abroad may mean some reduction of crime, illegal immigration, and terrorism. You don’t have to fight or arrest someone who isn’t born. Someone who isn’t born isn’t going to join a caravan in an attempt to overwhelm the Border Patrol.  I ask religious conservatives to consider how different U.S. history would have been if Osama bin Laden’s mother had aborted him.

It is time to recognize that many of the young people who might be attracted by the conservative message of strong national defense, secure borders, deregulation, and liberty are going to be repelled by the image of conservatives either as warmongers or as busybodies who interfere with sex, contraceptives, abortion, and the choice of whether to get high.  Clinging to an obsolete vision of conservatism will ensure that the GOP becomes a party mostly of the elderly.  Here’s a hint: This is not a winning formula.

It would be far better if conservatives forgo the culture wars and pointless foreign adventures, and instead push programs that really will empower families and strengthen the nation.  These include the following:

1)    Make U.S. infrastructure resistant to electromagnetic pulses, whether natural or artificial.  I warn religious conservatives that an EMP, which would wreck the telecommunications and electrical grids upon which we all depend and result in lawless chaos, would be far more destructive to families than sex and drugs.  Furthermore, strengthening the United States at home means that the United States will be stronger abroad – a key conservative goal.

2)    Mandate that the Federal Reserve target for inflation be 0%. 2% each year, while not horribly destructive like that of Venezuela or Zimbabwe, nevertheless represents a hidden theft of the money earned by working Americans.  The constant debasement of currency, and the resulting need for most families to be two-income families and to work harder and harder to keep up, is more destructive to families than sex and drugs.

3)    Pay down the national debt.  The national debt is almost $22 trillion; in 2018, the interest on that debt is $523 billion dollars. This is money that could be going to achieve objective 1) above, or simply returned to the people. To reduce national debt, the government needs to spend less. Two easy ways to spend less money: End the prohibition of drugs and commercial sex, and reduce foreign adventures. 

4) Create prosperity. This means cheap energy, resources, and freedom. To get the first two, it’s time to restart High Frontier. Returning to space will be far more inspirational — and pay off a lot more — than culture wars and foreign adventures. The establishment of the U.S. Space Force is an important first step. Conservatives, we must keep this momentum going.

Conservatives, the choice is clear: Jettison the culture wars and the puritanism and return to the core messages of strong national defense, secure borders, deregulation, and liberty, or be consigned to the wilderness.  Let’s stay relevant by staying out of foreign adventures and out of people’s personal lives.

A Wedding in Rural Kentucky

A few weeks ago, I took a few days off from my work for my cousin's wedding. Like many others, I spent most of the flight snoozing in cattle class. On descent to Bluegrass Airport in Lexington, Kentucky, I opened the window shade.

Wow!

Gentle rivers, ponds, lakes, farms, trees, grass on gently rolling countryside, and all of it green and cool and lovely -- so unlike arid Southern California. Everything was warmly illuminated by the setting sun. That's when I knew it would be a good weekend.

I picked up my baggage and my rental car and hit the road. After some blundering around -- highway numbers weren't always on street name signs -- I got on I-64, which took me to the Mountain Parkway, and from there to State Highway 52, which took me to Lago Linda Hideaway, my home for the weekend.

Driving is nice in rural areas. No crowds, no traffic. I was flying down the road in a zippy Nissan Versa. Did I break the speed limit? I take the Fifth!

I stayed in a snug cabin at Lago Linda Hideaway. After unloading the car and before sacking out for the night, I looked at the sky.

Wow!

Dazzling view -- so many more stars visible than in Los Angeles -- makes me wish our country would take A Step Farther Out to the High Frontier to see what's out there.  (If we don’t, some other unfriendly country will.)  It was glorious. I wish I'd had a telescope or binoculars. 

The wedding took place at Cathedral Domain, just 15 minutes away from Lago Linda. It's an Episcopalian retreat and camp next to the Daniel Boone National Forest. Just like Lago Linda, it was quiet and peaceful.  The American revolutionary Thomas Paine said that the word of God is in the creation we behold, not in scriptures or other writings -- and that is the closest that I come to being religious. 

I enjoyed the wedding ceremony.  The cathedral was a wooden building constructed in traditional mountain style. The main aisle had the insignia of the local Episcopal churches on flags designed after the style of European medieval heraldry. The warmth of the guests was palpable.  My cousin and her husband were very happy. Dinner was generous plates of beef brisket and pulled pork, with coleslaw, and wine and beer and Ale 8 One, the local soda.  Yum!  It’s refreshing to eat food that isn’t low calorie, low sodium, fat free, or gluten free – people should enjoy food without feeling guilty about it.  I took some back to my cabin at Lago Linda to eat for breakfast the next day.  

The next day, my uncle and I went hiking. We explored the Bat Cave on the Cathedral Domain property. It took us about half an hour to slosh through the cave, walking through the stream on the floor of the cave all the way. Yes, there were some bats hanging from the cave ceiling; no, they did not bite us or fly by us. When my uncle and I returned from the cave hike, I put my hiking boots (the only footwear I brought on the trip) out to dry in the Sun, and padded around barefoot -- just like a kid at camp.  We also went to the Natural Bridge State Park.  Then I rounded up my gear and drove to Lexington, where I checked into my hotel near the airport for my last night in Kentucky. 

Rural Kentucky is beautiful and the people I met were good and kind. I'm proud to have relatives there, and I regret not getting to know them sooner. It was with some regret that I boarded my flight back to the madness of Los Angeles.  I don’t know when, but I will return for a longer vacation to soak up the peace and quiet of rural Kentucky. 

And yes, I bought some Kentucky moonshine to take home with me.  The liquor made from hemp seeds was vile, but the traditional bourbon was wonderful – a great cure for travel or anything else that ails you.

Review of High Frontier, by General Daniel Graham, USA

High Frontier is an old book (1983), but it's still relevant.

I first learned of this book while reading Robert Heinlein's introduction to it in his book Expanded Universe. He said that General Daniel Graham’s plan was "as nonaggressive as a bulletproof vest".

High Frontier calls for establishing point defenses of U.S. ground based missiles and then space-based missile defenses to protect the United States and its allies. The idea is to replace Mutual Assured Destruction, which deters attack by threatening military (counterforce) and civilian (countervalue) targets, with Assured Survival, in which U.S. defenses are strong enough to ensure that a first strike will be unlikely to do catastrophic damage to the United States.

Not much was done about High Frontier during the 1980s; space-based defenses were ridiculed as Star Wars. Not much has been done recently. That's a crying shame.

The world has changed a lot since the 1980s:

North Korea is now able to threaten American cities.

China has become much more powerful and dangerous, and is also able to threaten American cities.

The Soviet Union is no more, but Russia still has a nuclear arsenal that can threaten American cities.

All of these can be addressed by High Frontier.

Intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) are the fastest way of delivering a sledgehammer blow against another country, whether by airburst, groundburst, or electromagnetic pulse (EMP). (EMPs can also happen naturally.) Taking ICBMs off the table would force hostile nations to use slower methods such as bombers or Russia's nuclear-armed drone submarine. Doing that will, to some extent, reinforce the protection provided by the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.

Moreover, High Frontier isn't just about missile defense. High Frontier also contemplates space-based solar power and asteroid mining. Space-based solar power satellites would have large arrays of solar panels collecting sunlight 24-7 -- no night or weather to interfere.  The energy would then be beamed to receiving stations on Earth. The resources to make these satellites could come from mines on the Moon or the Asteroid Belt. Jerry Pournelle addressed these ideas in greater detail in A Step Farther Out. The space based defenses of High Frontier would serve as a way of protecting space-based solar power satellites, as well as other U.S. space assets. With more and more dependence on GPS and other satellites, and more and more private U.S. investment in space such as SpaceX and Blue Origin, the time to start building the space defense assets of High Frontier is now. Even Neil DeGrasse Tyson takes the idea seriously. (Maybe that will help – Tyson is something of a celebrity, and celebrity endorsements are very important these days.)

General Graham was at his best when he mentioned the importance of the hope that High Frontier can bring. He mentioned teen crime, pollution, the low public savings rate -- issues that are problems today.  In his words: "A major thrust into space would provide the world with clear and convincing evidence that the resources available to the human race are not fixed; that new wealth can be created without depriving others." General Graham also noted that hope "would alter economic realities for the better, more rapidly than any amount of tinkering with social programs or Federal Reserve rates.”  In other words, doing something concrete to provide energy and resources will do more than financial hocus-pocus to employ Americans. Modern politicians would do well to heed General Graham’s words, but that seems unlikely at a time of political polarization. Sadly, High Frontier, the one thing that might end the political polarization crippling the United States, may well be held up by it.

We can't dither forever. If the United States does not take major steps now to establish a permanent space presence, nations hostile to the United States that are not paralyzed by Itchy and Scratchy politics might very well do so. They would then use that presence in space to dictate terms to the United States. Those who are primarily concerned with"social justice" ought to consider whether a United States impoverished and at the mercy of hostile powers would have any room for social justice. There would be none in the event of an EMP.

One might ask how to pay the initial costs of High Frontier. Graham touched upon this when he denounced the military procurement system, which makes contractors and their bought-and-paid-for Congresscritters happy, but is grossly inefficient at getting equipment to front line users. Here are two other ideas to free up some venture capital (the Silicon Valley term) for High Frontier:

End the drug war. Legalize and moderately tax drugs -- all drugs, not just marijuana. End the futile attempts to keep people from wrecking their minds (if any) and bodies. Government should only prevent people from harming and defrauding others; it should not prevent people from wrecking their own lives.  Spend that money on security and prosperity! Spend it on High Frontier!

Less meddling in hostile foreign countries. Jerry Pournelle, another advocate of High Frontier, stated on his website that the United States could have had energy independence for the cost of the Iraq War.  To fund High Frontier, let’s not get involved in the affairs of other countries so much. Every dollar spent on futile foreign adventures is a dollar that cannot be spent on the security and prosperity that High Frontier can provide. 

I enjoyed learning about High Frontier and it is a crying shame that nothing has been done to accomplish the goals in this book. President Trump's call for a U.S. Space Force might be a first step toward taking High Frontier more seriously. Let's hope he also starts pushing High Frontier.  The energy, resources, jobs, and hope that High Frontier can provide are the best way for President Trump to Make America Great Again. 

Further reading:

General Daniel Graham's Biography (Wikipedia)

Everett Dolman, Astropolitik

Robert Heinlein, Expanded Universe

Jerry Pournelle, A Step Farther Out

High Frontier: www.highfrontier.org

https://www.mikesnead.com/

Review of The Bitcoin Standard, by Saifedean Ammous

There's been a lot of hype and noise about Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. Ammous steered clear of all of this to write a good book about why Bitcoin is unique and what its benefits and pitfalls are.

The author is clearly in favor of Bitcoin, but his book isn’t a slick marketing screed. In his own words:

"Should you come out of reading this book thinking that the bitcoin currency is something worth owning, your first investment should not be in buying bitcoins, but in time spent understanding how to buy, store, and own bitcoins securely." Wise words, given that there have been Bitcoin thefts. Furthermore, time spent understanding is a good investment before buying anything.

Ammous's explanation of what money is and why it is necessary is well written. Hard money has the following characteristics: It should be hard to produce, it should be easily divided into smaller units or combined into larger units, and it has to last (no rotting, radiation, or corrosion). Historically, gold and silver have been hard currency.

Modern paper and electronic currencies, issued by national governments, are convenient in the sense that they can be physically held, easily used electronically or as cash, and won't easily deteriorate. This is all good. However, they lack the key characteristic of hard money: Difficulty of production.  These national currencies can be easily produced, via the old fashioned printing press or by quantitative easing, which is bureaucrat-babble for electronic creation of money. This is much easier than mining gold, silver, or platinum, and then turning these into nice shiny coins or bars.  Governments compel people to use their national currencies to pay taxes and fees, and – until the advent of Bitcoin – people were forced to accept these currencies, even though they are generally mismanaged through mild (U.S.) or insane (Venezuela, Zimbabwe) inflation. 

Ammous paints a damning picture of the destructive effects of fiat currency. He mentions the usual suspects: War, inflation, impoverishment.  Ammous is Lebanese; Lebanon went through severe inflation during the 1980s and 1990s.  It’s no surprise that he takes inflation more seriously than most leaders, and most citizens, in First World nations.  He also blames soft money for consumerism, rotten modern art and the breakdown of traditional families. Undoubtedly there are other causes for the breakdown of families and for the ridiculousness of modern art, but I think that Ammous is right to blame soft money and the resulting problems for the breakdown of modern families.  It's easier to keep a family together when there is a solid economy based on hard money, because the breadwinners will be more likely to find jobs.  Sadly, most political leaders prefer financial hocus-pocus such as “quantitative easing” rather than de-regulation and hard money.

I like Ammous's rapier wit. Unlike traditional academics, he knows how to put some verve in his writing. Some examples:

"Imagining that central banks can prevent, combat, or manage recessions is as fanciful and misguided as placing pyromaniacs and arsonists in charge of the fire brigade."

And:

"The debates of academia are almost entirely irrelevant to the real world, and its journals' articles are almost never read by anyone except the people who write them for job promotion purposes...”

That paragraph neatly sums up why I am not an academic.

So why Bitcoin? No government, so no pressure to inflate Bitcoin to death.  Bitcoin uses a peer to peer setup, so there is no central server that governments can shut down, and no corporate mismanagement to worry about. (Anyone remember Lehman Brothers?) Decentralization also means that users may still have access to Bitcoin in the event of war, accidents, or natural disasters impeding Internet access. Trust is provided by the mathematical proof of work, generally known as mining. (At least your computer is doing the work – no need to get sweaty and filthy inside a real mine!) 

So those are the good points of Bitcoin. The bad points are that you can't hold it in your hand, unlike paper currency or precious metals. There have been thefts of Bitcoin from improperly secured accounts. And Bitcoin, by its decentralized nature, will never be able to process as many transactions as centralized payment providers such as Visa or MasterCard. Nevertheless, Bitcoin provides digital hard money -- that is, hard money, like gold or silver or platinum, but in a form that can easily be sent to others.  The author endorses buying, despite the price volatility, because of its characteristics.

My take? Don't bet the farm on this. Don't use Bitcoin as a get-rich-quick scheme. Just buy a few Bitcoins, or a fraction, as one of many hedges against inflation of your country's currency.

I learned a lot from The Bitcoin Standard. I heartily recommend it.

Do you want me to write, research, or proofread for you?  Contact me today!

The Proposed U.S. Space Force: It's About Time!

President Trump and others have called for the establishment of a U.S. Space Force.

It's about time!!

Science fiction authors led the way on this. Robert Heinlein said the following in his lecture to the U.S. Naval Academy in 1973:

"Space navies will change beyond recognition our present methods of warfare and will control the political shape of the world for the foreseeable future. These spaceships will open up the Solar System to colonization and will eventually open the rest of this Galaxy."

Talk of colonizing the Galaxy is premature; faster-than-light drives are still science fiction. However, colonization of the Moon or Mars is possible. (If Elon Musk doesn't get to Mars, someone else will.) Space-based solar power as well as asteroid mining are just some of the possibilities. Let’s take a look:

Space based solar power (SBSP): Imagine solar energy collected 24-7 (no night, no cloud cover, no precipitation) and beamed down as microwave energy to ground-based receiving stations in the U.S. No more need for coal or other fossil fuel plants, or for controversial nuclear fission plants. (Nuclear fusion plants would also be clean, but they aren't available…for now.) Transport of almost all types except aviation could be electrified -- no more need for gasoline or diesel. No more wasting crop space on ethanol; food is for eating, not for burning. Perpetually thirsty California could use the energy from SBSP to power desalination plants instead of sucking the Colorado River and other rivers dry. Desalination via SBSP could also be used for mining various elements that are dissolved in ocean water, including lithium, which is becoming much more important as electric vehicles proliferate. (This would be a terrestrial alternative to lunar or asteroid mining.) Energy could be sold to other countries via long distance direct current (DC) transmission lines, in the same way that natural gas is sold via long distance pipelines. Lastly, the energy from SBSP could be used for plasma gasification, which would offer a safe way of disposing of waste by reducing it to its atomic components.

It is impossible to overstate the importance of abundant energy. Energy is such a part of our lives that it is easy to take for granted. We use energy to make and power everything, including the device you're reading this article on. We use energy to get around. Energy brings your food to the grocery store, powers your home and workplace, and much more. Power from SBSP could even be used to power lasers to be used for launching spacecraft without using chemical propellants.

Bottom line: The more clean energy we have, the better.

SBSP isn't the only possibility. Earth orbit is the jump off point to go anywhere in the Solar System. The Moon and Mars can be colonized. Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin are close to offering commercial space flights for anyone who can pay the hefty fare. The Asteroid Belt offers good prospects for space mining. Valuable elements can be mined from lifeless rocks in space. No more need for mining on Earth, with the risk of pollution of water, air, or soil.

A larger American presence in space would provide jobs. Asteroid miner, spaceship pilot, cabin crew for tourist flights, satellite technicians, medical personnel, astronomers, physicists, and yes, lawyers too! More jobs, more energy, more resources -- what a great combination!

The U.S. Space Force will be needed to defend all of these activities. Great power rivalry isn't going away; it's getting worse. Hostile nations such as China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea would be sorely tempted to attack U.S. space assets or space commerce to cripple the United States. China and Russia have already demonstrated the ability to shoot down a satellite. (The United States is capable of returning the favor.) Furthermore, a robust U.S. space presence in the form of the Space Force will ensure that no combination of hostile powers will be able to confine the U.S. to Earth.

For too long, U.S. leaders have tried to pump up the economy through financial hocus-pocus such as quantitative easing and artificially low interest rates. By now it should be clear that this doesn't work. Instead, let's have cheap energy, cheap resources, and the manufacturing and scientific bonanza that will result from a reinvigorated U.S. Space program made possible by the protective shield of the U.S. Space Force. It's time for the rest of our country's political leadership to get on board. Those who don't like the messenger should remember that President Trump will not be in office forever, that the United States will still need unfettered space access, and that there are hostile foreign powers that would cheerfully deny that access and that prosperity to us.

For further reading:

Everett Dolman, Astropolitik

General Daniel Graham, High Frontier

Robert Heinlein, Expanded Universe

Jerry Pournelle, A Step Farther Out

Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space

https://www.mikesnead.com/

Do you want me to write, research, or proofread for you? Contact me today!

Review of The Real Crash: How to Save Yourself and Your Country, by Peter Schiff

In this hard-hitting book, Peter Schiff tells the truth: The U.S. government, as well as many state and local governments, are up their ears in debt. He also denounces the use of gimmicks such as quantitative easing (the electronic version of printing money) and holding Federal Reserve (the Fed) interest rates artificially low so that people invest and take out loans rather than, God forbid, save money. The economic damage is compounded by a hideously complicated tax code and by laws and regulations that ostensibly help workers, but end up harming them instead. Schiff also trashes higher education for high prices and not much return on investment, and suggests that many people would be better off learning a trade. (This is what I’m doing now: my political science degree didn’t get me anywhere, so I obtained my CompTIA A+ certificate – and now I have a new job!) The text is interspersed with "Crashproof Yourself" hints for readers. It’s also written in a very clear style – no stereotype academic/economist jargon here.

Schiff is absolutely right. Too many laws and regulations strangle individual initiative. Federalist #62, thought to have been written by either James Madison or Alexander Hamilton, warned that “It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is to-day, can guess what it will be to-morrow.” The sheer number of laws and regulations at all levels of government have made this warning a reality. Excessive licensing requirements are one example of laws and regulations run amuck.

Excessive licensing requirements make it harder for people to find work. Furthermore, there is a national security imperative to getting rid of excess laws and regulations. With less laws, there is less potential for blackmail. If recruiters for the military, the intelligence agencies, and law enforcement agencies had any sense, they would start demanding that the prohibition on drugs and commercial sex be ended, so that they could have a wider pool of talent to choose from.

Schiff's solutions are easy to talk about and politically (not technically) difficult to implement: Allow interest rates to climb, stop quantitative easing, and get rid of many laws and rules and regulations. He also calls for throwing out the income tax and replacing it with a national sales tax (punish consumption, not work and saving), augmented by user fees (such as toll roads) and tariffs.

Out of all these, the most important to tackle is the return to honest money. The Fed should allow interest rates to go up. This will promote saving, which is the true source of wealth. The target inflation rate should be zero, not two percent. Yes, it is government policy to erode the value of everyone’s money – mine and yours -- by two percent every year. Inflation, which constantly erodes savings and the value of a paycheck, is a regressive tax -- that is, a tax which hits poor people harder than rich people. If we must have a tax code and a regulatory state which drives everyone crazy but provides employment for hordes of accountants, lawyers, lobbyists, and various types of government employees (could that be the real reason? Nope – nothing to see here, move along, folks), then at least let it be paid for by sound money.

I wish that his chapter on health care had included a "Crashproof Yourself" section on taking care of yourself. None of us chooses our genes, but we can all choose what we put in our bodies and we can all choose to exercise and get enough sleep. Choosing wisely can save a lot of money!

If Democrats were really interested in helping the poor, they would call for deregulation and sound money. If the Republicans were really interested in helping working people, they would call for deregulation (not just of big corporations, but of drugs and commercial sex) and for sound money. The Democrats are blatantly statist, while the Republicans at least pretend to be in favor of deregulation and sound money. However, I don’t expect that either party will put Peter Schiff’s prescriptions into practice.

I learned a lot from this book. I heartily recommend it. For the record, I am not one of Peter Schiff's clients, nor do I hold any financial interest in his brokerage firm or other enterprises.

Do you want me to write, research, or proofread for you? Contact me today!

Farewell to the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department, Part II

In my previous article, I wrote about why I left the Sheriff’s Department and shared some of my good memories.

As I said, law enforcement is about dealing with people at their worst, during nights, weekends, and holidays, as well as in bad weather. It’s a rough, thankless business. I like having a regular schedule. I dislike dealing with the public. It’s much easier to deal with a recalcitrant computer.

However, here’s another reason I left: I couldn’t trust the Sheriff’s Department brass hats to back me up. At the risk of stating the obvious, law enforcement means that force has to be used sometimes. However, in these times, almost every use of force, or even of strong language, leads to howling about racism, brutality, and insensitivity, no matter what the circumstances. For brass hats and their political masters, the temptation is strong to sacrifice line personnel who, God forbid, use force without having twenty-twenty foresight. The mission of law enforcement agencies is no longer law enforcement; the mission is to avoid liability and bad press. It’s always easy for those in academia, politics, or the media, many of whom lack a law enforcement background, to be Monday-morning quarterbacks. Living in fear that any of my actions might result in the end of my career is not a good way to live. So I chose not to live that way.

Law enforcement personnel are human beings, not robots. Big surprise: Being tired, hot, hungry, thirsty, or cold may make it harder for law enforcement personnel to be perfect, which is what the public and the politicians want. Law enforcement personnel also don’t like being cursed at, spat at, assaulted, or shot at. If they think you’re endangering them, you’ll be the one being shot at or thumped.

Who knew?

Here’s how William Shakespeare put it in The Merchant of Venice:

If you prick us, do we not bleed?

If you tickle us, do we not laugh?

If you poison us, do we not die?

And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?

While revenge is rightfully not part of the law enforcement credo, self-defense or defense of one’s partners certainly is. That has been forgotten by those who hate law enforcement. Law enforcement personnel been attacked with increasing frequency over the last few years. Personnel have been ambushed, assaulted, and executed. As Chief Brown of the Dallas Police Department said, society dumps all its problems on law enforcement.

In addition to dumping problems on law enforcement, many politicians like to bash law enforcement instead of considering their own roles in creating society’s problems through ill-considered legislation and regulation. To state the obvious, laws are created by politicians. The more laws and regulations there are, the more matters there are for law enforcement officers to investigate, to hand out citations, and to arrest. All of this leads to more interactions between the public and law enforcement. Some of these interactions, as we all know, end with shootings or other uses of force. Taxpayers are also on the hook for the overloaded courts, the overcrowded prisons, and the need for more and more and more lawyers, judges, corrections officers, and law enforcement officers.

So here’s a crazy idea to reduce public/law enforcement interactions and save money: Less laws!! Before political leaders pass some legislation, or regulatory agencies conjure up more rules, they should ask themselves whether the proposed legislation or rule is really about public safety, or is it about raising revenue or making some special interest group happy at the expense of everyone else?

One example is parking enforcement. Sure, there’s nothing wrong with ticketing or towing those who park on sidewalks or who block driveways or fire hydrants. However, residents of Los Angeles County know that Santa Monica’s parking enforcement is very aggressive. If someone is a few minutes over the time on a meter (a few minutes, not an hour!), is a whopper of a ticket really about public safety, or about raising revenue? The same question can be asked about speed cameras and red light cameras.

Next on the list: prohibition of drugs and commercial sex (prostitution). These should not be crimes at all. Let’s be honest: People want sex and drugs and alcohol. Prohibiting something that people want doesn’t magically make it go away; it simply drives it into the hands of criminals. We should have learned this from the stupidity of Prohibition. The temperance twerps who managed to ram through a Constitutional amendment that reduced freedom didn’t make the demand for alcohol go away. Instead, the demand for alcohol was satisfied by gangsters like the infamous Al Capone.

Nowadays, we have no shootings over the manufacture, sale, and distribution of alcohol because it can be done openly. By contrast, we have the ferocious drug cartels who spread murder and anarchy throughout Mexico and the other Latin American countries, and to a lesser extent here – because drug manufacture, sale, and distribution is still illegal. That’s why I proudly voted for the legalization of marijuana in my home state of California.

For the record, I’ve never tried drugs and don’t intend to. I don’t think that trashing one’s mind and body is cool or spiritual. I simply note that prohibiting drugs doesn’t prevent drug use; instead, it wastes taxpayer money, endangers citizens and law enforcement personnel, and tromps on privacy and civil liberties. The drug war is a colossal failure and it is time for drugs – not just marijuana -- to be made legal nationwide.

The same goes for commercial sex (prostitution). Want to protect sex workers from kidnapping and abuse and squalid working conditions? Don’t engage in feminist or religious rants about sex. Don’t try to use the police to stop commercial sex. Instead, legalize it. Bring it into the light. Let brothels be set up by honest entrepreneurs who will be monitored by OSHA and other regulatory agencies. Maybe some brothels will be run by women. After all, Playboy was run by a woman, Christie Hefner, for over twenty years.

The demand for sex is a fundamental human drive; it’s not going to go away. Let us instead make it safe for the sex workers and for the customers. In a time of more and more automation and outsourcing, the legalization of commercial sex will provide an extra supply of jobs. Why bother with sex robots or dolls when you can get it on with a real person, legally, in a safe environment?

Why should I be a sworn law enforcement officer and risk my life, my freedom, and my career to interdict the sale of goods and services which should be legal? Why should I be a sworn law enforcement officer and risk my life, my freedom, and my career to meet ticket quotas which are about revenue-grubbing rather than public safety? No thanks to both. I’ll deal with computers instead.

Message to the public: The buck stops with the politicians. If you don’t like a law, don’t pick a fight with the law enforcement officer whose job it is to enforce that law. Doing so is a good way to end up thumped or Tasered or shot. If you don’t like a law, write to your politicians to modify the law or get rid of it entirely, and use social media to encourage others to do so. Donate to groups that share your beliefs. You might not be able to give much, but for these groups, every little bit helps. The real threat to liberty isn’t law enforcement officers. It’s their political masters.

Added 08-03-2018: Sovereign Man recently added an excellent post about how too many laws strangle free enterprise. Read it here.

For further reading:

Radley Balko, Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America's Police Forces

Peter Schiff, The Real Crash

Do you want me to write, research, or proofread for you? Contact me today!

Farewell to the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department, Part I

I recently served my last day with the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department.

I leave with mixed feelings. I learned a lot about a noble profession. I learned a lot about how to deal with people. However, it just wasn’t right for me anymore.

I spent 6 ½ years with the world's largest Sheriff's Department. I was a security assistant – not a deputy. All I had was a radio, pepper spray, and some handcuffs. I was a glorified scout. If there was trouble, I used my radio to call for deputies and supervisors.

I spent my first two years in an administrative position, doing clerical work such as entering traffic collision reports and assisting with discovery searches for audio and video recordings of interrogations. I learned that the Sheriff’s Department gets sued all the time. Some claims and lawsuits have merit; most don’t. The Sheriff’s Department’s policy, most of the time, is to settle claims and lawsuits without fighting. This teaches people that they can easily get money from the Sheriff’s Department by filing a claim or a lawsuit. Call it litigation lottery.

I then transferred to Court Services Division to get some more field experience to decide whether I wanted to be a deputy. I quickly discovered that I should not be a deputy. Being a deputy or other sworn officer means being three things: an armed lawyer, an armed psychologist, and an armed social worker. Sometimes, it’s armed EMT as well. I would be a good armed lawyer; the others, not so much. Law enforcement personnel spend their days, nights, weekends, and holidays dealing with people who are angry, rude, irrational, crazy, lying, violent – or all of the above. It shouldn’t be a surprise that law enforcement personnel have to use force to enforce the law. I suggest that critics and haters of law enforcement try a ride-along sometime (in a rough area, not Beverly Hills or Brentwood), or stand a watch at a court checkpoint like I did. They’ll quickly find out that persuasion and kindness and restraint don’t always work. This is law enforcement, ladies and gentlemen – the key term here is force. We’re not talking about teatime at the faculty lounge.

On a typical day at the weapons screening checkpoints, the lines were usually long. Many people came in with bad attitudes and prohibited items. What’s prohibited? Here’s a hint: if something is prohibited at an airport, it’s probably prohibited at a courthouse too. Message to the public: Leave the weapons, the booze, the drugs, the tools, and anything sharp at home. Try leaving the attitude behind as well. I promise that law enforcement personnel really don’t give a damn about your race, or your biological gender or chosen gender, or your religion, or anything else. Just go along with the program. Obey the law. One more thing: Security personnel didn’t compel you to come to the court. Nor can security personnel fix your ticket or provide legal advice. So don’t get mad at them for not doing so. For more on reducing interactions between law enforcement officers and civilians, see Part II.

It wasn’t all bad. I will miss the camaraderie of working with my brothers and sisters in arms. I will miss the shared experience of butting heads with checkpoint clowns and then guffawing about it with my partners at the checkpoint. I will miss the salty locker room jokes and banter – yes, the same kind that landed President Trump in trouble during his campaign. (Oh no – men using salty language! Women never, ever use salty language, right?) I have some fun LASD memories. For example:

• The day we had to evacuate the court because of a mechanical problem. First, we herded out the public, many of whom were reluctant to lose their places in line or to have their hearings interrupted. Next, we herded out the civilian employees, most of whom wanted to remain at their desks and get some free time because they knew that the court was unlikely to burn down. Finally, the inmates were brought out of the court lockup, with leg chains and handcuffs, and guarded by deputies armed with rifles and shotguns. The inmates’ friends and families started cheering for their homies, and the deputies were yelling at them to shut up. Finally the problem was resolved and we all went back in. A fun circus, but I’m glad that only happened once.

• A customer reported a used syringe in the planter by the main entrance. The senior deputy detailed yours truly to put on some gloves to fish out the used syringe and drop it in the sharps container. Please, people, shoot up at home, not in public.

• Locking my keys in my car while trying to get in the court’s back garage gate, thus blocking the exit of the inmate bus. The senior deputy was not pleased.

• Serving during Valentine’s Day at a court which has an office of the Los Angeles Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk. Lots of couples came to get married that day. I can testify that many of the brides were dressed in such a way as to make it abundantly clear that they were not concealing any weapons.

It was a good learning experience, but it’s time for me to move on. I will be working with computers, not the public. That’s much easier for me.

And whenever I see LASD or other law enforcement personnel on duty, I’ll say to myself, “Thanks for making it possible for the rest of us to live our lives in peace. Thanks for doing a job that I couldn’t do. Do whatever you need to do to come home alive and uninjured.”

People who want to get rid of law enforcement should be careful what they wish for.

Do you want me to write, research, or proofread for you? Contact me today!

Review of The Case for Mars, by Robert Zubrin

Robert Zubrin was part of NASA, founded the Mars Society, and is president of Pioneer Astro, a company he founded to develop technology that would be useful for colonizing Mars. He also founded Pioneer Energy, which provides technology for managing and exploiting natural gas. In other words, he’s an experienced engineer who knows what he’s talking about. In The Case for Mars, he uses plain language rather than scientific or political jargon to explain why establishing a permanent base on Mars is essential to the United States.

He starts by explaining the reason why a 1990s plan to go to Mars failed. To make a long story short, it was too complicated and too expensive. He’s right that $450 billion is expensive, but that figure is less than the current spending for the military and less than Social Security/Medicare. Follow the money, and you will conclude that war and entitlements have a higher priority in Washington D.C. than creating a new frontier and the new riches that would go with it. Zubrin then goes on to explain in detail how successive missions to Mars could establish a self-sufficient base which could then become a self-sufficient colony for immigrants from Earth – and all for $50 billion rather than $450 billion.

The real meat of the book is when Zubrin goes into detail on why we must go to Mars. Put simply, Zubrin says that the human species needs a frontier. He discusses many problems we see in the United States today: the banality of pop culture, increasing bureaucracy, and an anti-tech ideology. Some might call that last statement strange, given the recent proliferation of smartphones and other smart devices, but his argument is that these are incremental rather than revolutionary. There is also the political polarization chronicled in The Big Sort and in many other articles and books. Zubrin argues that people need a place where they can be free to experiment and to start new societies. In homage to Frederick Turner, who lamented the closing of the American frontier in 1890, he states that Mars can be our new frontier.

I agree with part of this thesis. Certainly, Mars is far away; about 150 days of space travel. Radio, which moves at light speed, takes 20 minutes to arrive; communication with Earth will be a matter of e-mail and pre-recorded audio and/or video statements rather than instant telephone conversations or text messages. No code enforcement, no red tape, no poking, prying, etc. A can-do culture will evolve very quickly, because it must. There will be no sending for supplies or help from Earth on a whim, not when rockets will take at least 150 days to arrive.

On the other hand, Mars is not Earth. The important difference between Mars as a frontier and North America as a frontier is that a settler in North America who didn’t like what was going on in his settlement could just hit the trail. The air was free to breathe, the water was free to drink, the construction materials (wood, dirt, stone) were there for the taking, the animals and fish were free to eat. No high technology was needed for the agrarian society that the United States once was. Law enforcement of that time did not have any high tech such as helicopters, drones, and cellphone tracking to catch suspects. None of this will be true for a Martian colony, which will be an organized high-tech society from the beginning. Dissidents will not be able to saddle up and ride off into the sunset.

There’s also the matter of who does the settling. Canada and the United States ended up as free societies because of who settled these countries: the British. Had France or Spain settled North America, society here would be different. Culture matters, as David Landes and Samuel Huntington described. The Collected What If?, a collection of alternative history scenarios, includes an interesting view of Chinese colonization of North America. Zubrin alluded to the importance of culture when he said that the colonization of Mars could be a grand project to cement the increasingly loose alliance of Western nations. The colonization of Mars by nations hostile to the United States would give these nations a tremendous resource base with which to dictate terms to the United States – and their Martian colonies would not be very free.

So why hasn’t Zubrin’s plan become policy, despite the fact that his plan is much cheaper and very beneficial?

First, there is a general lack of faith in the future. Faith needs victory to be kept alive; in a 24-7 news environment describing political polarization, corruption, and incompetence, as well as a constant drumbeat of terrorism and war, it’s little wonder that the future is a matter for cynicism rather than faith. Ray Bradbury wrote about this in his short story “The Toynbee Convector” (published in an an anthology of the same name).

Second, neither major political party in the United States really believes in going to Mars, or in any other great space enterprises such as orbital solar power. They are too occupied with Earthly affairs. It was a Democratic President, John F. Kennedy, who inspired the nation to land humans on the Moon. Nowadays, the Democratic Party seems much more concerned with identity politics.

The Republican Party, the party which claims to represent free enterprise, is missing in action too. The Republican Party tends to believe in major spending only if there is a direct link to military or law enforcement. The 2016 Republican platform had much to say about coal and other fossil fuels and about reducing regulations in the United States – and very little about space. That’s a shame, because establishing a Martian colony can be done in a free enterprise way.

Instead of everything being done by government agencies, the government can simply announce prizes for going to Mars and for other achievements which would contribute to spaceflight and colonization. Zubrin goes into great detail about this. The late Dr. Jerry Pournelle was also an advocate of prizes to encourage space enterprise. The beauty of prizes is that the government need not spend any money until someone achieves the goal. Anyone attempting to claim the prize would have to raise money from the private sector. And of course, an enhanced space presence would contribute to U.S. national security, which is a traditional Republican concern. The recent attention by Congress and President Trump to creating a U.S. Space Force is encouraging.

Zubrin’s book is well worth reading, both for his explanation of how we can get to Mars, but more importantly, why we must. It’s a shame that our “leaders” haven’t bothered to take his advice.

Do you want me to write, research, or proofread for you? Contact me today!

Further reading:

Dolman, Everett. Astropolitik. A hard-hitting book detailing why the United States should seize control of Earth orbital space.

Heinlein, Robert: The Rolling Stones. An enjoyable science-fiction story describing the adventures of a family who leave their home on the Moon to seek their fortunes on Mars and in the Asteroid Belt. This could become reality if Zubrin’s plan gets taken more seriously.

Sagan, Carl: Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space: Speculation about humanity’s future in space. Sagan takes a much more international view of space travel than Zubrin. The photos are amazing.

Review of Scales on War

I recently read Scales on War: The Future of America's Military at Risk by Major General Robert Scales, U.S. Army, Retired.

General Scales’ passion for improving U.S. Army and U.S. Marine Corps infantry really comes through in his book. His concern is reminiscent of Robert Heinlein’s classic Starship Troopers. (Note: Read the book; don’t watch the movie. They are NOT the same.) As Heinlein put it:

“The Mobile Infantry is the Army. All the others are either button pushers or professors, along merely to hand us the saw; we do the work.” (Italics in original text.)

Damn right. What we see in Scales on War is that the U.S. Department of Defense has gotten away from these basic truths. Instead, there is too much of a focus on high-tech instead of plain old-fashioned infantry and artillery (which was General Scales’ branch). Arthur C. Clarke warned about this several decades ago in his short story “Superiority,” which was first published in 1951. General Scales puts it bluntly: “Every dollar wasted on trillion-dollar gizmos is a dollar taken away from those who actually fight our wars.” Well said.

It’s fair to say that the U.S. must keep up with technology in order to fight “peer competitors,” which is Pentagon-babble for Russia and China, and it’s fair to say that infantry won’t be the only arrow in Uncle Sam’s quiver. However, it really shouldn’t be too much to ask that the Army get rid of the M-16 and its derivative, the M-4, both of which tend to jam, and equip all regular infantry units with the same reliable rifle used by Special Operations Forces such as the Navy’s SEAL Team Six and the Army’s Delta Force. It shouldn’t be too much to ask to equip those rifles with the same aiming aids that are freely purchased by civilians for hunting. It also shouldn’t be too much to ask that the Army’s artillery be improved so that soldiers on the ground have a source of fire support in addition to having air support. Lastly, it shouldn’t be too much to ask to improve psychological and cultural training for soldiers and line officers so that they can better survive the horrible physical and psychological demands of combat and so that they can better reach out to residents of the countries they are deployed to. As General Scales points out, none of these improvements cost as much as big-ticket weapons such as the F-35.

Perhaps these improvements will be made. General Scales speaks well of General James Mattis, USMC, who tried to put into practice several of the improvements mentioned in Scales on War. Now Mattis has been promoted to Secretary of Defense, which will give him more power to make these improvements. Sadly, Secretary Mattis has to deal with Congress, which tends to take more interest in big weapons systems. In other words, while the mission of the U.S. Department of Defense is “to provide a lethal Joint Force to defend the security of our country and sustain American influence abroad,” Congress has, de facto, re-interpreted this mission statement to say “provide job security for us and for our corporate backers.” Can you say “complacency” and “ignorance” and “corruption”? General Scales certainly does. Read his book!

Do you want me to write, research, or proofread for you? Contact me today!