Saturday, February 24, 2007

Too Many Laws

In one of my first postings I commented that we have too many laws. There are so many laws at the federal, state, and local levels of government that it is virtually impossible to enforce them all. As a result, most of us are, to some extent, lawbreakers. Sometimes the laws conflict with each other, creating a lose-lose situation for citizens. Laws that start out simple become complex and convoluted, in attempts to deal with all possible variations of a problem, and to provide exceptions for special circumstances.

There are two reasons for the surfeit of legislation--one systemic, and one philosophical. The systemic reason is that we have made the job of legislator a full-time job. As a result, lawmakers feel compelled to seek reasons to write new laws and to amend existing ones. We ought to consider having legislative bodies convene only 6 months out of the year, with special sessions for emergencies such as natural disasters and war. The philosophical reason is that too many people believe that is the job of government to solve all problems for us, to provide all basic services for us, to resolve all disputes for us, and to protect us from both the greed of others and our own foolishness.

Three examples of pending legislation serve to illustrate the sort of problems that this combination of systemic and philosophical flaws is producing:
  • A California legislator drafted a bill that would prohibit parents from spanking their children. As soon as the bill was proposed, there was a public outcry against it. Radio talk show hosts derided the bill, and outraged parents called in to express their disagreement--apparently, many people still believe that spanking is a valid form of disciplinary action. Horror stories abounded about how an older sister might have daddy sent to jail for giving younger brother a swat on the behind, or how a supermarket clerk might call the police to arrest a mother who gave a swat to her misbehaving child. Most people who abhor the mistreatment of children also strongly resent the fact that someone wants to legislate the manner in which they discipline their children. The author is now re-writing the bill to outlaw selected forms of child abuse such as the use of belts and sticks, the shaking of infants and other acts of cruelty.
  • Jet Blue airlines did not prepare adequately for a large snowstorm and stranded a large number of passengers on runways and in airports. Federal legislators immediately began to consider a bill called "the flyer's bill of rights," to force airlines to prepare for such situations and to handle problems with more consideration of their customers. But is such a law really necessary? Won't the ensuing loss of business force Jet Blue to correct the problem without federal intervention, and set an example that other airlines will be likely to follow? Why does the solution to every problem have to be "write another law?"
  • California legislators are considering a ban on the sale of incandescent light bulbs beginning in the year 2012. The merits of the compact fluorescent lamps are obvious: for a given intensity of light they are cheaper to use, they last longer, and they reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas production. It seems simple, but it's not. What happens when (not if, when) the makers of incandescent lamps develop bulbs that produce comparable amounts of light with similar reductions in power? The answer is that we would have to amend this law, or write a new one. The other unadressed problem is that compact fluorescent lamps do not come in the wide range of sizes, shapes, and brightness that we have in incandescent bulbs. Where I can, I use the compact flourescents. But they don't make them in the small flame-shaped size that the chandelier in my dining room needs. I have a couple of 2oo watt reading lamps in one room--so far I have not found a fluorescent that bright that will fit in those lamps. Flourescent lamps don't work as well as flood lamps in the 'can lights' that are mounted in the ceiling. I resent the idea that some legislator arbitrarily wants to make those decisions for me in a way that does not consider the total costs of replacing the lamps in which compact fluorescents will not do the job, and you should resent it too. I can already envision folks in 2011 running down to the store and buying lifetime supplies of 200 watt incandescents, flood lamps, and teardrop shaped bulbs. Let's watch, too, as all of the auto manufacturers replace the incandescent lamps in brake lights and turn signals with compact fluorescents. Sure, it sounds absurd, but that's because the proposed law is absurd.

Since we are probably stuck with the concept of full time legislators, I propose that they impose a moratorium on new laws, except for true emergencies, and instead do the following:

  1. Review the thousands of existing laws and eliminate those that are obsolete, or no longer enforced, or that deal with problems that are better solved by market forces, education, or common sense.
  2. For each new problem that seems to cry for a law, consider carefully whether is imperative for government to solve the problem, or if normal market forces or consumer education might offer a better solution.
  3. Concentrate on issues that are both big and truly urgent, where only government action can make a big difference--for example, controlling or eliminating street gangs. Instead of making it illegal for a parent to spank a child, institute a mandatory course for high school students on the "best practices" for raising and disciplining children. If an airline treats customers poorly, let the customers use another airline, the one with lousy service will eventually go out of business. Instead of banning the use of incandescent bulbs, legislators could provide incentives for using fluorescents, but they do not need to do that--the incentive is already there in reduced operating costs for some applications. It might be more beneficial to increase the penalties for polluting our waterways.

Governments, please let citizens solve their own problems when they can; limit your lawmaking to the really big problems that are beyond individual control; and if you finish early, just go home.

Wednesday, February 21, 2007

Propaganda and Terrorism

The teacher of my ninth grade civics class was most enthusiastic about the topic of propaganda. He detailed all of the objectives, elements, and techniques of propaganda, illustrating them profusely with examples from the World War II era. I thought of him today when a friend sent me an email with the following link:
http://www.terrorismawareness.org/islamic-mein-kampf/

It illustrates the kind of propaganda we could be using in the war on terrorism, but are not. I don't remember all of the elements of propaganda, but most of them are in the video--the kernel of truth, the exaggeration, appeal to emotions, stereotyping, etc. It also illustrates the kind of propaganda that the Muslim extremists are using to bolster their cause.

With or without heavy-handed propaganda, however, I am continually disturbed by how much energy some public figures in our country are expending to criticize President Bush for their political gain, and how little effort they expend to attack the terrorist enemies for our safety and security.

With that in mind, I'll offer a couple more links to balance the scale a little bit: http://www.horowitzfreedomcenter.org/
http://www.terrorismawareness.org/

Now, in the political spectrum David Horowitz is a little far to the right for my taste, but the sites are still worth a read. Even the strongest propaganda contains kernels of truth, and those are worth looking for.

Now, back to the Islamic Mein Kampf:
The comparison to Hitler’s Germany is frighteningly valid, even without the emotional tone of the propaganda piece. The Islamist propaganda machine is a virtual duplicate of the machines established in Germany and Japan. The Muslim radicals are exactly what they claim the U.S. is, and what Hitler was—committed to world domination. The rest of the Muslim people are just like the citizens of Germany were—afraid, or unwilling to stand in opposition to the radicals. Similarly, the comparison of the modern western countries to pre-WW2 Europe is also frightening. Europe is echoing Chamberlain’s policy of appeasement. The loudest voices in U.S. today are repeating the pre-WW2 isolationist and pacifist idealism.

When Pearl Harbor was attacked, our government realized that the propaganda attacks had been converted to physical attacks, and it quickly responded with both physical force and propaganda of our own. The terrorists made dozens of smaller attacks around the world, but it took the 9/11/01 attack on the world trade center to awaken our interest.

Since 9/11, Pres. Bush has made, and refused to acknowledge, mistakes that may eventually lead us to a greater disaster:
1. Bush should have completed the mission to stabilize Afghanistan, including eradication of the Taliban and the capture of Bin Laden, before he took on a second target.
2. If, in fact, Bin Laden and his thugs did go into Pakistan, Bush should have given Mushareff a deadline by which to bring us Bin Laden’s head, or authorize us to do it for him. And, no Taliban whatever should have received safe harbor in Pakistan.
3. Bush should have implemented an internal propaganda campaign similar to the one implemented by FDR, to gain the nation’s continuing support for war against Islamic terrorism. Remember? We were all squashing tin cans and saving bacon fat for the war effort. Even Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny were fighting Hitler, Mussolini, and Hirohito in their cartoons. We are too “politically correct” to do that today. There is no sense of urgency. The president has lost his support.
4. Bush picked the wrong second target, probably because of poor and misleading intellegence. Iran was and is more of a threat than Iraq, as are Hamas and Hezbollah.
5. In Iraq, Bush repeated his Bin Laden error by not neutralizing Muqtada al Sadr and his thugs immediately.

The Islamic extremists will negotiate only to weaken us and strengthen their own position. They may offer compromise to the infidel, but to their own soldiers they preach only annihilation of the infidel.

Where is our sense of urgency?

Sunday, February 11, 2007

Negative Trends in Society

A series of articles in the Los Angeles times on the gradual disappearance of some independently owned book stores caused me to ponder the topic of the the ephemeral nature of human culture.

Few of the experiences, the discoveries, the reactions, the thoughts, the inventions, and the ideas of human beings through the ages have lasted very long. Early civilizations had no way of permanently recording their cultures; they passed them from generation to generation by word of mouth. Some of this valuable information has been lost and re-learned several times during the evolution of modern societies. Some information will never be retrieved from past cultures.

One of the earliest methods of recording culture proved to be one of the most durable: information carved into stone tablets. Records of that kind have survived for thousands of years (a mere instant in the time continuum of the universe). But the stone tablets are not very portable. Nor do they hold very much information. They are not easy to reproduce and make available to large numbers of people. But they do last a long time.

Recording methods that have been devised since the development of stone carving have greater capacity and are more convenient to use, but the trend is toward the less and less durable: stylus on wax tablet, ink on parchment, ink on linen paper, ink on paper from wood pulp. The advent of computers has increased our storage capacity for information, but made the data itself even more ephemeral. As storage media, magnetic disks and compact laser discs will probably not endure much longer than the highest quality written books. In addition, the electronic storage media require special complex machines to retrieve the data. Should some great catastrophe befall modern societies, the instructions to construct and use such machines will be locked in that same, inaccessible storage media.

This is not an alarmist cry for the preservation of books and bookstores in our society, and certainly not a call for a return to the use of stone tablets. I suspect that books will be available for many more years. There are many people in the world who are committed to preserving our knowledge for as long as possible. I am pointing, however, to some generally negative trends in modern societies.

One person wrote to the Times that retail bookstores are disappearing because it is so much easier and cheaper to find the books and obtain them on the internet. I find that I have said the same thing. I could wander through used bookstores for years before I would find a copy of an out-of-print book that I want. Or, I can log on to Amazon or Alibris and find a dozen or more copies in different conditions and at different prices, all to be delivered within a week or so. The trend that we are experiencing is that of instant gratification. We no longer have the patience, the tenacity, or the desire for the pursuit of something. We want the item immediately, at the lowest possible expenditure of energy and money. In the extreme, this trend makes us all more selfish and more impatient with those around us.

The second trend that results from purchasing items via the internet is personal isolation. When I buy something on the internet, my only interaction is with a machine, my computer. If I search for a book or another item in retail stores I come into contact with other people. Whether or not these people share my interests and beliefs, the interaction with them is an opportunity to grow and learn, to experience our culture first-hand. Most organizations of collectors have experienced a decline in attendance at their meetings and shows as more and more members choose instead to seek and purchase items through the internet auctions. This loss of personal interaction will make it more difficult for us to engage with others when we have to, say, in some kind of emergency.

These two trends, instant gratification and personal isolation, are not good for us as individuals, or as a society. Before the Socialists suggest that the Government take action to reverse the trends by subsidizing book stores or by limiting internet sales transactions, I propose that we individuals do something about the trends. We probably can not change the infrastructure or the habits of the whole society, but we can change ourselves. When we use the internet, remove personal interaction from the procurement of goods, and satisfy our specific need immediately, we should consider some new activities to provide the psychological and sociological benefits of which we have deprived ourselves. We can pursue a goal that is intangible, and therefore cannot be just bought on the internet. And we can find other people who are pursuing the same or similar objectives, and meet with them in pursuit of the common goals.

The development of a simple and convenient way to preserve our knowledge and ideas may be just that kind of goal. The people who take on that challenge may help to reverse three negative trends.