–Is gun control possible?

An alternative to popular faith

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Jesus: “all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.”
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Recently, a Chicago off-duty policeman was shot and killed by four good-for-nothing bums, who decided it would be a lark to commit armed robbery. Ho hum. Another Chicago murder. Another good life lost.

Is there any way to stop the killing, or at least slow it? In answer to that question, we must consider a few facts:

  1. Most murders are committed with guns
  2. Millions of Americans want guns.
  3. The gun lobby is powerful.
  4. Even the Supreme Court ignores the first phrase of the 2nd Amendment, to make anti-gun laws unconstitutional.
  5. Gun manufacture, import and sales are quite profitable.
  6. Prohibition of something people want never works.
  7. There is widespread belief that anti-gun laws leave criminals armed and honest people unarmed.
  8. Chicago, and most other cities, do not have fully staffed, fully trained police. Money has gone elsewhere.

So, what to do? Here are a couple thoughts. Though none is a complete solution, a few worthwhile partial solutions could move us in the right direction:

Make each manufacturer, seller or provider of a gun liable for the use of that gun.

If you make or sell or give someone a gun that is used in a crime, you are responsible for that crime. Harsh? Unfair? Some states have “dram shop” laws, making a tavern responsible for damages where intoxication was at least one cause of the damages. Sell liquor to a drunk; the drunk commits a crime; you go to jail.

If you feed someone liquor in your home, and that drunk drives a gets into an accident, you could be found guilty of aiding and abetting a crime.

These laws are weak (they generally don’t apply to the manufacturer, importer, wholesaler or package liquor dealer), are different in every state, and are difficult to apply across state lines, but the point is, they do make sellers liable for a product they sell, even though they themselves didn’t misuse it. So even these woefully weak laws make bartenders a bit more cautious about selling drinks to doubtful people.

The precedent, of making a seller liable for the misuse of product he sells, could be extended to guns. Gun manufacturers, wholesalers, retailers, even private citizens, would be liable for crimes committed with guns. So you, the gun provider, better set up a system to prevent your customer, or your customer’s customer, from misusing the gun.

Rather than trying to outlaw gun ownership, which for the above-mentioned reasons won’t work, merely make gun ownership more costly. Sellers probably would have to buy expensive insurance, the cost of which would be added to the cost of the gun.

I visualize a clearing center that would track every gun sale in America. All manufacturers, wholesalers, importers, retailers and private citizens would be required to submit a report on the purchaser of every gun.

The clearing center could be financed by a tax on gun sales and ownership. Just as we tax the sale and ownership of homes, cars, liquor and cigarettes, we could tax the sale and ownership of guns. The tax also could be used to hire, train and equip more police, as increasing police presence deters crime.

Under the economic theory “money changes everything,” making gun ownership more expensive, and making gun sellers more wary about liability, and hiring more police could together reduce the availabiltiy and ownership of guns — and reduce the murder rate.

Would this eliminate guns? No.
Could honest people still obtain guns? Of course.
Could criminals still obtain guns? Sure.
But the increased cost, the clearing house and the added police represent a step from the current, insufficient control for the single most dangerous, easily available product the world has ever known.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
http://www.rodgermitchell.com

No nation can tax itself into prosperity

–Undocumented immigrants

By now the world has seen the video: A little girl asked Mrs. Obama why the president was “taking everybody away that doesn’t have papers.”

“That’s something that we have to work on, right? To make sure that people can be here with the right kind of papers,” Mrs. Obama said.

“But my mom doesn’t have any papers,” the student said. In an interview conducted after the event, the 7-year old girl told a reporter: “I’m a big girl and I don’t want to be left with nothing. I could almost die.”

The right believes the law is sacred. The left believes people are sacred. Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas believe in “original intent.” Ruth Bader Ginsburg says the both world and the Constitution have changed markedly. The right feels law changes are Congress’s domain. The left feels Congress often violates the Constitution, which is the reason for the Supreme Court.

And while those august ladies and gentlemen debate arcane passages and footnotes and what Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, James Madison et al “really meant” in 1787, and whether or not those intentions apply to today’s world, and while Arizona will expend a great deal of time, money and effort to increase deportations, a little girl, an American citizen, worries that her mother may be deported.

And I wonder, why do we choose to hunt down and deport undocumented immigrants? Do undocumented immigrants cause more problems, commit more crimes, take more jobs, than documented immigrants from the same country? Why is gaining documentation so difficult? Does the many-year’s wait add to our wealth or security? Would America be a better, safer, wealthier, more productive place if we could get rid of undocumented immigrants?

Any thoughts?

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell

–Worried about your children and grandchildren paying the federal debt?

An alternative to popular faith


     The debt hawks claim to be concerned about your children and grandchildren, but their proposals actually will punish your heirs. The debt hawks say future taxpayers will pay for today’s federal deficit spending. This is factually wrong. Unlike state and local governments, the federal government does not spend tax money. It, in fact, destroys the tax money sent to it, and it creates new money, ad hoc, when it credits the bank accounts of creditors. Federal spending is not limited by, or related in any way to, federal taxes. Thus, taxpayers never have, nor ever will, pay for federal spending.

    What the debt hawks fail to mention is that their solutions (raising taxes and cutting federal spending) to this non-existent problem will impoverish you, your children and your grandchildren. Here is a sampling of debt hawk proposals. Read them carefully, and think about each proposal’s effect on current and future generations.

Retirement:
    Raise the normal retirement (Social Security) age to 68
    Reduce scheduled Social Security benefits
    Reduce Social Security spousal benefits
    Increase taxes on Social Security benefits

Health care:
    Tax insurance benefits
    Tax employees for employer-paid premiums
    Cut Medicare payments
    Cut Medicaid payments
    Raise Medicare premiums
    Cut spending on graduate medical education
    Raise the Medicare retirement age (again)
    Cut federal Medicaid funding to states

Jobs:
    Do not enact a new jobs bill

More taxes; higher taxes
    Raise taxes on higher incomes
    Increase the inheritance (“death”) tax
    Increase the gas tax
    Enact a VAT tax
    Increase the payroll tax (FICA)
    Eliminate the mortgage interest deduction
    Eliminate state and local tax deductions
    Tax life insurance benefits
    Eliminate EITC (Earned Income Tax Credit for low and moderate income workers
    Eliminate the $400/person making-work-pay credit
    Eliminate the “American Opportunity” college tax credit
    Add and excise tax on high-cost health plans

Military and Security:
    Reverse the “Grow the Army” initiative (fewer paid soldiers)
    Reduce purchases of weapons systems
    Reduce veterans’ income security benefits
    Reduce Homeland Security spending

Aid for the poor:
    Cut food stamps
    Cut average unemployment benefits
    Cut temporary assistance to needy families (TANF) program
    Cut funding for adoption and foster care

Education:
    Cut federal funding of K-12 education
    Cut school breakfast programs
    Cut funding for the education of disadvantaged and disabled children

Infrastructure:
    Cut federal highway funding
    Cut funding for bridge repair

Research & Development:
    Cancel NASA missions to the moon and Mars

States and Cities:
    Cut mass transit funding
    Cut federal funding to the states and cities

This is the world — a world of higher taxes and fewer benefits — the world the debt hawks propose for you, your children and your grandchildren.

And what is the federal debt the debt hawks worry over? The federal government spends by crediting the bank accounts of its vendors. Every credit demands a debit, and this debit on the government’s balance sheet is called “debt.” It more properly should be called, “money,” because the way the government creates money is by crediting bank accounts. That balance sheet merely is a score sheet, showing how much money the government has created.

You don’t owe it, nor do your children and grandchildren. It’s just a score sheet.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
http://www.rodgermitchell.com

No nation can tax itself into prosperity

–Even Paul Volcker doesn’t get it.

An alternative to popular faith

If even Paul Volcker doesn’t get it, how can the man in the street hope to understand — unless the man in the street is willing to look at the facts and Volcker isn’t?

“5/19/2001: STANFORD, California (Reuters) – Europe’s debt crisis shows the risks for the United States if it does not get its budget deficits under control, former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker said on Tuesday. ‘If we need any further illustration of the potential threats to our own economy from uncontrolled borrowing, we have only to look to the struggle to maintain the common European currency, to rebalance the European economy, and to sustain political cohesion of Europe,’ Volcker said.
[…]The U.S. budget deficit hit $1.4 trillion in 2009, roughly 10 percent of the economy. The White House projects the deficit this year will reach $1.6 trillion. The large deficits have evoked comparisons to Greece. But in a speech to the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research in California, Volcker said the United States differs from that country and other small European countries whose credit markets have come under speculative attack. Unlike those countries, the United States benefits from well-established currency and credit markets that are considered safe havens in times of financial turmoil.
[…]’There are serious questions, most immediately about the sustainability of our commitment to growing entitlement programs,’ said Volcker, who heads an outside panel of experts advising Obama on the economy”.

Here is Paul Volcker, who of anyone, should know better, saying the difference between the U.S. and European countries is we have a well-established currency. No, Mr. Volcker, the difference is we are a monetarily sovereign nation and the EU countries are not. And that difference makes all the difference.

Somehow, the fact that we are running trillion-plus deficits, with none of the problems the EU nations are experiencing, doesn’t seem to penetrate Mr. Volcker’s skull. He has the debt hawk’s “It-hasn’t-happened-yet-but-I’m-sure-one-day-it-will” mentality, rather than the scientist’s “It-hasn’t-happened-yet.-I wonder-why” mentality.

Mr. Volcker, the reason “it” (inability to service national debts) happened to Greece, but not to the U.S., is simple: The U.S. has the unlimited ability to pay its bills, merely by crediting creditors’ bank accounts. EU rules prevent Greece from doing this. Either Mr. Volcker truly doesn’t understand the difference, which would be remarkable, or he has been paid to adopt a debt hawk agenda that forces him to close his eyes to basic fact.

Anyone who says Greece’s problems foreshadow similar problems for the U.S. either is ignorant of the facts or a liar.

And by the way, for those debt hawks who keep warning us that deficits cause inflation, we’re running the deficits, but: “5/19/2010: WASHINGTON (AFP) – US consumer prices fell for the first time in 13 months in April, the government said Wednesday as analysts warned of the risk of deflation in the world’s largest economy.” Isn’t it inconvenient the way facts seem to get in the way of wrong opinion?

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
http://www.rodgermitchell.com

No nation can tax itself into prosperity