We’re just normal people. We are not polished politicians running for office. We are not slick campaign managers or talk show pundits. We may pen an occasional letter to the editor of our local newspaper or attend a local school board meeting, but other than that, we live our lives, raise our children, go to work each day, pay our bills, worship as we choose and pay our taxes. We struggle, we fail, we try again and we succeed. We just live life in America—and that can be a pretty busy enterprise. So what more can we do? I think I have stumbled upon the answer that may solve most of our nation’s problems.

My twelve year old and I were watching the news one night. The topic of one of the stories revolve around some seemingly frivolous lawsuit that was paying off millions for the claimant. My son said something to the effect that, “wouldn’t it be great if we could get a million dollars for something like that?” I think I shocked him by saying, “No.” When he asked me why I wouldn’t want a million dollars I said, “Because I don’t deserve it and all that corporation will do is raise the prices of its products or lay off some of its workers to pay for the lawsuit. It’s someone else’s money. Unless they really hurt me—I don’t deserve it.”

Another time we were talking about an older member of my family who is worth a few million dollars. He wanted to know if I thought she will leave us any of it in her will. Again I shocked him by saying I didn’t know and I didn’t really care. “You don’t want it?” he asked.

“It’s not my money. I didn’t earn it. I didn’t invest it. I’m not entitled to it. If she wants to give me some as a gift, I’ll be grateful, but I don’t have a right to it and I definitely don’t expect it.”

I think the single most important thing we can do as parents and grandparents is to teach this simple principle to our kids:

“You are not entitled to anything belonging to or earned by someone else.”

If we can get this message across at an early age it will solve a host of our nation’s problems.

By the way—this one principle encompasses two of the Ten Commandments.

            -Thou shalt not steal

            -Thou shalt not covet

They are not as sexy as “thou shalt not kill” or “thou shalt not commit adultery”, but God definitely got it right to include them. Nothing is killing this country faster than envy and its accompanying institutional theft.

 As a nation and as individuals there are two diametrically opposed philosophies from which to choose going forward:

1. What you earn and own is your’s

or

2. What you earn and own is everyone’s

It’s actually a very simple choice with very dire consequences.

Our nation is making this choice and has been for the last fifty years.

Are we making the right choice?

Friend of Liberty

www.jimclonts.com

Here’s the oath I took when sworn into the United States Air Force:

I, (state your name), having been appointed a second lieutenant in the United States Air Force, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic, that I bear true faith and allegiance to the same, that I take this obligation freely with no mental reservation or purpose of evasion and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office I’m about to enter. So help me God.

United States military officers swear allegiance not to a country or a man, but to a document and the ideals it represents. This is why many American soldiers tend to be conservative.  It is in our very nature to bristle at and defend against any attempt by politicians to subvert the Constitution of the United States, the ideals we swore to protect and so many died to preserve.

Realistically, most of the Constitution deals with the organization of the three branches of the Government, election procedures, confirmation of Supreme Court Justices, representation of the States, voting rules, etc. Nowhere in the Constitution does it mandate capitalism, the free market, supply and demand, stock and commodity exchanges, nor any other economic ideology.  Our capitalist, free-enterprise system of economy is a direct result of our freedoms, our unalienable rights. They are tangible manifestations of liberty. The Constitution does mandate the political structure of the representative republic.

There is very little in the main body of the Constitution for American military officers to worry about. The Liberal Progressives stretch things a bit, but the main body is not their target. The main target for the Progressives is that pesky Bill of Rights. Here is where a conscientious American military officer may have pause. With the steady erosion of the First, Second, Fourth and Fifth Amendments, as well as the virtual burial of the 10th Amendment, the American military officer will find it more and more difficult to rationalize the actions of one of our political parties.

At some point, men of conscience will have to ask themselves if they are truly upholding the oath they took. At the outset of the Civil War many officers had to make some very difficult decisions in a very short time. I’m sure many of them initially downplayed the threat, since it was coming from within, rather than from a foreign power. The truth was the Civil War was as much a threat to the United States as any war we fought before or since.  The same dilemma may occur in our near future.

American military officers are not required to follow illegal orders, and they may be prosecuted for crimes if they do. If the officer faces tough decisions, then the enlisted man faces something even worse. The enlisted oath of office does say “I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice.” 

In the world of military ethics, the officers are free to determine the legality of an order. The world of the enlisted man is far more ambiguous. The officer may win his court martial if he can convince the jury he was refusing an illegal order. The enlisted man or woman should be off the hook for following an illegal order, but in reality they are not. Though the intent of the oath is to provide a legal barrier between the officers and the enlisted, in reality, if an officer orders his enlisted troops to massacre a village, the enlisted soldier who follows orders may be tried for war crimes. The catch in the enlisted oath is interpretation of “according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice.” The enlisted man is still on the hook.

So what happens when orders from above run contrary to the Constitution of the United States? In a foreign war this is rarely a problem, since enemy combatants are not guaranteed life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness under the US Constitution. In a civil war or insurrection, the legality of orders will come into play. If the military is called in to break up a Tea Party rally, or shut down  a conservative radio station, or arrest political opposition members, officers and enlisted alike will have to choose—and choices will be made.

Many of my friends have speculated that military officers of integrity will desert rather than violate their allegiance to the Constitution. Many will, but many won’t. The same is true of the enlisted troops. This will leave gaps in the military ranks, which you can be sure Government will fill with the desperate, the unemployed, the unprofessional, maybe the radical, perhaps even the criminal.

This will put the American public in the uncomfortable position of not being able to trust their own military forces. The sight of an Abrams tank in the town square, a B-52 circling overhead, even a soldier on foot patrolling the streets, will strike fear in the hearts of American citizens. We just won’t know if we’re seeing defenders of freedom or harbingers of tyranny.

If the economy collapses some day and rioting breaks out (like in Greece) as people fight for scarce resources, you can bet the farm the National Guard, even the active duty military, will be deployed to keep the peace. When you roll up to the checkpoint and are staring down the barrel of that M-16—it may be a coin toss as to whether you can trust the man behind the trigger.

Friend of Liberty

www.jimclonts.com

In George Orwell’s book 1984, the protagonist, Winston, is being “re-educated” by the Government. His educator holds up four fingers and asks him how many fingers he’s holding up. Winston responds correctly and it hit with an electric shock. This happens over and over again. Finally, Winston pleads with his educator saying, “How can I see anything but four? Two plus two equal four.” His educator says, “Yes, sometimes two plus two is four. But sometimes it’s five or even three. Sometimes it’s all of those at the same time.” Winston is confused. How can this be? The answer he is given is that reality exists only in the mind and the Party controls the mind. If it is in the Party’s best interest for two plus two to equal four. Then it’s four. If it’s five, then it’s five.

Winston is hit with more shocks until he cries out that there are five fingers, but that is not good enough. “You are only telling me what you think I want to hear,” his educator says. “You have to really believe there are five.”

The current Administration is shocking us daily with the completely illogical, contradictory and untenable. To us the math just doesn’t add up, because to us two plus two equals four. To the true believers, it adds up to whatever they need it to add up to. The media, otherwise known as the Ministry of Propaganda, repeats the insanity over and over again. Once you’ve heard it repeated over and over as fact, you become desensitized to it. You may even start to believe the Administration has some special accounting rules or other mathematical gimmicks that make the numbers add up after all.  The goal is to get a significant portion of the population to simply give up and believe two plus two is five. Obama got 54% of the population suspend disbelief in 2008 and today he continues to look the American public in the eye and tell us the stimulus bill is creating jobs, even as we continue to lose jobs. We have $106 trillion in unfunded mandates the Government must pay out over the next ten years, but he tells us the Government is not spending enough. He tells us the Government must raise taxes on employers so the Government can spend more and in the process create more jobs. (If we just Rob Peter to pay Paul—Peter will start hiring more employees.) He continues to tell us in order to reduce the deficit, the Government must become the single payer of healthcare benefits. Our eyes are telling us we are growing further and further into debt, we are crushing the private sector, disabling our engines of wealth and proceeding down an unsustainable path to destruction, but perhaps not—if we just really make ourselves believe two plus two equals five.

JC

www.jimclonts.com

My personal belief is that profit, if legally obtained, has no moral connotation at all. An exceptionally large profit for one company over another in a given industry represents an imbalance in the market, driven by technology, costs structures and basic competiveness. The free market usually resolves this imbalance automatically as companies strive to compete. Some companies rise, while others fall. Some recover their market share; others go out of business, while younger, hungrier entrepreneurs enter the market.

Interestingly enough, the Progressives who claim to disdain profits, in actuality love them. Exxon-Mobil was demonized by Government and the Media for its record $45.2 billion profit in 2008. At the same time it paid $116.2 billion in taxes to the Government, a fact which did not make the headlines. That works out to $318 million per day in taxes in 2008, enriching Government coffers. Exxon Mobil’s CEO explained in an interview on PBS that their high profits are a result of the volume of their production and that the Government profits two and a half times more than Exxon-Mobil itself. When the economy was on fire and fuel consumption was high, Big Oil moved a lot of product, good for them—but more so for Uncle Sam.

By the way, 52% of ExxonMobil is owned by mutual funds, index funds and pension funds. Two million people are stockholders and less that 1% of that company is owned by “ExxonMobil corporate insiders.” ExxonMobil is largely owned by the common man, who profits from their profits.

 So why the Government demonization of corporate profits? Simple. It serves their political goals. The anti-profit, anti-corporate, populist message resonates with the common man. The Administration wants you to feel screwed each time you fill your gas tank, buy groceries, pay your electric bill or visit a doctor.  Make no mistake, though. They do not want the companies working as non-profits. They do not want corporate America to slash their prices, and hence their revenues, to the bone. They want the companies to make profits, large, large, immense, excessive, immoral profits, so they can demonize them in the Media, sway public opinion against Corporate America, and seize the profits in the form of taxation–all with public support. They want the little guy to think of the Government as their great equalizer. Even though the common man won’t see a dime less at the pump or the grocery store, the goal is to make him feel better knowing the Government is sticking it to the Corporate Fat Cats, recovering the common man’s money from the greedy Corporations. The Government is laughing all the way to the bank. The common man is still paying out the nose and Government collecting the spoils.

Whereas Corporate profits are used to reward investors, invest in new technologies, equipment or processes, and expand operations, the Government follows a similar model. The Government equates profit with expansion. The more revenue they receive, the more Government expands. The Government purchases property, builds buildings, fills them with offices, computer servers, basic infrastructure and hires employees. They do many of the things corporate America does with their profits. However, they pay for it all with the money generated by the private sector, the profits earned by productive corporate entities. They do it with money paid by the consumers of the company’s products. They confiscate that money, expand their own infrastructure and employee base, all the while generating no revenue of their own. They create jobs which rely totally on the profits of real world companies to sustain. I call it the parasite economy. For every Boeing Company or Ford Motor Company, there are a few hundred little Government agencies or branch offices, filled with clerks, middle managers and bureaucrats, providing some service the Federal Government has no business providing, all living off the life-blood of Corporate America.

While it is true this model does create good-paying Government jobs with great benefits (both of which has recently exceeded the average salaries and benefits of private sector jobs), it also drains the producing economy of resources and transfers it to the parasite economy. The truth is the producing economy would utilize this capital far more efficiently. Decisions regarding corporate capital are not taken lightly by companies looking to make a profit. They make the best decisions possible, develop the best strategies possible, to ensure capital is invested wisely, in the most productive manner possible, with the best return on investment. Invariably, this means better products for consumers, expanded markets, more jobs, more opportunities and, of course, more profits. The Government Parasite economy has no such motivations. They are not required to make good decisions. Since there are no profits by which to measure their performance, they are either evaluated solely on the services they provide, not on how effectively or efficiently they proved them. These agencies must spend all their money by the end of the fiscal year, even if it means wasteful spending, to ensure they get the same amount or more in the next budget. If they make a poor decision, it doesn’t matter—as long as Boeing, Ford and the real producers make good decisions.  When things go bad in the private sector and profits plummet,  it becomes apparent to all how just how large the Parasites have become—and friends, today there is more blood in the tick than in the dog.

JC

 Visit: www.jimclonts.com

Americans seem to have forgotten that our wants, desires, opinions, fears, ambitions and most all, our choices are the forces which drive the Free Market. It is based on the simplest of concepts: the freedom to live our lives as we choose. We have the freedom to choose what house we buy and how much we’re willing to pay for it, what car we drive and how much we will pay for it, the companies in which we invest and how much we will pay for a good or service. It’s that simple. The Free Market is the tangible manifestation of our choices.

The price of a good or service is based on what we will pay for it. Competition is what keeps prices in check. If the price of some product rises due to increased demand, an opportunity is created for a competitor to offer a comparable product at a lower price. This competitor cannot sell an inferior product and expect to make sales. The competitor must produce something comparable for a lower price. This takes hard work, dedication, risk-taking and innovation. If successful they make money and the consumer benefits from the lower prices. It also serves as a wake-up call for the first company to increase their efficiency, or they go out of business. The consumers’ choices drive the market. Most people do not realize that the profit, the primary goal of all businesses, is realized most often by producing a superior product or service at prices that benefit the consumer. Exploiting the consumer or providing them with unsatisfactory alternatives is a sure-fire way to bankrupt yourself.

The stock and commodities markets are no different. The price of a stock or commodity is determined by the buyers and the sellers, each operating in their own interests, opposing forces keeping the markets in check. Free choice determines where investment occurs with companies competing to attract investors. Companies strive to increase performance, which leads to sales and profits, allowing them to reward their investors through dividends or increased value of the shares.

Left to its own devices free markets can make short-term mistakes, but they are always self-correcting. If something is overvalued, the true value will eventually become evident and the price will fall. Free Market Capitalism is an economic auto-pilot that will keep an economy on a mostly even keel.

That being said, Government does its best to corrupt free markets, to exert control of the people and limit our freedoms. It does this through tax policy, regulation, price controls, subsidies, interest rates, monetary supply, wage controls, environmental regulations which defy common sense and other freedom-limiting legislation. Government continually makes decisions which limit our freedom, corrupts the natural cycle of supply and demand, disincentivizes competition and reduces choices.

One great example of Government interference is the fossil fuel industry. This country is blessed with an abundance of oil, coal and natural gas. Offshore areas of the US are rich in oil and gas and we’ve recently discovered an oil field in the Dakotas that rivals Saudi Arabia. You wouldn’t know this by where we get our fuel, however. In the name of stopping global warming the Government will not let us drill for these resources. This restricts supply, increases price and exports trillions of dollars a year to Middle Eastern countries not exactly our friends.

Why was there a housing boom for the last ten years? Why were prices rising 20% a year in California, New York and Florida? Why was the demand for new homes so high? Once again the Government interfered in the Market. Through their surrogates Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, they created the sub-prime mortgage market, encouraging banks to make loans to people who would not normally qualify. They would in turn buy the loans from the banks. This generated false demand for homes and caused existing home prices to rise dramatically. When tens of thousands of these risky loans finally went bad, the bubble burst and the Market tried to correct itself, but Government is still fighting it tooth and nail, pouring hundreds of billions into the banking industry and trying to re-inflate the bubble. The equity of those homes is not coming back up anytime soon. It was never real to begin with.

As Americans we have to be wary of Government tampering with our free markets, recognize it for what it is and act in the best interest of the nation at each election. We cannot sit idly by and watch the economic freedoms which have made this country great be slowly destroyed, only to be replaced with a Government-planned economy designed to cement power for a new political ruling-class. Janis Joplin said freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose. We are rapidly approaching that level of “freedom.”

JC

President Obama has chastised several big banks for their recent record profits and
the continuation of their executive bonus and compensation policies. The President spouts
populist drivel such as, and I’m paraphrasing, “When the average American is hurting, the
fat cat bankers are bringing home millions in bonuses. When the banks needed help the
American people came to the rescue, now the American people want their money back!”

Okay, a couple problems here. One, the banks that are making the huge profits have
already paid back their bailout money, with interest. Two, in reality, the bailout money
never came from the American people. It was borrowed from China and other countries. (Of
course, the American taxpayer will have to pay that back.)

The President wants to instate a windfall profit tax on banks. He is also upset with the
banks for not increasing their lending to businesses. These are the same banks that
weren’t making any profit last year and the Government deemed too big to fail. Now—here
are two dirty little secrets of banking in an Obama-world:

One: large and small businesses are not crying out for capital, because they are not
certain they can afford to expand with all the uncertainties the Obama Administration
presents. Who is going to commit to huge business loans with healthcare, carbon taxes and
union card-check as the priorities of this administration? Businesses simply don’t know
what rules they are going to have to operate under in the near future. They don’t know
what their taxes and other obligations will be. Only an idiot bets money on a game he
does not understand.

Two: The policies of the Federal Reserve and this Administration allow banks to make
record profits without loaning anything to anyone. How is this possible? The banks can
borrow money from the Federal Reserve at something like .1% interest. They, in turn, take
the cash and buy treasury bonds earning 3%.  The banks are making almost 3% profit with
absolutely no risk. They don’t even have to manage a loan. It is a way to bring money
from the Federal Reserve into the coffers of the Federal Government using banks as a
vehicle. When this money gets spent by Government, it will cause inflation because there
are no goods or services to back it up. It was printed. No wealth was created in the
process.

So, once again, the President is disingenuous. He spouts populist drivel denouncing the
banks in an effort to drive public opinion against them and give himself cover in the
process, all the while using the banks to launder his money. You can bet every time
Congress votes to raise the debt ceiling another trillion dollars, the banks show up on
the Fed’s doorstep with their hands out—and Obama meets them in the back alley to get
his 97% of the take.

As a Conservative I am generally supportive of profits and I do not play the class envy
game of begrudging executive bonuses for banks or other companies. However, I cannot
support the bank CEOs’ current actions. They seem to be taking a chapter from the Al
Capone School of Money-Management by colluding with the Federal Reserve and the Obama
Administration in the biggest money laundering operation in history.

Jim Clonts

www.jimclonts.com

The dangerous mindset is that of the modern Progressive. These people constitute, perhaps, 20% of the population. They believe in an autocratic, authoritarian Government with a society designed and engineered to control the population and ensure the People live as they should. They have a vision of the Perfect Human Society and they seek to coerce, or force if necessary, the population into conformance with this vision. They believe the Government has the right and responsibility to ensure we live as the “educated and enlightened” among us think we should. Freedom and liberty are not in the lexicon of this crowd. Personal freedoms are a hindrance to establishing their vision of society and they are correct. When human beings have personal freedom to pursue their own goals, ambitions, direct their own lives, utilize their own talents as they see fit, and spend their income as they desire, it becomes impossible to establish a well-ordered, homogenous society of equals.

The very notion of asking a child what they want to be when they grow up is foreign to this mindset. The child should be evaluated and placed in an occupation that best serves the public good. Modern day Germany is a great example of this (National Socialist Germany was as well, but we won’t go there for now.) Last year a young German woman visited my factory and when we asked her how she came to work for the company she told us she was placed by the Government of Germany. Upon graduation from college she was assigned to our company as the best fit for her. She seemed happy, but she also was very interested in working for the company outside of Germany. There are those in this country that would say, “That’s wonderful. It is the most efficient way to run an economy and ensure people are working where they are best suited.” If personal desires are compromised, so be it. Do you believe there are many in our education system that feel the same way?

In the grand debate over our future, we will have little to no effect on changing the minds of these Progressive Democrats. They are not interested in debate or compromise. They have a vision. They are true believers. This is their religion.

The Liberal mindset that perhaps we can reach is the man or woman who does believe in freedom and liberty, but are also weary of the corruption in our system and are willing to trade some measure of freedom for some measure of social justice. At heart they know the arguments. They know that Capitalism and Free Markets work, but they know they don’t work for everyone the same way. They know the system can be perverted and corrupted, allowing some to prosper at the expense of others. They understand that not everyone can have it all, but they think if the system were just tweaked by Government, if the redistribution of wealth and the regulation of markets and Wall Street were just done to the right level, that perhaps we could keep the Capitalist engine of wealth, while siphoning off just enough capital to equalize the playing field for the disadvantaged.

These people trust their elected representatives more than they trust the companies for which they work. They can be reasonable, have a sense of fairness about them and many are willing to make personal sacrifices. They are not looking for an all-powerful, authoritarian, command-economy Government. They do not want all of society re-engineered—just tweaked. These people can be reasoned with and that is where we have to concentrate our efforts.

My personal belief, and I think history backs me up, is that Man is a flawed species. Perfecting Human Behavior by coercion, force or tyranny will not work, and never has. Likewise, trying to equalize personal outcomes has never worked. I believe the economic system that provides the most prosperity for the most people is the best we as Humans can hope for. Capitalism, as long as competition is maintained and not allowed to devolve into monopolies, provides that level of prosperity. The same is true of our system of government, which John Adams once said was awful, but also the best ever created by Man.

Our goal has got to be to engage this type of Democrat in true debate at the water-cooler level. One compromise we can make with them is to agree with their basic premise that we can have Free Markets and Capitalism with some social tweaking, but that the Progressives doing the tweaking are doing it with a sledge hammer, that is it has grown out of control like a cancer and that it hurts the little guy more than it helps by forcing them to be dependent on an ever-growing Government while hurting their personal competitiveness and chances of employment.

Even more importantly, we must stress that the Progressives pushing the agendas in Washington are not doing it for the same reasons as our friend at the water-cooler. We must convince them these Progressives are not your father’s Democrats. I think the basic Democrat who desires a level of “social safety-net” as a hedge against the Law of the Jungle, needs to contrasted with the Progressive Democrat interested in crushing the Free Markets, expanding Government control over our lives and producing a command economy and a socially re-engineered society. I would venture many “old school” Democrats would part ways with the Progressives if that contrast could be seen. Conservatives have valid, logical arguments. It is time to use these arguments, and more importantly, aim them at the right target audience.

Jim Clonts

www.jimclonts.com

It is said that politics is show business for the ugly and I hold politicians in equal contempt. They say things they don’t mean, cry crocodile tears, lie to further their causes and do everything in their power to convince the American people they are something they are not.

I don’t know if this is a distinctly American attitude or just my personal foible, but I do not revere these people because of their positions. It is said you can dislike the man, but you must respect the office. I say bull$%^#. I don’t care whether we are talking about a mayor, a congressman or even the president. I do not respect the office. If there is respect it is for the man or the woman holding the office—anything else is hypocrisy. Getting 51% of voters to pull the lever for you on a cold day in November means nothing to me. It’s what they do after they take office. These guys are nothing but public servants, public servants that don’t even risk their lives for the People, like police, firemen and the military. I have far more respect for a fireman than a congressman and I fear when faced by the elected official I’d let them know it.

I guess I would never make it as a politician. If I was elected a congressman from Georgia and called into the Oval Office to be “coerced” by the President, my gut instinct would be to say, “Just who the hell do you think you are? I’m here representing my district, not to build monuments to you.” Think of all the first term Democrats in the House that are being asked to commit political suicide for this healthcare bill. Here are folks who have probably aspired to public office their whole lives, and when it finally happens for them, when they are looking at a potential career in the House or even a Senate run in a few terms, they get a president who tells them to fall on their sword—and to hell with your constituents back home.

The truth is these guys get elected and, just like in Hollywood, they get drunk on power and praise. Their egos swell and suddenly they turn into—a Teddy Kennedy (God rest his soul.) or a Harry Reid or even (God forbid) a Nancy Pelosi. A 2/3 term senator with no legislation to his name and scores of voting abstentions, is elected president by 53% of the voters and suddenly he is royalty in a room full of experienced legislators twenty years his senior. America rebelled against the notion of royalty over 230 years ago, but our society, our media, and our entertainment venues, treat these people like modern day dukes, earls and kings.

I’m sorry, but these people work for us. I would have no compunction against telling Harry Reid face to face there is a village somewhere missing its idiot, or Nancy Pelosi that I loved her in the Wizard of Oz.

These people are the stewards we have chosen to lead our nation—and the contract is for a limited engagement only. In some cases they have demonstrated no ability to lead prior to election. So I don’t give a rat’s behind what title is in front of their name. Their titles are earned by winning elections, which, like an Academy Award, could just mean they are convincing liars. If they want to earn my respect—let’s see what they do in office, then maybe they’ll get it. I’m from Missouri and they have to show me.

JC