Two little and disturbing stories concerning bailouts and potential bailouts:

First, a Connecticut lawmaker is begging for taxpayers to foot the bill for the unprofitable newspaper in his small town because he thinks it’s really cute and wonderful (and it probably endorsed him).  Apparently residents don’t agree enough to pay for neccessary subscriptions and advertising, but according to this arrogant politician, all of you should be forced to pay anyway.  Besides the immorality and economic stupidity of more bailouts, this one has particularly dangerous implications for free speech.  If newspapers are forced to answer to bureaucrats they could lose the freedom which makes them even a little relevant.  Government papers would be more boring and shoddy than private papers too.  Do you prefer PBS to CNBC, CNN, ABC, CBS, FOX, etc.?  The Post Office to FedEx, UPS or DHL?

Second, the bailout hungry U.S. automakers and the unions that work for them (or is it the other way around?) have been defending themselves and blaming their troubles on others, no surprise here.  But a funny little fact has emerged about the UAW - they have a money-losing “public” luxury golf course as a perk to union members.  No word about selling it.  Auto exec’s apparently have to hide their jets in order to steal our money, but union bosses don’t have to forgo their country club.  The sad part is that we’re even having this conversation.  Get ‘em off the public dole, remove the unfair legal advantages and it’s no longer anyone’s business what the UAW does with their money.  But so long as they get special favors at our expense, everything they do is subject to public scrutiny.

Get the government out and treat everyone equally under the law and you will find that people really get along pretty darn well.  Start dolling out the favors and we start to tear each other apart.

I used to work in the state legislature, so I am painfully aware of how insufferable the lawmakers “farewell” speeches are.

Leon Drolet of the Michigan Taxpayers Alliance has proposed a drinking game to make a sport of the speech-watching. (if you want to participate, take the list below, and go the the House’s live streaming video):

“This is the first week of the legislature’s lame-duck session. As a former state legislator, I experienced three such sessions with mixed public policy results. But one constant in lame-duck is the “farewell” speeches delivered by outgoing lawmakers who are completing their final term in office.

These farewell speeches are all reliably similar. In fact, the content of these politicians’ speeches is SO predictable, they’re formulaic enough to build a drinking game around. Wanna play the politician “farewell speech” drinking game? Tune in to Michigan Government TV and watch the speeches. Here’s how it goes:

1. The outgoing lawmaker opens his/her speech with reverent, almost religious, statements about how great the institution of the legislature is. They always use words like, “honorable”, “cherished”, “esteemed” and such. Everyone do a shot.

2. Next, each politician absolutely MUST, without fail, go on to disparage the citizen-imposed constitutional term-limit amendment. Nothing is more important and popular among House chamber members than this. Do another shot.

3. The speechmaker laments the demise of the great statesmen from the halcyon, pre-term limit days of Camelot. In those glorious days, politicians confined themselves to selfless public service resulting in brilliant leadership responsible for everything good in prosperous Michigan’s past. The longer these noble statesmen of old held and consolidated political power, the more selfless and brilliant their leadership became. Of course, those meddling citizens with their damn term limits law ruined everything! Do shot.

4. Now, the politician must ALWAYS thank some fellow House member from the opposing party whom they worked with to create some new law or regulation. This is a warm, fuzzy way of nobly appearing “above the fray” and creating an overall “team spirit” within the political class. Another shot.

5. Finally, a bonus shot if the outgoing House member breaks down and cries, and is surrounded and hugged by colleagues. Like someone died.

Still standing? You’ll need the booze in order to withstand the jaw-dropping detachment from reality on display in the House chamber. In reality, Lansing’s political class is not now, and never was, beloved nobility. Politicians, bureaucrats and rent-seeking special interests in Lansing have always been something that Michigan’s productive citizens must, at best, endure. No citizen loves government officials more than government officials do, and the politicians’ speeches to themselves put that fact on display.

Can outgoing lawmakers name ONE of those ‘great statesmen’ from the glorious pre-term limit days that they believe existed? They might name some prominent politician that led the bureaucracy and political class in Lansing to expand their size and power, but can they recall a statesmen who actually inspired and led everyday citizens?

Was John Engler was such a leader? Engler, I believe, is a perfect example of why term limits are a very good thing. Can anyone name an accomplishment from Engler’s final (third) term? I can name several from his first term and even a few from his second.

The “sucky speech” syndrome is symptomatic of a disease that infects the ego, creating a false sense of self-importance that strikes both Democrats and Republicans. Democrats are expected to worship big government, central planning and politicians as saints. Infected Republicans forget that they’re elected to restrain government, so that everyday citizens can lead Michigan forward - each in their own individual, productive ways. They forget that government’s primary responsibility is to serve by protecting the liberty of citizens - not to “lead” them with new programs and such.

Thankfully, there are exceptions to the “sucky speech” syndrome. A few former lawmakers never lost their sense of perspective. My personal favorite is former State Representative Margaret O’Conner (R-Washtenaw County) who dedicated her years in Lansing (1982 - 1992) to uncovering, exposing and publishing an annual report on wasteful and unnecessary state spending. House leadership despised her because she dared criticize the institution of the legislature. They stripped her of staff, and sentenced her to the worst office in the basement of the Capitol beneath leaky pipes. She never noticed, and kept churning out and distributing her reports on spending.

Another notable exception was former Rep. Stephen Dresch from the Upper Pennisula, whose 1992 farewell speech I listened to from the balcony above the House floor. Both House members and I couldn’t understand the things Dresch was saying in his speech because he chose words that exceeded our vocabularies. After he concluded his remarks, his House colleagues rose to applaud the speech that they hadn’t understood. Only later, with the help of a dictionary, did I discover that Dresch’s speech excoriated the elitist, egotistical mentality of his colleagues and their lack of constitutional restraint.

Two years ago, after serving my three terms in the House, I gave my farewell speech. You can find the content here.

Conservatives, libertarians and other supporters of constitutionally limited government can help future politicians avoid the sucky speech syndrome by doing our part to keep the political process in its’ proper context. We should not deify the institutions of government. We should not teach young people that elective office is some noble calling. America’s founders, the real statesmen from our past, understood that government was like fire; something to fear and handle with extreme caution.”

In 1979 Congressman Ron Paul gave a speech on the House floor in opposition to the bailout of Chrysler.  His words are extremely relevant to the new round of bailouts being discussed today.  Some excerpts:

“Do we in Congress have the authority, either moral or constitutional, to cause this suffering? I can find no provision in the Constitution authorizing Congress to make loans or loan guarantees to anyone, let alone to major corporations. Nor have I yet seen a valid moral argument concluding that we, as representatives of all the people, have the right to tax the American people – most of whom receive less in wages and benefits than Chrysler workers – to support a multibillion-dollar corporation. What right have we – and I pose a serious question that deserves an answer – what right have we to force the American taxpayers to risk their money in a business venture which private investors dealing in their own funds have judged to be too risky? Chrysler paper is now classified; that means that any private investor who is handling funds for his depositors, shareholders, or clients may be judged as violating his fiduciary responsibilities should he invest in Chrysler. Don’t we have a trust equally important from the American people? Are we not betraying their trust by voting for a Chrysler bailout? I believe so.”

And

“Last year there were 200,000 bankruptcies in this country, according to U.S. News & World Report. Yet we have selected only the largest for our aid. This is discrimination of the crassest sort. We ignore the smaller victims of this government’s policies simply because they are small. Only the largest, those with the most clout, the most pull, get our attention. This aristocracy of pull is morally indefensible. What answer can be given to the small businessman driven into bankruptcy by government regulations when he asks: “You bailed out Chrysler, why not me?” No justification can be given for this discrimination between the powerful and the powerless, the big and the small.

It is an axiom of our legal system that all citizens are to enjoy the equal protection of the laws. That axiom is violated daily by our tax laws, and now by this proposed corporate welfare plan for Chrysler. Apparently some citizens are more equal than others. That is a notion I reject, and I hope you do, too. I urge you to reject this proposal for all the reasons I have stated.”

I highly encourage you to read the whole speech.

From the Shotgun Blog, where they are spending this week celebrating free speech…

People who wholeheartedly support free speech and other social or “civil” liberties often have no problem opposing free markets. Unfortunately for them, social freedom and economic freedom are inexorably intertwined.

If government has the power to regulate economic activity – grant licenses to businesses or tradesmen, regulate accounting practices, implement workplace safety regulations, etc. – then they inevitably have the power to restrict social freedoms, not least of which is free speech.

I have personally met many business owners who have strong opinions on issues, but who would never voice them or fund organizations that advocate their position because they fear having their license revoked, or being denied a permit. These are not stories of people in the former Soviet Union, these are actual everyday citizens the U.S.

In Michigan, the Department of Environmental Quality is particularly troublesome and has extremely broad discretion in granting licenses and stopping businesses from engaging  in peaceful activity. They can classify literally any piece of land as a “wetland”, and prohibit development. They can arbitrarily require hundreds of thousands of dollars in changes to septic systems, parking lots, seawalls, and more. Many of these decisions are made entirely by field agents and can be decided by nothing more than his or her mood. Others come from the top of the department down.

Tax laws are also notoriously complex and nearly impossible to comply with. I’ve spoken to accountants who tell me that if ten different accountants ran the typical business tax return they would come up with ten different results. I’ve even been told if the same accountant ran the same return ten times he would likely come up with ten different results. When the laws are this complex, it means that at any given time nearly every citizen is likely to be in violation of some tax law or another. State treasury departments or the IRS, if they really wanted to, could find some way in which everybody was out of compliance.

What does this mean for free speech? It means that at any time government agents or their bosses in the executive or legislative branches can, if they so choose, deny licenses, impose costly requirement and find out of compliance anyone that voices opinions they dislike. This is a reality, not a worst case or slippery slope argument. Thousands of business owners find themselves in trouble with regulatory bodies when they stick their neck out to oppose government. As I said before, I have met dozens of business owners who refuse to get involved in political issues, at least not while they are in the middle of some ridiculously long licensing or inspection process.

Remember that every new regulation on the market is another tool in the chest of those who wish to restrict free speech.