Job Creation: Not a senator’s job, but…

…it is part of a senator’s responsibility. Let me explain.
Article I, Section 8 of the United States Constitution states that Congress has the power (and responsibility) to provide for, among other things, the general welfare of the United States. The Preamble to the Constitution also enumerates among the responsibilities of “The People,” and especially those who represent them as their voices in the elected legislature, as insuring “domestic tranquility” and promoting the general welfare.
As a member of Congress, a United States senator is sworn to uphold the Constitution, and is obligated to abide by its enumeration of powers. As such, it is a U.S. Senator’s responsibility to promote a climate that encourages and fosters economic growth and the job creation that comes with it.
The current senatorial race in Nevada is focused heavily on the economy, and the rhetoric coming from both major party campaigns has to do with jobs and job creation.
The state of Nevada is among the nation’s leaders in unemployment with about 14 percent of the state’s population out of work.
On one side, the republican challenger, Sharron Angle, is questioning the democratic incumbent’s Congressional efforts to create jobs and lower the unemployment rate. She is also ultimately charging U.S. Senator Harry Reid, D-NV, with responsibility for job creation.
Reid, meanwhile, is disputing his challenger’s criticism, having stated that he isn't responsible for our nation's unemployment rate. And yet, out of the other side of his mouth, he has stated unequivocally that job creation is a senator's responsibility. His campaign has launched political television advertisements touting the senator’s efforts to save existing jobs and bring new clean energy jobs to his state.
Interestingly enough, the challenger has said that job creation isn’t the job of a U.S. senator. Yet, she charges her opponent with responsibility for Nevada’s high unemployment rate.
Strange how both candidates tout the economy and job creation as the most important issues in this year’s senate race. Both candidates play up the importance of a senator’s role in job creation. And both also deny that jobs or their unemployment counterparts are a senator’s responsibility.
Oddly enough, both are right and both are also wrong.
Angle, the GOP challenger, has said quite plainly that the job of a U.S. senator is not to create jobs. She’s right.
It is not the government’s role or responsibility to create jobs. That task belongs primarily to the private sector. Sure, government can create government jobs or pass legislation for projects that require temporary jobs. But long-term, permanent job creation can only be achieved by those entities that exist on profit and engage in marketplace competition. Economic growth is reliant on the success of the private sector, which itself is reliant on consumers, the majority of whom are employed in the private sector. Our economy is circular, and the rightful place of government is not in the circle or even part of it, but on the outside.
By this I mean to say that the government’s proper and Constitutionally appropriate role—as defined by the philosophies of its framers—is to provide an economic climate in which both consumer spending and job growth can flourish.
As such, a U.S. senator’s responsibility is to support a strong economy by proposing bills and voting on legislation that promotes and provides for the general welfare of the United States.
How this gets accomplished is among the fundamental differences between left and right wing politics.
Reid, who has held his senate seat for the past 24 years, is facing a serious challenge for the first time in more than a decade. As the acting Senate Majority Leader and arguably the third most powerful politician in Washington, D.C., few in the nation’s capital are in position to affect a climate of economic growth and job creation than he is.
Angle has charged Reid with responsibility for Nevada’s 14 percent unemployment rate, among the highest in the country. While he isn’t responsible for unemployment, and job creation isn’t a senator’s job, the most powerful man in the senate does have a responsibility to support policies and laws that promote economic growth, part of that general welfare clause in the Constitution.
In a manner of speaking, then, Angle is correct.
Reid is partially responsible for Nevada’s economic woes.
After all, he did support Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, federal home loan programs for low income, first-time homebuyers. The programs have proven to be abject failures as viable financial entities.
Reid also supported federal policies that strong-armed mortgage loan companies into offering products which low income consumers could afford. This precipitated the housing collapse, the impetus of which was a tidal wave of loan defaults and foreclosures on properties purchased by people who could no longer afford their mortgage debts.
Contrary to the claims of the Democratic Congressional leadership, and the Reid campaign, the recession is not entirely the result of corporate avarice and greed, or deregulation by the Bush White House and former Republican Congressional majority. Many of the big problems we face from this recession were simply the result of government literally putting its two cents where it really doesn’t belong. Others responsible for the recession include the millions of consumers whose incomes were far exceeded by their spending. The current recession is the result of a credit crisis, and financial irresponsibility run amok.
Everyone, from Congress and the President on down to the individual consumer overextended on his or her credit, has a role to play in this recession and shared responsibility for it.
This includes Senator Harry Reid, who, along with his cohorts in Congress and the White House, has done a poor job of fostering economic growth with policies and legislation aimed at promoting real, long-term recovery. What Reid and the Democrats have done is spend hundreds of billions more dollars on financial bailouts to companies and industries “too big to fail,” and a largely ineffective stimulus package that could only offer, at best, short-term, temporary relief to a long-term problem.
Despite the $787 billion stimulus package passed in the spring of 2009, the national unemployment rate remains in double digits. Nevada’s, in particular, has grown to around 14 percent. This is legislation that Reid whole-heartedly supported. It was claimed to be an answer to the recession; but what it has done is only perpetuate the problem.
The Reid campaign claims that the Senate Majority Leader has either saved or created thousands of jobs in Nevada by way of promoting clean energy technology and using federal pork to bail out Nevada businesses in financial trouble.
And yet, the campaign disputes the challenger’s assertion that the incumbent is responsible for Nevada’s unemployment rate and sour economy.
Well, which is it, Senator?
Either you are or you aren’t responsible for jobs.
Reid’s campaign slogan this year is that “no one can do more” for Nevada than Reid can.
Perhaps.
But what exactly has Harry done for his state lately? Don’t just show us the money, Harry; show us what has been done with it.
All of those clean energy jobs you claim to have brought to the Silver State don’t do a majority of out-of-work Nevadans much good, because they are skilled jobs requiring a certain amount of technical experience and education. Many unemployed Nevadans are unskilled or possess skills limited to the construction and service industries. What good are those skills in qualifying for clean energy jobs?
And once all those solar panels, wind farms and geothermal projects are completed, what will happen to the project-based jobs? More than likely, they will be gone with the Nevada wind.
I find it fascinating that Sen. Harry Reid, one of the most powerful voices in Washington, claims that no one can do more for his state than he can; and yet, in spite of this, his state continues to be among the highest in the nation in unemployment, foreclosures and loan defaults, declining real estate values, individual and corporate bankruptcies, and failed small business ventures.
Are you sure you can’t do any more for Nevada, Sen. Reid? Either you haven’t done enough, or what you’ve done so far has been ineffective, because the results speak for themselves.
More to the point: Are you sure, Senator, that most of the bacon you’ve brought home to your state has gone to promote and provide for the general welfare? Or has it perhaps gone to promote and provide for the welfare of your specific interests?
Considering the evidence, I’d be hard pressed to believe that Nevada has truly benefited from your power and influence.
Sharron Angle is right that you haven’t done enough for the economy in your state while you’ve been in the best position a Nevada Congressional representative has held for the first time ever.
If your leadership and influence in Washington, D.C., has been so great for Nevada, then why is it worse off now than it was three years ago when the housing market crashed and the recession hit? Frankly, it gives me reason to pause and question the kind of policies you’ve supported of late. Have these policies really encouraged and fostered a climate of strong economic growth, or have they merely feathered your nest and those of your most important campaign contributors?
I wonder.
I also wonder why, Senator, you of all people have so vehemently opposed nuclear waste in Nevada when there is evidence showing that nuclear waste can not only be recycled, but also provide efficient alternative, renewable energy and be a possible economic boon to your state? An entirely new industry is right here for the taking. The feds don’t want the waste, and either do the other states that send theirs to us. Why don’t we take advantage of that and develop it into a viable industry that will provide jobs, energy alternatives to consumers, and vital dollars to the state of Nevada?
Why not? Because your interests don’t want it here; that’s why not. As a result, you’ve turned your back on a possible solution to Nevada’s economic woes. You do nothing while an industrial boon just sits underneath a mountain collecting dust and half-lives.
Sharron Angle is right to question your efforts to help your state. Throwing money at the problem isn’t going to solve it. Rather, it’s like putting a bandage over a severed artery or ointment on a first-degree burn. All it does is cover up the problem temporarily until another bandage or more ointment is needed to relieve the bleeding and the pain.
What you ought to be doing, Sen. Reid, is promoting policies and proposing legislation that will foster economic growth in your state and create a climate that encourages entrepreneurs to not only make money, but to grow their ventures and invest in new ones. You should be supporting policies and proposing bills that encourage small businesses to stay in business, to grow, flourish and invest in their communities.
Instead, you support the President’s tax plan to increase income taxes on the wealthiest Americans earning $250,000 a year or more. Don’t you realize that a significant number of these so-called wealthiest Americans are also small business owners around the country and in Nevada?
All you’ve done so far is throw money at the problem. As soon as that money is spent, then what? What has happened to the Big Three automakers is a perfect example. They were bailed out twice in three months. And yet, in spite of all this government cash, two of the three have filed bankruptcy; the same two that clamored for a bailout in the first place.
Much of the stimulus money Nevada was due to receive it hasn’t got. Yet you are the Senate Majority Leader. I might have expected your state to be among the first to benefit.
Exactly what good has all of your power and influence done Nevada in the last three years?
To Sen. Harry Reid I’d like to say that you haven’t done near enough to help your state out of its economic doldrums, in spite of all the help you claim to have brought. I don’t see the evidence. All I see is more Nevadans out of work now than when the recession first began, and more foreclosures, loan defaults and bankruptcies than three years ago, too. Whatever money you’ve sent Nevada’s way, it hasn’t addressed the root problems. And frankly, no amount ever will. You have to stand up and be a statesman for your state, an advocate in the senate, before Congress and the President. Stop being a party stooge and a money launderer for your special interests. Stop trying to buy off your constituents with hush money and be the representative to them that you once were. Stop being a politician and start being a representative. The two are distinctly different: One requires a lot of back scratching and boot-licking, while the other requires simply that you be your own man instead of somebody else’s, and stand up on your own rather than with the aid of your party crutch.
To Sharron Angle: It isn’t enough to just attack Sen. Reid. Your party is just as responsible for America’s and Nevada’s economic mess as Reid’s party is. Are you prepared to vote for prosperity and economic growth? Are you prepared to propose bills and support policies that encourage private sector growth? Paying it lip service isn’t enough, either.
You must be prepared to act, and do differently than Harry Reid has done as of late. You must accept the responsibility of addressing jobs and the economy that the office of U.S. senator requires. No, creating jobs isn’t your job; but creating an atmosphere and a climate conducive to job creation is your job. Remember that.

The truth about freedom

What is freedom, and what does it mean?
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines freedom as “the absence of necessity, coercion, or constraint in choice or action…the power or condition of acting without compulsion.”
What this means to the average American living in freedom every day is being able to choose what you say or do without government restraint or compulsion to say or do something else.
America’s founding generation regarded essential liberty as being able to say or do what one wants, but choosing to do or say what one should instead. In other words, the founders believed in the freedom to choose right from wrong without having to be compelled to do right by government.
This is the Enlightenment principle of self-governance, or self-regulation, which establishes that when men are given the freedom to choose right from wrong, and they do so, then there is little need for laws that compel men to do what they ought to.
America’s founding generation believed so strongly that men were capable of making such choices freely that it set out to establish a new nation built upon an entirely new political system to prove it. Thus, what has been known for more than two centuries as the Great Experiment, the result of which was the establishment of a Constitutional Republic, the basis for which is trust in the individual to do the right thing.
Evidence of this is in the establishment of the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution, as the foundation of American society and government. These rights are grounded in the philosophical tenets of the Age of Enlightenment; specifically, the Fundamental Rights of Man as detailed and articulated in the writings of philosophers John Locke, Immanuel Kant and Thomas Hobbes, as well as authors Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson et al.
Jefferson penned perhaps the most profound expression of trust in the individual with these words from the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
How much trust does it take to guarantee a person life (to be and exist), liberty (the ability to choose) and the pursuit of happiness (to do whatever one wants)? Or, even more poignantly, to guarantee the right to keep and bear arms, thereby fully entrusting the individual with his own security and that of his neighbors?
A substantial sum, to be sure.
Yet, so strongly was the belief and conviction of Jefferson and many others of his time in individual trust and self-governance that they literally staked their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to establish a society that practiced such values.
Trust in the individual.
Such a notion seems as obscure today just as it was at the time of the American Revolution.
Once upon a time in America, trusting the individual to do the right thing was a concept both commonly believed and widely practiced. There was a time when Americans put more faith in God and in the private citizen than in government and legislation. There was once a time when confidence in the individual trumped confidence in government.
I fear those times are gone.
Maybe I’m wrong—and I hope that I am—but it seems to me that there is much less trust in the individual to do the right thing these days, and a greater trust in the government to keep the individual honest and in line with the law.
Meanwhile, American politicians pay lip service to freedom and liberty by defending choice and touting the Bill of Rights without really understanding or appreciating the very basis of those laws.
Elected officials will proclaim loudly their support of the First Amendment—and in particular the freedom speech—and then turn right around and pass yet another law telling us what we cannot do all in the name of the public good and to protect us from ourselves.
There appears to be a prevailing notion in America that freedom means doing and saying whatever one wants. Our politicians especially subscribe to this belief.
Why? Because each violation against somebody else grants them license to pass more laws for our own good.
Politicians encourage us to do whatever we want, because they know that many people will do so without consideration of others and despite any consequences. They understand human nature, which is to think and act impulsively. They recognize that many Americans will do whatever they want just because they can and liberty affords them this right. Political demagogues are counting on the fact that thousands of violations against others will occur in the name of freedom all because people can do whatever they want.
Each occasion we violate others with our freedom gives politicians an excuse to step in and say “this is wrong,” and “I’m going to propose a bill to fix it.”
In other words, more laws meant to keep you and me from governing and regulating ourselves.
This is why freedom is so fragile. It can be lost much more easily than it is gained. All that is required to lose essential liberty is to take it for granted and take advantage of freedom by doing whatever one wants, rather than consider others and do what one should.
Political leaders are more than willing to step in and govern us if we choose not to do it ourselves. All one has to do is look at the United States Code and the tens of thousands of laws that have been passed over the decades in an effort to keep the people honest and in line, because the government doesn’t trust the people to do the right thing.
Quite frankly, We The People haven’t really given our elected leaders much reason to trust us, either. Truth be told, we’ve done a very poor job of self-regulation over the years. Instead, we tend to give into our impulses just because we can and have the freedom to do so. Unfortunately, the choice to do wrong rather than right—doing what we want instead of what we ought—has resulted in myriad laws meant to protect us from ourselves because we are not trusted. We aren’t counted on any more to do the right thing. Rather, government is relied upon to do the right thing for us and to make sure we comply.
Current state laws banning cellular telephone use while driving serve as an example, an object lesson, of how our failure to do the right thing results in the loss of choice.
Politicians have consequently taken it upon themselves to propose and pass laws that prohibit us from using cell phones while driving, because the public must be protected from itself. The people cannot be trusted to do the right thing. Therefore, government must do it for them.
Well, we’ve only ourselves to blame for that. We abused the freedom to choose to do the right thing by doing the wrong thing simply because we had the liberty to do so. Consequently, the government has essentially taken away that choice by compelling us to do the right thing.
You see? True freedom and essential liberty are defined by the ability to freely choose without compulsion. When you choose to do the right thing, you put the power to govern and regulate into your hands, instead of in the hands of government. By doing what one should or ought to do, rather than what one can or wants to do, one takes power away from government and puts it into the hands of the individual.
Benjamin Franklin, a Founding Father, statesman, ambassador and inventor, said it best: “Those who would trade essential liberty for a little temporary security are deserving of neither liberty nor security.”
What he meant was that those who defer to the government what they could otherwise do for themselves do not deserve either the freedom to choose, or the security of government to choose for them.
He’s right. Americans don’t deserve essential liberty if they are willing to let the government tell them what they ought to do. They don’t deserve government security, either, because they aren’t disciplined enough or willing to act with personal restraint; that is, doing what they should.
Character Ian Malcolm, played by Jeff Goldblum, in the movie “Jurassic Park,” summed up essential liberty with this: “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.”
One of my all-time favorite movie lines.
Millions of Americans have become so preoccupied with whether or not they can do or say something that they have never stopped to think if they should do or say something. Consequently, government gets bigger and its oversight into our daily lives more invasive and expansive. More laws get passed every day under the guise of our own safety and for our own good.
What we don’t see is the harm this does to essential liberty and its impact on individual freedom. The impact of a single law alone may be so insignificant that most people wouldn’t even know it exists; but the impact of thousands of laws just like it can not only be felt, but also plainly seen.
When you chip away at a tree, one chip or shaving seems to make little difference. However, hundreds or thousands of shavings can mean the difference between a tree and a stump. If we look at all the laws passed for our own good, we might be shocked at just how different liberty looks after all the chips that have been taken to it over the years and the pile of shavings that is left are counted.
Just remember: Each new law passed for the public good is yet another shaving off the statue of essential liberty. Each one we allow reduces essential liberty that much more to an unrecognizable pile of shavings.
It is time to take a stand for essential liberty by taking control of our lives. Take back control of government and regulation by beginning again to regulate and govern ourselves. Preserve essential liberty and the choice to do right or wrong by practicing to do right more often. The more we can choose to do right, the less likely we will be compelled to do right.
And that, my friends, is what essential liberty is all about. Now go do the right thing. America’s future generations will thank you for that.

A summer like no other

The summer of 1776 must not have been much different from other summers gone and yet to come: Hot, muggy and miserable for those who had to work out in it. And in 1776 that included most people.
Like any other summer, that particular one 234 years ago was alive with fragrances in full bloom; the sounds of children playing in fields of wild flowers, and splashing about in creeks and ponds where it was cool; young animals frolicking in the fields; men and women toiling in their gardens and on their farms; and the happy songs of birds, crickets and frogs relishing in the summer solstice.
But as common as the summer of 1776 seemed at the time, little did the people living in it know that it would become the summer unlike any other in the history of the world.
For in June and July of 1776 a group of delegates making up the Second Continental Congress met in Philadelphia to form a new nation, conceived in individual liberty and political freedom. They spent days agonizing in the heat while struggling to come to an agreement of what to say to King George III, monarch of Great Britain and absolute ruler over the American colonies.
For the last several years, resistance to the British crown had been escalating because of political tyranny and inequality. From the Stamp Act to the Tea tax, angst and anger among the American colonies over the King's unfair treatment of his subjects in the New World was spreading. Colonists reacted to the King's proclamations with exclamations of their own, including the Boston Tea Party and the Boston Massacre.
In 1775, King George dispatched a legion of several thousand troops to the colonies in an effort to snuff out rebellion and discourage further spread of revolutionary fervor. The trouble is that he was too late. By the time the British army landed, colonists were waiting for them with baited breath. Night riders like the famed Paul Revere rode from town to town warning of the advance of the British army into the countryside. Militias of armed colonists met the British Red Coats at the crossroads of Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts.
Before the convention of the Second Continental Congress in late June 1776, the colonies had unofficially been in rebellion against Great Britain for over a year. The infamous yet inspiring Battle of Bunker Hill had already taken place and the Continental Army had been driven from Long Island, New York.
Colonial forces, led and commanded by Gen. George Washington, were already on the run when the delegates in Philadelphia met to come to an agreement on independence.
A young Virginia lawyer named Thomas Jefferson was in charge drafting a declaration that was to be sent to and read by King George himself.
The exact date of the signing of Jefferson's Declaration of Independence is uncertain, but we know that the convention of the Second Continental Congress was in session on July 4, 1776 and that a draft of the Declaration had been presented around or on that day.
Nonetheless, when Jefferson penned the final draft, it was presented to the delegation, which then, to the last man, signed it.
The very last words of the Declaration of Independence turned out to be its most poignant: "To these ends, we, the undersigned, pledge our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor."
That just about summed up what America's Founding Fathers stood for. They were prepared to shed their own blood, if necessary, to not only defend independence, but to see it come to fruition. They were prepared to give the last full measure of devotion for an idea that men are not only created free and equal under God, but also have a right to be free and equal.
I often wonder what the founders would think about American society today. What would they say about the growth and size of government over the last century? How would they feel about the role of government in our daily lives? Most importantly, what would they think of the tens of thousands of laws passed by Congress over the decades all in an effort to protect the American public from itself?
Would they approve, or perhaps be aghast at the gross violations of individual liberty being committed by government today and the apathy and complacency of the people to let it happen to them?
Benjamin Franklin once said, "Those who would trade essential liberty for a little temporary security are deserving of neither liberty nor security."
It seems that today's America has either forgotten or ignored those words. Nearly every law passed today is supposedly for our own good. But each law that is passed shaves and chips away a little bit of personal, individual liberty. So small is the change from each law that we scarcely notice it. But put all of those chips and shavings into a pile and we might become alarmed at just how much individual liberty has been lost over the years.
And why? Because people have misused and abused liberty for their own selfish purposes and gains. Their misconception of liberty being the freedom to do whatever one wants has led to abuses that have hurt others. Add to it that politicians see suffering as an opportunity for them to make changes and exert their power and authority. The result is a recipe for lost liberty and superficial freedom; that is, freedom that the government permits us, rather than authentic freedom that comes only from the grace of Almighty God.
This is not the freedom that the founders staked their lives, their fortunes or their sacred honor for. This is not the freedom that thousands of early colonists died to obtain during the American Revolution. This is not the freedom that hundreds of thousands more have perished to protect and defend over the centuries and decades.
America has lost her way. I fear that the sacrifices of our ancestors may have been in vain if we don't wake up, take gentle hold of precious liberty and cradle it as the fragile, priceless gift that it is; not the entitlement we have come to expect it to be.
I hope we all remember what the Fourth of July is really all about. Not fireworks, hot dogs, barbecues or parties. Not flags or colors or even patriotism.
The Fourth of July is really about the birth of an idea; an idea that changed the world for the better. An idea that has given hope to millions worldwide.
But like any other ideas, those of the America Revolution are not invincible. In fact, they are fragile. They die if we do not take care of them, love them, cherish them or hold them dear to our hearts.
May this Fourth of July, in the Year of Our Lord Two Thousand and Ten, be the one that spawns change in our hearts, our culture, our society and our government. Change that brings us back to where we should be and where individual liberty can flourish without being choked to death by laws, policies and regulations. May this be the year we decide as a people to live by the principles of the Declaration of Independence and the American Revolution; not just pay them lip service.
Those values were relevant then and they are relevant now. They are the values that promote and spawn individual initiative, invention, ingenuity, and greatness. They promote equality for all; not just a few. They support the pursuits of happiness for everyone; not just the privileged.
And these values were designed to keep government honest; something I think every one of us--liberal, conservative, progressive, moderate, right and left wing--can appreciate.
There are those among us who say that the values of the American Revolution, America's traditional values, are antiquated and outdated. They cannot be applied effectively in today's culture and society.
I say they can. People change. Values and principles do not. All it would take for the revolutionary principles to succeed again is for peoples' beliefs in them to change. When you believe in something, you will do what it takes to make it work.
The America of our founders can live again, if we will it to. The question is, do we have the courage and the fortitude to do what the delegates of the Second Continental Congress did 234 years ago? Are we willing to pledge our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor to an idea? If we are, then America's greatness will return. If not, she will sadly fade into obscurity.
I hope and pray that Americans haven't lost their will to fight for what they believe in. I cling to a hope and belief that the principles and values of the Revolution and the Declaration are not forgotten and are still loved.
This Fourth of July, make an effort to plant the seed of liberty into your heart, nurture it, cultivate it, and help it grow. Resolve to teach your children that liberty isn't free and it comes at a great price. But it is one worth paying, because it has done so many great things for people worldwide.
Be happy, be safe, but most of all, be free.