Tag Archives: public sector

Feb 8 2019

The First Against the First: Behold, Ignorance

 

As fundamental as it may seem to our Republic, the ideals protected by the First Amendment are a topic of much confusion. The when, where, why, and how of Free Speech has become more about political leverage than the protection of a Natural Born Right. The blurred lines of defense, perhaps by intent, is a study in ignorance shocking to behold.

There is a line of transition between the public sector and private sector. All speech, devoid of physical violence, is protected by the First in the public arena. Still, private entities have the right to curtail speech, which violate the charters, statements of faith, and rules which govern them.

Through ignorance, we have now turned the protections of Free Speech on its head. Powerful forces on the Left, under the guise of tolerance, are steadily pushing to eliminate free speech in the public space. Some on the Right, in their zeal to defend the tenets of the Constitution, have challenged the rights of private entities to curtail speech, unwittingly opening the doors for the Left to attack private groups.

Private groups have the right to hold to beliefs or rules that guide or govern them. Some groups that have purposed to be apolitical have laws that govern such. It is not a violation of the First for those groups to prohibit certain speech which violates their charters or statements of faith; in fact, the First protects their right to do so.

Not only does the First Amendment hold the right of expression for the individual supreme in public, it also affords the right of private individuals and groups to protect their standards and beliefs. The Left is working to remove all protections of Free Speech. Through ignorance, the Right is helping them.

Oct 16 2017

The Red County Caucus Issues Statement on Tax Reform

 

 

Tax Reform

As Congress debates the way forward to reform the burdensome tax code, The Red County Caucus offers some common sense parameters for effective tax reform. Most can agree that this Nation is in desperate need of tax relief but the process and implementation often get lost to the web of special interests, D.C. Power brokers, and entrenched bureaucracy. The Nation can no longer afford to wait as Washington wallows in it’s stagnation and We The People demand true and effective reform now.

The business capital of the United States continues to shrink while the size of the government continues to grow. This alarming trend is unsustainable and must be reversed. History shows that our economy functions best when the free market is strengthened and the effect of government intrusion is weakened.

To that point, Tax Reform must provide relief to all taxpayers. It is important that tax cuts have a liberating effect on the economies of every tax bracket. Every hard working American must realize more of their own income in their own pocket which in turn will loosen restricted budgets energizing local economies.

A sound tax policy must encourage business investment which is the life blood of economic growth. The anti-business policies of the past administration must be rejected for a pro-growth, pro-business tax code which gives incentive for investment in both small and large business. This will create real private sector jobs.

The balance of economic power must be shifted back to the private sector. This can only be accomplished by offsetting the tax cuts with cuts to the size of government. We must shrink the size of government.

This is accomplished through cuts to discretionary spending, meaningful reductions and cuts to the federal bureaucracy. Federal procurement procedures must be audited and true reforms implemented. An effective restructure to the entitlements must be addressed, which will focus and target the truly needy by establishing common sense parameters on cost and qualification.

The government with the least amount of functions, functions best. A simplified tax code is the best solution. As those in Washington argue the whys and wherefores of true reform and government’s place in our society, it would do our representatives well to remember the old adage: Less is More.

Aug 9 2013

Redunculous

 

No, it is not a spelling error…really.  And, no, it’s not a word… yet.  It’s just one of my specialty.  A word coined to help find the appropriate emotion to attach to a situation.  This, the latest of my installments to the Webster’s dictionary, is the combination of the words redundant and ridiculous. I did this all by myself.  For some reason, Webster keeps sending back my offerings of literary coinage and asked that I please stop, as it has caused the great patriarch of the book, Noah Webster himself, to turn incessantly in his grave.  I guess that would be rather unsettling.

But I like the word.  It has an essence to it, the essence of economy.  Oh yes, I economized.  We all have to nowadays.  I took the two most prevalent manifestations of the liberal mind, redundant and ridiculous behavior. I combined them into one word and, now, I can respond to them both at once.  I….I….feel so focused.

And quite timely, I might add, because we have had a slew of redunculous behavior swirling around the State of Maine.  We just had the Senate President, Justin Alfond, make a speech assuring State workers an increase in the pensions and wages, while the those in private sector, who pay for those wages and pensions with their taxes, can barely put food on the table for their families.  This was a follow up to his speech attacking private schools.  The Senate President doesn’t seem to be fond of the private sector.

Mr. Alfond suffers from the liberal illusion that Maine people have an unlimited supply of revenue and that we work at our jobs simply to give it to him to disperse amongst his government allies.  I have to agree with the great conservative apologist Thomas Sowell who asked, “…why it is ‘greed’ to want to keep the money you have earned but not greed to want to take someone else’s money.”  Alas, I fear Alfond and his allies think its good policy; that is, if you look at the budget they passed. Tax increases to pay for those government employee raises.

Strange, Maine is looking at a $58 million surplus for the closing fiscal year, before these tax increases.  So, why, Mr. Alfond, would you want to increase taxes on a struggling economy when you don’t need to?  Oh, is that my “greedy” old self, wanting to keep my money in my wallet for my family to use.  I’m just so greedy that way.

That leads me to another issue to be resolved.  Recently, I criticized those activists, who seem bent on telling people what to do in their own backyards.  I feel very strongly about the sanctity and privacy of a person’s private lands.  I have been rebuked by some of those activists, saying that if I don’t want anyone to tell me what to do in my backyard then I shouldn’t criticize public government officials.

Let me try to help and clarify the issue.  There is a huge difference between private and public issues.  I do not criticize any official on what he does in his private home and on his private lands.  I have, and will continue to do so, criticized public officials on the actions or inactions in the public tax funded sector.  It is the taxpayer’s job, since our dollars fund their public decisions, to critique the exercise of their representative duties.

Secondly, I have been admonished that, because I am a Christian, I should not publicly criticize or rebuke public officials.  This individual obviously did not read the story of Jesus cleansing the Temple, nor has he read the accounts of Paul the Apostle rebuking Roman leaders to their very face, also of rebuking Peter to his face.  The idea that I should abdicate my God-given liberties for the sake of some contrived sense of propriety and allow myself to be relegated to the doormat of society as a reflection of my faith has no intellectual, Constitutional or, for that matter, Biblical merit.  The very conception of such an idea is utterly and unequivocally redunculous.