This Is How To Save The Country

We spent a lot of time over the years on this radio show podcast, you name it, talking about red tape and regulations and holding the country back. There was a great line in the movie, Bronx Tale, Robert De Niro’s character, that the saddest thing in life is wasted talent. And that’s what we’re doing in this country at this point in time. We’re wasting our talent, we’re wasting our ability. Lawrence Reed from the Foundation of Economic Education had a pretty great analysis several years ago about what happened to Rome. And he calls it the three most stubborn lessons of history. No people who lost their character kept their liberties. Power that is shackled and dispersed is preferable to power that is unrestrained and centralized. The here and now is rarely as important as tomorrow. And he also explains, and this is something that our founders understood clearly, that character embodies the trait of virtue. In Latin, the word vertus meaning courageous honesty. This trait was the end all, be all of Roman society. Other traits of character that were stressed in early Rome were gravitas, which is dignity, benedicta, which is goodwill, pietas, which is loyalty and a sense of duty, and simplitas, which is candor. The connection between character and liberty is a powerful thing. Liberty, by which I mean rule of law, respect for and protection of the lives, rights, property. and contracts of others is the only social arrangement that requires character. No other system, especially socialism, asks much of you other than what? Keep quiet, pay your taxes, and you know when the state tells you to go get yourself killed in some war you go ahead and you do so. The absence of character produces what? Chaos and tyranny. Its presence makes liberty. possible. Rome rose from nothing and sustained itself as a great entity for centuries because of its strong character. Now, Rome transformed from a republic to an empire through the process of erosion. Now this is going to sound a little familiar, people. The welfare state that was instituted little by little by individuals craving power ate away. at the vertus of the Roman people. Slowly but surely, a self-reliant people abandoned responsibility, discipline, and property rights. They turned to government to solve their problems. What’s in it for me? What am I entitled to? These are questions asked today by vast numbers of Americans. Or again, it’s nothing more than echoes of the past. Politics of Rome, also very familiar tune. They were incredible. sums of money spent to get oneself elected, taxes being raised in the aftermath to pray for all the grandiose promises made to all of these self-centered, you know, the self-centered populace that was out there looking out for themselves. The emperors of Rome built their power on entitlements the same way that our politicians do today. Now, when Rome was founded, they understood that concentrated power was very dangerous. They originally split the top position of power between two individuals called councils. The one was a check upon the other and neither could serve more than, wait for it, one year. That’s it, talk about term limits, one year. The legislature was composed of the Senate and assemblies of elected representatives. These checks and balances dissipated. over time because the cities and provinces of Rome lost their power and independence to the central government after demanding money to get them out of difficult situations. Again, something our states have done as well. The Roman historian Tacitus wrote that freedom was undermined when the focus of Roman legislation changed from the security and good of all to the satisfaction of particular individuals and interest groups. Again, sound vaguely familiar. Bills were passed, not only for national objects but for individual cases, and laws were most numerous when the Commonwealth was most corrupt. Fascinating. Romo also decided that they too needed to be policemen for the world, going from one quagmire to another. Wars are not cheap. as we are all well aware, and those costs to an ever-expanding welfare state, and you get a big fat bill with not enough people to pay taxes to pay for it all. The early Romans as well also understood the need and importance to plan for the future. The concept of devlaid gratification was understood and ever-present in their lives. Rome drifted, as we have drifted, to a point where all that matters is the here and now. Don’t worry about the cost or future ramifications. Uh, no, don’t worry about that. Somebody else is going to pay the bill. Somebody else is going to clean up the mess later on. Anyway, um, again, we have to admit that we have a problem. That’s, that’s half the battle. Um, we got to fix the problem as well. And again, I’ve written about this column I did years ago, uh, entitled wasted talent. I cite simple things. So a few simple things. that we could do as a nation to get us back on track. Simplify the tax code. No more loopholes, handouts, and giveaways. How about this? Balance budget amendment. Pretty straightforward. Don’t spend more than you’re taking in. Reform the regulatory process. No more judge, jury, and executioner from the various acronym agencies from the executive branch. Legislating should come from Congress. Simplicity is the key. Less is more when it comes to rulemaking. We need to make the United States user friendly again. Term limits, not just termed out of office, termed out of Washington. Individual should not be allowed to work any more than eight years in total as an elected official. I do believe that. Eight years is enough. Should be forbidden to work in any capacity as a lobbyist after serving for public office. We need to break up monopolies, real monopolies, not the nonsense that Lena Kahn and the FTC are doing today. Banking and media, banking and media. And we need to help allow small businesses to thrive once again. There was actually a Saturday Night Live skit that aired once, aired once. You don’t even see it on the reruns. It was called Mediopoly, where it was basically making fun of how all the media networks and what they own and the… information that they push out on us. Anyway, establish a non-interventionist foreign policy doctrine. Again, we’ve been in nearly perpetual war for, I can’t even, I can’t remember when we weren’t. Perpetual, yeah, those few years Donald Trump was president, but pretty much perpetual war decade after decade. Free trade, free trade when the playing field is level. Again, that’s important. Immigration reform. We want, people to become Americans, we need immigrants. It’s just the reality of the situation. We’re not doing a very good job assimilating people into our society and that vulcanizes the country. We know how to do this. We’ve been doing this for generations, okay? Centuries, if you will, okay? We can do this. No more subsidies. I’m sick and tired of paying for other people’s electric cars. The government should be forbidden from diverting taxpayer money to any private… Again, this is the exact opposite of what the folks in Washington, D.C. want to do. They want more of an industrial policy. We’ve talked about this. Not a good deal. No special tax deal should be given to any private concern on the federal or local level. Everyone should be, as our Declaration of Independence espouses, to be equal under the law. Number 10, entitlement reform. Again, basic algebra. Got two leading candidates for the presidency that do not believe that there’s a problem. They’re la la, Social Security keeps talking, but I’m not listening. No, they don’t even wanna deal with the problem. Both Social Security and Medicare are unsustainable. Again, need to rethink the entire concept of retirement and what it means to generations of people that are gonna be living longer and healthier lives. Welfare reform. Welfare, I’ve discussed welfare as being our nation’s, one of our nation’s number one, I guess you wanna call it our number one drug problem. Too many people that have been addicted to this way of life and we need to break the cycle. Great society programs by every metric have been an absolute failure. Children at risk of becoming part of this cycle need to be attending institutions that provide them what they’re not getting in the home. What, some of those Roman things, right? Vertis, Gravitas, Bebontia, Pietas, and Simplitas. Get out of healthcare, housing, and college education. As soon as the government gets involved, the costs go up. Bring the open and free market to these industries and the products and services will be priced according to what the market will bear. Now, we have all of this talent and potential, and guess what? We’re letting it slip. Slip, it’s 12 items I cite there. Difficult, they difficult to achieve. It’s not like putting a man on the moon the first time. I mean, these are simple things that we could do to get ourselves back on track. Watchdog on wallstreet.com.