When a consumer goes to the store to buy a particular item, he will usually consider the features of that item. Once he decides on the desired features, however, the savvy consumer will usually select the least expensive among the comparable items. A few consumers may pay more for “perceived” better quality. A few consumers may pay more out of brand loyalty. A few consumers may pay more for better service. But…all things being equal, who would pay more and expect nothing more in return?
Businesses often operate in a similar way. Conscious of the bottom line and a competitive market, businesses will seek to reduce the production costs of their product. Using cheaper parts or cheaper labor often means either, a better profit margin or a bigger market share…as long as quality doesn’t suffer significantly. So, of course, businesses will resort to using illegal aliens or cheap foreign labor if that option presents itself. And, of course, they will buy parts from a foreign manufacturer if they can meet the specs. If they don’t, then they fall behind their competitors who are finding a cheaper way to produce their goods.
We see a similar thing happen with respect to entitlement programs and other social services. We are all forced to pay various taxes – income taxes, social security taxes, etc. – but almost no one pays more than they have to. And, if there’s a government benefit available to us, we tend to accept that benefit. To not take advantage of those benefits would mean losing money (as compared to our fellow citizens). If you’re eligible for food stamps, not accepting those food stamps would just be money lost to you.
This tendency to take advantage of benefits also happens at the corporate level (…to the Nth degree). You can hardly blame a company for taking full advantage of any government hand-out or bail-out or tax break that’s available to them. If they refuse, then they are put at an economic disadvantage (as compared to their competitors). How long will any business survive if they constantly have significantly higher costs than their competitors?
I’ve said all of this to help explain that local/state/national politics offers a similarly insidious problem. All individuals and corporations in each city and state are taxed by the federal government. That money is taken out of the local economies and sent to Washington. If we are “lucky”, Washington may send some portion of that money back into our city or state…with strings attached, of course. Those strings impose federal rule upon those “free” cities and states in matters that the federal government would otherwise have no right to dictate.
And yet…the city or state will accept the federal money (which is really their own money) and accept the federal restrictions (which the federal government has no right to impose) because failure to do so would result in a drain on their economy and put them at a disadvantage as compared to their neighboring cities and states. This would, over time, result in an impoverishment of that city or state…
It is, politically, very difficult for a city or state to refuse this federal tyranny because such refusal would also mean accepting an on-going economic drain which would ripple through the city or state, depressing business revenues, raising unemployment, lowering home values, and so on.
The more serious problem with this relatively new strategy for imposing federal tyranny is that it is all blatantly unconstitutional! Article 1, Sections 8 and 9 lay out the general principles involved.
From §8:
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises… but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States…
From §9:
No Capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, unless in Proportion to the Census or enumeration herein before directed to be taken. (Note: This paragraph was altered by the 16th Amendment.)
No Tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from any State.
No Preference shall be given by any Regulation of Commerce or Revenue to the Ports of one State over those of another; nor shall Vessels bound to, or from, one State, be obliged to enter, clear, or pay Duties in another.
The Principle:
The principle at work, here, is the idea of fairness and equality…not showing any favoritism toward some states at the expense of others, whether in the method of taxation, or in the allotment of funding, or in the regulation of businesses or industry.
And yet, this very tyranny and favoritism has become the way Washington works. we saw it a generation ago with the imposition of a so-called “national 55mph speed limit”. Now, we constantly see it in the blackmailing of cities and states to accept federal control in other areas in order to receive back their own money, confiscated through over-taxation. We see it in federal education funding and other similar spending which are clearly states rights issues. We see it in the added taxes paid for oil being piped from Alaska. We see it in the way the government “picks winners and losers” as with Solyndra-type scandals.
All of these common practices violate basic Constitutional principles and every Congressman, Senator, and President who engages in such practices should be rightly labeled as a subversive and a traitor to our country. Is that extreme? …Radical? …Harsh? Maybe it’s high time for extreme, radical, and harsh in the reclaiming of our nation from a ruling elite that has violated its sacred oath to uphold our Constitution. If we are unwilling to be extreme, radical, and harsh in defense of our Constitution, then we are nothing more than “just another Democracy” on the road to tyranny…and oblivion.
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