Special Interests
So, we all hear about how special interests are controlling our government. You know - BIG OIL - PHARMACEUTICALS - ETC...
(Tee hee hee - I just realized the word "harm" is in pharmaceuticals...)
In any political discussion, you will hear about some industry that represents their interest through bribery or lobbying to glean special favors through the coercion of government.
Well, don't get me started today on the role of government in the business world - I am sure that is a different Thought of the Walk.
No, no - What I wondered yesterday was this:
(Tee hee hee - I just realized the word "harm" is in pharmaceuticals...)
In any political discussion, you will hear about some industry that represents their interest through bribery or lobbying to glean special favors through the coercion of government.
Well, don't get me started today on the role of government in the business world - I am sure that is a different Thought of the Walk.
No, no - What I wondered yesterday was this:
- Why don't these same people get outraged when the specials interest of an ever growing government are preserved at the cost of its citizens? You do not hear complaints about "GOVERNMENT MONOPOLY INTERESTS."
- Why don't people RAGE about the teacher's unions becoming so intertwined with the government that they not only do not help children learn, they also do not HELP TEACHERS TEACH?
If you get pissed off about special interests of BIG OIL being represented, then you should be outraged when the GOVERNMENT MONOPOLY keeps you from getting decent internet service, or worse, causes a mother and child to be separated because of national origins.
On no particular schedule, I take a walk. Each time this happens, I have a thought. This is Nicole Sauce's Thought of the Walk.
Actually you can blame special interests, a corrupt F.C.C. and deregulation for poor Internet service.
Since when was any union been about anything other than protecting it's members interests?
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Actually, municipal governments that choose single service providers to offer service over their telephone lines or cable lines (and require the companies to invest in public infrastructures that have nothing to do with wires as a bribe) keep out competitive forces that would improve internet. When I have lived in markets with competition, even COMCAST has been both stable and fast. Think of this - COMCAST. Regarding forced labor unions - they exist to protect the power of the union, just as the FCC exists to protect the power it wields. Teachers unions are an excellent example - for instance, some collectively bargain to require districts to buy health insurance for the teachers from the Union. The health insurance becomes a union profit center. You end up with astronomically high monthly health insurance costs for teachers to get mediocre health benefits. Welcome to the teacher's union mafia... and just try to be a public school teacher who does not join the union - egads!
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Ok, so from place to place you'll have varying experiences with regards to Internet. I would argue that choosing a single provider should be illegal. Obviously sometimes local government is part of the problem. Thanks to deregulation, phone companies aren't inclined to compete with each other even where they can expand into each other's coverage zones in a given city. So, very little fiber optic penetration.
Thanks to the F.C.C., which wouldn't want to force any company to actually improve service for customers, broadband in our country is measured by counting any region with a single broadband user as having broadband coverage. So, though we actually have one of the worst broadband penetrations in the modern world we proudly proclaim we have excellent broadband coverage. No problem here, move along move along.
Unions, like any body, may be ruined or corrupted by misguided or evil people, but that doesn't mean they can't or don't provide value that doesn't harm the public at large.
Would you argue that it would be better that teachers' union not require insurance coverage for their members? Is the union health insurance actually any worse than private insurance which "exist to protect the [money]" they have taken from their insured? Lest we forget private insurance in this country is grossly inefficient, seeks to avoid paying claims at all costs and spends more on executive salary and advertising than claims.
As for being a non-union worker in a unionized field I'm not sure what the compelling argument would be unless they received a guarantee of better pay and benefits. In which case why weren't all of the other unionized workers offered that.
Seemingly you would argue that we would be better off without unions and government regulations.
If you'd like an example of the Utopian life without government interference take a healthy look at the financial meltdown going on now and the corrupt and irresponsible antics of the Bush administration for the past seven years and you have a pretty accurate picture.
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Did you just use the Bush Administration, responsible for the single largest growth in US government spending in history, as an example of limited government? This makes no sense.
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I didn't realize we were talking about government spending. The overall increase in spending can be squarely blamed on the Iraq war, which can be traced to the bulldozing that the Bush administration has performed on the checks and balances of executive power and their general policy of malfeasance. I was talking about government regulation. The Bush administration has systematically crippled, politicized, corrupted or otherwise destroyed regulatory agencies on an unprecedented scale. Not the least of which was fostering the unregulated mess that lead directly to the current financial crisis.
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In other words, it's almost like we don't have any federal regulation at all.
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There is regulation everywhere you turn, including in financial industries. At some point, people who borrow too much must shoulder part of the subprime crash. Investors who take too much risk and lose client's wealth must also shoulder this responsibility. That's not the government's job.
Under the Bush administration you have become less free - take a jaunt to the airport with a bottle of wine.
You have just proven my point: If you have ever-increasing regulation, as we do in the US, eventually some crazy mother f-ing regime will come into power, and you're not gonna like what they do.
Better to keep their fingers out of it.
FCC is another example, like when they expend resources to investigate wardrobe malfunctions. Or do you like it when the Republicans control the definition of "public decency.?"
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Anonymous wrote:
"I didn't realize we were talking about government spending."
I believe the original topic of discussion was the difference in people's reactions to the behavior of special interest groups or 'big business' vs. their reactions to the same or similar behaviors by our government...
I think most people find it easy to demonize big business, the evil tobacco companies that are trying to kill us and the greedy oil companies that are taking our money and the corrupt auto manufacturers who are in league with big oil etc etc.
But for some reason those same folks (myself included most of the time) look at that same 'evil' behavior by our government as just a normal part of life... like bad weather.
Sure, you might gripe about it, but that's about it. Trying to change it is just a frustrating waste of time and money, neither of which do they have to spare.
I think for the vast majority of people, politics and government are like sausage, you don't want to look at it too closely and the less you know the easier it is on your stomach.
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Don't you know, Nicole: Government is completely benevolent and it's decisions can never be made for anything but the people's best interests. That and the "fact" that the teachers' unions are just trying to get more money for teachers--all of whom are, of course, quality instructors--and never anything for their bosses.
Perish the thought.
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That sentiment, even in jest, is as ignorant and wrong as the assertion that all bodies which hold power are inherently corrupt.
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