neil young | Rockin' On The Right Side

What are the top domestic problems in the USA? We can negotiate the order of importance, but I bet we agree on the list.

Rising Net Cost of Living
Border Enforcement
Availability and Cost of Health Care
Broken Families
Homelessness
Failing Schools
Increased Crime and Lax Law Enforcement

On his daily radio update, Bill O’Reilly offered a pretty simple and cost-effective solution to the problem list. Stop drug and alcohol addiction. It really made me think.

He listed the problems caused by addiction. The majority of homeless people, criminals, and child abusers are addicts. Half of unemployed men are addicted to opioids. The economic cost of accidents, mistakes and absenteeism attributable to addiction is gargantuan. Businesses can’t find workers. Medical facilities are overrun with sick addicts who can’t pay for their care. Kids with horrible home lives due to addicted parents have little chance to become successful adults. Street crime is way up and most of it is perpetrated by addicts. Families are destroyed by booze and drugs.

O’Reilly reported that ever since we started viewing drug use as a victimless crime, and addiction as an illness, our drug problem has worsened. Now with lax law enforcement and a wide-open border, it is out of control.

Clearly, many of our domestic problems would be solved, or at least greatly improved, if we had a way to stop addiction. But that’s impossible, isn’t it?

Not according to O’Reilly. He said after WWII when the Chinese communists made the use and sale of opium illegal and in some cases punishable by death, addiction was reduced from 25% to virtually zero. And he points out that Singapore’s zero-tolerance policies toward drugs has made that nation nearly drug-free. This proves that drug addiction is not an illness, but a problem that can be solved by policy and enforcement.

Many Americans blame our open border, the “supply”, for the drug epidemic. Obviously an open border along with no consequences for selling and using drugs is a recipe for disaster. But what if we were to attack the “demand” side of the equation?

O’Reilly calls for a law that requires apprehension and “confined rehabilitation” for illegal drug use in the US. The deterrence effect would be dramatic. With no drug cartels extorting wannabe immigrants and smuggling fentanyl and other nasty stuff into our country, the border would become pretty manageable. And with drug overdoses and other drug-related illnesses down, some medical facilities could be converted to rehab lockups. Reduced crime would have a lot of benefits. Whole departments, like the DEA, TSA, ATF and others could be eliminated or merged, largely replaced by a drug enforcement and rehab agency with some real teeth.

Hmmm, a healthier, safer, more productive country and (bonus) a leaner, more functional federal government – Bill O’Reilly, I think you are on to something.

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

I caught you knockin’ at my cellar door
I love you baby, can I have some more?
Oh, the damage done
I hit the city and I lost my band
I watched the needle take another man
Gone, gone, the damage done

The Needle and the Damage Done – Neil Young

President Trump’s State of the Union speech included a lengthy “to-do” list: infrastructure improvements, workforce development, secure borders and immigration reform, strengthened military, and much more.

One of President Trump’s “to-do” items grabbed my attention, although I have not seen it mentioned anywhere in the press. Half-way through his epic speech, he said:

All Americans deserve accountability and respect — and that’s what we are giving them. So tonight I call on Congress to empower every cabinet secretary with the authority to reward good workers — and to remove federal employees who undermine the public trust or fail the American People.

I have long pressed for accountability from government employees. We all know that as the cost of government continues to spiral out of sight, resulting in a $21 trillion debt (and climbing), performance continues to decline. The federal government hires more and more employees, at ever high wages and benefits that far eclipse comparable jobs in the private sector, with no improvement in results. Any work done by the federal government will take much longer and cost much more than the same work done outside the Beltway.

The problem is clear, it is huge, and it is easy to solve: we must eliminate the destructive influence of federal government employee unions.

No business or private organization could survive in an environment where managers can not fire or discipline their employees. And what employer could afford hiring three people for every job just to get the base amount of work done due to minimum five-week vacations, 21+ days of paid sick leave whether used or not, 12 or more holidays, personal leave, six hour (or less) work days, long lunches, protesting time, travel to exotic locales for meetings, “she’s away from her desk” time, etc. Government employees are virtually guaranteed over-market salaries, regular raises, bonuses, Cadillac benefits and lifetime employment regardless of performance. And in many cases the service level to the taxpayers who pay the salaries is disgraceful – witness the abuse of Western landowners at the hands of federal agencies and veterans who die waiting for care at VA hospitals.

Worse yet, the cozy union/Democrat alliance is quid-pro-quo corruption at its worst. Unions collect gargantuan sums of money to be fed directly to the Democrat party, and federal workers vote overwhelmingly for Democrats, who repay the favor to their benefactors. It’s so easy to be generous with somebody else’s money.

Of course there are federal government employees who earn their keep, especially in the armed forces and security agencies. But there are also buildings all across the nation overstuffed with un- or under-productive federal employees and officials who won’t or can’t address the outrageous waste. Meanwhile, competent and cost-effective individuals and companies who could do the work of the people efficiently can’t break through the bureaucracy.

Now is the time to eliminate the federal government employee unions once and for all. I call on Congress and the President to relieve this festering sore on the behind of the taxpayers. Rep. Ralph Norman (R-SC) gets it. He told me, “This could be part of federal right-to-work legislation.”

We are tired of being told that federal spending can’t be cut because it’s just too huge to even bother trying. We demand that our legislators do their jobs, which are setting and administering budgets, appropriating funds, and overseeing agency and department heads. OMB Director Mick Mulvaney and Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta must step up. The taxpayers will hold you all accountable as you must hold your federal bureaucrats accountable for efficacious results.

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side