Trackbacks

• No trackbacks exist for this post.

Comments

• 12/7/2011 7:23 PM Mark wrote:
  What I don't understand in many, many posts is the tone that would suggest that the government just doesn't understand that this regulation is crushing the small business. They understand and have understood for decades!
  
  These leaders are not whittling away at our freedoms and riches with misguided good intentions. If that ever were true, we're far, far past the point of the initial discovery that they are causing harm. At this point, it's intentional and it would seem to me, with a defined purpose in mind.
  Reply to this
• 12/8/2011 8:44 AM GJ wrote:
  So, is it your belief that it is a "defined purpose" on the part SOCIALISTS, BIG BUSINESS, or OTHER (some other entity)?
  Reply to this
  1. 12/9/2011 7:03 AM Cultural Offering wrote:
     Depends on what "it" is.  My belief is that government - any government - will naturally tends drift toward two things: money and power.  Kept unchecked, government will grow in its consumption of both.  Unfortunately, this tendency naturally displaces the private economy and at some point the private economy cannot sustain it.  If my benefits all come from the government, who pays for them?
     
     The current administration has taken power in ways that have created great uncertainty in the private economy - health care reform is but one example as is TARP and the evolving mission carried out under TARP.  When government does this, the private sector won't take risks they might otherwise take.  Capital sits out and waits for a better time to be deployed.  I believe very firmly that the current administration believes it can do everything better than the private sector if only it had enough money.  The fatal conceit.
     
     Reply to this
     1. 12/9/2011 1:22 PM GJ wrote:
        I may have clicked the wrong Reply button. Sorry. I follow your reasoning, Kurt.
        
        I was focused on the final sentence by Mark, and I meant to ask, to-wit: Who was it that he believes is intentionally, with actual and defined purpose, crushing small business?
        
        I offered up two specific alternative culprits and then 'other'. Socialists logically probably wouldn't primarily attack smaller, street level commerce as a greater priority rather than crushing big business, I suppose. (The seeds of small business are organic in perhaps any Western populace-- a tough target.) Big business, however, routinely crushes smaller, street level commerce. And, big business routinely uses $$$$$$$s as speech ‘in satchels’ in D.C. and in the media to get ‘us’ to ‘hear’ them, creating for us many of the conditions which they prefer. Then, there could be “other” with purpose yet to be known.
        
        Anyway, that was my intended question. I was just curious.
        
        Just as a side note (perhaps of limited relevance to my question above, perhaps not), I almost never hear big business plead its case (usually using $$$$$$$s, see above) in the marketplace of political discourse unless it clothes what IT wants in loud complaints about small business conditions at street level. It gets them way more traction with the public (me included). We readily identify with that pitch, and rightly so. We sometimes can be mobilized or de-mobilized on big business’ behalf in this way.
        
        (I say, one of the very few really great uses for your TV is for analyzing the ads-- doubly so for political messages in ads. I see almost no real use in trying to get news from TV, because it is always primarily aimed at increasing ratings for the sole purpose of profit. That is what drives the content of what you see, not truth or news. Even the networks that are on the Right and the Left all have those points of view as secondary goals which WILL be bent and further twisted for a buck. The ads, though, can be scrutinized, and if you do, THAT’S education! I digress….)
        Reply to this
        1. 12/9/2011 3:00 PM Cultural Offering wrote:
           I'm not a big conspiracy theory guy to take nothing away from Mark's comments.  I have had some small experience in politics at the local and national level.  It is tough enough to get people to agree on wall colors let alone rigging the government but I do believe there is a natural tendency for government to grow and there are some strange people out there who don't understand that eventually we could run out of money.
           
           I agree that big business is often just as bad as government, especially when they lobby ($$$$) for regulations that increase barriers to market entry for small business.  Happens all the time.
           
           Kurt
           
           Reply to this
           1. 12/9/2011 3:31 PM GJ wrote:
              Hey, you only used four $$$$s! It's always at least seven $$$$$$$s, or they don't suit up anymore...heh-heh-heh. And, you can't even get a college coach for that anymore.
              Reply to this
• 12/9/2011 10:36 AM David wrote:
  Well said. Here are a couple of pertinent quotes that might help bring the money and power issues into perspective. First, money:
  
  "If you knew economic growth and new job creation begin to slow when total government spending is larger than about 25 percent of the economy, and you knew total government spending in the United States is about 36 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), would you propose policies to make government larger or smaller to create more jobs and boost economic growth?
  "Over the last few decades, many economists have done studies on the 'optimum' size of government. A new study just completed shows the optimum size of government is less than 25 percent of GDP.
  "Optimum is defined as that point just before government becomes so large as to reduce the rate of economic growth and job creation. Governments are created to protect people and property. A government too small to establish the rule of law and protect people and their property from both foreign and domestic enemies is less than optimal." –Richard Rahn, “The Optimum Government,” Washington Times (Jan. 29, 2009)
  
  Next, power:
  
  "If a sports league set up a permanent office with a number of lawyers to write new regulations for its particular game (basketball, for instance), what do you think would happen after a few years? The lawyer-regulators would know that if they stopped writing new regulations, whether needed or not, they would be out of a job. Over time, the regulations would grow in both number and complexity, and the players would have a more and more difficult time understanding what the rules were and would increasingly, though unintentionally, run afoul of them. The fans also would no longer understand all the rules and probably would begin to lose interest in the game. Finally, the game would die under the weight of all the new regulations." –Richard Rahn, “Costs Without Benefits,” Washington Times (June 15, 2010)
  Reply to this
• 12/10/2011 1:14 PM Mark wrote:
  Who is "It"?
  
  I got my first lesson in it when I was in the Army. We were tasked with driving armored carriers in a big circle for days. Literally days. I had to risk the penalties of questioning orders and I asked our Captain why. He said in confidentiality that we were trying to break the vehicles. We hadn't broke them enough to meet last years costs, so we needed to spend enough on repairs this year or they'd cut the budget for next year.
  
  How many times have you heard similar stories about govt.? Every part of it operates this way. Even welfare is designed to keep churning dependency. It? It's the government that facilitates it and the businesses that profit from it. It is a greedy monster. A big greedy, power and money hungry monster that feeds on the labors of hard working people.
  
  Nobody wants to believe the truth of the matter. Anybody who speaks against it is immediately labeled in some way. Look at the first question here. "SOCIALISTS, BIG BUSINESS, or OTHER (some other entity)". We know where this tired assumption is heading. Are you right-wing extremist that would dare call the govt. Socialist? Are you a leftist that claims big business is the root of all evil? Or - are you a conspiracy theorist that thinks the snake people from Center Earth are shaking things up. On the ready, we've got a lengthy argument to make you look foolish and prove you wrong.
  
  I'm not any of these things. I'm a person that notices that nearly every small business will face extreme government opposition if they are clearing a profit. They'll face high taxes and heavy regulation. There is relief for some though! Grants! Follow the rules of a grant and the government will grant you with funds to overcome your problems and your competition. Handy. "It" is picking and choosing who can succeed and who cannot. Competition is negated when some get free money and are passed over by regulators and others are not.
  
  Look at how taxes control us too. We're cranking out trillions of dollars of debt for undeclared war, grants, "stimulus", welfare, extended unemployment, etc. The government doesn't need our tax money to operate. If they did, how could they create these trillions?
  
  Who is in control? If we knew that would be easy wouldn't it? It's certainly not who were told it is. A struggle between two parties? Ha! Name one thing the Obama administration is doing that is nothing more than a continuation of the Bush administration. Healthcare? Bush started many federal programs. War? Obama continues down the exact same path and then some. Confiscation of Constitutional freedoms? Obama continues with The Patriot Act that was actually written by Joe Biden in 1995.
  
  Who is "It"? I don't know. Who's enjoying the profits? Who planned our current situation? Who's been compliant in the actions, even when their words would make them opponents? Who is receiving the favors of those in power and who do they support? "It" includes Socialists, big business, and many
  Reply to this
• 12/12/2011 10:59 PM GJ wrote:
  You are supposing an awful lot.
  
  Your language led me to a single, simple curiosity and therefore to a single direct question. Instead of answering the question of who has a "defined purpose" and intent to crush small business, you apparently are assuming all sorts of things in order to vent.
  
  Most of us believe that large organizations, especially governmental ones, get fat and sloppy, and that they tend toward dysfunction and growth which often become counterproductive, impede us, and even may become confiscatory.
  
  I apologize for mentioning by name the only two entities (socialists and big business) that I could figure might be the enemies of small business intentionally and "with a defined purpose in mind".
  
  I guess maybe I only should have asked who, or maybe what entity...?
  Reply to this

Leave a comment