Conclusion Ten Cannots Reverend William J.H. Boetcker You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift. You cannot help small men by tearing down big men. You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer. You cannot help the poor man by destroying the rich. You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than your income. You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred. You cannot establish security on borrowed money. You cannot build character and courage by taking away men’s initiative and independence. You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves. In this world there are two sorts of men: the men of yesterday and the men of tomorrow. To which of these do you belong, my brethren. Come, let me gaze at you, and learn whether you are of those entering into the world of light or of those going forth into the land of darkness. Come, tell me who you are and what you are. Are you a politician who says to himself: “I will use my country for my own benefit?” If so, you are naught but a parasite living on the flesh of others. Or are you a devoted patriot, who whispers into the ear of his inner self: “I love to serve my country as a faithful servant.” If so, you are an oasis in the desert, ready to quench the thirst of the wayfarer. Or are you a merchant, drawing advantage from he needs of the people, engrossing goods so as to resell them at an exorbitant price? If so, you are a reprobate, and it matters naught whether your home is a palace or a prison. Or are you a honest man, who enables farmer and weaver to exchange their products, who mediates between buyer and seller and through his just ways profits both himself and others? If so, you are a righteous man; and it matters not whether you are praised or blamed. Are you a leader of religion, who weaves out of the simplicity of the faithful a scarlet robe for his body; and of their kindness a golden crown for his head; and while living on Satan’s plenty, spews forth his hatred of Satan? If so, you are a heretic, and it matters not hat you fast all day and pray all night. Or are you the faithful one who finds in the goodness of people a groundwork for the betterment of the whole nation and in whose soul is the ladder of perfection leading to the Holy spirit? If you are such, you are like a lily in the garden of Truth, and it matters not if your fragrance is lost upon men or dispersed into the air, where it will be eternally preserved. Or are you a journalist who sells his principles in the markets of slaves and who fattens on gossip and misfortune and crime? If so, you are like a ravenous vulture preying upon rotting carrion. Or are you a teacher, standing upon the raised stage of history, who, inspired by the glories of the past, preaches to mankind and acts as he preaches? If so, you are a restorative to ailing humanity and a balm for the wounded heart. Are you a governor, looking down on those you govern, never stirring abroad except to rifle their pockets or to exploit them for your own profit? IF so, you are like tares upon the threshing floor of the nation. Are you a devoted servant who loves the people and is ever watchful over their welfare, and zealous for their success? If so, you are as a blessing in the granaries of the land. Or are you a husband who regards the wrongs he has committed as lawful, but those of his wife as unlawful? If so, you are like those extinct savages who lived in caves and covered their nakedness with hides. Or are you a faithful companion, whose wife is ever at his side, sharing his every thought, rapture, and victory? If so, you are as one who at dawn walks at the head of a nation towards the high noon of justice, reason, and wisdom. Are you a writer, who holds his head high above the crowd, while his brain is deep in the abyss of the past, that is, filled with the tatters and useless castoffs of the ages? If so, you are like a stagnant pool of water. Or are you the keen thinker, who scrutinizes his inner self, discarding that which is useless, outwork and evil, but preserving that which is useful and good? If so, you are as manna to the hungry, and as cool, clear water to the thirsty. Are you a poet, full of noise and empty sounds? If so, you are like one of those mountebanks that make us laugh when they are weeping, and make us weep, when they laugh. Or are you one of those gifted souls in whose hands God has placed a viol to soothe the spirit with heavenly music and bring his fellow men close to life and the beauty of life? If so, you are a torch to light us on our way, a sweet longing in our hearts, and a revelation of the divine in our dreams. Thus is mankind divided into two long columns, one composed of the aged and bent, who support themselves on crooked staves and as they walk on the path of life, they pant as if they were climbing towards a mountaintop, while they are actually descending into the abyss. And the second column is composed of youth, running as with winged feet, singing as if their throats were strung with silver strings, and climbing toward the mountaintop as though drawn by some irresistible, magical power. In which of these processions do you belong, my brethren? Ask yourself this question when you are along in the silence of the night. Judge for yourselves whether you belong with the Slaves of Yesterday or the Free Men of Tomorrow. Slaves of Yesterday or Free Men of Tomorrow by Kahlil Gibran from “The Voice of the Master” Current trends in out-of-wedlock births, crimes, drug use, family decomposition, and educational decline, as well as a host of other social pathologies, are incompatible with the continuation of American society as we know it. The trends are dangerous and they are potentially catastrophic. That is the hard truth of our times. ------------Bill Bennett The genius of the United States is not best or most in its executives or legislatures, nor in its ambassadors or authors or colleges or churches or parlors, nor even in its newspapers or inventors . . . but always most in the common people ---------Walt Whitman Until 1930s, the United States was primarily a decentralized society in which the state and local governments were the primary governmental entities with the federal government serving to defend the nation, administering a common commercial policy for the states, adjudicating disputes among them, and providing a framework of law--acting as an umpire and defender, not as a participant in the day-to-day lives of its citizens. During the depression, a great faith arose that the “neutral competence” and “professionalism” of the newly expanded bureaucracies and commissions would lead to accurate, rational determination of the broad public interest and to efficient management of the government. Democratic socialism, many termed it, attempting to combine the best of both while eliminating the worst of both systems. Utopia is here, was the cry, all that‘s needed is to take everything away from the wicked, selfish interests and turn it over to the benevolent government. The intention was good, the implementation was faulty. The attempt of the welfare state to deny, suppress and plan away the dangers and uncertainties of our lives--to domesticate the inevitable unknown--violates not only the spirit of capitalism but also the nature of man. The government devoted to suppressing uncertainty finds itself forever having to channel or repress the human will to risk. The effect is often to drive it from positive and creative avenues into negative or destructive ones. The Israeli Kibbutz is an egalitarian commune, anyone who wishes to join is welcomed; however, no more than 5 percent of the Jewish population of Israel have ever chosen to be members of a kibbutz; this can be taken as an estimate of those who would voluntarily choose a system enforcing equality of outcome in preference to one characterized by inequality, diversity, and opportunity. The “sickness of an overgoverned society” as Walter Lippman so succinctly put it, has caused severe economic disruptions. The change that “exercise of unlimited power by men with limited minds and self-regarding prejudices is soon oppressive, reactionary, and corrupt . . . that of the very condition of progress was the limitation of power to the capacity and the virtue of rulers . . . to the new beliefs that there are no limits to man’s capacity to govern others and that, therefore, no limitations ought to be imposed upon government.” For Hayek, ‘democratic socialism’ was an impossibility since state planning led inexorably to collectivism and dictatorship; it was not the best of both which resulted but the worst of both which inevitably resulted from such policies. Economic control is not merely control of a sector of human life, which can be separated from the rest, it is the control of the means for all our ends. Few people approve of moral codes that justifies forcing people to give up much of what they produce to finance payments to persons they do not know for purposes they may not approve of. When the law contradicts what most people regard as moral and proper, they will break the law. When people start to break the law, lack of respect for the law spreads to all laws. If public policy consistently diverges from the direction of public preferences, or if government persistently impinges upon basic rights and liberties, the motivation for voluntary allegiance and compliance is eroded. Coercion must then be substituted for voluntary action and the democratic system denigrates into authoritarian rule. We do not want this. Another vindication often provided for such policies is that government can provide us services at lower costs than can the private sector. Low cost, cost efficient and government are oxymorons. Few can find an example of an activity that is conducted more economically by government than by private enterprise. Shoddy products (postal service, schooling, railroad passenger transport) are all produced by government or government regulated industries. Passenger train service is slower and less satisfactory than it was fifty years ago. The public, though, has been persuaded that private enterprises produce shoddy products, that we need ever vigilant government employees to keep business from foisting off unsafe, meretricious products at outrageous prices on the ignorant, unsuspecting, vulnerable customers. History has shown that most government programs are expensive, inefficient, and ultimately do not work. Indeed, businesses prosper when they are not impeded by a vast bureaucracy. In our experience if we learn nothing else we learn that there aren’t any super human people. People exist with character, who are well informed, prescriptive, and that want to serve. Leadership means service. It doesn’t mean power, money, recognition. It means a person who willing to serve. We wish to get to the point that when one says he wants to serve, a person really means that and is not attempting to gain at the public trough at taxpayer expense. Responsibility must be reestablished in our personal lives and our public entities. We must provide for a new system of finding and elevating leaders than we currently have. Majority rule is a necessary and desirable expedient. It is very different from the type of freedom you have in a supermarket. When you enter the voting booth, you almost always vote for a package rather than specific items. If you are in the majority, you will at best get the items you favored and the ones you opposed but regarded on balanced less important; generally you end up with something different from what you thought you voted for. If you are in the minority, you must conform to the majority vote and wait for your turn to come. The ballot box produces conformity without unanimity; the marketplace unanimity without conformity. That is why it is desirable to use the ballot box, so far as possible, only for those decisions where conformity is essential. At no time, though, do we expect the majority to dominate the minority. At all times the minority will be protected (although not to the point of dictating terms to the majority) and we don’t envision an elitist government that is not responsive to his people, believing themselves so superior that they don’t have to get the support of the people. In order for individual rights to be maintained, economic growth and exchange must exist. The former says that common man has a feeling of improved status and the latter says he does not feel denied. If either factor is lacking then social/economic reforms will occur. These usually manifest themselves in wealth redistribution and moral decay. The free exchange of both ideas and goods/services will foster or provide both factors. If everyone has a feeling of being better off, can readily get what they need and has equal opportunity for gain, then not only is there less need for wealth redistribution but less need for war. History has proven that the following characteristics spell economic greatness: private ownership of the means of production, capitalism, free determination of prices in the marketplace, and human rights-freedom of conscience, continuous development of the democratic process and the separation of powers. Most people, if they so choose, can respond positively to the challenge of change. Adoption of certain features are required before economic progress can be substantial: existence of a market economy, merchants and entrepreneurs not discriminated against, deterred and preyed upon, absence of rigid doctrinal orthodoxy, freedom to inquire, to dispute, to experiment, belief in the possibilities of improvement, concern for the practical rather than the abstract, rationalism that defies mandarin codes, religious dogma, and traditional folklore. A society dominated by fundamentalist mullahs or conservative land barons is unlikely to embrace change whether it be 15th century or the 20th century. We do know what makes an economy great, man strive for greatest, and the economic engines producing innovation after innovation. Political forces that create an innovative climate include the presence of scientific and technological know-how, which arises principally from (1) government-funded research and development institutions, (2) private universities and research institutions, and (3) investors with technical expertise in addition to money for investment. Impediments to entrepreneurship--such as taxes, regulations, and other unfavorable conditions--tend to dry up the supply of entrepreneurs, while favorable conditions tend to spawn entrepreneurs. Favorable or unfavorable tax structures and financial regulatory conventions are usually controlled through the political system. The barriers to innovation are almost never technological but rather social, political, financial, or economic. The primary barriers to such innovation in any society are (1) the structure of the society itself and the state of business, political, and educational institutions, (2) the society’s “reward system,” or lack of it, (3) attitudes and concepts among the labor force, and the philosophy of the people involved in contributing their labor to production and innovations, (4) the political forces which influence the overall economy, and (5) any standards which are based on product rather than performance expectations. Our recommendations on reengineering government and the system are an attempt to move the economy back on the positive track. We believe in the government of the less (Who giveth can also taketh away), the individual, democracy and capitalism. Anything which is not explicitly granted to the government is a right of the individual. We sincerely believe that your freedoms end when another’s begin and limits to freedom exist which personal responsibility must adapt to. We believe in the philosophy of ‘naturalism,’ that is economic noninterference, tolerance, allowing natural (market) forces to work whenever and wherever they can. Throughout this book, we have been providing our recommendations. In reengineering, one uses technology not to do the same job better but to revise it and make it an entire new job altogether, one that could not have been imagined without the technology available. One must always ask why doing things a certain way. Many times the answer is because always been doing it that way. It is then a complete review of the process needs be accomplished. This we have related. It is not necessarily our intent to ask for approval or to create disapproval of our thoughts and recommendations, but basically to create an interest in examining this issue in more detail. A man that had done 10,000 experiments in the area of cancer and didn’t find a cure was told by a counterpart that he had wasted 10 years of his life experimenting on ten different approaches to solutions; he replied, “No I haven’t because now we know these 10,000 things won’t work.” Thomas Alva Edison said he knew a thousand different ways light bulbs do not work. So it is on our book. We now know what does not work, we must consider new options and see if they will work. A goal both for conduct of business and planning is to separate top management from operations. Steering requires people who focus intently on one mission and perform it well, requires leadership and using the best method, whatever it may be, to achieve the goals. Government basically would be operating as a skilled buyer, leveraging the various producers in ways to accomplish its policy objectives. use competition between service providers, flexibility to respond to changes, accountability for performance. Privatization is but one alternative; services can be contracted out or turned over to the private sector but governance can not. The objective is to become Mission-driven not rule-driven. Most public organizations are driven by rules and regulations, not their mission. They have a rule for everything that could conceivably go wrong and a line item for every subcategory of spending. When anything goes wrong, the response is a set of new rules. Governments, instead of firing the offenders, keep them on and punish everyone else by wrapping them in ever more red tape. American democracy was founded on the principles of limited governmental authority and formal public accountability. Responsiveness to citizen desires and respect for citizen rights constitute the essential underpinnings of consensual democracy. Freedom from the abuse of power is not enough for a free society; free society rests on the freedom to make responsible decisions. This is the system that must be changed and we have provided recommendations on changing it. What we are in essence saying is that we desperately need a countercultural revolution to undo the consequences of the last thirty years: • The promise to end poverty has cost us over $4 trillion but poverty has not ended and the number of the poor has not been reduced. • The promise of liberation from the traditional family. The destruction of the family has been catastrophic: only 39 percent of children born in 1988 will live with both parents until their 18th birthday. • The promise of sexual freedom. Free love has turned out to come with a terrible price: divorce, abortion, AIDS, teenage pregnancies, STDs. • The promise of enlightenment. Drug addiction failed to free the mind as promised but imprisoned the soul and made captive and criminal the addict. • The promise of progressive education. Students have found courses without assignments, lectures or grades. Truth is neither being pursued nor recognized. Ghettos for the mind have resulted with illiteracy and inadequacy. • The promise of unrestrained expression. Please kids by shocking parents. Anything goes. And went. • God’s death, not separation but annihilation of religion and morals. Activists sponsored an escape from traditional religion and morality in an attempt to create new values for a new generation. Yet despite the utter failure of the cultural revolution with the results we have so painfully described and lived through, many advocates continue to hoe their ways. It is instead, Personal responsibility, smaller government, stronger families led by parents who put the maintenance of their marriage and doing for their children ahead of materialistic pursuits which is the necessary first step for this countercultural revolution. That is our Manifesto, the new American Manifesto, to which we subscribe. And that we hope, you too, will ascribe. Afternote: The Socialist Platform of 1928 can be abridged as follows: •Nationalization of natural resources beginning with Boulder Dam and Muscle Shoals (yes) •Publicly owned power system under federal government (TVA) •National ownership and democratic management of railroads and transportation and communication (Amtrak, Conrail, FCC, ICC) •National program for flood control flood relief, reforestation, irrigation and reclamation (yes) •Government relief of the unemployed through public works programs (WPA) •Employed hours and wages fixed by labor unions (Davis-Bacon Act) •Loans to state and municipalities (federal grants in aid) •Extension of public employment agencies (U.S. Employment Service) •System of health and accident insurance and old age pensions (Social Security) •Shortening the workday (40 hour work week) •Enactment of federal anti-child labor (done) •Increase of taxation on high income levels and inheritance (on its way again). •Appropriation of taxation of annual rent value of all land held for speculation. If meeting these conditions is a prerequisite for a socialist society, since 13 out of 14 have already been accomplished, The United States can indeed be considered a socialist state. The Socialist Party never received more than 6 percent of the popular vote for President ( in 1912 for Eugene Debs), most of the time less than 2 percent. Yet almost every economic plank in its 1928 Presidential Platform has now been enacted into law and is under control or command of the federal government, just as any dyed-in-the-wool socialist would have wanted it to be. This is camel head under the tent in its classic form. Throughout the world, and especially in Eastern Europe, socialism is being replaced with capitalism; only in the United States are we doing the opposite. If we are not yet socialist, it is because the socialism of the nineties has far exceeded what the socialists of the twenties ever dreamed of being. James Madison warned about the danger of an overcentralized, overexpensive government. If we weren’t careful, he said, our democracy would turn into an oligarchy run by politicians at the center. He must have been reading the headlines in 1994. We need to change that otherwise the future is bleak for the America of liberty, freedom, and justice for all. Home Page Preface & Introduction Chapter 1: Responsibility Chapter 2: Leadership Chapter 3: Government Chapter 4: Congress Chapter 5: Regulations and Bureaucracy Chapter 6: Defense Chapter 7: International Affairs Chapter 8: Crime and Justice Chapter 9: Civil rights Chapter 10: Economic Chapter 11: Education Chapter 12: Health Chapter 13: Planning and National Goals Conclusions