Does Government Enhance Quality of Life?

HARBESON: Quality is job one

> SOUTHERN INDIANA — New Albany City Council member Dan Coffey recently introduced a resolution to move city council discretionary funds to the Board of Public Works and Safety. When questioned by other council members for specifics as to how the money will be spent, Coffey said the money is intended for “quality of life” purposes.

This really confused several members and no wonder. “Quality of life” is one of those fluffy, fuzzy phrases politicians love to utter when they don’t want to answer a question. When pushed further though, Coffey did offer up an example — a recent “Beach Day” where the fire department turned on its hoses so kids in public housing facilities could splash in the water.

So I guess quality of life has something to do with being wet. That does make some sense and not just for kids. I know many men who would say their quality of life definitely goes up when women in T-shirts get wet.

Seriously though, if asked, we know the examples people would offer up as quality of life issues would be virtually unlimited. When it comes right down to it, quality of life is one of those vague terms that can vary widely between individuals. Your determination of quality of life may agree with mine and it may not.

For example I like to get up early and go on bike rides. But I know others who would rather go out dancing, stay up all night and sleep in. Still others don’t care if they have to get up early or stay up late, as long as they can see wet women in T-shirts.

Isn’t it contradictory for government entities to take your money through threats of force and then tell you they are going to spend it to improve your quality of life? Wouldn’t your quality of life go up if they just got out of the way so you can determine for yourself how to give your life quality? Isn’t quality of life built on a foundation of mutually respectful voluntary relationships with others — relationships without coercion and threats of violence?

Even with projects that we have been told are “necessary and proper” functions of government, it’s impossible to definitively determine quality of life to everyone’s satisfaction. For example, just last week a recent letter to the editor in this paper was from a New Albany resident who claims that the quality of life in the city will go up if all of the city government roads were two-way instead of one-way.

When the questioning members of the city council continued to push Coffey for specifics, he finally said, “You know what, figure it out.”

What does that mean? It can’t mean he really wants them to determine quality of life purposes because at a subsequent meeting the issue came up again when discussing the city’s portion of costs for a new air conditioner for the City-County Building.

Coffey said that would not be a quality of life issue and in response a council person said it is for the people who work in the building. That’s probably true, particularly if they also get the fire department in there to spray any woman wearing T-shirts.

Of course, we must remember that both sides are really just concerned about who gets control of other people’s money. After all, those skeptical, questioning council members who voted against the funds being moved do not appear to object to the concept of a discretionary fund. Yet a “discretionary” fund is as equally confusing, fluffy and fuzzy for a city council when it comes to determining “proper” spending.

At some point during the discussions about this money, it was mentioned that spending it on the upcoming city bicentennial celebration would be a nice quality of life expenditure. What do you think? Does government spending on items like bicentennial celebrations really improve anyone’s quality of life or is it just a local example of bread and circuses meant to appease and deflect from the reality that these people are bickering over spending money that no one gave them voluntarily?

— Southern Indiana resident Debbie Harbeson knows that if her T-shirt ever gets wet, it would probably not enhance anyone’s quality of life.

The Smell of Wealth Redistribution

HARBESON: In federal money we trust

> SOUTHERN INDIANA — People who are concerned about government spending usually point out problems such as cost overruns and waste in a given government project. However, it’s also important to pay attention to the “add-ons,” which are what I call side projects that increase spending and go beyond the scope of the original government plan.

The city of Jeffersonville just gave an excellent example of how these “add-ons” work. Mayor Mike Moore proudly announced that the city will be receiving a $250,000 Main Street Revitalization Grant which will be used to pay for costs associated with redeveloping a block of roadway next to the proposed Big Four Station, which in itself is an “add-on” to the original Big Four pedestrian bridge plan.

Big Four Station, the park Jeffersonville wants to build at the end of the bridge ramp, is supposed to be funded with TIF funding, which would come from city taxpayers. However, the second “add-on” to redevelop the roadway will be using money coerced from people all across the nation.

Many people don’t realize that Main Street Revitalization Grants actually come from the federal government because there is another layer of government at the state level that is in charge of redistributing the funding. In Indiana, this layer of government bureaucracy is called the Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs (which I always thought had something to do with marital infidelity).

This state bureaucracy distributes Community Development Block Grant money, which is a part of the U.S. Housing and Urban Development (HUD), a program that was passed under a Republican administration in the supposedly great bipartisan days gone by.

If you read up on the Main Street Revitalization Program, you will see that the eligible national objective of this federal government welfare program is the “prevention and elimination of slums and blight.”

I don’t know how these government redistribution schemes work, but Jeffersonville tried to get at this money before and was turned down.

I also don’t know how bureaucrats make decisions in how they will dole out money to the supposedly needy communities but if eliminating blight is a primary objective I guess it couldn’t have hurt the second time around that several homes in the area which had been purchased by the city have been left sitting there, boarded up and unoccupied, which of course led to various problems that could certainly cause the area to be defined as blighted.

The main reason city officials want to develop this block is so they can push pedestrians and pedal pumpers to their downtown shopping district. I’m not sure why a sign or two purchased by the businesses who would like to market to those people couldn’t suffice to direct potential shoppers a block or two away from where they roll down the ramp.

Will there really be the influx of consumers just panting and sweating in anticipation of what they can purchase in Jeffersonville? Most people who cross are likely just interested in finding their way to the river, where they can continue to walk or bike along the water. The river-crossers won’t even necessarily be needing any refreshments because the Waterfront Development Corp. plans to sell licenses to vendors, giving them special “permission” to sell stuff very close or perhaps even right on the bridge itself.

One other point that is often lost when communities celebrate being “awarded” these types of grants is the part they play in increasing the ongoing costs of maintenance and security of more and more government property.

Oh but maybe that doesn’t matter — if the costs get to be too much and the community gets run down and blighted, the federal government will probably just give them even more money to revitalize the area.

— Clark County resident Debbie Harbeson wonders if there is a federal program that pays for revitalization cream to eliminate the blight of aging skin.

Indiana State Police Marijuana Eradication Team

HARBESON: Weed it and weep

JEFFERSONVILLE — The Indiana State Police has a very special team of people performing very special work this time of year. Dressed in camouflage, these government employees get paid to traipse around Southern Indiana counties and pull weeds out of the ground.

The ISP’s Marijuana Eradication Team wants you to believe this is important work. Somehow every pot plant they manage to successfully creep up on and wrestle to the ground makes your community safer. See, it’s these green leafy stalks that put communities in danger of violence, not the black market created by the government’s prohibition on voluntary trade of this particular agricultural product.

The weeds these guys get paid to hunt down are usually hidden inside corn fields, which is so ironic considering how important corn was as an ingredient in illegal products distilled during alcohol prohibition. Yet now it’s perfectly fine if these fellows, thirsty from a hard day’s work among the vegetation, decide to go out after work, probably around 4:20 or so, and throw down a few shots of corn-based whiskey, toasting themselves for eradicating a couple of marijuana plants.

There is a double irony to the prohibited pot plant being hidden inside corn fields. Corn has grown tall in the market due in part to lots of government favor over the years and the subsidized plant has been used to make a product known as high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). HFCS is used in loads of processed foods, which has enabled sugar addicts to obtain a cheap high, which has helped cause an increase in obesity, which can lead to many assorted health problems and even early death.

But hey, marijuana, that’s the bad stuff.

Oh and meanwhile, as this group of government employees is running around ripping roots, we find out that inmates inside several of Indiana’s prisons have been successfully operating a flourishing drug business while sitting in the government cages.

So while you are constantly being fed the baloney by one group of government agents that the government’s drug war is actually a positive action, other government agents are failing to control the drug trade even when they catch people, lock them up and force you to pay to house, clothe and feed them.

The only validity to pulling weeds that even comes close to actually looking like it could involve defending against aggression is the illegitimate use of a farmer’s land without his permission, which means the land owner’s property rights are being violated.

That thought doesn’t really take one very far though because the main reason the marijuana plant growers invade the farmers’ property in the first place is because of the government prohibition. So we’re back where we started — just like the Marijuana Eradication Team is back where it started when a new growing season rolls around.

Growing plants on other people’s property without their permission is not a big problem otherwise as far as I know. I don’t really hear stories about people clearing out parts of someone else’s corn field to grow a stash of tomatoes. We might if the government suddenly decided to prohibit tomatoes though wouldn’t we?

I don’t know what’s worse, paying these guys to weed someone’s garden or hearing them pontificate about their work in terms of the supposed street value (a distorted price created by prohibition) of the plants they confiscate and pretending that slicing a few stalks is doing much of anything to stop the marijuana drug trade.

There is good news though. Despite the fact that the people who make money off of prohibition keep trying, fewer and fewer people are willing to inhale the government propaganda that groups like the Marijuana Eradication Team use to justify their jobs.

— Clark County resident Debbie Harbeson is thinking about forming a Government Eradication Team.

A Few Thoughtful Responses

Harbeson: Tales from the mailbag

> SOUTHERN INDIANA — Today, I would like to share and respond to a few thoughtful responses I’ve received in the past few months. The following is from Tammy, responding to a column I wrote in May about vouchers where I pointed out that true educational freedom cannot occur as long as government is involved:

“What you wrote makes a lot of sense. On the other hand, you might as well hear from someone who has a child using a school voucher. My daughter went to a local school in New Albany. The principal was distant and not very communicative whenever we came to the school to talk with her about our daughter. Our daughter has no learning disability. She’s shy, though, and tends to be overlooked. She’s one who falls through the cracks. And the principal would not listen to us and help out.

“We decided to get her out of the situation and applied for a voucher. Now our daughter is going to a Catholic school in New Albany. There, she is getting all kinds of attention and she finally thinks that school is enjoyable. She’s begun to improve her reading skills by leaps and bounds and she wasn’t afraid to take her ISTEP this year (unlike last year when she wanted to play hooky).”

“Vouchers really do help the kids. They help families help their own kids. They’re actually a good idea and I applaud Tony Bennett and any and every legislator and the governor who has supported them. In fact, I cannot thank them enough.”

• Tammy’s story shows us that some families’ lives can be dramatically changed and I personally know other families who have benefited from various school reforms. It’s only fair to acknowledge these heartwarming stories. However, any benefits that accrue to some people do not justify the continued use of threats and force against other people.

TAX TALK

The next item is a response from Joyce reacting to my claim that property taxes are rent.

“Debbie, by framing property tax as another government encroachment, you are creating a problem where there is none. Property tax, or whatever you call it, spreads the cost of important local public services: police, fire, schools, libraries, water, sewers, animal control, parks maintenance, road repair and trash pickup to name just a few.

“From this perspective, aren’t those of us who are lucky enough to own property doing our part to take care of our communities? Would you have every person pay a separate ‘user fee’ for each public service? And how would that play out each time you receive the service, for example response to a fire or break-in?”

• I was glad to see Joyce asking important questions about how to provide services without government. For a long time now, many people have been working to answer such questions and if you want to investigate those ideas for yourself, one of the best places to start is mises.org, an online site full of free books, articles, audio and video.

MY DOMAIN

Next, I want to thank Kurt Fetz for responding to my request and actually reading the court opinion for himself concerning the Linden Meadows property ownership controversy. Here’s Kurt’s response:

“Debbie, after reading the opinion it is clear, at least to me, that your interpretation is the correct one regarding the disposition of the Linden Meadows case regarding eminent domain.

“Where I would disagree is that this case will not serve as precedent so much as it relies upon it. Eminent domain is firmly established in the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and is an essential, if unfortunate (especially when it’s your property that gets condemned), power for the proper functioning of the states. At least the takings clause and just compensation provide for recourse …

“It looks like eminent domain goes back farther than the constitution actually and derives from common law. However, prior to the Fifth Amendment it could be exercised without compensation. The Fifth acknowledges its crucial function, while guaranteeing just compensation. Anyhow, the point is that there is a long history for this power and it would be difficult to argue that it does not serve an important function. How would you suggest interstates, railroads, sidewalks, etc. get built without it?”

• Kurt also asks an important question and once again I’ll recommend mises.org for anyone interested in learning more about peaceful voluntary alternatives to the coercive state.

MORE PROBLEMS

Finally, I have been meaning to respond to those who complain about my consistent focus on the problems of government, but then I saw this concise response by Jim Wetzel that said it all for me:

“I’m sure, that I can’t say with certainty what Debbie H. might do under any hypothetical set of circumstances. I’ll venture to guess, though, that she’ll write about things other than government when government gets out of the robbery-and-tyranny business.

“I’m not holding my breath while waiting for that to happen, though. Blue’s just not my color.”

— Clark County resident Debbie Harbeson happens to like the color blue but, like Jim, she’s not holding her breath either.

Indiana IOLTA Funds Boosted By New Law

HARBESON: Public money for ‘free’ work

CLARK COUNTY — Republican State Sen. Ron Grooms is getting so good at writing laws to force his neighbors to hand over money to others that he’s now collecting awards from the groups who benefit.

Grooms received the President’s Award from the Indiana Bar Foundation for his help in authoring a bill which led to the new pro bono legal services fee that now must be paid by those filing civil cases in Indiana. The fee will go directly to this private foundation and is supposed to be used to help pay for legal services for the needy.

Helping people gain access to legal services can certainly be considered a good cause to support but is it any more important than the hundreds of other causes and needs that exist? Why should Grooms and his buddies single out one charitable fund over all the others who are also struggling in the current economy?

One reason may be that the bill’s other author, Republican Sen. Brent Steele, just happens to be a lawyer and just happens to think the work of this particular charity is important. Steele wanted to do something to help the struggling pro bono fund and said, “This is the only thing I could think of.”

I guess we shouldn’t be surprised that the only idea a politician might have is to create a new law to force people to fund his pet cause in the amount of $450,000 per year instead of going out and seeking voluntary donations.

Perhaps the reason his brain blanked out has something to do with the history of funding Indiana’s pro bono districts. The districts are primarily funded by the Interest on Lawyer’s Trust Account program (IOLTA), which comes from pooling trust accounts held by lawyers on behalf of clients which are either too small or too short term to be set up to earn interest for the client.

The interest earned from the pooled accounts is paid to the Indiana Bar Foundation and is supposed to be used “primarily” to support pro bono civil legal services. This idea of pooling trust accounts and giving the interest to groups who provide legal aid was controversial nationally from the start because these trust funds are private property of the clients.

When objections were raised about the setup, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed that these programs do amount to the taking of private property, but hey, it’s OK because the interest is used in a manner that they considered to be the “common good.”

Yet many other charities and foundations do work that is in the “common good.” There is only one reason I can see that explains how this particular charity is deemed more worthy than others — it involves the lawyers and the courts. In other words, lawyers and courts told other lawyers and courts that what they were doing was OK because there are direct benefits to lawyers and courts.

The court also said no compensation was due to those whose property is taken since the accounts, held individually, would not earn interest anyway. (Of course if compensation was due, then that would defeat the entire purpose of what the lawyers and government courts wanted to achieve by taking other people’s property.)

This scheme of skimming interest off the pooled private property accounts of other people worked well for awhile — until the economy tanked and decreased earnings of the IOLTA fund, which is what led to the new legislation instituting the pro-bono filing fee.

This is not just about instituting yet another government fee either. Like all government actions do, this legislation also costs taxpayers in general. The state has already incurred the costs of pushing this bill through the legislative process and now there will be the continual costs of collecting and processing the fee.

In addition, the funds spent are supposed to be audited by the State Board of Accounts. Yes, that’s the same entity that has been so busy here in Southern Indiana finding mistake after mistake in almost every single local government’s spending.

Now the award-winning Grooms just gave the SBA more spending to audit, all because he decided this specific cause demanded the use of government force. Thank Ron for increasing government bureaucracy and costs the next time you see him.

By the way, all of the local legislators in Floyd and Clark counties voted in support of this new fee. State Rep. Steve Stemler even sponsored the bill for the House. I don’t know if he received an award though. If not, he should probably ask Grooms for advice.

One of the worst aspects about this type of legislation is that the politicians and people who run the private entities present themselves as the charitable ones. They send out press releases and grab all the glory as if they did something really virtuous. But all they did was collaborate to use the force of government to get what they want, rather than respectfully asking people to voluntarily donate to their cause.

If people were asked to pitch in a dollar to the fund, many would do so. If the property owners of the trust accounts were asked to consent to the pooling of their money to help pro bono districts, many of them would have given consent as well. No one asked though.

Politicians just went straight to the force and now here we are, with yet another new law and all the associated new burdens that are always attached.

— Clark County resident Debbie Harbeson would be happy to preside over any award ceremony for a politician, provided the token is a pin of some sort.

Government School Clothing Control

HARBESON: School clothing choices should be optional

> SOUTHERN INDIANA — Clothing is a good example of a topic where there is a wide variety of opinions on what’s “proper” in certain situations and what’s not. Individuals can and will draw the line at very different levels.

Clothing choices are not normally a huge issue though, and even in public areas most of us are willing to leave each other alone even when we may not agree with another person’s choice of clothing.

However there is one place where this is not necessarily true: government schools.

At first glance the conflicts over clothing and calls for dress codes or uniforms make little sense. The students are not wearing anything that they can’t wear in society at large so where is the justification for the government to have any involvement in the clothing a family chooses to buy for school?

From an individual standpoint, we all know that clothing choices are quite irrelevant when it comes to learning. After all, uniforms or dress codes are not needed for a toddler to learn to walk, people can read just fine in their pajamas and this column is proof that writing can be done wearing only underwear.

So when students’ clothing is deemed “improper” by some, the reason most often used to justify interfering in their clothing choices is because it can be a distraction to other students. In other words — unless the school simply has administrators who merely want to demonstrate their power — controlling clothing in schools is not so much about the person wearing the clothes as it is about the other students who may be distracted.

I can understand this concern. It’s very easy to become distracted in these institutions that do not allow for individual interests.  Government regulations are already standardizing the most important part of an individual — his mind — so they might as well standardize clothing too, right?

I believe that the answer to this problem is the same as most other conflicts that result from compulsion in education. All that needs to be done is to make both attendance and funding voluntary.

However, I know not enough people are ready to accept that answer, which means this problem will continue as long as the compulsory institution exists. So I’ve decided to search for an idea that might at least help lessen the conflict over government school clothing control.

Though nothing can be perfect, I would like to offer what I consider to be the best way to handle the problem — all government schools should adopt the burqa as the official school uniform, for both male and female students.

Now, hold on. Don’t get your sexy, revealing panties in a wad until you hear me out. Here’s just a partial list of reasons why burqas are the perfect clothing for government school uniforms.

• First of all, students can continue to wear whatever they want to school. They only need to pull on the burqas while on the government property.

• Burqas are as close as you can get to removing all the distractions of the human body, as well as distractions of slogans and images on unapproved clothing.

• Burqas not only hide distracting breasts, butts and beautiful faces, they also reduce teasing by hiding less desired differences like weight or acne.

• Since burqas can be worn over clothing, they don’t need to be washed very often and schools can easily keep a few extras on hand to use for students who show up without the approved uniform.

• Income, gender and racial disparities disappear under a burqa. In a burqa, everyone is equal.

Since the forced association that occurs in the government schools can easily create a clash of values among those compelled to attend, it’s clear that burqas are the best solution to the inevitable conflicts that arise concerning “proper” clothing.

— Clark County resident Debbie Harbeson learns best when wearing only underwear.

Updates on Three Items

HARBESON: These things come in threes

> SOUTHERN INDIANA — I have three items to discuss today. The first two are follow-ups to recent columns and the third item is about the Greater Clark County Schools hoping that lots of people in the area will take their eyes off the road while driving.

Linden Meadows

In response to last week’s column “The sad tale of Linden Meadows,” a reader who calls him or herself “M” sent in two replies to the newspaper’s comment section on their website. You can go to newsandtribune.com to read the full text of M’s comments, but there is one specific point I’d like to address here concerning the lawsuit over ownership of the land used for the project. M said, “The court’s 3-0 majority did not base its decision on anything having to do with eminent domain.”

After I saw M’s reply, I felt like I should read the opinion again. I didn’t want to though. I had already read the darn thing several times before writing the column. I was sick of reading it. But I grabbed a bucket and read it again anyway. I still stand by my contention that eminent domain played a part in the court’s decision.

But don’t take my word for it. Don’t take M’s word for it either. Read the opinion yourself at this link: http://tinyurl.com/linden-opinion

If you do, I would be very interested in hearing whether or not you think the court “did not base its decision on anything having to do with eminent domain,” as M claims.

Mayor Moore and Competition with Private Business

My column, “Fit to be tied,” about Jeffersonville Mayor Mike Moore introducing a new government funded program (Anchors A-Weigh) through his newly created Fitness Council sure caused some people to burn a lot of calories pounding on their computer keyboards.

Several commented on the newspaper’s website, but there was also a rather lengthy discussion on one of the local online community forums, ClarkCountyChatter.com. A few forum participants did not understand that the column was not specifically about Anchors A-Weigh. It was merely an example I used to discuss the actions of a local politician.

The reason I chose Anchor’s A-weigh was because Moore had publicly stated his concern about government competing with private business and then spent government money to fund a brand new program that does the exact opposite of the principle he claims to hold.

The direction is clear for any politician who truly does stand for the principle that government should not compete with private businesses: Do not spend government funds to create new programs that contain services already being offered by existing private businesses.

Greater Clark County Schools Billboard Advertisement

The final issue for today is about the Greater Clark County School board’s decision to spend $2,000 for a billboard promoting their government school system.

Lots of thoughts popped into my head after reading this, some I can even talk about in public. Here’s my first thought (and it came up when I saw New Albany-Floyd County’s billboard as well): “Are there really people out there, people capable of driving down the local interstates while reading billboards, who really might not know — until they see a large shiny advertisement — that these government-funded and government-operated school systems exist?”

Greater Clark’s board and school officials sounded like they were unsure whether this was a good move or not and this tentative attitude is certainly understandable. After all, they’ve held a monopoly on government funding for so long, I’m sure it’s a real chore to figure out what to do now that some rules of the education game in Indiana have changed to allow more schools to grab money that’s been coerced from taxpayers for education.

— Clark County resident Debbie Harbeson keeps a bucket handy because she never knows when she may have to read a government document. Write her at Debbie@debbieharbeson.com.