If we manage to escape the economic catastrophe that is ObamaCare, we may breathe a little easier, but watch the horizon for a storm is brewing that makes the health care monstrosity look like pin money.

Unions have long been in decline in private industry, but recently for the first time union membership in the public sector surpassed that in the private sector, and it is still growing.  We all know the stories about municipal workers working for 20 or 30 years, then retiring at 50% to 90% of their last year’s pay which is often inflated with heavy overtime, and then they go out and get another job where they work until retirement and a cushy life of a public pension, a handsome private 401k, and Social Security.

It used to be that it was a trade off that government workers (teachers, cops, firefighters, sanitation workers, clerical) got great benefits because they were paid poorly when compared to the private sector.  However that is no longer the case as reported in USA Today:

 USA Today reported that nearly one in five federal government employees now earn over $100,000. The paper also reported the average federal salary rose to $71,260, almost $31,000 more than the comparative average private-sector wage. 

If that doesn’t get the hair on the back of your neck to stand up as, after all you are who pays for these salaries and benefits, then perhaps this will from National Review’s March 8, 2010 issue:

The highest-paid municipal employee in Madison, Wis., is bus driver John E. Nelson, whose salary last year totaled more than $159,000. Half a dozen of his fellow drivers also earned in six figures. How is this possible? The Wisconsin State Journal explains:“A high base salary and other benefits for drivers were largely setin the 1970s and 1980s, when the city took over the bus company.” Combine that with generous, federally mandated leave provisions that make for lots of overtime, and it’s not unusual for a bus driver to out-earn the mayor (and with much better job security). In the 1950s, Ralph Kramden of The Honeymooners was paid $62 a week by the skinflints at the Gotham Bus Company; he was constantly hatching schemes to strike it rich so he could quit. Today Kramden’s dreams of avarice would have been a lot simpler: get a government job and join a union. — The Week, “National Review,” March 8 , 2010

$159,000 for driving a bus.  Imagine.  I wonder what the private bus company was paying their drivers before the city took them over?  I am sure, like ObamaCare, the takeover was a cost savings measure.  After all, those greedy private companies are out to make a profit. 

Who was the most frequent visitor to the White House  at the time the White House released its visitor logs?  It was Andy Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union (government workers), which should tell you where this is going.  Remember, as well, that when the federal government took over GM and Chrysler they gave huge percentages of those companies to the unions.  So when it comes time to negotiate the next contracts the union will sit on both sides of the bargaining table, as management and labor.  How will that turn out?  It will be one of two ways, either the union will have an epiphany and realize that profits are important to staying employed, or the unions will pick the bones of GM and Chrysler clean, driving them out of business and leaving you and me, brother, holding the bag.

The Ticking Pension Bomb

The killer, however, is unfunded pension liabilities.  All those pensions that we will be paying for with retirees being retired for longer than they worked in many cases, will be like nothing we have imagined before from a fiscal crisis standpoint.  In private industry as businesses learned to appreciate the value of their human assets, they treated them accordingly and the unions withered.  However in the public sector we have elected officials writing laws, e.g., Davis Bacon, that heavily favor or require union labor.  Unions in turn, pour millions into making sure those same politicians get re-elected.  Who is looking out for you and me?  As the ultimate employers of government employees, how about a law that union contracts must be ratified by the public at the ballot box?  Too cumbersome?  Okay, how about a law that government employees cannot receive salaries and benefits that exceed what the average private employee (the public employees’ bosses) receives in that geographical area?

Tea Party Members, are you listening?

It is clear from the present administration that the statists believe that it is their destiny to rule, not govern, over the masses who they believe are their intellectual inferiors.  Keep piling it on, but don’t worry we can always tax the rich to pay for it.  But as you board that bus in Madison Wisconsin, ask yourself if Mr. Nelson behind the wheel, is the rich guy picking up the tab or is it you?  Watch out folks, if we don’t do something soon, the rich won’t be rich enough to pay for it even if we tax them at 100% and there is no law to stop them from taking their wealth and moving somewhere else where taxes are lower.  And at this rate there are a lot of places in the world where the taxes are lower.

Daniel Henninger wrote in the Wall Street Journal:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid tells of congratulating freshman Sen. Obama on a phenomenal speech. Without a hint of conceit, Mr. Obama replied, “Harry, I have a gift.”

In the article he also describes this observation:

Harvard Law Prof. Charles Ogletree told how Mr. Obama spoke on one contentious issue at the law school, and each side thought he was endorsing their view. Mr. Ogletree said: “Everyone was nodding, Oh, he agrees with me.”

That’s essentially how he got elected.  With a heaping helping hand from the popular media, many people saw Obama as a blank screen upon which they could project their own views and see those as Obama’s own.  He’s our man!  He listens.  He cares deeply.  For a politician it is a phenomenal gift.  For a legislator it is an extremely valuable gift.  For an executive it is poison.

Pulling the Trigger

As a politician or a legislator you are in the role of persuader; somebody else makes the decision to vote for you or vote with you, respectively.  As an executive you are in the role of the decider.  You must make a decision and every decision, especially the tough ones are going to make a good many people unhappy.  Perhaps that explains why, in the Illinois Senate, Obama voted “Present” so many times.  Voting “Present” rather than “Yea” or “Nay” allowed him to hold that special place where everyone felt he agreed with them.  Too many decisions one way or another would have tarnished “the gift”.  So why is “the gift” poison for an executive?  If you don’t have “the gift” and you make a decision your opponents may disagree with you, but they are not surprised.  If you have “the gift” and you make a decision, those on the short side feel betrayed and angry, because they thought you agreed with them and then “sold out” and decided the other way.

Obama is in a tight spot where he has to make decisions and decisions have consequences.  When you make a decision it is very hard to make it seem like everyone got their way.  His complete lack of executive experience is telling.  If he had some executive experience, such as a mayor or a governor, he might have had enough practice learning how to make his decisions appear to satisfy everyone, as his campaign speeches did.  But that’s the thing about decisions.  If everyone supports them, they’re not much of a decision, like deciding to pardon a turkey on Thanksgiving.  Everyone enjoys the decision, but it’s really not what we elect presidents for.

I’ll Have the Waffles, Please

If you watch closely, you can see that Obama is struggling to preserve “the gift”.  He said he is for closing Guantanamo, but not yet.  He is for pulling out of Iraq, but no timetable.  The general he put in charge of Afghanistan, McChrystal, said he needed 40,000 more troops, but Obama could not bring himself to say yes or no.  He had to ponder, think, consult, weigh alternatives, and three months later, he gave McChrystal what he asked for.  Those on the left complained that he was not pulling out.  Those on the right complained that he wasted precious time while our troops were on the battlefield.  His backers tried to give him the fig leaf of showing gravitas.   He can’t seem to find the magic formula where everyone applauds him.  From “the gift” he has gone to “the anti-gift”.  Instead of satisfying everyone, he is finding that he is satisfying no one.

Move On

It’s time for Obama to “Move On”.  He should put “the gift” in his trophy case right next to his Nobel Peace Prize.  It got him to the White House.  How much more can he ask of such a thing?  So drop the pretense.  We all know he is a hard left guy, so he should just be who he is.  He may suddenly face a more hostile press, or they may love him more, although that would be hard to believe.  But when he makes a decision he will at least please his base, and then his opponents can fight his statist goals without being branded as racists.  As a hard left guy he will probably not get re-elected because America is not a hard left country, on the contrary the majority of Americans describe themselves as conservative.  But by choosing he can try to do what he can within one term.  It will be a battle. Obama’s poll ratings have dropped steadily since his inauguration and the Democrats are likely to lose seats in Congress this fall.  As an old acquaintance once said to me, “It’s like standing in the middle of the road.  Choose left or choose right, but choose; otherwise you get hit by traffic coming in both directions.”

Reading one of the liberal pundit’s pan of Sarah Palin’s new book and how the reviewer harps on her inexperience, anyone with a room temperature IQ cannot help but ask, what about the guy who won?  You can say she had little executive experience, only two years as governor of Alaska and two terms as mayor of 7,000 resident Wasilla.  But while one may argue she had little executive experience, he had none.  For that matter, neither did McCain or Biden.  Legislative experience?  Sure.  Executive experience? No, and it shows.

Decisions, Decisions

What has he actually made a decision on?  The economy?  The porkulus package that is “saving” so many jobs, was put together by Pelosi.  It was as if she brought it to him and said, “Here, sign,” and he did.  Health care?  He talked a great deal about it, but five or more proposals sprouted from different committees and like a demolition derby, banged around until there was one left, dented, but still moving.

Guantanamo?  Iraq? Afghanistan?  A decision, no, no, no, we need to ponder and confer more. Despite putting the commander, McChrystal, in place, Obama can’t seem to agree or disagree with his recommendation.  And now, the granddaddy of them all, trying the 9/11 terrorists in New York.

Who’s the Boss?

This is what Barack Obama said:

“‘This is a prosecutorial decision as well as a national security decision.”

Er, no.  This is a decision for the Commander in Chief.  Don’t slough it of on some underling, no matter how lofty his title, so that at some future date you can put the blame on him.  As Harry Truman (D) said, “The buck stops here.”  It’s time, Mr. President, to step in, assert your constitutional authority and put a stop to this.  The military tribunals were set up and authorized by Congress for just this purpose.  It’s time to do the right thing.  You took an oath to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, not to bow to your left wing base. 

 After 9/11, President Bush kept us safe  for seven and half years.  Less than a year into your presidency, we have had the worst terrorist attack on our soil since then.  This was preventable.  But we are already starting down the slippery slope of liberal happy talk and putting all Americans in harm’s way.  Consider this, if the jihadists had their way and actually defeated us and took over, the first place they would go to slaughter the devils would be Hollywood.  If you don’t want to protect America because it’s what you took an oath to do, then do it to save your Hollywood friends from themselves.

Movin' Out

One of the great blessings bestowed upon us by our Founding Fathers was federalism. Our federal form of government evolved from the Aticles of Confederation, where states had primacy and the national government acted only with the consent of the states.  This proved to be too cumbersome.

In writing the Constitution, the Founders identified very specific roles and responsibilities for the national government and left everything else to the states or the people (see Tenth Amendment).  In doing so it gave the people the power of liberty through mobility.  If you didn’t like the way they did things in Massachusetts, you could move to Virginia.  If the people of Pennsylvania didn’t want a mass migration of people to Georgia, they needed to be careful regarding the laws that they passed so as not to alienate a large block of their constituents.

The War on Federalism

The statist, who loves government and believes government should control every aspect of our lives, hates federalism, because it weakens its control.  So they attack it through the courts.

Here is their standard battle plan.  Let’s the case of Gay Marriage.  Vermont’s legislature approves Gay Marriage.  Whether you are in favor of that or oppose that it shouldn’t affect you if you don’t live in Vermont.  If you are in favor and you live elsewhere, you can move to Vermont.  If you live there and are opposed you can either fight to overturn it in Vermont, or move elsewhere.  That’s the beauty of federalism.  If continued to its logical conclusion, some states would approve it and those in favor would migrate there, and those who are opposed would concentrate in states that would ensure that it would not be adopted in their state.  You could have a raging debate, but your liberty would be preserved through mobility.

However, the statists have a different view of things.  After the law is passed in Vermont by the legislature (as is proper), or made up out of thin air by the the court in Massachusetts (judicial activism and improper), some couples who are married in these states move to another state.  By doing so, they should leave their state sanctioned rights behind.  However, what they will typically do when their Vermont sanctioned rights are not honored in, say, Tennessee they will rush to federal court and says their Constitutional rights are being violated.  A court stocked with judicial activists, will find some fig leaf of justification with words like emanations and penumbras, to make a new law of the land and with the stroke of a pen, the liberties of all Americans will be swept away based on the will of the people of Vermont.  You no longer can protect your liberty through mobility.  You cannot go anywhere to live in proximity to like minded people and live the life you believe in.  Mobility is no longer a tool to protect your liberty it is a weapon against you.  People can secure rights elsewhere and use mobility to come to your doorstep and use the courts to force their beliefs on you.

Fierce Fighting

I believe that is why the fighting over these issues become so fierce and acrimonious.  If something is allowed anywhere, it will soon be allowed everywhere, because of an activist judiciary.  Our rhetoric has become more strident, our politics is anything but bipartisan, all because everthing is being elevated to the federal level.  States are becoming less and less important.  If you don’t believe it  ask people, who was responsible for the fiasco after hurricane Katrina?  If they say President Bush, ask them to name the mayor of New Orleans or the governor of Louisiana at the time. Bush and the federal government should have been the third line of defense, not the first.  The first should have been the city, then the state and then the federal government.

Back to Federalism

Show me where in the constitution it says the government should own General Motors and Chrysler.  Show me where it says that a tunnel, entirely in the city of Boston should be paid for by the taxpayers of Arizona.  Show me where in the constitution it says education is the responsiblity not of local government but the federal government.  It doesn’t.  And until well roll back this juggernaut, our liberties will be crushed little by little, day by day.

This is why it is also important to guard against activist judges getting on the bench or being elevated to higher levels of the court. It is just these activist judges who are taking away your liberty to move away from those who don’t believe what you do and moving toward those you do agree with.  Take note of the nomination of Judge Sotomayor to the Supreme Court.