Regulations

People dislike regulations, until someone seeks to place a manufactured home on their block. Trust me.

What’s troubling is how few people understand the regulatory process. It’s much easier to dislike something, or someone, if you don’t know anything about them. Let’s take a simple look at how regulations got started and how they work.

I suppose they got started when the cave dwellers decided that the toilet area and the living area should be separated. If you’d rather, Genesis sets forth the earliest written regulation in Judo/Christian literature in its second chapter: “The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the Lord God commanded the man, ‘You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.’”

At any rate, the regulation of our lives, despite what libertarians think, goes way back in American history. It was James Madison, I think, who observed, “If Men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and the next place, oblige it to control itself.”

We might compare the regulatory process to the evolutionary process. Some of the first governmental regulations originated, believe it or not, at the request of the industry that was to be regulated. These granted certain privileges designed to increase profits or discourage competition.

Regulations then evolved to solve problems. A river catches fire. The air in large, automobile-infested cities becomes unbreathable. Skyscrapers block out sunlight from the streets below. Terrorists carry firearms on passenger planes for the purpose of hijacking them. Minorities aren’t allowed to vote and are lynched if they tried. Uh, … well let’s leave that one for now. We solved some problems, albeit with loss to our personal freedoms. We considered the loss worthwhile.

Then came the final stage in the evolution of regulations. Governments hired people to write them. Now some, not all, people who face the task of writing regulations forget that they are hired to solve problems. They come to believe that their job is to write regulations, a belief often fostered by their superiors.

So, they write regulations. Some serve a useful purpose. Some don’t. A fish faces extinction. Its role in the ecosystem, as it might affect homo sapiens, isn’t understood. A detailed and complex set of protecting the species of fish lands in the State of Arkansas. The regulations require complex and costly reporting requirements despite the fact that the particular species can’t exist in this temperate zone. The job, see, is to write regulations and someone has fulfilled the mandate.

Regulations from the first and last of the evolutionary epochs withstand attempts at revocation. The industries still benefitting still protect the first. Special interest groups fight “tooth and toenail” to protect the last.

It is the middle group of regulatory barriers that fall like trees before the bulldozers. They are the ones that protect us and the planet. They are the ones that would protect future generations They deserve our concern. All we can do at present is watch them fall.

Yeah. It's a pain in the keister.

High Thoughts and High-rises

We sat on the balcony of our East Little Rock condo Tuesday for a late chat, cigar (me), martinis (bofus), and a state of pure joy (Brenda). Our magnificent downtown skyline showed itself itself grandly that night. I suppose it wanted to impress the crowd that had just filled Verizon Arena to see U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Brenda was still “walking on air” as they say. I think the experience of seeing a powerful woman speaking to so many other women and young girls, along with the outpouring of love our city had shown, gave her hope, at least for a while, that we might be nearing a state of “Hate Fatigue.” At least it seemed so on that warm, sparkling night.

Me, I looked south toward the high-rise apartment building on Broadway, near to where we had spent ten years of our life restoring a Victorian cottage. I remembered talking by phone to an aged woman in Ohio, born there in 1898. She told me how her father’s boss, a Mr. Gans, had thrown a fit when he learned they were building a house “out in the country” instead of “in town.” They were busy building our city then and still are.

My thoughts shifted to the words of John Ruskin: “When we build, let us think that we build forever. Let it not be for present delight, nor for present use alone; let it be such work as our descendants will thank us for, and let us think, as we lay stone on stone, that a time is to come when those stones will be held sacred because our hands have touched them, and that men will say as they look upon the labor and wrought substance of them, See! this our fathers did for us."

Any thinking person, one who sat where we did that evening, would have to marvel at the miracle that is a modern city. Just to wonder at the fact that so many families rested out there safe in their homes with so many conveniences of our modern world at hand. I thought of the myriad maze of pipes and wires, both above and below ground, that allow those miracles. I thought about the armies of dedicated public and private servants that maintain that world of safety and convenience.

Oh, I know there are cynics who will point out the lapses of safety and convenience. Tell that to the tribes that once lived on the savanna with the mammoths, vipers, and saber-tooted tigers. It’s not the cynics that bemuse me. We’ve always had them. They may even serve an evolutionary need. I read somewhere that there is a genetic mechanism within us that goes off when we begin to feel too safe, warning us that danger still exists. It goes back to that savanna wherein the most relaxed and unstressed was likely to be the next eaten.

No, I don’t begrudge the cynics. It’s the misguided who call themselves “libertarians” that amaze and trouble me. They stand in the majesty of a great city or great nation and, somehow, delude themselves into thinking that all this could exist if each individual were simply free to behave exactly as she or he felt, at any given moment. They seem to believe that things would work for the best if each of us did this without regard for

- accomplishments that, by their scope and size require the efforts of the entire village;

- systems, services, and structures for which individual costs can’t be assigned;

- the needs of “the least of those among us;

- a public good that transcends politics;

- brilliant accomplishments by scientists that can’t be effectuated without cooperation and assistance from the polis; or

- the unalterable cost of civilization.

They are not stupid or evil beings, these folks. They are our brothers and sisters with whom we would agree on most things American. It is we who have let them down by halting their education at the sophomore level. It is we who have allowed education to become demonized by those who are stupid and evil. It is we who elect politicians who promote nihilism. It is we who only pontificate from a warm room on a full stomach and by words instead of actions and examples. It is we who would cast a vote for The Dark One himself if he only supported the one single issue upon which we are fixated.

Is it any wonder that the Galilean is so often depicted as weeping? 

Sunrise With Schubert

For years, I’ve used the simple four-way traffic stop as an amateur “game-play” example of rulemaking in public administrations. No, now stay with me here.

Think about it. It is a perfectly fair, non-discriminatory, self-policing phenomenon that requires little, if any regulatory framework. We don’t need an entire bureaucratic apparatus writing volumes about how to maneuver through a four-way stop.

Ever who gets there first, goes next. Gee, that’s simple.

Oh, there are other considerations maybe. There are oddly designed intersections that can cause confusion. And there is the tendency of “control freaks” to motion for you go ahead, not realizing that their deeply tinted windshields prevent your processing their generosity.

And police departments do demand their overuse on streets that should move traffic. Sadly. In the age of so-called “helicopter parents,” police in suburban cities had rather hold up the traffic flow for everyone than face a two-hour cursing from a parent whose “precious innocent” had been ticketed for speeding.

All in all, though, four-ways have served us well.

Yes, I had often used the four-way stop as a lesson in self-regulation. I also used the example of Ebay and others in maintaining honesty through a voluntary rating system. Then, there is the notion, so hated by regulatory purists, called “nudging.” That is a process of governing that rewards and makes life simpler for those doing the things considered proper.

But back to four-way stops as an ethical and moral lesson. I would, in the past, proclaim, to whomever, that in all my years of driving, I had only seen two flagrant examples of perfidy at intersections governed by four-way stops. One was nearly fifty years ago when they were first introduced in my home town. An elderly matron in the “high-rent” district, totally unused to restrictive rules, sailed through one as she had sailed through most events of her life.

The second was ten years or so by a teenager driving a pickup truck on a street near a school in one of our state’s “white-flight” cities. The driver embellished that action with a hand gesture and the facts speak for themselves.

As long as it can affect them personally, though, Americans love fairness, and will abide fair restrictions.

That all may have changed now. In the last week, I’ve witnessed two additional and flagrant violations of the “first come, first through” behavioral contract.

I fear that this signals a new social paradigm, and, if I’m right, I will blame politics. We are drifting off into a lawless world in which educated people are increasingly skeptical of rules of social interaction. We even have a small, but scary, political party dedicated to the sophomoric concept of libertarianism (the style of non-government that works so well in Somalia).

Whether it be denying a sitting United States president the right to nominate someone to fill a Supreme Court vacancy or developing laws to restrict citizens' right to vote, we daily witness a departure from civilized behavior.

The best example I can give is a society in which any behavior is allowed as long as the referee doesn’t see it. Concomitantly, aberrant behavior is allowed even if the ref sees it but is powerless to do anything about it. The increasing acceptance of that as an allowable form of government simply scares the hell out of me.

The problem is, as I see it, that an abandonment of social norms—at least those properly dedicated to the health, safety, and welfare of us all—may not lead to less social restrictions, it may lead to greater and more tragic social restrictions. At least that’s how I think the victims of the French, German, and Russian revolutions would see it.

I increasingly fail to understand how we would make America great “again” by abandoning any cultural foundation-block that ever served to make America great. I’ll keep trying, although I’ll have to disregard slavery, Jim Crow, the Great Depression, Vietnam, and Iraq. Yes, that narrows the window.

In the meantime, be wary of four-way stops. They may not be safe in this era of “government as professional wrestling.”

The Libertarian Dream

Morning Thoughts: March 21,

I have some pet peeves about films that drive anyone me around crazy. Take handguns. No, don’t “take” them. Just consider an example.

Make notes from this, by the way. It’s important. When a semi-automatic pistol fires its last round, it doesn’t keep going “click click” when you pull the trigger. After the last round, the slide stays back and it looks pretty silly, which is probably why they don’t portray it accurately in movies.

As an inside, and you won’t be charged an extra cent for this, an Army-Issue 45-caliber semi-automatic pistol has three safety devices: the regular kind, a pressure-sensitive bar on the handle, and a disabling feature on the barrel if you press it into someone.

When I was a star-garnished member of the United States Navy (that’s a LOL for those who don’t know me) the Army-Issue 45-caliber semi-automatic pistol was responsible for more accidental deaths than any weapon in history. A drunk discharged one while going through a checkpoint once that sent a slug whistling by a foot from my leg and embedding itself into a pile of sandbags. I was left to ponder the question forever whether, had the round nipped my leg, would I have earned the Purple Heart and the CIB?

Later, there was a Marine on our ship who killed his relief while showing him his “fast-draw” technique. It was a sad and tragic affair that should remind us that weapons of war are not playthings. I can still see the face of each Marine, both very nice guys.

Now how did I get off track? Oh, I remember. Pet peeves in movies. My most despised involves music. Incidentally, I have found no examples of accidental, or intentional, deaths from a musical instrument, even a banjo or accordion. I think Bing Crosby threw a sweet-potato whistle at Bob Hope once, but he missed.

No, my peeve involves bio-pics of the lives of musicians. Let me ask you. In all the films you’ve ever seen about the lives of great musicians, have you ever witnessed a scene in which they were practicing?

I doubt it. The scenarios generally run like this.

- A child witnesses someone playing beautiful music on some instrument

- The child is intrigued

- The child is too poor to obtain an instrument, but obtains one somewhere

- The child immediately plays music on a street corner but makes no money

- The child has to pawn the instrument

- The child works a series of meaningless jobs and, along the way, falls in love

- Love gets the instrument back somehow

- Love produces scene after scene of amorous adventure and disharmony

- Love triumphs and the couple spends a year abroad doing God knows what

- In the penultimate scene, the hero or heroine is playing a Paganini violin concerto in a packed concert hall

Scenes of passionate love: dozens. Scenes of bitter poverty and despair: dozens. Scenes of a musical performance: dozens. Scenes of practice: none.

It’s like a child can get a guitar for Christmas, open a tab book, and play the guitar break from Hotel California (both parts simultaneously) that evening for his family. We don’t need no stinkin’ knowledge or practice. Everything in life is simple and easy. Just ask a Libertarian.

Is it any wonder that we have elected such a bunch of clueless clowns to run our country?

I don't think he learned his craft
by running a reality TV show.

Sailing to Oblivium: September 11, 2017

Sad, but it takes a disaster, maybe even two or three, to make people proud of the people I’ve worked with for over 45 years. I’m talking about the people who work for the local, state, and federal governments. I don’t know if you have noticed, but they’ve been in the news lately. Oh, and they were in the news 16 years ago today when our most memorable national tragedy occurred. You may not have recognized them then, behind the dust and soot, but they were there.

These are the people who brave, daily, the antipathy of many Americans and talk-show hosts. They withstand the jokes, jibes, and slander hurled at them like bitter breaths of wind. These are the people about whom Ronald Reagan was talking when he said, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help.”

Oh yes, these are the folks who stormed into the burning Twin Towers to rescue people. They were there to help, and it was terrifying.

They are the ones who, along with brave civilians, rescued victims of Hurricane Harvey from swirling floodwaters. They were there to help, and it was terrifying.

They are the ones who, albeit with more time to prepare, performed a marvelous job of forecasting, planning, and oversight in dealing with Hurricane Irma. They were there to help, and it was terrifying.

And on any given day, they perform less publicized heroics, from teaching our children, to making our neighborhoods and country safe. They don't live in gold-plated penthouses. They just keep those places safe before going home to mortgaged homes in modest neighborhoods.

It saddens me when I must endure the denigration of public servants by folks who scarcely go an hour without benefiting from their service. It’s terrible to say, but the only respite from the insults comes during, and for a short time after, a disaster. The so-called libertarians grow silent, conservatives admit how lucky we were that the forecasters and rescuers were there, and even Hate Radio takes a break … sometimes. Then they’re all at it again.

Rudyard Kipling noticed it in 1890 in the attitude the British had toward their soldiers, when he wrote, in his immortal poem Tommy: “For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Chuck him out, the brute! But it's "Saviour of 'is country" when the guns begin to shoot;”

Since I work, and have worked, with these folks, I appreciate them every day and feel proud when I call them friends and colleagues. I don’t wait until the buildings are on fire, the waters are rising, or the winds are toppling buildings, to appreciate them.

The work they do is not the problem. The work they do is the solution. There should be a national day of appreciation for our public servants. Don’t count on it, though. The winds are already subsiding. Calm will come, and once again we’ll hear, “Chuck them out, the brutes.”

Lest we forget