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Pelosi, with
raised fist, squawked, "Jobs. Jobs. Jobs. Jobs."
The shamefulness
of the spectacle of the passage of the Climate Bill did not spring from the
squeaked two votes "win" (217 would have denied passage; 219 was
secured) nor Pelosi’s embarrassing squawks.
No. It oozed from
the now predictable spectacle of Democans and Republicrats birthing
yet another monstrosity of oppression.
Powerful
parasites teamed with clever-thinking thugs, clueless confidence men and
large numbers of brainwashed bellies to disgorge the latest bread and circus
baby that would have made Machiavelli proud. Machiavelli knew all the ways to
get people to voluntarily consent to their own enslavement.
We witnessed it
live on C-Span. It was an ugly sight. The very nature of the State apparatus
itself was on display. Clearly, the tyranny ruling our land hasn’t been
established by force or by inheritance; it has been elected. Those elected
have obviously worked feverishly to convert a short-term shot in the
driver’s seat into a near-hereditary entitlement for themselves and
their friends, with the single exception, known to me, being a humble doctor
from Texas who has even refused pension.
The men and women
who comprise Congress may not be evil, but they are aggressively designing
our economic and cultural prisons. Many of us are as convinced as they are
that the common good is their goal. It is untrue, but how has this palatable
corruption and deceit come about? Two strategies – one material and one
ideological – were implemented.
First, elected
representatives got as many as they wanted in on the take. This is the raw
purchase of consent. That tactic attracted a hard core of powerful people
benefitting from the pillage. Waxman, Markey, Pelosi and Obama are busy this
minute distributing promised loot to big business special interests. The
other side of the aisle will get theirs also. It is equal-opportunity
plunder.
Second, an
intellectual propaganda network bamboozled us with tales of a large planetary
cause, a looming crisis that they would avert. Such perception management
permitted the despots to appear wise and protective. Some participant-props
had been awarded Nobel prizes. Most garnered authority credentials.
Anthropogenic global warming was, this time, the crisis-opiate that girded
our loins and softened our forthcoming sacrifice. We are duped into believing
that we, or the planet, will benefit by the micro-regulation and
macro-taxation of our behaviors. Prostituted scientists and
"climatologists" in black robes had christened natural,
life-sustaining carbon dioxide a "poisonous pollutant." The
over-reaching Environmental Protection Agency teamed with the pathetic
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change to steamroller legislation before
their gig was up. (Way too many inquiring minds had been exposing the AGW urgency, as
presented, to be fraud. The Australian Senate is
rejecting its own version of Cap-and-Trade. The EPA has been caught
red-handed censoring a global-warming study that was inconvenient. New EU
Parliament Group includes climate skeptics. The Polish Academy of Science is
challenging man-made global warming. The earth’s temperatures have
flat-lined since 2001, despite growing concentrations of CO2. Green jobs are
found to be a cost not a benefit to our national economy.)
Thus, in two
subtle strategies, we have strengthened the chains that will keep us bound to
tyranny. The bad-seed baby – H.R. 2454: the American Clean Energy and
Security Act – sets in place a gargantuan government army of
bureaucrats to fleece trillions from an already burdened and sinking
middle-class sheeple. Rationing energy will give this mob the power over who
literally lives and who dies. There is no part of this inflicted pain that
will gain any significant reduction of global warming. There is every piece
of this inflicted pain that will be impoverishing Americans through its
economy-killing mandates and, very likely, be precipitating a trade war by
taxing our large trade partner, China.
Having created
this new monstrosity, some members of the House may be feeling the shame.
There had been, after all, a refreshing crack in the serious work of plunder
and obfuscation when Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) began to read from
page after page of the 300 additional pages that dropped onto the already
massive 1200 page bill at 3:09 just that same morning. Mind-numbing details
gave mere glimpses of the newly unleashed tyranny to come. Guffaws were a
rational and healthy response as many members realized the absurdity of
pretense that any of them had had time to read and comprehend what he was
being asked to vote on. So much for transparency.
This awful bill
passes now to the Senate. Perhaps Senators will actually read it. Having read
it, perhaps there are enough Senators with integrity to defeat it.
House members
have opportunities to redeem themselves. They can repeal laws. Begin now.
And, they hold the most important power. The House of Representatives in the
Congress of the United States of America constitutionally holds the power of
the purse. House Representatives can, in fact, strangle oppressive activities
by withdrawing financial support. Just cut off funds and wars will wither
from the Executive vine. Just deny money and plunderers will have to turn to
production. Tough love could find a home in the House.
And,
individually, tough wills could find a way out from under this tyranny. We
can just say no. We can withdraw consent. The Prince had his
Machiavelli to show him the way to rule. We have our Gandhi and our
Étienne de La Boétie (the first libertarian political
philosopher in the Western world) to show us how to undo the seemingly
overwhelming power of the ruling State. Murray Rothbard uncovered those
liberty-saving strategies in The Political Thought of Étienne de La Boétie. Listen carefully
to his sage and stirring words.
Tea Parties,
secession movements, bailout protests, and plummeting approval ratings of
both elected and unelected "leaders" show that thoughtful citizens
are restless. When our monopoly cartel central bank is transparently audited,
the statists’ failed experiments and unhealthy entanglements will be
exposed. Unexamined faith in government will face fresh and critical
examination. If it withdraws its consent to servitude, free society will
flourish.
Floy Lilley
Floy Lilley [send her mail] is an
adjunct faculty member at the Mises Institute. She was formerly with the
University of Texas at Austin's Chair of Free Enterprise, and an
attorney-at-law in Texas and Florida.
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