Dumbest campaign ad so far this year

Of course, there's going to be stiff competition for the worst campaign ad of the year. So far, though, the dumbest ad, the one most insulting to voter intelligence this year to date comes from John Kerry, concerning medical costs. He says that just the paperwork of medical care costs billions of dollars every year, and that he's going to cut the cost of medical care by cutting paperwork.

Yes, it is well known that medical paperwork costs a lot of money, but a quickie promise to cut health care costs by cutting paperwork is just stupid, and insulting to the intelligence of voters.

For starters, how's he going to do this? This sounds very much like the episode of Yes, Minister in which Sir Humphrey was told to cut bureaucracy, and responded by hiring a bunch of people to study the problem. I'm sure President Kerry would appoint a commission, draft some reports and recommendations, and pass a new Medical Paperwork Reduction Act. Then doctors and insurance companies can each add on a new office worker to ensure compliance with the MPRA.

In truth, quite a bit of paperwork in medical practice is absolutely necessary. They have to keep track of which patients are getting what treatments. Stuff has to be kept up for legal liability reasons. HMOs and insurance companies of all types need to know what they're getting socked for. Much of this falls beyond what even a good, smart, politically brave president could do anything about - much less John Kerry.

That may be more the humor point, but more important is that paperwork is not the main reason medicine is expensive. Medicine costs a LOT. It takes up a significant share of our GDP, and our personal budgets.

This is largely because we're asking a LOT of medicine. We're basically the richest country in world history with the accumulated knowledge of all history in science and medicine. It's natural that we spend our wealth on our health. After all it's the most important thing.

However, as the great Robert Heinlein liked to say, "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch." (TANSTAAFL) Fancy new ultra-sound equipment and amazing new drugs just flat cost a bunch of money, and they have to be paid for. Those scientists and technicians don't work for free.

You can try to shift the costs around, and get someone else to pay for your medical care through socialized medical coverage such as Medicare and Medicaid -- but at some point SOMEONE has to actually pay for it. NO politician can just pass a law to make it free. Reality, John Kerry. John Kerry, reality. Oh, pleased to meet you.

Now, there is ONE major area of medical expense that IS within the government's control, as it is entirely a creation of government. That, of course, is legal liability. Every time we have one of these winning-the-lottery $10 million medical malpractice lawsuits, that feel-good giveaway ends up costing more like $30 million dollars in increased insurance costs.

Lots of doctors are paying SIX FIGURES for standard malpractice insurance -- besides the similar insurance issues for drug companies, medical equipment manufacturers and others. Inevitably, YOU the consumer are paying for all this.

Of course, the obvious choice would be some major tort reform to minimize the abuses and costs. Some level of malpractice liability is important and necessary, but some significant reigning in of medical costs could be achieved here relatively painlessly.

FAT CHANCE that a Democrat president or Congress is going to cross their number one campaign donors, though. Michael Moore will tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth before Democrats cut the legs out from under themselves. The vampiric and parasitic medical malpractice and product liability lawsuits of the likes of John Edwards are the very lifeblood of the modern Democrat party.

Hey, I've got a better idea: We could just cut some paperwork costs to make it cheaper. It'll be like the guy in the Ditech ads taking a page off the top of the two foot stack of mortgage forms he expects the borrowers to fill out.

Nader needs help in Indiana

Calling all Hoosiers: Ralph Nader needs a bit of support, right away.

I'm disappointed, but not surprised by THIS NEWS. Short version, Ralph Nader doesn't look like he's going to be on the Indiana ballot. He has just until noon on Wednesday, June 30 to come up with another 20,000 or so signatures, minimum.

As a member and candidate of the Libertarian Party, I'm supporting Michael Badnarik. [We already have full ballot access ourselves.]

However, Ralph Nader should be a ballot choice for those who wish to support him. I urge all Indiana voters to immediately contact Nader's people, and arrange to sign his ballot access petition.

You can contact Nader's Indiana organization HERE, or email his state co-ordinator, a Dallas Stoner or call 317-809-3120.

Moore reasons to abolish the FEC

All three branches of the federal government have colluded in the rape of the First Amendment that is McCain-Feingold's BiCRA. Here comes the fruit of their labor, from The Hill:

Michael Moore may be prevented from advertising his controversial new movie, Fahrenheit 9/11, on television or radio after July 30 if the Federal Election Commission (FEC) today accepts the legal advice of its general counsel.

At the same time, a Republican-allied 527 soft-money group is preparing to file a complaint against Moore's film with the FEC for violating campaign-finance law.

In a draft advisory opinion placed on the FEC's agenda for today's meeting, the agency's general counsel states that political documentary filmmakers may not air television or radio ads referring to federal candidates within 30 days of a primary election or 60 days of a general election.

The opinion is generated under the new McCain-Feingold campaign-finance law, which prohibits corporate-funded ads that identify a federal candidate before a primary or general election.

Personally, I think Michael Moore is a dishonest dirtbag. Nonetheless, he has a right to speak. Roasting politicians before an election is exactly THE #1 main point of the First Amendment. How dare they even consider trying to suppress this?

This comes not just from the FEC, but at the behest of some partisan hacks:

David Bossie, the president of Citizens United, plans to allege that Fahrenheit 9/11 violates federal election law, arguing that 'Moore has publicly indicated his goal is to impact this election season.'

Well, gee whiz. We can't have private citizens running loose in public trying to influence voters in an election season.

Oh, but it's not just Michael Moore who faces ugly, unconstitutional censorship. From the same article:

The FEC ruling may also affect promotion of a slew of other upcoming political documentaries and films, such as Uncovered: The Whole Truth About the Iraq War, which opens in August, The Corporation, about democratic institutions being subsumed by the corporate agenda, or Silver City, a recently finished film by John Sayles that criticizes the Bush administration.

Another film, The Hunting of the President, which investigates whether Bill Clinton was the victim of a vast conspiracy, could be subject to regulations if it mentions Bush or members of Congress in its ads.

For starters, Americans have -- in the words of a quaint old document -- an inalienable right to vigorously question our government. Besides which, Bush and the Congress already have a multi-trillion dollar federal budget with which to buy votes.

My proposed two part alternative solution: 1)Repeal BiCRA, and 2)Abolish the FEC entirely.

Hey, there are guns in my alphabet soup

I've had at least one criticism in this early part of my campaign that has some merit. In my essay on John Ashcroft, I faulted him as Attorney General for the IRS seizure of the Indianapolis Baptist Temple. A fellow Blogcritic countered that this was just wrong, because the IRS is the Treasury Department, not Justice.

Now in this particular case, I'm minimally covered in that the IRS was specifically backed up in their seizure by the FBI. They surely ARE under John Ashcroft's purview. Still, that's primarily the Treasury Department.

The thumbnail version of civics is that the Attorney General is the head federal law enforcement officer. The natural tendency then is to consider him responsible for acts of federal law enforcement.

Thing is, minions of the Justice Department are not the only federal agents who have guns and the authority to use them. Thinking it out, half the agencies of the federal government get to make up their own rules, then enforce them at gunpoint.

We've got a whole vat of alphabet soup, the FEC, FCC, BATF, IRS, SEC and who even KNOWS how many others? How many of them get to carry firearms, and enforce unilaterally whatever edicts they like? Who is even to be held responsible?

Copyright law as corporate welfare

American copyright law is MILES out of whack. The entertainment corporations have taken over the law so completely as to not just have copyrights effectively in perpetuity, but to expand the privileges of copyright so much as to effectively destroy any concept of fair use.

Copyrights are restrictions on everyone else's freedom in thousands of ways in the name of ONE person or company. Information wants to be free. It's natural that it flows and mingles and gets put back and forward in different forms.

How many truly ORIGINAL thoughts do YOU get? Most human knowledge comes built and expanded from pieces of the old. I have my own minor additions to thoughts on copyright laws, and my own writing style, but I, Al Barger, did not conjure up most of the underlying ideas or even examples in this very essay just out of the blue. I've picked them up from a hundred different books, web columns, tv shows and conversations. Am I doing something bad, or violating the "intellectual property" of others?

European classical composers, for example, would take a bit of some folk song and spin off in a different direction to create something new. A songwriter today quotes a line out of a 70 year old song though, and he's asking to get sued for a million dollars.

It's normal creative practice to take a theme or character or situation from Shakespeare, and with some new creative input it becomes West Side Story -- and thousands of others.

The entertainment corporations sway public opinion by appeals to "intellectual property rights." It's THEIR property, and people are just trying to "steal" it. We have to respect people's property rights.

People are being fooled by a bit of bogus verbal hocus pocus, though. It's COPYright, not PROPERTY right. Calling them "property rights" is merely a metaphor, a verbal sleight of hand, not a reflection of any coporeal reality. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS INTELECTUAL PROPERTY. When I go on P2P and download some Elvis Costello song, I haven't TAKEN anything. Go back to the warehouse at Sam Goody's and count your inventory- it's all there.

Lengthy and restrictive copyright law hurts individuals and the whole of society in thousands of ways, big and small. It's not just kids downloading Britney Spears, but writers and creators and businesses.

Old movies that should be available cheap as public domain are not available at all. Disney and other studios have cut out things that they think will hurt their corporate image. Try finding a copy of Song of the South, or the Popeye cartoon "You're a Sap, Mr Jap." These should be part of the public record.

Moreover, record companys with their government granted copyright privileges charge cartel prices. They want $15 for a 20 cent CD of a 40 year old record. You get to pay $20 for a 50 cent DVD of a 60 year old movie- if it's available at all.

All of this amounts to censorship and corporate welfare. You're pushing your luck to dare to parody Mickey Mouse, or to use this classic character of our collective history in a new creative context.

But the corporate greedheads aren't satisfied with their de facto permanent copyrights -- they want their Washington hacks to basically outlaw anything that could possibly be used to make copies of anything copyrighted, apparently including VCRs. The senate, and the devil's errand boy Orrin Hatch, are preparing an ugly sounding little piece of work called the Induce Act. As a senator, I would be strongly opposed to any bill vaguely resembling this description.

With stuff like this, the greedheads not only want eternal copyrights, but also a ban on any technology (hardware OR software) that exists or might be dreamt up in the future that could be used to undermine their cartel monopoly privileges. They might as well put Sony execs in jail for making the cameras used to film Al Qaeda videos.

It would be better to do away with copyrights altogether. It would open up people's creative options, and make much more stuff available much cheaper for consumers.

The problem is, of course, incentivizing creativity. If you write a book, and everyone else can just start making copies to sell same as you, then why bother? Creators need a chance to make a buck for their efforts.

Thus was written into the US Constitution this explanation and authority in Section 8 -- the only legal authority in the US for creating copyright laws: "Clause 8: To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries"

In the early days of the republic, copyrights lasted 14 years, and they could be renewed for another 14, making a total of 28 years. This still seems MORE than fair. It's generally considered that most copyrighted material makes 80-90% of its money in the first two years or less. It seems likely that this couple of years is the incentive for the writing, not what this song might be making 50 years from now.

Also, if 25 or 30 years of copyright does not strike a creative type as fair or sufficient, I would suggest that they drive a truck or wait tables for a living instead.

That's because these perpetual and constantly expanding copyrights absolutely and manifestly do NOT "promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts." They absolutely hinder it, by restricting EVERYONE'S freedom in the name of speech, of the press, of commerce, of creative expansion and expression.

Indeed, the heavyhanded copyright laws now sound unconstitutional to me, MUCH less some nonsense Induce Act. I tend to be skeptical of judicial activism, so I might go lightly on this point. However, I fail to see how 75 years after the death of the author, and the promise of further decades of extensions long before that constitute "limited times."

In short, then, 20 or 30 years should be the maximum of copyright protection. Further, I would presume that this means mostly just a monopoly in the commercial exploitation of a work. Common non-commerical P2P swapping of mp3 files, for example, should arguably be protected fair use -- though there's room to negotiate the legitimate concerns created by these emerging technologies.

However, I can understand why copyright holders might be legitimately concerned about some of this, though it has not demonstrably hurt them so far, despite how badly they've played these technologies. Considering this, and also THEIR presumed freedom, it's fair enough that they would try to CREATE Digital Rights Management technologies (DRM), such as the copy protections put into commercial DVDs.

As a consumer, I tend to be highly skeptical of these things, but then I have the right not to buy them. Done right though, such things as DRM or the empty decoy mp3 files the industry pushes into the P2P networks might at least slow down the wholesale copying of new material. Or it might just anger consumers. At least these things constitute, as it were, fair fighting -- as opposed to getting Congress to force people to pay them tribute under threat of arrest and ruination.

By rights, the Beatles and Ayn Rand and James Joyce and Charlie Chaplin should all long since be public domain. Eleanor Rigby and Father Mackenzie and Mickey should all be getting re-invented in hundreds of permutations in movies and short stories and songs, much as are Tom Sawyer and Hamlet and Moses. That's liberty, and that's certainly the greater public good.

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My strange love for John Ashcroft

I must admit to some grudging appreciation of Attorney General John Ashcroft.

First, I feel compelled to list some complaints against his Justice Department upfront. For starters, in his first months on the job, he let his IRS absolutely steal a church -- seized by force of arms, specifically the Indianapolis Baptist Temple. This was, to put it mildly, unconscionable. This seems particularly inexcusable for a supposed evangelical Christian. On the other hand, you could consider it a mitigating factor that he merely seized the building, rather than burning it down with the congregants inside. I suppose that constitutes an improvement over the previous AG. That's really setting the bar rather too low, though.

Also, he's got people out trying to prosecute plain old porno - using the Patriot Act. I guess he's fighting the insidious porno-terrorists. Shut the hell up. Are there no real crimes needing investigated? Don't you people have some Al Qaeda cells to monitor?

I'm not real thrilled with his gung-ho support of the Patriot Act in general. It's not the Third Reich or anything, but this unquestioning support of a badly put together gobbledygook expansion of police powers doesn't indicate the greatest care for constitutional liberties.

Please excuse me if I seem a bit overly suspicious. For the sake of argument, let's say we trust Ashcroft's good will not to abuse these new powers. I'm just not thrilled with what kind of precedents and expanded powers for abuse are going to be handed to the next Janet Reno that comes down the pike.

Lastly in complaints, he's got Tommy Chong in a federal prison for selling glass pipes. If the Bush administration has something for Tommy Chong, it should be an arts award at the Kennedy Center, not jail time.

Moreover, Ashcroft is just plain creepy. Watching him, I get the idea that he doesn't go home and unwind: kiss the wife, have a little drink and some dinner and a video. He's all dark and dour and obsessive.

I saw him testifying before a senate committee June 8 or 9, dryly detailing various scenarios of possible terrorist attacks. I had visions of him sitting in a rocking chair in the dark for hours by himself, obsessively gaming things out night after night, having Revelations of the Apocalypse, like John on the Isle of Patmos.

Then they got to the real meat of the hearings, with Democrats grilling him about news reports saying that his people had written advisory memos for the president and/or the military suggesting something like that there might be some loopholes or leeway in laws against "torture." Ashcroft absolutely LAUGHED at the question, before politely and repeatedly deflecting the question- executive privilege or whatnot. There's your answer: non-denial. Actually, that seems like a pretty clear answer to me.

As a civil libertarian, I felt a small cold chill. I don't entirely trust this guy with my constitution, and he was looking like Lurch and like maybe he hadn't slept much in the last couple of days, and if he had it must have been with this suit on.

But also at this hearing, Ashcroft slowly read the names of terrorist suspects that he is looking for, and I felt a little better about him. I know I wouldn't want this freak reading MY name in front of a senate committee. It would put the fear of Yahweh into ME, and I don't scare that easy. I will admit that I like the idea of THIS particular dark cloud hanging over anybody in this country plotting our demise.

In short, John Ashcroft is a crazy, dark SOB -- but he's OUR crazy, dark SOB. I suppose this was approximately Nixon's appeal, but Rand knows I'm not proposing making Ashcroft president.

I sure believe in keeping a close eye on this guy though, cause he could go all Jack D Ripper on us. I wouldn't trust him with the nuclear codes. Yes, Mr. Ashcroft, that's just what we need -- a little water on the back of the neck and the code.

I don't know how much any of this indicates that he's a more effective head of federal law enforcement than anyone else would be, versus being just a surface emotional reaction on my part.

On the other hand, we haven't had a successful major terrorist attack since 9/11, and surely he deserves some small part of the credit. The arrests keep coming, and the plots keep unraveling. He'll certainly be getting the blame if there IS another big successful domestic terrorist attack.

Yesterday (June 14), there was Ashcroft announcing the arrest and indictment of some Al Qaeda jackass from Somalia who was busted plotting to blow up a mall in Columbus, Ohio. Hey now, I've got people there. I've got a three year old niece in Columbus.

Thank you, then, Mr. Attorney General, and thanks to your staff. I just respectfully request that you try to ignore the old hippies, Christians, and masturbators. They're not the problems.

Reagan was OK

So we just buried President Reagan today. Seems like a good place to start with this campaign. I was nominated by the Central Committee of the Libertarian Party of Indiana as our candidate for United States Senate on June 6, a few hours after the passing of the president.

I never voted for Reagan. I turned 18 in October of 1980, but I was already a committed purist Libertarian Party supporter, passing out Ed Clark literature door to door a good year before I ever met another self-described Libertarian. Sure, it SOUNDED good when candidate Reagan said he was going to cut government, but I didn't think any Republican (or Democrat) would ever really do such a thing. Would that he were the budget slashing monster of pinko nightmares.

I was correct in that judgment, despite my tender years. For all the squalling and bawling about Reagan killing the poor and "slashing" the budget, he never so much as actually proposed even a trim. The budget went UP every year. He added MORE cabinet level departments rather than getting rid of them. Plus, I really did not appreciate the drug war.

On the other hand, he did cut some tax rates, and did a few things in a regulatory relief vein that helped, and kept the government from getting a whole lot bigger and grabbier. Beat a sharp stick in the eye.

He was, of course, quite effective in dealing with the Soviets. I probably did not fully appreciate that at the time.

On the other hand, we could look at some flaws. I understand how he might have been thinking he was doing right, but he got us into bed with a lot of lowlife scummy dictator types that gave him the Iran-Contra heartburn, and ended up setting up the likes of Bin Laden. That cut and run in Beirut was a very costly mistake for the nation in the long run.

Still, he stood down the Soviets, and set the economy back in the right direction. He won his war. We'll will win this one.

Moreover, Reagan was a good guy. He tried to be honest and straight and do what was right and decent. Just purely as a human being, Ronald Reagan was outstanding. Among all the American political leaders of my lifetime, he's about the number one best pick whom I would like to have foreigners look at as our exemplar. THAT is the kind of people Americans are. The only politician in my lifetime that I would rate higher would be Reagan's hero Barry Goldwater.

Ronald Wilson Reagan was pretty good- we could (and have) done a lot worse. That's about as high a praise as you're likely to ever hear me utter for a big time politician. He probably did about as good as anyone could have, and still actually get elected.

Also, that was a beautiful final ceremony at his library. The children were great, even especially Patti Davis and her story about the goldfish. The pageantry and spectacle were perfect- not a gross display of military might with thousands of troops, but a quiet and dignified ceremonial with a dozen or so soldiers paying the nation's respects. The setting, the hills, the sunset- just breathtaking. Bonus image: Governor Schwarzenegger sitting on the front row next to Margaret Thatcher. That brief site of Maggie bowing to his coffin made a good quiet climax to the event.

This funeral made for a perfect final display of Reagan's pride in his country, and a final affirmation of Reagan's faith in the American people. Heck, even I was a little choked up.

Thank you, Mr. President.