Dear Friends,
It seems to me, the entirety of my articles taken in the aggregate, are a road map of a nearly ideal government, pragmatically accepting human nature as it is, without the presumption of trying to change it. People are people, we want to collaborate, but we take advantage of the weak, we want to trade but we will take if there is no chance of getting caught, and we want equanimity but when our own interests are at stake, we balk at it. We are our own worst enemy, each and every one of us, any governmental structure must speak to our dualistic natures. Whenever possible, passive incentives rather than active measures should be put in place, to give everyone a stake in society. Since history is unambiguous about the outcomes of a free market versus a rationally controlled market, the free market must be as free as possible, to reap the greatest gain from it’s inherent abundance. Those who run government, always have been and always will be the greatest source of tyranny, their ability to usurp power to themselves must be sufficiently strong and have real teeth else no form of government, no matter how well constituted, can survive long. To that end I offer the Fourth Branch.
Our natures get the better of us all the time. Selling a house we might “forget” to mention there is a septic problem and when directly asked, simply lie. Then lament the huge extra costs of paying for a lawyer to do anything. If those around us are so corrupt, imagine how much more corrupt, those who pay no price for their actions and take no blame for any decision, are. Leaders have almost no incentives to remain virtuous and every reason not to be. Name them, power, sex, money, these are the worldly things that draw us into corruption. How much more magnified must the corruption be in our leaders than us, when they are caught doing things that put you and I in jail, but they skate with a standing ovation, a raise and another intern to abuse. Meanwhile churches, synagogues, fraternal organizations and others, give away food for the needy, provide for orphans, nurse the sick and help rebuild after catastrophe, all at their own costs. Human nature must be taken into account in any attempt to form an ideal government.
Since human nature is so mercurial, tending to corruption in a vacuum, oversight should be greatest for those at the top and least for those at the bottom. This is exactly opposite of what society does now. Today, our leaders have no oversight whatsoever, except themselves, while the rest of us are monitored incessantly. An ideal government would subject leaders to every law they pass on anyone, even, and especially if those laws don’t fit to lawmakers. Safety regulations for example, when a lawmaker crosses the parking lot to his waiting air conditioned limousine, he or she should, as a McDonald employee must, wear day glow green vest and a hard hat. Every regulation passed, must be applied to those who passed them, else there is no incentive to keep laws sane, and to pass the responsibility to a bureaucrat. Rather, if every law was forced on the lawmakers, including the President as he gets off Air Force One, wearing a safety helmet and day glow green vest flapping in the down draft, rest assured, laws would be very well thought out.
Active measures like law enforcement should be the last resort never the first in community problems. Most crime comes from a lack of a stake in society. Take away a child’s stake in society, or just blind them to their stake, and you have created a criminal. Suddenly everything that was off the table when that child had a stake in society is now on it. Drugs, stealing, prostitution, robbery, murder and every crime you can think of. Fraternal organizations, Scouts, churches, Synagogues, etc… all have a function, or at least they did, now the government has muscled them aside and taken over that role with the government monopoly school system, with the result that no one believes they have a real stake in society. Passive measures like, a school voucher system and limiting government’s ability to interfere with cultural and social institutions, would go much farther than an unlimited number of police in limiting crime and societal upheaval.
Even in a very limited constitutional government we see that the elite in government must be actively policed. How absurd is it that in the US today, a politician who wants to balance the budget and return to Constitutional government, is called radical!?!?! Only in revolutionary times would such a thing go past our noses without at least a sniff. The offices of every congressperson, senator, judge, bureaucrat, appointee, diplomat, etc… should be equipped with full video and sound, recorded and available to the public both on demand and live streaming on the internet. Any infraction of any law would bring instant enforcement action through a Fourth Branch. The Fourth Branch would be given power sufficient to try even the Alger Hiss’ of the world, without reprisals, teeth to punish them and eyes and nose to detect any hint of corruption.
Limited government, laissez faire free markets, returning to a society that embraces morality, individualism, innovation and risk taking are the hallmarks of my vision for a better government, economy, culture and society. One that is limited and so doesn’t limit anyone’s potential, is based on free market principles so the people can be affluent, is moral so the laws need be few and enforcement rare, individualistic people to beware of those peddling tyranny in a bunny mask and finally, innovative to advance our technology, understanding of God’s universe and ourselves. In short government should not be in the way. Anyone who reads the entirety of my work will quickly grasp the subtleties of such a government, why I have concluded it is nearly ideal and how to implement it. Any country that adopted these ideas would very quickly become a power house, economically, militarily and have a wealthy happy people.
Sincerely,
John Pepin
