State is the name of the coldest of all cold monsters.
Coldly it lies; and this lie slips from its mouth:
"I, the state, am the people."
-----Lysander Spooner

Liberty and Nothing Less


Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force.
Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.
-George Washington

George Washington was the indispensable man in US history. He well understood the natural character of government and led the fight for American Liberty against oppression. Unfortunately today we Americans are still fighting the same fight except it is not against a foreign government but our own.

I leave you with a final thought by syndicated radio talk show host Paul Harvey to ruminate:

They have gun control in Cuba. They have universal health care in Cuba. So why do they want to come here?

Nationalizing Oil?

6.16.2008 by skeiser , ,

A recent Rasmussen Reports poll indicates that only 47% of Americans favor not nationalizing oil. 29% favor nationalization and about a quarter of Americans are not sure. Nationalization of industry is a dangerous practice of totalitarian governments, governments like Soviet Russia, Communist China, and Socialist Venezuela. This to say the least is a scary thought. By a similar margin more Americans trust private industry as opposed to government intervention to lower oil prices.

Hugo Chavez in Venezuela has nationalized oil production. What have been the effect? Simply, declining production and wells falling into disrepair. This is in short the effect of nationalizing an industry. Another example comes from a teacher I had for US History in 8th grade. She visited Russia many times in the 1990's after the fall of the USSR. She was visiting a family and looking at some family portraits. She noticed as the children grew older the nails holding the frames grew larger as well. She asked the family why this was. The family replied that in Soviet Russia businesses were told they had to produce a certain weight of nails and then they could call it a day. In effort to speed up the day they produced fewer larger nails while decreasing the quality and usefulness of the product.

Nationalizing has an effect of reducing efficiency and quality of the product because the government is not motivated by profit. The evidence for this is on display in Venezuela where nationalizing the industry has seen declining oil production. In a free market economy where oil can be bought and sold, nationalizing oil would increase the price because of the reduction in quantity that would result. Nationalization of the oil industry is not the answer.

Nationalization may cut out the profits companies seek but in return the government will become a monopoly. Without competition in the market, the demand for higher efficiency in the drilling and refining process will decline and prices will rise. The government will not be forced to compete for survivability, which in all cases has resulted in higher prices.

Finish reading the story here.

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