The word “outsourcing” is on everbody’s lips. But how many know what it means?

It’s a business buzzword. When a company hires out for things normally handled in-house, that’s “oursourcing.” It needn’t be out of state, or country. Quite a bit of it is to businesses around the corner. In all of the brouhaha over outsourcing, it’s rarely mentioned that politicians have been trying to meet today’s challenge. Trouble is, they’re only making things worse.

Outsourcing frightens some. Employees don’t like competing with strangers. Politicians don’t want to lose tax revenue to other districts. So states and municipalities fight back, making special deals with the biggest companies. Tax deals. Infrastructure deals. Subsidies. They think of it as a kind of investment! But it’s money thrown away.

Washington state recently spent over $3 billion trying to keep Boeing nearby, a new record. But in a sense that’s not the biggest figure. State and municipal governments around the country spend at least $40 billion per year to keep businesses local. That’s loco. And no way to encourage good business.

The best thing governments can do is not try milking businesses for all they’re worth. Be efficient. Establish a fair playing field. And give up showing preferences for some, which makes other businesses and individuals pay all the more to keep government chugging along.

In politics we need to think about sourcing, too. The kind that gets us back to the source of our prosperity: freedom.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Talk about a case of Multiple Personality Disorder. A thousand public service announcements a day urge Americans to kick the smoking habit. Meanwhile, state and federal governments rely on cigarette taxes to cover the check for everything from Medicaid to education. Washington subsidizes tobacco farmers then turns around and tries to regulate cigarette manufacturers out of existence.

It’s even more absurd in New York City, where cigarette taxes now total three dollars per pack. “Legal” smokes are so expensive that it pays to bootleg with predictable, violent results. The NYPD has a new “Cigarette Interdiction Unit” and smugglers are shooting each other in the streets. So why can’t we just stop the madness?

If you think it’s hard to quit smoking, ask your lawmakers to give up “their” tobacco revenue and see who gets shaky and irritable first. It’s not about your health it’s about your money. They want it, as much of it as they can get, preferably right now. What do they want it for? Spending is its own justification.

Thirty million bucks for a smoking cessation program in Michigan. Ninety-three million in crop subsidies to North Carolina tobacco farmers. It all comes down to buying our votes with our own money. Don’t try weighing the differences. Yes, 300,000 people per year die of lung cancer and four people are killed smuggling smokes. But what matters is that politicians get re-elected.

It’s time for the voters to just say no. And not just about smoking.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

We’ll get this commentary going in a sec. Sorry, we’re waiting for a regulatory agency in Washington, the Federal Election Commission, to tell us exactly what we can say about members of Congress and with money raised just how and from whom and when exactly during the year we might legally mention the names of these politicians.

You’re lucky if you don’t deal at all with the campaign finance law. They’re a purposely ridiculous legal tangle requiring lawyers and accountants. Who charge, by the way. Which pushes out the little guy, of course, while hardly impacting the big players at all. It really should be any time now.

The decision of the FEC will actually be ongoing, because new issues always crop up in the battle to regulate elections to federal office. Congress passes new laws, the FEC issues ever more regulations, lawyers and accountants interpret the regs, then it all ends up in court. Not very good at waiting . . . especially for something so vital as freedom of speech.

So let me mention a name: Nancy Pelosi. Democrat, San Francisco. She was recently fined for flagrantly violating the campaign finance laws she pushed through Congress. While campaigning for the job of minority leader, seems she funneled $100,000 illegally to various Democrats running for Congress. Well, can I say that?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

It looks like the Florida Chamber of Commerce has decided to double as both business lobby and comic troupe. What else could we make of the Chamber’s most recent campaign?

Cozying up to Florida legislators, the Chamber has urged them to take initiative rights away from Florida voters. You didn’t think coming on like snobby deniers of the rights of voters was serious did you? It’s laughable; it has to be a gag. The Chamber says there are too many constitutional amendments passed by the voters 95 since 1970. Of course, only 16 were by citizen initiative. Still, you can hear Chamber lobbyists, with straight faces and impeccable timing, tell us that we therefore need to restrict only citizen initiatives require a super-majority to pass them, and allow the state supreme court to strike them down willy-nilly. Not those put on the ballot by wise legislators, mind you; only those put on the ballot by the rabble er, I mean, the people.

Funny stuff. In comedy, timing is everything, so which election should these anti-voter measures be put up for a vote? Hey: why not an election with the least voters? The primary, not the general election. Avoid almost 2 million independents! “A wise plan,” say the comedians, twiddling their waxed mustaches. Voting is a laugh to the state’s new Chamber of Comedy & Commerce and to legislators. But, I wonder: how funny will the people of Florida find their routine?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Seems every year or so legislators in South Dakota go into session and forget just about everything they once knew about the people they are supposed to represent.

You see, South Dakotans have been clear as a cowbell about term limits. They like ‘em. They voted to make term limits part of the state constitution back in 1992 by a solid 64-to-36 percent vote. A few years back, legislators tried to undo the term limits; by the time the public got wind of it, the measure had already passed one chamber. Within days, radio ads alerted South Dakotans about what the legislators were up to, and . . . well, the other chamber backed away lickety split.

Last year, legislators again tried to water down term limits. Polls showed voters no longer supported term limits with the 64 percent it passed by. No, support had shot up to 70 percent. As voters found out about the legislative machinations on term limits, legislators backed off. Now this year, many legislators again forgot where the voters stood. The state Senate voted 23 to 11 to repeal term limits.

Senator Paul Symens of Amherst said, “I think we ought to do away with term limits because I have not seen anything valuable come from that.” Voters soon heard about the scheme and called to wake up a few representatives. The House decided to quietly kill the bill. South Dakota. Great faces. Great places. Forgetful politicians.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.