Category: Common Sense

What’s going on in Russia? It’s starting to look like the Soviet Union again. In some respects it probably never changed, but this isn’t exactly a step forward. Russian President Vladimir Putin arrested a wealthy businessman, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who also happened to be a political opponent of Vladimir Putin. The arrest was made in the most obnoxious manner possible, with masked Fedskies storming the businessman’s private plane. The government even seized a chunk of the stock of Khodorkovsky’s company, Yukos Oil.

The thug-like actions aren’t exactly reassuring to Russia’s stock markets. Or Russian businessmen. “Shut up or be shut down” is not a reassuring message. Or a liberalizing one. It’s possible Khodorkovsky is guilty of shady dealings. But some reports suggest that his business operation is one of the most open in Russia. What we do know is that Khodorkovsky had traded sharp words with Putin at a meeting a few months ago, complaining about corruption in the sale of an oil company to the Russian government. And Putin hasn’t done anything to allay the impression that this is a political counter-strike. Russian politicians of every ideological stripe have denounced it for being just that. This is bad stuff.

Ordinary Russians with no assets to loot should complain as best they can. Too bad they don’t also have the power to recall their president. The good news is all the public complaining already about Putin’s action. Even his own prime minister has gone on TV to question the move. Fifteen years ago, you wouldn’t have seen that kind of opposition in Russia.

This is Common Sense.  I’m Paul Jacob.

It’s the American Automobile Association to the rescue yet again. I hope. Lon Anderson, who does public relations work for AAA Mid-Atlantic, suggests that maybe speeding-ticket cameras should be getting tickets themselves. They are too fast on the draw. And they’re too often being used to bring in revenue rather than to improve safety.

An example is good old Washington, DC, near where I live. Between August of 1999 and June of this year, DC collected almost $22 million in fines as a result of citations generated by red-light cameras. Then there are the citations issued by photo-radar cameras. Which brought in another $30 million during that time. Most of the citations get sent to hapless drivers who run the red light by just fractions of a second. Sometimes the yellow light is on for only a few seconds, and then what’s the motorist supposed to do as it flips to red while he’s in the middle of an intersection? Screech to a halt?

The district is using the cameras to generate revenue, and Mayor Williams admits it. So the AAA no longer supports the district’s use of them. Anderson says, “The truth appears to be that we are not interested in just nabbing the egregious violators it’s the blink-of-an-eye violator, it’s the unintentionals, that bring in the big bucks. I think we ought to be out to catch the bona fide red-light runners who are threatening our lives.”

Let’s hope City Hall brings this program to the shop for an overhaul. Or maybe it should go straight to the scrap heap.

This is Common Sense.  I’m Paul Jacob.

Now I have to tell you about the German cat. In a recent column for Townhall.com I talked about the TV licensing tyranny in Great Britain. It seems that the British people must pay an annual “licensing fee” just for turning on their tallies. Been going on for years. There are vans that go around detecting signals from people who watch TV without paying the fee. The TV licensing people send periodic letters to non-payers and do their best to search the homes of non-payers who claim they don’t watch TV. Even confirmed non-TV watchers can’t get out from under this TV regime. It’s an outlandish petty tyranny that I really wouldn’t believe if there weren’t so much documentation of it.

Readers tell me that all this is happening in Ireland, Italy, and Germany too. And who knows where else. Which doesn’t surprise me, now that I have gotten over my surprise about the situation in the UK. But I already knew about Germany, because I had seen that story about the German cat. The cat got harassed about its lack of a TV license by the German TV-ocracy. The owner says, “My cat Maxi loves animal films, but I am not paying for him to watch telly.” A representative of the German TV-ocracy says, “From time to time, cats or dogs get letters. It just happens and of course Maxi won’t have to pay.”

Sure. What do we expect, what with 13 million letters from the TV-ocracy going out to German households each year? You’re off the hook, Maxi.

This is Common Sense.  I’m Paul Jacob.

If you’re going to ask non-journalists to ask questions at the Democratic presidential debates, how should you go about it? Well, I personally being very nave think you should do it by saying, “Okay, think of a question. As long as it doesn’t violate reasonable requirements of civility, decorum, and relevance, go ahead.”

But the producers at CNN moderating a recent CNN-sponsored presidential debate called “Rock the Vote” didn’t agree with that approach. “Macs or PCs?” one student wanted to know, and everybody groaned at the vapidity of the question. But the student, Alexandra Trustman, reports that it wasn’t her question at all. Trustman says it was a CNN producer who suggested she ask the PC versus Mac thing. She was puzzled but came up with a more complicated, question about technology that she thought more relevant. But the producer told Trustman that “it wasn’t light-hearted enough and they wanted to modulate the event with various types of questions” and instructed her to ask the Mac versus PC thing instead.  A CNN spokesman says, “In an attempt to encourage a lighthearted moment in this debate, a CNN producer working with Ms. Trustman clearly went too far. CNN regrets the producer’s actions.”

Okay. I’m glad they admitted they steered the student wrong. But they’re still not ‘fessing up to the bigger problem here. Their whole spin approach as such was a blunder. There’s a difference between moderating and sit-com directing. And if you really want to know what the people want to know, you let them ask.

This is Common Sense.  I’m Paul Jacob.

Howard Dean’s decision to opt out of the presidential public financing system is supposedly that system’s death-knell. If only it were true! The system is broken, but it doesn’t need fixing. It needs to be buried deep in Yucca Mountain.

They say private money is “dirty” and corrupting, while public funds are “clean” and wholesome. I have some dirty private money in my pocket and I don’t want politicians cleaning it for me. Sure, corruption in our government is rampant, but public financing of presidential campaigns certainly hasn’t done anything to change that. Moreover, public financing gives government far too much power. Power over elections and speech. And who do you think will be writing the rules for public financing? Yeah, career politicians in Congress.

Even as Dean has opted out, he insists that we need a much more robust system that provides “qualified candidates with the public funding necessary to wage meaningful and competitive campaigns . . .” Under Dean’s system, just how much tax money will it take to give everyone enough to run a “meaningful and competitive” campaign? Or will the incumbents in Congress continue to write the rules so that mainstream candidates are subsidized to a much greater degree? So that the powerful and connected get an extra push at the expense of everyone else the way it is now?

Let the people donate if they choose. And let voters judge candidates by their fundraising as well as by other issues. It’s called free elections.

This is Common Sense.  I’m Paul Jacob.

One of my favorite writers is the economist and social thinker Thomas Sowell. Sowell is a professor, but hey, he can think straight. So he’s one of those weird hybrids. One thing I like about him is his stand on term limits. Sowell is in favor. I guess it helps that he lives out in California, where everything is done in a big way, including the screw-ups of career politicians.

Recently the good doctor took on one of the weaker arguments career politicians like to hurl at us. You know, that crock about how career politicians are so super-experienced that we can’t possibly let ’em ever ride off into the sunset. I’ve bashed this notion so often myself that I’m starting to get tennis elbow. So I’m happy to turn the floor over to Sowell.  In a recent column talking about the politics of the Davis recall effort, Sowell says that “the old ‘lack of experience’ game that politicians like to play against any newcomer doesn’t have quite as much weight any more, when you see what a monumental mess the experienced, lifelong politicians like Governor Gray Davis have made.

There could even be a lesson here for people in other states. “When politicians talk about being ‘experienced,’ the question should be asked: Experienced in doing what? In deceiving the public? Evading responsibility? Claiming credit for what happens that is good and blaming others for whatever happens that is bad? Experience in spin or smoke and mirrors?” Dr. Sowell, you took the words right out of my mouth.

This is Common Sense.  I’m Paul Jacob.