The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Nearly Enjoying Trifecta

Posted on | April 29, 2011 | 5 Comments

by Smitty

Trifecta has a bull session about amending the Constitution. They badly need to support buffering, so that I can let the clip download at a medium pace in a back tab, and then watch it normally. Typing commentary for this post was somewhat improved by the stop-n-go motion, but it’s bad. I managed to enjoy 3 minutes of it. (Click to watch.)

They’re on about term limits. ‘Meh’, say I. Term limits are symptomatic, but not, of themselves, problematic. The real issue is the systemic drivers that reward a West Virginia for afflicting the rest of the country with Byrd droppings for half a century.
As I’ve already argued at some length, what we need to do, rather than add, is subtract.
Fiscal responsibility through a budget amendment is another bugaboo. There will be a loophole for ’emergency’ spending, and reality, itself, will become a total emergency.
A fair, flat tax with everyone having skin in the game isn’t such a bad idea, but it still accedes too much power to DC, in my opinion. States should firewall their citizens from DC, and tax farm however the citizens see fit. This would be slightly less stable, but States need skin in the game, too. My notion would have the states liable for a target amount, the budget limited to the previous years’ actual receipts, and a VAT assessed on States that fail to meet their tax target of sufficient magnitude to make up the previous year’s delta.
Admittedly, this sucks because the government’s revenue stream is less predictable. However, that ain’t no bug: it’s a feature. Reality-based estimates of what the government actually can provide will help curb the propensity for idiocy. In other words, we’d have a desperately needed negative feedback loop.
My full presecription is here.

Update: linked at The Camp of the Saints.

Category: Constitution

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