Charles Murray, in his book, We The People, not only outlines when and with which case we lost our liberties and unchained the federal government, but also proposes a solution. Flat out repealing all the bureaucracy simply won’t work. Too many links and too many depending on all this. The only way is to start cutting back on government power.
Murray’s proposal is to fight EVERY overstepping of authority, EVERY snide bureaucrat thinking HE (or she) had the answer AND authority (EPA just naturally comes to mind) – all the way to federal court.
This, of course, can get expensive. So Murray’s proposal is that rich conservatives and libertarians set up think tank-like organizations dedicated to fighting in court every overstep they can find.
Like this.
This is a case where a small milk-producing company in Florida ran afoul of the Florida what-ever-the alphabet-department is, over branding their skim milk, skim milk. They were told they can’t do that because there is a loss of Vit A in the process. The company tried all manner of ways to fulfill the supposed “standard”, including putting a notice on the container about it, etc. But they were ALL denied. ONLY labelling it “mild product”, NOT “skim milk” would do.
But in point of fact it IS – JUST SKIM MILLK!
So yesterday, or a day or so ago, a federal judge struct down the restriction, noting there was no public danger in the label and that the state was unnecessarily encroaching on the 1A rights of the dairy. Skim milk, which is exactly what this is, is just skim milk and people should be allowed to call it so.
We need lots more of these. We need to tie the fed in knots, waging lawfare on every department that is out of control. While the fed seems to be an endless deep pocket, only the poor find it so. Yes, the usual attempt is to threaten fines so astronomical as to extort anyone to comply, the response ought to be to tell them to put that threat where the sun don’t shine and sue them all the way to federal court.
I am a great admirer of Charles Murray; own three of his books and have “We The People” en route. Looking forward to this one in particular, because he has been focused on the other aspect of restricting taxpayers rights- enabling and supporting dysfunctional behavior that harms and, in the context of history, eventually destroys society.
Question: Should “We” be our first Book Club member selection? I wholeheartedly vote yes!
“Question: Should “We” be our first Book Club member selection? I wholeheartedly vote yes!”
Yes, but you can only read while in the shower so as to give the rest of us a chance to keep up!
*
Deal.
*
I still need to read Coming Apart.
It’s not like he wrote a series. Come on, Mikey!
Maybe if he’d included a chapter on cheerleaders and sorority girls…
I’d be happy to volunteer; one of my greatest pleasures in life is to inhale and discuss a great book. I gravitate towards historical biographies and 19th/20th century novels but am open to almost anything but 50 Shades of Gray!
I think we could establish a plethora of categories and focus on one per month via an AMU discussion. I think it’s much more fun to talk about books than to write about them as does Arthur Herman who has given some mesmerizing lectures on his historical biographies of Gandhi and Churchill at AEI in D.C.
Do I hear Road Trip? But, I get ahead of myself…
But there are no visuals in his books save graphs! ):
Florida could have just required that unapproved milk be labeled “assault milk”.
Or Rotobagwazian. It is the very arbitrariness that is at the heart of the problem. It is why originalism is SO important in law – to actually have a standard by which one can expect to behave.
Government agencies are sticking their noses in just about everything. One couple had a church group that via word of mouth had increased to some 40 couples on Sunday morning. Some officious dipstick from government told them they could no longer hold the bible group because … it violated “zoning law” and they didn’t have a permit for the activity!
I have this book (audiobook) and would love to participate. So who is going to run the book club? Sounds like we may have a head start going in this thread.
“. . .19th/20th century novels. . .” What’s your take on “Bleak House”? I just watched a BBC adaptation. I thought, for about a day, that I’d like to read the book to see how Dicken’s writing compared to the visuals. (I’m over it now– I heard that it’s a realllyyyyy lllloooonnnnnnggggggg book.)
Not a particular Dickens fan (I didn’t even like a Tale of Two Cities or a Christmas Carol- all too depressing) but adore Austen, Wharton, Eliot and Maugham along with American westerner Wallace Stegner and that utterly bizarre but intriguing John Irving.
I haven’t come close to listing them all, but those are a few of my favorite novelists.
My true loves are the historians: McCullough, Chernow, Caro, Kearns Goodwin and the late, great David Halberstam.
I know there are a lot of sci-fi fans on the site and I’m open to that as well but not nearly as well-read there.
How about satirists? Kurt Vonnegut, Twain, Sinclair Lewis, Dorothy Parker, even the traitorous Chris Buckley!
Also the traitor’s traitorous friend: PJ O’Rourke. Don’t forget Florence King.
Good suggestions both. Florence King is the epitome of the descriptive phrase “What a character!”
On second thought, King and Parker could have been good friends I think. :)
There are so many interesting conversations to be had of authors, poets, satirists, and even political editorialists that aren’t always on FOX (Kim Strassel of WSJ) comes to mind.