Into the Scrap Heap

Now that our Department Of Government Efficiency is getting started, we must immediately work on its top priorities—to slash spending, save money, and more importantly, to release the people from the grip of bureaucracy—TO GET GOVERNMENT OUT OF THE WAY AND LEAVE PEOPLE ALONE. To do this, we must focus on the departments and programs we must eliminate first. Here is a short list:

1. The invasive and abusive

2. The counter-productive

3. The non-productive

4. The poor producers

Obviously the top priorities would be items 1 and 2. These are the shackles that not only waste tons of revenue, but also hold back the private sector's ability to produce revenue. These are double-edged swords that destroy productivity and create debt.

We must stamp out the abuse and needless enforcement that stand in the way so America can go about its business without the needless regulations, mandates, permits, licensure, paperwork, and other hurdles that government at all levels place in the way of our means to earn our livings.

One big example is transportation—an item absolutely essential for civilization to even exist. China, India, Thailand, Vietnam, Mexico, Australia, and other nations are free to build and use automobiles and trucks that are cheaper and easier to produce than anything our government will allow. That gives them a hand up in the production of every consumer product we could imagine. But our government, instead of giving our people the freedom to do likewise, holds us back with regulations and mandates, and also imposes insane tariffs and bans on the importation of these essentials.

All over the world, even in third world countries, people are allowed to build, buy and use really practical and inexpensive vehicles that are forbidden here in America, like the tough Toyota HiLux pickup truck (the most widely used truck in the world) and the economical IMV Zero and HiLux Champ with MSRPs of about $8000 in US dollars. In our country, these essential vehicles are prohibited with abusive safety and environmental (CAFE) restrictions that are impossible to meet. STOP this nonsense. Let the PEOPLE decide what is safe for them to drive.

How do we fix it? We all know the answer: ELIMINATE these regulations and the departments that created them. Sooooo simple. SAVE the tax money that funds them, and let us build and buy what we really need.

That's just one example. We are hamstrung by multitudes of abusive departments that need to be dropped from our backs. Save trillions of dollars and enhance our God-given natural rights.

Our military is OBESE from reckless overspending. Do we really need the tons and tons of super high tech equipment to defend our country? Look at Switzerland. It hasn't been invaded for over 400 years. Its military budget is very small. But its defense is very effective. WHY can't we follow Switzerland's example? Stay out of other nations' wars. For example, let Netanyahu take care of Israel.

We are in desperate need for prison reform. Why does America have to suffer the world's highest incarceration rate? Are our people really that bad, or is it because the prison industrial complex can't give up its cash cow of keeping hundreds of thousands of people behind bars? What we should do is abolish extreme prison sentences like life without parole, which is needlessly cruel and also needlessly expensive. STOP spending millions of dollars to keep dangerous people like El Chapo in super secure prisons for years and years when we could just eliminate them with nitrogen asphyxiation, the simplest and most humane method known. After speedy trials, execute them promptly and be done with it. Don't impose stupid anti-suicide policies. If an inmate can't stand the trauma of prison life, grant him a quick execution and spare us the cost of feeding, housing and guarding him. STOP wasting the taxpayers' money by filling up our prisons. Follow the examples of Europe and Scandinavia.

Nearly all regulatory agencies, like the EPA, OSHA, FEMA, MSHA, EEOC, FAA, and numerous others should be scrapped, or at least severely downsized. Everything created since the year 2000 should be GONE—including George W. Bush's abominations—Homeland Security, Patriot Act, TSA, and all others. Jimmy Carter's Department of Energy and especially the Department of Education MUST GO. To be honest, just about everything created since 1960 should be scrapped, and also many others created well before that time.

Even though it is the world's greatest Ponzi scheme, Social Security is too popular with the majority of people to be scrapped without violent repercussions. For the foreseeable future, we are stuck with it as it stands. Medicare, which is newer, might have some wiggle room for some reform. Before 1965, when Medicare began, health care expenses were much more reasonable, and emergency treatments for traumatic illnesses and accidents were more affordable. But just like everything else that gets corrupted by government, health care costs have skyrocketed once bureaucrats began meddling with them. Practical solutions are going to be tough to implement.

Welfare programs are counterproductive. They train people to be dependent parasites instead of productive workers. The largest and most wasteful portions arose with LBJ—"Why work for a living when you can vote for one?" From his time until the present, poor families with two parents have plummeted. Today, one parent families with numerous children prevail. Contraception is largely ignored. Never forget, welfare, especially government-run welfare, creates dependancy AND poverty.

Foreign aid is something we must STOP. Are you aware of what happens when we send food and supplies to poor African countries to feed starving children? Much of the time, their dictators seize these goods and sell them on the black market. But even when they don't, feeding them disincentivises responsible parenting and encourages reckless childbearing, which therefore creates even MORE starving children. Have you checked out their exploding birthrates, rampant population growth, and the ways they strip-mine their forests for every last tidbit of wood to cook their meals? These people need CONTRACEPTIVES, not more food.

And under the Biden administration, we have spent millions providing aid to Gaza. Did you know that Gazans have been training 90% of their 5 year old children to make bombs and use fully automatic weapons to become TERRORISTS? Biden has been AIDING AND ABETTING THE ENEMY. That must be stopped.

Elon Musk has even suggested eliminating the IRS. That may not be feasable, but it does need serious reform. For many years it has imposed draconin practices to pursue "tax cheats," often spending large sums and abusing people to collect small amounts for innocent, honest mistakes and/or incomplete paperwork.

INSTEAD, the IRS would be more effective and collect more revenue IF it switched from enforcement to SERVICE. Simplify and minimize the paperwork and make it easy for everybody to comply. Provide ample people to answer questions by telephone. Don't ask for needless tidbits of information. Make the forms simple and short. DON'T ask for inputs FROM such and such a form or schedule that the filer does not have or can't get, or doesn't even know what it is. AND go back to PROVIDE COMPLETE forms, schedules and instructions to every taxpayer like it did before 2010. And also, make ALL forms and schedules readidly available in public places, like post offices. And yes, provide postpaid pre-addressed envelopes to send them in.

THE VIEWS OF SUBMITTED EDITORIALS MAY NOT BE THE EXPRESS VIEWS OF THE ALABAMA GAZETTE.

Online tax filing must also be simplified. Ambiguous questions must be avoided. The system should NEVER choke down if a filer misses a question or input he can't answer.

NEVER FORGET. Our founding fathers created the United States to be a FREE COUNTRY—where the people rule and the government serves, not the other way around.