Saturday, September 02, 2006

Government Corruption continued

So, the question we ended with was how does the NFL reduce the amount of corruption?
To begin I want to show why I am using the NFL to compare with government. The NFL is the league that unites different teams together. The Federal government unites different states together to form the United States. They both have rules and regulations to keep one state from abusing the other. They have police power which I shall also include military in. For the NFL, the police power are the officials during the game who do not let a player abuse another. Now I will not agree with everything in the NFl as in the salary cap and other programs they have, but for the most part is a regulatory authority that is easily compared to the government.

The NFL reduces the amount of corruption easily since the teams are independently owned, not owned by the league. This allows the teams to leave the league if there is an increase in corruption. Even the threat of the teams leaving the league would cause the NFL to decrease the amount of corruption. So, the United States once had states who seceded from the Union, but why? They wanted to reduce corruption. They wanted to reduce the control the Federal government had upon them, and increase the states own rights. But I am not only talking about the civil war, as before the Civil War there were many northern states that threatened to leave the Union. These states were threatened with backlash of military might as well, but in the end caused a change in government. Exactly what the threat of secession is meant to do. Unfortunately, although I do not agree with slavery but other issues were addressed when the Confederacy was formed and they seceded from the Union. The Union though did not change policies, perhaps increased them denying this form of reducing corruption. With the Union winning the war, the South had lost, and as they say, "To the victor the spoils." I won't put President Lincoln to blame for corruption, but at this point in our Nation's history did the corruption begin. The intervention of government and the economy began to rise, and the Federal government was able to increase their taxes without outcries of revolt.

So to reduce corruption we have to be able to revolt. Without this ability, the citizens have no power in reducing the corruption of the government. Yes, they will still be corrupted, but in fear that they will be the next Robespierre will cause the reduction. We don't even have to revolt. Its just the outcry of revolution, the cry for freedom, and the end to government intervention.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

So what you're saying is, we need to shift the power of government from Federal to State? How would we do that and what problems would arise from that having a state controlled government?

Ian Dunois said...

I like the way you are thinking, but no, I am not on the side of increasing the power of the states as they would only act selfishly and increase their own gain against the loss to other states. Therefore one state would make laws to make it difficult for other states to trade in their own state. Perhaps some would have open borders but there will also be the one who takes advantage of the trade. So the problems that can arise are endless in a state controlled government. Just as they are endless in a strong central government. But to reduce the strength of all forms of government would reduce corruption since the government doesn't have much power to be used in the corruption.
Think of problems in global trading. One country increasing tariffs, to rise the costs of imported goods, while others maintaining an open border policy. Each state would have its own tariff on other states decreasing the economy of all of the states. So the reduction of government is what I believe may be the best way to reduce the corruption. The state power of threatening to secede can decrease the Federal government's policies causing them to reform the regulations and allowing a free market.