Tuesday, February 22, 2011

A Time of Unease Brought to You By the Looters

We are entering a time of true unease both here and abroad.

Riots have broken out in Libya, Bahrain, Iran and elsewhere. Over 200 have died in Libya. Egypt is now under military rule, but we saw one of CBS's best known foreign correspondents raped in the streets of its capital.

Fifty-three died in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico since Thursday. Mexican Army efforts to pacify that city's violence have failed. How much of this stemmed from drug cartel influence in the army itself?

Madison, Wisconsin is seeing some of the same unrest that rocked Athens last year. Wisonsin is broke and needs to adjust state employee premiums. The would be Bolsheviks have joined short sighted state employees to try and deal the Republican governor a political defeat. However, he seems to be leaning towards giving them the same treatment meted to air traffic controllers by President Reagan thirty years ago.

It is the looters that have caused this. These looters take different forms. One form is the "president-for-life" that steals from his country's economy and foreign aid. Qaddafi, Mubarek, and others are now being held to account. Iran's day of reckoning is coming soon. The other is the culture of entitlement among welfare statists. They feel like they deserve something that the private sector cannot guarantee to its own. Why should government workers have more security or privilege than anyone else? (By the way, I AM a state employee who now pays more in premiums than last year.) Mexico's drug cartels have looted the money, decency, and spirit from that proud nation.

Looters' belief that they are above the laws of economics and decency are behind a lot of our problems. It is time to deny them all.

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