What Does More Government Spending Do?

            Congress recently passed the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS). The Senate passed the bill by a vote of 64-33 on July 27, and the House passed the bill by a vote of 243-187 the next day. President Joe Biden was set to sign the $280 billion bill today. According to Gillian Richards, the purpose for this legislation was “to boost American semiconductor chip manufacturers and combat the threat China poses to America’s national security.” 

            In her article at The Daily Signal, Richards reported on a discussion with Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts and President of the Intercollegiate Studies President John Burtka IV. The two men discussed “CHIPS and Science Act, family policy, and the trajectory of American conservatism.”

Throughout the discussion, Roberts stressed the practical importance of policy questions. Those aren’t mere political games, he said. When those on the left or right are too focused on winning a debate, they lose sight of the broader goal of public policy: namely, improving the lives of real Americans.

Roberts said that good intentions alone do not ensure good policy outcomes. Policymakers must keep in mind the Americans affected by their policies, as well as what’s politically possible, he explained.

He pointed to the CHIPS and Science Act as an example of a seemingly well-intended policy that will produce bad outcomes….

The measure aims to boost American semiconductor chip manufacturers and combat the threat China poses to America’s national security. Roberts said he views the Chinese Communist Party as a greater threat than the former Soviet Union was.

But the CHIPS and Science Act, Heritage’s president argued, simply would line the pockets of corporations that are its beneficiaries.

The conservative movement at its best focuses on the lives of real Americans, Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts said at the recent American Economic Forum in Washington.

“We have to get out of the habit of spending so much and expecting modern monetary theory and/or inflation to pay down debt,” Roberts said, adding that the national debt is an albatross around the neck of the typical American family….

“These chip companies, making tens of billions of dollars, don’t need our money,” Roberts said.

            Roberts suggested an alternative to the CHIPS and Science Act. In his pilot initiative, “legislators could find three of the poorest areas of the country that could support chip factories. It would involve a public-private partnership in which federal money would be sent with a clear and specific purpose to those localities.”

            When Burtka asked, “What causes inflation?” Roberts responded “government.” He cited other ways the federal government oversteps its bounds and stated that both the Trump administration and the Biden administration are partly to blame for the overspending by the government. Inflation is created by government overspending. Roberts stated, “We have to get out of the habit of spending so much and expecting modern monetary theory and/or inflation to pay down debt.”

            Roberts also said that those who make policies should “cut down on the overgrown safety net” because it “undermines human dignity.” The current welfare system should be reformed.

Need to Work

                    President Bill Clinton signed a successful welfare reform law in 1996, which required able-bodied welfare recipients to either work, prepare for work, or look for work in order to receive aid.  This law ended the policies that helped generation after generation to receive handouts from the government without doing any thing to get it.  President Barack Obama gutted the law by ending the requirement for welfare recipients to work for what they receive.  He did this because he needs more people to be dependent on government in order to be re-elected!

                    Liberals predicted that the poor and needy in America would suffer dire consequences if the reform bill were passed; however, just the opposite happened.  There was a surge upward in employment and earnings among welfare recipients even as the welfare caseload dropped by 50 percent.  In addition, the rates of child poverty fell after the reform.  This reform bill from the mmid-1990s freed nearly four million adults and three million children from the government plantation and gave them the opportunity to escape poverty.

                    Robert Rector at The Heritage Foundation  reported:  "As welfare dependence fell and employment increased, child poverty among the affected groups fell dramatically.  For a quarter-century before the reform, poverty among black children and single mothers had remained frozen at high levels.  Immediately after the reform, poverty for both groups experienced dramatic and unprecedented drops, quickly reaching all-time lows."

                    Successful welfare programs help people to help themselves.  Millions of people need help at one time or another in their lives and deserve to be assisted; however, it is better to give them a "hand up" rather than a "hand out".  The old adage is still true:  It is better to teach a man to fish than to give a man a fish. 

                    The policy change by Obama was not only illegal, but it is detrimental to all welfare recipients.  Instead of being required to work, look for work, or receive training for work, recipients will go back into a welfare cycle of being dependent on the government and will never escape poverty.  They will continue to live on the plantation of the federal government.

                    Benjamin Franklin understood this principle well because he said, "I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means.   I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it."

                    The importance of working for our daily needs was instituted by Heavenly Father at the time He expelled Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden.  "And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it:  cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life;

                    "Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field;

                    "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, …" (Genesis 3:17-19; emphasis added).

                    Work is a valuable part of life and can bring feelings of self-worth, achievement, and happiness.  President Gordon B. Hinckley said, "Without labor there is neither wealth, nor comfort, nor progress….

                    "I believe in the gospel of work.  There is no substitute under the heavens for productive labor.  It is the process by which dreams become reality.  It is the process by which idle visions become dynamic achievements.  We are all inherently lazy.  We would rather play than work.  We would rather loaf than work.  A little play and a little loafing are good - ….  But it is work that spells the difference in the life of a man or woman.  It is stretching our minds and utilizing the skills of our hands that lift us from the stagnation of mediocrity….

                    "Without hard work, nothing grows but weeds.  There must be labor, incessant and constant, if there is to be a harvest….

                    "Work is the miracle by which talent is brought to the surface and dreams become reality" (Teachings of Gordon B. Hinckley, pp. 704-707)

                    Parents must teach their children the importance of work by word and example; otherwise, the rising generation will believe that they are entitled to having their needs met by others.  President Spencer W. Kimball quoted President David O. McKay as saying, "We are living in an age of gadgetry which threatens to produce a future generation of softness.  Flabbiness of character more than flabbiness of muscle lies at the root of most of the problems facing our American youth" (Faith Precedes the Miracle, p. 122).

                    Work is a valuable way to spend our time.  Youth and adults who are not required to work for their daily needs have too much time on their hands and tend to get into trouble.  I wonder how many of the people involved in the "flash mobs" of today come from homes where the principle of work was not taught or modeled.  Obama did our nation a huge disservice when he gutted the welfare reform act and took away the requirement for welfare recipients to work for their daily bread.

Farms and Plantations

Do entitlement and affirmative action programs keep Blacks "on the plantation," Hispanics "down on the farm," and other minorities under the control of Democrats? Do these liberal/progressive programs truly help minorities or are they in place simply to keep minorities voting for Democrats?

A blogger named Kevin DuJan asked the question, "What is the difference between slaves on plantations and blacks who blindly vote for Democrats?" He then answered his own question by listing the following areas where there are no differences: The slave owner (and Democrats) provides free "housing," "food," "healthcare," and "A menial education sufficient to the task he requires the slave to perform." In return, the slave owner (and Democrats) requires "unquestioning loyalty."

DuJan continued his article by claiming that Democrats keep other voting blocs under their control by similar questionable tactics: He stated that Democrats 1) tell gays that "Republicans are evil and want to kill us," 2) make policies making Spanish our unofficial second language so "Hispanics never learn English and don't progress as much in society," 3) keep women "in line" "through cultural wedges like abortion" by using scare tactics about the evil Republicans.

I would add that Democrats also keep Hispanics in line by pushing laws and policies aimed at giving illegal Hispanics the right to vote. The 2010 census showed Hispanics and Latinos to be 16.3 percent of the U.S. population. Hispanics and Latinos are expected to be 39 percent of our population in 2050.

A large voting bloc of Alaska Natives secured re-election for liberal Senator Lisa Murkowski in 2010 because they were scared they would lose some of their benefits if Tea Party favorite Joe Miller became our Senator. I'm sure that some of these voters were upset when Senator Murkowski admitted in a recent interview that benefits must be cut in order to bring fiscal security to our nation.

There are numerous people who claim that blacks are being kept on a modern-day plantation. U.S. Representative Allen West (R-FL) was interviewed on the O'Reilly Factor by guest host Laura Ingram on August 18, 2011. During the interview Congressman West claimed that liberal Whites are the plantation overseers of the 21st century. He said that black leaders such as Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Maxine Waters, and Barbara Lee follow instructions from liberal Whites who tell them "…pacify the black communities, keep the black communities firmly behind us." Rep. West stated that the "black leaders" are "absent" regarding the "devastation in the black communities" and the "flash mobs" against Whites.

The next evening on the O'Reilly Factor, Representative Charles Rangel (D/NY) agreed with West's claim that liberal policies have failed Blacks on the Democrat plantation. Guest host, Laura Ingram, attempted to interview Rangel, but he avoided every question put to him. She was finally able to pin him down when she asked, "Has liberalism - has Obama - worked for inner cities?", and he answered "no."

I believe that the "Great Society" programs instituted under the Lyndon Johnson Administration are the worst things that could happen to Blacks and other minorities. Under the direction of LBJ the national welfare programs were expanded with policies that encouraged people to not marry and to have more children than they could afford - all on money from the government. The result of those policies is that we had third and fourth generations of welfare families in America.

President Bill Clinton signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act in 1996 that restructured the welfare program and instituted work requirements to encourage employment among the poor. The new requirements forced thousands, if not millions, off the welfare rolls and out of the cycle of poverty.

There are many ways that Democrats keep minorities firmly behind them. Blacks, Hispanics and other minorities would all benefit from good education, and reforms in the education system would make big differences in the lives of all students. Changes are needed in the education system such as education vouchers where students could choose which school to attend and policies that would reward good teachers and get rid of bad teachers. Democrats, with their teachers unions firmly behind them, oppose education reform. Just as slave owners wanted to keep their slaves illiterate and unable to read, liberals/progressives do not want minorities to become educated. They know that educated citizens can provide for their own needs and would not need the entitlement programs. They also know that educated citizens are much harder to fool by shady practices.

I believe that Democrats with their liberal/progressive ideas, entitlement programs, and other handouts keep Blacks "on the plantation," Hispanics "on the farm," and other minorities firmly behind them in order to win elections.