By James T. Carney
Since the current administration in Washington sees inequality as a great problem, I have decided to put my lawyerly ingenuity to work to suggest some ways to deal with it.
First of all, however, one has to focus on the real problem. The real problem is not inequality but poverty. This is unfortunate because inequality is easier to solve than poverty. Inequality could be solved by dividing up everyone’s goods based on market value and having the rich follow Jesus and turn almost all of their goods over to the poor. Of course, to make sure that Kamala Harris’ equity is maintained one must take this action at least once a generation since it is the unfortunate nature of some people to work hard and try to get ahead, which by definition means leaving some people behind.
If we are to have true equity, no one must be permitted to get ahead by hard work or any other mechanism. People who succeed are a living afront to those who don’t. Of course, some Americans are particularly devoted to this concept of equity since they despise anyone who tries to do better than other slum dwellers.
In any event, if everyone were rich but some were richer than others, I doubt that many people would object to the fact that, as in George Orwell’s Animal Farm, all animals are equal but some are more equal than others. So onto the war against poverty….
Now, let us look at who is responsible for poverty. Obviously it’s God. He is the first cause of all things. Although it is not needed, we have a clear admission of guilt in the New Testament, where God’s Son said, “The poor you will always have with you.” Indeed, it is probably God’s guilty conscience that is responsible for all these socialistic reminders in the Bible about the need to take care of the poor, etc. If they needed so much taking care of, why did he create them? In particular, why did he create so many of them?
Now, one advantage of suing God is that he has deep pockets. All the things on the earth are his. I would suggest hitting the Vatican first in an effort to collect a judgment. But there’s a problem with this course of action: The Supreme Court is dominated by Roman Catholics, who would undoubtedly rule lack of jurisdiction.
However, if we don’t like those Supreme Court decisions, we should be sure that any court-packing measure limit the number of Roman Catholics to a single Justice. After all, the court has to be representative of all Americans: men, women, transgenders, Protestants, Catholics, Jews, Moslems, atheists, disabled, Afro-Americans, Hispanic Americans, Native Americans, military veterans, etc. It cannot be dominated by members of one denomination.
One reason that I favor Illinois’ U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth for the Supreme Court is that she can represent a number of these groups. It would be great if she were an atheist as well. Frankly, any justice is going to have to be a three-fer (representing at least three groups) and preferably a four-fer.
I don’t know what we do with Armenians and Turks, but I don’t think we could have one of each on the court at the same time. Disputes between Justices are bad enough now, but at least they are limited to words. Maybe the solution would be to have a mountain Turk (aka a Kurd) who is now pro-Armenian even though his ancestors did a good deal of massacring of Armenians in 1915-1923. After all, we cannot be responsible for our ancestors’ actions. What Afro-American is blaming other Africans whose ancestors were responsible for capturing and selling as slaves the hundreds of thousands of Africans who were brought to the New World? If reparations are in order, we know where to look.
| The power to tax is the power to destroy |
The war on poverty is a real war. Our object should be to destroy the enemy. Subsidizing poverty, as the Covid acts do by providing unemployment compensation benefits greater than what many people can earn working, is the wrong way to go. The best way to win the war against poverty is to tax the poor! The result would be to give them a tremendous incentive to work and earn enough money to pay the taxes as well as to put food in their bellies. Those who do not will suffer the natural consequences of their choice. We could eliminate poverty in a generation by this measure.
Now, I know that a bunch of tenderhearted, fuzzy-thinking liberals will complain about this approach, but they cannot deny its efficacy. Poverty is a major American problem; indeed, it is a disease. Since this is Shakespeare’s birthday follow-on week, we should remember his immortal words:
Diseases desperate grown,Let us follow the wisdom of the immortal Bard of Avon and tax the poor.
By desperate appliance are relieved,
Or not at all. [Hamlet]
| Copyright © 2021 by James T. Carney |
James, your wry humor is well displayed, as it often is. I hate to distract from that with a serious question, but on the subject of the Supreme Court: the court membership is 2/3 Catholic, and our country's population is 20% Catholic; from your lawyerly perspective, is it constitutionally/legally correct for there to be such an imbalance?
ReplyDeleteBravo, James! My God I haven't seen so many sacred cows gored in one shot since I don't know when! In reference to Paul's question (which seems to me to be the lead-in question for support of a court-packing move) maybe misses your point-Alito, Sotomayor and Thomas are all at least two-fers, with Sotomayor a three-fer, being of course female. The question is, until Ginsberg passed (may her name be a blessing among you) there were three Jews. Jews only make up 2.4% of the population as of 2020, so what the Hell are three Jews doing on the SCOTUS? Does anyone get how absurd this discussion really is? James has illustrated the absolute absurdity of all this identity politics, with the time-honored tradition of using absurdity to do so. Maybe we should leave the court alone, and rather seek to put the best and brightest on it without consideration of their skin, their sexual plumbing, or their belief in the One True Way or superstition, however you choose to charactirize faith?
ReplyDeleteExcellent, both Jim's satire and your choice comment, Roger. Identity politics may appeal to people left out (and to those who wish to exploit identity politics), but we Americans should just be Americans – We the People just be people. That, to me, would be following the Constitution more to its letter (overlooking the class-system thinking encapsulated in some of the framers’ minds).
DeleteMoristotle, so documents written and statutes created in the late 1700s shouldn't be updated to reflect the changes in our country's population and demographics and cultural awakenings over the past 232 years since the Supreme Court was created? Interesting.
ReplyDeleteA bit of "for the record" regarding the Supreme Court, from www.uscourts.gov -- Article III of the Constitution establishes the federal judiciary. Article III, Section I states that "The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish." Although the Constitution establishes the Supreme Court, it permits Congress to decide how to organize it.
This is where I hope for James Carney's lawyerly input, because reading this as a layman it sounds like the Constitution empowers Congress to organize the Supreme Court as it wishes. In that case, does the ultimate legal power of our land lie with the Supreme Court, or with the Congress that has control over the Supreme Court?
Either way, since moderates and liberals outnumber conservatives three to one, and non-Catholics outnumber Catholics five to one, I don't see how the most powerful "jury of one's peers" in our land, should possibly have six conservative Catholics in control, and only three people who represent the rest of us.
Motomynd, you seem to have misconstrued my “overlooking the class-system thinking encapsulated in some of the framers’ minds”; I had in mind the very updating you refer to. Everyone equal under the law, that sort of thing. I realize that the nuts and bolts and legal wordings, etc., etc., required to write that into law is way, way above my pay grade. But not Jim’s, let us hope.
DeleteMoristotle, to me, the "following the Constitution more to its letter" part of your comment overwhelmed all else. I didn't know if you were serious or continuing down James Carney's trail of humor.
DeleteAs for the term "identity politics" here is where it started, according to the almighty Wikipedia: "The term was coined by the Combahee River Collective in 1977. The collective group of women saw identity politics as an analysis that introduced opportunity for Black women to be actively involved in politics, while simultaneously acting as a tool to authenticate Black women's personal experiences."
Looking at its roots, dismissing "identity politics" is also dismissing the rights of various small groups who otherwise have no voice, and which - unfortunately - may indeed be getting back to the “letter" of the Constitution and its original intent to disenfranchise those who were not white men of wealth and power.
The original Constitution said nothing about doing away with slavery, and specifically exempted the international slave trade from regulation by the federal government; it also said nothing about giving women the right to vote. Based on that I can make a case the Constitution was originally designed to permanently install white privilege - at least as it pertained to white men of wealth and power - and we would be better served in our modern world to veer as far away from "its letter" and intent as we can get.
motomynd, I owe you and everyone else an apology for attempting to add some “Constitutional substance” to a comment that started out as a simple “Bravo” to Jim & Roger. It has been a long time since I even read the U.S. Constitution or any of the letters of the big thinkers of the late 18th Century. I simply don’t have “the Creds” to weigh in like that. Thank YOU for your scholarship (and fact-checking); “Bravo” to you too.
DeleteYour point about the negative aspects of forgoing “identity politics” concerns me. I regret, though, that “left-out” groups (which have been numerous – and have included women as a group, half the population!) have had to take up such politics. But everyone does what they need to do. The result is far, far more complex than anything I can begin to sort out. I leave that to you & Jim & Roger & George Pickett & Neil Hoffman & Nortin Hadler & Steven Weller & Brooks Carder & ….
Moristotle, the "we the people" intro to the U.S. Constitution and all the following blah blah blah about "more perfect union, establish justice" and so on, could have more accurately read "we the wealthy and powerful white men of this country hereby create a set of rules that allow us to control and subjugate all others who live in OUR country for as long as we can possibly get away with it."
Deletemotomynd, I agree with what you colorfully state the framers probably had in mind. That is what we need to ignore (“overlook” in my original, very poorly articulated original comment) or update. We have no argument about this. Let's collaborate, not wrangle.
Delete