The way to avoid the maddening convulsions of politics isn’t to change them, or rise above them, or move past them, or transform them, or whatever the trendy term of art is on any given day. It’s to avoid them—and reduce their power to hold sway over how we live. And the more decisions about our lives and welfare we put in the hands of politicians, the harder that will be to do.

And while the House of Peers withholds
Its legislative hand,
And noble statesmen do not itch
To interfere with matters which
They do not understand,
As bright will shine Great Britain’s rays
As in King George’s glorious days!
As bright will shine Great Britain’s rays
As in King George’s glorious days!

Story here.

. . . strips away privacy before it goes to work.

Here’s a nice, discrete example: S. 2485, introduced in the U.S. Senate last week, would require asset verification of participants in State Medicaid programs, exposing the personal information held by financial institutions to government access.

This privacy loss is a natural outgrowth of entitlement programs. It’s nearly mandated by the simple and warranted effort to reduce waste, fraud, and abuse.

My 2004 Policy Analysis, “Understanding Privacy – and the Real Threats To It,” explored how entitlement programs almost always carry with them a significant privacy-cost:

To provide benefits and entitlements—and, of course, to tax—governments take personal information from citizens by the bushel. Nearly every new policy or program justifies new or expanded databases of information—and a shrunken sphere of personal privacy.

POSTED BY JIM HARPER ON 04.12.08 @ 5:13 PM

So why do we hear so much about the dire consequences of failing to pass a piddling bilateral trade deal with a ruthless Latin American regime but almost nothing about the dire consequences of the hideous $300 billion distortion caused by the latest round of farm subsidies — most of which goes to big agribusiness, not struggling family farms? How about a little more noise on the farm front?

Why don’t we hear more outrage about the ludicrousness that is are farm policy? For those on the left who decry “corporate welfare”, here is a great place to focus your opprobrium; for those on the right who are against big government programs, fire away; for those who are in favor of free trade, this is a no-brainer; for those who are protectionist, they are already too familiar with no-brainer.

[Update] Go ahead, nix the subsidies:

So by all means, eliminate farm supports and don’t stop there. I suspect that once all agricultural subsidies, including those for energy crops, are removed, the net effect on food prices will be a moderation.

Please, let this trend catch on.

[all this post had was a link to the above site. I originally marked it on 5.18.2007 (happy birthday, Roy!), apparently looking forward to David's coinage of a new word.]

How wild would that be? But according to the 12th Amendment, each state’s delegation gets one vote:

But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice….

So the sole Alaskan rep’s vote counts the same as all the Califronia reps. Would delegations vote the way their state voted, or split along party lines? How would the Democrats choose which candidate to back? Huge can of worms…fun to contemplate.