Letters on risks of freedom, refugees, oligarchy, printing money, loss of water, Medicaid debt

Our freedom comes with some risks

Freedom is inherently risky. The decision to allow all citizens to be free risks the possibility that a few of us will take advantage of that freedom. In the past, this has largely been the criminal class, but globalization has allowed rogue political groups to do this, and they have routinely turned to terrorism as their means of operation.

Acts of terrorism generate immediate panic, but that panic rapidly dissipates, leaving behind a pervasive fear of the randomness of terrorist attacks. What becomes clear is that terrorist attacks can happen anywhere at any time. None of us is totally safe, but we have a strong desire to be so. We long for a world in which ordinary citizens in ordinary circumstances can feel safe. But that world is gone.

We all face a small degree of risk, but unless we are willing to accept this, we will take extraordinary means to protect ourselves from any risk. In doing so, we will lose our freedom, and we will lose the decency that has allowed us to be a refuge for the downtrodden of the world.

Love thy neighbor

I’m an evangelical Christian Republican living in a retirement community. My elderly neighbors are a Syrian couple who are very nice and ready to help when they can and who treat others with Middle Eastern cuisine. At a get-together this year, they had their family picture taken under the American flag flying over our community. And just last summer they took in a young girl from the same region where they had lived.

When I met this young girl, she was very respectful and told me in broken English how glad she was to be in America. I welcomed her and assured her she was safe by giving her kind words and a stuffed Minion doll as a gift. Her eyes lit up as she embraced the doll and danced about the yard – an image I will never forget.

What troubles me, however, are those Republicans who only want Christians coming to America and who hold in contempt fine people like these. I couldn’t imagine Jesus telling them they were not welcomed.

I have also worked with international students attending Wichita State University. One young Syrian girl who received her degree in elementary education went on to teach in the public school system in a small town in eastern Kansas. I wonder how she is now being received by her students and those in her community.

As for me, I will continue to pray for the Syrian people here and abroad and love my neighbor as I love myself – my Christian duty.

Not a democracy

It is time we stop referring to our system of government as a democracy and that the United States stop holding itself up as its exemplar. While those of us of a certain age were indeed raised in a democracy, where our votes and voices mattered, the same cannot be said of our children, according to a recent Princeton University study.

Instead, today’s children, like those in Russia, are living in an oligarchy, which is understood by this reality: “Economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial, independent impact on U.S. government policy, while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence.”

Though the U.S. Supreme Court decisions allowing unfettered money into politics further deepened our descent into oligarchy, they did not, as many surmise, cause it. Rather, say the researchers, this shift goes back to the 1980s, making it difficult for most people to acknowledge, much less reverse the direction.

Next time you’re tempted to pridefully say you live in a democracy, correct yourself. Today the term and all it implies and represents in this country is as outmoded as the horse and buggy and, worse, is destined to stay that way.

Expansion debt

Every editorial and letter that advocates expanding Medicaid mentions that the federal government will pay no less than 90 percent of the cost. They never explain how the federal government is going to pay for its share of the expansion. The reality is:

▪  Medicaid has no unique funding source other than general tax revenues.

▪  General tax revenues are currently more than half a trillion dollars below the level required to pay for the federal government’s existing annual liabilities.

▪  Therefore, every dollar that the federal government uses to expand Medicaid expands the annual budget deficit and the national debt by the same amount.

That’s just crazy, given this nation’s economic realities.

In the name of full disclosure, instead of saying, “Let’s expand Medicaid,” proponents should say, “Let’s expand Medicaid/the national debt.” Or simply, “Let’s expand K-Debt.”

Who is responsible?

Though “taxpayer” was once a meaningful term implying ultimate fiscal responsibility for government expenditures, that is simply no longer true. Our federal government has not depended on (or burdened) taxpayers for decades; it simply prints the money it needs.

There is no longer any such thing as a “taxpayer bailout.” There is only money printing and crony capitalism, or money printing and social welfare, or money printing and (fill in the blank with your pet federal spending program). Please do not kid yourself any longer; nobody is responsible for federal spending.

In case you want to argue, consider this statement by Oregon Rep. Peter DeFazio, the top Democrat on the House Transportation Committee, who recently expressed outrage that the Federal Reserve is objecting to Congress taking money for highways from the Fed’s “surplus fund,” which it uses to pay fat dividends to its member banks: “For the Federal Reserve to be saying this impinges upon their integrity, etc., etc. — you know, it’s absurd. This is a body that creates money out of nothing.”

This can only be nirvana – no more taxes, just create money out of nothing. That’s even better than old-fashioned alchemy, or hens laying golden eggs. The only question left to answer is this: Who is responsible when nobody is responsible?

Hidden costs

“Keep Kansas from running out of water” (Nov. 22 Eagle Editorial) missed a significant leak in our water supply. It’s steam-generated electricity.

In 2005, Kansas thermoelectric power plants consumed 459 million gallons every day making electricity, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. This is mostly lost to use by farm, city and industry. It’s a hidden cost to society when burning fossil fuel for electricity. Western Kansas coal-fired power plants such as the one near Holcomb accelerate the depletion of aquifers, which can force some irrigated crops back to dry farming methods with lower yield and profit. Communities near power plants often pay hidden costs for the rest of us.

There are many things we can do to save water. Gov. Sam Brownback’s efforts and expressed urgency are indeed worthy of praise, as the editorial said. He and the Kansas congressional delegation can save us rivers of water with a revenue-neutral price on carbon, which would benefit wind and solar, both of which generate electricity without sucking Kansas lakes and aquifers dry. The proposed carbon fee and dividend legislation of Citizens’ Climate Lobby corrects all this quickly and fairly, without boiling our future dry.

This story was originally published November 28, 2015 at 6:03 PM with the headline "Letters on risks of freedom, refugees, oligarchy, printing money, loss of water, Medicaid debt."