Wood You?

Author David W Franklin

Recently I met a lady who like I, labors to gather, cut and split fire wood for supplemental heat in the winter months. Mutual knowledge of this shared activity provided a common ground for further personal communications.

Just recently, she informed me “I did vote for Obama. I’m still in holding pattern as to whether it will all work out!”

I sent her a copy of my prior article published here on THETEXASRING titled: THE SUPREME INVIOLATE LAW of ECONOMICS.

She answered: “Thanks Dave, interesting. You are a good writer.”
In return, I responded as follows:

Dear Ms.,
The principle expressed in that article is a universal human one. It can be applied to any Thing any human being any where in the world deems worthwhile and labors to produce. You can apply it to every single item we humans eat, wear or use, even to wood.

Just think what would happen to your wood pile and mine, which individually and together, we have labored so hard to have, and then along comes the state or local government. They issue “claim checks” on our wood. Only this time, the government declares their wood “claim checks” to be Legal Tender. LEGAL TENDER means, by legal edict, you and I are compelled at the point of the STATE’s LEGISLATIVE GUN, to accept those mere pieces of paper, for all our wood.

Our wood would be gone, and you and I would be left to the mercy of the elements, or forced to purchase a much more expensive source of heat for our survival, with what monetary resources we had left, if any.

And what about next year? What would happen to your incentive to gather and produce wood, should the local or state government continued to issue “claim check money” on cut and split firewood? Would you or I continue to labor so enthusiastically as we have, to gather and produce wood for our heating independence?

Would you? Would you even bother any more, to continue to pick up wood along the roadside, knowing it would be taken away from you again and again? Would your personal incentive to gather and produce wood be destroyed?

I write about the Universal Human principles of individual incentive, and why we human beings labor to produce Real Wealth. I write of these ideas in order to bring to light as simply as possible, the truth of the source of all Real Wealth, which is the individual human being.

The other principle I write of is self-evident. Government does not produce any real wealth. It only consumes it.

If there is to be and continue to be, a truly free human society any where in the world; one with a flourishing culture and an abundance of Real Wealth for all to enjoy, then the rational, legitimate role of local, state and national government must be to protect first, the individual citizen’s inalienable, natural incentive to labor and produce Real Wealth.

However, once a local, state or national government of any form decides to distribute “claim checks” on the Real Wealth of human producers, both for itself and it’s political ‘friends’, then, if continued to it’s logical conclusion, the end result of future human history for that government and its’ citizens will always be the destruction of the natural human incentive to produce any Thing worthwhile.

This is where we are in America today. Having created the economic crisis of Real Wealth scarcity facing America today, the National government and national political leaders have further entrenched themselves into our individual lives, more determined then ever before, to “manage” the very scarcity they created.

Understanding all of the above, this is why I have zero loyalty or affiliation to any political leader or party.
All the above justifies why I have not voted for any President in the last forty years.

When asked why he does not vote, H. L. Mencken answered:

“..because all an election does is change the name and face of the person who robs us.”

My loyalty is only to the Truth of what makes a nation truly free and prosperous.

History proves the Natural Cycle of all governments to be Birth, growth, decline and death.

Recorded history also proves that once any government sets upon a course of destroying the individual human incentive to invent, create and produce Real Wealth, history for that nation and government must continue on a course to its’ logical conclusion, as follows:

Scarcity, civil unrest, and the eventual imposition of a tyranny which will supersede individual liberty.

In my judgment, our America is well on the way down the fourth part of that Natural Cycle.

Kind Regards,

Dave

AUTHOR’S FOOTNOTE
Quoted from the Hartford Courant, 1809, titled:

“Who Makes the Honey?

“ALL free men have a right to manage their concerns in their own way, and government should protect them but not direct, much less obstruct, them, in the exercise of their callings and occupations.

“The best government can do is very little more toward the prosperity of the people than to afford them general protection from injustice and injury in the undisturbed employment of their time, talents and property.

A wise government is the people’s guard, and it takes effectual care that there should be none to police or annoy, none to interrupt them in their lawful callings and pursuits. Thus guarded, there is full scope and also sufficient encouragement given for industry and enterprise. Each individual employs himself as he finds it most to his own advantage and each, in advancing his own interest, by honest industry, adds to the common stock.

“A nation resembles a swarm of bees. The bees must be well hived, protected from external and internal annoyance and injury, and left free as air to make their combs, construct their cells and labor in hive or field according to their own liking. Thus protected and thus free, they seldom fail to treasure up honey.

‘But who makes the honey? Not the guarders of the hive but the bees themselves, so civil government, however wise and vigilant, is not the direct and efficient cause of the nation’s wealth, which is, in fact, produced by the great swarm, the people.

“On the other hand, should the keeper of the bees undertake to dabble in their private concerns, interrupt their labors or divert their wonted course of enterprise into new channels, should he foolishly do this. he would find little or no honey in the hive at the end of the war.

“It belongs to government to protect commerce, to guard it by a few gentle regulations and there leave it. The skill of the merchant will do the rest. All history testifies that trade flourishes most where it is most free, and that it soon leaves the nation that shackles it.”

Related posts:

1. The Supreme Inviolate Law of Economics
2. An Open Letter
3. I Have A Dream
4. Pay No Attention To Men Behind The Curtain
5. Something’s Changed

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 30th, 2010 at 1:30 pm and is filed under David W. Franklin, Economics, History, Opinion, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.