[mag]

Originally Posted by Marek
I would like to raise the point that killing with a gun is probably a lot easier than killing any other way. With a gun you just pull a trigger.

Granted, guns make it easier to kill. But if you're at the point where you're ready to use a gun, it's not like the particular tool you're using to kill is going to matter much. And frankly, I would think that stabbing somebody or beating them to death with a bat would be a more natural reaction for most people than grabbing a gun.

Originally Posted by Marek
Anyway, why not ban guns AND try to fix whatever motivates people to kill? Kill one bird with two stones, so to speak.

But why should we ban guns? It's not going to do that much to make us safer. And it does put citizens in the very dangerous position of having nothing to protect themselves, from both criminals and the government, should the need ever arise. Almost every tyrannical government in history has started with the state taking control of all the weapons. I'm by no means suggesting that citizens need to begin open warfare. But I do believe it is extremely important for people to have the right to own guns.

mag

[Krftwrk]

Ok so a burglar appears in your home, he is after the family silver. You get your gun, sneak up behind him, pull the trigger and bam his dead. Wohoo ! The silver is safe oh boy good thing you had that gun...

[tabacco]

Originally Posted by ysbreker

And mag, the usa schools teaches you from the very first day in kindergarten: be number one, else you'll end up in the gutter and will die alone in a abandoned building and found 10 weeks later cause the smell is starting to reach the neighbours.

Seeing as you're *.nl, I'm guessing you didn't go to an american school, so I'm not sure you're in a position to comment.

[Zygomaticus]

Originally Posted by ysbreker

And mag, the usa schools teaches you from the very first day in kindergarten: be number one, else you'll end up in the gutter and will die alone in a abandoned building and found 10 weeks later cause the smell is starting to reach the neighbours.

I was unaware.

Nothing like that ever came across my blackboards...

[Zygomaticus]

Originally Posted by Marek

Anyway, why not ban guns AND try to fix whatever motivates people to kill? Kill one bird with two stones, so to speak.

It's a difficult problem to fix with even two stones. We should address the bigger problem first. Which one is the bigger problem, I'll leave you to continue judging.

[Todd]

"You ride them everyday, but in an instant an escalator can mangle you or a loved one. 7 on Your Side reveals why you may be riding a stairway to danger."

Whatever Moore may have exaggerated, the media and the government in America really is based on keeping people afraid. And since 9/11 it's just gotten worse.

The media is based on keeping people entertained, because that's what sells ads. I'm glad to admit that nothing they say will make me fear escalators. (Hey, I got over that when I was 5!)

I do agree that politicians try to keep people afraid. But like I already mentioned, it's easier to keep people afraid of guns than to admit their own failures. Fear and anger translate directly into votes, and steel can't talk back! Perfect scapegoat. Bonus points awarded for confusing symbols with real things.

If people with guns aren't victims of crimes then America should be one of the safest places on the planet.

It is one of the safest places on the planet as long as you're not a drug dealer or gang member who kill each other. They're responsible for the high murder rate. Take them out of the picture and the rest of us are safer than anyone else in the world. Leave them in, and our non-violent crime rates are STILL lower than other countries that have banned guns.

The other big contributing factor is the drug war. Our government spends $20 BILLION per year

What we have in this country is a situation where the rich people living in nice neighborhoods with plenty of guns and police to protect them are legislating gun control that prevents people in poor inner-city neighborhoods/ghettos from being able to get, carry, and afford the guns they need to defend their own lives.

The fact is, though, that people with guns are in just as much danger as anybody else.

You may believe it's a fact, but it's most certainly not. Did you notice in that last article I quotes, 1.5 to 2.5 MILLION people per year used guns to stop crimes. That included many cases where the attacker didn't have a gun. Just think about it. If someone tries to attack you, and you pull out a gun, they're running because it's not worth their life. And estimated 19/20 victimizations are stopped without a shot ever being fired.

What if the attacker DOES have a gun? Don't assume people who carry guns are stupid, because they're not. If an attacker is pointing a gun at you, you're not going to pull yours out and get shot! But what if they intend to rape or kill you? At least a gun gives you a *chance* to defend yourself. The chances of a person who don't have a gun are close to ZERO.

http://www.gunowners.org/sk0802.htm

(Notice the footnotes and credits all throughout this site. You won't find those on anti-gun sites.)

More people with guns end up shooting themselves rather than somebody trying to attack them.

This is an example a mythology, or might I call it a religion, that exists because human beings are often blinded by emotions (such as fear, anger, misguided compassion). But reason overcomes superstition. Sadly, some here will read this, it still won't dispel their religious zealotry.

Statistics used by anti-gun people about people shooting themselves and accidental shootings are greatly exaggerated. Remember how I mentioned gang members are responsible for so many murders in this country (around half)? Well, for instance, Handguns-Inc., and anti-gun lobby, includes 17-19 year old gang members in childhood accidental gun death rates!

In fact, those licensed to carry guns have a performance record that indicates the utmost responsibility. They actually outperform police by a factor of 20 to 1 when it comes to shooting actual criminals instead of innocent victims. That's because police get on the scene too late if they get there at all, and have to come in shooting since they're all dressed up in blue uniforms. Law abiding citizens are already on site to see what's going on. If a life is threatened, they solve the problem on the spot. There's *nothing* worse about being a criminal than a law-abiding citizens with gun, and studies show it's a criminal's #1 fear.

So what's that supposed to prove? Are you saying this somehow justifies racisim?

I subscribe to science, and science doesn't prove; it only explains. This has nothing to do with racism whatsoever. In fact Larry Elder himself whose articles I have been posting (if you bothered to read them) is black. What's he's showing that it's sensible to attribute more danger to young black males, because they're statistically 50 times more likely to victimize whites than other young white males.

Yes, blacks commit more crimes than whites. Blacks are also on average a good deal poorer than whites. It has nothing to do with race. It has to do with money.

So what? That's totally irrelevant to this discussion. There are a lot of honest law-abiding black people who need guns to defend their own lives too.

If you saw a black guy in a nice business suit it's unlikely you'd be afraid of him. If you saw a white guy dressed like a gangster you'd probably be just as cautious around him as if he were black.

Exactly. And that doesn't mean you're a "fashionist." It doesn't mean you like or hate clothes. You're just using common sense with all the information at your disposal.

The reason we have such a problem with crime is because of this prevelant Hobbesian paranoia that tells us everybody is out to get us and life is "nasty, brutish, and short." In reality, there's a lot less to be scared of out there than most people think. It's not like there's a horde of black barbarians waiting in the ghetto to shoot the first white guy they happen across.

Fear and racism are totally irrelevant to me. I'm neither afraid nor racist. The purpose of my position is to preserve the rights of all human beings to control the means to protect their own lives.

[Continued...]

[Todd]

Todd, I'd love to hear you explain to the families of victims of school shootings (such as Littleton) how it was people that shot their kids, and not guns.

There's nothing to explain it. I've read perspectives from parents of tragedies like Columbine and Littleton, and many if most of them don't blame guns. They're not necessarily stupid.

I can imagine you'd say one of these two things:

1) Violent computer games turned those two guys into mindless killers.

I play violent computer games, and I'm one of the most violent competitors you'll ever come accross in virtual reality. I mercilessly slash though millions of 3D models without remorse. But I've never hurt a human being or animal in my life. I couldn't even kill a dying bird to put it out of its misery.

People can play whatever games they want. Symbolic violence is not real violence. Only real violence can be made illegal.

2) If everyone in that school had been armed it would've been okay cause they'd have just shot the two instantly.

To get the benefits everyone doesn't need to be armed at all. We only need the right to be armed to be preserved, because then if only 1 out of 1000 people carries a gun, more criminals are afraid to try something, and we effectively have millions of totally FREE security guards stationed everywhere there are people.

As for guns in schools, look at the example in Israel. They had a problem with terrorists taking over classrooms and shooting innocent children. Quite a problem, you have to admit! Their solution wasn't to require teachers to carry guns. It was to allow teachers to carry guns. Since then, there has never been another such event something like 30 years now, save one. There was a case where a girls' school took a field trip to a site were guns were banned, and 7 young girls were killed.

Well, I'm not even going to bother to adress the completely laughable first option... but as for the second one: If you truly believe that a society with everyone armed to the teeth would create a safe situation I'm sorry to say that I have to question your sanity. Considering how trigger happy Americans appear to be as it is, it would be a massacre waiting to happen, which it mostly already is, but hey, more of that then...

You're right that it's a completely laughable option. I have nothing to do with a society where everyone is armed to teeth. (I think you're thinking of Switzerland?) I'm talking about a society where guns are mistakinginly outlawed which causes innocent people to suffer and die needlessly and foolishly.

Ever see Battle Royale?

No. Got link?

_______________________________

I do however strongly feel that something is rotten at the core of America though (no offense intended), and I support anyone who tries to find out what it is.

That's the most reasonable thing I've read so far. There is something rotten in America and I know what it is.

Take away the guns, give people some quality of life, and you remove 95% of the problem.

I've never found one bit of historical evidence that any problem has been solved by taking away rights. A government can't "give" people a quality of life. A government can only protect their rights to make their own qualities of life. The more we give people, the more we create waste and inflation.

That terrorist threat level color code is not made for security, it's made for repression.

I don't know about repression, but I would agree that it's ridiculous.

We don't need an extra homeland security federal organization to defend us. What we need is for the FBI and CIA to do their jobs. On 9/11 when planes were crashing into buildings, CIA agents in N.Y. were busy cracking down on prostitution, and Bush was in some other state reading to children for publicity. The U.S. Constitution carefully spells out the powers and responsibilities of the federal government. Things like healthcare and education are not present. The job of the president and federal government is to protect the rights of the people of the U.S., not to nurse us and teach us. We can do that ourselves much better, as long as we are safe.

Homeland Security a typical big-government solution: make people *feel* safe, not *be* safe. How does it grow and get more money from taxpayers? Not by solving problems! It grows by failing. The more it fails, the more power we give it, and the more money people in it make. It's the same with government health care and education.

But I'm not *afraid* of terrorists or any government programs. I'm only ticked off because their wasting my money.

I hope that with these anecdotes -- which turned out to be much longer than I wanted -- I've sort of illustrated what I think.

You're anecdotes are totally new to me, and I've lived 30 miles south of L.A. all my life. I've never seen a gun in public outside of a gun store or attached to some kind of officer. I've never been the victim of any crime other than having a bike stolen from my front yard when I was a little kid.

That may be because I don't use public restrooms or airports. (Hmm, I wonder if I saw you at E3?)

_______________________________

Sorry, mag but I don't buy that. Sure the NRA's eternal argument "people kill people" is true theoretically.

You don't really have a choice. It's not for sale. It's a fact! Guns are inanimate, and people are responsible for their own behavior.

It was those two kids that pulled the trigger. But the point is, they could scarcely have done it if there was no trigger to pull.

It's easy to kill people without guns. Take Japan for example. They just use knives and swords, and even though guns are totally banned and tightly controlled, criminals still use guns. That's because (and this may come as a shocker) criminals don't obey the law.

In Japan guns have been totally outlawed. Only police and the military can have them, and must lock them in safes when not on duty. Violators get sentenced to 15 years in prison. Yet gun violence there is increasing! That means more people are using them now that they're totally outlawed. Why? Because it's safe to do so. As long as you don't see a police officer, you can safely victimize anyone you want. Kill them, and there are no whitnesses.

The fact that some people can own a gun responsibly is no excuse to allow the rest the same opportunity.

The fact that some people can use guns, knives or even their bare hands to harm innocent people is the very reason to defend law-abiding citizens right to do whatever is necessary to defend their own lives.

_______________________________

Todd I really advise you to watch bowling for columbine, download it if you don't want to pay for it, cause michael moore does make some valid points about the american society of today.

And mag, the usa schools teaches you from the very first day in kindergarten: be number one, else you'll end up in the gutter and will die alone in a abandoned building and found 10 weeks later cause the smell is starting to reach the neighbours.

I'm afraid your second paragraph invalidates your first. You should have quit while you were ahead Besides, I know Moores points, and I mostly disagree with him. I think it's pretty safe to say I've studied him more than anyone else here.

[Todd]

Ok so a burglar appears in your home, he is after the family silver. You get your gun, sneak up behind him, pull the trigger and bam his dead. Wohoo ! The silver is safe oh boy good thing you had that gun...

There's a good chance that what you're describing is murder, and the homeowner in that case would probably be prosecuted for it. You can't kill someone for breaking into your house or stealing silver. You can only kill someone to defend your own life.

But in countries where people have guns in their homes, criminals are more afraid to break in lest their intentions be *mis-interpreted*.

[Zygomaticus]

If one can guarantee the removal of every single gun in the United States apart from those held by Policemen and Military men, I would agree that gun-related violence would dwindle. Fast.

But unless every single gun is guaranteed confiscation, no current gun-owner will feel safe about giving up his gun.

I don't blame them for their stance as different as it is from mine.

[Zygomaticus]

Originally Posted by Todd

You can't kill someone for breaking into your house or stealing silver.

Really!? Wow, I didn't know that... :|

I mean, he is trying to rob you...what is one to do? Inform the robber that he's around, have the robber attack first and then kill him? Hopefully he'll run away, but you can never be sure...

Oh well, this is another discussion altogether. Just felt like pointing out its outrageousness.

[Erkki]

Originally Posted by Todd

The fact that some people can use guns, knives or even their bare hands to harm innocent people is the very reason to defend law-abiding citizens right to do whatever is necessary to defend their own lives.

But it's not that easy to kill someone without a firearm. Do you think Columbine could have happened like that with knives? I don't remember how many people were killed / injured, but it would have been less (or maybe not at all) if they hadn't had guns.

I'm not against anyones right to have a gun BTW, I just think it is good not to always exercise that right.

I've only seen one gun in my entire life so far, when one was being pointed at me. I was about 14-15 and was at a "friends" (who was maybe 1-2 years younger) and he wanted to show off, opened the bar and pulled out his fathers gun and pointed it at me. Let me say I didn't feel great at that moment. That guy was a jerk anyway, and I never saw or heard of him again.

[Todd]

If one can guarantee the removal of every single gun in the United States apart from those held by Policemen and Military men, I would agree that gun-related violence would dwindle. Fast.

While gun-related violence would probably dwindle, other forms of violence would most likely skyrocket since people are defenseless. It'd be like going back to the dark ages. Plus when law-abising citizens don't have guns, they also start to lose other freedoms like the freedom of speech and freedom to assemble. That's what happened in cases like Nazi Germany. Think of all the human lives that would have been saved if Hitler was prevented from outlawing guns.

(And remember the Simpson's episode with the board with a nail through it? LOL.)

Plus, if you noticed what I wrote about Japan, you would see that they HAVE removed guns from everyone but the police and military, and yet gun violence is STILL increasing. That's because the people are sitting ducks. By removing guns you increase potency of criminals with (and without) guns.

[Todd]

I mean, he is trying to rob you...what is one to do? Inform the robber that he's around, have the robber attack first and then kill him? Hopefully he'll run away, but you can never be sure...

That's right. You can never be sure. A lot more options are open when you have a gun though.

Oh well, this is another discussion altogether. Just felt like pointing out its outrageousness.

And I just felt like pointing out it's murder

[Todd]

But it's not that easy to kill someone without a firearm. Do you think Columbine could have happened like that with knives? I don't remember how many people were killed / injured, but it would have been less (or maybe not at all) if they hadn't had guns.

If we could somehow remove guns from the picture, perhaps less people would have died in Columbine. But school shootings have been staying pretty constant for the last 30 years and crime, violent crime, and murder trends are all going down in the U.S. In other countries where guns are being banned crime rates are increasing, and gun-related murders are mostly decreasing while overall murders are mostly increasing. Those same laws that might have keep guns out of the hands of Columbine kids probably would have also kept guns out of the hands of people who needed them to survive some kind of attack. (Those are the stories you hardly ever see on the news, but it doesn't mean they don't happen.)

Also, these Columbine kids were pretty screwed up. They might have used poison, fire, or explosives all of which could have been even more deadly than guns.

I'm not against anyones right to have a gun BTW, I just think it is good not to always exercise that right.

Well, not just anyone is allowed to carry or own guns. The right is reserved for law-abiding adults of sound mind. Like I said, it's like adding a free security guard to society. Anyone who's licensed to carry a gun and who commits a crime with it will be punished severely, so they make a point to be very careful.

I've only seen one gun in my entire life so far, when one was being pointed at me. I was about 14-15 and was at a "friends" (who was maybe 1-2 years younger) and he wanted to show off, opened the bar and pulled out his fathers gun and pointed it at me. Let me say I didn't feel great at that moment. That guy was a jerk anyway, and I never saw or heard of him again.

The first (and last) time I went shooting was when I was 6 years old. Back then my dad told me the basic safety rules. The first one is that you never point a gun at anything you don't want to destroy, regardless of whether it's loaded. And I never have. Anyone who does should be fined or imprisoned, and if they're too young, their parents should be fined or imprisoned. That's people control, not gun control! The advantage is that people control really works.

[Kingzjester]

Originally Posted by Marek

Google ads are selected dynamically based on the page's contents

I wonder what would happen if we stareted quoting, say, lyrics of Avenue D?

[mag]

Originally Posted by ysbreker
And mag, the usa schools teaches you from the very first day in kindergarten: be number one, else you'll end up in the gutter and will die alone in a abandoned building and found 10 weeks later cause the smell is starting to reach the neighbours.

Actually, I would agree with that (maybe a little exaggerated, but you get the idea). I'm a little unsure what your point is in bringing it up, though. But I may just not be reading it right.

Originally Posted by Krftwrk
Ok so a burglar appears in your home, he is after the family silver. You get your gun, sneak up behind him, pull the trigger and bam his dead. Wohoo ! The silver is safe oh boy good thing you had that gun...

I was actually thinking of a bit more threatening situations than protecting the silver. Like rape. Little bit of a difference there.

Originally Posted by Todd
The media is based on keeping people entertained, because that's what sells ads.

I agree that the media is interested first and foremost on making money. But they are able to make money by selling fear and playing off of people's paranoia.

Originally Posted by Todd
It is one of the safest places on the planet as long as you're not a drug dealer or gang member who kill each other. They're responsible for the high murder rate. Take them out of the picture and the rest of us are safer than anyone else in the world. Leave them in, and our non-violent crime rates are STILL lower than other countries that have banned guns.

Actually, that's kind of what I've been trying to say. The vast majority of Americans have no reason to worry about being shot. The problem, though, is you can't just take out the gang members and the drug dealers and leave everything else. Those types of people are a product of the society they were raised in. So until we seriously start looking at the way our society is run we're going to continue having violent crimes. That's why you don't see this kind of violence in other types of cultures. That's why it's more dangerous living in the city than it is in the jungle.

Originally Posted by Todd
You may believe it's a fact, but it's most certainly not. Did you notice in that last article I quotes, 1.5 to 2.5 MILLION people per year used guns to stop crimes. That included many cases where the attacker didn't have a gun. Just think about it. If someone tries to attack you, and you pull out a gun, they're running because it's not worth their life.

I did notice that. But that statistic really doesn't prove anything. Who else is going to stop a crime? But just because you're carrying a gun on you doesn't mean that you're safe. Especially since a lot of gun owners don't have a lot of experience using them and have no business owning one.

Originally Posted by Todd
I subscribe to science, and science doesn't prove; it only explains. This has nothing to do with racism whatsoever. In fact Larry Elder himself whose articles I have been posting (if you bothered to read them) is black. What's he's showing that it's sensible to attribute more danger to young black males, because they're statistically 50 times more likely to victimize whites than other young white males.

I have no doubt that those numbers are accurate. But with statistics you can't just look at the numbers. You also have to think about why you got the results you did.

I'm not trying to accuse you of racism at all. But there's a little bit of truth in every stereotype. Numbers like those you present are quite true, and that's what feeds the fear that a lot of people have of black people. In reality, of course, most black people you meet aren't going to shoot you. But we use race, along with a number of other traits, as a means of quickly identifying who could be a potential threat because it's not like we can go over their entire psychological and socioeconomic history. So the good part is that it allows us to make judgments quickly. The down side is that such judgments are very often wrong. And then when people see that black people commit more crimes than whites they think, "Those darn blacks are causing trouble again." So it just reinforces that bias. We need to realize, though, that it has nothing to do with race.

Originally Posted by Todd
Besides, I know Moores points, and I mostly disagree with him. I think it's pretty safe to say I've studied him more than anyone else here.

Well, you should at least watch it before criticizing it. Whatever you think you know about Moore's points, you can't really know anything for sure until you actually hear what he has to say, not somebody else's interpretation of it. I have to say I did find some of Moore's methods questionable, but I do agree with his overall point. I have to at least give him credit for looking at the matter seriously and raising awareness about some of the underlying factors.

Originally Posted by Erkki
Do you think Columbine could have happened like that with knives? I don't remember how many people were killed / injured, but it would have been less (or maybe not at all) if they hadn't had guns.

You really think so? Because I seem to recall an event in September a few years ago where a bunch of guys killed a lot more people, and all they had were box cutters.

mag

[remixor]

Originally Posted by ysbreker

And mag, the usa schools teaches you from the very first day in kindergarten: be number one, else you'll end up in the gutter and will die alone in a abandoned building and found 10 weeks later cause the smell is starting to reach the neighbours.

This is certainly something I have not at all experienced during the 14 years or so since my very first day in kindergarten. I'm not sure what reason you have to say this, except for the general anti-American sentiment that is so often thrown around the internet. In fact, many of the international transfer students I know, particularly those from Asia, say that their experiences with the school systems of their own countries emphasize that cutthroat attitude more than the American school system does.

[Zygomaticus]

I'm not first in class! Here I go the death pit!



I just found out I got into UT Austin!

[Swordmaster]

Originally Posted by Todd

Plus when law-abising citizens don't have guns, they also start to lose other freedoms like the freedom of speech and freedom to assemble. That's what happened in cases like Nazi Germany. Think of all the human lives that would have been saved if Hitler was prevented from outlawing guns.

Uh, are you seriously comparing the right to own a gun to freedom of speech? What about our right to own cocaine and heroine? Child porn? Weapons of mass destruction? I personally can't draw any parallel between basic rights of human beings (ie. freedom) to centuries old laws which, in the first place, were only created to help citizens fight possible intervention of Red Coats.

As far as my knowledge of history goes (I may be wrong), people in Germany were not forced to form the Nazi Germany, they willingly followed their charismatic leader. Of course, there were those who didn't embrace the change but they got along or moved out of the country - I don't see a university professor making it his duty to use a handgun to destroy the Nazi agenda?

[Todd]

>> Actually, that's kind of what I've been trying to say. The vast majority of Americans have no reason to worry about being shot. The problem, though, is you can't just take out the gang members and the drug dealers and leave everything else.

Hmm. Well actually it is the government's job to take out the gang members and drug dealers from society But they're not. They're too busy wasting and spending that 42% of our income on programs that create more poor and also give welfare to the rich.

The government is not supposed to provide educations, loans, welfare (especially since the rich collect 5 times as much welfare as the poor), medical care, insurance, or any of that. Why? It's not very good at those things, and it was not designed to do them. A free government can't do those things, because many of them cost the freedom our government was designed to protect.


>> Those types of people are a product of the society they were raised in.

Yet they're also responsible for their own conduct. Welfare and failing public education are what's creating the problem, not TV news. Public schools aren't giving children the one thing they need: the realization that hard work pays off. Anyone who's willing to get an education and a job in this country succeeds. To steal a line from Ahnold, there's no two ways about it. But instead we're sending a message to children that they need to become the next great celeb or basketball star, or else they're failures.


>> So until we seriously start looking at the way our society is run we're going to continue having violent crimes.

I am seriously looking at the way our society is run. We traded certain freedoms for government programs that are failing us. Government programs are inefficient and wasteful, because (1) politicians only have an incentive to present the illusion of success, (2) the millions of government employees don't have any opportunity to get raises if they save money and do their jobs efficiently so they don't care as much (3) government forces people to spend money on failing programs whether they work or not thereby circumventing free choice, and there are plenty more reasons. Our government was not founded to run programs and insurance schemes, but to police free people who do, and to ensure that our ability to live freely and conduct business is protected. But our government isn't doing it's job. It's taken over our rights and responsibilities to do what free people can do better ourselves by exercising free choice.

If you really want to solve problems we need to be willing to do what it takes. I'm very much in agreement with Larry Elder about these steps:

THE TEN STEPS TO FIX AMERICA

The 10-Point Elder Plan

1) Abolish the IRS
Pass a National Sales Tax--Also known as the "Let's Make Tax Lawyers and Lobbyists an Endangered Species Act." A simplified tax code gives lobbyists little to lobby about. A low tax rate spurs people to work harder without resorting to schemes to "shelter" income. At the turn of the century, government took 10 percent of the national income. Now it takes nearly 40 percent. Low taxes means higher productivity and greater job creation. Let's welcome any move to reduce our tax burden, whatever form it takes.

2) Reduce Government by 80 percent
Less than 2 percent of Americans are farmers, yet the Department of Agriculture adds still more bureaucrats. And what exactly does the Department of Commerce do? Do we need the Small Business Administration? Amtrak? The Tennessee Valley Authority? Department of Education? Before 1950, the government largely stayed out of the housing business. Now we have housing projects in all of our major cities. They have become sewers of crime and drugs. The government, an absentee landlord, couldn't care less. The private sector can build housing more cheaply, with an incentive to maintain the property and screen tenants.

3) End Welfare, Entitlements and Special Privileges
Welfare for the poor works out to a national average of $12,000 to $13,000 a year (cash and non-cash) per recipient. Why work at minimum wage? Why worry about impregnating someone when the government shields you from financial responsibility? But welfare for the non-poor, or entitlements, are five times as bad. This includes Social Security (the average recipient has put in fifteen cents for every dollar he or she takes out), Medicare, tuition tax credits, farm and dairy subsidies, tobacco subsidies, as well as government ownership or control of airports and utilities.

4) Abolish the Minimum Wage
A low-paying job remains the entry point for those with few marketable skills. The minimum wage hurts the so-called hard-core unemployable by forcing an employer to pay more than the fair value of labor. Every time the government raises the minimum wage, thousands of entry-level jobs get destroyed.

5) Legalize Drugs
Legalization does not mean approval. America spends at least $20 billion a year to fight a losing battle against drugs. (Research by William F. Buckley places America's direct and indirect costs of this "war" at more than $200 billion a year.) Experts say that worldwide, the annual drug trade may be as high as $500 billion! "Just say no" ain't gonna stop that. The drug trade provides an economic incentive for children and teens to drop out of school and earn fast money. It accounts for 50 percent of all street crimes and perhaps 30 percent of the prison population. Tax drugs, and use the money for drug treatment and additional police protection. Drug legalization would free up prison spaces, vacancies that could be used to lock up violent criminals. What about the harm to society? Drug abuse would have to increase well over fivefold to match the deaths caused by cigarette smoking (allegedly 400,000 a year).

6) Take Government Out of Education
Before the mid 1800s, elementary and secondary education (except for slaves) was largely parent financed. Today, taxpayers spend more than $6,000 a year per student, more than virtually any other country, including Japan. With what result? Poor test scores, high dropout rate, kids incapable of filling out employment applications. Why can't the private sector assume this responsibility? Let's cheer anything, including vouchers, that takes us in this direction.

7) Drop the Davis-Bacon Act
This little-known act compels contractors bidding on government jobs to pay union wages. This cuts out competent, non-union workers willing to work for less. This hurts minorities, many of whom were for years discriminated against by unions.

8) Eliminate Corporate Taxes
The government taxes corporate profits and re-taxes the dividends, taking money otherwise used to reduce prices, pay higher dividends, pay higher salaries, or invest in research and development. More corporate investment means more jobs.

9) Charity from People Not Government
During the 1980s, the "decade of greed," charitable contributions by corporations and private citizens increased by at least 30 percent! Why? People had more disposable income, paid fewer taxes, and therefore gave more away. Americans are among the most generous people on Earth. But people want their money to go to people and organizations that they choose and trust.

10) End Protectionism
How many people know that Japanese trucks and minivans cost $2,000 more due to import tariffs? Government-mandated "price supports" force consumers to pay more for milk. Government goodies for the tobacco and sugar industries stiff consumers. Congress imposes a mind-boggling array of rules and regulations to protect declining, inefficient businesses, while taking money away from new ones.