Fair - part one

"…we hold these truths to be self-evident…”

Fair.

It is the indefinable, nebulous single word catchphrase that is becoming the purported goal of government and society as a whole. The President pontificates about fairness in the regulation of private business with a more specific point about the current tax structure, while the loyal opposition blathers on about their blueprint for attaining their perception of a ‘fair’ machination of government, also with a specific eye to regulation of business and the accompanying tax codes.

This new Pavlov-ian reflexive adherence to such a singular word is also the demonstrative example of political cowardice and legislative incompetence.

The best corollary for this discussion would be to revisit the undefined specificity of United States Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart to describe his threshold test for pornography in Jacobellis v. Ohio (1964).

“I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description ["hard-core pornography"]; and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it, and the motion picture involved in this case is not that.”

  concurring opinion in Jacobellis v. Ohio 378 U.S. 184

This may sound ambiguous at best, but it is also clearly understood by the American people as the standard to be used, and this is the underlying central point, in specific, case by case situations. There can be no true standard for obscenity; once it is applied as a one size fits all salve to true pornography, the dictum of unforeseen consequences would be an assault on the first amendment that would be historic in its scope. Given its full frontal nudity, would Michelangelo’s’ “David” be considered obscene? A simplistic example to be sure, but there are times where a simple answer to a simple question is more than appropriate.

The same standard must be applied to the imbecilic euphemism of ‘fair”.

Consider what Thomas Jefferson, in this excerpt from his first inaugural speech, dated March 4, 1801, saw as the duty and responsibility of government as he assumed the presidency:

“A wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities.”

Jefferson, like most of his contemporaries, saw the United States Constitution as a document that defined government by restricting its involvement in the lives of the people. It may today be considered popular mythology, as espoused by many in the body politic, that the Constitution is too rigid for today’s governmental needs, but that is the height of intellectual dishonesty. The government should not be using its powers to shape the path of the nation; it should be used as an instrument of the people to determine their own future, individually and collectively as a people.

The concept of ‘fair’ at its heart dismantles the strength and history of America.

The Declaration of Independence speaks of the unalienable right of the ‘pursuit of happiness’. The Constitution should be considered the ‘how’ of democratic self rule, while the Declaration should be taken as to the ‘why’ of our democratic republic. The framers and the founders were quite clear as to the ‘why’ – the unfettered pursuit of happiness; there is no mention of a guarantee of happiness, or even of any level of success in the actual pursuit thereof. It was left up to the individual to define that aspect of their own, individual life.

The proposed concept of fair, by its intended current definition, is intended to create a standard of the pursuit, and provide some guarantee of government defined happiness, an imposed criteria for the end result.

This is folly, absurd, and a threat to the healthy future of this country.

We as a nation should demand that there is no advantage given to any specific group of people, or organizations in the pursuit of happiness, but we must be vigilant over allowing someone else, specifically government, to define that pursuit for us individually. The concept of ‘fair’ is nothing more than the seeding of the national consciousness with the insidiousness of collectiveness; America is the heart and soul of mans striving towards the strength of the individual, the sense of a personally realized successful self. It is an integral part of the national fabric. We may not all agree on what may be considered ‘fair’ while simultaneously agreeing on what is considered ‘unfair’.

The concepts of ‘fair’ are even more deleterious when used in concert with attempting to mangae the fiscal health of the nation.

The next blog will discuss the inherent obfuscation relative to a ‘fair’ tax code, and address how that equation is intended to derail private business.