I had some time, regrettably, to sift though an OP-ED piece written by Svetlana Wasserman a contributor to the local papers here in Greenwich and Stamford directed at our Local State rep. Kimberly Fiorello.
Her diatribe is riddled with a lack of historical context coupled with perverse intellectual musings as to the nature of having a healthy distrust of what ones government does.
Instead of making salient counter arguments to Fiorello's endeavors to properly inform and represent her constituents, about the current power grab by Hartford to strong arm local towns and municipalities under the auspices of "racism", "climate change" and a variety of other contentious straw man fallacies, Wassermen instead waste's her opportunities on the the same ole dogmatic Marxist mantra i.e. Republicans/Conservatives are evil and bad because: (Fill In The Blank).
Wasserman doesn't waste any time mis-characterizing Fiorellos politics as: "naive Libertarianism" and as a "dogged faith in individual choice... that.. ignores decades of economic research about market failure" and then goes on to use the poor example of the "Tragedy of the Commons" as her primary example of "market failures". The presumption is directed at the limited resource component of the argument. Apparently this idea was first introduced by Garrit Hardin. In a nutshell the fallacy of the commons assumes that the number of people that consume resources exceeds the amount of resources available for all. This is in essence some of what has brought many nations to war including but not limited to even Native American indigenous peoples. The fallacy of the commons also wrestles with more ontological questions such as who really owns any thing? One could argue that to the degree humans resort to unbridled procreation that this fallacy might hold sway which gives rise to yet another argument. Can a Government limit the amount of births in a single family home? This policy was actually implemented in China under the One-Child-Only policy in 1980.
She seems to enjoy conflating cronyism and corporate greed with individual choice and freedom. Shouldn't it be obvious every single soul on the planet has "self interest"? This raises the specter of "determinism". People who flee oppressive governments that were supposed to bring "equity" and "prosperity" to them have been left empty handed. People like the idea that they can chose their own destiny. The government, not so much.
She goes on to say; "market failure is the concept of negative externalities, whereby the prices charged by producers do not reflect the true cost of the damage they cause." So it appears Wasserman wants Government to solve the problems that she inadvertently muses they helped to create? Talk about confused. Does miss Wassermann bother to talk about the incestuous relationships between Lobbyists, Corporations and our Representatives who deal in bribes and payoffs ?
Her allusion to climate change, side steps the fact that the United States is one of the largest proponents of cleanliness and has been a leader in the world for renewables. Another caveat to Wassermans fallacy is, for example, the 2017 WHO report on air pollution, the United States is listed as one of the countries with the cleanest air in the world, significantly cleaner than the air in Germany, Italy, Switzerland, the UK, Japan, Austria and France.
It seems those of her ilk have this idea of retribution and restitution is passing the collection plate for the remission of your societal “sins” along with all costs associated with said problems onto YOU the taxpayer. And so, people like me wonder if Ms. Wasserman is prepared to pay penance for her prolific contributions to "climate change" by all of her globe trotting excursions (In the name of self interests) via fuel guzzling Jet liners.
She continues : "Fiorello’s faith in what she calls “we the people,” is the cornerstone of neoliberal economics. Rational choice theory holds that individuals use rational calculations to make choices aligned with their objectives. Yet we see all the time how people make terrible choices, such as gathering in large groups during COVID or storming the Capital, when they are fed a steady diet of lies and disinformation."
The first three words as to how and what rights the Government are to insure that are preserved is in the premable to Our Constitution: "We The People". Not: "We The Government".
Wasserman seems to have a problem with our Constitution and our Declaration of Independence. Yes, of course people make terrible choices and what of the colossal failures of Government? Because it seems according to her there are none. Where has she been for the last 60 years? Has she bothered to see what all these repackaged social policies have done to cities like Hartford? Waterbury? Bridgeport? Clearly not. Instead she chooses to resort to the conventional scapegoating of conservatives in the attempt to assign blame for all that wrong with America. Incidentally, the Democrats have succeeded in turning those towns into places few people with an iota of common sense would never actually consider moving to. But who knows maybe thats the way they like things?
Non Sequitur:
"Storming the Capital" "Gathering in large groups during COVID " and ""Diet of Steady lies and disinformation"
1.) Post hoc ergo propter hoc (fallacy attempts to create a causal relationship between ideas/events),and 2.) Argumentum ad populum (A fallacy that attempts to prove an argument is true because the public, press and politicians agrees with it.)
None of Wassermans assertions on the above fallacies have any bases in absolute fact whatsoever. Perhaps because she enjoys Statist media and propaganda? Portions of the press and Democrats have drawn conclusions based on innuendo, speculation, and in some cases flat out lies about said incidents.
And apparently she hasn't seen the recent video of the Capital Police giving the OK for the protesters to peacefully enter the Capital building. When one views it, its hard to conjecture that this was anything that remotely resembled an "insurrection" or "Storming the Capital" but this argument has been a useful boogeyman to gaslight, pester and malign Republicans and Conservatives ad nauseum.
Wasserman: Fiorello’s blind faith in individual choice and her distrust of government explains her extremist voting record. She has voted against every piece of civil rights legislation because she believes that racism lives in people’s hearts and government has no role in mitigating it. Embracing the libertarian goal of replacing public schools with private ones, she introduced a bill to divert public school funding to charter schools. She has been at the forefront of the protest against requiring vaccines for public school students, claiming that individual liberty trumps public health. She has spoken out against every piece of climate legislation introduced in the Assembly, opposes any kind of gun regulation, and voted against a ban on importing trophies from the killing of highly endangered African Big-6 large mammals.
Firstly, the Vaccines have NOT had full approval by the FDA and have been sanctioned for "emergency use only". Meaning; the vaccines have NOT gone through the rigors of passing muster. And at least one of the companies has stated that the vaccines are experimental and may not prevent you from getting sick. Also, the government cannot be held responsible nor the companies that manufacture the vaccines in the event of adverse reactions or death. This is rather convenient considering the obvious double standard Wasserman has adopted in the quest of "whats in the best interest for all" fallacy. Since Wasserman clearly appears to be an advocate for the co-erced medications paradigm I wonder if she would be interested in accepting responsibility in the advent of an adverse reaction or death?
At the end of the day individuals decide what level of risk they are willing to live with. Once the government is given completely autonomy to make those decisions for you than you've quite literally flushed the whole concept of individual freedom and liberty down the proverbial toilet in the name of "public health". Wassermann seems to be more interested in holding people to account for theoretically extracting more than their share of resources but she doesn't appear to be interested at all that experimental medications could end your life. Priorities, priorities.
And since when is healthy distrust of government is a bad thing? Unless tyranny and authoritarianism is your thing then I'd say you're in the wrong country.
Disparaging and gaslighting individuals who may chose to work through moral problems (such as racism) on their own suggesting that people are somehow incapable of recognizing their own sins and faults and seeking to change the way they think on their own. Fixing what isn't broken and breaking what has already been fixed is rather insane but so is the politics coming from the left lately.
Authoritarianism assumes that individuals are incapable of doing any thing without the help of Government. Wasserman doesn't appear to be familiar with the historical axiom that it is not the governments job to legislate morality, while it IS the governments job to preserve justice in the face of the people who act on the impulses of bad thinking. People of Faith and Conscience know that what we call "racism" is inherently wrong and now she wants the Government to step in and somehow be the arbiter of moral virtue? That's a tad comical if I'm honest. I wonder if she's had a talk with any citizens of China or in Hong Kong and asked them how thats been working out for them.
Diverting public school funding:
Any person who does not see what an abject failure public schools have become has not been paying attention. If Wasserman had bothered to investigate why Fiorello didn't see the wisdom in continuing to fund public institutions that are failing our children (in a manner of speaking) then she hasn't looked at the data of children who attend public schools with respect to reading comprehension, math, etc which has been on a steady decline for the past 30 years or more. Why should the taxpayer be required to fund institutions that are not properly serving or educating children ? The law of diminishing returns applies here and the taxpayers are not getting what they pay for and as such they have a right to file for a redress of grievances.
Conclusions:
Most of Wassermans diatribe is little more than a distraction from the real work Fiorello is accomplishing through educating her constituents on what is happening in our Government. And isn't this what elected officials are supposed to do anyway? Clearly Wasserman does not appear to be familiar with U.S. History. Or maybe she has subscribed to the perverse historical revisionist musings of Nicole Hannah Jones (of the 1619 project) who has predicated some of her flaccid musings of American History on the adversarial writings of Gerald Horne who himself declared that our country was formed for the purpose of keeping slaves. Anyone who actually believes or subscribes to this revisionist drivel has not done their own homework.
Titillating erroneous theories that have been debunked ad infinitum with the exception of the Southern Dixiecrats who genuinely wanted to retain their stronghold on slave labor is a poor augury for unifying our society . And isn't it ironic that the Dixiecrats (who later morphed into the Democrat party) are supposedly the ones advocating for the abolition of racism? The irony is palpable and I also have some sand from Mars I'd like to sell you too.
Questioning what the government does is part of the fabric that has been woven into American Culture it’s who we are. Kimberly Fiorello clearly understands this. But here again for the sake of Wassermans cataleptic ill informed bias, doesn't appear to have any use for the American Ideal and her myopic ad hominem attacks on Fiorello are indicative of what appears to be a contempt for free thinkers. Thomas Jefferson, among other Founders, had feared the day that this brand of despotism would come. And here we are.