KINDER'S COMMENTARY: AN EXAMPLE OF BIG GOVERNMENT

Dr. Paul Craig Roberts is a nationally renowned economist and former Treasury Department official during the Reagan administration. He now writes a nationally syndicated column in which he offers a consistently interesting critique of the dangers of Big Government from a principled perspective. The example that follows, from a recent Roberts column, is one that is writ large countless times across the bloated federal budget. How many more examples could we cite, even from our own experience here in Southeast Missouri? While you're reading, ask yourself: When did local city parks become a responsibility of the federal government -- that is to say, a responsibility of taxpayers from Seattle to Sarasota?

Path to the poorhouse

"The U.S. Department of Transportation has given Eugene, Ore., $1.3 billion to build a park. The city is using our money to seize Marist High School's (a Catholic school) river frontage through eminent domain in order to accommodate a bike trail along the east side of the river.

"There is already a bike trail along the west side of the river. If Eugene had to find its own money, taxpayers would object to the second bike path.

"The victims are numerous. Marist High is one, along with the millions of Americans who cannot scrape up the funds to meet family needs because their money is being used to build low-priority projects in distant places.

"The federal budget is a social engineering tool used by elitists to impose their agenda. The more the budget is cut, the better off we will become."

Words to live by in the current fight over the federal budget.

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Taxpayer-funded food stamps for Missouri's politicians?

Speaking of cutting bloated budgets, Gov. Mel Carnahan seems ready to be moving in the opposite direction -- toward dumping still more spending commitments on already overburdened Missouri taxpayers. A proposition passed by Missouri voters in 1994 required the governor to appoint a commission to study methods of cleaning up campaign funding and to make recommendations to this end. Gov. Carnahan appointed a majority of members whom he knew, before they ever met the first time, to favor taxpayer-funded election campaigns.

In one of the most under-reported stories of the year, Gov. Carnahan's commission held a bunch of hearings before issuing a report calling for -- surprise! -- taxpayer-financed election campaigns for politicians.

I have always opposed socialized election campaigns, or "food stamps for politicians," as some have called this scheme to force taxpayers to pay for election campaigns. So does an overwhelming majority of voters whenever the question is asked in any poll. Being the liberal he is, Mel Carnahan is now properly identified with a reform he knew would be proposed by the majority of a commission whose members he appointed. I'm told a minority report is being prepared by the dissenting members who don't toe the Carnahan line.

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"Self-centeredness and its related vices -- crime, illegitimacy, child neglect -- are exploding in America because Americans are glorifying extreme individualism beyond healthy limits. Civilization was created to constrain egoism. When a society decides that its individuals should live for themselves, then such a society must expect all manner of unkind consequences."

-- Andrew Peyton Thomas, writing in the Wall Street Journal.

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Hooters to the rescue?

The ridiculous Hooters incident with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission may yet prove a tremendous boon to conservatism in America. Or so said House Speaker Newt Gingrich in a conversation with pundit George Will. In the exchange, Gingrich had this to say on ABC's "This Week with David Brinkley":

"The reason, George, that you and I can be very optimistic about the future of conservatism is that every time we fail to be clear, the government does something so incredibly stupid and silly and inane.

"The power of the federal government, the might of the Constitution, the weight of the American military is poised to make sure that if you go to Hooters, your chance to have a waiter is not denied you."

The Atlanta-based Hooters chain said it would ignore the EEOC's recommendation that it hire men to work alongside its waitresses.

~Peter Kinder is the associate publisher of the Southeast Missourian and a state senator from Cape Girardeau.