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Contributors
K. Lloyd Billingsley - Contributor
[Courtesty of Pacific Research
Institute]
K. Lloyd
Billingsley is Editorial Director for the Pacific
Research Institute and has been widely published on topics
including on popular culture, defense policy, education reform,
and many other current policy issues. [go to Billingsley index]
 Infantopia
A legislature ruling in denial of real consequences...
[K. Lloyd Billingsley] 10/30/03
Yes, it is
true that "we spent too much," as
Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante candidly conceded on television during
the recall campaign. Mr. Bustamante's cure for this problem,
taking even more money from the people, did not find much favor
with voters. But beyond the simple arithmetic, and the obvious
truth that a state should not spend more than it takes in, lies
a broader malaise.
In September,
George Will observed that California resembles Britain in 1975,
when "bad government by both
parties - meaning bad decisions by British voters - had brought
that nation
to the brink of bankruptcy." While Britain was "the
sick man of Europe," Will wrote, "California is the
sick man of the Republic." The problem, in his view, is
infantilism.
"The
public has repeatedly used the initiative process to mandate
spending that prevents sane budgeting," Mr. Will
said, "And
the public has used this recall to throw a tantrum about what
it, the public, has wrought."
Will noted
in California a dearth of the "vigorous virtues" that
rescued Britain under Margaret Thatcher, and which together can
be called "adulthood." These include entrepreneurship,
deferral of gratification, individual initiative, and personal
responsibility in making appetites conform to resources. California
needs all that, but must also shed another prevailing ethos -
utopianism.
Utopianism
is the impulse that prompts politicians to launch policies
that either have never been implemented elsewhere
or
have already proven disastrous. It is the notion that every problem
has a political solution and that perfection is attainable through
politics. It is the belief, tenaciously held, that a ruling political
class can do great things for masses of people at no cost or
adverse effect to the people themselves.
Under utopianism,
a tax dollar can be sent to Sacramento, go out on the town,
and
return to a district with no loss whatsoever
in bureaucratic overhead. Worst of all, under utopianism, ideas
have no consequences. That is why the actual utopia is always
just around the corner.
Before the recall, California received a vivid example of utopianism
in action - a proposal for universal health care by state senator
Sheila Kuehl. The measure was an open-ended entitlement, based
on residency, with no deductibles or co-pays. It would have
provided practically unlimited benefits, just about everything
short of
pedicures and plastic surgery on demand. The government would
have been in total control and private insurance as we know
it would no longer exist. The plan would have been financed
by new
taxes, but it came billed as free health care.
When Mark Paul of the Sacramento Bee interviewed Sen.
Kuehl about the legislation, she "couldn't explain the details
of her own bill." Yet, as Paul also noted, Kuehl recently
contended that the Senate would have to save California from
the "ignorance" of
the new governor, who is getting called a lot of childish names
these days.
Infantilism
combined with utopianism makes for infantopianism. As the new
administration, particularly the auditors, will quickly
discover, infantopianism has consequences. The cure will be
difficult and painful. California needs to grow up and get
real.
copyright
2003 Pacific Research Institute
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