David McElroy

When you write a check to the IRS, is that charity? According to UK-based philosopher Alain de Botton, that’s what we should call taxes, because the word “tax” is “colorless, odorless and offensive.” Yes, he’s really serious.

Modern political language seems to be intended to conceal the truth rather than make facts clear. It’s no wonder that nobody can agree about what’s going on when almost everybody is busy redefining words to mean what he wants them to mean — in order to make a point.

For instance, in normal conversation, if you say that someone’s budget has been cut, those words have a specific meaning. The money in the budget is something less than it was before. In politics, though, it can mean something altogether different. A “budget cut” might mean that a budget went up — not down — but that the rate of increase wasn’t as much as had been previously planned.

This language is dishonest, and its intent is to conceal the fact that real overall budgets are almost never cut. Politicians can claim to have cut budgets, even though spending still goes up.

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More than two years after a drunken Tony Logan crashed his car into a city-owned police car — in his own driveway — Logan is still the police chief in Tuscumbia, Ala.

Logan was finally sentenced Tuesday on his DUI conviction. It was in December of 2009 when he ran over his mailbox and smashed into a police car. It was March of 2010 when a jury first convicted him of DUI. And he finally found out his punishment this week — which amounts to almost nothing.

The judge sentenced Logan to a year in jail, but then reduced it to the two days he’s already spent locked up. (Why bother to impose a sentence if you don’t really mean it anyway?) In addition, he’ll lose his driver’s license for 90 days and be subject to random drug screening for two years. There’s also a $761 fine.

In sentencing Logan Tuesday, the judge made it clear that he wasn’t going to treat him harshly because the guy is a police chief.

“Chief Logan, I have never sentenced a police chief for DUI,” the judge said. “You can be assured I’m not going to treat you any differently or any harsher because of your position.”

Why not? Shouldn’t we hold the people put in positions of enforcing laws to a higher standard? And if we’re not going to hold him to a higher standard, shouldn’t we at least make sure he’s no longer in the position to enforce laws over other people?

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Cleaning out the notebook again…

I’m not sure what to say about the Florida GOP results that I haven’t already said over and over again. Barring something completely unexpected, Mitt Romney is going to be the Republican nominee. The fall choice will be progressive vs. progressive lite.”

I continue to hear from my Ron Paul-supporting friends that he still has a chance to win. No, he doesn’t. I have more chance of being struck by lightning than he does of winning. A friend accused me Tuesday night of being negative, but it has nothing to do with that. It’s just a hard, cold analysis of the facts. Neither Paul nor anybody else selling libertarian ideas has any chance of winning anytime soon. That’s not what people want.

People don’t understand basic economics. I’m reminded of that frequently. The latest example comes from a couple who live on my street. They had their house on the market for months and months. They had one offer, but that offer was for $20,000 less than the asking price, so they declined it and the house is now off the market.

They talked to me a few days ago about this situation, and the wife kept saying, “I’m just not going to give it away. It’s worth what we’re asking. People just want you to give it to them because prices are down.” No, seriously. I’m not making this up. People don’t understand that something is worth what a willing seller will take and a willing buyer will pay. The value from a few years ago is irrelevant. What they prefer to get is irrelevant. This very nice woman is angry at potential buyers — who she sees as trying to cheat her. She doesn’t understand the market. Sadly, this is the way most people think. It’s the kind of ignorance that leads to wage and price controls, as well as laws to control all sorts of things instead of letting the market work as it’s supposed to. It’s that ignorance that’s leading us to financial ruin.

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