I’m sure someone has a story to tell about how one of his Scandinavian ancestors swam across the Atlantic, hiked through the forests and prairies of America, and helped found this city with his bare hands. It’s just another version of the commonplace, “when I was a child…” stories one hears from crusty old relatives.
It was probably never like this years ago; it’s surely not like this now.
Consider the words, from one of Whitewater’s career bureaucrats, on planning and grants that might come the city’s way:
I just want to let the Council know that if it wasn’t for the foresight that you all had it putting together a capital improvements plan, started last year, we wouldn’t, it was about thirty-thousand dollars worth of planning, we wouldn’t be sitting here today with a two-and-a-half million dollar grant. And, I guess that’s the benefit of planning. I know that sometimes we think that it’s expensive to plan, and put together plans, but they really are necessary in order for us to go forward as a community.
Later, these remarks:
…we’re very close to having an announcement from the Economic Development Administration, the federal administration, for the development of our technology park and innovation center within the park….believe it or not, the federal government wants to give us more money than we’ve requested…
See, the first remarks, beginning at 10:35, and the second, beginning at 11:05:
A few quick observations.
Hayek thought that the purpose of planning was to compete; now the purpose of planning is to get grants. In the new scheme, planning doesn’t lead to productive, private opportunity; it leads to state and federal grants. The private activity could continue, grow, and evolve; the grants only last as long as a government budget holds out (not a good bet, these days).
It’s the difference between giving fish to someone, and teaching someone to fish.
These grants aren’t free to Whitewater, Wisconsin, or America. It’s taxation (and federal deficit spending and consequent higher interest rates) that make these grants possible. Whitewater didn’t get $2.5 million for $30,000. America spent $2.5 million by obligating taxpayers for $2.5 million plus interest.
The men who founded our city, and the tribes that lived here before them, didn’t need a federal grant. All the stories about how wonderful it must be to descend from Scandinavian or German settlers ignore two truths. First, the original settlers to this area were mostly unwashed, vulgar Europeans. (Only in hindsight do living descendants portray their forefathers as would be Rockefellers or Vanderbilts.) Second, the settlers didn’t do what they did with all the dependency on government common today.
There’s another irony here. It’s predictable that progressives — committed to government intervention and assistance — might applaud a government grant.
What, though, of conservatives? There used to be small-government conservatives. (In fact, no one needed to add ‘small-government’ before conservative, at least for American conservatives.) Not now — many conservatives like government just fine, when it gives them something for their pet projects or political interests.
It’s a deep descent from Goldwater & Reagan to Bush & McCain. When so-called proud conservatives defend their politics, while crowing about state and federal money, they may be defending their politics, but they’re not representing the better understanding they’ve foolishly abandoned.