The answer to complicated government processes is well, complicated.
The answer to how we solve the current dilemma is not complicated.
Build some respirators. Make some beds. Let the virus spread. Allow it to run it's course.
Property rights are what allows every one of us here on BP to invest in real estate in the first place. The virus threatens our property rights. Wait what? Yup. We are already seeing them erode. But even worse would be to see them disappear like a magic trick. Never! You say. O yes! I say. It can happen real easy.
Shall we have a history lesson in property rights and how they can be taken? I think maybe we ought to.
How did we get them? Did we ever not have them? What did the world look like without them? How could we lose them?
Before lots of people, there were no property rights given, they were inherent.
But after some time more people came, and those people all wanted the same property, even though there was enough actual land mass for everyone. So from the beginning it was location, location, location!
So the fighting broke out. He with the biggest fists and eventually biggest weapon and eventually largest army claimed rights to property. This arrangement still exists to this day.
For most of history, anyone who was not the leader of the army had to request permission from the leader to use a piece of land the leader was not already using for themselves. This arrangement continues in much of the world to this day.
But there have been a few exceptions to dictatorship rule, also known as warlords, also known as monarchy, also known as ultra-left government to put it into a modern definition.
The exception was democratic. Where a group of people decided to work for the common good of all. They realized immediately that it must be democratic in nature always otherwise, it would be the same as dictatorship rule - this is why communism didn't exist until very recently - it is in effect a form of dictatorship.
But democracy was outgunned. It's small uprisings were mostly squashed in short order. Again, he with the largest army won the day.
Until the year 1776. This is when the British Colonies of the Americas declared their independence from Great Britain, renouncing their allegiance and loyalty to the ultra-left dictatorship monarchy and opting for a democratic form of government, called a republic.
They decided they had enough of the old ways and wanted to try something new - an experiment they called it - which they would maybe like to take credit for inventing, but it was really not a new idea. The idea was that each man would be represented in government, and government would be as small as possible, including no taxation without representation, where taxation is the only measure of the size of government. What that meant is all tax dollars went to social causes serving everyone and no tax dollars went to luxury causes serving the few - like building a castle or fine clothing or building weapons and armies that could be used against the very people paying the taxes to make them pay even more taxes. They decided less was more, meaning less laws equaled more freedom, and today we call that ultra-right government, just left of absolute right, also known as Anarchy (the absence of government). And for good measure, they included a provision where each man would always have the right to keep and bear arms. Not so they could hunt rabbits, no, but so they could fight an army of their own government turned against them.
Which brings us to property rights. The new democratic republic decided that land could be owned by a single person, and that any person could own land. In fact, the early republic limited voting rights only to land owners. Perhaps a bad idea to stray from that original policy? I'm telling this story to a biased crowd I know.
So anyways, the King Of England was not pleased. He did not simply say, "ok fine my subjects, you can have America". O no. The king was was very angry for in fact, the subjects were stealing land from the king! How dare they! So he assembled his army and attacked the rebellious colonists. He lost that war. And the next war a few years later. He gave up after that. But I might think he never got over it, and possibly even vowed to take it back. Maybe even his descendants kept that vow??? Hard to say. Maybe we ought to ask them, Prince Harry has moved to the states so maybe someone could ring him for tea and bring it up?
So there it was! The greatest empire the world had ever known was defeated by a rag-tag up-start of rebels. How could this be?
Geography and resources mostly. But there was something else - the experiment. What could happen the founders wondered, if all men were allowed to own property and be free to do with it as they would - live or die - sink or swim? The result was more than they imagined, and out of many, one - e pluribus unum.
The experiment was such a success that no nation could challenge it. Of course the geography helped out quite a bit, considering it made it pretty impossible for an alliance of dictatorships to attack - attack from sea across an ocean was not exactly easy back then, and still isn't to this day.
And after a very short time the people of the world were brought the news of this new form of government. Rebellions around the world ensued, and in short order the great monarchies of the world were overthrown. Even the Great British Empire fell eventually. But this new form of government did not take over the entire world. Indeed, much of the globe continued under dictatorship and to this day, democratic government has yet to see the light of day in many places of the world.
What holds it all together? Exception. Geography. The United States Of America.
What could bring it down? What could destroy America? And if America could go down, could not all the other democratic societies go down too?
The answer is money. The collapse of currency. You see the irony is, the very thing that makes the United States strong also is it's weakness. Out of many, one. Out of none, none. If our currency collapses, our nation collapses. Because at the end of the day, the thing that makes a country a country is it's currency.
Our currency is not backed by gold, it's backed by faith. Faith in labor to be more specific. If we stop laboring, our currency stops having value. "Backed by the full faith and credit of the United States of America".
This is why we must go back to work. This is why it is acceptable to sacrifice lives if that's what it takes. If America goes down, the democratic governments of the world might go down with it. We must not allow a virus to take America down.
Want to keep investing in real estate? Better fight to keep our republic. Because when we lose our republic, we lose our property rights with it.
R.I.C. - R.I.P. - U.S.A. - Give me liberty or give me death.
1.2 Million dead so far. Will we honor our dead? The sacrifice they made so we might keep our freedoms? Or will we throw it all away, dishonor our dead just because we can't live with the thought of grandma dying? Has anyone asked grandma what she thinks? She might be more willing than you think if it means her descendants will live in the golden age of humanity as she has, instead of the tyranny that is inevitable as the alternative. You go girl! I'll remember you.
Happy Easter. O yea, another story of sacrifice that one. I'll let the preacher tell that story.
