Friday, February 19, 2010

Census: more out of touch government overreach

The Dope hired - at great expense I'm sure - a "Blue Ribbon Commission" on deficit reduction. He can not be serious. If he were, he'd simply cancel any more spending from the stimulus (waste) package or throw out his own bloated budget that adds another $1.4 to the deficit.

If that's just too damned hard, how about recovering what is left of the Census Bureau's 133 million ad money? Read this if you want to get good and pissed off before lunch. The same idiots that blew 2.2 million of your hard earned cash on a STUPID Super Bowl ad are still at it. The Census Bureau's ad campaign is threatening people that if they do not fill out and return their Census form, their communities might not get the teachers and traffic lights that they need.

What the hell kind of American community relies on the census and the federal government for teachers and traffic lights? If there is such a community, whatever problems they currently have are about to multiply 100 fold.

Picture a town that has a sudden influx of people due to unrestrained liberty. The town grows 100 fold. I'm sure the mayor and town council would just sit by and do nothing for ten years while waiting on the census before hiring more school teachers. The once sleepy little town has a rash of bad accidents at particularly busy intersection in town. The mayor is heard to complain, "Damn! The census is still 7 years away. It'll be that long before we can do anything about the carnage down at Spruce and Elm." What utter BS!

The census is not supposed to be about teachers and traffic lights. Those are local issues best handled and paid for by local communities. Article I, Section 2 of that nearly forgotten document - the US Constitution - requires a census every ten year to determine the apportionment of Representatives in the House and taxes RAISED in each state.

Now, the census is not used in determining a fair share of tax burden but rather the REDISTRIBUTION of those taxes. Were the census conducted in accordance with the intent of the founders, the form would have one question: How many people live in this dwelling?

Today's census has 10 questions, including phone number, the are and sex of the home owner, the names of the people living in the dwelling, etc. You can visit the Census Bureau's website here. They make it very clear that their intent is about redistribution of tax money - it doesn't even cover the primary purpose of the census - determining the number of Representative as was the original intent.

I got the Census Bureau's long form in the mail during the last census. It was much more onerous than this year's. The last census demanded to know how much money I made and - no kidding - how many bathrooms were in my house. Oddly, according to the last census, I made a scant $2,000 but had 37 bathrooms in my home.

I don't know what to do this year. Normally I'd answer question 1 correctly; answer question 4, which asks for your ph #, 800-eat-$h!t and leave the rest blank. But since they have gone to such great expense to tell us that the form's primary purpose is to redistribute money, maybe I should kick the number in block 1 up 400-500%. You know sort of like a one man ACORN office.

This is more typical government overreach. The purpose of the census has morphed from determining a state's fair share of representatives and tax burden to determining who gets the tax money raised. Throw all of the bums out in Nov.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The 2010 census says,"The census DOES NOT ask about the legal status of respondents or their Social Security numbers." If you look at the 2000 census you will see that the US counted 7,705 Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander owned firms. We can ask if you are Hawaiian, live on an island, own all or part of a business, and wear boxers or briefs, but asking if you are legally in the United States is considered "too pushy" or invading one's "privacy". this government at it's manic-depressive best.
The Griffin.