-Caveat Lector- from: http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.6/pageone.html <A HREF="http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.6/pageone.html">Laissez Faire City Times - Volume 3 Issue 6</A> The Laissez Faire City Times February 08, 1999 - Volume 3, Issue 6 Editor & Chief: Emile Zola ----- Canada in a Skinner Box by Peter Topolewski In his still-radical 1971 book, Beyond Freedom & Dignity, behaviorist champion B.F. Skinner wrote about control, specifically how to control behavior, and who should control it in order to ensure that mankind not only survives but thrives. He called autonomous man, the inner man and his will, a fiction created to explain the unexplainable. He was speaking both psychologically and politically, and so his theories are anathema to our tradition of man’s innate freedom and dignity. Skinner declared autonomous man dead, bruising our pride and leaving us, despite the vehemence of our libertarian mantras, to wonder if our declaration of freedom has more smoke than substance. Under Skinner’s light the history of man’s achievements looks frighteningly unfamiliar, particularly when we admit that no where do humans live as free individuals, only as controlled ones. "Control" of itself is not bad. It is a fact of life and, as Skinner puts it, is "ethically neutral". Questions of right and wrong pertain only to how it’s used, and to what ends. On political control he wrote: "A party in power may act primarily to keep its power, or to reinforce those it governs (who in return keep it in power), or to promote the state by instituting a program of austerity which may cost the party both power and support." In Canada these days there is no way to know whether the ruling party is acting for its own survival or that of the country. On the east coast of Canada is an island called Cape Breton. In the 19th and early 20th century the coal in its soil was like the seed that grew the nation. Cape Breton coal fed the construction of the railroad that tied one coast to another, powered Canada’s industrialization, and turned the engines that helped win World War One. The men who mined the coal never grew rich, but they grew tough and dedicated and proud, kin to the miners in America’s coal states. By World War Two, however, the world worked on oil, and the way of life in Cape Breton was being threatened. By the 1960’s there was no money to be made in Cape Breton coal mining. Controlling Coal Mining The Canadian government thought otherwise. Specifically, the federal government thought that it could make mining in Cape Breton profitable. In 1967 it created Devco, a government-owned mining company. Last week the federal government announced that Devco is closing, and this time for good. The "for good" is an important addition to the government’s statement because closure has been threatened many times in the past—"for good" reason. The Devco 30 year track record is a dismal one: thousands employed, years of restructuring, billions invested, and not one year of profit to show for it. This massive socialist experiment was of course not only a poor investment for Canadian taxpayers, it was an unjust one. What began as a government’s attempt to bolster Cape Breton’s mines turned into a huge redistribution of wealth. Devco spent billions dressing up a dead industry. Three generations of miners worked in what might as well have been fantasy land, making false contributions, mining for mining’s sake. Of course, with the government’s benevolence, the mining way of life continued on Cape Breton; that was really the point all along. In preserving their way of life, the miners were themselves not above arrogance. By some unfathomable route – perhaps too immersed in an industry without foundation – they came to actually see the largesse as something Canada "owed" them. Government attempts to streamline Devco were railed against. At times union contract negotiations turned to violence. This past month, in the face of what the government calls "assured closure," some miners appeared ready to restructure, but many were still holding out hope that "it ain’t over". Hope is all that most have. The government’s kindhearted foray into mining – entered into despite the history of socialist failure – has created a culture and countryside of miners. Seventeen hundred miners and their families who grew up in the mining life—and who know nothing else—last week had that life dismantled. It is easy for the government to say: It’s time for Cape Breton’s economy to readjust and retrain. It is an altogether more painful thing to do. There is no way to know if the federal government ever believed Devco could show a profit. In the end the only people truly helped by Devco were the members of parliament elected to keep the checks coming. Preserving a dying industry under false pretenses bought miners time, but being more reliant on mining than ever has made the inevitable transition hurt that much more. To the rest of Canada, Devco is another of the misbegotten projects that has buried the nation in debt. Its closure is another in a long list of spending cuts the federal government has made over the last six years. Perhaps this government is admitting that the oppressive debt and the oppressive taxes are about to crush the way of life Canadian cherish so dearly. Canadians in Denial It is wrong, however, to assume how the government thinks in this regard, for few Canadians seem to truly care about the debt or the taxes, and those who seem to care mostly just talk about it. Last year, for the first time in decades, the federal government created—with a prodigious amount of balance sheet chicanery —a budget surplus. Now Canadians of all stripes are calling for more money: doctors, premiers, artists, scientists, students, the sick, the old, the young, and most everyone in between. If they had their druthers even the minister of finance’s own party members would spend the entire budget surplus on their constituents, as though the money fell from the sky. The spend-happy Canadians foaming at the mouth for a bite of the budget surplus are showing the world that they still don’t want to pay for what they were given all throughout the 70s and 80s. Above all they are proving that they have utterly no concept the government has borrowed nearly $600 billion from the banks. The government has placed the nation at the banks’ mercy. Somehow there is among Canadians severe denial about this. For his part, the minister of finance has been promising a cautious approach for his upcoming budget. Increased spending for the failing health care system, a small tax cut, and a small debt payment. Is this a responsible government ruling for the good of the people—a good that they’re too lame to see? Or is this a government coloring itself "responsible" to ensure its rule continues? Well, consider this: in the last month the minister of health announced the government’s tough new legislation to fight killer tobacco companies. Now a whole 60 percent of cigarette packaging must be dedicated to labels such as "smoking can cause a painful death" and "smoking does not make you more attractive". Furthermore, the local convenience store cannot any longer display cigarettes at a child’s eye level. These tough new measures might be significant if they dealt with something like fattening food or sharp kitchen utensils. But smoking kills thousands across the country each year. The human and dollar cost is immeasurable. In light of pharmaceutical regulations that yank products with the slightest chance of uncomfortable side effects, and food regulations that destroy products which cause might food poisoning, or bicycle regulations that require riders to wear helmets, the tough new tobacco regulations are a complete and sick joke. The reason for the hypocrisy is of course money. The federal government collects $2 billion a year in tobacco taxes. On the other hand, the federal government just granted an income tax concession to the film industry. The feds had wanted to tax foreign actors at the same rate as Canadians, a move that would have as good as killed a sector of the economy that is, despite the local crews’ pride, surviving on a weak Canadian dollar to attract Hollywood productions. Deciding that the film industry was a good thing to keep around for the time being, the government decided that instead of taxing foreign actors at near 50 percent the rate will be closer to 15 percent. Perhaps the low tax rate foreign actors enjoy is what the government has in mind to give all Canadians one day. Such a goal will in the mean time require many more spending cuts, and many more hidden hypocritical tax schemes. It might never happen though if today’s ruling party is booted from power by voters looking for another public spending spree. As B.F. Skinner pointed out, the controllee also controls the controller. -30- from The Laissez Faire City Times, Vol 3, No 6, Feb. 8, 1999 ----- Published by Laissez Faire City Netcasting Group, Inc. Copyright 1998 - Trademark Registered with LFC Public Registrar All Rights Reserved Disclaimer The Laissez Faire City Times is a private newspaper. Although it is published by a corporation domiciled within the sovereign domain of Laissez Faire City, it is not an "official organ" of the city or its founding trust. 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