A Utahan for President

2016

A Utahan for President

A performance based conclusion

By Stephen L. Wilmeth

            Many of us have heard about the experiment with the five monkeys. The monkeys were placed in a cage where a banana was suspended. As each tried to reach the banana, an attendant sprayed cold water on the monkey.

            At the point the monkeys were averse to claiming the reward, one of them was withdrawn and replaced. When that victim tried to reach the banana, he was not subjected to the cold water spray, but he was derailed by the caged veterans of the experiment. In succession each was removed until, finally, not a single monkey that was subjected to the original negative stimulus was present. Each monkey was taught the avoidance procedure by his fellow monkeys. They had no idea why they shouldn’t reach for the banana. They just knew that was the way the system worked.

            Washington is no different. It has been too long since it was staffed by free and independent men who relied upon nine full time employees four of which were … chaplains.

            2016 looms

            Our nation is damaged.

            Regardless of the suggestion of recovery, those of us in the heartland know the consequences of the federal policies and regulation enforcement that continue unabated. Even the Stock Market is not a true measure of the economic reality. Increasingly, reliable experts view its continued rise as a function of the monetary policy and resulting bond market influences driven by the Federal Reserve and the federal government. It is a bubble fueled by deficits and printing presses.  

            Optimism is just a word that seeks a place to park. The idea of anything robust has no real relationship with our private businesses or our business plans. Despondency is more the central character than it has a right to be.

            We are looking for a leader from an economic model that works, but, more importantly, we are searching for honesty.

            A place to start is a review of the state of the states. Eleven states, including my New Mexico, are upside down. There are more welfare recipients than there are gainfully employed citizens. California is worse off by all measures.

            North Dakota is interesting. The reality of what energy can do to an economy is clearly being experienced, but a national leader is not visible to those of us yet further into the hinterlands.

            Texas is a model of encouragement, but Texas, too, suffers from the absence of a leader who can speak from a national platform. If presidencies could be won by trench work and good looks, Rick Perry might well have been our candidate. He may have won, too.

The country would have been better off, but here we are in 2013 incredulous as to how we reach 2016. Let’s cut to the chase …

Over the past week, we have been bombarded by scandals that, if reported honestly, would make Watergate look like the petty, class C larceny it was. There is no difference in Fast and Furious, Benghazi, the IRS scandal, or the AP taps. It is the same story, same cast of characters, but with a different headline. That fellow’s support stands at a rock solid mid forty percentage. Nothing is going to be done.

What did matter in Washington took place before a Natural Resources subpanel of Utah Congressman Rob Bishop’s Subcommittee on Public Lands and Environmental Regulation. In that hearing, Utah’s governor, Gary Herbert, testified that Utah can manage its own lands, and it has the ability and best interest to manage them better than the federal government.

Congressman Bishop laid the discussion out with his normal non-inflammatory style. He said, “Over the last few decades we’ve seen our National Forest System fall into complete neglect – what was once a valuable asset that deteriorated into a growing liability. I believe our forests and public lands are long overdue for a paradigm shift.”

A paradigm shift is needed indeed! The ‘public lands’ reference in the Congressman’s statement center on Department of Interior lands. It is there that backlogged maintenance alone is estimated to be in excess of $11 billion.

It is probably true that Governor Herbert answered the questions in a manner that only those who wanted to hear the words would find comfort, but his words were profound. The progressives chose not to listen to him.  

What a terrible thing partisan poison in Washington is.

If the words of the head Bee Hiver weren’t adequate to those short on courtesy, perhaps the performance of his state should stand as ample proof.

For starters his unemployment stands at 4.7% while the other fellow’s is a conditional 7.8%. His economy is growing at an annual rate of 207% of the other fellow’s.

He is also very interested in the figure of 66%. That is the goal he seeks by 2020 for college and other higher learning graduation rates among adults in his state. There is no counterpart on a national level that even addresses such a lofty expectation.

He doesn’t even brag about the latest Forbes rating that inserted his state in the number two slot of the best place to be in business in the nation. What he does do is admonish communities for not moving fast enough in identifying and reducing regulatory burdens on local economies that can be extended to the state. Unlike the disdain Washington seems to have with local governance, he believes good government comes from people in the places they live, work, raise their families, pay their taxes, worship their God and … die.

He also believes that his state would also be an infinitely better place if those same Utahans could expand their horizons to more than 29.6% of the land mass on which they are required to live, create wealth and stake their futures. Government, dominated by the absentee landlord federal government, owns the rest.

It took no time for the NEA and the tax payer supported communalists to venture forth with their finger paintings and colored bows to protest Utah’s ‘arrogant’ battle with the federal government over ownership of certain lands and titles to disputed roadways or trails.

“Ultimately, this public land transfer will result in marred and scarred landscapes for years to come”, said James Thompson, one of the tax dollar dependent protesters from Bingham High School.

The dishonesty of that asinine nonsense can no longer be condoned nor can it be accepted as status quo.

Herbert’s testimony was founded on the basis that the opportunity cost to his state and the residents of Utah for living under the dominion of an absentee landlord exceeds $5 billion annually. For those like Thompson who have come to believe money sprouts from mail boxes or electronic transfers to their credit union, $5 billion to support their existence is not only substantial it is future altering.

Utah is consistently one of the best three managed states in the union, and it is being done on the basis of innovation and diligence. It is not yet blessed as a major energy producer, but it is fueled by a keen work ethic and a bright and energetic workforce. The more the state is studied and scrutinized, the more it resembles two or three of the most innovative economies in the world.

Governor Herbert has repeatedly referred to ‘fidelity’ in his allegiance and adherence to his oath of office. He will counsel the definition of the word has not changed. It remains the unbending matter of “faithfulness, loyalty, strict conformity to truth or fact, and exact correspondence to the original.”

Likewise, he believes the federal government must be constrained by the “few and defined” powers enumerated to it by the Constitution. He doesn’t have to quote Thomas Jefferson to remind his constituents and colleagues the balance between the National and State governments is of the utmost importance. To that end, it is the only security to the people in guarding against tyranny and the loss of intended freedoms.

The rest of the Crew

This nation could use a bit of fidelity in the management of its affairs.

Politics aside, Utah is doing something right. If an objective assessment is done to array leadership that demonstrably comports to constitutional originality, there is a cadre of leaders from the state that demand our attention.

Gary Herbert, Rob Bishop, Jason Chaffetz, Mike Lee, a constitutional scholar in the state house named Ken Ivory, and several other up and coming leaders are earning our trust. Three of them probably cannot be lost from the Congressional seats they currently fill, but there remains presidential and attorney general candidacy viability within that arrayed list.

“It is the nature and disposition of men and governments to amass unbridled power.” It is also the responsibility of us, the God fearing, productive Originalists to make sure men of fidelity don’t allow that to happen.

Stephen L. Wilmeth is a rancher from southern New Mexico. “One of these men is capable of being our next president.”