Kesterson: a Microcosm of Government Corruption [1] by D.A. Tuma

Government Fraud Sustains Public Confusion about Drainage

California State water regulatory boards host forums of fraudulent contention between demented environmental socialists, including corrupt federal government officials, and pragmatic agribusiness management.

Moral disaster at Kesterson

A long train of human events has brought us to our present situation. What we have done in the past, working together or struggling to out-compete others for scarce common resources, has established expectations and trust that holds our society together as do language and common law. And the expectations in our heritage include anticipated uses for all the words in our language that are variations on the theme of deception. Among these I find the words fraud, hoax, scam, canard, mendacity, and equivocation to be useful in this response to a petition to:

Request that the State Water Resources Control Board rescind the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board's July 24, 1998, decision to approve Waste Discharge Requirements No. 98-171 for the San Luis & Delta-Mendota Water Authority and United States Department of the Interior, Bureau of Reclamation, for the Grassland Channel Project, and that the State Board schedule a formal evidentiary hearing on this matter.

This petition helps describe a relatively short train of human events in recent (since 1980) California water wars associated with an alleged environmental disaster at Kesterson, a defunct drainage holding tank for a demonized and partially plugged San Luis Drain, a feature of the federal Central Valley Project (CVP). I refer to these events as the Kesterson debacle. Debacle is French for a breakup, an overthrow. It applies to the breaking up of ice in a river, a rush of debris-filled waters, a rout, a great and sudden disaster. But contrary to environmental socialist opinion, I find Kesterson not an environmental disaster. It is a disaster in human governance, a breakup of human morality.

Slouching toward Kesterson

Kesterson is a moral disaster because I find a multitude of human actions taken in bad faith. Many of these actions were directed by government decisions, made by government decision-makers. Therefore, it is my intention to use the Kesterson debacle as an example of how government's legitimate role of defending us from fraud becomes corrupted when we fail to limit its command and control of our lives. Hence, the title for this response.

We form government to have a justice system ready to defend individual liberty because we foresee opportunistic aggression in the absence of impartial and swift justice. But just because our government sometimes fails to control injustice, fails to expose fraud as in the case of the Kesterson debacle, we are not condemned to forever honor past mistakes. Statutes of limitations can protect the culpable from delayed prosecution, but nothing can forever protect past crimes from public exposure.

Our fate is not only determined by unforeseen and uncontrollable human and environmental events, but also our willingness to use all of God's gift of reason to observe and understand our environment and each other and take action to safeguard our future as we think best. If we limit our observation and reason, if we refuse to take action, if we slouch and drift, we should have no complaint as our civilization, our mutual trust, dies from lack of interest.

The sound of commerce

Everybody loves the sound of a train in the distance
Everybody thinks it's true.

The thought that life could be better
Is woven indelibly
Into our hearts and our brains.
(Like a train in the distance)

- Paul Simon

This thought resonates with a satisfying feeling in my mind. And if Simon means that "the thought that life could be better" is as deeply ingrained into our human nature as the love of "the sound of a train in the distance", I hope he is right.

When we hear the sound of a train in the distance, we hear the sound of commerce. We hear the sound of opportunity for freedom. We hear the sound of growing prosperity in our common weal. And the thought that life is going to be better because we as a society worked together to build the tracks and the train is enough to make anybody proud. Not just because of the tracks and train. But because of the way we worked together to make our lives better.

We built railroads in a way that preserved individual dignity. We did it with voluntary labor. I presume it was voluntary, for much of the work was done between the passage of the 13th and 16th Amendments to our federal government's Constitution-1865 to 1913. During those 48 brief years in our nation's history, our federal government was designed to prohibit slavery and involuntary servitude. This was protection for everybody's right to self determination, not specifically adult men at the exclusion of women, children, embryos, eggs, and sperm (wild, wiggling, bits of human genetic code fated to suffer high natural mortality in hostile habitats). Since then, the federal government's income tax has progressively taken the fruits of our labor until our involuntary servitude to the federal government consumes half of our working lives.

Some of us could be equally proud of building wetlands, if it were done with voluntary labor on our own property. And if we didn't care that our effort expended was going to yield only personal pleasures-fond memories-intangibles as self-satisfying as memories of masturbation. Which is okay, if we individually can afford such self-indulgence. That means not forcefully taking assets away from others, even if some of us form a government and a majority of us agrees to take taxes from everybody to build recreational wetlands.

When I see government issued agricultural drainage discharge permits limited to protect waterfowl reproduction from selenium toxicosis, I see tax slaves being forced to build wetlands in the San Joaquin Valley desert. I see other wildlife habitat, much more valuable for species diversity and density, including tropical rain forests, being sacrificed by our parochial federal government interference with our global market for food and fiber. Species diversity is a natural resource of genetic knowledge about wildlife survival that has beneficial, tangible applications for people. Species density is a measure of land use value for supporting wildlife. A sacrifice of valuable knowledge for all humanity to provide self-satisfying recreation is greedy masturbation.

Before there was the sound of a train there was the sound of draft animals and the loads they pulled. Perhaps not so intrusive on the landscape of pristine sounds. Perhaps more intrusive on the landscape of pristine odors. And these beasts of burden were constant reminders that but for the grace of our intent to make life better for people the loads they pulled would be pulled by people.

We had tradeoffs. With trains we used the energy released by fire to get a vast increase in transportation capacity, efficiency, and reliability. We voted our choice with our dollars. We were glad to get more products from more businesses who could out-compete our less efficient and less reliable neighbors. And in turn, our more efficient and more reliable neighbors were glad to sell more production to where ever trains could go.

Not only did our choice for diverse products in a wide range of craftsmanship dramatically increase, the cost dramatically decreased as businesses searched for ways to cut inefficiency to lower cost and remain competitive for our dollars. The competition for our dollars and our willingness to honor copy and patent rights, property rights, gave creative artists and inventors incentive to develop and sell us products most of us never even imagined could be possible.

In my lifetime I witnessed our market put camcorders in the hands of consumers. Consumers now have the capacity to document government brutality in motion pictures and sound, a market outcome that must have been unimagined by all kings and communist tyrants with absolute control of newspaper and film publication.

We can thank ourselves for the blessings of freedom and a better life we found in market trades, because our individual liberty flows from our individual willingness to honor other people's property rights.

Government thought control fading fast

The success of our market in bringing us unimagined freedom gives me hope that someday soon we consumers will laugh at government distractions designed to lead us into crusades against superficial images - the color and texture of hair, the color of skin and eyes, stature, and bodily proportions - that put people of a common ethnic heritage, like Japanese Americans, into objects of hatred and remove them to internment camps. We consumers will laugh at government distractions designed to lead us into crusades against superficial images - the deformed shapes of ill fated bird embryos, ferreted out of Kesterson by aspiring wildlife refuge imperialists - that put farms of a common water supply, like CVP water, into objects of hatred and force them out of production by water supply reallocation and drainage prohibition.

We consumers can now communicate without government censorship, without publishing house and newspaper editor filters on political incorrectness, and without special interest group peer pressure for self-censorship - thanks to our market supplied word processors, electronic mail, and web sites. The days of government thought control are fading fast. Ideological cleansing by purging political dissent is being ushered into the historical dustbin of government atrocities by our market. We consumers raise our own standard of living and freedom by buying what we individually want with our own money. But for lingering government interference, we consumers rule.

The uncooperative: robbers in the polling booth

Trains pulled down the unit cost per mile of transported goods and expanded our marketplace. We as a civil society, trusting each other to keep our promises, buying what we want with our own labor and the fruits of our labor, built this market. It has been very, very good to us consumers. Not so good for the inefficient, unreliable, unwilling to do better, unwilling to honor other people's property rights. In other words, the uncooperative.

I'm not in a position to speak on behalf of the uncooperative. I recognize them by the way they force me to change my lifestyle to accommodate their whims. It happens every time I get outvoted. But since our vote is secret, it's really hard to tell if people I meet are robbing me in the polling booth. I have to guess. I guess if only 2 percent of the voters are voting Libertarian, 98 percent are robbing me.

So I'm going public. I want people to know how I vote. I'm not among those who are uncooperative. I'd like our market to get better. It will as long as we consumers are not deprived of choices and prosperity by government programs which benefit some businesses at the expense of others directly and all of us consumers indirectly.

Representatives give us the kind of government we want: no?

What are these government programs that rob us consumers of our wealth? What are these government programs that are forcing us to limit our choices? They are every program in existence that does something other than provide national defense and justice (domestic defense).

We maintain national defense at a capacity greater than what we think is just enough, because we don't want to be a penny short. We subsidize a military-industrial complex because we want it ready to defend us in a moment's notice. But we risk corruption of defense capacity by a President who misuses it without specific congressional authorization to assault foreign countries. Libertarians see the current bombing of Serbia as misuse of our national defense with grave direct consequences to casualties. If we kill people to save the world from ethnic cleansing today, for what reason will we kill tomorrow? To save the earth from consumers?

Do we maintain domestic defense at a capacity that is greater than what we think is just enough? Or are we willing to sustain some rate of casualties from domestic violence? Corrupt government officials spread fear of ethnic traditional medication to support punitive statutory laws that spray prosecution like machine gunfire at one minority after another. In some way, each of us is in a minority position. If not by genetic heritage, then by ideology. The non-violent people we imprison and punish could someday be ourselves.

All issues over common "public trust" assets, including national and domestic defense capacity, have opposing groups of special interests. In order to win control of common assets each special interest group appeals for support for what they want government to do for them and/or against their opposition. Thus special interest groups fight for majority control of democratic government national and domestic defense - government guns.

Political parties - like the tweedle dee, tweedle dum Democrat, Republican Party - without any principles to advance - like individual freedom, a Libertarian Party principle - pander promises of government command and control to special interests. The Democrat-Republican coalition has thus helped polarize issues into opposing alternative solutions-like penal prosecution or medical treatment for drug abuse, like environmental protection or economic development for natural resources - at the exclusion of who should decide, central planning communists or private property owners. So government prosecution guns are up for grabs and out of control.

Some of us would like to maintain domestic defense at a capacity greater that what we think is just enough because we don't want to lose a single innocent victim. We subsidize a police-prison complex, because we want it ready to protect us in a moment's notice. But we risk corruption of domestic defense capacity by congressmen who misuse it without specific voter authorization to assault personal choice of smoke. Libertarians see the current persecution of marijuana smokers as misuse of our domestic defense with grave direct consequences to casualties. If we punish, imprison, and confiscate property to save ourselves from drug abuse today, for what reason will we assault alleged self-abuse tomorrow? To save ourselves from all forms of masturbation?

Meanwhile, some of us, including a lot of women, are terrified of human predators loose in our "public trust" streets and parks for lack of prison space.

Do we really want the kind of national and domestic defense we got? Just because we voted for representatives who are presumably doing the best they can to give us what we want, are we really as satisfied with the results as we could be?

Then how can we believe every other government program that just transfers wealth from those who cooperate to those who don't is also what we really want? Because our elected representatives decided we wanted it too? No. Libertarians are sure we are not getting what we really want from our government because we property owners have been denied individual decision-making by every decision made by government.

Out-of-control government

If we think about the retaliation for our federal government's aggression, both foreign and domestic - like the World Trade Center in New York City and the federal building in Oklahoma City - the lethal assault of criminals loose for lack of prison capacity, the lethal threat of law enforcement assault on personal choice of smoke, and the lethal threat behind every law enforcement action - from tax collection to agricultural drainage discharge permits - we must admit the root of terrorism in our country is an out-of-control federal government. An out-of-control government is not what we want. It is a real danger.

Our elected representatives could not possibly have decided we want an out-of-control government. They could not possibly have decided we want wealth to be forcibly transferred from those who cooperate to those who don't. Our elected representatives' decisions to force those of us who are innocent of harming other people to do anything against our individual will is not what we want. The dementia of Kesterson morality has inflated the population of alleged people we have harmed to include fish, wildlife, pristine habitat, water, rocks, and the flows and formations in which lifeless matter may be found. Ever since our government redefined who to protect, it has been out of control.

Government we want

What we want is to let political campaign contributors compete for what they want government to do or not do for us. In other words, we put our representative offices up for auction to the highest bidders and let our market demand for good government decide. What some people fail to notice is that voters, as political consumers, see value in political bids. Value is not just based on the amount of commercial air time bought for television broadcast. It's also based on the message. Smart shoppers check for quality as well as quantity. When a superior product is discovered, its satisfied customers give product endorsements voluntarily. Campaign contributors bid for public office not just with dollars, but with time, persuasive talent, organizing skills, inspiration, and a shared vision of better life.

New ideas are wild cards in politics. Socialists have tried a lot of wild ideas to keep voters supporting their leadership. In desperation, some now advocate market based regulation, as in tradable discharge permits. But government-limited market is in a corner of a political field opposite from a market-limited government. Freedom to trade, contracts among willing parties with ownership rights to property traded, is an opportunity to gain a better life without enslaving losers in democratic majority rule. Democracy looks good compared to an aristocracy or monarchy, but not good compared to the absence of political losers in our market. Our market is not a new idea. It predates government. It continues in the absence of government.

The thought that life could be better is a thought that we could be more free. Since the beginning of recorded history, people have yearned for more freedom. Liberty is not a wild new idea. It has been relentlessly defeating slavery as our love for freedom leads us to trade with each other for our mutual benefit without government coercion. Expansion of our market gets us the minimum government we want.

Fight for pork

But some people fear the more affluent will outbid the less affluent and raid public trust resources. Some fear other government consumers will always choose instant gratification at the expense of others and ultimate consequences. Feeding these fears, some campaigners promise to fight a mad rush to get government pork to their constituents before someone else gets it. But when elected, instead of making do with what limits were previously set on government, they negotiate with other elected representatives to grow the government's share of the gross domestic product by "taking" more assets from private ownership.

This government "taking" has not been authorized by people who have not signed the government's constitution. The government's power to "take" is an illegitimate self authorization-like the self-authorization for Kesterson "National Wildlife Refuge". Like the self-authorization of a robber, the self-authorization of elected representatives is used to rob more and more from all constituents to feed an expanding government barrel of confiscated loot, the source of government pork.

* Pork, like social security benefits for seniors, subsidizing other government programs with trade protection against private enterprise.

* Pork, like affirmative action quotas for financially depressed minorities, subsidizing poor performance with trade protection against superior performance.

* Pork, like drug war laws for punitive prohibition fascists, subsidizing crime with trade protection against a legal market.

* Pork, like federal flood control levies for river cities, subsidizing the white water tour industry with trade protection against flood control reservoirs.

* Pork, like clean water laws for environmental protection fascists, subsidizing the duck hunting and sport fishing industries with trade protection against irrigated farms.

Calling the hand that feeds us "subsidized"

Oh no! This is not who gets pork, according to Marc Reisner, George Miller, Dan Beard, Bill Bradley, and the entire environmental socialist movement. When they look at competing water users, they see farms. And in their water war against farms, they figuratively bury agribusiness corporations with lying grave stone epitaphs like "rich", "greedy", and "huge". Appearing clueless about the huge government "public trust" domain they expand at the expense of private property and the government favors they greedily grab for their eco-fascist constituents, they borrow pejorative terms, like "subsidy" and "marginal land", from free market criticism of government water projects for farms. A criticism that castigates all subsidies regardless of their relative position on the human food chain defense against famine.

From my perspective, the environmental socialist crusade against "public trust" water resource development of deserts to support new farms and cities is not just a pot calling a kettle "black". This is carbon black calling white sugar "waste". This is a black hole calling a falling star "disaster". This is sewage sludge calling snow melt "surplus". This is a Siberian gulag calling Sun City "subsidized". This is the black infinity of cold space calling the big bang "rich". This is Joe Stalin calling Ukrainian farmers "greedy". This is malaria calling people "huge". This is wilderness calling civilization "precarious". This is the prince of darkness, the anti-Christ, calling God's children "consumers".

Who puts the pork in the barrel?

Who pays for government pork? Rich, greedy, huge corporations that would rape Mother Nature and plunder her treasures if left unregulated by a kind and gentle government? It depends on our perspective. And our perspective is changing.

My perspective is very close to those of us who are approaching retirement and wondering how many more years we have to work. I've been retired five years. I love it. I don't have to jump when ordered by my employer. Except for taxes, I choose what, where, when, and how I want to spend my life. Not how my employer wants me to spend my life. I'm enjoying a degree of financial freedom that took me 50 years to get.

If I hadn't spent a lot of my life working for the federal government, directly and indirectly by taxation, I'm sure I could have retired earlier. I could have enjoyed this sense of financial independence sooner. And because I was forced to pay income taxes and payroll taxes - or its civil service equivalent - as a condition of my employment, the extra years I had to work before retirement to pay those taxes were years of involuntary service - years of slavery.