Redneck Review
7/13/15
The Davy Crockett incident discussed during the last two reviews brings a reader face to face with a political reality of life! That is that public money distributed by a legislature might well involve what could be called a "Reverse Robin Hood" activity!
Recall that in his lecture, constituent Horatio Bunce stressed that public money was "Not Yours to Give." Commenting on the $20,000 Crockett and fellow congressmen had voted to give to burned out families in Washington, D.C., Bunce concluded, "No, Congress has no right to give charity. Individual members may give as much as they please, but they have no right to touch a dollar of the public money for that purpose."
Then his concluding statement, "So Colonel, I cannot vote for you!" spurred Crockett into admitting at a public meeting called by Bunce that he had made a mistake and would not repeat it.
Remember also that Crockett stuck to his promise later in Congress when he refused to agree to a legislative gift to a widow of a deceased war hero. Voting no, he urged his fellow congressmen to match the amount with their own donations, being more than capable of doing so financially. But the very men who were so willing to give money out of the national treasury were not willing to do so themselves! Hmmm!!
Does this not give more meaning to another Bunce statement, when he said, "You will easily perceive (giving away public money) what a wide door this would open for fraud and corruption and favoritism...?"
And does this not make more believable the claims back in RNR #s 5 and 9, where it was twice asserted, "...that dollars are more carefully spent by those who directly earn them, than by whose whose job is essentially to give them away?"
Now return to the "Reverse Robin Hood" suggestion! My own family experienced the fire destruction of our family home when I was about 10... and no contribution from Congress was sent our way!! And how many other homes have burned down in this area in the last 50 years, and again... no help from Congress! Any "favoritism" here?
Is it not true that disasters far from the eye of Congress are less apt to trigger help than those which happen in their vicinity? AND IS IT NOT TRUE THAT MANY OF THE RECIPIENTS OF THAT LOCAL LEGISTALIVE "CHARITY" MIGHT WELL BE MUCH BETTER OFF THAN MANY OF THE TAXPAYERS WHO PAID INTO THAT PUBLIC FUND THAT WAS TAPPED? MAYBE A CASE OF REVERSE ROBIN HOOD??!!
In the weeks ahead, a hard look will be taken at a book called THE LAW, written about the middle of the 19th century by a Frenchman named Frederik Bastiat. In simple and easily understood language, Bastiat argues that money taken by taxes from someone who earned it, and then given to someone who did not, could best be called LEGAL PLUNDER. PLUNDER he defined as the taking by force from the earner, an action more commonly called STEALING, with the adjective LEGAL attached to it, because it is done by the power and the force of government. A study and analysis of his argument will shed much new light on the REVERSE ROBIN HOOD title discussed above!!
Jake Wren

To the Editor
Letter to the Editor, 
Would like to ask the  "self appointed weekly columnist" Jake Wren "Redneck Review!!" how he justifies ranting about the Federal Government's out of control national debt while he continues to  rake in  USDA Farm Subsidies ($89,485) that contribute to the debt he's talking about?  - during the same period of time 64% of his fellow farmers did not receive subsidies. Even Davy Crockett would be mortified with this hypocrisy. See:  Patrick J Wren's total USDA Subsidies 1995-2012 EWG Farm Data base: http://farm.ewg.org/persondetail.php?custnumber=A08342165 
Idaho farms received $3.16 Billion Dollars from 1995-2012. Meat, fruit and vegetable growers were almost completely left out of the subsidy game. Despite the rhetoric of preserving the family farm, the vast majority of Farmers  do not benefit from Federal Farm Subsidy Programs. 64%  did not receive  Federal subsidies since most of them didn't apply. 
So Jake, come clean and explain yourself to your readers on your Federal hand outs  . . . . . . .
Taxes "...reach every man in the country no matter how poor he may be. So you see, while you are contributing to relieve one, you are drawing from others who are possibly worse off than he." 
"If you have the right to give to one, you have the right to give to all...and thus are at liberty to give to any and everything which you may believe...is a charity, and any amount you may think is proper" 
"You will very easily perceive what a wide door this would open for fraud and corruption and favoritism on the one hand, and for robbing the people on the other." (Quote by Davy Crockett,  in Redneck Review #8,  Jake Wren,  2 July, 2015, Cottonwood Chronicle).   
Jim Reed
Portland, Oregon 

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