Constitutional Conservative
columnist: Del Sharp

Topic: About the Chart
Nolan Push Chart?

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Is the Nolan Chart designed to elicit Libertarian responses? The answers presented did not seem to offer responses that represented the various political affiliations depicted on the Nolan Chart.

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by Del Sharp
(libertarian)
Monday, April 14, 2008

I jotted down a few observations while taking the push poll, er, I mean survey.

The first two questions were pretty straight forward in that you are essentially asked if you agree with the first two amendments, except that the constitution was written to define the powers of the federal government and not the state government. When the survey refers to government, it doesn't differentiate between state government and federal government.

For instance, at the time the first amendment was adopted, state churches were established and that was the reason James Madison's first draft of the first amendment was rejected - it was thought to be in conflict with the right of the states to have state churches. What is okay for the state is not necessarily okay for the federal government and that is a fundamental distinction that the Nolan Chart survey ignores.

The third question becomes a little more of a challenge in that it asks you to make a determination based upon your own constitutional view of the role of government. The determination in itself is not a struggle, selecting from the given choices are. None of the choices acknowledges federalism. All four choices could be appropriate in our federal form of government. The Nolan Chart survey doesn't give an opportunity to define a strict constitutionalist who supports the right of the people at the state level to determine if:

• Homosexual relationships should be granted a civil stature similar to marriage without necessarily calling it "marriage."
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  The government should pass laws that favor whatever view the majority of the population supports regarding homosexual relationships, including homosexual marriage.
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  There should be no laws regarding homosexual relationships among consenting adults. It is a private, contractual matter between free, private individuals that should not be regulated.
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  Homosexuality is an abomination, is banned by the Bible, and should be illegal in all cases.

In these instances, I would oppose all four choices on the federal level regarding homosexuality, but would allow a state to make its own determination in accordance with the will of the people in favor of all four choices.

Question four was very satisfying to answer in that the choices made honest distinctions between isolationism and interventionism. Clearly, this question was not written by Fox News.

Question five, national ID, no-brainer. No ID card.

Question six blurred the lines by mingling social welfare with corporate welfare, even though the question was about corporate welfare. Fortunately, for a conservative, whether it is social or corporate welfare the answer is the same. The federal government has no business being in the welfare business, even if Lincoln dedicated his whole political career to corporate welfare.

Question seven is certainly biased and does not seem to even consider that the Federal Reserve is a private bank and unconstitutional. The answers also muddy the issue by referring to the "Fed" and the "Federal Reserve" interchangeably. Is the "Fed" the "Federal Reserve" or the federal government. Considering that tariffs are the constitutionally provided means for raising federal revenue, but that tariff rates can be abused (Abraham Lincoln's protectionism) none of the answers acknowledges this distinction.

• Trade that isn't fair isn't free. Fair trade practices should be enforced as needed to insure free trade while maintaining reasonably open borders. The Fed's policies should be revised to help the poor rather than the rich.
  The government should involve itself in the regulation of trade as needed to insure a healthy economy at all times. The Federal Reserve system has made our money supply the most stable in all history.
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  End government barriers to international free trade. The regulation of trade tends enrich selected interest groups and industry captains at the expense of everyone else. We must move away from the inflationary approach of the Federal Reserve by re-adopting a hard money approach and dissolving the Federal Reserve system. Ever wonder why prices of everything (including real estate) keep going up over time? The Federal Reserve system is the culprit. President Woodrow Wilson, who signed the Federal Reserve Act into law regretted his decision three years later saying, "I am a most unhappy man. I have unwittingly ruined my country."
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  Trade should be free in general, but it should be controlled as needed to insure that our borders are protected against outside threats. Monetary policy under the Fed has generally been good for our economy. Hard money can't keep up with a modern economy.

We have no way to know if hard money can keep up with a modern economy; it's never been tried. We do know, however, that printing presses don't have any difficulty keeping up with a modern economy and now, we accept inflation as a fact of life. Like the unconstitutional income tax.

Unfortunately, tariffs are considered by globalists to be barriers to free trade, but tariffs protect national soverneignty, particularly ours, against globalists who see the American constitution as the main impediment to the establishment of world government.  When you destroy the standard of living by replacing factory jobs with jobs greeting customers at WalMart, you make it easier to force the people into accepting socialism.  Especially, since they have to work three jobs to make the same money and don't have time to pay attention to the shenanigans going on in D.C.

Question eight, Social Security, is socialism plain and simple, thank you, FDR.

Question nine, Healthcare, another legacy from our great socialist president, FDR. Thanks to Roosevelt and WW2, employers began including health benefits in lieu of wages. This turn of events led to our healthcare being paid for by third party payers. When you combine someonelse paying the bill, with the beneficiary only realizing a benefit when healthcare is accessed you have a system ripe for inflation through lack of competition. So, not only does the government need to get out of the healthcare business, but consumers need to start buying the healthcare themselves.

Lawyers parasitic relationship to healthcare needs to be severed as well.

Question ten, taxes, spending and national debt. When the government was financed solely on tariff revenue, the government regularly ran surpluses. The income tax is illegal and the only means of financing the unconstitutional government. The only constitutional answer is: Abolish the income tax, the Federal Reserve and the national debt and return to sound monetary policy, tariffs for federal revenue and constitutional government. Too bad, that answer wasn't a choice.

In the computer age, divining someone's political persuasion with answers to ten questions is weak. Certainly, a test could be devised that offers five answers, not four, that honestly represent the five political disignations on the Nolan Chart. I am a self identified constitutional conservative, but Nolan Chart got the Libertarian it was looking for.

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©2008 Del Sharp, all rights reserved. You must have written permission from the author in order to republish this work.
Published: Monday, April 14, 2008
Last modified: Tuesday, April 15, 2008

The views expressed in this article are those of Del Sharp only and do not represent the views of Nolan Chart, LLC or its affiliates. Del Sharp is solely responsible for the contents of this article and is not an employee or otherwise affiliated with Nolan Chart, LLC in his/her role as a columnist.

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