Before turning to Arianna Huffington’s interesting thoughts on “How to Overthrow the Government,” it is worth noting that manufactured housing is a relatively tiny industry at this point in time.
There are several possible implications from that reality. A positive takeaway could be that the upside potential is strong. Indeed, the evidence reveals that because of the affordable housing crisis, manufactured housing has good growth potential. But the other reality, a more ‘negative’ one is that the industry’s ‘political’ influence is nominal.
Certainly, some segments of the manufactured housing industry have more ‘pull’ than others do. But when the ‘independents’ of manufactured housing are pondered, their strongest voice isn’t in Arlington. Rather, it is across the Potomac River in Washington, D.C. But we are getting ahead of ourselves.
Legacy Housing’s Curt Hodgson’s quotable quotation above ought to be paired up, in this context, with Sunshine Home’s John Bostick’s observation that “Easy doesn’t pay well.” Want the easy path? Want to think short term only? Then you are more likely to be swept away by currents you may not even seen moving under the surface of the water.
To grasp the broader picture of the industry’s status, and how that can be better be navigated, it is useful to step back and look at the bigger picture. If you are hanging on a specific tree, it is harder to see the forest around you. But you certainly want to know if a fire or other threat is coming your way, don’t you?
Thus, this report and topic.
Arianna’s HuffPo
The Huffington Post is an influential progressive publication that has as its famous co-founding publisher Arianna Huffington. While she has since moved on, the Huffington Post (HuffPo) still bears her name.
In 2000, she published a book that was hailed by moderate Senators John McCain and Joe Lieberman, among others. The title was “How to Overthrow the Government.”
A copy of her book sits on our bookshelf and has for many years. But the pull quotes below are from this link here. Citing the book shouldn’t be construed as an endorsement. While there are some intriguing comments, there were also some policy prescriptions that in hindsight were bound to go nowhere fast. But that is part of the lesson to be learned. There are others.
Books are sold to make money; duh, right? Get a few good endorsements and pull quotes, a X numbers of copies will fly off the shelves — or in the modern era, will be ordered online or downloaded onto a device.
That noted, Huffington was insightful on some issues.
For instance, she lamented the limitations on U.S. ballot access that kept third parties in check. That quotation is one of the ones that will follow below. Having made her claim, she then promptly partially refuted her own hyperbole. Ironically, her comment had a tone that sounded vaguely like Alabama Governor George Wallace who said in 1968 that “there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between the two major parties.” It is likely that Huffington would cringe at that ironic comparison in the political divide between the two. She might be only modestly happier about a similar comment by libertarian-leaning Senator Ron Paul (KY-R), who observed that there is an “unholy alliance” between the two major parties on certain issues that keep the two in power, while largely precluding other political organizations to grow through ballot access hurdles and other means.
Precisely because her book is now 2 decades old, from the same era as the Manufactured Housing Improvement Act (MHIA) of 2000, Huffington’s book is interesting as a bit of historical context and analysis. It’s a mix of interesting and mistaken positions.
For instance, as MHProNews is a believer in the core principles of the Constitution, including the much misunderstood 2nd Amendment, Huffington’s clearly anti-gun stance misses the lesson that Iran, North Korea or Venezuela should teach all willing to see. Those nations might be free of their dictatorial leadership if they had the right to keep and bear arms that Americans enjoy. That said, Huffington’s thoughts on the role that anti-depressant medications might play in some student-involved shootings is interesting. It is an example of why the principle of separating the wheat from the chaff ought to be routinely employed.
Truly striving to understand another perspective can at a minimum help clarify our own. But at times, that new outlook can yield a new understanding that helps professionals in a variety of ways.
But arguably a gem is her quotes on the corrosive influence on money in politics and her thoughts on media. Her posture on money in politics is one that many agree on, but her solution is again a miss.
There are many takeaways from this. In discussions on ballots by mail, for instance, one misses the issue of ballot harvesting as a form of potential vote fraud. Just as some push term limits as a solution, that misses the point that special interests can always replace one candidate for another.
As Iowa looms, and Democratic leaders are scrambling to de-rail Senator Bernie Sanders’ surge. It’s clear that some find Democratic voting to be inconvenient at best. On the political flip side, former President Trump advisor John Bolton’s book is getting hyped at the time of its pre-release. It is touted even by Bolton’s critics as the next volume that could ‘bring down the president.’ But that would be to ignore a series of other ‘inside the White House’ ‘tell all’ books that each bounced off of the “Teflon Don” Administration.
There are several core issues that won’t be solved in time for the 2020 election. Ballot access or campaign finance are among them. But that doesn’t mean that the issues are irrelevant. What’s fascinating is to look back and see that about 2 decades ago, some of the same laments were being made then and now.
That’s one of several reasons to ponder these pull quotes. More analysis will follow. The headings are from “On the Issues,” but the quotes are from her book “How to Overthrow the Government” which might have more accurately been labeled “How to Reform the Government.” Like the publisher thought the “overthrow” word in the title would sell more copies.
On Principles & Values: It’s time to overthrow a rotten government system
The fact is, beneath the thin veneer of prosperity our politicians seem so eager to celebrate, America is a fast-ticking time bomb. It’s time to do something about it, before the clock runs out.
The first step will be for the American people to take back their country-to overthrow a governmental system that has gone rotten at the core, and replace it with a reinvigorated democracy that serves all the people, all the time. Let us begin.
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p. xxxi-xxxii Jul 2, 2000
On Government Reform: People don’t vote because politicians don’t care
Our political world is divided into two camps: those who consider plummeting turnout and high disengagement a serious threat to our democracy, and those who do not. The problem is that almost every elected official and political consultant is in the latter camp. Which isn’t so surprising when you consider how many of them owe their jobs to the worst aspects of the system.
The defenders of the status quo have no problem with disaffected citizens dropping out-it keeps them from making waves. Better that they get out than care enough to stay in and vote against them. In many ways, it is easier to play to, control, and manipulate a smaller audience.
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p. 3-6 Jul 2, 2000
On Health Care: Tobacco Bill was bought & paid for by Big Tobacco
Sleazy episodes like Big Tobacco’s efforts to keep its product on the lips and in the lungs of Americans are a primer on the corrupting influence of money in our political process. Jesse Helms bellowed, “Any increase in the cigarette excise tax will fall disproportionately on low and middle-income consumers-the citizens least able to pay.” Of course, he was strangely silent on the fact that it would also fall on the tobacco companies-those most able to pay. Helms has received over $175,000 in tobacco contributions over the last decade.
Sen. Wendell Ford (D, KY) wrung his hands over the possibility that increasing the cigarette tax would lead to reduced smoking. That’s clearly an undesirable outcome, especially when you’ve received-as Ford has-$94,773 from the tobacco industry. Trent Lott ($88,000 in tobacco contributions) even went so far as to call the president twice and warn that raising taxes on cigarettes was a “deal breaker.”
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p. 52-54 Jul 2, 2000
On Government Reform: Politics by polls is not leadership: end phone polling
As we march into the next century, the motto of every politician seems to be: “I am their leader; I shall follow them.” Both parties, with their scores of poll-tested plans, are unable to beat their addictions. Yet this is a moment when the nation needs leaders with the wisdom to see what does not show up in the polling data, and the passion to build a consensus for reform.
Here’s a better idea: Let’s fight back against the pollsters. Contact your congressman and demand that he or she work to get telephone polling added to the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. This would not only offer consumers one more tool to protect their privacy, it would also give citizens a valuable weapon to protect democracy from its ongoing hostile takeover by pollsters. Given the collective nature of politics, people always ask, What can one person do? Well, you can start by removing yourself from the polling pool.
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p. 77 & 85 Jul 2, 2000
On Principles & Values: Dems & GOP are identical cousins
Today’s Democrats and Republicans have become like Beltway versions of the identical cousins in the old Patty Duke Show: they walk alike, they talk alike, sometimes they even think alike. In fact, the differences between the two have become so narrow that they should consider changing their names-as some have suggested, how about the Pro-Life Corporate Party and the Pro-Choice Corporate Party?
As Bob Dole so passionately said: “The Republicans want government to grow by 14% while the Democrats want it to grow by 20%.“ Wow, I guess we’re lucky we avoided civil war. No wonder so many Americans are sick of the political process-how can you get excited when all you’re offered is a choice between two versions of the same outdated agenda?
This bipartisan identity crisis has already begun to shred the fraying coalitions that have defined the two parties for years. Traditionally loyal factions seem readier than ever to pick up their marbles and play the third-party game.
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p.126-9 Jul 2, 2000
On Drugs: Drug War is a disaster: need more prevention
Despite being funded to the tune of $18 billion annually, the war on drugs has been a disaster. The proof? Among other things, a 72% increase in drug use among teens since 1992.
Only 1/3 of the anti-drug budget is earmarked for education, prevention, and treatment programs; the remaining 2/3 go to the higher-profile trio of interdiction, supply reduction, and law enforcement.
Drug abuse is the only market in which the government thinks it can suspend the laws of supply and demand.
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p.137-38 Jul 2, 2000
On Crime: Mandatory minimum sentencing is cowardly
Overall, our state and federal jails are currently holding two million inmates, despite a violent crime rate that has fallen to a 32-year low. By the end of 1998, our federal prisons were filled to 27% overcapacity.
Millions of underprivileged minors are crowding our prisons, all the result of crowd-pleasing but cowardly mandatory minimum sentencing law. This is modern politics at its worst. Such bad policy can only serve to erode the public’s already shaky trust in democracy.
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p.139-41 Jul 2, 2000
On Crime: Investigate anti-depressants’ role in school shootings
Buried in the saturation coverage of the Littleton massacre was the finding that traces of Luvox were found in [one of the shooters] Eric Harris’s bloodstream. Did the presence of Luvox change the cause and manner of Eric’s life?
“Mania” pretty much describes Harris’s web site, on which he wrote: “My belief is that if I say something, it goes. I am the law. If you don’t like it, you die.” This should have troubled any doctor who was following Harris after he was put on Luvox. Or was Harris one of the tens of thousands of children cavalierly prescribed anti-depressants without either a proper psychiatric evaluation or any ongoing monitoring of side effects?
In the aftermath of the Littleton massacre, President Clinton proposed new laws to restrict the marketing of guns to children, and hosted a conference to examine the entertainment industry’s marketing of violence to children. But no one [considered] the third problem-the marketing of mood-altering prescription drugs for children.
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p.151-53 Jul 2, 2000
On Health Care: AIDS drugs show industry focus on profit over health
One of the most chilling illustrations of the drug companies’ misplaced priorities was [with regards to] South Africa’s Medicines Act of 1997. The act was intended to make it possible for its infected citizens, many of whom live in extreme poverty, to obtain inexpensive AIDS drugs. The big international pharmaceutical companies sued South Africa, preventing the law from taking effect, and lobbied for severe trade sanctions to be placed on the country.
That the drug companies are acting out of pure self-interest is not surprising. But the drug industry’s unadulterated self-interest is also governing public policy. Despite two years of complaints from public health groups, Gore remained steadfast on the industry’s side until embarrassing public protests at campaign stops forced him to issue anemic defenses of his position. The protesters persisted, [eventually resulting in a] long-overdue change in the Administration’s position is directly traceable to them.
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p.169-73 Jul 2, 2000
On Gun Control: Favors all the gun control we can get
and
On Civil Rights: Live the Ten Commandments, instead of posting in schools
In the wake of tragedies like the one in Columbine, TV bookers race to their Rolodexes to line up the usual suspects to explain how something like this could occur. So for the umpteenth time we get the gun-control advocates debating the NRA mouthpiece, and talking heads from the Christian Coalition and the ACLU locking horns over the value of posting the Ten Commandments on the school cafeteria wall.
Now, I’m certainly in favor of all the gun control we can get-but if we want to rebuild our frayed civil society, we’d better reload young people’s hearts and spirits at the same time. And while reading the Ten Commandments is great, living them is even better-particularly the biblical admonition about tending to the least among us. The TV bookers need to program their speed dials to include people around the country who are using family volunteering to keep kids connected to their own families as well as their communities.
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p.205 Jul 2, 2000
On Government Reform: Make all political donations anonymous, like ballots
An intriguing alternative for reforming campaigns has been put forward by Ian Ayres, a law professor at Yale, and Jeremy Bulow, an economics professor at Stanford. It’s the “donor booth,” which seeks to correct the rampant buying and selling of influence in the political process by arguing not for complete and instant donor disclosure, but for complete and total donor anonymity.
It’s a simple idea-and a radical one. But, as Professor Ayres reminded me, the radical idea on which it’s modeled-the secret ballot-is only about a century old, though we take it for granted today. The secret ballot put a halt to voter buying [at a time] when party bosses [bought votes]. “The voting booth,” Ayres says, “made it harder for candidates to buy votes. The ‘donor booth’ would make it harder for candidates to sell influence.”
Would it really work? In some states, it already has – Louisiana, Tennessee, Washington, and South Dakota have experimented with keeping donors to judicial campaigns anonymous.
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p.232-33 Jul 2, 2000
On Government Reform: Mandated donor anonymity would dry up PAC influence
[The “donor booth,” mandated anonymity in campaign donations,] would work by having campaign contributions funneled through blind trusts administered by known, reputable financial firms. Anyone who wanted to give money to a candidate would mail it to the trust, which would then pass it on to the candidate-without revealing the donor’s name.
Like any reform, this would create its own set of problems. But at this stage, even cynics are ready to exchange a new set of problems for the old ones. With the donor booth, PAC money would dry up-because knowing who’s giving is exactly why PACs exist. Donor anonymity would prove-as if more proof were needed-just how many contributions have nothing to do with the donor’s policy desires. And while the protectors of the status quo keep trying to use constitutional arguments to protect soft money, this proposal is as constitutionally unassailable as the secret ballot. Donor anonymity calls everyone’s bluff [because] donors can never prove [their donations].
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p.234-36 Jul 2, 2000
On Government Reform: Open up voting, ballots, and debates
[We should] ease the voting rules with measures like same-day registration, [as] the first step in a new voters’ rights movement which this country needs both to make voting easier and to open up the political process to those outside the entrenched two-party system.
Reformers are also proposing “early voting,” which extends the election period from a single day to up to three weeks; “weekend voting,” which, like early voting, keeps the polls open longer, and on days that are more convenient; and “vote by mail,” an institutionalized form of absentee voting in which the entire election is held by mail.
Of course, once it’s easier to vote, the problem becomes finding someone worth voting for. That’s where questions of ballot access and debate access come into play.
Byzantine ballot regulations make it next to impossible for those outside the political mainstream to take on the system. [And] the other way the two parties try to perpetuate their duopoly is by limiting access to debates.
Source: How to Overthrow the Government, p.256-60 Jul 2, 2000
MHProNews Observations and Analysis
Let’s look at one of her topics, quoted above.
Her handling of anonymous donations in politics is arguably a bit of razzle dazzle. It is part of a method MHProNews has previously explored. A speaker or writer says something that sounds intelligent or is true. The speaker or writer can then get people nodding on certain issues, and they may keep their audience nodding their heads subsequent issues that are illogical at best if not a coy and deceptive head-fake.
Rephrased, it is a method of manipulation.
Why and how does this apply to Huffington’s anonymous donations pitch? Because ‘Sunlight is the best disinfectant,’ not darkness. Turn the lights on at night in certain fleabag motels and watch the roaches run. The solution isn’t hiding who the donors are, or term limits, or undoing Citizen’s United – as popular as each of those slogans tends to be. Rather, it is to grasp why money and politics have become such huge issues. It’s simple. The federal government collects and doles out trillions of dollars. Businesses that have the better access will often get their share of those taxpayer funded bucks.
In the meantime, smaller industries like manufactured housing can get swept along in the current. Some level of government is necessary or anarchy occurs. But too much government is potentially as or more problematic. Finding balance is what the founders and writers of the U.S. Constitution sought to achieve.
Pivoting from Huffington, but applying that takeaway, one of the comments letters cited in our Sunday report on the White House Council on Eliminating Regulatory Barriers to Affordable Housing, manufactured home community operator Craig Shute said in part:
“4) The massive amount of subsidized housing and Section 8 vouchers that directly compete with manufactured housing, the only unsubsidized, brand-new affordable housing option”
That’s similar to comments made a year ago by community owner Marge Clark who sounded off on her concerns about that issue.
Subsidized Housing vs Manufactured Homes, Community Owner Marge Clark Sounds Off
By allowing the federal government to do ‘sound good’ or ‘feel good’ legislation, significant disruption in the constitutional and economic system of the U.S. has occurred. The prudent game plan is to keep such thoughts until after the 2020 election is over. Once that dust has settled and the outcomes are understood, an effort to roll back spending that is not clearly authorized by Article 1, Section 8 of the constitution should be put on the agenda. With over $22 trillion in spending on social programs, including housing programs reported by the Heritage Foundation, Shute’s and Clark’s points both point to an underlying issue that many never even consider.
Decades of giveaways, however well intended, have not achieved their promised aim. That’s what data like the chart above the quotation reveals. The bad news is that money and politics are a reality. The good news is that there are more voters among the 99 percent than the 1 percent.
MH and Broader Lessons Learned?
Some 2 decades after court rulings on hanging chads settled the race in Florida and thus tipped the 2000 election away from former Vice President Al Gore to President George W. Bush, the lack of longer-term and bigger-picture thinking haunts America and our industry. As several 2020 candidates present plans that are calculated in the tens of trillions of dollars, how successful were the prior plans ones that had smaller and logically more achievable goals?
While several candidates are talking about antitrust and monopolization issues, how many have acted on that issue in their current legislative capacities?
Isn’t a far better case to be made that breaking up mega corporations would level the playing field between independent businesses and the goliaths that they compete against? If laws that aimed to prevent monopolization were being robustly employed, arguably one outcome would be that there would be fewer opportunities for those behemoths to lobby Big Brother to get favoritism that smaller businesses often can’t achieve.
Government is in some senses a neutral force, that can be tilted for good or ill. The Constitution was supposed to limit government and thus limit its influence on our lives, economic and political forces.
Critical – meaning analytical – thinking is vital in an era of disinformation.
Political vigilance and engagement are a key. While it is prudent to sample thinking across the political spectrum, it is equally prudent to question the logic or motivations of those authorities.
See the related reports below.
On a closing note, comments on that affordable housing topic are due by 11:59 PM on 1.31.2020. Learn more on those at this link here or others below the byline, offers and notices.
The Tony Kovach submission is found at this link here.
There’s more insights ahead, but that’s a wrap on this installment of “Industry News, Tips and Views Pros Can Use“ © – MHVille’s runaway #1 news source, where “We Provide, You Decide.” © (News, fact-checks, analysis, and commentary.) Notice: all third party images or content are provided under fair use guidelines for media. 
Submitted by Soheyla Kovach for MHProNews.com.Soheyla is a co-founder and managing member of LifeStyle Factory Homes, LLC, the parent company to MHProNews, and MHLivingNews.com. Connect with us on LinkedIn here and here.
Politics Downstream from Culture, Mad as Hell, Affordable Housing and Manufactured Homes
