‘We already have a mass transit’

Spend for mass transit? WHY? We already have mass transit. You can go anywhere on the island for three bucks. Look on a phone pole, get a number, call a cab. If we can keep our over-zealous Attorney General from hassling a segment of the community trying hard—and succeeding—at providing a much need service, you’ll continue to have that option.

I realize the government wants a slice of the pie and thus feels it must interfere with the market for taxi rides, so here is my solution: As of tomorrow morning, all taxi rides go up to $3.50. The government gets the fifty cents (not that they deserve it, but remember, they have a gun so they can get pretty much what they want). No more licensing, counterproductive regulations, and other bureaucratic claptrap designed only to keep a few rubber-stampers in a dead end government job. Having fees set by a bureaucrat instead of the person rendering the service causes far more problems than it solves. Let all the folks who want to drive a taxi do so, and charge whatever the heck they want to charge. The rest of us will be far better off with the free market place deciding what service is to be provided and at what price. Remember this is an offshoot of the same government that brings you the $2,000 toilet seat and the $300 screw, errrr, bolt.

For the AG to claim that some taxis are dangerous just because they don’t have her permission (taxi license) to drive a willing passenger, or because they are not being properly bled by the government via taxation, is a childish and ridiculous assertion. What is really dangerous is a person with the power to seize personal property without due process. This is not just some arcane constitutional argument. This capability, which the AG asserts she has, should scare the hell out of anyone with an asset she might covet. Now don’t have a cow, Ms Brown, I have nothing against you personally. In fact, that is part of the problem with allowing exceptions to constitutional rights. The next person in the AG’s office may be even more inclined to appropriate private property and thus be an even greater danger to freedom than you are. Today he takes an illegal taxi; tomorrow he takes your house.

Sorry for the digression. Back to the subject: Besides all the above, not a lot of people on this island would want the conventional type of mass transit. Imagine yourself standing in the pouring rain waiting for a diesel fume-belching bus to wander by to take you to work 20 minutes late. Remember this bus is owned and operated by the government. Remember the school buses, which are also owned and operated by the government. If you have a job and can afford a car, this is highly unlikely to sound appealing to you. If you don’t have a job, where the heck do you want to go that a three-buck taxi driver, who comes to your door to pick you up, couldn’t take you in air-conditioned comfort?

In short, there’s nothing wrong with the service we all now have available to us. The only problem is the ever-intrusive finger of the government wanting to insert itself into the pie. LEAVE ’EM ALONE!

Bruce A. Bateman
Tanapag, Saipan