Dear Senator So-and-so:

The Senate recently voted 63-35 for cloture on the Cass Sunstein confirmation/approval vote, paving the way for a vote on his confirmation to become President Obama's so-called Regulatory Czar.

The thrust of this letter is: NO to "czars" in general and especially NO to Mr. Sunstein in particular.

More about Mr. Sunstein in particular in a moment. First, general comments about President Obama's special advisors.

I don't understand, and strongly question, President Obama's need for so many special advisors, or czars, now amazingly and troublingly numbering over 30, especially since many of their areas of focus duplicate those of either presidential cabinet secretaries or other extant government officials. Is it not government waste any more to pay two people or agencies to do the same job? For example, would not the function of a so-called Regulatory Czar normally be performed by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB)?

Further, particularly at a time when increasingly more and more ordinary Americans are out of work, when Team Obama and a profligate 111th Congress have already massively increased the national debt just within the last seven months, and Congress, like many Americans, should be doing some belt-tightening and strict budgeting, it's more than legitimate to ask: What are any of these so-called czars being paid? How big are their staffs? What are these staffs being paid? Who is approving these expenditures of taxpayer money? Is Congress no longer the keeper of the national purse strings?

With the president's creation of a virtual shadow government of unelected and unvetted "czars" who are also unaccountable to Congress, when are those of you in Congress going to do anything to prevent the president from increasingly bypassing your authority to oversee and ensure accountability in so many areas? Hint: One way to do that, if you have the backbone (i.e., political will) is to withhold funding.

Now, to Mr. Sunstein as a czar candidate in particular.

Mr. Sunstein thinks that animals should have lawyers, co-equal rights with humans, be able to sue people, and that all hunting should be abolished. This latter point in turn causes me pause about what he may also think of my Second Amendment rights, which I am absolutely adamant about defending.

He also favors "reformulation" of our First Amendment rights.
 
Much of his work also brings behavioral economics to bear on law, suggesting that the "rational actor" model will sometimes produce an inadequate understanding of how people will respond to legal intervention. Instead, he favors using the law to effect behavioral modification of the population.

He has collaborated in elaborating on the theory of "libertarian paternalism" and is an advocate of the "nudge theory," i.e., maintaining some freedom of choice by people while also steering, or nudging, their decisions in directions that will make their lives go better. He is also partially responsible for coining the term "choice architect."

Now, I am sure Mr. Sunstein is a smart man and may be one hell of an academic, but...

I don't want my First Amendment rights "reformulated," thank you. And don't even think about touching my Second Amendment rights.

I don't favor behavior modification of the population through manipulations of the law. That sounds much too Orwellian to me, as does the concept of a "choice architect."

I don't even like the sound of "libertarian paternalism," much less its overall implication that some libertarian bureaucrat is going to act as my substitute father about anything. I am not a child and don't need, or want, governmental "paternalism." In many instances, government is not the solution; it is the problem. And the more government you have, the more problems it creates. The nature of a bureaucracy is to feed itself first.....and most often.....and in increasing amounts....at the public trough.

I don't want my government insidiously "nudging" me, or anybody else, into decisions in directions that will make our lives go better. "Better" according to whom, some other government bureaucrat?

I want to know my government is there, to provide those common services and safeguards which the general citizenry cannot. Otherwise, I want my government to stay out of my day-to-day life and not try to manipulate me, my rights, my money, my possessions, or my freedoms. Thomas Jefferson had it right when he said that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take everything you have. 
 
Therefore, since I do not agree with so many things for which Mr. Sunstein stands, nor even with the idea of presidential "czars" in general, much less so many of them, I am expecting you to vote NO on Mr. Sunstein's confirmation and will be watching your vote as an indicator of how I should vote for you in the next election.

Sincerely,

Colonel Charles Fowler
USA, RET

[Note: Any of you who read this, agree with it, and want to copy and use it to send to your elected officials have my permission to do so.]