Ever since Karl Marx coined the concept, "From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs," socialism and its angry stepchild, communism, have been dedicated to the notion of grabbing what does not belong to them.

Sometimes the reformers of envy gobble up the possessions of others an entire country at a time. There’s nothing like a quick revolution to fatten the community bank account. Then, you kill the rightful owners to prevent legal problems down the road.

When you live in an allegedly democratic republic like the USA, your approach must be more gradual. Incrementalism, the bite-sized devouring of our rights and property, is well underway in this country, thanks to the efforts of leftist leaders like the current resident of the White House, Bill Clinton.

But let’s not underestimate the effectiveness of Clinton’s approach. He has already put sizeable chunks of the American west off limits to commercial development by declaring them national "monuments." When this method of government larceny stole virtually the entire domestic source of our clean burning coal in Utah, state officials and local residents were fit to be tied. They knew how this decision would hurt the local economy, impact the local tax base and damage our national balance of payments.

Clinton’s federal theft in Utah accomplished two purposes. He threw a bone to his environmentalist voter base…and he forced U.S. industry to import almost all the prime coal we need from his friends in Indonesia, which holds the only other major deposit of clean burning coal in the world. The fact that investment banker Mochtar Riady, who donated substantially to Clinton’s campaign, is from Indonesia cannot be overlooked.

Now, Mr. Executive Order is reportedly at it again. The Washington Times is reporting Bill Clinton’s staff is preparing 29 thousand pages of new rules that Clinton can order into law with the stroke of a pen before he leaves office, next month. Among the items listed was Clinton’s plan to declare the huge Alaskan Wildlife Range a national monument. Once again, above the objections of Alaska’s congressional delegation, this federal land grab would end all hopes of private land development.

What does this mean for you and me? For one thing, higher gas prices in the future…if we can buy gas, at all.

With the Middle East on the verge of a major war and "friends" like Saudi Arabia threatening to use the oil weapon against us, the day may soon arrive when we face an OPEC oil embargo or prices so stiff that no one can afford to operate an automobile. The declaration of the vast new Alaskan national monument would cut off a huge new domestic source of petroleum at a time when we just might need it the most.

The Republican controlled congress is fuming over the proposed new regulations but, according to the Times article, remains powerless to stop them. Efforts to overturn the new rules by an incoming Bush administration might take months or even years to accomplish due to the red tape imposed by the process.

The Clinton legacy, at this point, is assured.

Somewhere, we suspect in a very warm locale, Karl Marx is smiling.

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