The American dream was a mistake. It is time to emulate the failed centralized economic controls of the collapsed Soviet Union.

Introducing . . . The Certified Entrepreneurial Community Program (CEC). [See Item VI.D1 here.]

Asheville City Council will be voting this Tuesday on whether or not they want to participate in this program sponsored by Advantage West. Advantage West is a private-public partnership commissioned by the NCGA to market oppportunities for economic development in Western North Carolina.

In the kindest of interpretations, Advantage West is merely selling a PowerPoint presentation of weasel words. Unfortunately, the glaring message behind the weasel words is that people are incompetent to contract intelligently, the free market doesn’t work, and centralized micromanagement by government appointees is the path to prosperity.

Like all “good” collectivist endeavors, this one has a mission statement: The CEC seeks to create communities of entrepreneurial interests by promoting public and governmental awareness of the need for entrepreneurship. The CEC program requires certification of participating or governmental bodies and local units of governments regarding their approach, strategy, and state of readiness with respect to entrepreneurship. (Huh?)

It has a pithy and original slogan: Growing our economy one business at a time.

It even has a picture of seven diverse models posing as entrepreneurs.

The word, “community” is drilled into the reader’s head as he reads the incomplete expressions of thought (sentence fragments) in the PowerPoint bullets.

To summarize, a sponsoring organization would be appointed to oversee the certification process. Among other requirements is, “written proof of a broadened economic development policy,” extending beyond the typical economic development recruitment strategies assumed these days by government. The program would provide mentoring, networking, training, counseling, micro-lending, and other essential ingredients whose absence in the private sector have evidently been strangling the economy.

The creation of a “strategic plan” for economic development is strongly encouraged. An essential element of this will be a resource inventory to include, “a document that outlines the current entrepreneurial talent presently living and working in the community.” More advanced stages of the certification process require the “development of a system for these resources.” Though the wording is ambiguous, I think it has something to do with an umbrella catchall justifying government meddling to the nth degree. As the certification process progresses, the participating agencies will develop a “completed, comprehensive community strategy for entrepreneurial growth.”

Now, if you are searching your soul to count exactly how many weasel words it will take to sell your few remaining liberties, here’s another incentive. If you act now and sign up for the CEC, your agency can have signs (Progressives love signs) planted at its community gateways advertising its cooperation with the scheme. What’s more, participating agencies will get recognition in Advantage West publications. Agencies can now broadcast to the world, “Hey, I’m a dupe!”

Remember, entrepreneurs, by definition, are innovators. It is in the best interest of our collectivist utopia that government, the Great Equalizer, should spoon-feed the future of independent thinkers to them as the less-creative are given a leg-up to compensate for their unmarketable ideas and lack of ambition. In the meantime, I need to see if I can drum up a government grant to get me some counseling, mentoring, education and outreach to overcome my synergy-challenged community awareness.