What this Election is About

"This is the issue in this election: whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American Revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves" – Ronald Reagan, Speech in support of Barry Goldwater, 1964

“The two ideas of human freedom and economic freedom working together came to their greatest fruition in the United States. Those ideas are still very much with us. We are all of us imbued with them. They are part of the very fabric of our being. But we have been straying from them. We have been forgetting the basic truth that the greatest threat to human freedom is the concentration of power, whether in the hands of government or anyone else. We have persuaded ourselves that it is safe to grant power, provided it is for good purposes.

“Fortunately, we are waking up. We are again recognizing the dangers of an overgoverned society, coming to understand that good objectives can not be perverted by bad means, that reliance on the freedom of people to control their own lives in accordance with their own values is the surest way to achieve the full potential of a great society.

“Fortunately, also, we are as a people still free to choose which way we should go – whether to continue along the road we have been following to ever bigger government, or to call a halt and change direction.” - Milton Friedman, Free to Choose, 1979

“Back in 1927 an American Socialist, Norman Thomas, six times candidate for President on the Socialist Party ticket said the American people would never vote for Socialism, but under the name of liberalism the American people would adopt every fragment of the socialist program…

“If you don’t [oppose the government takeover of healthcare] this program I promise you will pass just as surely as the sun will come up tomorrow and behind it will come other Federal programs that will invade every area of freedom as we have known it in this country, until, one day…we will awake to find that we have Socialism. And if you don’t do this, and I don’t do it, one of these days you and I are going to spend our sunset years telling our children, and our children’s children what it once was like in America when men were free.” – Ronald Reagan, “Ronald Reagan Speaks Out Against Socialized Medicine”, 1961

“The West has come to regard the values of freedom – the yardstick of human rights – as something Western. Many of them, especially in Europe, take the values and the institutions of freedom – the institutions of science, freedom, curiosity, the individual – I mean the rule of law, they've come to take them so for granted that they're either not aware of the threat against it, they're not aware of the fact that you have to sustain day be day, as is with all man-made things. I mean if this building, the roof will leak and the paint will fall and you have to repaint it, you have to maintain it all the time. It seems that people have forgotten that. And perhaps part of the reason is because the generation that's now enjoying all these freedoms in the West is not the generation that built it. These are generations that inherited it. And like companies, family companies often you'll see, for those of you who are interested in economics, the first generation and the second generation are almost always more passionate about the brand and the family company and keeping it all in the family; and then the third generation live, use, take the money and they're either overtaken by bigger companies, swallowed up, or they go bankrupt; and I think that there is an analogy there in that the generations after the Second World War living today in Europe – the United States may be different but I'm here much too short to say anything about that – is that they are people who are so complacent, they've always been free – they just no longer know what freedom costs.” – Ayaan Hirsi Ali, 2007

“You know what I think the Tea Party is all about. These people are angry, these people are frustrated, and these people are upset, because they believe that this Obama administration is taking their freedom away, taking their liberty away. We don’t let anybody do that.” – Rudy Giuliani, Campaign Stop for Kelly Ayotte, 2010

“Freedom doesn't come like a bird on the wing
It doesn't come down like the summer rain
Freedom, freedom is a hard won thing
You've got to work for it, fight for it
Day and night for it
And every generation got to win it again” – Pass It On, old Trade Union Song

The Don Rickles Presidency

I wrapped up my blog yesterday with a comment about our tough, smart senior citizens. Case in point: The King of Insult, Comedian Don Rickles, age 84. Last month he appeared on the Late, Late Show with Craig Ferguson, where he insulted Mr. Ferguson (“He’s a lonely guy”), Mr. Ferguson’s Scottish homeland (“Have you been over there?” “No…we like to go to places where we can have fun”), Frank Sinatra (“got lucky”), and an elderly man in the audience (“You can always tell when they get old cause the mouth can’t close. Dad you gotta keep the mouth closed. Otherwise they come at you with the hook and you’re in a box.”). If none of that seems funny when you read it on the computer screen, you got to watch the video. The audience laughs for thirteen minutes straight.

Clearly Mr. Rickles is a role model for those who never want to retire. Unfortunately, he also seems to be a role model for President Obama. The President has developed an insult routine of his own, and he’s taking his act on the road. In San Francisco he told a fundraiser that rural Pennsylvanians “cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them” (Audio: Barack Obama's small town guns and religion comments, April 6, 2008). In Boston, he said that those of us who are so eager to eject his allies from Congress are not thinking "clearly" because we're "scared". We can't help it though; we're "hard-wired" that way (Remarks by the President at DSCC Fundraiser, October 16, 2010). In Portland, Maine, shortly after the passage of ObamaCare, he ridiculed those concerned about its provisions: “After I signed the bill, I looked around. I looked up at the sky to see if asteroids were coming. I looked at the ground to see if cracks had opened up in the earth. You know what, it turned out it was a pretty nice day. Birds were still chirping. Folks were strolling down the street. Nobody had lost their doctor. Nobody had pulled the plug on Granny. Nobody was being dragged away to be forced into some government-run health care plan.” ( Remarks by the President on Health Insurance Reform, April 1, 2010).

Politics ain’t beanbag. Those who run for office, pontificate on TV, or even write a blog choose to put themselves out there. They’re fair game for comedy. But it’s not good leadership, and it’s not right, to ridicule average Americans for going to Church, wanting good health care for their families, and worrying about the direction of our country. I’ve been following politics for some years now and this is the first time I can remember a President of the United States doing so routinely and publicly. Richard Nixon did refer to anti-war protestors as “bums”, but that was a one-off incident. (How’s that for insult humor – accusing someone of having less grace than Richard Nixon?)

Although Mr. Obama and Mr. Rickles have embraced the same form of comedy, there is an important difference between them. Don Rickles actually has affection for the targets of his insults. You can see that in the Craig Ferguson video. He might have told Mr. Ferguson, “I don’t like you. I never liked you.” But he wrapped up with “May God be good to you and your lovely wife. I mean it from my heart. You are indeed a gentleman and a great deal of class.” There is a reason that Don Rickles is called “Mr. Warmth”. Even when he is making fun of his own wife of forty-five years, you can tell that she’s the one who keeps him grounded.

I doubt President Obama has warm feelings for the targets of his contempt because, as a liberal, contempt is what he really feels. Liberalism is based on the notion that average members of the public like us are too busy, too greedy, or just too plain stupid to make decisions about choosing an insurance plan, investing for retirement, or buying a light bulb. It is therefore necessary for enlightened individuals, such as Mr. Obama, to make those decisions for us, and, if we resist, use the full force of the United States Government to impose them on us. (If you think that is a good philosophy of governance, vote Democrat on November 2.)

There’s one other important difference between Mr. Obama and Mr. Rickles. It cuts to the heart of why Mr. Rickles has been so successful as a comedian and Mr. Obama is doomed to failure. The difference is that Mr. Rickles is funny. Again, you got to watch that video. And let's help Mr. Obama retire before Mr. Rickles.

They Could Be Desperate Part II: Scaring the Elderly

With the election a week away, we’re in the last round of the 2010 fight for control of Congress. The Democrats are on the ropes. As of today: RealClearPolitics predicts they will lose at least 45 seats in the House and between 3 and 11 in the Senate. So the future minority party is turning to acts of desperation. Their current favorite, suitable for Halloween: frightening seniors with the prospect of reduced Social Security benefits.

They started on August 13, when the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee presented a “Social Security Scorecard”. The accompanying press release explained the scorecard’s purpose: to “track the Republican Senate candidates’ extremist positions on privatizing Social Security. A full thirteen Republican Senate candidates want to dismantle Social Security through privatization or complete elimination, putting the life savings of hardworking senior citizens in risky Wall Street accounts and squandering their retirement security.” The thirteen candidates include Nevada’s Sharron Angle, Florida’s Marco Rubio, and Kentucky’s Rand Paul. Since August, the Democrats have repeated these accusations with increasing frequency in debates, commercials, and flyers. On the House side the accusation surfaced recently in a mailing from Massachusetts 3rd District Congressman Jim “The Constitution is Wrong” McGovern. “They want to break into your retirement,” it said. Mr. McGovern’s 4th District neighbor, Barney “Fannie Mae is Sound” Frank is running radio ads warning of the threat to the Social Security system posed by his Republican opponent Sean Bielat.

No one in the GOP had a better response to this accusation than Mr. Rubio: “It’s blatantly untrue.” During an October 6 debate he explained, “Every idea that I’ve ever advocated for Social Security would not impact a single senior in Florida. That is no one who’s over 55 years of age or older would be impacted by any of the ideas that I’ve put forth." Mr. Rubio’s response is true for other Republicans as well: the ideas they put forward will not affect anyone who is currently on Social Security or nearing retirement age. Sean Bielat, for example, wrote in a letter to Congressman Frank, “Absolutely no changes to benefits for current retirees – we made a promise to them and we should keep it.”

Democrats used to criticize George W. Bush on the grounds that his thinking lacked “nuance”. Here is a nuance that apparently is lacking in the Democrats’ thinking: there is a difference between a Social Security reform that would change the benefits of current retirees and a Social Security reform that would change the benefits of individuals retiring ten or more years down the road. Apparently this distinction is too nuanced for the Democratic Party.

And that’s too bad, because Social Security really does need reforming. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the system will begin paying out more than it takes in this year. Somewhere between 2037 and 2041 the Social Security trust fund will run out of money (“ Social Security to See Payout Exceed Pay-In This Year”, The New York Times, March 24, 2010). If nothing is done, the United States can look forward to following in the footsteps of Greece (retirement age: between 58 and 61). Unable to sustain a system where more people were supported by the government than were working, the Hellenic Republic saw its credit rating downgraded, its sovereignty ceded to lenders, and its streets overrun with rioters.

Reforming a program as vast as Social Security is like changing the direction of a cruise ship. If done far from its destination, the course correction is barely noticeable. The passengers relax in their deck chairs and help themselves to the buffet, undisturbed by the gentle arc of the vessel. But if the Captain waits until the last minute, he has to turn abruptly, overturning the deck chairs, tipping the buffet, and possibly capsizing the ship. The Republicans are behaving responsibly by proposing a course correction long before the crisis is upon us. They’ve advanced a number of ideas: raising the retirement age, partial privatization, means testing.

Unfortunately, the Democrats threaten to obstruct any change. The party that prevented reforms to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac before the housing bubble burst now seeks to prevent reforms to Social Security before that bubble bursts as well. Will the real “party of no” please stand up? Marco Rubio’s opponent Kendrick Meek is typical: “If they want to change Social Security, they’re gonna have to go through me,” he said. “I’m 6-3, former State Trooper. Used to be a football player.” His web page calls him “a firm opponent of gambling with seniors' benefits”, without mentioning that his opponent did not propose gambling or doing anything else with the benefits of anyone who is currently a senior. Maybe his attention was wandering when Marco Rubio pointed that out during the debate.

Trying to get elected by frightening seniors is just plain sleazy. A tactic like that doesn’t deserve to succeed. But this is America; our seniors, like all of us, are tough and savvy. They are way too smart to let the Dems get away with it. The purveyors of fiscal irresponsibility will be swept out of Congress, and their seats taken by those with the courage to confront our problems and do something about them.

They Could be Desperate

During a “Moving America Forward” rally in Philadelphia last weekend, President Obama warned supporters that dark forces are seeking to “hijack” our democracy. “Thanks to a Supreme Court decision called Citizens United,” he said, Republicans “are being helped along this year by special interest groups that are spending unlimited amounts of money on attack ads… attacking folks like [Democrat Senate Candidate] Joe Sestak…without ever disclosing who’s behind all these attack ads. You don’t know. It could be the oil industry. It could be the insurance industry. It could even be foreign-owned corporations.”

Observe that the President did not actually say foreign influence was behind the ads. Merely that it “could be”. Indeed the White House later admitted that it had no evidence that scheming foreign devils were corrupting our system.

The Democratic National Committee followed up the President’s speech by naming names. “It appears,” according to a DNC ad, that the villains at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce “even take in secret foreign money to influence our elections.” When skeptical Face the Nation host Bob Shieffer asked White House advisor David Axelrod for evidence, Mr. Axelrod replied, “Do you have any evidence that it’s not?” Mr. Axelrod explained that this subversion of the nation was made possible by a “loophole” in the law (that loophole, Mr. Axelrod, is called the First Amendment).

But the Democrats do seem to be hurting ahead of next month’s elections (latest RealClearPolitics prediction: the GOP will pick up at least 33 seats in the House and 5 seats in the Senate). Being a great humanitarian, I decided to help the Dems out by offerings some suggestions for other attacks along similar lines:

For example, it could be that Shriners are actually aliens from Mars. Do you have any evidence that they aren't? Sure, they seem like harmless, Republican-leaning, small town boosters, scooting along the parade route in their tiny cars and fez hats, but the cars are really spaceships and the hats cover up their antennas. They could even belong to the Chamber of Commerce.

Conservative Talk Show Host Rush Limbaugh could have been the chief prosecutor in the 1692-93 Salem Witch Trials. In addition, he could have provided the rope used to hang six condemned witches, rope purchased with funds obtained from secret foreign donors. Do you have any evidence that he didn’t?

Speaking of the dark arts, Delaware GOP Senate Candidate Christine O’Donnell could still be spending date night practicing Wicca on a blood-stained Satanic altar (Oh, wait, they already used that one).

Nevada GOP Senate Candidate Sharron Angle could be the manufacturer of a non-flouridated (“safe from socialism”) juice product which induces insanity and Second Amendment fever in the drinker (Oh, wait, they used that one too).

I’m not really fond of this sort of negative campaigning, but fortunately the technique can also be applied to create positive, uplifting messages about the Democratic Party’s own members:

In 2002, President George W. Bush choked on a pretzel and passed out while watching football at the White House. The reason he is alive today could be that then House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi saved his life by performing an emergency tracheotomy using an exacto knife and four inches of electrical conduit. Do you have any proof that she didn’t?

Mild-mannered Congressman Barney Frank could be in reality the caped superhero Mighty Mouth. Do you have any proof that he isn't? Exchanging his rumpled suit for rumpled tights, Mighty Mouth uses his powers of talking funny to fight for liberty and mortgages for all.

Democratic Senate Candidate Richard Blumenthal, upon returning from grueling combat in Vietnam, could have single-handedly created 16 bazillion jobs in the state of Connecticut by suing people (Oh, wait, they already used that one).

As a student at Harvard, future Vice President Al Gore was the model for Love Story before going on to invent the Internet (Oh, wait…)

Obviously I’m having difficulty coming up with original ideas to help the Democrats. No matter how silly my arguments, they don't top the ones the Dems are already using.

Support Free Enterprise: Privatize the Royal Family

The headline glared at me from the magazine rack by the cardio machines: “Royal Romance in Ruins”. Apparently the course of true love is not running smooth for Prince William and Kate Middleton.

There was a time when the Royal Family actually ruled England. In those days, Kings like Henry II codified the laws and institutionalized trial by jury. Queens like Elizabeth I inspired the nation to fight its enemies. But the authority of the Royal Family ebbed after a German immigrant who couldn’t speak English was crowned George I in 1714. Today, George’s descendents in the House of Windsor are primarily in the entertainment business.

Unfortunately, the business is not profitable; it survives on government bailouts. Each year the British taxpayers subsidize the royal family to the tune of £7.9 million via the Civil List.

Over the decades, the Windsors certainly provided the public with moments of high drama. Elizabeth II’s branch of the family had a spectacular debut in 1937. Her uncle, Edward VIII fell in love with Wallis Warfield Simpson, who, as an American and a divorcee, was an unacceptable Queen to the British public. Rather than give up his beloved, Edward abdicated, clearing the way for Elizabeth’s father, George VI, to ascend the throne. During the Battle of Britain, free people marveled at the family’s courage when George’s Queen (also Elizabeth) was advised to send her daughters out of the country for their safety. “The princesses will never leave without me,” she said. “I will not leave without the King. And the King will never leave." A generation later, Americans woke up at five in the morning and turned on their TVs to watch the fairy tale wedding of Prince Charles to Diana Spencer.

But the show definitely jumped the shark after that. The cast is aging and the plotlines have grown stale. Prince Charles gets divorced and remarries. Princess Anne gets divorced and remarries. Prince Andrew gets divorced and his ex is caught influence peddling.

Clearly the franchise is dying. I realize many of my British brethren are emotionally attached to the Royal Family and may not be able to see the situation clearly. Fortunately, as an American, I am able to observe the Queen’s brood with detachment and arrive at an objective diagnosis: as a government supported entity, the Royal Family does not benefit from the creative destruction of the marketplace. My solution: privatize the Royals. Let them compete on a level playing field with other entertainment enterprises. They will either have to gain market share or close shop. They could learn a great deal about this from the Disney Corporation.

Walt Disney’s first full-length feature, Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, premiered in Los Angeles on December 21, 1937 – the same year George VI became King. While the Windsors foundered, Disney grew to a $38 billion a year media behemoth, with operations all over the world. Disney had its ups and downs, but competition forced it to reinvent itself constantly. The Queen would do well to copy some of Disney’s successes:

Theme parks – who wouldn’t stand in line to board Buck House – the Ride?

Merchandising – Souvenir stands all over London sell Royal Family products, but the Windsors don’t make a farthing from the Queen’s Jubilee commemorative plates, Beefeater plush toys, and Prince Phillip action figures with Kung Fu grip. It’s time for the Queen to protect her intellectual property, prosecute the manufacturers of knockoffs, and promote the Windsor brand exclusively through her own chain of shoppes.

New plotlines – The Royal Family needs to break this boring cycle of marriage and divorce, marriage and divorce. Perhaps, for a change, Prince Harry could rub an old teapot, a genie pops out, and high jinks ensue. Or how’s this for a plot twist? Camilla Parker-Bowles is actually a mermaid.

These are just a few examples of the creative genius that would be unleashed, if only the British people cut the House of Windsor loose from the safe harbor of public subsidy, and set it free on the open seas of the market economy.