Random Observations on Government

Ronald Reagan was the most conservative president in the last 75 years. Despite interest rates of 20% when he took office, during the first 5 years of his presidency the economy grew by a total of 17.7%. Barack Obama is the most progressive president in American history. Despite interest rates close to zero throughout his terms, during the first 5 years of his presidency the economy grew by a total of 5.8%... and it's getting worse, shrinking at an annual rate of 2.9% in the first quarter of 2014!

At the very moment in time when crime in the United States is at record lows, local police departments are morphing into paramilitary armies. How many times have you heard of someone buying a brand new toy and letting it sit in the closet? Probably not that often…

Barack Obama’s never been a big fan of American Exceptionalism or hegemony, despite the fact that American leadership has ushered two generations of relative peace after two world wars in the first 40 years of the 20th century. He is however a big fan of international consensus and cooperation. The UN is a good example of just such cooperation. They are the ones who brought us a UN Human Rights Council featuring such freedom loving states as Russia, China, Saudi Arabia and Cuba. Barack Obama likes that non-US centric model so much that he has decided the United States will relinquish its management of the Internet traffic cop organization, ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers). So now such liberty stalwarts as China, Venezuela and Iran will have just as much to say about the freedom of the Internet as the United States does. That should work out well.

Despite mounting proof that NOAA and other organizations manipulated data to further the myth of global warming… despite record cold temperatures and ice packs in the Great Lakes, Barack Obama believes “Climate Change” (AKA “Global Warming”) is as great a threat to national security as is terrorism.

Why is it that over the last 5 years GDP has grown by 6% yet the stock market is up by over 120%. Could it have anything to do with Big Government?

There are over 3,000 counties in the United States. Why are 7 of the 10 richest located adjacent to Washington, DC? No, that couldn’t have anything to do with Big Government.

The bad news: In 2014 there are 127,000 fewer native born Americans working than there were in 2000, despite that group growing by 17 million people. The good news: Since 2000 there have been approximately 5.7 million jobs created in the United States. The worse news: According to the Center for Immigration Studies, all of that 5.7 million net job growth has gone to immigrants – legal and illegal – leaving a total of 58 million working age native born Americans without work.

After years of practically non existent border enforcement, and his administration signaling to millions of poor that if they can just get to the United States they just might be able to stay, Barack Obama blames Republicans for the tens of thousands of unaccompanied children who are flooding across America’s southern border. Constitution be damned, he’s going to use executive action to solve America’s immigration problem. Regardless of the rhetoric, the outcome of Obama’s unilateral action will likely be amnesty for millions of illegal immigrants who will soon thereafter be converted into Democrat voters.

Despite crystal clear evidence that ethanol is worse for the environment than gasoline… Despite the fact that prices for everything from beef to plastic and everything in between are rising because so much farmland is dedicated to ethanol corn production… Despite the fact that ethanol significantly raises the price of gasoline… Congress just passed another Farm Bill that will provide tens of billions of dollars to maintain the ethanol cabal.

Congress’s approval ratings are at historic lows, in the single digits, yet somehow American voters regularly return over of 90% of their Congressmen and Senators to Washington.

Despite the fantasy that progressive policies are good for the poor, in the end they are bad for everyone, except those in government and the friends of those in government. If you’re riding the Wall Street gravy train then you love big government. If you’re a big business who uses government to limit competition and pad your bottom line, you love big government. If you’re a government employee with practically lifetime employment, 50% higher salaries than your private sector counterparts and the power of life or death over businesses, you love big government.

If however you are an entrepreneur seeking to start a business and create jobs, you are oppressed by big government. If however you are an unskilled youth seeking to get your first job, your opportunities are limited by big government. If however you a simple wage earner who wonders where the rest of your check went, big government exploits you.

None of this is rocket science, nor is there anything here particularly surprising. Nonetheless, Americans continue to vote for big government progressives in both parties and wonder why things never seem to get any better. The question is not whether this unsustainable and suffocating government system will end, but when. The more important question is, will the entity we know as the United States survive intact or will it devolve into anarchy and chaos and become just another ghost of a failed state on history’s chronicle of mankind’s evolution? If people with no sense of liberty, no appreciation for small government and no allegiance to the the Constitution keep getting elected, the outlook doesn't look good.

A Lack of Identity politics...Exactly why the GOP can't seem to attract minorities and immigrants...

The GOP establishment has spent a great deal of effort over the last decade pushing for amnesty under the guise of “comprehensive immigration reform”. This is of course because they are scared of the fact that minorities are going to become a majority in the US over the next 40 years and they don’t want to be left out in the cold. They have what I call a “Fear of a Black Planet… or at least of a minority majority country…”. And according to some numbers cited recently by Phyllis Schlafly, they have good reason to fear.

Of course the establishments’ solution to the problem is to acquiesce to the demands of the left and essentially give amnesty to the 20 million people who came here illegally. Honestly though… who can blame Boehner, McConnell and their friends? It’s hard to compete with “No human is illegal” signs and heartbreaking stories of kids brought to America at the age of 5 and at 25 they have no legal status. They don’t want to be seen as “heartless” or get tagged as racists as the press is wont to label them, so they simply give in and make the same mistake Ronald Reagan did in 1986.

Frankly, the immigration debate is the GOP’s problem in a nutshell… The GOP has a communication problem - and an identity problem too. They have a hard time distilling their messages down to a bumper sticker. Every day they face a plethora of bumper sticker issues which they typically fail to properly address. Calls for an increase in the minimum wage are heralded by stickers proclaiming “A living wage is a moral value”. Each new school year is inaugurated with teachers striking in one city or another carrying signs broadcasting the false equivalency of opposition to education spending increases with a hatred of children. Then there are the Facebook shares of posters with quips like “Keep your laws off my body” or “Stop the War on Women”.

It’s often difficult to respond to these issues (and many more) because the rebuttals to these debates are typically too complex to fit on a bumper sticker or in a network sound bite. The GOP’s feckless attempts at responding to these issues often result in them being involved in a political version of a school yard skirmish where the response is “No I’m not!” rather than explaining a nuanced opposition to the particular issue at hand.

As an example, the argument against increasing the minimum wage is based on an understanding that doing so hurts far more people than it helps. This is particularly true in the case of teens and younger workers and those with little experience or skills. In order to hire an employee at a minimum wage of $10, an employee must provide an employer with work that brings at least $10 in value to the company. If they can’t the owner is not running a business but a charity. This is exactly why virtually every time the minimum wage is increased, unemployment among the young and unskilled (particularly minorities) increases. At the same time doing so always increases the potential for outsourcing and mechanization and we’re beginning to see that everywhere, even in the burger industry.

That kind of a rebuttal simply can’t be distilled down into a pithy sentence or sound bite. The result is that in the face of such a challenge, the GOP establishment more often than not simply chooses to go along to get along. The GOP is so worried about being painted as racists or as the party that hates the poor that they forget to talk about what they actually supposed to stand for. They get caught up in defending themselves against being women haters or immigrant haters that they forget to stand up for individual freedom or the rule of law.

The GOP’s problem isn’t immigrants don’t like what they are saying… which is true, the GOP’s problem is that they are saying the wrong things.  And this is where the identity problem comes in.  With “Compassionate Conservatism” and “comprehensive immigration reform” the GOP is simply remaking itself into the Democrat Lite party. It’s no wonder that immigrants and minorities choose not to support them. Who wants generic crackers or cola when they can have Ritz or Coke instead?

As Schlafly points out, immigrants and minorities don’t support the GOP on a range of issues from small government to gun rights and others in between. But it’s not because there’s something wrong in their DNA. It’s because there’s something wrong with the GOP. On a wide range of issues from immigration to education to government spending, the GOP has simply lost their identity and have become a party that stands for nothing extraordinary and has no message. In the last two presidential elections Americans actually chose a socialist over the milquetoast offerings of the GOP. On the biggest stage in the world in a bitter fight for the most powerful position on the planet the GOP was unable to convince 50% of Americans not to vote for the socialist! It’s not because the minorities and immigrants voted for the socialist… which they did. It’s because the GOP failed to give Americans of all stripes a reason to vote for them. When your bumper sticker could essentially say “Not quite as socialist as the other guy” it should come as no surprise that people don’t rally to your cause.

The lesson for the GOP is not how to play a better game of bumper sticker politics, but rather to begin articulating fundamental ideas that will inspire people to join their crusade. Ronald Reagan promised to eliminate the Departments of Energy and Education. Unfortunately he failed to do so, but everyone knew where he stood on big government. Contrast that with the GOP of 2014, which has just signed off on a $1 trillion farm bill that sends 80% of the dollars to food stamps, subsidizes Big Agriculture and taxes such things as home heating oil and Christmas trees. Does that make you think of a party wedded to the idea of limited government, market economics and low taxes? Probably not. And the GOP is confused why they can’t attract minorities and immigrants? Maybe they need to stop worrying about the demographic makeup of the voters and start looking in the mirror for their identity.