The Greatest Trick the Devil Ever Pulled ...

  
... was to convince the world he didn't exist. This is one of my favorite quotes from one of my favorite movies, The Usual Suspects. We see devils everywhere trying to pull this off, but none more successfully than the left who have somehow managed to convince much of the world that capitalism is to blame when government is the true culprit.

For example, health care. The more government gets involved with medicine, the higher the prices go. It's one of the least free markets that I can think of and there are many aspects of health care that desperately need the help of capitalism (see my blog on the subject), yet somehow all we hear is the opposite. It's as if the devils of government control, cronyism and politics were blameless.

Another great example is the 2008 collapse of the real estate market and the subsequent credit crisis, immediately followed by TARP and other government interventions. Headline after headline assured us that the blame for your underwater mortgage should be placed on Wall Street greed ... predatory lending and the repackaging and leveraging of these loans to "make a quick buck at the expense of the little guy." Sure, the government gave incentives to lenders to relax their standards so that everyone could enjoy the benefits of home ownership. And sure, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac spent dozens of billions of dollars buying up these loans, thus reducing the perceived risk of trading in them. But government's artificial manipulation of the real estate market had no measurable effect and the real evil-doer was capitalism, right?

How about black poverty? Freedom is to blame there, too ... namely the freedom to be racist. So, government needs to rise again to stamp out discrimination anywhere and everywhere. We need affirmative action, minimum wage, public housing, food stamps, welfare, social services and preferences for minority-owned businesses. Of course, we are not supposed to notice that no group has been the "beneficiary" of more government "help" than poor blacks and simultaneously no group is in worse shape. Generation after generation of blacks have now been raised believing that sustenance comes in the form of a government check instead of your own hard work. Ethnic group after ethnic group, with every skin color, have been able to find their place in the American fabric, yet capitalism and freedom are to blame for the hardships of only one of them.

(As an aside, the normal counter-argument here is that slavery was an extraordinarily deep hole for blacks to overcome, but I don't buy that argument. I used to, but not any more. Blacks were on the rise and were doing a great job of climbing the American socioeconomic ladder during the time of the civil rights movement when the left implemented all the above "help". An emergence was interrupted, in my opinion.)

And finally, the government has beautifully avoided blame for out-sourcing and offshore manufacturing. It's all the greedy companies that have shipped jobs overseas and abandoned the American worker. The ridiculously high cost of union labor (yes, our govt caused this), enormously expensive workplace regulations, health care costs (again!), corporate taxes and the threat of litigation for you name it ... none of these play a role in a company's decision to open a factory in Mexico? Believe it or not, a company would much prefer to keep their manufacturing local to their headquarters ... managing an offshore plant is a major headache and quality is likely to suffer. But when the cost difference is 5X, there's no comparison. Policy after policy has pushed production away from the US.

This list could go on and on ... farm subsidies, the high cost of college tuition, the lack of innovation in our schools, rationing of permits and business licenses, high gas prices ... it's endless. And so many people continue to buy the anti-capitalism cheer. It would be entertaining watching the clownish Occupy Wall Street crowds rage against capitalism if they weren't so typical of the left, helping the devil do his work.

But when we read the papers or watch the evening news ... poof ... he's gone.

The Thinking Class

One interesting piece of the "right vs left" story is that right-leaning media outlets tend to do better than equivalent left-leaning ones. Now, with the political parties roughly the same size and the balance of power always tipping back and forth, why is the market for conservative ideas bigger?

For example, Fox News viewership is 4x-5x that of MSNBC. Rush Limbaugh couldn't even see Air America from his lofty ratings perch. Political non-fiction by conservatives (Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin) outsell their liberal counterparts by a significant margin.

Look at Al Gore's Current TV ... Keith Olbermann's show recently reported a whopping 46,000 viewers. More than that attended a recent Paul McCartney concert in Cincinnati and Olbermann is getting paid $10M per year to host a nationally televised show.

Why is this? Why do liberals not turn out in force to hear the ideals and philosophy of the left? But when it's time to donate or vote, they run neck and neck with conservatives?

Perhaps we can investigate this by breaking down the demographics of the Democratic Party. Let's consider the profiles of groups that vote largely Democratic:

• Government workers: 23 million
• Labor/Union: 14 million
• People receiving govt assistance in some form: approx 60 million (there are 40 million receiving food stamps)

Looking at groups voting largely Republican:

• Evangelical Christians (anti-abortion): 40 million
• Military: 3 million

If we assume these groups are predominately single issue voters, then we can see that Democrats have an edge on "guaranteed" votes on election day. These people are not going to be swayed by ideas or debate. History shows that approximately 70% of these groups will vote for the party that gives them what they want.

It's also interesting that about 20% of the US population describe themselves as liberal while about twice that associate with a conservative ideology. These are philosophical points of view, cutting across many issues and not likely to be a single issue voter.

My conclusion is this: there are a lot more people interested in conservative ideas than are interested in liberal ideas and the data support this. The fact that the Democrats successfully compete with Republicans on election day is attributable to their alignment with certain single issue voters who want more government, more power to organized labor and more government handouts.

These people don't care about ideas. They don't care if what is happening is morally right or if such policies overall do damage to the country. They just want their check every month.

Why buy a book?

The Sky is Falling, Again

In 1957, the Soviet Union proved the superiority of communism over capitalism with the successful launch of Sputnik, the first man-made object to orbit the earth. To many in this country, the USA was falling behind in science and math and drastic government action was needed. To some extent they were right: the field of battle was moving into space and if we were to defend liberty, we must go there also. Soon, DARPA and NASA were formed.

Around this time, Castro and Guevara overthrew the government of Cuba and we were told that their investments in social services, particularly medicine, would put the US to shame. Drastic and immediate government action was needed to shore up capitalism's weaknesses.

In the late 1980s, the fear spread that the Japanese (and to a lesser extent, Germany) would soon take over the world, thanks to a complete retooling of their manufacturing infrastructure after WWII. There were calls for the nationalization of several industries in order to perform the capital investments necessary to compete.

In the 1990s, it was the outsourcing of manufacturing jobs to Mexico and elsewhere that would create a "giant sucking sound", leaving the US with nothing but minimum wage jobs. NAFTA was to be killed and trade barriers erected to prevent massive unemployment.

Today it's China. Now the left is telling me that the Chinese are smarter and more nimble because they are planned and controlled centrally. They apparently benefit from having only one political party, avoiding partisan bickering and gridlock. When something needs to be done, they do it. Snazzy airports, high speed trains, focused high-tech training programs, government subsidies of strategic businesses ... you name it, the Chinese do it better.

The US is a fading nation and large government action is needed to save us.

Rinse.

Repeat.

Liberals, who seem never to tire of being wrong, panic easily and don't hesitate to recommend a deal with the devil when it looks like a storm may be coming. They spout on about how we should emulate China, but seem oblivious to what might go wrong if we give government the right to control all aspects of our lives just so we can skip the tedious process of convincing people to do things voluntarily.

In the 15 years or so since China started waking up to the idea of using their vast (mostly human) resources to create wealth, they have gone from a 3rd world country to the 2nd biggest economy. That's pretty good. They've done it without a lot of violence. Also good. But, the human rights violations are uncountable and there is significant danger of a bloody attempt at revolution, one that could either liberate a billion people or see the communists tighten their grip. China is on the rise. Let's talk in 100 years to determine whether they succeeded.

And if China does succeed, it won't come at the expense of the US. Such a rising tide will raise all ships.

I'll take a free nation where capitalism and individual liberty prevail. The US has remained a great nation, truly exceptional, for generations. This could change, but only if we put aside our values.

What does Tuesday mean? Maybe a little.

With the 2010 mid-term election about a week away, the rhetoric is running at a fever pitch. Every election is important and this one is no exception. But this election is but a tree in a big forest.

I have seen it written many times that the US is 20% liberal, 40% conservative and 30% somewhere in the middle. I assume 10% are kids or surfer dudes.

The 2008 election was clearly as much or more a reaction (away from Bush) as it was an action (toward Obama). This year's result may be equal, but opposite. If 40% of the voters are truly conservative, they are unavoidably seething over what has happened in Washington the last 2 years and wield considerable power when provoked.

Liberals seem to be disappointed also, but that's only because there are still some components of our lives that remain private and untouched by government.

1994 made Bill Clinton a moderate. Against the will of his own party, he signed Welfare Reform, he sent troops in the former Yugoslavia to defend the Muslim population and, if his presidency was to have any lasting effect, he was forced to work with a Republican Congress. Nothing can make Barack Obama a moderate, but perhaps he will have no choice but to behave like one after next Tuesday.

Regarding the rhetoric on the campaign trail, the other day VP Biden said the following words in a speech:

“Every single great idea that has marked the 21st century, the 20th century and the 19th century has required government vision and government incentive."

 Now I understand that Joe Biden is crazy, but I don't think this was off the cuff. This was actually written down, approved by staff and read off a teleprompter. They mean it. Or, more precisely, they want us to believe it so they pretend that they mean it.

I suppose I could spend the next few paragraphs citing examples and offering a philosophical foundation for not only why this isn't true, but also why it simply cannot be true. However, there are some things that one really should not have to argue.

The fact that Biden was not laughed off stage, the fact that people remained in the audience, the fact that this statement could actually be uttered on a national stage does not speak well of our mindset in 2010. Sure there will be a minor course correction on Tuesday, but it won't cure the disease.

It's clear that liberals have institutionalized certain segments of our population and made them less dynamic as a result. Urban poor (mostly black), labor unions, government workers and many universities can't imagine life without government sponsorship. In the case of urban poor, a generation or two of kids have grown up with enough empirical data to confirm that one's place in life is fixed and that sustenance arrives in the form of a government check every week, independent of your actions at school or in society.

But Biden's statement starts to leak into the productive, commercial segment of the citizenry. Innovation? It's a government thing. Investment in the future? Not without Uncle Sam. Placement of available capital? We'll take care of that. Central planning of the economy has been tried uncounted times throughout history and has failed reliably. Are we really taking seriously a man who promotes the idea here in the USA?

Why do political leaders espouse such things? Because it expands their power. But why do their followers lap it up?

That is a complete and total mystery to me.

Doing What They Said

It should come as a surprise to no one that today's government is anti-business. They made that clear before the election of 2008. They were going to "clamp down" on wall street, regulate the banks, spread the wealth and not allow the "greed" that caused the crisis do any more harm.

Problem is, in the middle of a downturn, enough voters were seeing nothing but doom and gloom and actually bought into this message ... Howard Dean proclaimed that "capitalism has failed" (despite 200 years of evidence the contrary). The liberals won bigger than ever before. Now, what are the consequences of that election?

I just read an interesting interview with the CEO of Intel, Paul Otellini. Intel is the world's largest semiconductor company and remains a testament to the power of innovation combined with business savvy. Without Intel and the myriad of businesses that were either spun off, inspired, funded or made more efficient by it, the US and world economies would be much different. Dear reader, your standard of living is in no small measure higher thanks to Intel.

One year ago Intel had $11B cash in the bank. Today they have $18B. Why? Why is the ratio of cash to revenue the highest in history for the S&P 500? Because today's administration has said and done enough that is anti-business that fear of future taxes and regulations has paralyzed American businesses. They are not investing, expanding or hiring. They are sitting on their cash because they have reason to believe that the liberals will stick it to them again and again. The small companies that I help manage are doing the same thing.

Getting inside the head of liberals who think they can run the economy better than the business people is a theme of this blog. Runaway capitalism, monopolies, unfair business practices, inhumane working conditions and overpaid executives are just some of the reasons liberals use to explain their policies. We must regulate tightly and keep a close watch on business or they will start doing more harm than good.

Read the article with the new health care law in mind. With the new Dodd-Frank financial reform law in mind. With the fact that almost none of President Obama's staff has ever worked in the private sector in mind. It starts to become clear why we have 10% unemployment and some economists are saying "Get used to it".

Is it possible that liberals actually want to handicap companies so that growth slows? This would reduce suburban sprawl, pollution, consumption of resources and globalization. Is this the hidden agenda? Turn the clock back to pre-industrial, agrarian times with a smaller world population?

Or do they just simply not appreciate the power and value of capitalism? Have they not witnessed the last 200 years of American exceptionalism? Have they not seen the data tightly correlating the level of economic freedom in a given country to its quality of life? Do they still think that Karl Marx was right?

I don't know. But I do know that they're very clear about their intentions and they continue to deliver on what they promise.

Obama v. Roberts

It is often overlooked that we have 3 branches of government. The Legislative branch makes the laws, the Executive branch enforces the laws and the Judicial branch interprets the laws. These days, the Supreme Court seems to live in another place, rarely viewed as an equal player in the game.

However, there have been many historical examples of the Supreme Court striking down laws as unconstitutional, nullifying the work of the other two branches. In 1803, Marbury v. Madison gave us the first case of the Court overturning an act of Congress. Over the couple of centuries since, there has been an ebb and flow to the prominence of the court in the lives of the citizens, but there has always been a sense that these 9 jurors are the final arbiters in great matters.

The genius of the Founders can be found sprinkled everywhere in the Constitution, but no more so than in Article 3: The Judiciary. If the Founders believed in Democracy and the power of the people to determine their fates, why allow a group of nine unelected, permanent justices to strike down the work of Congress? A law that was signed by the President? Did they create a king by committee?

They created a defense mechanism. The Founders believed that individuals possess certain inalienable rights and these were not open for modification based on a brief period of popular sentiment. If, for some reason, the people elected a Congress and a President that brought about a violation of basic human rights, the Supreme Court is there to restore liberty. The fact that they are not electable or directly influenced by the people gives them an opportunity for more reflection and a view of the longer term.

It is the job of the Judiciary to rule, without emotion, whether a law is in accordance with or contrary to the Constitution. Their job is not to rule on whether or not they like a law or think it would be nice to have. As Justice Scalia once said, "I have a pretty simple job and I have nothing to negotiate." He simply weighs an issue based on the Constitution and court precedent and makes a ruling. No constituents, no lobbyists, no special interests.

The Founders also gave us a mechanism for over-ruling the Supreme Court: we can amend the Constitution, as has been done 27 times. This rationally requires an enormous amount of effort and popular support, not done on a whim based on an election cycle or two.

Which brings us to today's topic: Obama v. Roberts. The recently passed health care law is rightly being challenged in lower courts based on its constitutionality. The argument goes like this:

The Constitution gave the federal government specific, enumerated powers. In that list of powers, the only one that could possibly permit this health care law is the Commerce Clause, which establishes that the federal government has a right to regulate commerce among the states. Now, a law requiring someone (who is presumably doing nothing and is therefore not engaging in commerce across state lines) to purchase health insurance is at a minimum stretching the Constitution and at most clearly in defiance. What exactly is the federal government regulating?

On that topic, I really don't understand how anyone can, in good faith, conclude that the health care law is constitutional. If the federal government can compel someone to stop doing nothing and to purchase health insurance, then the federal government can do anything and our traditional system of government is null and void. You may love the new health care law and you may really want it to be implemented, but you have to at least acknowledge that it flies in the face of our Constitution and the intent of the Founders.

Also on that note, President Obama is probably the most intelligent person to occupy the White House in decades. He was a professor of Constitutional Law. He knows very well the points I've made and, for some reason, he doesn't care. He knows that the right way to implement his vision of health care is through a Constitutional amendment and not in a rash moment of voter frustration with the previous administration. He, however, knows that the pubic greatly disapproves of universal health care and probably concludes that the ends justify the means. This is among the reasons that I am disgusted with our current President.

So sometime soon, in some fashion, the new law will make its way in front of Chief Justice John Roberts' court and will need to stand up to 221 years of Constitutional Law. This will be the biggest decision by the Court in memory. It will either fundamentally change the nature of our Republic or it will confirm the wisdom of the Founders.

I, for one, will be paying close attention.

What's Right is Right

Recently Michael Steele, the Republican National Committee Chair, said that the war in Afghanistan was of "Obama's choosing" and "probably a lost cause". He derided the President for not studying history, because if he had, he would know that you don't engage in a land war in Afghanistan ... everyone who has tried has lost.

If Michael Steele does not resign, he should be fired. And if the Republicans let this stand, then they no longer occupy the high ground on principled foreign policy. This is outrageous.

After spending 8 years (rightly) denouncing Democrats for speaking this way about Iraq and Afghanistan, they cannot tolerate such behavior from their own party. Move swiftly and make an example out of Michael Steele.

Republicans should be rallying behind President Obama and the mission in Afghanistan. He is managing the war as he sees fit ... in other words, doing his job. Make suggestions on strategy or tactics. Recommend fewer or additional or different troops. Offer ideas on how we might do better. At least publicly, show a unified front.

But the last thing a government or party leader should do is call the war lost or say that we should not be fighting it. This is what Obama, Clinton, Biden, Pelosi, Reid, Durbin, Schumer, Frank, Murtha and Dean did endlessly and to the detriment of the war efforts (many after voting for the wars in the first place). The result was an encouraged enemy, lower morale among the troops and allies who saw America wobbling. In other words, the Democrats knowingly did harm in exchange for remaining popular among their ever shifting base.

If a government or party leader wants to condemn a war effort and try to end it, do so privately behind the scenes or resign your position ... then live on a cable news network.

Republicans claim that they're more principled than Democrats on foreign policy, that they are true patriots.

Prove it.

Quickly.