Less Courage, More Free Market
In cities across America, free-market ideas have been losing the battle against the welfare state for a long, long time. The November 2012 elections merely offered the latest depressing results. To reverse the tide, free-market believers should think about a brand new approach: stop demanding courage as the price of admission.
The unfortunate reality in America’s urban areas and their suburban surroundings is that free-market ideals are often considered both uncool and unjust. Too many well-educated urbanites or suburbanites have been conditioned by their universities, workplaces, and social networks to bask in the hypocrisy of identity politics or to accept without question the logic of state intervention. At the same time, too many racial minorities, recent immigrants, women, and less well-to-do urban dwellers have been taught all their lives that they are entitled to, and cannot do without, government handouts.
From New York to San Francisco, America’s urban centers are some of the most hostile places for free markets and free thought. The hostility subjects every subscriber of free-market ideals to constant character assassinations and professional attacks. If he openly criticizes President Barack Obama, he will likely be labeled a racist as well.
Given the difficulties, most urbanites opt for an easier path. It is a path paved with the self-congratulation inculcated by years of living and breathing liberal dogma. For most, the dogma began in college, an environment that actively drowns out or condemns free-market thought. Then graduate schools continued the biased education and further encourage intellectual intolerance. Finally, employers in the real world — fancy law firms, reputable investment banks, high-flying technology companies — allow identity politics and political correctness to continue uninterrupted, and make sure that left-wing women’s groups, minority gatherings, and similar initiatives are never more than a heartbeat away .
In the end, a sense of self-congratulation can be highly intoxicating. After all, pushing for handouts that create short-term gain for the less fortunate fosters a feel-good delusion, especially when the advocates forget to assess responsibility for government dependency or fiscal insolvency.
Yet even self-congratulation will be no match for obsequiousness. In time, one will eagerly ask the biggest culprits of the expansion of the welfare state: “Would you please raise my taxes?”
Against such weak-kneed suggestions, free-market teachings have won the arguments, as evidenced by the sorry state of America’s economy, crushing deficits, spiraling debt, and teetering entitlement programs. Yet the heartfelt and articulate defenses of freedom put forth by conservative think tanks, magazines, and advocacy groups have proved to be no match for the hypocrisy of identity politics or the dependency fostered by the welfare state.
Being right is simply not enough for city dwellers who wish to be cool or who like freebies from other people’s taxes. In response, conservatives must make subscribing to free-market ideas and policies much less difficult. This does not mean, as many have suggested since the November 2012 elections, caving to liberal ideology and doling out government freebies (ranging from amnesty to welfare to free contraceptives) in exchange for support from various racial, gender or age groups that increasingly make up larger portions of America’s urban population. It certainly does not mean, as Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal has declared, that conservatives should keep their mouths shut about a basic free-market tenet — that handouts from the nanny state create warped incentives and distort individual behavior.
Instead, free-market types should think more about new ways to broadcast their ideals not as an argument but as the way that life should be. For example, across America’s cities and college campuses, conservatives can think about organizing events and activities that would have wider social and cultural appeal than panel discussions, lectures, or policy papers on serious topics. The new gatherings could aim to attract large crowds by offering what is fun, interesting, and cool and convey free-market messages as the icing on the cake. After all, going to a concert, a parade, or a party featuring a celebrity or social icon who happens to be conservative would not require nearly the same courage as telling your feminist boss that you voted for Mitt Romney for president.
At the same time, conservatives can do more to convince the impoverished and the less fortunate that a more dignified life — one that does not involve forever drinking from the government trough — is possible. Consistently showcasing prominent individuals who have prevailed against the welfare state through hard work would be a good start.
Free-market ideals are worthy of a robust defense and often demand courage. Unfortunately, courage is not a character trait that everyone has. If courage is required from every disciple of the free market in America’s urban centers, those ideals will often be left undefended against the nanny state and its onslaught of handouts, or “gifts” purchased with taxpayer money. Courage from those willing to defend the free market in hostile territory will always be needed and should always be respected, but for everyone else, it is time to find ways to take courage out of the equation.
Welfare needs to end at the top, first. No more handouts to corporations, no more special tax breaks, no more regulations that only apply to certain companies and keep out competition.
Giving poor people $5 a day to buy food with is not bankrupting the country. Republicans are not going to win elections by being mean spirited towards the needy.
And if Republicans were talking about ending that $5 (it’s a state matter, properly) or objecting to ending that welfare at the top, you’d have a point.
Whole lot of Republicans for a long time have wanted a flat tax with all income counted, and with a per capita deduction only (to reduce circular flows of money) it would be a “progressive” tax although having a single rate. Funny thing, Democrats call that unfair, although it rests far more heavily on the haves than the have-nots. Maybe, the Democrats don’t want what they say they want, they want something else.
With these Democrats, what they really want is called socialist and totalitarian. If the President orders a $2500.00 coin minted in platinum with the lie it’s a trillion dollars on it, and expects us to respect that…if he issues and Executive Order by which he pretends the 2nd amendment has an in anyway altered meaning…if damn many more verified reports of the donks running the majority vote total up by having %100 Obama (no errors out of thousands of votes, never happened before) and precincts where %120 of the population voted…if he keeps saying the validity of the debt already issued means he can spend more money against the will of Congress…without his party permitting a budget to be passed.
I think it may be “Game On” before the end of this term.
And no, Art Chance, the majority of the military will not, “Just Follow Orders”, not when those orders come down.
How can your flat tax be progressive with a single, flat, rate? Think this through again. We conservatives do not want a progressive tax, that’s the beauty of a flat (rate) income tax.
I believe that Tom means that a flat tax resulting in the rich paying more in dollars and the poor paying less in dollars is what the so-called progressives say they desire. I think Tom is right in arrogating and manipulating the term “progressive” to his ends … conservatives need to do more of that to take back the cultural high ground. Take over their terms and change them. What is not “progressive” about the rich paying more than the poor? Forget percentages, just in dollars, percentages are about punishment not payment, but don’t you progs want the rich to just pay more? Argue that with a prog sometime and watch her head start to smoke.
Actually, while I think it would be a great improvement and achievable, it would in fact be progressive in the usual sense of a progressive tax.
For example, with a rate of 25%, a family of 4 with an income of $40,000.00, and an per capita deduction of $5,000.00 would pay $5,000.00 in tax. The same family with an income of $20,000.00 would pay $0, and the same family with an income of $120,000.00 would pay $25,000.00.
Respectively this would be 12.5%, 0%, and 20.83% tax paid. It would be a progressive tax. Even so, it would be a drastic improvement over what now obtains.
it is amazing how many people don’t understand the difference between flat tax-rate and flat tax-amount….
Read this through again:
> and with a per capita deduction only … it would be a “progressive” tax although having a single rate
Let’s say everyone gets a $10,000 deduction.
The effective tax rate would be strictly progressive (except for those paying 0%).
Gingrich and Clinton already reformed welfare for the poor in the 1990s.
But I agree that reforming other entitlements–like food stamps–is a lot harder to sell when the voters see prominent Republicans supporting such obvious handouts to business as the Export-Import Bank. $20 billion a year, most of it going to Boeing.
Or ethanol subsidies. As long as we’re talking about courage, how many Republicans are willing to go to Iowa and tell Iowants that ethanol subsidies are toast?
Free-market economics is inconsistent with handouts to either the disadvantaged or to politically well connected corporations and lobbies. Let politicians finance their political campaigns solely by private donations from voters.
“As long as we’re talking about courage, how many Republicans are willing to go to Iowa and tell Iowants that ethanol subsidies are toast?”
More elected and campaigning Republicans have been willing to do that, than have Democrats.
I think a lot of them have, always generating the same media surprise.
“Gingrich and Clinton already reformed welfare for the poor in the 1990s.”
Gingrich reformed it, Clinton submitted to it after 1994. Obama and these Democrats have illegally undone those laws, in the act of Obama’s Executive Order to that effect.
To be fair,
in 1992 Clinton campaigned for the Presidency on a pledge to “end welfare as we know it.” That was a daring thing for a Democratic presidential candidate to promise.
So Clinton was always interested in having that done. Otherwise, Gingrich could never have rolled him.
Notice that when Clinton stood up to Gingrich years later, Clinton won.
I’m not so much of a rabid partisan that I won’t give credit where credit is due anyone who deserves it.
Telling the ruth about leaches that demand part of the fruit of someone elses labor is not being “mean spirited”. The dumb “you first” stuff is part of the problem. We can tell the whole truth about all of the grifters at the same time. Your attitude on this sounds like someone that frequents Slate.
We conservatives have told the truth about all the leeches.
The GOP leadership, on the other hand, is pretty selective about which leeches it speaks out about.
Another example: Conservatives at RedState.com and elsewhere pleaded with Romney to say something about the “too big to fail” problem that forced taxpayers to bail out banks with few or no strings attached. Romney said no. And so has the rest of the GOP leadership. They don’t want to jeopardize their campaign contributions from Wall Street.
We need to be able to explain the Bourgeois Deal that brings mass prosperity from individual choices that allow for differences of taste. What made the silk stockings that were always available to the Queen cheap enough to be affordable to many of us as a % of our wages or salary. That’s what the consumer decides means. Mass markets mean that a little profit per sale can generate huge revenue from just one great innovation.
When Bruce Katz of the Brookings Institution talks about a shift away from the consumer deciding to the producer decider as part of the Low Carbon alliance with the State, he is saying we are returning to Mercantilism. Where there was no mass prosperity or much choice in services and products. We take the benefits of capitalism for granted with no idea of how they come about.
In writing something like this post http://www.invisibleserfscollar.com/19th-century-blueprints-for-20th-century-tragedies-is-a-repeat-pending-in-the-21st/ I have to read a great deal of history and economics. One of the points that keeps coming up in dealing with government as the sovereign power in the economy which is where we are headed is that no government in history with that model could provide mass prosperity AND personal freedom.
So what kind of future do our young people and urban dwellers and “I’d prefer to work in the nonprofit sector” naifs want? Do they like their I-Phone? Do they want to continue to live at home? Is an assigned role acceptable? Will they be bothered when hard work and initiative are no longer rewarded because drawing a breath earns the inherent right to much the same standard of living?
We have to know our history and economics well enough to explain the cause and effect and consequences of all these taken for granted everyday benefits of once free markets. And tell it with humor, not pretension. We have to understand why the rational, well-stocked mind can defy the herd and make its own decisions. And appreciate what will happen when the education system, K-12 and higher ed, continues to be determined to remove the distinction between affect and cognition.
Because when feeling is the dominant form of thinking of a majority of voters, you cannot be reasoned out of what is not a matter of reason in the first place.
And idealogues with nifty slogans and great visuals get to prevail. Which is darn close to the situation we find ourselves in today.
After watching this GOP parade with Obama as the drum major, the GOP should do something truly radical
Right after the SOU address, the GOP should announce they will pass a bill, the next day, that recognizes the American public voted him in and want what he wants. The bill will allow the white House and/or all Federal Agencies:
1. to ignore the debt ceiling
2. set spending each year as without Congressional review and to set it each year without Congressional approval unless Reid passes a budget
3. authorize the Executive Branch to spend whatever it desires
4. set taxes on anything, anyone, anytime for any reason
5. authorize nationalizing any industry for any reason
6. authorize implementing any immigration law and naturalization procedures
7. implement any treaty
8. suspend elections in any jurisdiction
Maybe a few more. Boehner could start with the first 3 and them work on the remaining ones.
Then tell the American People so cherished by the politician in speeches that you wanted this baby so go rock him.
If Barry gets everything on this list, he’ll just want more, probably starting with the repeal of the 22nd Amendment (limiting the President to two terms). Appeasement is not the answer, although after the last election, it’s hard to see any rationale way out of the dim future that the liberal-socialist agenda portends. While touting his welfare programs, Obama has been the leading the way toward crony capitalism with billions of dollars of benefits to his political supporters, such as those in the “green energy” business. (The real “green” is the money flowing from Washington into the pockets of the green energy corporate owners.) I agree that cutting corporate welfare – rather than cutting welfare to the poor – ought to be higher on the agenda of the sensible political class but even that won’t help when voters select their representatives based on who they like better or who is “cooler.”
No. What needs to happen is the acceleration of the current ideological migration where conservatives are decamping Blue states heading for Red states.
This will cause Red states to get redder and Blue states to get bluer thereby hastening their collapse. Experience is the best teacher.
But Red states will need to act to defend themselves from Blue state refugees. To do so I recommending my post here http://www.redstate.com/derkrieger/2012/11/26/the-war-is-lost-time-to-establish-a-red-state-redoubt/
Excellent article Eric. I’m in Silicon Valley and agree 100% that they should be left alone to themselves to rot in their own Socialist feces.
A version of a ‘Red-State redoubt’ would be a scenario where you could live according to your own political policies. I wonder if that could be pulled off. For example, pay lower local taxes and do private school, pay for road use, 911 calls, etc. And of course private SS accounts.
I came here all the way from Brezhnev/Andropov USSR and the rot they set abrew in 1960′s caught up with me here. You think the rot won’t find you in your red state? It wasn’t Soviet migrants that got the con to grow this big here and it won’t be migrants you’ll need to watch out for in your red state or red town or red block.
There is no place to run. Have to take a stand where you are.
Find ways to organize and to explain to those who are ready to hear the truth about the collectivist con.
Kuch, immigrants like yourselves are not only the backbone of America; you ARE America. Your message is crucial to our survival.
“….you cannot be reasoned out of what is not a matter of reason in the first place.”
Very good point. And you are going to get a magnificent display of that paradigm on Tuesday when the pathetic dimwit Joe Biden trots out his purely emotion driven gun-control nonsense.
“At the same time, conservatives can do more to convince the impoverished and the less fortunate that a more dignified life — one that does not involve forever drinking from the government trough — is possible. Consistently showcasing prominent individuals who have prevailed against the welfare state through hard work would be a good start.”
Um, did you actually WATCH the Republican National convention? It had one speaker after another (from Marco Rubio to Condi Rice) who came up from humble beginnings to become famous in this country. Did that mean anything to the low information voters out there, ESPECIALLY in either the black or hispanic communities? Not, one, bit. Obama carried the black and hispanic vote by huge margins, even though he has done almost nothing for them economically EXCEPT expand the amount of government handouts and benefits they are elegible for.
Now what does that tell us about the people who voted for Obama? That the social welfare state is the overall goal in this country and that a majority of voters in this nation are now very comfortable with socialism and handing over all of their rights to the government as long as the government provides them with the absolute minimum needed to live without actually working for a living. THAT is where America is today. If it was not, Romney would be president today.
I’m sick and tired of hearing that Republicans have a “messaging” problem and that we need to “educate” the American public more on the wonders of a free market society and capitalism. Rubbish. The majority of Americans today, as proved by the last election, want “free stuff,” and they will keep voting for the politicians that keep giving them that “free stuff,” even though YOU are going to be the one stuck with the bill. They WANT the European-style welfare state and will keep voting for the liberals who are more than willing to hand it to them on a silver platter, just like in Europe. THAT is how liberals intend to stay in power. Get more and more people dependent on government by either working for it or getting benefits from it, and you will have a voter base that will keep getting you re-elected. THAT is America today.
So what to do about it? Unfortunately, not much. This will continue until we really do go broke, just like Greece, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Ireland, and Great Britain, to name just a few. Like an alcoholic, only when we hit rock bottom will the majority of Americans be willing to change. Just like Britain was willing to give Margaret Thatcher a chance while it was wallowing in economic misery, so too will a conservative be given a chance in this country once we hit rock bottom, like we did under the Carter administration. Until then, folks, all we can hope for is more of the same from Washington. That is, of course, until they finally run out of spending other people’s money. Then it’s Thatcher time.
All of our theories are predicated on one idea, that being most people want to work for a living. Since most people no longer want to work for a living, we are paddling upstream with nothing but a lost ideal. This country doesn’t have a problem in the world that about 50 more million people couldn’t solve if they only wanted to work for a living. Trying to find these people is the problem. Ever go into a big box store and try to get help when the only time any of the employees will talk to a customer is when the boss is coming down the isle? Ever try to get a real plumber to show up when you call the plumber? Ever try to get even a simple answer from anyone supposedly working for the government? Ever try to convince a pot head that being stoned affects their ability to do their job? Ever watch a sales clerk trying to actually count you change out? The problems are systemic and will not be solved by throwing concerts by conservatives. Most people are just pusillanimous slugs, so just queue up for your potatoes and shut the hell up. We can’t fix this until at least 50,000,000 lowly pusillanimous slugs finally figure out who is actually screwing them. As for this article, they never had any courage before and they never will have any courage in the future. They are just drug infested slugs. Fix that.
Good advice, well written, nice article, little or no chance for success.
Liberty and I have may have different reasons, but have come to the same basic conclusion.
I’ve talked to these youth indoctrinated in America bad – they have no intent in trying to understand. McDaddy Obama is cool, weed is legal, abortion virtuous, more college credits is the key to success, not going to worry about the student loan – Sallie Mae will come through with more as the pot never runs empty. They like the role of lifetime student.
I’ve talked to recent immigrants who don’t understand they’ve run from the bad to the hopeful, only to demand they keep their inferior culture and thinking, completely ignorant of history and the fact they’re being used and set up like pigeons for the fox. They have little or no intent of assimilating into what works and have no idea why it worked – only to survive better for as long as it lasts and Democrats are more free with the freebies.
Democrats have done a monumentally superior job of brainwashing, country be damned. Unfortunately, most are too stupid to recognize they too will become pigeons, sooner or later.
Now I am completely convinced that we must hit rock bottom to survive. The fastest way is to sit on the wallet and let them eat cake.
My biggest concern besides protecting my assets best way I know how, is that I am convinced after this last week of Executive Order and threat, that Obama and his Brownshirts are more than willing to take private possessions if necessary to fund another round.
I think you’re right, Tex Taylor. Far too many people and the feral government itself have invested far too much time, effort, and money in anti-realistic thinking and behavior.
They sincerely do believe in the free lunch. They sincerely do believe government is benign and competent. They sincerely do believe open market capitalism is unfair because it rewards intelligence and hard work and daring. They sincerely do believe they can keep taking more and more from the makers without limit. Sincerity of belief is a measure of sincerity, not the validity of belief—but that’s not one of their beliefs.
They neither can nor will abandon their anti-realistic beliefs until that’s their only choice.
“They sincerely do believe open market capitalism is unfair because it rewards intelligence and hard work and daring. ”
I don’t think so.
I haven’t heard any liberals get angry about a system that rewards intelligence and hard work. Remember, Silicon Valley–the hard-working high-tech companies like Adobe, Apple, Oracle, etc.–voted overwhelmingly for Obama. (How do you explain that?)
But I have heard liberals get angry about a system that rewards accidents of birth and other forms of luck.
If you’re born into wealth, you’re going to start off from a much better place automatically. Such a child could have Down’s Syndrome and still end up inheriting more money than some bright child from a poor coal mining family could ever hope to earn.
Sinz you’re oversimplifying, Silicon Valley techie here. Immigrants who come here and kick serious ass: Red. Spoiled white hippie kids: Blue.
The latter get fired. Then they move to SF and overdose.
We need a lot of work and time is running out for conservatives. If you’re rich, start some private elhi schools or endow some scholarships at elhi schools. If your’e religious, endow some good Catholic, Jewish, or Lutheran schools. This would do a few things, vastly improve education, decrease indoctrination, and serve as as spear against the unions in our schools.
If you’re a Tea Party member and live in a blue, give up or lessen your fervor to elect more republicans in your states. Its like trying to move an immoveable object. In most of these states, the electorate is so indoctrinated you can’t change their mind until the whole thing goes bankrupt. I know I’ve tried with my two sisters and I just can’t penetrate their minds. They think I’m crazy and weird.
Support Republicans in light red or purple states. We already have 30 governorships, but we need more. Support those states that are doable. Support the National Right to Work Committee and a gun rights organization. Support outside groups if they are effective; not just a smattering, scattering approach. We need more money spent wisely; nor just more money.
Pressure your states legislatures, or if your’e in a blue state, your local sheriff to protect you from Obama’s gun grabbing and his executive orders to grab
you off the street and hold you. Petition them to protect you from Obama’s FEMA camps which sound so Orwellian that they echo Hitler’s death camps.
You are right. unfortunately, groups and organizations like The Heritage Foundation spend vast sums of money preaching to people who already agree with their policies. They would be more effective with a massive outreach or the university crowd and other under informed potential voters. Also a campaign to call out people on the left, including the media, who are trying to impress socialism on the country by name and expose their looney ideas. I don’t know how such an effort could be organized, but hopefully there is some conservative within our ranks who could energize such an effort. We are reverting to a country where slavery was legal. Before the emancipation, the slaves did all the work while the owners luxuriated with the fruits of their labors. Today, almost half of he country is luxuriating on the efforts of the taxpayers who have become the slaves.
“Against such weak-kneed suggestions, free-market teachings have won the arguments, as evidenced by the sorry state of America’s economy, crushing deficits, spiraling debt, and teetering entitlement programs”
I am not uptodate with is Asian Author so forgive me if I wrong but my feeling if by this “free market” she is asking USA rich to put more money in ATHEIST COMMUNIST CAPITALIST red China and black and blue forced murder of every baby in Mommy’s tummy not first born The USA people may find out in their crisis monent of need and tip you upside down shaking the rest of your money out of your pockets call you traitor to your own people .
You rich already loser of all your money supporting Mitt Romney maybe tempted by the Borg with their ” resistance is wasting time” and promise you first born status with the Bog. then you get there and they say you do not look like us so have good plastic face operation with the slanty eyes to fit and but you may be too tall and then must have your legs cut off at the knees and be given cyber legs to fit in but then they see your hands and they say you must stay away from all their women because the hand is too big and you not allowed even the one child to advance your bloodline then feel like old dinosaur freak on display
This is not good for you to trust the borg for your future comforts I believe
Side note to post above:
In the history books if China lose you go down as the Great Dragon that turned China into Superpower that almost destroyed your own nation
Wow.
Painful to read and less coherent than usual.
Collectivist ideology is not an end in itself, it is a vehicle. It’s destination is as old as mankind, raw power.
Free market principles in theory empower individual actors, presumably generating the greatest good for the greatest number.
Statist policies concentrate extreme power in the hands of relatively few.
The principle actors in our bad political theater are operating the vehicle. Where is it going, and at the behest of whom?
testing
Some of you may have heard about a story from Orlando this past week. A couple were threatened with $500-a-day fines if they did not remove their front yard vegetable garden. The backlash from across the political spectrum was significant.
I believe far greater progress would be made if the focus was on issues such as private property rights, instead of arguing endlessly about Politician X vs Politician Y. I have talked with people of an anti-business mindset who agree that people should support small, local businesses. Yet when they hear free market and business, they are conditioned to think giant international corporation. The closer you can bring the issues to home and family, the more you are likely to get people to grasp what you saying.
Two people, one indoctrinated by college professors, the other a regular listener to talk radio could hear the exact same sentence and interpret in entirely different ways. This needs to be understood.
I think the closer you can bring the discussion to issues at the local level, the more you are likely to find agreement. I believe most people still want the best for their children and grandchildren. They simply have not thought through the consequences of where we are heading. I suspect most of us who read blogs such as this understand that the more power we give to government, the more personal freedom we relinquish. However, I doubt that many people of a younger generation have been taught this truth. They have probably never thought it out for themselves. They hear blah blah blah Candidate X, Candidate Y. then click Like on whatever their friends like on Facebook.
It is not my job to indoctrinate them into a political party. It is my job to help them comprehend that Liberty matters.
As a Statist, why exactly would you be in favor of freedom in any form or in any amount? Every iota of freedom that the people have diminishes the control that the Statist seeks. Statists hate freedom.
But it’s more than that. In fact, freedom is the visceral enemy of all Statists. You can read the entire history of civilization as one long conflict, not among states, but between states and the people who live in them. What is the first thing the new tyrant does? Is it to attack other states or is it to tighten the grip on the citizenry. Reference the Russian and Chinese Revolutions for data points.
It might be a good idea to hang onto those guns, even though the arrogant Brit with no audience is shocked, shocked at the idea that the people might distrust the US government. Who you gonna believe? the arrogant twit or your own eyes?
I am trying to visualize how our side could win on this. I just don’t. As others have said above, it has to get worse before it gets better, and even then we would have to wait for a new generation to overcome inertia.
If we do win it will be a very long time from now. And since our side creates opportunity out of challenges I am thinking of proactive steps we can take to win the battles but not the war.
To me the battle means keeping our earnings for our families and retirement. When my company picks up there is no way in Hell I’ll pay 55% of my earnings (Calif. resident) like I did in ’08 and promptly lost the rest in the market.
I’m no tax expert but there has got to be a way for somebody to come up with tax shelters the Feds can’t touch. Does the Cayman Islands thing actually work? Is there any way for us to work here, pay our local taxes, and keep the nest egg safe offshore?
Most of you commenters suggest we educate them out of their socialism. Well, you know what? I feel the opposite way. Give them socialism in spades, just hide your money.
I live in Silicon Valley, where intelligent, productive immigrants have taken over from lazy white hipsters who bash in Starbucks windows. There is not the slightest hope of educating these idiots and to hope otherwise is irresponsible. But more importantly, to gamble our nest eggs on the hope that this will turn around is whistling in the dark.
Dear Todd
Instead of putting your riches on an Island why not put it under your bed and some even in your pilliow. The money may start speaking to you when you sleep then once a week for an hour share your rich blessings with the poor in spirit Jesus calls them.
Just a smile, through the window , a pat on the back to a stranger ,buy a stranger a cup of coffee as long as they not Mormon and you may have an angel in front of you that accept your coffee and then who know where God will lead you in sharing weekly with the poor in spirit?
Perhaps you do this already but the key is not to judge the person in front of your eyes so then your eyes as it is when you sleep can enter through the door of what has been invisible in your past walk through your life
This post makes the point. How is anyone supposed to get through to these useful idiots? A guy who has busted his butt all his life to have some of the wealth he has created wants to protect that wealth, and a nut job who actually thinks he owes other people what he has. Communism is firmly in control of this country.
Jim Baker, waxwing indeed makes the point. I have sounded like him when I’ve been at the lowest points of my life. Broke, resentful, confused and nowhere to lash out except at those who are not.
As we all know when you are at low points like waxwing there is no flashing green arrow saying “go this direction and make everything better”. Often you see no other way out except hate.
And we all know people who have found solace in that hate. It’s easier to stew than get up and off your duff.
This is why we lost this most important election. You’re right that communism is firmly in control with all the hate and vitriol as we see above.
And this is precisely why they will not see a damn cent of my money. That issue is more important to me than hoping that these people will some day go back under their rocks. I don’t think they will…I think this is their time and we have very little to combat them with.
Before the election I posted here that I was really concerned we would lose because we do not have a message for loser. We have only messages for winners, but the problem is most people don’t want to push that hard. The response I got here was I had nothing to worry about, the Dems were so horrific it would be a landslide.
I was so shattered by this election I stayed off the news, off PJM for a month and am only now slowly crawling back.
The reality we face is that the country has turned away from the founding principles and my patriotism is directed towards a historical object, not an existing one.
Sorry Todd but I think waxwings is more likely a Media Matters troll just doing his job alongside his comrades. This would be a good year to read “Witness” by Whittaker Chambers, I say. Not to add doom to your gloom, but these guys have been serious for 100 years and they think they are winning and they are smelling blood now. I will fight these bastards until I can’t fight any more because they are flat out wrong for any country, much less ours.
“From New York to San Francisco, America’s urban centers are some of the most hostile places for free markets and free thought.”
Maybe this coincides with the fact that power is being rapidly accumulated there.
I have to agree with the premise of the author.
People should be given the chance to find out, at little personal risk, that their self interest is best served by a free market economy. Dress that up some, if you need to, to lure the gutless and the shiftless out of their seeming comfort zone.
I also think that everybody will grow a pair when the government give-aways and the public funded troughs dry up and those who have banked on the free ride lasting forever find themselves with no resources at all.
Rewarding the behaviors you want works. Until the rewards run out.