Successes in Failure

I didn’t mean to depress all of you in my last post… ok, I admit it, I did intend to alarm you, to get your attention.  Now I feel like that guy at a party that said too much, and feels bad the morning after. 

So let me try to make it up to you.  Regardless of the outcome of the election this Tuesday, there are reasons to be happy!  I am not doling out therapy here, but instead pointing to the reasons we have to be optimistic while being alarmist.

I must admit, it appears Obama will win the election, and while I see John McCain as the last man standing in this epic wind of collectivist change sweeping across our country, I have to come to grips with the facts, and you do, too. 

While things suck, it’s not totally dark, and I mean that literally.  If you are reading this on a computer, I assume you also have electricity powering your lights and heat.  That’s a good thing!  There are countries that don’t have that luxury.  If you are an American, you live in the greatest country in the world.  As we face globalization for what it is, we will push our industry even further, to compete on a global level with other blossoming free countries.  We should welcome the competition, not dread it, as it will push us to create a greater quantity of better quality items.  We have done this before, and we can do it again.  Things are no longer so compartmentalized; energy, education, national security, the environment, and education are all correlated.  It’s time to address these issues, regardless of the buffoons who might oversee our government.

Fear Change?

The President, as designed, has little influence over your life.  Even though the National Journal rated Barack Obama as the most liberal member of the Senate in 2007, followed by Senators Sheldon Whitehouse (2) of Rhode Island, Joe Biden (3) of Delaware and also Obama’s VP pick, and Bernie Sanders (4) of Vermont, who is admittedly, not a Democrat, but a Democratic Socialist (Independent party), and even though it is true that John McCain voted with Bush 90% of the time while Barack Obama voted with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid 100% of the time, and even though Obama has never opposed his party on major legislation, that doesn’t necessarily mean he will govern from the far left… ok, yes, it does, who are we kidding? 

The fact of the matter is, though, things are going to suck for a while, regardless of who the President is, and if they do, I’d rather the left get the blame for it.  We won’t become Obamistan overnight.  I know we can survive as a democratic and capitalist nation, because we are a nation of fighters.  Even though liberty ebbs now, the tide will come back in, with the help of patriots.

You have reasons to smile!

First, just to get this point out of the way:  with an Obama presidency, arguments for equality against racial prejudice will be put to rest.  We are at a pivotal point with regards to race relations, and it is indeed a great moment in our nation’s history.  If McCain were to win, though, we would hear about racism in America for his entire term as President.  He would go down in history as the spoiler to racial equality; if he lost, he would be remembered instead as the Greatest President We Never Had.

What excites me, though, is the fact that dissent is always strongest when it is in the minority.  Think about it.  It is now our duty, as Bill Buckley said, to “Stand athwart history, yelling, Stop!”  We are Americans, and we stand for freedom, regardless of which party will champion it.  Call your Congressmen and put up a fight.    The left protested the actions and decisions of this President for eight years.  Now, it’s our turn.

There are still reasons to fear, but the President has less to do with it than the rest of us do.  The Constitution can’t be repealed all at once, even if Obama wanted to “break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution.”  His words, not mine.

We have the power to stop legislation through our objections.  Consider the fact that the Amnesty Bill actually crashed our Congress’s phone service due to the amount of incoming calls, or that the House of Representatives website crashed during the Bailout legislation due to overuse.  These actions had a direct effect on swaying legislation.

And here we go again.  Governors of states were on Capitol Hill asking for bailouts, with New York Governor David Paterson telling the House Ways and Means Committee yesterday, “We are cutting all we can.  Therefore, we feel that targeted, sensible actions by the federal government will provide relief for us now.”  New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine implored, “We need federal help to get through these tough times.”  Oddly enough, Corzine used to be our Treasury Secretary, and like our Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, CEO of Goldman-Sachs.  I wonder where they got the idea that Big Government will help everybody out?  But I digress.

Listen how loudly South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford’s dissent rang before Congress, as his words gained national attention for the striking difference in tenor as compared to the Democrats, as he begged Congress NOT to bailout the states:

“I’d ask members of the committee to simply give the states more freedom.  Give us more flexibility.  Give us more in the way of control over the dollars we already have and less in the way of costs.  Give us more options, not more money with federal strings attached… The situation we’re now in did not develop overnight, and in the same way it won’t be cured by morning.  As the old saying goes, the first step to getting out of a hole is to quit digging… Our national debt is now over $10 trillion — more than $4 trillion higher than when I left Congress at the end of 2000… In fact, if this $150 billion stimulus package is passed, this year’s budget deficit could top $1 trillion — adding to the over $10 trillion national debt and making it 70% of a roughly $14 trillion economy…

Essentially, you’d be transferring taxpayer dollars out of the frying pan — the federal government — and into the fire — the states themselves.  I think this stimulus would exacerbate the clearly unsustainable spending trends of states, which has gone up 124% over the past 10 years vs. federal government spending growth of 83%. … There seems to be no consequence, and indeed a reward, for unsustainable spending growth by states.  In effect, sending $150 billion more to states would produce another layer of moral hazard — already laid bare at the corporate, individual and federal levels in recent years.”

So smile:  with patriots like these on the national stage, we won’t be marched into the gulag all at once.

I can only say this:  In the coming months, beware of legislation calling for equalization between individuals or industry by tinkering with the tax code.  If we don’t pay attention, it’s going to happen.  Liberals have been trying to achieve “economic and social justice,” to quote Obama, since the advent of our tax code.  I think unjust corporate taxation is a greater danger to America than an income tax hike is, although both are usually unjust.  We have to start thinking three-dimensionally about our tax system, remembering that we will experience diminishing returns due to over-taxation.

At this juncture, I’d like to make a point on the behalf of Wal-Mart, and corporations like them, such as Big Oil.  Sanctioning Wal-Mart for its innovation is simply un-American.  Wal-Mart’s annual profit is larger than the GDP of Saudi Arabia, and it employs more people than the American military.  Wal-Mart lowers the price of goods in an area by 5 to 8% (greater in rural areas).  Inhibiting growth is anti-capitalist.  I believe government’s role in regulating competition should be miniscule, and should only intervene to bust oppressive monopolies, which Wal-Mart and Big Oil are not.

Regardless of your concerns about Obama’s terrorist acquaintances, radical leftist leanings, inflammatory preachers (I said it), or Joe Biden’s predictions of an “international crisis,” or the Mayan prophecies, or end times analogies, or whatever’s got you scared, remember that America is resilient, and the President is constitutionally limited in the actions he can take against its citizens.  It’s not the end of the world, even if things are going to hurt for a bit.  We who stand for freedom will continue fighting for this country, and try to maintain an upwardly mobile trajectory, against all odds.  Americans love the challenge, and the coming challenge of our time is to keep government off our backs.  George Washington, the model for every Presidency since his, said, “Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master.  Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.”

So smile:  You are still an American!  Next up, your guide to Election Night.