While some leftists strain to deny a "convergence" toward collectivization between the U.S. and European models (and some are consumed by denialism altogether), others on the left are openly embracing an identifcation with genuine socialilsm. Michelle Goldberg, at The American Prospect, wrote a detailed piece the other day arguing that the declining birthrates in Western democracies are less problematic in states with aggressive social welfare regimes. The key? Progressive social programs supportive of working mothers that in effect engender fecund family-level reproductive patterns. So, don't worry about falling birthrates! Big government will take care of it! And here's the clincher:
In other words, the threat of population decline is one of the best arguments yet for socialized day care, family leave, and other dreamy Scandinavian-style policies. It’s a discussion we should welcome.Put aside the idiocy of Goldberg's argument for now. I'm simply fascinated by the growing acceptability of the state-socialist model among those on the left.
Moreover, Rasmussen has a new poll out today on this, "Just 53% Say Capitalism Better Than Socialism." According to the survey:
Republicans - by an 11-to-1 margin - favor capitalism. Democrats are much more closely divided: Just 39% say capitalism is better while 30% prefer socialism. As for those not affiliated with either major political party, 48% say capitalism is best, and 21% opt for socialism.I don't take too much away from these findings, actually. Those on the extreme left of the spectrum, including many in Congress, are committed to some version of a revolutionary socialist doctrine. Most Democrats are more likely disenchanted with the free enterprise system, and they likely equate "capitalism" with greed and corruption.
Nevetheless, it's extremely telling that a bare majority prefers capitalism to socialism. Of course, no other system in human history has been developed to provide greater prosperity and encourage greater human potential than the capitalist mode of market organization. Hendrik Hertzberg may think that Americans are warming up to a "nice" cushy progressive social welfare state, but folks need to read Mark Levin's, Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto, for a powerful argument that statism does nothing but destroy freedom. It's that simple. Growing support for a European-style socialist welfare state is a shift toward tyranny. It's un-American through and through, and one can only hope that we're in a passing phase of deviation from America's historical norm of liberal exceptionalism.
13 comments:
So now it's Secular Socialist Progressives that are going to bring down America?
Alarmist.
I agree with you, Professor, about the Rasmussen poll. I need to look at how the question was asked in the first place. Also, I wonder how many thought capitalism was superior over socialism as they got older, started working and maybe begin home ownership. I am impressed that the overall majority still favored capitalism. There is hope yet! Oh Tim, may I shorten it to SSP? I like acronyms!
Timmy,
If I were you (and thank God I am not) I would go back and calculate just exactly how much of your money (along with that of your fellow Americans) was confiscated by the government to send you to government schools that allegedly "educated" you.
Once the exact amount is noodled out, I would suggest you seek an immediate refund in full.
Honestly, as I read more and more of your posts here, it has become rather apparent that you were shortchanged in the extreme.
-Dave
Dave:
Since government, in our system, is a construct of the people, it is only an institution separate from the people in the sense that it acts as the people's agent. This means that it does not "confiscate" money from citizens, but accepts contributions we have chosen to make through our representatives.
Through political activity, we have directed the government carry out various actions collectively in our name--public education in the case you cite. This makes it legitimate, whether or not you approve.
If this principle is foreign to you, it may be you that the system short changed, not Tim.
your blog is very good
Mr. Scott ... our system was designed so that life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are not left to the total mercy of the state ... even if that state is a collective construct of We the People.
Our founding citizens even said that we have the right to change, or even abolish, a government that becomes destructive of those ends.
Also, when you have a system where deference to party and seniority in Congress skews the balance of representative power to a relative few, to the point that their ability to set the agenda of our representative government is significantly elevated above the body as a whole ... is it really representative?
Especially when that deference to seniority gives the subset of America that elects these relative few, powerful disincentives against replacing them -- even when these voters can see that their representatives have replaced common sense with historically-proven-to-be-failed ideology?
Mr. Casebolt:
I'm afraid I have to disagree with your opening premise. Our system was designed precisely to place life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in the hands of the State. Indeed, both the Declaration of Independence ("to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men") and the Constitution ("We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America") explicitly state that the purpose of government is to safeguard our liberty.
Of course, government derives its power "from the consent of the governed," which means that the people can withdraw it, and, as you say, seek to change or abolish it.
Some changes are, to be sure, needed. But government is no out of control monster that confiscates the people's money. Indeed, today's interest groups operate much as Madison predicted they would. Americans have not lost control of their government--they control it through political activity as channeled through a variety of interest groups, including unions, trade associations, community organizations, chambers of commerce, ethnic organizations and on and on. The people have the government they want--you just don't like the government that they picked.
Rick: “our system was designed so that life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are not left to the total mercy of the state ... even if that state is a collective construct of We the People.”
The other day, a politician said, “We cannot allow public opinion influence public policy.”
This, I believe, would indicate that those at present in power disagree with you. Further, it seems that these politicians ignore the preamble to the constitution, which states, “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”
Scott: “Of course, government derives its power "from the consent of the governed," which means that the people can withdraw it, and, as you say, seek to change or abolish it.”
How will this belief that “We cannot allow public opinion to influence public policy,” support the goals stated in the preamble?
Mr. Scott, as you said, government exists to safeguard our liberty.
However even the will of the majority can not legitimately override that requirement.
The fact that such an override has now gained many allies among our leadership speaks volumes about a number of items:
>The "faulty intelligence" regarding those put forth to lead us, that our information systems deliver -- often, willfully -- to We the People for use in our decision-making ... that is, when those being put forth are not duplicitous as to their views and intentions themselves. In particular, I speak of institutions in both the realms of media and education.
>The degradation of the value of personal responsibility among many of us, to the point that we are always looking for someone else to solve our problems FOR us -- even to the point of near-total dependence upon such "experts", and/or standing by while the legitimately-held resources of others are confiscated for our alleged benefit.
>The distortions in our systems of governance, that both skew representation towards a relative few, and give We the People more incentives to "game the system" for personal gain, than to engage in legitimate enterprise that builds social and economic strength.
The problem with such overrides is that they are not easily reversible ... even when We the People realize that we have made an error in allowing them.
Mr. Casebolt,
The media is in fact quite informative. The problem is that most Americans would rather watch Monday Night Football than Meet the Press, and corporate control of the media only makes it worse. But good sources of information are out there--we just ignore them as we make our choices in the market.
I say again: Americans have exactly the government they want. We have chosen it in a free political market. No shadowy group has taken the reigns of power by controlling the media so they can confiscate our money and give it to some promiscuous woman with seventeen kids. Capitalists have constructed a political dialogue that Americans will buy. Americans don't care about the nuances, or the founders, or the political theory of liberty and personal freedom, so they mostly ignore it.
This is not a good choice, but it is a legitimate one, or liberty doesn't mean very much. One of the most popular foundations for tyranny is "the people don't know what they are doing." Demonizing government won't fix this--you have to change the social norm to privilege engagement with politics.
"Markets" are largely to blame for all this. When you make every aspect of society about free markets and profit, this is what you get--life defined as a profit-making enterprise. Markets work by rewarding those who recognize and meet demand, whatever it is, whether or not the things consumers demand are bad for them. We've constructed social norms that make us worry only about ourselves, and I'm guessing that on some level you think this is a good thing.
I don't have a suggestion for a better way of going about this, by the way. But at least I understand what's going on: we worry more about profit (whether more money or more fun) than about each other, so our aggregated individual transactions have more meaning than acting collectively to solve problems and protect the weak. This is Capitalism, baby. Hope you like it.
Mr. Scott -- the problem is not a result of capitalism or free markets.
It is the result of allowing moral relativism to spread like kudzu in a rights-respecting, free-market society, "freeing" the citizen to substitute the exploitation of others ... even if it requires making oneself excessively dependent upon others who offer to do the exploitation on one's behalf ... for personal responsibility and self-control.
By the way, that exploitation flows in all directions ... for I view "soak-the-rich" class-envy-derived politics just as exploitative as robber-baron capitalism.
I agree, the social norm needs to be changed. Without self-control, a society will slide towards anarchy, then repression.
This, however, is NOT the message of the current Administration -- they promote legalized exploitation and dependence, instead.
It is the free market, at present -- not our "betters" in Washington -- that is providing the incentives for a return to self-control and personal responsibility. Painful incentives ... but incentives nonetheless.
The self-control that will resolve our present situation will not come by government-forced "contributions", "volunteerism" or micromanagement. Any/all of those will move us further down the road to a lowered standard-of-living at the least, outright repression at the worst.
It will only come when We the People choose self-control and responsibility for ourselves, in the "free market" of moral choice ... and leaving the snake oils of both Gordon Gecko and Timothy Leary (and that of Hugh Hefner, as well) on the shelf to collect dust.
But at least I understand what's going on: we worry more about profit (whether more money or more fun) than about each other, so our aggregated individual transactions have more meaning than acting collectively to solve problems and protect the weak.
Collective action works well when the problem can be resolved by a one-size-fits-all solution -- not so well when you need 300 million sizes.
This is especially true when collective action is implemented as engaging government to solve these kinds of problems in a rights-respecting society, where the requirement for equal-treatment-under-the-law restricts the ability of the government to tailor the solution to the individual.
What you end up with is the attempt to repair a complex life with only two tools at your disposal ... a bag of money, and a pair of handcuffs.
This is one reason why I like to see "collective action" as local as possible, and even disconnected from the force of law. Private charitable entities can act in ways that would be discriminatory if our government was the service provider ... without compromising the civil liberties of the recipient, for the relationship between provider and recipient is voluntary.
It is also easier for We the People to change or replace service providers in such an arrangement, for the social and political incentives to keep an ineffective service alive is greatly diminished, relative to government service providers.
And as for protecting the weak -- to coin a phrase, that depends upon what "weak" is. I think ... based in part on observing the lives of my dirt-poor grandfather in Appalachia and his progeny ... there are a lot of people who have been told they are "weak", and are encouraged by the well-meaning (or politically-exploitative) to wait around for others to help them ... when in fact, they are not "weak" at all, and can and do overcome when left free to do so.
It's not that We the People -- including conservatives -- lack in generosity. It's that we want our generosity directed towards the weak ... and not diverted to those who see themselves as weak, just because some "better" told them they were.
This is Capitalism, baby. Hope you like it.
Even this flawed version we live in at present, still beats the alternatives to it -- including the alternatives being promoted by some in our current leadership.
I don't believe socialists are coming out of the closet. I think people are branding themselves that way because they don't have the foggiest clue what it really means.
Browsing around - I've seen hundreds of definitions for it, few of them accurate.
"spreading the wealth around" is not socialism. That's simply screwed up taxation.
Socialism is when government takes ownership completely away from a business owner and then decides what everyone in the company should make.
And we are indeed headed that way.
When government officials - like Obama or his underlings - presume to fire a CEO and hire someone in it's place...... an act that has no basis in law..... you are well on your way to socialism.
When banks beg to give bailout money back - but the government tells them they cant.... That is socialism.
When the government begins deciding what executives in a company can make... that's socialism.
All of which have transpired in the past few months.
So the American people are going to have to decide if they are truly ready to become a slave to the state.... To be controlled, owned and rationed by the state.
How is that freedom?
Would you rather fail as a free person..... or just get by as an owned person.
That choice is here.
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