A Voice in the Wilderness In Defense of "Mere Conservatism"

Meghan McCain: Pretty, and Pretty Wrong

Senator John McCain's 24 year old daughter/blogger, Meghan McCain, was recently a guest on the Colbert Report on Comedy Central. Before I give my thoughts on her appearance, please watch the brief interview below:

There are many things racing through my head right now after watching that...

First off, Meghan McCain is really good looking. I'll give her that. I know it's superfluous to some, but not to me. Although I'm a man who craves substance in another human being, it helps to have someone in the public limelight who calls herself a Republican that looks like she does. It'd be nice to pretend we live in a society where looks don't matter, but they do.

She did make some good points, actually, some very good points, about the GOP needing to avoid the mindset that Twitter and Facebook will magically win them votes with the under-30 crowd. While all of us under the Center-Right umbrella (conservatives, Republicans, libertarians, etc.) must utilize any and all technology in getting our messages of limited government, fiscal responsibility, and strong national security out..."poking" people on Facebook, or "tweeting" on Twitter isn't an ends, but merely a means. We will ultimately win with our ideas and values.

Ms. McCain also correctly identified the need for better candidates to be put forward in 2010 and 2012 for the Republican Party. Candidates, like, oh, I don't know, ones NOT named McCain perhaps? Your dad, Meghan, was, frankly, a disaster.

He's an honorable guy. He served his country. He's one of the only people in Congress the past 20+ years that practices what he preaches when it comes to spending and pork-barrel projects, and I thoroughly praise him for that. But he was too old, too ornery, too moderate and seemed to spend more of his time trying to "make nice" with the oppositional media than fighting for the issues and causes that Republican voters made him their candidate to champion.

And here I come to the first of my criticisms regarding what Meghan McCain had to say on Stephen Colbert's show: Despite being spot-on in her assessment that we need newer, fresher, more exciting candidates in the future, she foolishly and unnecessarily alluded to "those people" who are trying to "hijack" the GOP and make it "more extreme."

This is PRECISELY what the Left wants, for us to be fighting amongst ourselves, and more specifically, for the GOP moderates (whose don't win national elections) to attack the GOP conservatives (who won in 1980, 1984, 1988, 2000, and 2004). I hate to reduce things to an "us vs. them" mentality, but we're dealing with a president, congress, and media that wants NOTHING to do with people who aren't on-board for the secular-progressive, Euro-style "change" currently taking place in Washington. We're quickly approaching a "line in the sand" moment where Americans of any party or ideology are going to have to band together along core Constitutional principles and ideas if there is to be any hope of side-tracking our current double-time's pace upon the road to serfdom.

Those of us who do recognize the disastrous path our nation is currently on, a group that includes the McCain's, need to stick together, and there are some issues more important than others. For the time being, and because of the mistakes those in power the past 8 years (including Obama's first 5 months), we need to show people why government is the problem instead of the solution more than we need to take cheap shots at fellow Republicans just to get a pat on the back from Chris Matthews or the venomous vixens on The View. The Left in this country want a different America, and they are currently running the show. "Know they enemy" in this case means that Meghan McCain needs to realize that, loosely speaking, the enemy of her enemy is her friend.

Meghan's own father, and his best friend in congress (Senator Joe Lieberman, formerly a Democrat, now an Independent from CT), have prided themselves for years as being two of the most bi-partisan, reach-across-the-aisle, politicians in Washington. But when push came to shove, a liberal like Lieberman (the 2000 VP Nominee for the Democrats) was booted in 2006 from his own party for supporting the troops (and their mission), and a moderate like your dad was shunned in 2008 and labeled "too extreme" and "too far to the Right" by the same people who cheered him when he would undermine and oppose fellow Republicans during the previous 8 years.

Senator McCain was constantly praised for being a "maverick" before 2007, and incessantly mocked and ridiculed for being one during the campaign of 2008. In both cases, the liberal Democrats in this country were setting the agenda. Conservatives ending up voting for McCain. Moderates and Left-of-Center "independents" did not.

When Ms. McCain references "those people" who are allegedly trying to make the GOP "more extreme", she is talking about the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, and Sarah Palin. But there is a problem with assuming that these people are the problem. THEY REPRESENT THE BASE! Conservatism is the fuel that drives the GOP engine. Conservatism is comprised overwhelmingly by the religious, fiscally-minded, social-issues voters that actually show up on election day.

Married, religious service-going, law-abiding Americans are predominantly conservative and consequently tend to vote Republican. These people give more of their time and money to charity than any other demographic. These people also happen to like Rush, Newt and Sarah. Of course not all of us love them, and "these people" in the head-lines aren't infallible and don't speak for all of us individually, but who cares? Vote for someone else. Nominate another candidate at the ballot box. Turn your radio dial to whatever "Adult Contemp" radio programming replaced Air America when it went belly-up.

I don't understand why so many people on the Right who share vitally important values and ideals for their government and society think it necessary to spend their time "hating on" those ideologically closer to them, instead of rallying the troops to defeat the people who stand in direct opposition to their correct and necessary vision for the United States?

People like Meghan McCain are saying that they can't stand the "extremist" conservatives for standing on the same principles that have won us elections in the past. They are saying that conservatives are "hi-jacking" the party, and that it is selfish to do so. But then their solution is to "hi-jack" the party themselves and turn it in to something that it has never been and has never won for us in the past. Democrats who voted for Ronald Reagan did so not because he told them he was "pro-sex", or because he compromised the conservative ideology that got him elected twice governor of California, but because his ideas were better, and better articulated, than Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale's. Conservatives and Republicans won the war of ideas, not just some morally-questionable popularity contest.

Ms. McCain wants us to "reach out" to her age group by being more like the party and ideology that the under-30 crowd just voted for in November. But the under-30 crowd largely voted for Obama because of his "hug-a-tree" environmental policies, his "hug-a-thug" terrorist interrogation policies, and his "stab-a-CEO" economic policies. They want to be able to tell people they are green, politically correct, and egalitarian more than they want to be good stewards, intellectually honest, and personally responsible. Those of our generation, Meghan, who have swallowed the Left's distortions of capitalism and perversions of federalism will not suddenly begin to understand and appreciate the ingenuity of the Constitution or the magnificence of a free market economy because Republicans contradict Obama's own stance on an issue like gay marriage.

What really needs to change if we're ever to woo younger voters back to the Right is how, going forward, we educate ourselves and our children, and what values we collectively deem as foundational to the continuance of the American experiment in democracy. Are we going to keep letting government employees and cynical entertainers indoctrinate our kids, or will we care enough to learn the history, economics, and theology needed to properly groom future voters and taxpayers? Will we stand on the values of the "American Trinity" that Dennis Prager masterfully disseminated above, or will we succumb to petty in-fighting and look for guidance to a continent (Europe) that has adopted bureaucracies, lifestyles, and birthrates that are unsustainable?

The old saying goes: "If you're 20 and not a liberal, you don't have a heart; if you're 40 and not a conservative, you don't have a brain." So now we should make the 40 year old's look and act like the 20-somethings?

Parents (and any adults) who value liberty, limited government, economic freedom, personal responsibility, civic duty, and keeping this country safe with a strong military and intelligence gathering capabilities should be teaching their kids, relatives and neighbors the real-world practicality of conservatism. And more than this, they must themselves begin holding wishy-washy Republicans (that give us all a bad name and push moderates to the Left), Democrats, and Independents accountable for over-spending and legislative power-grabbing.

Meghan McCain is implying that unapologetic conservative public figures like Gov. Bobby Jindal (wildly popular governor of Louisiana) and Rush Limbaugh (30 million weekly listeners) and former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (the smartest conservative alive today) should take a backseat to moderates like her and her dad. We're supposed to look for leadership from the RINO's (Republicans in Name Only, i.e. Senator Arlen Specter) who blur the lines so much between the opposing sides each election that more and more voters decide they might as well vote for the "cool liberal guy who swears he is a moderate despite his clear far-Left public track record" because that liberal community organizer has a great teleprompter...I mean, is rhetorical genius...and he starts to sound more and more like our our moderate candidate.

We need men and women of substance, with real, concrete ideas, clearly explained and passionately pursued. Any ideas, Newt?

I'm ALL FOR a big-tent Republican Party. Everyone is welcome, and actually, most surveys and polls confirm that the nation is still a Center-Right one in many ways. But politicians won't save this nation, and neither will catchy slogans or cool iPhone applications. (We just say "apps".) The American people, deciding that they've had enough of the corruption, ineffectiveness, liberal indoctrination of their children in public schools, and un-Constitutional annexation of power in to the hands of the few, they will be the ones to re-direct the nation towards the Right. Cities like Detroit and New Orleans have been controlled by Democrats for half a century, with nothing to show but precipitous decreases in the standard of living and quality of education.

We need to make our case to these entrenched voters, and you can rest assured that they won't be swayed to break a nasty 50-year habit simply because you ripped Sarah Palin on Comedy Central, Ms. McCain.

Finally, and in response to Ms. McCain's "pro-sex" tour that she's been on lately, all I will say is that she is absolutely being used by the liberal media. They want to attack and belittle Bristol Palin and the traditional-conservative parents who don't want education employees of the state teaching their kids about sex and sexual identity. Bristol Palin made a mistake, and contrary to what the NOW ladies would suggest kept the child. Lately she has been speaking to un-married teens about the health and emotional benefits of abstinence, and the potential repercussions of risky behavior (see: her infant child). So of course now that the media has on their side the daughter of the man who brought Bristol's mom on to the GOP presidential ticket 9 months ago joining in the chorus of "Palin haters", they're having a tasteless field day with it.

You're better than this, Meghan. Class isn't only something your father (and regrettably, I) rarely attended in college.

It was also tacky of her in the Colbert interview to "accidentally" bring up that she "practices what she preaches" when it comes to safe sex and using condoms. She then compounded her off-color remark by "acting" embarrassed that her dad would see her saying those things later on television. All this does is make someone look desperate for attention. Whatever happened to discretion and a lady's honor?

But I digress for now, and will ease up on Ms. McCain. I have no ill will towards her, and think that what you see in this interview is a 24 year old girl who means well but hasn't fully thought through what it means to be a public figure. Especially when you are a public figure who calls herself a Republican. Ascribing to yourself a label like that means you've now got a target on your back, and no matter how nice you are, no matter how many things you insist you agree with liberals on, they'll get you in the end. She hasn't caught on yet to the fact that the Left is laughing at her, not with her.

More importantly, and what you need to remember is this: Conservatism can win again, and Republicans can certainly use the input of people like Meghan McCain, but let's leave the out-of-their-league-young-people-saying-silly-things to the Left. They have much more experience in such matters.

We should be raising the bar, not placating to the lowest common denominator.

Free "Free Markets": Part II

by: R.J. Moeller

(if you haven't read Part I, do so here first)

“Life, faculties, production --- in other words, individuality, liberty, property --- this is man. And in spite of the cunning of artful political leaders, these three gifts from God precede all human legislation, and are superior to it.”

-Fredric Bastiat The Law

In response to last week's "Free 'Free Markets': Part I" I received many emails from people asking for a further clarification of what exactly I meant by "a free market" or "capitalism", so in this week's second half of my column I will attempt to do just that.

A common theme heard from all the various thinkers throughout history who have championed liberty over unenforceable equality, and free enterprise over arbitrarily and ineffectively “planned” economies, is that the values and ideas being explained (or defended) stand upon their own merit. Liberty, freedom, and natural rights are, to quote the immortal words of Thomas Jefferson, “self-evident.”

Capitalism, a more recent term given to a long-standing idea that groups of individuals in a community are better suited to make decisions regarding their local commerce and economic interaction than “elites” in far-off cities of influence, is not a new idea. It’s just that until America came along, no country had been fortunate enough to have leaders that were wise and willing enough to implement such a subtly brilliant economic system. The reason our Founders said they did this? In short, capitalism, free markets, presume and encourage the de-centralization of power.

Like most great ideas, a free market system is simple in concept, but not always easy to fully explain. Much in this world that stems from common sense (and life experience) usually is. But for the sake of clarity let me, with the help of some of the intellectual giants whose shoulders I humbly stand upon, give some general explanations and definitions for what is meant by terms like as basic as “economics”, to those as complex and layered as “free market capitalism.”

Dr. Samuel Gregg from the Acton Institute defines economics as, “The study of how free persons choose to cooperate through voluntary exchanges to satisfy their own and others’ needs in light of the reality of limited resources.” Gregg points to Adam Smith, David Ricardo, and Reverend Thomas Malthus as the intellectual founders of modern economics. Smith is a big one, so let's dive in with him.

Adam Smith, the 18^th century Christian moral philosopher and economist, identified an “invisible hand” that seemed to direct economic trade and commerce between free individuals who voluntarily participated in a market for the purpose of satisfying their own “self interest.” A cattle rancher in Texas got up this morning before the rooster crowed not because he loves me, not even because Barack Obama’s our Rock-Star-in-Chief, but because he loves himself and his family enough to work day and night to provide a service (see: the steak in my Chipotle soft tacos), which yields an income.

Of course many have confused or purposely distorted Smith’s notion of “self interest” in order to disparage capitalism and promote ideas such collectivism or socialism (or even modern secular-progressive liberalism), but the simple reality is that everything we do is out of some form of “self interest”. Even the most pious religious person working with the poor in 3^rd world countries is doing so because they choose to, they personally deem it necessary and/or valuable, and ultimately because their relationship with their God or fellow man will grow stronger.

The Austrian-born economist F.A. Hayek, in his seminal work The Fatal Conceit, said, “Our civilization depends, not only for its origin but also for its preservation, on what can be precisely described only as the extended order of human cooperation, an order more commonly, if some-what misleadingly, known as capitalism.”

For Hayek, the key word when discussing the meaning of free market economies was “competition.” If people have to compete, if a baker knows that his baking has to be up to snuff or his customers will go elsewhere, then the quality of the product increases, his income increases, and both the customer and the vendor benefit. This isn’t possible or even likely in a government-run and planned economy. The Soviets didn’t have bread on their shelves in part because bakers were employees of the State who had little incentive to get up extra early and make sure the local people had their loaves for the day. (Also, the USSR had no wheat production to speak of, but that’s another matter for another blog.)

Hayek believed economies primarily controlled and directed by a central governing authority (i.e. the Euro-style federal government President Obama envisions) were fatally flawed. He saw that the conflict between those who favor higher degrees of free trade and those who favor centrally-planned markets hinged on a “factual error by the latter about how knowledge of available resources is and can be utilized.” Not only are the liberal-socialist aims factually unworkable, they are logistically and logically impossible.

The clearest modern example of champions of central planning is the American Left. Liberal Democrats, and “moderate” Republicans acting/voting like them, believe that with enough “smart” people from Harvard and Yale calling the shots, the same ones who oversaw our economy during both the Great Depression and our more recent economic crisis, any community can be organized.

Practically speaking, Hayek would contend that un-elected (and for that matter, elected) government officials in Washington D.C. don’t have the ability, vested interest, or motivation to know and do what is best for, let’s say, wheat farmers in Nebraska. Not to mention that such a power grab over commerce, the kind we’ve been perhaps unknowingly witnessing for decades, would technically be un-Constitutional and far removed from the vision of our Founders.

I know what some of you are thinking right now, but before you “go there”, realize that no one is arguing for a non-existent or thoroughly impotent government. Taxes are required, militaries must be funded, and Al Gore and Nancy Pelosi’s globe-trotting private jets need fuel and munchies to nosh on during those long flights to criticize America on foreign soils.

So how can a voluntary economic market co-exist with the State?

French legislator and economist Fredric Bastiat wrote that free markets were impossible without law, but that the law must be well defined, limit the powers of those in charge, and never supersede the “natural rights” of mankind. In The Law, one of the greatest works defending liberty ever penned, Bastiat said: “Life, liberty and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that they existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place”

The purpose of the law in Bastiat’s mind was to “protect property and punish plunder.” A society and its laws should do everything possible to encourage personal responsibility and ensure protection from those who would seek to take away a man’s natural right to work and own private property (which includes the fruits of his labor). The biggest threat to the liberty of a free market in Bastiat’s eyes was a “perversion of the law” by a central authority that annexes itself more and more power. The reality of this constant back-and-forth between power and liberty was at the root of the matter. He explains it as follows:

“The fatal tendency that exists in the heart of man to satisfy his wants with the least possible effort helps to explain the almost universal perversion of the law. Thus it is easy to understand how law, instead of checking injustice, usually becomes the invincible weapon of injustice. It is easy to understand why the law is used by the legislator to destroy in varying degrees among the rest of the people, their personal independence and slavery, their liberty by oppression, and their property by plunder. This is done for the benefit of the person who makes the law, an in proportion to the power that he holds.”

But capitalism does not purely reside in the theoretical realm. In fact, it’s the most practical system in the world. University of Chicago economist Milton Friedman famously used the example of the production of a simple #2 pencil as one of his best explanations for how free market capitalism works, and why it is intrinsically superior to all other forms of market economy.

Think of all the products that go in to one single #2 pencil. There is rubber for the eraser. Lead to make your mark on the paper. You need wood for the body of the pencil. And don’t forget the metallic binding clip that hold your eraser to the pencil. Let’s just, for the sake of argument, say that those are the four materials needed for one of the most basic things we’ve all used a thousand times in our life. No big deal, right?

The hypothetical pencil company I am imagining produces them in Ohio, but has to get wood from Oregon, rubber from San Francisco, lead from the East Coast, and buys its metallic fasteners from “a guy” in Texas. Before a single employee can be hired to begin production on pencils in Ohio, that company has to have investors who deem the venture worthwhile, raise capital, retrieve loans, and buy property and equipment. Someone has to have a passion for pencils and want to do this more than anything because, especially in those early years, things won’t be easy and there will be long hours for little pay off.

So now you’ve got your funds and facilities, but you have to track down suppliers and negotiate with those suppliers prices for each of the materials. The people in Oregon supplying the timber for the saw mill that produces the wood that you use for your pencils have their own set of worries, everything from weather to union strikes to syrup-related accidents on the job site. Let’s say there is a fire or horrible storm and the price of timber skyrockets. Not only do the people in Oregon have to adapt, but so do the managers of the pencil factory in Ohio. And to make it all even more complicated, if the price of timber ruins the business of the pencil company, the people in San Fran with rubber and on the East Coast with their lead will be out of luck and have to adapt to price changes and lack of income themselves.

Now repeat all that, with even more incalculable and unpredictable variables, for each of the other three material providers for the pencil factory in Ohio. It’s mind-boggling what the average small business has to know and stay on top of at all times of the day for the entire life of the company. But those small businesses (and of course larger corporations) do it every day and do so because they have their livelihood, honor, name, and security of family members on the line. They adapt because immediate action and reaction spells death to the company who is even one step behind the demands of the market (i.e. you and me buying, or not buying, pencils to write funny notes to each other in History class).

What can a bureaucrat, even in a benevolent, hope-happy administration like that of Barack Obama’s, do to compete with the motivation, on-the-ground knowledge and understanding of all the commodities and factors involved, and personal stake that drives the tens of millions of hard-working Americans in the private sector?

Answer: nothing, so leave us alone and stop spending all of our money.

Capitalism works and it matters. Increasingly our government has sought to ham-string the private sector in favor of centralized economic authority in Washington. The only way this has been possible, and will continue to be a sad reality, is with the apathy of the American voter fueling the "change." Let us start demanding better from our elected representatives, each other, and ourselves.