Now She Tells Us

After the “stunning” loss of a special congressional election in Mississippi, many Republicans are “stunned.” Really, writes Peggy Noonan. On her reckoning:

You have to be stupid to be stunned by that... Most party leaders in Washington are stupid – detached, played out, stuck in the wisdom they learned when they were coming up, in ’78 or ’82 or ’94... In politics especially, the first lesson sticks.

What Republicans should have done is broken with Bush back in 2005, or ’06, or ’07, Noonan advises. It’s a bit late now. Anyway,

"Members and pundits . . . fail to understand the deep seated antipathy toward the president, the war, gas prices, the economy, foreclosures," said Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia in a 20-page memo to House GOP leaders.

I’ll say. You can say that the war is now going well, that the economy ain’t so bad. You can say that the gas prices are high because Democrats have stood on the drill rig platform for twenty years forbidding exploration for oil. You can say that the foreclosures are an ineviable result of half a century of housing subsidies.

But that is beside the point. It all happened on Bush’s watch and so the Democrats are going to run on the idea that voting for McCain is voting for a third term for Bush and his mistakes. You can’t argue with that!

In my view we must stop all this defeatism. Of course the conservative brand is badly burned right now. Of course Republicans deserve to be soundly defeated. Of course the American people think it is “time for a change.” But we’ll be back, and sooner than you think.

Conservatives believe that it is time to radically downsize the government role in education. Democrats believe that it is time to expand government education with universal pre-school.

Conservatives believe that it is time to crank down the huge government role in health care, getting most people to pay directly for routine health care. Democrats want to extend government power in health care by forcing everyone to carry health insurance.

Conservatives believe we should prospect for oil and gas, and that we should respond to any global warming by adaptation. Democrats believe we need swingeing taxes and regulation and subsidy to transform the energy economy.

Conservatives believe that we should reduce the government preseence in the social safety net, and that we should re-empower the mediating institutions of family, church, association, and neighborhood. Democrats believe we should normalize gay marriage.

These are huge differences, and both sides cannot be right. Each approach implies a vastly different approach to government and society.

Conservatives believe that we are right and that the liberals are wrong. What is more we believe that the Democratic path will lead to serious economic and social dislocation. We believe that it is not a question of “if” but “when” America gets a clue and realizes that we are right about the major issues of our time.

Win or lose in November these issues will define the politics of the next fifty years. Therefore we should not lose heart and give into despair.

Be not afraid.

Oh, and Peggy. Could you think of something helpful to contribute to the conservative narrative?

Enviro-racism

Environmentalists are racists. And sexists, and classists. Think that’s a little bit extreme?

Then read Roy Ennis of the Congress on Racial Equality. When Ennis looks at the proposals of environmentalists and global warming enthusiasts he can’t help wonder if they care about poor folks.

The Congress of Racial Equality and I care deeply about our environment. But we also care about having jobs, and affordable food, heat and transportation. We care about impoverished Third World families achieving their dreams.

Me too. You wonder about the agenda of rich environmentalists.

The fact is that you can trust rich people to look after themselves. And one of the things that rich people value is open space and freedom from “sprawl,” other peoples’ sprawl, that it. But you can’t really trust them to think of other peoples’ needs.

When the rich environmentalists want to make ANWR out of bounds to oil production, and the outer continental shelf, it means something. When they want to stop energy development to save the polar bear, it means something.

These energy takings force Americans to pay more for energy that is artificially scarce. Their economic progress is held back. They lose the jobs that energy development would create. They lose billions of dollars in royalties and taxes.

So let’s go ahead and blame ExxonMobil and Shell Oil for “price-gouging.” That should teach them a lesson. And it is bound to help the poor.

Polar Bear Threatened

With the listing of the polar bear by the Interior Department as a “ threatened” species, here’s the current state of the Stupidity Index:

• Polar bear threatened
  
• No oil drilling in ANWR
  
• No oil drilling on continental shelf
  
• No refineries built in last 30 years
  
• No nuclear plants built in last 30 years
  
• No reform of education in 100 years
  
• Huge subsidies for health care
  
• Huge subsidies for homeownership
  
• Huge subsidies for higher education
  

And so on. Of course, this is nothing new, or even extraordinary. The whole point of government is to use power to short-circuit the operation of the market and its tendency to deliver products and services that the consumers want and at the price they are willing to pay. When you go to government to get some privilege or subsidy, you are trying to do an end run on people without access to power, and do a little “rent-seeking” courtesy of your friendly local politician.

Maybe it’s just as well that Republicans are getting flushed down the toilet this year. When all these problems and stupidities back up, we wouldn’t want it to be on the Republicans’ watch, now would we?

Conservatives: Be Not Afraid

According to the opinion polls, over 80 percent of Americans think that the US is on the wrong track. But does that really mean: Go Left, asks Dennis Prager?

Well, yes it does, Dennis. The American people have two choices when they go to the polls. It’s the donkey or the elephant, and right now, they are sick of the elephant. It doesn’t matter why: Iraq war, mortgage meltdown. Americans are sick of it, and they think that it is time for a change.

The question is whether the kind of change they want is the kind of change that Democrats are offering.

If you vote for Barack Obama, you are voting for more government in health care, more government in schooling, more government in the energy industry, and more “progressive” social agenda.

My guess is that Americans aren’t in favor of all that. But they do want the troubles of the past eight years to go away.

Unfortunately that’s no way to live. There is only one way to live, and that is to follow the advice of Pope John Paul II to the oppressed nations of the Soviet Empire: “Be Not Afraid.”

In worrying about the future under a new Democrat administration, Dennis Prager sounds almost defeatist.

There is no call for defeatism. Be Not Afraid. Democrats won’t be able to destroy the nation in two or four years. In fact, a short Democratic interregnum might be the best possible thing for America.

The American people need another good look at the Democrats, and they deserve to get it. When they see what they get, the higher taxes, the bigger government, the declining schools, the higher energy prices, they’ll think again.

And then the conservative army, after a dose of the time that tries mens’ souls, will be ready for another glorious era of conservative reform.

But first we must be clear. Like is uncertain; reverses are inevitable. Be Not Afraid.

America Moving to the Middle?

Everyone says that they are fed up with the partisanship of the past decade. In consequence many people are eager to uncover signs that the partisan years are over, and that America is moving to the middle.

So along come Gerald F. Seib and John Harwood to tell us that Americans want change.

When the Wall Street Journal and NBC News surveyed voters in December, as the campaign began, almost half agreed that America needed "major reforms and a brand new and different approach" to handling problems.

Earth to Seib and Harwood: Major reform is what Republicans have been trying to enact for the last 12 years since Newt Gingrich won a Republican majority in Congress.

But major reform, if it means anything, means major changes in the way we run government. If it would mean anything it would mean changing the numbers on government spending. Here are the numbers for 2008 from usgovernmentspending.com

• Pensions: $911.6 billion
  
  
• Health Care: $925.0 billion
  
  
• Education: $848.2 billion
  
  
• Defense: $730.8 billion
  
  
• Welfare: $445.2 billion

Now, seriously, what kind of a hope do we have that any substantial change will happen in the delivery of these huge programs?

A big part of the current animus, Seib and Harwood claim, is that Congressmen no longer live yearround in Washington. When Friday rolls around everyone heads back home to the voters instead to sticking around and socializing.

But there is hope. There’s Mara Vanderslice, a Democratic operative who is trying to develop outreach to religious voters. She represents “a new wave of younger activists willing to reach across party lines for the causes they advocate.” That’s one way of putting it. But her website Common Good Strategies seems to be nothing more than a Democratic Party organ. Its mission is:

Working with the Democratic Party and non-profits on the local and national level to reach out and build authentic relationships with America’s diverse religious communities.

OK. Why not Peter Wehner, “a genial social conservative who worked for Mr. Rove in the Bush White House?” He sees, apparently, a movement among evangelicals away from abortion “toward social issues, social justice and aid to Africa.”

If you read what Peter Wehner actually writes—for instance this piece for the Commentary blog—you experience basic Republican partisan talking points.

This talk of moving to the center is just a slow-day navel piece. The level of partisanship is a measure of the political temperature: how much agitation is there for change and how much resistance is there to reform.

The partisanship of the last decade issued out of Republican desire for reform and Democratic determination to stop it. Right now, Republicans are exhausted and discouraged. So you can expect a period of quiet.

But something tells me: Not for long.

BritCon Throws Down Gauntlet

Lots of people think that British Conservative Party leader David Cameron is a lightweight. I don’t. Instead I see a strategic mind at work.

This week, after cold-cocking the British Labour Party in the local elections and scoring a huge gain in the horse-race opinion polls, Cameron wrote an op-ed for the lefty Independent: “We are the champions of progressive ideals.” He throws down the gauntlet immediately.

A painful reality is dawning on Labour MPs: in its longest unbroken period in office, Labour has done little to advance progressive ideals. A government that promised social justice and economic efficiency has in fact delivered neither, to the dismay of the Labour Party. Instead, it is the Conservative Party that is the champion of progressive ideals in Britain today.

Look, he writes, nobody can deny that income redistribution has done a lot to alleviate poverty. But “those methods have now run their course.”

The returns from big state intervention are not just diminishing, they are disappearing.

In other words it is time for the left to admit that just throwing money at the poor doesn’t help the poor. It is not lack of money that causes deprivation, it is lack of character. Something else is needed, and Conservatives know what it is.

[W]e will use the modern mechanisms of civil society – whether it’s businesses that can really help get people trained and ready for work, social enterprises that get people permanently off drugs, or charities and community groups that can give couples the support they need when relationships come under pressure. For us it’s about the whole public realm, not just the public sector.

As David Cameron has said, time and time again: “There is such a thing as society. It’s just not the same thing as the State.” By forgetting that truth, first enunciated by Edmund Burke over two centuries ago, the progressive dream has guttered out into fumbling darkness. But there is a way out.

If you care about poverty, if you care about inequality, if you care about the environment – forget about the Labour Party. It has forgotten about you. If you count yourself a progressive, a true progressive, only we [the Conservative Party] can achieve real change.

The latest opinion poll has the Conservative Party ahead of the Labour Party by 49% to 23%. Talk about kicking a guy when he’s down.

The Happiness Quotient

First he discovered that conservative religious people give more, in Who Really Cares? Now Arthur C. Brooks is writing about happiness, according to Maggie Gallagher, and the happiest people are—wait for it—religious conservatives.

Really, this should surprise nobody. We know that the worst thing in the world is to have nothing to do and nothing to contribute. Naturally, conservatives are happier than liberals.

For Brooks, one of the great surprises was the enormous "happiness gap" between political liberals and political conservatives that has persisted over the last 35 years.
...
Of course, conservatives are more likely to be religious and to be married, both important contributors to happiness. Religious liberals, for example, are happier than secular liberals, but neither group is nearly as happy as people who say that they are both religious and conservative. Fifty percent of religious conservatives are very happy and just 5 percent are not too happy.

Freedom, according to Brooks, makes people happier. But people are also happier when they live under “moral constraint.”

What makes people happy is freedom and community. That seems a paradox. How can you be free and yet bound into a community that may shame you and judge you?

That’s how liberals think. We conservatives know better. You make yourself happy when you are free to bind yourself in loving service to others. As Minette Marrin wrote back in 2001: compassion and community without compulsion.

Somehow that notion has a familiar ring.