America Starts to Rumble

What's wrong with me, she asked in the email? I've got "increasingly angry," and it seems like in the Obama world WASPish values like "hard work, integrity, initiative, accountability, self-determination... have been rendered totally worthless in the blink of an eye[.]"

Reading stuff like that makes me have faith in America. You see, the United States is built upon a faith, a reckless faith, in the idea of a government of limited and specifically enumerated powers. It is built upon the notion that hard work, integrity and the rest will trump power every time. But only if you let it.

We few, we lucky few who believe in this incandescent faith, stand against almost all of history--of power, piracy, and plunder.

But this faith is not just wishful thinking. It is based on the revolution in human affairs since the rise of the commercial city.

In the countryside, land is life. You must have land to survive, and to keep land you must fight for it, or pay someone else to fight for it. In such a world power is everything, for he that does not have power does not have land, and he that does not have land does not eat.

But in the city not power but trust is king. You can only get power by serving your customers, and that power is good only as long as you continue to serve them. It is not collateral that is needed when a banker makes a loan but trust. Said J.P. Morgan, on oath: "Because a man I do not trust could not get money from me on all the bonds in Christendom."

The entire program of our lefty friends is built upon the notion that this is rubbish. Marx insisted that the history of mankind is the history of class struggle. Al Gore promised in the election of 2000 to fight for the people against the powerful. President Obama has launched the federal government upon a massive grab for power.

But we say that the spirit of democratic capitalism is that if you limit power, if you separate political power from economic power and moral/cultural power, then you will flood the world with prosperity, with liberty, and with moral elevation.

We conservatives should thank President Obama. He is helping Americans reach clarity on the power and scope of government.

He is proposing to change health care provision in this country to a system in which government experts will decide what kind of health care you will have. Do you think that is a good idea, or do you think that people should have the right to make their own decisions on the matter?

He is proposing a radical change in the way we produce and use energy with a heavy tax on fossil fuels. Do you think this is a good idea, or do you think that the social system of property and the market, under law, should be the way forward?

And let us not imagine that, if Hillary Clinton or John McCain had been elected in November 2008 that we would be in a different place today. President Obama represents the consensus of the ruling class in America, the progressive educated elite. Not surprisingly, the elite believes in elite power, and they believe that they know, based on the knowledge of the experts they have retained, that they know what is best for us.

There is another way. It is baed on the idea that no elite, no experts can know enough to know what is best for us. It is that discovery is the way forward, by individual discovery by ordinary men and women and social discovery in the marketplace. And that means learning from our mistakes. We have all the tools we need to make this system work, and they work every time they are tried. They are law, markets, prices, money, credit, equity, trust, mercy, service, "hard work, integrity, initiative, accountability, self-determination."

They worked for us before, and they will work for us again. But first we have to have the courage and the determination to take our country back.

In my judgment we are seeing already that the courageous and detemined people are already organizing to do just that.

The Hit-the-wall President

You really can't blame President Obama. It's not his fault. After all, what is the leader of the Democratic Party for?

His job is to implement the policy nostrums of the liberal world.

Right now, liberals want, in foreign policy, to negotiate rather than fight a war on terror. In health care, they want to implement their dream of a universal health care program. In energy and environment, they want to force-march the nation away from fossil fuels and towards a planet-saving renewable future.

OK. Let's check the half-time score on these liberal dreams.

In foreign policy, the negotiate-with-dictators policy is dead, as Jonah Goldberg as pointed out. The Iranian regime now has blood on its hands, the blood of the Martyr of Tehran, a beautiful young woman, Neda Salehi Agha Soltan. No American president can now negotiate with the Iranian regime, whatever his ideas on "soft power."

So the Obama foreign policy has hit the wall.

On energy and environment, the energy-tax bill is in deep trouble, and looks like it will barely make it out of the House of Representatives. It would be best for Democrats if it did stay there, because if the energy tax ever gets into law it will wreak havoc on the economy and on the political future of the Democratic Party.

So the Obama energy and environment is about to hit the wall.

On health care, President Obama made a damaging admission on TV, reported by ABC News. A physician asked him what he would do if medical care he needed for his wife and kids was disallowed by government gatekeepers.

Dr. Orrin Devinsky, a neurologist and researcher at the New York University Langone Medical Center, said that elites often propose health care solutions that limit options for the general public, secure in the knowledge that if they or their loves ones get sick, they will be able to afford the best care available, even if it's not provided by insurance.

Devinsky asked the president pointedly if he would be willing to promise that he wouldn't seek such extraordinary help for his wife or daughters if they became sick and the public plan he's proposing limited the tests or treatment they can get.

The president refused to make such a pledge, though he allowed that if "it's my family member, if it's my wife, if it's my children, if it's my grandmother, I always want them to get the very best care.

Er, just a moment, Mr. President. Isn't that game, set, and match? The whole point of the Obama plan is to impose government rationing. It has to do that if it refuses to ration by price. But if rich Democrats can dodge the limits, then where's the justice, where's the equity?

So the Obama health care policy is hitting the wall.

So it looks as though the Obama administration is hitting the wall on three separate signature issues.

I've always said that this is why we needed the Obama administration. The only way America is going to get beyond the folly of liberal ideas and liberal policies is when they hit the wall.

We've tried being nice about it. We've tried a national conversation on the issues. But we have found out that liberals just won't listen.

So now we've got to do it the hard way.

And by the way, the score still isn't in on the Obama administration's economic policy. Remember this. When the economy last hit the wall in 1980-82, the policy of the Reagan administration was to cut spending and cut tax rates. The policy of the Obama administration is the exact opposite. Increase spending and increase taxes.

I'd say that both policies can't be right.

How They Treat the Servants

Even in these modern days, you still want to know if you can trust someone. The trouble is that you can't tell from outward appearance. And you can't tell a dog when it's out hunting. You can only tell when it's being hunted.

Of course. some people tell you all about themselves even when they are out hunting. They mistreat the servants. We've had occasion to visit this subject before.

Agatha Christie has a memorable commentary on that in her Autobiography. A friend was visiting Agatha as a girl and behaved rudely to a servant. Never treat a servant like that, the girl was told. Servants are professionals and they work hard. And because of their position, servants cannot talk back.

So when we read about Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) humiliating a Brigadier-general in the armed forces of the United States, we know what to think. The brigadier answered her as "ma'am" according to the culture of the military, where all superiors are "sir" or "ma'am."

But that wasn't good enough for the senator, as reported by Fox News.

"You know, do me a favor," an irritated Boxer said. "Could say 'senator' instead of 'ma'am?'"

"Yes, ma'am," Walsh interjected.

"It's just a thing, I worked so hard to get that title, so I'd appreciate it, yes, thank you," she said.

"Yes, senator," he responded.

Now you know all you need to know about Senator Barbara Boxer.

Because now you know how she treats the help.

Two Welfare States, Both Heading for Ruin

There are two welfare states in America, according to Robrt J. Samuelson. Both of them promised more than they could deliver.

Broadly speaking, the U.S. welfare system divides into two parts -- the private, run by firms; and the public, provided by government. Both are besieged: private companies by competitive pressures; government by rising debt and taxes.

GM is your typical private welfare state, and it is in ruins. The public welfare state will end up in ruins. But its collapse is still in the future.

We've known that the GM welfare state was bound to collapse--for nigh on 25 years. It was pretty easy to figure out what had to be done. In fact other corporations are doing it. They are abandoning defined-benefit pension plans and retiree health care. But the UAW had the power to stop that kind of reform. It had the power because the Democratic Party backed it up.

On this view, you can see that the Obama administration has done the sensible thing with GM and Chrysler. It has given them to the UAW. If the UAW loots them before their members die off, well, they have only themselves to blame.

The same scenario seems likely to play out with the government's public welfare state.

The U.S. welfare state is weakening; insecurity is rising. The sensible thing would be to decide which forms of public welfare are needed to protect the vulnerable and to begin paring others.

But we probably won't do the sensible thing because liberals are powerful enough to stop us. Anyway, you think that all the people who have gotten benefits over the years are going to give them up for the sake of the greater good?

It's a pity, isn't it. The people that will be hurt by this will be the people, the Democratic faithful, that put their trust in the government. "Put not your trust in princes:" That comes from Psalm 146. Presumably politicians were just as two-faced then as now.

Meanwhile the job for conservatives is to develop the ideas and the reforms that will be needed in the post-welfare state. And where we can, in the here and now, we should push through reforms that will help mitigate the awful suffering of the government program beneficiaries, after the Fall.

None of this is rocket science. We know exactly what needs to be done. No more government pensions. No more government health care. No more government education. No more government welfare.

But wait, you say! What will happen to the poor and the vulnerable if there are no government programs to take care of them?

How about this? They will be better off in the conservative sociable state than in the cruel, corrupt, unjust, wasteful, and deluded welfare state.

Not Really Too Smart

At the six-month checkpoint in the Obama adminstration, Michael Barone has a few thoughts.

1. Obama is a long-range strategy guy who is flummoxed by events that threaten the plan.
2. Obama leaves the details to others (e.g., Congress)
3. Obama thinks Chicago-style that "there will always be a bounteous private sector that can be plundered endlessly on behalf of political favorites."

To me, this is a recipe for disaster, and it shows that the Obama people really aren't that smart.

First, the long-range strategy, to grow government. It may not be obvious to people inside the liberal bubble, but the century-long expansion of government, already complained about by Herbert Spencer in the 1880s, is about over. Growing government is the natural thing for a politician to do, but it also creates opposition. The century-long ascendancy of the progressive educated class is starting to get people really angry. And it is anger that fuels political change.

Second the details. Details matter. Every successful businessman is a details man. You can have all the business plans in the world, but without execution of the details it will remain a glorious vision. Politicians have a problem here, because their principal expertise is getting elected. But the success of government is doing the boring, gritty details. If Obama doesn't want to bother with the details then that is the best news that conservatives have heard yet.

Third, the Chicago style. We are getting numerous sightings of Chicago-style politics, from the overall strategy of piracy and plunder to the recent flap over the firing of the inspectors general. This sort of thing may go down without a murmur in Chicago but ordinary middle-class Americans hate it. Democrats know this. That's why they made such a big deal of Bush and Republican corruption in 2006-08, and were full of talk about transparency. The truth is the Obamites don't believe in any of that transparency and good government stuff. They believe in power.

"Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard," said H.L. Mencken. A gentler version of that is that people need to experience things to find out whether they really like them. In 2008 people were really fed up with Republicans and decided it was time for a change.

Chances are that the change they had in mind is not the change that President Obama has in mind, neither in the grand vision, in the gritty details, or in the Chicago style.

In the next six months to a year, the American people are going to wake up to that. The president won't like it; liberals won't like it; Democrats won't like it; the mainstream media won't like it. But it won't make a bit of difference.

Obama's Double Bind

Nobody likes the bailouts. Conservatives hate them because, for us, they are a lurch towards socialism. But now the Wall Street Journal has discovered that the left hates the bailouts too.

The Journal's Laura Meckler writes about local government worker Laura Zamora. She's worried about losing her job, and she doesn't like to see money going to corporations.

"He's bailing out the private sector. He's putting all kinds of money into the private sector," says Mrs. Zamora. "The money should be going to social programs, not to bailing out banks and GM. It should go to people who are unemployed."

Even the jaunty Rush Limbaugh has noticed. Obama supporters are calling up his program and complaining about Obama throwing money at corporations. As an economic conservative, Rush deplores the bailouts because they put the government in control of more of the economy.

But the Obama supporters see money going to corporations that they thought was going to be spent on them. And they are mad. What's the point of Hope and Change if all the change ends up in the pockets of corporate greed?

You have to feel sorry for the president. Here he is spending all his political capital on, e.g., saving all those union jobs at GM and Chrysler, not to mention keeping Wall Street afloat so that it can push all that government debt out into the world.

So what does he get? His supporters are mad at him. Don't they realize that he is helping Democratic constituencies all over America with his policies?

Well, it serves the politicians right. They have been making hay for over a century blaming business for everything. It's hardly surprising that the American people actually believe their lies about corporations.

The truth is that corporations are the geese that lay the golden eggs that politicians then get to spend on buying votes. So it really matters that the private sector should be healthy.

Too bad that politicians have been telling their supporters otherwise.

But don't worry. They'll think of some way of pinning the blame on someone else. How about Bush, Cheney, and the evil right-wing extremists? They tricked Obama into all these bailouts!

Yes. If they hadn't let Wall Street bankers run riot with outrageous bonuses there would have been plenty of money for social programs.

Meanwhile, the president's approval numbers keep nudging lower, and this week everyone was shocked, shocked, when they found out how much health reform was going to cost.

A Pattern of Corruption

Maybe we shouldn't call it corruption. Because in the Obama administration the high-profile firing of Gerald Walpin, Inspector General of the government volunteering programgs, is not really a betrayal of principle.

Modern liberalism combines a kind of high-minded intellectualism with bare-knuckle power politics, a kind of Jekyll and Hyde combo. You talk to the media in high-flown phrases taken from recent university press books written by fashionable professors and featured in the New York Review of Books. But behind the scenes you run a ruthless Chicago-style political machine, where everything is quid-pro-quo and pay-to-play.

Now Dan Riehl reveals that the Walpin firing is part of a pattern. There's Neil Barofsky, inspector general for the federal stimulus program.

He was appointed with fanfare as the public watchdog over the government's multi-billion dollar bailout of the nation's financial system. But now Neil Barofsky is embroiled in a dispute with the Obama administration that delayed one recent inquiry and sparked questions about his ability to freely investigate.

On top of that, the inspector general for the International Trade Commission is also in trouble.

The third instance involves an acting IG for the International Trade Commission, Judith Gwynne, who has been told her contract would not be renewed amid allegations that an ITC employee forcibly took documents from her possession. Just three hours after Grassley sent along his letter asking questions, she was told she'd be hitting the road in July when her contract is up.

The bigger point here is that this sort of thing really would be more scandalous in a Republican administration. Republicans are supposed to believe in limited government, especially where economic interests are concerned.

Republicans believe, more or less, in Michael Novak's greater separation of powers between the political sector, the economic sector, and the moral/cultural sector.

But Democrats believe that the political sector must dominate the economic sector, otherwise the nation will revert to a nineteenth century economy of robber barons and rampant exploitation. The only remedy they know is political power, and they are prepared to apply it ruthlessly. So when they wield the ax on inspectors general who expose corrupt practices, they are consistent with their principles in choosing political power over an excessive regard for the rules and dotting the "i"s and crossing the "t"s. Why should a politician helping out a political ally be hauled up before the green eyeshade boys?

There's only one problem with this relaxed attitude towards political insider dealing. The American people hate it. And now with the blogosphere backing up the MSM it's hard to hide it.

We know the American people are trending conservative, according to the Gallup Poll. We know that the American people hate the bail-outs. We know they hate the deficit. We know that, all of a sudden the health reform express doesn't look quite the shoo-in now that the GAO has put a $1.6 trillion price tag on its head. But the Obama administration is still doing liberal business-as-usual.

I'd say that a a wake-up call is coming. Particularly since the Democrats made such a big deal about corruption and ethical behavior in the last two election cycles.