We are in a time, that many have labeled as dark. This is not difficult to explain. There are no conservatives in real position of leadership, on the national scene. We see that we may well be in danger of rising and restrictive taxes, the loss of public voices who are allowed to disagree and few on our side of the aisle get any positive press. It is not, however, time to despair. It is most certainly not time to waste our good energy on conspiracies. We must not be resigned to the place of having yesterdays ideas.
In watching the President, in his many speeches, we have little doubt that he has plans to take the country in a more 'France-like' direction. He has, in a month, out spent any previous administration, in a comparable amount of time. He talks of heavy regulation, higher taxes, higher levels of entitlement and more interference in banking and health care. Pretty grim.
In fact, few have spent this much money in their entire term as president, and with the placation of the three senate 'Milk-Duds,' there doesn't seem to be a away to stop the 'left-wing' train. The picture seems even bleaker, with the real possibility of Norm Coleman's seat in the Senate, going to Al Franken. We also seem to have a wave of new young voters who vote on the left. Now it's time to scream, right?
So what do we as conservatives do about these grim omens. We can first start by looking locally. This would be a forward looking and positive solution. 'Off Year' Elections are, more often than not, known for low turn out. If we want to change the future it starts with; City Councils, Mayors, State Legislatures, and County Representation. In Salt Lake City they have had liberal mayors for the last 35 years. The hideous part is that the mayor doesn't represent the population. Conservatives don't show up to vote. Worse yet, over the last 10 years, the city population has shrunk by about 4 thousand. Many of these people are saying that the city is too liberal. These facts show the root of the problem all over the country. Conservatives don't show up to vote, then they get angry that the people, who they didn't vote for are too liberal. The conservatives quit. Hence the growth of liberalism in metropolitan areas all over the country.
Along with population shift: staying home, 'third-party' voting, and 'write-ins,' hurt our cause even more. Indulge me again to mention a local voting trend. In Salt Lake County (which has about 1 million people) we have seen a rise in liberal voting, to the point of there being no conservative leadership in our state legislature from the largest county in the state. What happened? A mix of pessimistic voting apathy, thousands didn't vote, as well as thousands of conservatives who moved out of the county. Another important fact that the rise of liberal representation was that many conservatives voted for silly 'third-party' candidates and wrote in other candidates. Had conservatives voted for the the front running conservative candidates in the county, there would not have been a loss of representative leadership.
Pessimism manifests in 'third-party candidates and 'write-ins' and staying home, effect things nationally as well, in precincts all over the country. In Minnesota, had people voted for one of the two candidates, instead of some third party, the election would be decided. Minnesota would have two senators instead of one. In Salt Lake County in the general Presidential Election the county went to Obama because just over one thousand voters wrote in another candidate who wasn't running. Hundreds of other votes went to 'third-party's.' Had these two goofy voting anomalies not happened the county would have gone to McCain. In 1992 20% percent of the national vote went to Ross Perot (10% percent in 96). If one were to add Perot's percentage with that of the ' third-party' candidates, Bush would have won in 92 (Dole in 96) instead of Clinton. Perhaps McCain, and Bush, aren't ideal conservatives. Perhaps Colman hasn't been perfect in Minnesota. The alternatives, however, are much worse, much more liberal. In each case pessimistic Conservative tendencies, to not vote, or vote for some other candidate, have been total disasters.
Pessimism is not an effective political strategy. Especially in the case of conspiracy theory. I was having conversation with someone the other day. This individual brought up that they had heard a popular radio talk host discussing President Obama's Birth Certificate, and questioning if the president is a natural born citizen. This same talk show host voiced that, other talk show hosts, lack the 'gut's' or 'chootbah' to address this 'important' subject. As one in a team on a talk show I will address this subject, Barack Obama is the president. His legitimacy has been certified by the 50 State Attorney's General. He will be president for at least four years. I hope that he is only President for one term, but he won't be removed by silly, juvenile, and time wasting discussions like these. It is perfectly legitimate to question his leadership, his plans, his fiscal policy, his appointments, his view on guns, unions, education, banking,..the list goes on and on. It is not realistic to think that our country will be at all better off by wasting energy on, whether or not Obama's citizenship is valid, whether he is the "Anti-Christ, he is Malcolm X's son or if he is a secret Muslim. (If anyone knows even the smallest bit of Islamic culture being a 'Secret Muslim' doesn't really fit the Five Pillars.)
New and more ridiculous stories come up every day. More conspiracies. Each more distracting, to the real work, than the next. The real work of looking forward with realistic hope. The work of holding our officials accountable, only gets muted, when real work has to compete with mush. Ben Franklin printed his Ideas, he printed Paines' Common Sense. He didn't help to father the new nation, with Adams, Jefferson and Washington, by wasting his time with silly rumors. These men had real work to do. They were optimists.
Pessimism and cynicism are what lead to these propensities of destructive behavior. We as conservatives have too much love for our country to waste more time on 'Third-Party's,' Conspiracy Theories and these other points. Each of the pessimistic behaviors show that many are giving up, or giving in, to the forces with which we sincerely disagree.
We are in a time of a perfect storm. A storm that, I believe, will bring a sprouting of conservatism. Pessimism, conspiracy theories and watering down our message, are what will be our greatest stumbling blocks; they distract us from this most profound opportunity. We can point out the innate falsehoods of the welfare state and the nanny state. We can stop the spread of feminizing all aspects of our young boys lives, and instill a true sense of honor in our young girls. Truly a free society with Men as Men and Women as Women is the true identity of America. We are a society that that has succeeded on Liberty. A society where failure is the strengthening doorway to success. We can herald the coming of a new age, but only if we as conservatives can embrace this time of setbacks as a time to educate ourselves and others. We have the American solutions of liberty and freedom, and these are the only solutions for our country.
California clamors to fix their broken budget by, still holding to the same old 'nanny state' and anti-development ideas that put them in a perpetual state of catch-up.
In a state that won't tap it own resources, then overspends, borrows to make up for overspending, when California misses the point on so many levels we all pay for it.
San Fransisco Chronicle reported that after days of wrangling California's legislature, a budget was passed that would avoid what Barbara Boxer referred to as a"crisis of a lifetime." California faced a projected $41 billion budget shortfall. What's on tap for this new budget? $11.4 billion in borrowing, $12.8 billion in increased taxes and the obligatory 2 billion in federal stimulus. Spending makes things harder on businesses in the state and eventually every body suffers.
So what's the problem? We've been here before. After the recall we were supposed to see new and responsible leadership, but with a budget shortfall almost $3 billion larger than the one that led to the recall, observers are left searching for the point of the recall. Let's go back to October 2003. Newly re-elected Gov. Gray Davis had been recalled. The new popular Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger assumed the office vowing to fix the broken budget. California was said at the time to have a deficit larger than every other state in the union put together $38.2 billion. He went on national television pushing a bill that would 'temporarily' borrow to help on the path to fiscal responsibility. Since then Schwarzenegger has occasionally cut taxes, but for the greater part of time in power he has done nothing to really build California's resource base, or truly reform the out of control entitlement programs that plague the states budget. His time as executive is hardly distinguishable from the previous Davis administration. Oh, and the legislative branch helped both administrations put holes in the boat.
With the help of the left-wing legislature, the pre-recall spending continued after the recall. The last six years under Arnold, and his cohorts, has brought much discussion about alternate energy sources. Wind Farms and Solar Panels are neat ideas but their implementation, while popular amongst the environmental crowd, come at a massive cost. These forms of energy only address part of part of the energy 'point.' They don't really produce enough energy for the 36 million inhabitants. The great western coast-line of California has vast deposits of Natural Gas and (I know that this is a bad word) Oil. The revenues from utilizing these resources could help the state budget and create vast amounts of jobs (imagine if nuclear energy were on the table) this discussion would be closer to 'the point.' Most of these vast resources will however remain untapped and the high populous state will continue importing much of it's energy and eventually the utility purchasers of P.G.&E will get stung.
The inhabitants of California get an added bonus. There is discussion of decriminalizing of marijuana for the purpose of taxation. Another plan would release one third of the sizable California prison population. These Ideas are an example of how The Golden State perhaps thinks that it is the only state in the union. Both of these plans help the budget, in theory, to the detriment the citizens of California, as well as those of the states around them. Can you say 'miss the point?' Imagine thousands of newly released criminals within a short drive of Las Vegas or Reno after they have made their own state unlivable. I wager the thank you letter from the Nevada Commission on Tourism is in the mail.
As in the case of Nevada these decision don't just stay in the Coastal Paradise. California is really a microcosm of U.S. in many ways. The farming areas are more conservative. The large coastal cities have more people and much more liberal perspectives on the role that government should take. The more agricultural areas produce goods that help all of us, but they are under-represented, due to their lower populations. The capitals are closer vicinity to elitist metro areas. In the capitals they attempt to solve blatant miss-management by passing bills that raise taxes and don't starve the spending 'beast.' Legislatures also claim to 'fix' budget problems by borrowing money to keep 'the beast' fed. Out of the capital Sacramento come Nanny State ideas like Sensitivity Training, Clean Air Acts, and Helmet Laws that infest the surrounding western states like an Influenza Virus. The Golden State misses 'the point again and again.
Why does it matter if they miss the point so often? California composes more than 10% of the U.S. population, and the worlds 8th largest economy. The nations Food, Shipping, Banking, Construction and Tourism Industries, with countless others, are all disproportionately represented in this one state. When California misses 'the point.' The nation, as a whole, feels it.
A Return to Stagflation. Feb,16.2009
We have been told repeatedly that we are in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.' We have recently heard that "it is only government that can break this vicious cycle." (President Obama referring to unemployment and consumer skittishness in his news conference Feb. 10th.) Is it however, more appropriate to compare our current situation, to stagflation in the the 1970's or even Japan's lost decade of the 1990's. Right now we don't have inflation, yet. But like in the 70's, we are trying to to address unemployment by government (federal) spending, and as in the the Ford and Carter administration 'Big Government' action will largely have little positive effect (the 'little effect' is from the State Department's own web-site.) We will however, have a another parallel with the Ford/Carter malaise in that we will at some time have spiking interest rates to attempt to combat inflation, which will be difficult to avoid with Obama's "Unprecedented Action" i.e 800 billion dollars. The potential interest rate spike will panic the stock market and we will end up where we started which is climbing unemployment.
What about Japan's lesson to us in history? Google CEO Eric Schmidt was on the Sunday talk show circuit squawking about the need for yet more stimulus saying that the lesson of Japan's lost decade, was that it took too long for the money to be spent. One might ask, however, did borrow, borrow, borrow, really help the Japanese economy? There was plenty of "Unprecedented Action." The equivalent of billions of dollars were spent to 're-stimulate' banking as well as their economy at large, but even after corporate and banking bail-outs banks collasped in spectacular fashion and even to this day many corporate firms are saddled with massive debt. To sweeten the pot a bit more, Japan has only four banks left. Now that Japan is on the verge of another economic crises they are ill-equipped to take more "Unprecedented Action" when after the last series of "bold actions" left them with zero percent interest and money still difficult to borrow. To top off the whole picture as a nation, they are still heavily indebted to foreign banks. One cultural fact that may have kept them from utter economic failure, is that Japanese people have a inherent tendency to save money. We as a nation however, actually have a negative savings trend. We spend both individually and legislatively more money than we have.
The bottom line in the case of Japan, is that in the process of attempting to fix their economic problems after having an economic system based on real-estate and other lending bubbles, they weakened their economy of more lending, by way of federal action.
So, we either keep interest rates low and in-effect weaken our economy, as Japan did; or interest rates rise again and we get stuck in malaise, while attempting to spend our way out of it. We are told that tax-cuts are not the only answer and doing nothing is not an option. We are also told that de-regulation is what caused our current crises. When the answer was the 80's era of fewer regulation and taxes that brought us to nearly twenty years of unprecedented growth (from 1985-2005) in the mean time surviving two recessions and a major domestic terrorist attack. What if during that twenty year period we as a country had saved, or perhaps not jumped from the 'Manufacturing Bubble' to the 'Tech-Bubble' then finally to the 'Construction-and Housing bubble.' What if we had focused on making a product rather than money. What if the Federal Reserve could have kept it's meddling fingers off our economy and allowed certain industries to die a healthy death.
For the first time there is serious discussion that the 'Fed' simply chases the bubbles while creating new ones ,all of which pop. Such radio talk show hosts as Glenn Beck and Michael Medved have had serious discussions on their shows about the steady but gradual dissolution of the 'Fed.' Perhaps, we are to simply look back to the words "government is not the solution, it's the problem," or even more poignantly "government that governs least governs best."
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