Posted on 03/20/2009 5:37:29 AM PDT by IbJensen
The political virtue of limited government has been in eclipse for decades. Once the hallmark of American conservatism, limited government was never an objective for President George W. Bush, who spent like a Great Society liberal.
Under President Barack Obama, the profligate spending is the envy of European socialists. But more than just spending is involved. In fact, thought about with sufficient care, the question of limited government is really one about the best political setting for human happiness and flourishing.
Charles Murray, author of such seminal books as Losing Ground: American Social Policy, 1950-1980 (1984) and (with Richard Herrnstein) The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life (1994), has thought about this issue with extraordinary care. And his recent address titled “The Happiness of the People” (the 2009 Irving Kristol Lecture sponsored by the American Enterprise Institute; the text is available at aei.org) is a fiercely insightful presentation of two very different options presented to Americans.
One is the traditional American approach of limited government with its wide berth for citizens to form voluntary associations to meet human needs. The other is the European cradle-to-grave social-welfare state. The Obama administration is very enamored of the latter.
Mr. Murray begins with a Madisonian premise: Government should aim for the happiness of citizens. And his definition of happiness has classical elegance: “Happiness, which the Founders used in its Aristotelian sense of lasting and justified satisfaction with life as a whole.”
Happiness is found, says Mr. Murray, in four institutions: family, community, vocation and faith. The essential flaw of European social democracy is that, as he phrases the point, it “enfeebles every single one of them.” Mr. Murray is particularly trenchant on this problem:
“Drive through rural Sweden, as I did a few years ago. In every town was a beautiful Lutheran church, freshly painted, on meticulously tended grounds, all subsidized by the Swedish government. And the churches are empty, including on Sundays. Scandinavia and Western Europe pride themselves on their ‘child-friendly’ policies, providing generous child allowances, free day-care centers and long maternity leaves.
“Those same countries have fertility rates far below replacement and plunging marriage rates. Those same countries are ones in which jobs are most carefully protected by government regulation and mandated benefits are most lavish. And they, with only a few exceptions, are countries where work is most often seen as a necessary evil, least often seen as a vocation, and where the proportions of people who say they love their jobs are the lowest.”
The absence of transcendent meaning in contemporary European life has resulted in a kind of carefree hedonism. Mr. Murray identifies the consequence of this exaltation of leisure: “The same self-absorption in whiling away life as pleasantly as possible explains why Europe has become a continent that no longer celebrates greatness. When life is a matter of whiling away the time, the concept of greatness is irritating and threatening.”
The second part of Mr. Murray’s address advances an argument that the limited-government view, with its foundation in the immutability of human nature, will increasingly have the support of science in the 21st century. Specifically, the work of neuroscience and genetics is revealing that traditional assumptions and patterns of behavior have a well-established biological foundation. Egalitarianism is on a collision course with biological reality.
The ideological premises of, say, feminism, are being scientifically undermined. Men and women are different, in real, permanent, and profound ways.
Mr. Murray is, of course, correct about the developments we can expect from biology, but he underestimates the impact these scientific understandings will have on such ideological fevers as feminism.
It has always been obvious that the basic assumptions of feminism — for example, that men and women are interchangeable in the workplace, in the caring for children, on the battlefield, and so on — are at war with human nature. It is very difficult to imagine that scientific corroboration will make what are referred to as traditional gender roles more palatable to feminist ideologues.
But that is a minor criticism of Mr. Murray’s immensely penetrating lecture. The breadth of his critique is invaluable inasmuch as the European-style social-welfare vision of President Obama’s will only be defeated, Mr. Murray concludes, “when we are all talking again about why America is exceptional, and why it is so important that America remain exceptional. That requires once again seeing the American project for what it is: a different way for people to live together, unique among the nations of the earth, and immeasurably precious.”
The political virtue of limited government has been in eclipse for decades. Once the hallmark of American conservatism, limited government was never an objective for President George W. Bush, who spent like a Great Society liberal.That irrittating fact is like an anchor around all Republican Pol's necks. Evry time a Republican criticizes Barry and/or San Fran Nan for spending, they just turn around and say,
"Well, BUSH DID IT, and YOU went along!"And the response is (((((( crickets ))))).
Dubya's 'compassion' is still killin' us. From spending to illegals, he gave the RATS the upper hand.
Gaffes, mistakes, blunders, errors, misjudgement, inexperience, over extension.....it’s a comedic march toward confusion, chaos and failure.
It’s not socialism, it’s fascism.
I don't understand the logic of this. Are you saying that Bush should have spent more? Why vote for the Bolshecrats, if you are already getting all you want from Bush? The only reason is you want more and so you vote Bolshecrat. The logic would imply that Bush did not spend enough. We have to destroy the country to save it, leaves us with the dead country we are going to get. Personally, I have not figured out what Bush did that was so bad that the country wanted worse.
I don't understand the logic of this. Are you saying that Bush should have spent more? Why vote for the Bolshecrats, if you are already getting all you want from Bush? The only reason is you want more and so you vote Bolshecrat. The logic would imply that Bush did not spend enough. We have to destroy the country to save it, leaves us with the dead country we are going to get. Personally, I have not figured out what Bush did that was so bad that the country wanted worse.
And very well enabled by about 300 Republican Congressmen and Senators, for most of his administration. It wrecked the entire party.
And it's only just begun, the tip of the iceberg so to speak.
America, under Obomba, is Communism!
And very well enabled by about 300 Republican Congressmen and Senators, for most of his administration. It wrecked the entire party.Exactly. Not vetoing a single pork filled spending bill when the 'Rs" were in charge spelled doom.
What it comes down to is that America's elites must once again fall in love with what makes America different. I am not being theoretical. Not everybody in this room shares the beliefs I have been expressing, but a lot of us do. To those of you who do, I say soberly and without hyperbole, that this is the hour. The possibility that irreversible damage will be done to the American project over the next few years is real. And so it is our job to make the case for that reawakening. It won't happen by appealing to people on the basis of lower marginal tax rates or keeping a health care system that lets them choose their own doctor. The drift toward the European model can be slowed by piecemeal victories on specific items of legislation, but only slowed. It is going to be stopped only when we are all talking again about why America is exceptional, and why it is so important that America remain exceptional. That requires once again seeing the American project for what it is: a different way for people to live together, unique among the nations of the earth, and immeasurably precious.The conservative message has become so politicized that its respectable and perennial undergirding has been forgotten. Has Murray's speech been posted on FR? It would make great reading for a lazy Sunday afternoon.
This just in.
Based on their success in stealing the 2008 election, ACORN has changed its name.
The catchy new acronym is defined below.
Commies
On a
Rampage
Now
Have
Obama
Leaving nearly
Everyone
Really
Screwed
This, as you can see, spells “CORNHOLERS.” The leadership of the group formerly known as ACORN felt this was a more descriptive name given what they did to the rest of us in November of 2008.
They suggest all affected Americans also learn another acronym familiar to most veterans: BOHICA.
Bend
Over
Here
It
Comes
Again.
Film at 11:00!
Indeed.
And note he is still praising Obama to the sky.
He destroyed...from the inside...any opposition to the Democrats spending mania.
At best, it could be argued that he and Rove were deluded as to think they could outspend/bribe the RATs for voter popularity.
As they discovered....they were not able to...and they only CEMENTED the supposed LEGITIMACY of SOCIALISM.
Bush paved the way for Obama...and STILL praises him to the stars...
Why, oh why, could every supposed GOPer have just LISTENED to Lawrence Auster
To view this item online, visit http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?pageId=3045
Friday, March 20, 2009 My Bush epiphany Posted: September 20, 2000 1:00 am Eastern
WorldNetDaily.com
A few weeks before he was nominated as the Republican candidate for president of the United States, I happened to see Bob Dole being interviewed on TV. As I watched, everything I knew about Dole came to mind -- the love for big government that he had unembarrassedly revealed in his Senate retirement speech a few days earlier, the constant hints and sardonic asides by which he distanced himself from conservatives and accommodated himself to liberals, even the way his eyes kept shifting from side to side as he spoke. Suddenly the thought flashed into my mind: "He's not on our side; he's on their side." It gives me no pleasure to say it, but George W. Bush, at least on some key issues, has given conservatives reason to have similar concerns about him. Of course, many conservatives were already put off by W.'s "compassionate" conservatism, his inclusion-soaked nominating convention, and his failure to say anything serious about the Clinton-Gore corrup-tion of our national life. If W. would not take even a minimal stand against the epic illegalities and abuses of power that we have been living under, then how could his election be seen as a repudiation of those abuses, and how could it cleanse the country of the stain that Clinton has left? By the same token, given the fact that W. panders to Hispanics and is so conspicuously fond of diversity, how can he be counted on to defend America's national identity and sovereignty from the organized Hispanic interest groups and globalist elites who are hostile to both? A case in point was his refusal during the primaries to criticize a Texas town where Spanish had been declared the official language. Thus W. had already shown a troubling degree of softness on the important issues of public morality and national identity. But in a two-day period in late August, he went much further (or much further backward) on both fronts than he ever had before. On the matter of public integrity, he announced his approval of Janet Reno's decision not to appoint a special counsel to investigate Al Gore's role in the 1996 campaign scandal. In doing this, W. was not just avoiding a "partisan attack" on Clinton-Gore corruption; he seemed to be going out of his way to help protect Clinton and Gore from accountability. On the matter of national identity, W. delivered in Miami on Aug. 25 a major address on U.S.-Latin American relations, in which he unveiled a startling -- at least for a Republican -- view of America. We should pay close attention to his words:
We are now one of the largest Spanish-speaking nations in the world. We're a major source of Latin music, journalism and culture. Let us be clear that W. is not (as Republican politicians including Reagan have done for decades) celebrating immigrants from diverse backgrounds on the assumption that they are becoming part of our culture and way of life. On the contrary, he is applauding the expansion and the increasingly dominant role of the Hispanic culture and the Spanish language in this country. He is explicitly welcoming the very things that are making America less and less like its historical self and more and more like Latin America. To repeat, this is not the usual establishment conservative line of "immigration with assimilation." This is multiculturalism, the view of America as a collection of unassimilated yet "equal" cultures in which our former national culture will be progressively downgraded and marginalized. Also surprising is W.'s claim that Republicans have "made a choice to welcome the new America." Did Republicans realize that by nominating W. they were not only committing themselves to a pro-multicultural candidate, but shutting down all debate on the issue? Complementing W.'s support for the Hispanicization of American culture was his view of Mexico-U.S. relations:
I have a vision for our two countries. The United States is destined to have a "special relationship" with Mexico, as clear and strong as we have had with Canada and Great Britain. Historically, we have had no closer friends and allies. ... Our ties of history and heritage with Mexico are just as deep. In equating our intimate historic bonds to our mother country and to Canada with our ties to Mexico, W. shows a staggering ignorance of the civilizational facts of life. The reason we are so close to Britain and Canada is that we share with them a common historical culture, language, literature, and legal system, as well as similar standards of behavior, expectations of public officials, and so on. We share none of those things with Mexico, which, along with the rest of Latin America, constitutes a cultural region quite distinct from that of the United States and Europe. Everyone, on both the left and the right, has always known this to be so. W., apparently, does not. As he sees it, our mere physical proximity to Mexico is tantamount to cultural commonality with Mexico. W.'s delusions of cultural similarity don't stop there. "Differences are inevitable" between Mexico and the U.S.," W. continued. "But they will be differences among family, not between rivals." Coming from the Republican candidate for president of the United States, the statement boggles the mind. It was bad enough when the Democrats in the 1980s started their socialist rant (soon echoed by the Republicans) that Americans are all "one family." But now George W., "The Man from Inclusion," has taken the "family" idea several steps further. For W., it is not just the United States, but the United States and Mexico, and ultimately the United States and the whole of the Americas, that constitutes one "family." With this thoughtless clich?, W. is moving in symbolic terms toward the goal that Mexico's newly elected president Vicente Fox is calling for in concrete terms: the opening of the U.S.-Mexican border. After all, who would want to maintain national borders and high-tech barriers between members of the same family? Within a family there is unconditional support, mutual obligation, and the sense of a shared destiny -- not armed patrols and checkpoints. Whether or not W. himself understands the logical implications of his "family" rhetoric, its political consequence if he becomes president will be the same -- the further delegitimization of our borders and our national sovereignty. All of which leads up to the question: Why is he doing this? Most conservatives had accepted, if without enthusiasm, the pragmatic need for W. and other Republicans to project a warm and "inclusive" image, conspicuously embracing minorities and so on. But by no reasonable calculation did that require W. to embrace multiculturalism, any more than the need to avoid "negative attacks" on his Democratic opponent required him to praise Reno's cover-up of Gore. Since his adoption of a multicultural vision of America makes no sense in political terms (indeed, it would tend to alienate his own base), the only explanation is that W. really believes in it. Watching his speech in Miami, you couldn't help but feel that W. is genuinely moved by this "We're all one family" sentiment. It is as central to his heart (about which he is always telling us) as the love of big government is to Bob Dole's. Just as Dole at the 1996 Convention showed his liberal colors when he declared that the Republican party is rife with unspecified "haters" for whom "the exits are clearly marked," W. has unambiguously demonstrated his allegiance to the liberal policies of open borders and multiculturalism, characterizing everyone who dissents from those policies as driven by "resentment" and implying that they have no place in the Republican party. He has left no wiggle room for honest conservatives to tell themselves, "Well he's really on our side, the side of a unified American nation. He just has to say all these things about welcoming other cultures in order to get elected." Of course, many principled conservatives feel they have strong reasons (I will leave it up to the reader to decide whether they are compelling reasons) to vote for W. They believe that with W. in the White House, there will be at least a chance of forestalling a further leftward lurch by the Supreme Court and such nightmarish statist projects (endorsed by Gore) as universal childcare. They also feel that our country cannot endure the continued debauching of our national institutions and character that has occurred under Clinton and Gore. But, if conservatives do mark their ballot for W. on Nov. 7, they should do it without illusions -- and they should be prepared to fight President Bush every inch of the way to preserve what remains of our national identity and sovereignty.
Lawrence Auster lives in New York City. |
I am way beyond thinking that politics can solve our real problems. In Reagan's time we could still believe that their was something crucial about national elections. When there was a Cold War that was an arguable position. Now, however, I think the real action is where the culture wars play out: the education system, academia, the media.
There is one other thing that few are talking about: the progressive secularization of our society. We are becoming as secular as Europe. The loss of religious faith over the course of several centuries paved the way for Europe's secularization and its subsequent socialism. The only fault I would find with Murray's article is that it overlooks the religious question. Otherwise Murray does a great job of explaining the secular aspect of our crisis. As a believer, I believe there is an even deeper root to the crisis: the attenuation of religious faith of America. There doesn't seem to be anything like a Moral Majority or a Christian Coalition out there today which can give a voice to religious believers. Indeed, there are even fewer believers. Today's crop of evangelicals is not cut from the same cloth as Jerry Falwell, et al. Whatever one thinks of Falwell, Robertson, etc, they were great allies in the political battles of recent times. Their absence will have to be filled by someone, but by whom?
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