A happy libertarian meditation on elections

So America has just re-elected President Obama. Congratulations to him, and to all who supported him. For many Republicans, I'm sure this is a bitter pill to swallow, since they were so convinced the whole time that Obama is one of the main reasons for everything that is wrong with America right now. For us libertarians, it's not really that big a deal: we knew all along we probably weren't going to get a candidate we liked!

However, it's not all bleak. A lot of people today are very happy, because they view Obama as a very good man and an inspiration for the future. And I think they are right: Obama is a good man. So is Romney, for that matter. I think it's overly cynical to view all politicians as bad people. I'm guessing that both candidates for president really want to serve their country well, that they're both good to their families, and that they both can be nice people to be around if you get to know them.

It isn't because I think all politicians are bad people that I am against big government. It's because I think that big government has a way of causing good people to do bad things. Many people seem to have trouble accepting that evil can result from intellectual mistakes and/or systemic problems, but it can. I do not think that it was out of hatred for truth or justice that George W. Bush dragged us into two never-ending wars, or that Barack Obama started a secret "kill list" outside the bounds of the rule of law. On the contrary, these men believe in their country, and they will do "everything it takes" to defend it.

That "everything it takes" part can be really scary. Even, and perhaps especially, in the hands of good people.

Indeed, sometimes libertarianism comes across as a political philosophy which celebrates poor traits in humanity, such as greed and selfishness. On the contrary, I don't celebrate these things at all; I just don't have the same irrational fear of them that others do. In fact our great mistake as a society is to celebrate our own optimism and idealism.

Why fear greed and selfishness? They will forever be unpopular. On the other hand, idealistic politicians with a heart of gold and a vision for the country--they really frighten me. Why? Because people actually put their hopes in them!

A common objection I hear is that libertarians are as utopian as socialists. Socialists believe that we should try to organize society in such a way that all of her efforts are directed toward the common good by means of a democratic state. Clearly utopian--no state worked or ever will work like that. On the other hand, the libertarian view of the state is that it ought simply to enforce the basic rules of justice, not play favorites, and not intervene in the lives of citizens when no injustice has been committed. And that, unfortunately, has never happened either!

But the two kinds of utopianism are not equivalent in spirit. While socialism rests on a belief in a kind of society that has never existed, libertarianism merely rests on the hope for a government that has, unfortunately, never existed. Indeed, all libertarianism demands is that government help, rather than hinder, those natural forces which in fact make society work. Its demands may be too much for any real government, but they are not too much for society. What actually makes society work is not the politicians we elect, but the fact that each of us as individuals respect the life and property of other individuals.

It is an absurd mischaracterization of libertarianism to say that libertarians are against working together for the common good. Au contraire ! The amazing thing about this global civilization we live in is that we already do work together for the common good, whether we appreciate that fact or not. The system of global capitalism that is in place is mostly not our doing. It is rather the unforeseen result of billions of decisions along history's long and complicated path.

And I think that civilization is remarkably resilient. I am hardly a fan of the belief that progress is inevitable. What feels like progress often isn't, and often the path that actually leads to progress is not ideal. But freedom is ultimately difficult to destroy. It arises from the moral traditions we have inherited, and whether we realize it or not we will mostly continue to persist on those traditions: respect for human life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Democracy often blinds us to these simple truths. We place our hopes in the amazing gift of being able to choose our government--and it is an amazing gift--while forgetting that government does not make us free or prosperous. And you know what, that's okay. You may have voted for all the wrong reasons, but the free world will not collapse because of it.

So I remain content, not because I think government as it exists is acceptable or that I think everything is just going to be alright without any effort on anyone's part. Rather, I remain content because I know that no political election, no matter the outcome, can ever take away from humanity that which it really needs to fight for justice, truth, and peace.

Things could get bleak in the short run. I don't know. I fear the results of Obama's executive power grab, and now that he has a second term it could get worse. I fear what the Republicans will do, given that they may be even more angry after this election than before. Yes, there are lots of worries.

But in the long run, freedom is not really in the hands of these elites, elected or not. And that is why I remain a happy libertarian...

...who will cheerfully continue to blast America's current political policies, mostly because it's just so darn fun!

Why I think Obama and Romney are essentially the same

There are many reasons why libertarians disapprove equally of Romney and Obama. One could note policies on the war on terror, drone strikes, the NDAA and related national security policies, Guantanamo Bay, etc. Or one could even point to the fundamental similarities in their economic philosophy, which always requires the government to "steer the ship," and which always focuses on the middle class in an obvious attempt to strike a populist chord with America's voting population.

But I wanted to provide a very pithy evaluation of these two candidates, in anticipation of the upcoming Election Day in the US, in order to explain why a Romney presidency will most likely have a very similar effect on American society as an Obama presidency.

Both candidates share this fundamental trait on common: they really want to be good politicians. Each promises to bring but one ingredient to the White House: competence. This "competence" is expressed in all sorts of ways: the ability to run a business, pass laws, or finally "put aside politics" and do "what's best for the country." This latter phrase is never actually explained: it is a way of merely summarizing current prejudices among political elites, whose position in society renders them incapable of philosophical self-criticism.

This desire to appear above all competent to "run the country" is, sadly, a manifestation of how most Americans view politics. Modern people seem to view the government, not as a source of justice, but rather as a source of progress. Thus elections have become about which candidate has the best "vision" for the country, rather than about which candidate would be most true to the principles of our Constitution. We want our president to not simply govern, but rather "run the country."

I am hardly optimistic about the potential results of this trend.

Why I will not be voting for "the" pro-life candidate

On occasion, it becomes painfully obvious that large segments of the pro-life movement have been completely co-opted by the Republican party.

Consider a the recent article from LifeNews.com, entitled "You Can't be Pro-Life and Not Vote for Mitt Romney." It's exactly what it sounds like.

This extraordinarily poorly thought out diatribe against those of us who would rather not vote for a man has flip-flopped on just about every question imaginable, including abortion, actually makes no positive arguments for Mitt Romney. The presumptive Republican nominee is simply the negation of Barack Obama:

How can someone who believes in the sanctity of life belittle, deride and not support the only chance we have of removing him from office? It’s sheer life-endangering folly.

I admit, there can be little doubt that Barack Obama is the most pro-abortion president we've ever had. But does that make Mitt Romney pro-life? And does it really mean electing him will make any difference for the plight of the unborn?

Let's consider the following argument:

The next president of the United States will also fill between two and four seats on the Supreme Court. As a people who believe abortion is wrong, who do we think will fill those seats with strict-constructionist jurors who will interpret the Constitution and not reinvent and rewrite it?

A curious argument, completely devoid of any basis in historical fact. Consider Ronald Reagan, one of the cherished heroes of pro-life conservatives. His Supreme Court nominees were

• Sandra Day O'Connor
• William Rehnquist (only an elevation)
• Antonin Scalia
• Anthony Kennedy

Two out of the three justices added to the Supreme Court by Reagan sided with Planned Parenthood in the 1992 decision Planned Parenthood v Casey. How's that for a pro-life record!

And take a look at George H. W. Bush's nominees:

• David Souter
• Clarence Thomas

I'll give you a hint: one of these justices is not a "strict constitutionalist."

One could argue, I suppose, that George W. Bush had more success in that area. One could object that Ronald Reagan got "Borked." One could say a lot of things. None of these objections change the fact that voting a conservative into the White House won't ultimately change the fate of unborn children.

Besides, who says being pro-life somehow goes hand in hand with being a "strict constitutionalist"? In most states, abortion was legal up to the moment of quickening, up until the late 1800s. I guess the Founding Fathers weren't strict constitutionalists. (Then again, they didn't outlaw slavery, either.)

"Strict constitutionalism" is nothing more than conservative-speak. This means, in particular, that it has very little meaning beyond, "Whatever the left is doing is probably wrong." There's nothing wrong with being skeptical of the left. But let's not borrow meaningless terminology in order to express our reasons why.

Bottom line: if pro-lifers really believe that faithful adherence to the Republican party has any long-term benefits for our cause, just look at the facts: it hasn't worked so far.

There is a deeper why it hasn't worked, and why I won't be voting for Mitt Romney. The more our pro-life position on abortion is coupled with other positions that people find deeply troubling, the less likely it is that we will gain more support from the general public. When people look at Mitt Romney, it should not surprise us if they see a friend of corporate greed, a man distanced from the plight of ordinary Americans.

And for us pro-lifers, why should we not be deeply troubled by the Republican party's platform on foreign policy? If our core issue is protecting innocent human life from unjustified killing, should we not oppose the idea of preemptive war? Should we not oppose the use of drone strikes over countries with whom we are not even at war? Especially when they kill innocent people, including children!

As if Obama's support of fetal abortion were not enough, it also appears he has no problem aborting his enemies overseas. All the more reason why I oppose Obama. But is Romney any better on this issue? In all of the Republican debates, Romney has constantly tried to make Obama out to be weak on foreign policy. It sounds to me that Romney, if he changes anything about Obama's tactics of drone strikes and military occupation, will only make it more aggressive, more reminiscent of the George W. Bush era, and ultimately more dangerous for innocent human life and for our moral reputation abroad.

Let me be clear: I do not want Obama to be president, and therefore I will not vote for Obama. That is all anyone has any right to ask of me, since I do profess to be pro-life and against any politician who will not defend those most vulnerable in society. Insisting that I vote for "the other guy" solely in order to oust Obama from power is incredibly short-sighted, and for that reason I find it morally repugnant.

One has to think for a moment to understand why it is so short-sighted. Elections are winner-take-all. This means our government will tend to merely oscillate back and forth between two more or less arbitrary but evolving political poles. If both sides have become odious to me because of my conscience on crucial matters involving the dignity of human life, then what gain is there in me participating in this tug of war? Should I not rather vote my conscience? In a free society, liberty of conscience is all we have to stem the rising tide of tyranny.

The author of the aforementioned article would like to play (somewhat hypocritically) the moral superiority card. He seems to suggest that because he has been the recipient of persecution in the name of the pro-life cause, he is entitled to proclaim that "it is a requirement for any pro-life American" that we vote for Mitt Romney. Let's call this the moralist's fatal conceit. Dedication to a cause by no means makes one rational. Sometimes one's dedication can cause a person to do things which are, in the long run, quite counter-productive to the cause.

Ultimately, it is not the presidential election of this year or any year which decides the issue of abortion in the long run. What decides the issue is our ability to persuade thoughtful people to come to our side. How will we ever be successful in persuading thoughtful people if we ourselves throw our blind adherence to a political party with countless other agendas than our own? The world is watching, and it will not judge kindly.

The Life of Julia

In case you're not up on your politics, here is the link to Obama's new gimmick:
http://www.barackobama.com/life-of-julia
And I quote:

"Take a look at how President Obama's policies help one woman over her lifetime--and how Mitt Romney would change her story."

This truly blows my mind. Is this what Americans really want? Is voting really an act of choosing which manager would be better suited to make our personal lives better, from cradle to grave? There is nothing "progressive" about this. Inculcating Americans with the idea that we can't live without the all-powerful government is not "liberal." Liberalism is supposed to be about freedom. It's supposed to be about limiting arbitrary power and unleashing the potential of the individual. What would be "progressive" is if we could truly imagine a world in which we didn't have to bring all our gifts before the altar of the state in order to make life better for ourselves and one another.

What happened to liberalism, that it now boasts of such wretched ideas? Is Barack Obama the people's monarch? Is that what we do when we vote? Are we electing our king?

Fortunately, there is at least one good response out there:
http://www.thelifeofjulia.com/

"How Obamacare is Destroying Accountable Care Organizations"

That's the title of an article from Forbes. Excerpt:

“Accountable care organizations” is the health wonk phrase du jour. Obamacare’s advocates point to its support for ACOs as one of the important cost-control initiatives in the law. Except that, like nearly everything about Obamacare, the truth isn’t so simple. It turns out that the government’s idea of an accountable care organization is completely unworkable, to the point where nearly all leading health providers have declared it dead on arrival.

It turns out these organizations are already being tried--under the Medicare Advantage system, which is a privatized system. But just to make the invisible hand a little more visible, the government insists on spending hundreds of millions of dollars to try out their own version. Only, the government model doesn't seem to be as popular; I wonder why?

On March 31, Donald Berwick’s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services issued 427 pages of proposed rules and regulations that will govern how ACOs will operate.

In May, ten groups that participated in an ACO pilot program called the Medicare Physician Group Practice Demonstration, including leading centers like Dartmouth-Hitchcock, Geisinger, and the University of Michigan, told CMS in a letter that it would be “difficult, if not impossible” to participate in Obamacare’s ACO program, due to its incessant federal micromanagement and high start-up costs.

Once again, ladies and gentlemen, your tax dollars hard at work.

Accidental Entitlements

From the Boston Globe:

President Obama’s health care law would let several million middle-class people get nearly free insurance meant for the poor, a twist government number crunchers say they discovered only after the complex bill was signed.

Well, wasn't that the idea all along? Hurry up and sign it, then figure out what it actually says!

Oh, the joys of "progressive" legislation.

HT: the Freeman online

More on health care and bureaucracy

Dr. Donald P. Condit writes in The Detroit News:

The sugar-coated rhetoric from HHS cannot disguise the bad medicine in this part of the Affordable Care Act, which intends to bureaucratically cut as much as $960 million in Medicare spending over three years. This Obamacare prescription threatens patients, the physicians who care for them, and the common good.

The only clear winners are the consultants and lawyers busy trying to decipher this 429-page tome.

Medicare beneficiaries will be "assigned" to 5,000 patient-minimum organizations to coordinate their care. While HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius talks about improvement in care, the politically poisonous truth is that Medicare is going broke and ACOs are designed to save money.

The words "rationing" or "treatment denial" or "withholding care" are not part of her press release, but reading the regulations reveals intentions to "share savings" with those who fulfill, or "penalize" others who fall short of, the administration's objectives. The administration's talking points include politically palatable words that emphasize quality improvement and care enhancement when the real objective is cost control by a utilitarian calculus.

Read the rest here.

On traffic lights and economics

Suppose you are sitting behind a long line of cars at a traffic light, and the light turns green. Despite the light turning green, the car in front of you does not move for half a minute. Finally, you are free to drive, yet you are hardly able to move forward before the light is red once more. The light changes again, and you go through the same cycle. By now you'll be late for your appointment. You want to scream at all the cars who were in front of you and wouldn't move.

You think to yourself, "Why is it that when the light turns green, we don't move?" You decide that it would be much more logical if as soon as the light turned green, everyone at the light started moving simultaneously. This would make getting cars through the light much more efficient. Then you wouldn't be late. Driving would be so much better if everyone followed this simple rule that you are convinced they should pass a law requiring it. After all, it would help everyone, in the long run.

How "capitalism" works around here

The Freeman tipped me off to a story this week that has stirred in me an even deeper moral outrage against government interventionism. The headline reads:

McDonald's, 29 other firms get health care coverage waivers

Nearly a million workers won't get a consumer protection in the U.S. health reform law meant to cap insurance costs because the government exempted their employers.

Thirty companies and organizations, including McDonald's (MCD) and Jack in the Box (JACK), won't be required to raise the minimum annual benefit included in low-cost health plans, which are often used to cover part-time or low-wage employees.

The Department of Health and Human Services, which provided a list of exemptions, said it granted waivers in late September so workers with such plans wouldn't lose coverage from employers who might choose instead to drop health insurance altogether.

Without waivers, companies would have had to provide a minimum of $750,000 in coverage next year, increasing to $1.25 million in 2012, $2 million in 2013 and unlimited in 2014.

Pro-life orthodoxy

A recent article from LifeSiteNews.com, a comprehensively right-wing news site, tries to nail Obama for hypocrisy:

Following reports of widespread skepticism over his professed Christianity, President Obama on Tuesday invoked the teachings of Jesus Christ as the inspiration for his public agenda, which he called part of an "effort to express my Christian faith" - and in his next breath defended the legalized killing of unborn children.

Someone explain this to me

From the New York Times:

The White House on Wednesday issued new rules requiring health insurance companies to provide free coverage for dozens of screenings, laboratory tests and other types of preventive care.

The White House issued new rules? When did the president gain the power to legislate? And how is this not a slow but steady government take-over of health care? The whole argument for this legislation (which mysteriously has come from the executive branch, according to the NY Times) appears to be, "We're the government, we have the experts on our side, so do what we tell you." As illustrated in the Times article:

In general, the government said, Americans use preventive services at about half the rate recommended by doctors and public health experts.

...

The rules stipulate that no co-payments can be charged for tests and screenings recommended by the United States Preventive Services Task Force, an independent panel of scientific experts. The rules apply to new health plans that begin coverage after Sept. 23 and to existing health plans that make significant changes after that date.

At least the experts who are so benevolently dictating what happens in our economy are willing to admit that you can't get something for nothing.

The administration said the requirements could increase premiums by 1.5 percent, on average.

There is, after all, no free lunch.

I am troubled by the fact that people are willing to grant the President more and more power over the private sector all for the sake of "fairness" and this "fundamental right" to health care. Motivated by a sense of resentment toward businesses we like to demonize, we willingly create a monster in the White House, who promises to ensure that everyone gets what they need. That is not the system of economics that has led to American prosperity. We did not achieve prosperity by handing such authority over to a single team of "experts," and we will not sustain prosperity that way. In the long run, we will all be worse off--even the poor, who supposedly benefit from such paternalism.

Merkel vs. Obama

I found this kind of amusing:

German Chancellor Angela Merkel directly contradicted US President Barack Obama on Saturday, saying spending cutbacks were now needed following the spate of throwing money at the global economic crisis.

Referring to the G20 summit in Canada next weekend, Merkel said in a videotaped message that "we are going to discuss when to quit the phase of short-term measures and go on to lasting budget consolidation."

Such a move was "urgently necessary, in the view of the Europeans and particularly of Germany," she said.

Obama, on the other hand, thinks governments should keep spending money they don't have, because the private sector clearly can't recover on its own.

Kind of crazy when our own president believes in socialism more than the Europeans.

Calming Down...

The past few days have been stressful for me as I've watched this whole health care debate unfold and reach its climax. I feel like I'm sort of reliving the days when Obama won the election back in 2008. That was what got me blogging in the first place; I guess it's fitting that I've been driven to blog so much lately.

I blog because I'd like to think that at the very least, I can put my ideas out there, rather than just keep them in my head all the time. Sure, it's fun to just talk politics over lunch with friends, but we live in an age where getting ideas out into the public arena is not nearly as difficult as it used to be. I feel a responsibility as a thinking individual to be part of a much bigger conversation.

Ideas matter. They determine our relationship with the world around us. They shape our government policies, which in turn shape all of our lives. The fate of our democracy depends on us being able to critically evaluate those ideas that affect all of our lives. We cast the votes that endorse one idea over another; we need to take responsibility for understanding those ideas.

Ideals, as opposed to ideas, just don't cut it. Ideally, we could simply wish everyone to have health care coverage, and it would happen. But the problem is, that can't happen. Intentions are not enough. The world does not run on our good intentions. It runs on our ideas, not our ideals.

In my opinion, that's where health care reform falls short. It's full of good ideals, but not good ideas. What is needed is a clearer picture of what's actually causing inefficiencies in the current health care system. It doesn't do any good to repeatedly point out that there is a problem, which is one of the most frustrating tendency I've found in liberals on this issue. As if conservatives don't know there's a problem! But unfortunately, it is possible to do worse than nothing. I fear the bill we just passed is in fact worse than if we had just done nothing.

Which leads me to blame conservatives for not tackling this issue when they had the chance. What we need in the government are smart conservatives. Not "compassionate conservatives" the way George W. Bush thought. Compassion is a good thing; but compassion is useless if you don't know what you're doing. Far more important is for conservatism to be smart.

But smart conservatives also need to be pro-active. I'm tired of seeming to have only two choices: one choice is to have Democrats in power taking the country further left, the other choice is to have Republicans in power focusing on the war on terror and not implementing any conservative solutions to domestic issues. Where was the health care reform back during the Bush era, when Republicans could have at least passed significant tort reform? What were the Republicans thinking when they passed No Child Left Behind, another inefficient big government program that fails to see the fundamental problems with education?

Since I've been truly alert to politics, I can't think of one thing that Republicans have successfully argued for on the domestic front other than lower taxes. As if lowering taxes solves all economic problems! And it makes me so sad, because I read all the incredibly bright conservative thinkers out there with great ideas about how to bring real reform on huge issues like education and health care. Who's going to put those ideas in place? We need a smart conservative, one who can make the case to the public convincingly, and then actually get it done, the way Obama and Pelosi hammered their agenda through.

Whatever else I have to say about Obama, he's a pretty impressive politician. If I agreed with his ideas, I'd probably be ecstatic. Unfortunately, it never feels good when the star player is on the other team.

And with that, I think I can wind down, count my blessings, and remember that frustration will not accomplish anything. I'm thankful that in this country I have the freedom to express my criticisms, my doubts, and even my frustrations. But with that privilege, I think, comes a responsibility to figure out the best way to use it. I can certainly do better than just complain.

Ideas matter, and I'll continue to defend ideas that are counter to Obama's. But they don't really matter as much as love. And no matter what this health care bill does, I can still choose to love my neighbor. Will it cause me to have to pay more to the government? I can still be generous with what I have left. Will it actually, as Obama says, end up saving us money? Well, then I'll have the blessing of being proved wrong.

Will it end up promoting abortions? That is still a tricky issue. But even then, the way we show love does not change. We go and we stand and pray and show that we love all people, no matter what. We give our own money to pregnancy centers, and show that there is an alternative to abortion. We change hearts and minds. There really is no shortcut past this. Our political stances are only as good as the love we show to other people.

It's good for my soul to have written this out for myself, and also for all of you who happen to think I have anything to say worth reading. In the land of political commentary on the Internet you don't get a lot of calming influences. If nothing else, at least I'll sleep better at night.

Big business conservatism? No way.

I really appreciate this article written by Jonah Goldberg, which discusses why "big business" does not equal "conservative."

In fact, the interesting bit of information he opens up with is how much big business seems to support the Democrats: "It's worth remembering that Obama was the preferred candidate of Wall Street, and the industry gave to Democrats by a 2-1 margin at the beginning of last year."

Yet, as Goldberg points out, the generally left-leaning newspapers would rather focus on whatever support big businesses are giving Republicans. What they fail to highlight in stories with headlines like "Wall Street shifting toward Republicans" is that Wall Street is still giving a majority of their political contributions to Democrats, despite whatever gains Republicans have made.

In casual political conversation, it's almost a given that Republicans are in line with big business while Democrats are trying to protect the little guy from those big evil corporations. Could it be that big evil corporations had a change of heart last year and decided to support the liberals in office?

I doubt it. Here's Goldberg's take on things:

The lesson here is fairly simple: Big business is not "right wing," it's vampiric. It will pursue any opportunity to make a big profit at little risk. Getting in bed with politicians is increasingly the safest investment for these "crony capitalists."

It's all about profit. Would anyone seriously be surprised to hear that?

The scary thing is that sometimes politics can actually feed the desires of powerful companies to maximize profit. And in our day, this is how "progressive" policies end up actually working. By being overly involved with which businesses are profitable or unprofitable, the government is actually favoring the powerful, not the little guy.

In a just system, powerful people should not be able to gain financially from laws passed by Congress. Markets should be driven by what consumers want, not by what politicians want, especially politicians who are driven by pressure from wealthy political supporters.

This is why it would be so wonderful to have genuine conservatives in government, who believed not in big business, but in free markets. That means restrained government--not "small" government, as many conservatives would put it, but simply disciplined government that didn't use its power to play favorites.

But chances of that appear dismal, as even Goldberg admits: "For years, the GOP defended big business in the spirit of free enterprise while businesses never showed much interest in the principle themselves."

It's no wonder Americans get so apathetic about politics. For all of our conversations about basic political ideology, neither party actually seems to represent the ideology to which is pays lip service.

Yet I do think our conversations about such things are important, because we do have power over politicians in this country. At some point they will listen, because they want votes. See? Politicians are just like businesses, really. Just as you can always count on businesses to desire maximum profit, so you can always count on politicians to want to win elections.

The question is whether the American people, consumers both of goods provided by business and of government provided by politicians, will be able to restrain these desires for profit and power. This means taking responsibility for what we value, both in what we buy and in what political opinions we hold.

Of course, it's easy to get cynical about that, too. Can we really expect Americans as a people to take more responsibility for our values as consumers and as voters? But we can't afford to ask that question. We really don't have an option; American democracy depends on taking this responsibility on ourselves.

To me, this is fundamentally what being a conservative is all about: I think that society should be structured so that people are capable of being independent--not independent from one another, but independent from ruling elites.

From that point of view, it's sheer nonsense to suppose that conservatism is anything like "pro-big business." Big businesses are powerful elites that need to be restrained from exercising too much authority over people. But on the other hand, it is natural to restrain big government for the same reason.

My only question is whether your average, everyday Democrat would disagree with me. Being surrounded by liberals in the academy, I know there are plenty of elitist liberals out there who genuinely believe in meritocracy--which of course means they should run the country because they're so smart.

But I'd like to think that most Americans do value independence from any sort of aristocracy, whether it's based on how rich you are or how smart you are. I just wonder, then, what leads people to vote for such flaming liberals like Barack Obama.

Oh well. Some things I will never understand. At least I have enough freedom to blog about them.

A year of blogging

I haven't been blogging much recently. Shockingly enough, there are times when grad school is really busy. But I suppose that's not the real reason. Sometimes I just run out of things to say.

Not that there aren't things to say.

I could blog about the Stupak amendment (now in the form of the Nelson-Hatch-Casey amendment) which would prohibit public funds from going toward abortion. How anyone could be against this amendment is beyond me, but somehow many Democrats manage to show moral ineptitude once again.

(Fortunately my representative, Tom Perriello, a Democrat, did vote for the Stupak amendment--clearly because I bothered to pick up the phone and call his office.)

I could blog about the recent "climategate"--the discovery that scientists are people, too. The whole "climate change" controversy is an intriguging one. I think it's unique in how a purely empirical question can draw in such widespread discussion of economic, moral, and even theological questions. It's no wonder we'd start to care about scientists' personal motivations on this issue.

It's certainly not as if there's nothing going on.

But I suppose my blogging is the condensation that forms in the nebulous clouds of my day-to-day thoughts, and sometimes those clouds are scattered too quickly.

And then sometimes I just feel too tired to write, or maybe too discouraged. I can't help feeling like such a tiny blip in this universe. I don't know why that's sometimes comforting and sometimes depressing. But lately it hasn't been the greatest motivation.

I started blogging more than a year ago. I remember exactly why. While millions of people felt a wave of optimism over the election of Barack Obama, I actually felt quite the opposite. I felt, and still feel, that Obama would take us in the wrong direction on a lot of issues.

(Obama's approval rating recently dropped below 50%. I guess maybe some other people out there agree with me on a few things.)

My blog has been far from only political, though. It really is what the title says it is--whatever I'm thinking about, I blog. In many ways it's my way of publicly compiling my own search for a coherent outlook on life. Philosophy, religion, and mathematics have all been subjects on my blog. Someday I hope to find some underlying unity to all of these subjects.

But for various reasons, I just feel scattered lately, like there's not much of a unity to it at all. I guess I have to remember that I'm subject to many more forces than my own thoughts or goals. It's only natural to be scattered by forces beyond my control.

At this point I could summarize my faith in God in this way: though I might be blown away in the wind, yet there is a Oneness that is present--before all things, in all things, beyond all things, and for all things. He is in control. My scattered fate is in His loving hands.

Maybe this Christmas break will lift my spirits. God knows I could use a break.

Well, good night, cyberspace. I'll write you again when I have more to say.

Outrageous Myths

As you can see in this lovely video, Obama thinks that pro-lifers are making an "outrageous lie" when we say that the new public option will force us to pay for abortions:

When I watched the video, toward the end Obama's lips and his voice got more and more out of sync. Somehow that was fitting in my mind.

Here's a direct quote from FactCheck.org, a non-partisan web site that monitors claims made by politicians:

"Despite what Obama said, the House bill would allow abortions to be covered by a federal plan and by federally subsidized private plans."

Technically, I suppose the federal plan wouldn't force abortions to be covered, but by allowing abortions to be covered, it would, in fact, force the public to pay for them. That is, if anyone with a government-subsidized plan used it to pay for an abortion, that would mean you and I would be paying for it.

Obama comes across as trying to wield some moral superiority on this issue, and what kills is me is how many religious leaders will follow him down that path. I think they might all just be blinded by some mixture of arrogance and ignorance.

Abortion is not health care; it is violence. Anyone who wants to belittle the concerns of pro-lifers on this matter has immediately lost all of my respect for their moral beliefs.

And by the by, here's another direct quote:

"President Obama has repeatedly said that under the health care overhaul efforts in Congress, 'if you like your health care plan, you keep your health care plan.' But he can’t make that promise to everyone.

• In fact, under the House bill, some employers might have to modify plans after a five-year grace period if they don’t meet minimum benefits standards.
  
• Furthermore, some firms are likely to buy different coverage for their workers than they have now, or simply drop coverage and pay a penalty instead, leaving workers to buy their own private coverage or go on a new federal insurance plan."

Oh wait, what? Government getting involved in the marketplace would actually cause businesses to have to change the way they make decisions?

I agree with everything Obama says about how we are responsible to make real reforms to help people in need. We are responsible, and if we totally screw it up by ramming through yet another plan that increases government involvement in the private sector, we will only make things worse.

I hate to say it, but I might just be getting even more upset with Obama every single day.

Pro-lifers be warned

This is pretty much all the big names in the pro-life movement on one video saying that Obamacare is going to be devastating to our cause. If you have any sort of pro-life convictions at all, I urge you to somehow get involved.

Hey, this is my 100th post. I think it's fitting that it should be about pro-life issues, since one of the main reasons I started blogging last fall was because I was so frustrated at people's lack of understanding of how liberal Obama was on certain issues, such as abortion.

I remember people telling me he was just so "inspirational," blah blah blah. Can anyone seriously say that matters now? Here we are waiting to see if Obama and the Democrats are going to pass the biggest government take-over of health care ever, which will have enormous consequences for future generations.

Right now, what kind of person Obama is, the way he makes you feel when he talk, and anything inspirational about him are all completely irrelevant. What matters is that he just doesn't have good ideas about the way our country should be going.

All I want is for people to think before they vote, and where we are right now seems to me to be a product of people voting on anything but real issues. Change, hope, inspiration are all meaningless words in the land of politics. What matters is the policies people actually put in place, and in Obama's case, they're absolutely terrifying.

There's my two cents. Maybe in three more years we can have another "change," so we can fix all this nonsense.

Darfur--All We Get Is Words

Well, I intended to write quite a bit more on my vacation, but you'd be surprised how busy family can keep you.

I gotta say, as frustrated as I am with Barack Obama, being the pro-lifer that I am, I try to give him the benefit of the doubt. But as fate would have it, I'm committed to another cause that is also getting frustrated with Obama.

Anyone remember Darfur in Sudan? Now 2.7 million people have been forced out of their homes, and hundreds of thousands have been killed at the hands of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir. (Click here to learn more.)

I was hopeful back during election season that whoever became president would actually do something about this. This is one issue where I was happy with Obama (as well as John McCain and Hillary Clinton, since they all agreed). As you can see in the video, Obama certainly gave us the right words.

Edit: I didn't like hearing that video come on every time I loaded my blog, so I took it off. You can view the video here.

But where's the action? Now I'm getting letters from Jerry Fowler, President of the Save Darfur Coalition, telling me that "no long-term strategy for easing the suffering of the people of Darfur" has been made.

So I'm signing a letter that the Save Darfur Coalition has drafted to President Obama, saying that the US needs to send a clear message to Sudan, giving them two simple options:

"One: If Sudan permits immediate and unimpeded humanitarian access, secures peace in Darfur and South Sudan by fully implementing the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, and removes its President indicted for war crimes, a clear process toward normalization of relations and rejoicing the community of nations can begin.

Two: If President Bashir and his party are defiant and continue to undermine peace, a series of escalating costs will ensue, including diplomatic isolation, targeted economic sanctions, an effective and expanded arms embargo and, if necessary to stop massive loss of civilian life, eventual targeted military action."

I think Fowler's plan is pretty sound. Now all I'm wondering is whether Obama has the dedication to this issue to push this plan through.

Could the president's overall attitude towards foreign relations be stifling his actions on this issue? Maybe his propensity to shy away from anything that remotely smacks of George W. Bush style interventionism is keeping him from stopping this genocide.

I don't know what the deal is. But I just can't sit around and not say anything when hundreds of thousands have died, and millions are in dire straits.

I hate sounding like a public service announcement, but, if you care about this like I do, go to www.savedarfur.org to learn what you can do.

Obama's Goals on Abortion

LifeNews.com has published an interesting first-hand take on what the Obama administration is really about when it comes to abortion:

Two days before President Obama’s commencement address at Notre Dame, I was at the White House for one of the meetings that he spoke about. About twenty of us with differing views on abortion were brought in to find “common ground.”

...

Melody Barnes, the Director of Domestic Policy Council and a former board member of Emily’s List, led the meeting. As the dialogue wound down, she asked for my input.

...

Melody testily interrupted to state that she had to correct me. “It is not our goal to reduce the number of abortions.”

The room was silent.

The goal, she insisted, is to “reduce the need for abortions.”

The article goes on to ask all the questions that are obvious to pro-lifers: "Does Obama want to reduce the “need” but not the number of abortions? In that case, is he okay with “unneeded” abortions?"

With people from Emily's List shaping Obama's domestic policy, you can bet that his administration will be completely out of step with the American people on abortion. Polls show a strong majority (about 60%) feel abortion should be illegal in all but a few circumstances.

I'm having flashbacks to November, when all my friends were telling me how Obama was so great. Remember what they were saying about his abortion views? Oh, don't worry, he'll work to reduce the number of abortions.

But what has he done? Nothing that would remotely contribute to accomplishing that. And now we have a top Obama official saying that's not even the goal at all. In fact, she can't say that's the goal, because saying we want to reduce the number of abortions implies there's something wrong with abortions.

I rarely appreciate Ann Coulter, but I must give her credit for an article she wrote the other day successfully summarizing the frustration of pro-lifers in this country:

Showing his open-mindedness, Obama asked, "How does each of us remain firm in our principles ... without demonizing those with just as strongly held convictions on the other side?"
[...]

A good start would be letting us vote.

Liberals can be all sweet reason as long as their preference for abortion on demand is lyingly called a "constitutional right," immutable to the tiniest alteration by the voters.

In the minuscule areas where abortion policy can be affected, Obama has shown his passion for compromise by always taking the most extreme pro-abortion position.

For all my hopes that we can be more charitable and understanding toward one another on this issue, there are times when I can't help but get angry. All the evidence that I've seen suggests that what Obama says about compromise is just a politician's front. He looks so nice on camera, but I can't help but think there's something insidious about how his poise and confident demeanor serve to deceive everyone about his real beliefs.

People who really are radically pro-abortion will try to discourage us by saying that the rest of the country is on board with this, and that's why they voted for Obama. But the evidence just doesn't show that, and I find such bullying rather offensive.

There are other critical issues out there, and on many of those issues I very much respect the views of those who side with Obama. But if the abortion issue is important, and I think it is, then Obama needs to be held accountable for his repeated deception. Those who seek to defend him on the issue also need to wake up, because at this point it's really kind of offensive that anyone should call Obama anything but radically pro-abortion.

Pro-lifers gain a slight majority

Gallup has released a poll showing that a slight majority of Americans now self-identify as "pro-life." This has never happened since Gallup started polling this issue back in 1995.

I was curious about why this happened, and Gallup has some interesting theories. They point out that over the past year the number of Republicans self-identifying as "pro-life" has increased by 10%, whereas Democrats haven't shifted much on the issue. They offer this explanation:

"With the first pro-choice president in eight years already making changes to the nation's policies on funding abortion overseas, expressing his support for the Freedom of Choice Act, and moving toward rescinding federal job protections for medical workers who refuse to participate in abortion procedures, Americans -- and, in particular, Republicans -- seem to be taking a step back from the pro-choice position. However, the retreat is evident among political moderates as well as conservatives.

It is possible that, through his abortion policies, Obama has pushed the public's understanding of what it means to be "pro-choice" slightly to the left, politically. While Democrats may support that, as they generally support everything Obama is doing as president, it may be driving others in the opposite direction."

It's an interesting short-run analysis, but what I'm interested in is the long-run. The fact is, Gallup polling shows that there has been a roughly steady shift over the past 14 years toward the pro-life side. What does this mean?

One thing that makes these data complicated to analyze is that political orientation also changes over time, just as views on specific issues do. So it's not really sound to say, "Liberals didn't change their views on this." Maybe there are people out there who used to identify as liberal, but then changed their position on abortion, and so now they guess they're politically moderate, even though their basic outlook has remained the same in a lot of ways. You get the idea.

In any case, even if liberals really haven't budged on this issue (20% of them still identify as pro-life, by the way), moderates surely have (45% pro-life, up from 38% last year), and it really doesn't make sense to me to explain this using Barack Obama. For whatever reason (I can think of a couple), Obama is attractive to a lot of moderates (even Republicans), and I just don't see them becoming more pro-life because they're turned off by his political agenda.

What's most significant, in my opinion, is the shift in views on the actual question of when abortion should be legal. Some people have strange definitions of "pro-life" and "pro-choice," but there's no denying what these data mean:

• Last year, 28% of Americans said abortion should be legal in all circumstances. This year, only 22% said so.
• Last year, only 17% of Americans said abortion should be illegal in all circumstances. This year, 23% said so.

This represents a clear shift in actual opinion among Americans, not just a shift in self-labeling. In order to explain this, I just don't think you can deny the power of peaceful vigils like 40 Days for Life, the passionate presence of Students for Life of America, or the compassionate work of Feminists for Life.

I think the bottom line is, pro-lifers on the ground are getting it done, changing opinions with facts, with passion, and with compassion. Folks like Planned Parenthood are getting so desperate as to call for days of protest against charitable organizations that give women free resources for pregnancy and parenting. It's kind of sad.

Ideally, people would stop seeing this as a war between pro-life and pro-choice. But, as Barack Obama so tactfully pointed out at his Notre Dame graduation speech, "at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable." Maybe pro-lifers really do just have to keep fighting to make themselves heard. The evidence shows it's working.