"Backlash and the 2020 Election"

Sydney M. Williams

swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“Backlash and the 2020 Election”

April 19, 2019

“We inhabit a backlash moment in American History of uncertain duration.”

                                                                                                Joseph Ellis (1943-)

                                                                                                Preface

                                                                                                American Dialogue, 2018

Backlash is defined as a strong and adverse reaction or protest by a large number of people, especially to social or political developments. What we saw in the Middle East and North Africa beginning in late 2010 and going into the spring of 2011 and what we see today in Sudan and Algiers are backlashes against authoritarian governments. History does not proceed in straight lines. It is replete with consequential setbacks. Sometimes they are for the better – the English Civil War of 1642, the American Revolution in 1775, the world-wide women’s suffrage movement that began in the 19^thCentury, and the U.S. Civil Rights movement that ran through the 1950s and ‘60s. Sometimes they are for the worse, like the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the rise of National Socialism in Germany, following the 1919 Treaty of Versailles. And sometimes the verdict is unclear, like Brexit. In 2016, it was a backlash against elitism and the establishment that catapulted Mr. Trump into the White House.  

In any society there will always be groups that rise up to make a point, highlight a grievance, or correct a wrong. Generally, they are without (or with limited) violence. They manifest a dynamic society and, while temporarily disruptive, they often change things for the better. We think of women’s liberation in the 1960s and the more recent gay-rights movement, positive developments that reflected changing mores. Other backlashes are political, like Occupy Wall Street, the Tea Party, BlackLivesMatter and #MeToo, with the intent to garner power rather than righting a social or cultural wrong. It is how we move forward. They are not unlike creative destruction in economics, a term used by Joseph Schumpeter to describe innovations in manufacturing.

Now, it is the continued enmity toward Mr. Trump that is causing Democrats to push beyond the boundaries of decency and common sense, even disrespecting those non-Trumpians whose conservative ideas and opinions differ from their own. Consider a few non-issue issues that are claimed vital to leftist elites, but are of little concern to middle class voters:

Social Justice:               The concept that society consists of oppressors and victims. Oppressors are whites, Asians, male, heterosexuals, Christians and Jews. Victims are people of color, Muslims, females, bisexuals, homosexuals and transsexuals. Anyone who supports Mr. Trump is either an oppressor or an ignoramus. Elites pride themselves as supporters of victims.

            

Political Correctness:     This occurs when language and policy are excised of any possibility of insult or offense, especially to one considered a “victim.” Taken to extremes, political correctness leads to a dumbed-down electorate incapable of defending him or herself. Anything President Trump says or does, according to these false paragons of virtues, is politically incorrect. 

Identity Politics:            This is the tendency for people to form groups, for political purposes, based on race, religion, sexual preference, or any such outward appearances, which have nothing to do with political ideas or ideologies. In the empty minds of those on the left, one cannot have a political philosophy that differs from what has been sanctioned.

Climate:                       The left has trivialized science to serve their political ends. There is a refusal to debate causes of climate change. The assumption: if you do not agree with us that climate change is caused by man you are a “climate change denier,” an absurd statement, especially for anyone having grown up in New England. 

Multiculturalism:          This is a term that has been hijacked by the left to infer that if one does not agree with their belief that all cultures are equal, one is a xenophobe, homophobe or a misogynist. The term no longer defines a society, such as America’s, which has people from myriad racial and religious backgrounds living together but tethered by the laws of our country and the customs and traditions of our common history. In invoking multiculturalism today, the left assumes a patronizing attitude toward those who believe it was principally the magnetism of liberty that drew immigrants to these shores.

Equality:                       Free-market capitalism has been the principal reason poverty has declined over the past two hundred years. In his 2018 book, The Economics of Poverty, History, Measurement and Policy, Martin Ravillion suggests extreme poverty rates in 1800 were about 85%. Today, Action Against Hunger puts that number at 10.7%, with 90% in Asia and Africa. The lowest rates of poverty are in those countries where democracy and capitalism have flourished. The poorest in countries where Socialism and authoritarianism have thrived. It is equality of opportunity that needs be encouraged and offered. Outcomes are based on aspiration, effort and ability, qualities that differ from one person to the next. A promise of equal outcomes is an empty promise, as it can never be fulfilled without violating the rule of law and impinging on the rights of people.

On all of these issues the left has taken extreme positions, and they are standing fast. Too often, they let blind hatred of Mr. Trump guide their behavior. As well, they have ignored a large swath of the American public, calling them “deplorables.” On issues like immigration and education, the left has taken stance from which they are immune from any negative consequences, because of where they live and where they send their children to school. On others, like climate and political correctness, they ignore the costs, both in terms of dollars spent and/or freedoms lost.                               

                                    

At its essence, the difference between the right and the left on these issues has to do with our expectation for government. What is its role and what is its purpose? The preamble to the Constitution says it is to “…establish Justice, to insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our posterity…” Does the welfare for ourselves and our posterity include the redistribution of taxes collected? Or has government become so intrusive that it impedes our rights as individuals? These are questions over which reasonable people will disagree. The Founders left some of these terms vague, knowing interpretation will change to reflect new societal norms. But they did emphasize the rights of the individual, and I doubt they expected the adamancy, nastiness and partiality so prevalent today. 

When passions rule reason, reactions occur and often not the ones intended. Hatred for Mr. Trump can be seen in the refusal to accept the findings of the Mueller report, an investigation initiated and supported by the left. This is not a defense of Mr. Trump’s manners and etiquette. They leave much to be desired. But he doesn’t deserve the blind disdain he has received. His tax and deregulatory policies have helped economic growth and especially minorities. He has faced down those who, while misusing government agencies like the IRS and the FBI, would wrench away his Presidency. Would those conservatives who played by the Queensbury Rules have fared as well? From the perspective of this unrepentant conservative, the upside to the emotional display of Trump-hatred and the concomitant disarray among Democrats is that a backlash against the supercilious, arrogant elites now in charge of their Party might well lead to the re-election of Donald J. Trump in 2020. That is not the outcome those creating the backlash would prefer.

"Advocacy and Bias: In Media, Universities and Federal Bureaucracy"

Sydney M. Williams

swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“Advocacy and Bias: In Media, Universities and Federal Bureaucracy”

December 11, 2017

“It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of something he was never reasoned into.”

                                                                                    Ascribed to Jonathon Swift (1667-1745)

We live in a time of media bias. From universities to news anchors to reporters, opinions dominate facts. “Our information environment is sick,” so warns David Patrikarakos, in his book War in 140 Characters, “…where facts are less important than narrative, where people emote rather than debate...” What is less publicized is bias in the federal government’s bureaucracy. For example, in last year’s election, 97% of Justice Department employees’ political contributions went to Hillary Clinton. She received 94% of all donations from IRS employees, and from those in the Department of Education, she received 99.7% of all monies. That bias is understandable, in the sense that Democrats are the Party of an expanding government, while Republicans would shrink it. But, still…

Trying to uncover the facts of the tax bill, the Mueller investigation, or climate change is more challenging than a 1000-piece jig-saw puzzle, and more fraught with emotion than a teen-ager. Advocacy has replaced reporting, and angry words, reasoned debate. Political partisanship is molded into our youths in our colleges and universities. Objectivity is missing from those responsible for ensuring a smooth, post-election transition from one Party to another. We have more information at our finger tips than ever before, but fewer disinterested reporters and news sources. Consequently, we are more polarized. For someone trying to make sense of the news, these barriers are almost insurmountable. A decline in print media and the rise in internet-related news, has aggravated the bias.

The tax bill has been vilified. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) called it “Armageddon,” though later walked that back. Larry Summers, economist, and former president of Harvard, said the bill would kill 10,000 people each year. There was no evidence to support such an imprudent allegation. “…Tilting the United States tax code to benefit wealthy Americans…,” is the way The New York Times put it. The article omitted the fact that the top 1% of wage earners pay 40% of all income taxes, that the top 10% pay 70%, and that the bottom 50% pay no federal income taxes. In the Wall Street Journal, Tom Steyer was hyperbolic. The plan “…puts another knife into American Democracy.” Consider the hullabaloo regarding losing or limiting the ability to deduct state and local taxes. Who gets hurt? It is not the 80% of the population that makes less than $100,000 a year. It is the wealthy, like Mr. Steyer in high-income-taxed states like California, and New York, New Jersey and Connecticut where publishers, editors and reporters of the Times live.

All governments (including states, cities and towns) rely on taxes to fund services. But why should residents of Florida, Texas and Nevada pay higher federal income tax rates than those with the same incomes in states like California and New York? Why is the State of Connecticut’s budget, on a per-capita basis, twice that of Florida, even though the latter has more immigrants and elderly, as a percent of their population, than the former?

The current federal tax code is 74,608 pages long. Complexity helps large corporations and the wealthy through special exemptions and allowances, and their ability to hire high-priced lawyers and accountants. Complexity is what feeds the denizens of Washington’s swamps. Simplification, lower taxes and reduced regulation is what encourages economic growth – a necessity for government to maintain essential programs. The best answer would be a flat tax, but that is not possible in a country of 330 million people, where legislation is crafted by 535 elected representatives, each representing different parts of the country, and each susceptible to special interests and reliant on them to fund campaigns. One might conclude that a benevolent dictator would be preferable, but there is no such thing as a dictator (or administrative state) that is benevolent.

The Mueller investigation is another example of facts rendered extraneous by a media that dislikes Mr. Trump, loyalists to the “resistance,” and by Left-leaning employees of the Justice Department. The original purpose of Robert Mueller’s probe was to uncover proof of collusion between Mr. Trump and the Russians. After seven months and almost seven million dollars, they have found nothing. The arrest of Michael Flynn on charges of lying to the FBI raised hopes on the Left, but that was for a conversation after the election. The Washington Post and The New York Times recently disclosed that Peter Strzok, a lead FBI investigator – a chief lieutenant to former FBI Director James Comey – was demoted after it was discovered he had sent anti-Trump texts to his mistress (also an employee of the FBI) last summer. Given less ink was the fact that Mr. Strzok was outed in August, but no one on Mr. Mueller’s team bothered to tell the House Intelligence Committee (or the press), and his texts have not been released. And what about another of Mr. Mueller’s deputies, Jeannie Rhee? She was personal attorney to Ben Rhodes and also represented the Clinton Foundation. And Andrew Weissmann? He had praised acting Attorney General Sally Yates for defying President Trump. Where are investigative journalists? Where is fairness? Where is justice?

The investigation brings to mind Edwin Fadiman’s 1971 novel, Who Will Watch the Watchers?, a story of post-World War II Nazis in South America. If we can’t trust our elected officials and can’t trust those who are supposed to conduct non-partisan investigations, and we can’t trust the media, who can we trust? Special Counsels are appointed by the Justice Department, and are not accountable to voters. Once embedded, they are hard to remove, regardless of legitimate reason.

Climate change is yet another area where politics trumps common sense. Anthropogenic global warming is accepted wisdom by a credulous press. EPA Secretary Scott Pruitt has urged the creation of “red-teams, blue-teams,” where scientists publically challenge each other’s evidence on man-made climate change. But the Left refuses to participate in this logical exercise, expressing outrage that their conclusions should be questioned. No sensible person doubts that man has had an effect on climate. The questions have always been: The degree of effect? Is change inevitable? Is it part of nature? Can it be reversed? While the Left has always referred to skeptics as “deniers,” the truth is they are agnostic, while the Left are fervent believers.

Keep in mind, climate change is big business. Oil companies, coal mining and myriad other resource businesses depend on laws governing the environment. But, so do organizations like the Sierra Club, Greenpeace and the Audubon Society. They have budgets involving millions of dollars. The Sierra Club employs over 500 people in the U.S. Greenpeace has a budget in excess of $250 million. The National Audubon Society has over 550,000 members in 518 chapters in North America. These may be eleemosynary organizations, but they are big, with a self-interest in their perpetuation. Both sides employ lobbyists. Remember also, Al Gore made tens of millions of dollars off man-made climate change. One is reminded of H.L. Mencken – a cynical but insightful reporter – who wrote in his 1918 book, Defense of Women, “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed – and hence clamorous to be led to safety – by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.”

Advocacy should not be the purpose of the press, nor the job of government bureaucrats. It should not be the role of universities. The first has responsibility for keeping citizens informed – to keep them apprised of the facts. Opinion writing should be limited to the paper’s editorial page. Bureaucrats have the obligation to keep the wheels of government running smoothly and fairly, regardless of which Party is in power. Fairness and justice should supersede Party loyalty. Colleges are supposed to inform, not apostatize.   

"The Paris Accord - Much Ado About Nothing"

Sydney M. Williams

swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“The Paris Accord – Much Ado About Nothing”

June 12, 20117

“Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more,

Men were deceivers ever, –

One foot in sea and one on shore,

To one thing constant never.”

                                                                                                     William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

                                                                                                     “Much Ado About Nothing”

                                                                                                     Act II, Scene 3

The importance of the Paris Accord has been greatly exaggerated. It is vital to the narrative of leftists, but it makes no requirements with respect to climate. It was “largely symbolic,” a good friend (a man who resides deep in left field) e-mailed me. He later added, “these days, symbolism is everything.”

It is actions, not symbols or words, that are meaningful, at any time and in every situation. The behavior of elites does not match their rhetoric. As Victor Davis Hanson recently noted, private jets – a favored mode of transportation for wealthy progressives – emit “more carbon emissions in a year than do entire small towns in Ohio.” The U.S. pulled out of the Kyoto Protocol in March 2001, but that did not affect our emissions’ reductions. According to the NYC Data Science Academy, European countries failed to meet their Kyoto target levels of per capita CO2 emissions, while the United States did. The reason we succeeded was because of innovation, not supranational mandates – energy companies, using hydraulic fracking and horizontal drilling, substituted natural gas for coal on an unprecedented basis.

The Paris Accord has been signed by 190 countries. Much has been made that only Syria, Nicaragua and the U.S. have not signed the Accord – and Nicaragua said it wasn’t tough enough. But, besides symbolism, what was the point? Wealthy countries contractually committed to nothing, but are expected to send monies to emerging nations. India and China, the world’s largest per-capita polluters, were exempted from taking any actions until 2030. And emerging countries stand to take in money – to help them meet developed countries’ standards. What’s to lose? Why wouldn’t they sign the Accord?

When Mr. Trump announced that the U.S. would be withdrawing from the Accord, Hollywood and main-stream media went ballistic. Bette Midler called the President a “megalomaniac” who was voted in by “numbskulls,” (including yours truly). Al Gore said the decision was “reckless and indefensible.” The Washington Post accused Mr. Trump of “turning his back on the world.” David Brooks’ column was headlined: “Donald Trump Poisons the World.” But to me, he looks like the small boy from the Hans Christian Anderson’s tale who proclaimed the emperor naked – the one person willing to speak truth. The New York Times acknowledged in an editorial that the Accord “does not require any country to do anything.” Yet, that same editorial referred to Mr. Trump as a man who “knows nothing” and does “dumb things.” So, why is the Accord so important? Because progressives have determined that the science of climate change is forever settled. It is part of their mantra, and that of their commercial dependencies. As Holman Jenkins, Jr. recently wrote in The Wall Street Journal, “…the whole point of being in office is to redirect resources to interest groups best able to reward [one’s self and one’s Party].” That the Accord does.

In announcing America’s withdrawal from the agreement, the President was respectful. He said he “…would begin negotiations to re-enter either the Paris accord, or an entire new transaction on terms that are fair to the United States, its businesses, its workers, its people, its taxpayers.” That doesn’t sound “reckless,” “dumb,” or like a “megalomaniac.” The left has been reacting to this issue with heat and hypocrisy. A front-page article in the June 4^th edition of The New York Times, read: “How G.O.P. leaders Came to Reject Climate Science.” In the article, Coral Davenport and Eric Lipton claim Republicans do not believe in man-caused climate change. That is wrong, or “fake news” if you prefer. Excepting some kooks, no one on the right rejects science; no one rejects the fact of climate change, and no one claims man has not played a role. The mules, in this debate, are all on the left. It is they who insist that causes can be precisely determined. Science is the pursuit of answers. It is delving into the unknown. To claim that the science of climate change is “settled” shows a disregard for scientific discovery. Science is rarely, if ever, settled, and certainly not in matters as complex as climate. 

Bjorn Lomborg, president of the Copenhagen Consensus Center and former head of the Danish government’s Environmental Assessment Institute in Copenhagen, noted that adherence to the Paris accords non-binding recommendations would cost a trillion dollars a year, all to reduce global temperatures by 0.36 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100. Lomborg’s alternative: encourage investment in non-carbon power…which is what we are doing and which we will continue to do. While regulation is necessary, it should carry a light touch. It is the individual’s aspiration, creativity, ability and a willingness to take risk that leads to innovation.

Besides its cost, its reliance on peer pressure and its ineffectiveness, there are other reasons to quit the Paris Climate Accord: The Accord subjects a large segment of the economy to oversight by a supranational body – not a positive thing, if economic growth is an objective. The Accord allows the world’s two largest emitters of carbon dioxide, China and India, to ignore any recommendations for a dozen years. The Accord asks developed nations (read: US) to pay $100-$200 billion a year to developing nations. If history is guide, a significant portion of those funds would end up in the Swiss bank accounts of a few dictatorial leaders. (It is not as though we have money to spare.) President Obama signed the Accord, but only as his term neared its end – in September 2016, nine months after the Paris meeting. And he did not submit what is essentially a treaty to the Senate, because he knew it would not garner a two-thirds majority.

Global leaders must balance economic growth with protecting the Earth. We must recognize that people everywhere want to live better lives. We must acknowledge that the world is more prosperous and more equitable because of democratic, free-market capitalism. As democracies and capitalism flourished over the past two centuries, poverty declined and equality improved. As globalization increased, so did wealth, health and longevity for millions, but so have greenhouse gasses. We should continue to minimize the effect we have on the Earth and the skies. But we must recognize that the ability to correct environmental damage is a function of wealth, which is why economics are essential to any solution.

The Paris Accord is a “feel-good, do-nothing” program. Apart from the vitriol it has generated from the left, it is much ado about nothing. The world could use a climate agreement, but one that is fair, sustainable, and which recognizes that economic growth is crucial to progress.