Category Archives: Libertarianism

DENVER (KDVR) Colorado is getting bluer, even if it is a purplish blue.

Colorado has three statewide measures on the ballot for an November 2021 election: a fiscal accountability amendment, a tax increase for marijuana sellers and a property tax cut. The Colorado Secretary of State will begin mailing ballots to voters on Oct. 8 ahead of election day.

The ballot initiatives could test the states growing conservative/liberal divide. Two of the measures Proposition 119 and Proposition 120 have been sponsored and promoted by Michael Fields, executive director of conservative Colorado Rising Action.

Fields is also a political analyst for FOX31.

The measures lean into Republican goals. While Colorado is a relatively low tax state, its voter rolls have gotten more and more Democratic, even as the state adds mainly unaffiliated voters.

Since last September, the state has gained far more Democratic voters than Republican ones. There are now 29,227 more registered active voters in the state than in September 10 times the 3,117 Republican voters the state gained in the same time period.

Gains to the relatively minor Libertarian Party outnumbered Republican voter gains by more than 1,000.

Still, by far the biggest party gains happened with unaffiliated voters. Colorado has 189,280 more independents now than it had in September 2020.

Purple though they might be in name, records show those voters are more blue than red.

Unaffiliated voters are allowed to list a party preference on their registration if they choose. Not all do, but far more of those who do prefer one party prefer the Democratic Party.

Of unaffiliated voters, 59% swing blue. Republican-leaning unaffiliated voters are only half as many, making up 31% of the party preference whole.

Largely, this follows population trends. As Colorado has exploded with in-migrants from other states, its Front Range counties have gotten less Republican as theyve gotten more populous.

The map above charts the difference between the number of Democrats and Republicans gained in each county since last September 2020. Deeper-colored states gained more of that party than the other.

The counties that gained more Democrats than Republicans in the highest amount were almost entirely in the Front Range. Arapahoe and Jefferson counties, in particular, added 10,000 more Democrats than Republicans.

Most counties outside the Denver metro, though, got redder, but not by the same margin that metro counties got bluer.

Mesa and Weld counties got the largest amount of Republicans over Democrats. Even combined though, they only gained 1,000 more red than blue voters.

See the original post here:
Voter rolls looking bluer ahead of off-year election - FOX31 Denver

After a month of disastrous news coverage following various revelations of alleged misdeeds, Facebook reached its nadir on Monday with the site suffering a massive outage. Perhaps Facebook isn't so dominant, after all, and thus government force is absolutely not necessary to constrain it.

All apps in the Facebook familyincluding Instagram and WhatsAppwent down simultaneously on Monday. By the evening, they were up and running again, though not in time to rescue Facebook's stock, which slipped 4.9 percent in value. (CEO Mark Zuckerberg reportedly lost more than $6 billion in just a few hours.) The outage was so bad that Facebook employees couldn't even get inside the company's headquarters: The security systems were part of the same network.

The company's recent woes have fueled a new wave of criticisms from tech skeptics on both the left and right who want the government to either break up Big Tech, take away its liability protection, or either prohibitor possibly require!so-called misinformation on the platforms. A major theme of the Big Tech battles is that former President Donald Trump, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (DMass.), and everyone in between wants to go after the companies, but for opposite and often conflicting reasons.

Conservatives think the platforms engage in too much moderation and have corrupted democracy in favor of 2020 election winner Joe Biden; liberals think Facebook doesn't practice nearly enough moderationallowing right-wing violence and faulty info about quack COVID-19 cures to spreadand also corrupted U.S. democracy in favor of 2016 election winner Donald Trump. That the most extreme and opportunistic members of both political factions like to blame all their problems on Big Tech probably tells us more about them than it does about Facebook.

If there's one fear that unites the left and right, though, it's moral panic about social mediaInstagram, in particularcausing feelings of depression and anxiety among teenage girls. This isn't a new fear: The psychologist Jean Twenge has been writing about it for years, and even Jonathan Haidt, co-author ofThe Coddling of the American Mind and a figure generally well-respected by libertarians, thinks there's something to it. But it received a powerful narrative boost recently after a former Facebook employee came forward as a "whistleblower" and provided a series of scoops to The Wall Street Journal.The most significant of these scoopsas judged by the fact that it prompted an immediate (and, per usual, wildly embarrassing) Senate hearingconcerned Facebook's internal efforts to gauge Instagram's ill-effects on the mental wellness of young people.

The whistleblower, Frances Haugen, appeared on 60 Minuteson Sunday and will testify before Congress on Tuesday. Thanks to Haugen and the Journal's reporting, we know that Facebook attempted to survey teen users on how the platforms were impacting their mental health. Unsurprisingly, their findings were not entirely encouraging: One in five respondents said Instagram made them feel worse about themselves, and teens already struggling with mental illness said the platform was giving them a harder time.

Ostensibly, the problem with Instagram is that it promotes social competitionthe race for likes and commentsamong users posting artificial, filtered images of themselves, which may exacerbate body images issues. Of course, there's absolutely nothing new about this: Glossy magazines have been accused of doing the same thing for decades, but no one talks about the existential threats of CosmopolitanorTeen Vogue.High school is a major source of misery and depression for many teenagers, but as Mike Solana pointed out in a terrific article on the anti-Facebook crusade, no one is demanding that the secretary of education be hauled before Congress:

Among teenagers in a state of mental crisis, how many are struggling with their family? How many are struggling with their friend group, or their crush? How many are struggling in a classroom? To the question of "does high school make you want to kill yourself," how many suicidal teenagers would answer "yes" emphatically? Almost all of them? Next question, when are [we] dragging the Secretary of Education in front of Congress to explain why he hasn't solved depression?

Solana pointed out that Haugen didn't tell us anything new about Facebook and Instagram: Her achievement was really one of self-branding. Since the mainstream media is already inclined to believe the very worst about social mediaa disfavored upstart competitoranyone who comes forward and tells the media exactly what they want to hear on this subject is going to be celebrated as a hero. Thus Haugen is already being hailed as some sort of brave truth-teller, though her perspective is very much the popular one in progressive circles: Facebook emboldens hate and disinformation, and it has far too much power.

On this last charge, it's never been more apparent that something close to the opposite is true. Far from occupying some dominant and unassailable position in modern society, Facebook's relevance is probably fading. The company is desperate to attract the sorts of usersyoung people, mostlywho provide cultural cache and excite advertisers and investors. But this is increasingly a losing battle. Facebookor "Boomerbook" as some call ithas never been less popular with the kids, and even Instagram faces tremendous competition from Snapchat, TikTok, and whatever cool new thing is coming along next.

"The truth is that Facebook's thirst for young users is less about dominating a new market and more about staving off irrelevance," wroteThe New York Times'Kevin Roose in an article that sounded a highly pessimistic note with respect to the company's long-term health. "Facebook's research tells a clear story, and it's not a happy one."

For the past several years, anti-tech crusaders on both the left and right have assured the public that Facebook is a menace, and can only be stopped via aggressive government action: antitrust legislation, Section 230 reform, and so on. Despite repeated threats, politicians never made good on their promises to do somethingand yet Facebook is undeniably in a much weaker position. While it's hard to predict the future, it's even harder to picture the company mounting some massive comeback and becoming a popular trendsetter once again. Expectations that Facebook had fought its way into an unbeatable, permanent, market-dominant position suddenly look incredibly foolish.

In fact, Facebook may soon find itself in the position ofneedinggovernment intervention to maintain its dominance. It's worth remembering that the company has actually come out in favor of reforming Section 230, the federal statute that limits the legal liability that online platforms face.

"I believe that Section 230 would benefit from thoughtful changes to make it work better for people, but identifying a way forward is challenging given the chorus of people arguingsometimes for contradictory reasonsthat the law is doing more harm than good," noted Zuckerberg during a March 2021 appearance before Congress.

Of course, tinkering with the liability protections enjoyed by social media sites could actually help Facebook stave off competition: As long as the company remains the largest social media site, its armies of moderators might be better prepared to deal with increased moderation demands than smaller rivals like Twitter. Facebook is also better positioned to lobby and steer whatever new governmental agency arises to enforce a modified version of Section 230. All those who support Facebook's bid for ongoing relevance should want the company to hand-pick the members of a new federal bureaucracy tasked with regulating Big Tech's policies; on the other hand, anyone who thinks the company should face free and fair competition might prefer to leave the matter out of the government's hands.

My new book, Tech Panic, is subtitled Why We Shouldn't Fear Facebook and the Future. The events of the past few weeks provide additional, concrete reasons. Zuckerberg's platform is not in control of our lives, our economy, or our democracy, and the mainstream media's cynical attempts to convince the public otherwise should be easierto dismiss in light of recent events.

Continued here:
As Facebook Crumbles, the Case for Breaking It Up Is Weaker Than Ever - Reason

Country

United States of AmericaUS Virgin IslandsUnited States Minor Outlying IslandsCanadaMexico, United Mexican StatesBahamas, Commonwealth of theCuba, Republic ofDominican RepublicHaiti, Republic ofJamaicaAfghanistanAlbania, People's Socialist Republic ofAlgeria, People's Democratic Republic ofAmerican SamoaAndorra, Principality ofAngola, Republic ofAnguillaAntarctica (the territory South of 60 deg S)Antigua and BarbudaArgentina, Argentine RepublicArmeniaArubaAustralia, Commonwealth ofAustria, Republic ofAzerbaijan, Republic ofBahrain, Kingdom ofBangladesh, People's Republic ofBarbadosBelarusBelgium, Kingdom ofBelizeBenin, People's Republic ofBermudaBhutan, Kingdom ofBolivia, Republic ofBosnia and HerzegovinaBotswana, Republic ofBouvet Island (Bouvetoya)Brazil, Federative Republic ofBritish Indian Ocean Territory (Chagos Archipelago)British Virgin IslandsBrunei DarussalamBulgaria, People's Republic ofBurkina FasoBurundi, Republic ofCambodia, Kingdom ofCameroon, United Republic ofCape Verde, Republic ofCayman IslandsCentral African RepublicChad, Republic ofChile, Republic ofChina, People's Republic ofChristmas IslandCocos (Keeling) IslandsColombia, Republic ofComoros, Union of theCongo, Democratic Republic ofCongo, People's Republic ofCook IslandsCosta Rica, Republic ofCote D'Ivoire, Ivory Coast, Republic of theCyprus, Republic ofCzech RepublicDenmark, Kingdom ofDjibouti, Republic ofDominica, Commonwealth ofEcuador, Republic ofEgypt, Arab Republic ofEl Salvador, Republic ofEquatorial Guinea, Republic ofEritreaEstoniaEthiopiaFaeroe IslandsFalkland Islands (Malvinas)Fiji, Republic of the Fiji IslandsFinland, Republic ofFrance, French RepublicFrench GuianaFrench PolynesiaFrench Southern TerritoriesGabon, Gabonese RepublicGambia, Republic of theGeorgiaGermanyGhana, Republic ofGibraltarGreece, Hellenic RepublicGreenlandGrenadaGuadaloupeGuamGuatemala, Republic ofGuinea, RevolutionaryPeople's Rep'c ofGuinea-Bissau, Republic ofGuyana, Republic ofHeard and McDonald IslandsHoly See (Vatican City State)Honduras, Republic ofHong Kong, Special Administrative Region of ChinaHrvatska (Croatia)Hungary, Hungarian People's RepublicIceland, Republic ofIndia, Republic ofIndonesia, Republic ofIran, Islamic Republic ofIraq, Republic ofIrelandIsrael, State ofItaly, Italian RepublicJapanJordan, Hashemite Kingdom ofKazakhstan, Republic ofKenya, Republic ofKiribati, Republic ofKorea, Democratic People's Republic ofKorea, Republic ofKuwait, State ofKyrgyz RepublicLao People's Democratic RepublicLatviaLebanon, Lebanese RepublicLesotho, Kingdom ofLiberia, Republic ofLibyan Arab JamahiriyaLiechtenstein, Principality ofLithuaniaLuxembourg, Grand Duchy ofMacao, Special Administrative Region of ChinaMacedonia, the former Yugoslav Republic ofMadagascar, Republic ofMalawi, Republic ofMalaysiaMaldives, Republic ofMali, Republic ofMalta, Republic ofMarshall IslandsMartiniqueMauritania, Islamic Republic ofMauritiusMayotteMicronesia, Federated States ofMoldova, Republic ofMonaco, Principality ofMongolia, Mongolian People's RepublicMontserratMorocco, Kingdom ofMozambique, People's Republic ofMyanmarNamibiaNauru, Republic ofNepal, Kingdom ofNetherlands AntillesNetherlands, Kingdom of theNew CaledoniaNew ZealandNicaragua, Republic ofNiger, Republic of theNigeria, Federal Republic ofNiue, Republic ofNorfolk IslandNorthern Mariana IslandsNorway, Kingdom ofOman, Sultanate ofPakistan, Islamic Republic ofPalauPalestinian Territory, OccupiedPanama, Republic ofPapua New GuineaParaguay, Republic ofPeru, Republic ofPhilippines, Republic of thePitcairn IslandPoland, Polish People's RepublicPortugal, Portuguese RepublicPuerto RicoQatar, State ofReunionRomania, Socialist Republic ofRussian FederationRwanda, Rwandese RepublicSamoa, Independent State ofSan Marino, Republic ofSao Tome and Principe, Democratic Republic ofSaudi Arabia, Kingdom ofSenegal, Republic ofSerbia and MontenegroSeychelles, Republic ofSierra Leone, Republic ofSingapore, Republic ofSlovakia (Slovak Republic)SloveniaSolomon IslandsSomalia, Somali RepublicSouth Africa, Republic ofSouth Georgia and the South Sandwich IslandsSpain, Spanish StateSri Lanka, Democratic Socialist Republic ofSt. HelenaSt. Kitts and NevisSt. LuciaSt. Pierre and MiquelonSt. Vincent and the GrenadinesSudan, Democratic Republic of theSuriname, Republic ofSvalbard & Jan Mayen IslandsSwaziland, Kingdom ofSweden, Kingdom ofSwitzerland, Swiss ConfederationSyrian Arab RepublicTaiwan, Province of ChinaTajikistanTanzania, United Republic ofThailand, Kingdom ofTimor-Leste, Democratic Republic ofTogo, Togolese RepublicTokelau (Tokelau Islands)Tonga, Kingdom ofTrinidad and Tobago, Republic ofTunisia, Republic ofTurkey, Republic ofTurkmenistanTurks and Caicos IslandsTuvaluUganda, Republic ofUkraineUnited Arab EmiratesUnited Kingdom of Great Britain & N. IrelandUruguay, Eastern Republic ofUzbekistanVanuatuVenezuela, Bolivarian Republic ofViet Nam, Socialist Republic ofWallis and Futuna IslandsWestern SaharaYemenZambia, Republic ofZimbabwe

See the article here:
Voice of the People 09/30/21 | Letters To Editor | leadertelegram.com - Leader-Telegram

In Clarksburg, we meet some of the victims, longtime employees who lose their health coverage and pensions. Poverty and diminishing opportunity in West Virginia also make it prime recruiting country for our all-volunteer military, and we meet badly damaged veterans. Recruitment from such communities enhances Washingtons ability to wage war and to keep America safe, including the speculators in Greenwich and the politicians in the nations capital, who are also kept safe from having their sons and daughters serve in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Perhaps local legislators should do better than Congress. Not so in West Virginia, where the legislature is allied with industry, and does little to protect its citizens, even when Freedom Industries, co-founded by a former cocaine dealer and tax evader, spills toxic chemicals into the Charleston water supply.

In Chicago, Osnos shows us the continuing struggle of African American children to get an education, and to avoid a largely hostile police force in an underfunded city. Many of them have never seen the lake, nor Michigan Avenue and its magnificent mile. What would either mean to them? Such exclusion from the best that the country has to offer is a running theme and, as Osnos notes, many of the Capitol rioters were visiting D.C. for the first time.

Some will find Osnoss picture too dark, too one-sided. American capitalism still permits many to flourish, and it supplies us with an immense range of goods and services. Yet it is true that Washington is largely hobbled by the needs of campaign finance and the clamor of lobbyists. And as corporations and the rich avoid taxes, and as health care devours one in every five dollars without delivering good health, federal and local governments are increasingly struggling to fund the police, teachers, roads and public health. For those without a four-year college degree, life is getting worse; their lives have become more painful and, since 2010, their life spans have shortened, even before the Covid pandemic. It is also true that our country has been polarized and paralyzed before, most recently in the 1960s, and we have not descended into another civil war.

In The Raging 2020s, Alec Ross similarly argues that our social contract is broken, that the roles of business, labor, government and foreign countries need to be rethought, and he supplies several of his favorite templates. Osnoss view is from the ground, Rosss view, that of the policy wonk, is from above, not the view of the people nor even the politicians. The best chapter (by far) is an immensely (and unusually) readable account of how tax havens and the competition between countries have allowed multinational companies, especially the big tech companies, to avoid paying taxes in any of the many jurisdictions in which they operate.

Read the original here:
Two Authors View America From Above and Below, and Are Not Happy With What They See - The New York Times

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. The first of several deadlines in a special election to fill the congressional seat left vacant by the death of U.S. Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Fla., is soon approaching.

Monday marks the deadline for those Palm Beach County or Broward County residents living in Florida's 20th Congressional District to change their party affiliations before the Nov. 2 primary election.

Hastings, who served in the House since 1993, died of pancreatic cancer in April. He was 84.

Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis set the primary and general election dates for Nov. 2 and Jan. 11, leaving the constituents of this mostly Democratic district without representation in Washington for months.

Am I eligible to vote in the special election?

The short answer is, most likely, yes, provided you meet a few basic requirements and assuming you reside within Florida's 20th Congressional District.

In order to register to vote, you must:

What do I need when I go to vote?

Polls are open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. during the special and general elections. Any voters waiting in line at 7 p.m. will have the opportunity to cast a ballot.

In order to vote, you must provide a Florida driver's license, identification card, U.S. passport or some other form of photo identification with signature.

Where is Florida's 20th Congressional District?

The district includes portions of Palm Beach and Broward counties. That includes parts of Loxahatchee, Royal Palm Beach, West Palm Beach and Lake Park in Palm Beach County and parts of Fort Lauderdale, Miramar and Pompano Beach in Broward County.

Who are the candidates?

A total 11 Democrats and two Republicans -- plus one Libertarian and three independents, one of whom is a write-in candidate -- are seeking to occupy the seat.

Here are the candidates, in alphabetical order by party:

DemocratsSheila Cherfilus-McCormick: CEO of Trinity Health Care ServicesElvin Dowling: West Palm Beach native, former aide and longtime mentee of HastingsBobby DuBose: minority leader in Florida House, representing portions of Broward CountyOmari Hardy: Florida House District 88, former Lake Worth Beach commissionerDale Holness: Broward County commissioner, former mayor once endorsed by HastingsPhil Jackson: retired U.S. Navy chief petty officerEmmanuel Morel: former president of Democratic Progressive Caucus of Palm Beach CountyBarbara Sharief: Broward County commissioner, previously served as first Black mayorImran Siddiqui: doctor of internal medicine in Broward CountyPriscilla Taylor: former state legislator, Palm Beach County commissioner and mayorPerry Thurston: Florida Senate District 33, representing portions of Broward County

RepublicansJason Mariner: former drug addict and convict, CEO of AdSkinzGreg Musselwhite: welding inspector who lost to Hastings in 2020 general election

LibertarianMike ter Maat: Hallandale Beach police officer since 2010

IndependentsJim FlynnLeonard SerratoreShelley Fain (write-in)

What is the difference between a primary and general election?

Florida is a closed-primary state, which means that only voters registered within a political party may vote in that party's primary election, unless a universal primary contest occurs. A universal primary contest is when all candidates for an office have the same party affiliation and the winner will have no opposition in the general election.

That is not the case in this special election, so voters won't be able to cast their ballots for a candidate in another party. For example, a Republican voter can't vote for a Democratic candidate during the primary election and vice versa.

Important Dates

WPTV

Monday, Oct. 4: Deadline to register for primary election or change party affiliationMonday, Dec. 13: Deadline to register for general electionSaturday, Oct. 23: 5 p.m. deadline to request vote-by-mail ballotTuesday, Nov. 2: 7 p.m. deadline to return vote-by-mail ballotTuesday, Nov. 2: District 20 primary electionTuesday, Jan. 11: District 20 general election

Early Voting Dates

Saturday, Oct. 23-Sunday, Oct. 31: 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. (primary election)Saturday, Jan. 1-Sunday, Jan. 9: 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. (general election)

Early Voting Locations

WPTV

Palm Beach County Library, Belle Glade Branch725 NW Fourth St.Belle Glade 33430

Palm Beach County Library, Main Library3650 Summit Blvd.West Palm Beach 33406

Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections, West County Branch Office2976 State Road 15, Second FloorBelle Glade 33430

Palm Beach State College, Loxahatchee Groves Campus15845 Southern Blvd.Loxahatchee Groves 33470

Wells Recreation & Community Center2409 Ave. H W.Riviera Beach 33404

Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections

Here is the original post:
Voter information guide for special election to fill Alcee Hastings' seat - WPTV.com

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

Gavin Newsoms overwhelming victory in Californias recall vote is a warning to Republicans to change their strategies and platform if they want to succeed in the mid-term elections.

California is bedeviled by horrific forest fires, power outages, water shortages, rising urban crime, COVID-19 restrictions, and surging illegal immigration. During the early days of the recall campaign, fallout from homelessness, a shoplifting epidemic that forced stores to close, and other sordid conditions gave Larry Elder some hope of deposing the governor.

Mr. Newsom is a high priest in the religion of woke, so much in fashion among morally pious and intolerant elites in finance, corporate suites, academia, and public schools. With his missionary fund-raising advantage, he managed to turn the recall ballot into a referendum on the Democrats approach to addressing the pandemicspecifically, President Bidens policies versus those of Republican governorsand on Donald Trump.

Campaigning for Newsom, Mr. Biden said, Voting no, well be protecting California from Trump Republicans trying to block us from beating this pandemic.

Republicans may choose to take some solace in the fact that so many Republicans have moved to Texas. However, despite all the agony the Golden State has endured this year, 64 percent of the electorate voted to retain Newsomabout the same as backed him for governor two years ago and voted for Mr. Biden last year.

In the wake of the Presidents announcement to extend vaccine mandates to private firms deeper into public education and hospitals, conservatives, libertarians, and Republicans should not be surprised.

Unvaccinated Americans are 4.5 times more likely to get infected with COVID-19 and 11 times more likely to die if infected. Though the risk of a breakthrough infection is small for the vaccinated, they must be exposed to an infected individual to face that risk. Generally, that means exposure to unvaccinated, unmasked folks.

The United States lags all major industrialized countries in vaccinations. Delta disruptions keep us from traveling and slowing the economy, and public acceptance of vaccine mandates is rising.

Also, all the distress Californians endure did not move the needle for Mr. Eldereven among swing votersbecause the Democrats have a narrativehowever repugnant to libertarians and conservativesthat finds resonance among swing voters.

Specifically, climate change is threatening coastal communities and the global food system. Sexism, structural racism, and globalization beget jaundiced market outcomes, damaging inequality, and monopoly abuses.

They attack the old Washington Consensus policiesfiscal conservativism, light-touch regulation, and free tradethat delivered acceptable growth and social progress for Presidents Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Clinton. However painful and expensive, they prescribe withdrawing from the worldleaving Afghanistan and cutting defense budgetsaggressive taxes on success and social spending, and tighter bank and antitrust regulation to redress inequality and boost growth.

The Democrats say their new taxes on households with incomes over $400,000 and corporations will pay for four entitlementschild allowances, universal pre-K and childcare, paid family and sick leave, and two years of free collegeplus address climate change and a host of other ills.

Unfortunately, budget trickery abounds. These programs are likely to cost up to $2 trillion more than advertised. The tax haul will come up short because, contrary to Democratic claims, their program will slow growth.

For example, means-testing child allowances and higher marginal tax rates for professionals will encourage lower-earning spouses to quit the job market. Higher capital gains taxes will discourage risk-taking in high-tech startups, and college is already a poor investment for half of those that enroll.

Overall, we face federal deficits of up to $2 trillion a year and will have little latitude to address a future pandemic or financial crisis.

Washington could hit its limit to sell new debt to the public and be forced to issue more bonds that the Federal Reserve would buy by printing more money. The resulting inflation would bring home the folly of spending more than our means with cruelty not seen since the days of Jimmy Carter and perhaps the Weimar Republic.

Voters may believe the warnings about the unaffordability of all this spending and instinctively accept that combined all these goodies will discourage work. Still, there is something attractive for everyone among the half of households that do not pay income taxes.

The goodies will come quickly, but the drag on growth will take several years to become apparent. In the meantime, Speaker Pelosi is betting Democrats can skate through the mid-terms. And with Republicans clinging to President Trump and without an alternative program, she may be right.

Peter Morici is an economist and emeritus business professor at the University of Maryland and a national columnist.

Read more from the original source:
California recall flop a warning to Republicans - Washington Times

'Ultimate knuckleheads': Gov. Murphy calls out anti-vaccine protesters

Gov. Phil Murphy showed rare public ire when anti-vaccination protesters started chanting during a bill signing ceremony.

Paul Wood Jr, NorthJersey.com

So now its a booze shortage?

Can this year get any worse?

Well, stay tuned. It just might.

This has been a hard year thats definitely an understatement. We still have three more months to go before the winter of our discontent. But lets take a look at the just-completed summer of trouble. What exactly did we learn? Better yet, what did we ignore at our own peril?

Before we explore all the darkness, let's take a moment and return to those hopeful, pre-spring days of February and March. People gleefully bared their biceps for a vaccine. Lines at the recreation center in my town stretched around the block on some afternoons. Strangers smiled at each other. Nurses told jokes as they stabbed you with a needle. President Joe Biden suggested that we should prepare to celebrate our newfound freedom on the Fourth of July.

Well, you know what happened.

Nearly one third of American adults refused the vaccine. Florida, led by its silly governor, became a hot zone. Texas also breathed in the idiot winds of warped libertarianism and led the charge into the mask wars. The so-called red states of "Trump Nation" proclaimed they would not join the rest of America in fighting a pandemic.

Welcome to the new Southern succession. The old, arrogant Confederacy is still alive. As we enter the third decade of the 21st century, we are a nation as divided as we were during the Civil War.

We need Abe Lincoln.

Sadly, we have Joe Biden.

Sorry, Democrats. I know youre shaking in your Birkenstocksand sweating through your tie-dyedDead Head T-shirts about the prospect of the Republican Visigoths sweeping into power in Congress and then electing someone like Ted Cruz or Josh Hawley as president in 2024, but Biden needs to find his rhetorical groove soon before he becomes another Jimmy Carter. Setting aside the results of the California recall vote, which left Democratic Gov. Gavin Newson in power,Democrats are all too adept at losing their way as they battle each other over competing agendas. They're proving it again sadly.

The nation faces dire problems, from the roller coaster investments of Wall Street to the deepening worries inside countless Main Street schools, restaurants and apartmentbuildings to name just a few places where people feel as if lifes foundations have become far too shaky.

Teachers increasingly talk of a lost generation of students who have fallen behind in math and reading. The nations hospitality industry of restaurants and hotels is now hooked on a weird version of inhospitable life support. And with one survey by the Magnify Money website showing 15.4%of apartment dwellers behind on their rent more than double the normal rate of delinquency America seems on the verge of a painful uptick of homelessness as winter approaches.

In just a few months, far too many hospital wards filled again with people gasping for breath and begging for the shot in the arm before they closed their eyes forever and headed for the cold darkness of a grave.

Meanwhile, we cant even drown our sorrows with a shot of whiskey or just a beer. Experts say there are not enough truckers to deliver liquid spirits to boost (or mask) the nations diminished spirit. Gov. Phil Murphys marketing campaign to promote vaccines with a shot and a beer for New Jersey residents might now be called a shot and maybe a beer one of these days.

Elsewhere, U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, the Kentucky Republican, and alleged journalists such as Tucker Carlson of Fox News sneered and proclaimed to millions of sycophants in their echo chambers how much they wanted to save America from the overreach of government mandates that require masks and vaccines. Millions of Americans cling to the misinformation spewed by Paul and Carlson and plenty of others. And look where it has led us? By the end of 2021, more than 700,000 Americans will have died from complications from COVID-19 complications that can mostly be stopped by a vaccine.

But right-wingers dont deserve all the blame for Americas plague of disunity.

Consider what our liberal leaders have been up to. For example, how is it possible that alleged progressive, Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, a Democrat whose district includes some of the poorest corners of the Bronx and Queens, could show up at a glittering Manhattan gala, wearing a donated designer dress with a Tax the Rich message on her dress and posing for the cameras like some sort of foolish runway model?Where are America's women in complaining about this idiotic display?

Column continues below gallery.

Welcome to the new generation of limousine liberals. Welcome also to the new version of Tom Wolfe's "Bonfire of the Vanities." Democrats: Are you listening?

Such is the state America as we enter the last quarter of 2021.

The just-ended summer will surely go down as a time of wasted hopes and dashed dreams.Our nation produced enough vaccines to protect everyone from this dangerous pandemic.And yet, we let our political foolishness run wild.

Here in New Jersey, where vaccines are not only plentiful but nearly 6million people have received a shot, more than 2,000 new COVID cases were recorded on Thursday. For context, its worth remembering that in late June, when we still held out hope that America would defeat this pandemic, the number of new daily cases in New Jersey had dropped to around 290. Since then, the massive increasein new cases falls mostly among one category of people those who refuse to get vaccinated.

So much for coming together to defeat a common foe.

But our disunity is not confined to just COVID vaccines.

A recent study by the Preply online educational platform found that we cant even agree on what language America should speak.About 93% of Republicans favor English only. Only 68% of Democrats believe that.

Another study by Digital.com, a website that caters to small businesses, found that nearly half of all consumers are unlikely to buy products from companies that align themselves with political views they disagree with.

This is our nation as we approach the final months of 2021.

Disunity is the new pandemic. Only this time, there is no vaccine.

Mike Kelly is an award-winningcolumnist for NorthJersey.com. To get unlimited access to his insightful thoughts on how we live life in New Jersey,please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email:kellym@northjersey.com

Twitter:@mikekellycolumn

See the rest here:
With 3 months to go, 2021 is already a dismal year. Welcome to the pandemic of disunity | Mike Kelly - NorthJersey.com

If there is a Trumpism after Trump, it might look a bit like Thielism or somewhere between the two. Its unclear where one ends and the other begins, though, because, as Max Chafkin says, its unclear whether there actually is a coherent Thielism. Chafkin is a Bloomberg reporter and the author of a recent book on Thiel, The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valleys Pursuit of Power. While there are certainly strains of authoritarianism and libertarianism that run throughout Thiels writing and political activities, Chafkin says, Thielism is riddled with so many contradictions that it remains, at its core, largely a mystery.

I called Chafkin to talk about his book and where Thielism goes from hereif it even exists in the first place.

This conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.

Katie Fossett: How would you describe Peter Thiels ideology?

Max Chafkin: I think there are real questions about whether or not there even is a coherent ideology. It could just be a collection of random contrarian impulses.

Theres always been a lot of libertarianism in Silicon Valley, but there are aspects of Thiels politics that aren't libertarian at all; theyre closer to authoritarianism. Its super-nationalistic, its a longing for a sort of more powerful chief executive, or, you know, a dictator, in other words.

I will say the speech that Zuckerberg gave at Georgetown in 2019 [where he defended Facebooks decision to publish political ads that contain lies and emphasized the importance of freedom of speech] he articulated a libertarian vision for how Facebook should relate to content; it should allow politicians to lie. And there are obviously counterarguments. Zuckerberg sees Facebook as a platform, but of course, you dont have to see it that way. You can see Facebook as helping to distribute those lies. So I think that speech owes a lot to Thiel and Thiels libertarian instincts.

Fossett: Thiel has poured a lot of money into the campaigns of candidates who have come out swinging hard against Big Tech and Facebook specifically. Im thinking about Josh Hawley, the Missouri senator, Ohio Senate candidate J.D. Vance and Arizona Senate candidate Blake Masters. How long can Thiel keep playing both sides like this?

Chafkin: Thats a theme throughout Thiels life ... At once being a loyal board member to Mark Zuckerberg, and in some ways a really important conservative ally, but also subtly and increasingly not so subtly needling Facebook and putting pressure on the company through these actors, including people like Vance and Hawley and Masters ... and [Texas] Senator Ted Cruz. (Ed. note: Thiel has donated to Cruz in the past.)

From the outside, it feels like Thiels almost daring Zuckerberg to fire him. And Zuckerberg is not. There was a moment I report in the book where they did come to a head. Zuckerberg didnt quite ask Thiel to step aside, but he sort of floated the idea, and Thiel very firmly said, No, youre going to have to fire me. Thiel had leaked correspondence with Netflix CEO Reed Hastings to the New York Times through Chuck Johnson, and Zuckerberg suspected Thiel was behind the leaks. Zuckerberg almost fired Thiel but didnt want to for whatever reason.

And I think you could ask, Well, why isnt Zuckerberg firing him? And I think the answer is that Facebook still really needs Thiel. I mean, Thiel in some ways is a liability to the company. Hes very closely associated with this pretty extreme faction of the Republican Party that I think probably makes Zuckerberg uncomfortable, on a personal level.

On the other hand, he gives Facebook a really great talking point when they're attacked for, quote unquote, suppressing conservative views. Because Zuckerberg can say, Hey, I have this board member, and hes the longest-serving board member, he's my good friend and mentor, Peter Thiel. And its not just that Thiel is a Republican or a conservative. He is a hardcore Trumpist.

I think maybe Thiels future on the board depends to some extent on politics, and on what happens in 2022 and beyond that.

Why is Thiel kind of needling Facebook? I think part of it is that despite being the first investor and all of that, he may have some ethical and moral qualms about Facebook, similar to the feelings that a lot of people have, about it being too powerful, for instance.

But I also think that the work that Vance and Hawley have done is theyve pushed Zuckerberg from the conservative point of view and kept him in line. And so I think you could regard this kind of subtle activism, or this disloyalty, from Thiel as partly an effort to push Zuckerberg to the right. And I think its worked, for now anyway.

Fossett: How much is Thiel shaping his Senate candidates? Is he meeting them where they are already, or are they influenced by him?

Chafkin: Well, I think if you asked any of them, they would say they aren't being influenced. Vance in particular has been asked this a bunch of times and in a bunch of different ways. And he says, Peter and I are friends, but Im not in his pocket, essentially. That said, I think its a combination of things.

I think Thiel has an eye for spotting young talentand this goes beyond politicsboth in young, talented techies like Zuckerberg, but also these kinds of talented political troublemakers like Hawley. And Thiel has kind of a type.

But I also think its pretty clear at this point that Thiel has a lot of money and is interested in donating money to candidates. So I almost think he doesnt even have to tell people to adopt certain views, right? There's going to be a tendency to move towards his politics for any candidate who wants his money. And that's actually happened at various points. [Former presidential candidate] Ron Paul, when he was running for president the second time, embraced this tech-friendly agenda that seemed like an effort to cater to Thiel after he had donated money to the campaign.

This is not true for Hawley, but in the case of Vance and Masters, they both kind of worked for him. Masters literally still works for him; hes the COO of Thiel Capital, and Vance doesnt work for Thiel, but Thiel was a major investor in his venture capital fund. (Ed. note: Vance previously briefly worked at Mithril Capital, a venture capital fund co-founded by Thiel.) His involvement with Vances venture capital fund was very important to that funds viability. And they've invested together in companies, most recently in Rumble, which is a conservative answer to YouTube.

So its not like Thiel is telling them to think things, but I think in some sense they are ideologically just extensions of him. And when you look at their platforms, they're just very, very similar to the Thiel agenda. Vance put out a big statement on crypto. There isnt an obvious reason why an Ohio populist should be embracing crypto, or why that would matter to the average Ohio voter in the Republican primary. But I think it certainly is an issue that people in the tech/libertarian and right-wing tech community care a lot about.

Fossett: Thiel was all in for Trump in 2016he spoke at the Republican National Convention, and he donated more than a million dollars to the Trump campaign that year. But he sat out 2020. What was behind that? Was there any kind of falling-out or did Trump just not look like a good bet anymore?

Max Chafkin: I think there was a falling-out, but it happened earlier. Thiel, obviously, was very close to the White House in 2017, and the early months of the Trump administration. He was on the executive committee of the transition team.

But then he suggested all these people for jobs in the administration [such as Princeton physicist William Happer and Yale computer scientist David Gelernter for science adviser, and Stanford computer science lecturer Balaji Srinivasan for FDA commissioner] and Trump took very few of the suggestions seriously. Thiel was also close to [Trumps former chief strategist] Steve Bannon, and Steve Bannon got pushed out. Thiel had other connections to Trump, but Bannon was a very important one.

But I think he also, to some extent, absented himself, as the Trump administration started to go sideways. And I think the strategy in 2020 was to kind of hedgenot to criticize Trump, but also not to be too closely associated with him. I think from Thiels point of view, Trumpismthe sort of ideology behind Trumpis very good, and it's what Thiel believes in. And I think Thiel wants to find a way forward for that ideology, with or without Donald Trump. And I think his play right now is to be a major backer and a player in that world. Somebody who is going to shape the direction of that part of the electorate.

Fossett: How has Biden being in office changed the way Thiel does business? I'm mostly thinking of Palantir, the software company that does a lot of business with the Defense Department and the CIA, and Anduril, a defense tech startup backed by Thiel.

Chafkin: Palantir is a pretty big company by this point. And it's not like they don't have Democratic lobbyists. They can continue to advocate within the government, under any administration.

We're only nine months into the Biden presidency, so it remains to be seen what the long-term trajectory for these companies will be. But besides whatever influence Thiel was able to wield in the government during the Trump administration, there has been a broader trend towards these kinds of companies, and Palantir has been riding that wave. So I think its totally possible that Palantir will adapt and is adapting to that future. But in the long run, obviously, I think it's better for Thiel's interests if he has political allies in power. And I think thats part of why hes spending way more money in this Senate race than he ever has. I think that's a big reason.

Fossett: Was there anything that you really, really wanted to know about Thiel when you set out to write the book but werent able to answer?

Chafkin: Well, there are a couple of things. One is religion. Thiel has said that he is Christian. His parents were evangelical, and he has at times talked about his Christian faith, but he hasn't really ever explained the nature of his Christian faith.

The other thing is Ive talked to him a handful of times, but I only talked to him off the record for this book. But an on-the-record interview where he is pressed on his actual beliefs would be very interesting. I think it is unfortunate that he hasn't been willing to sit down with a with a journalist who can do that. I think most of the time, most of the access he's given has been to people who are pretty friendly. Most of the times he appears on stage, it's with ideologically aligned people. But he's written some very outrageous things. Hes written that womens suffrage was unfortunate. And hes gotten pretty close to some people who are promoting basically visions of authoritarianism for America. And I think it would be interesting to hear what he actually thinks about that stuff. Because at times, hes sort of walked things back, but not quite. Theres a bit of a sorry-not-sorry quality to these clarifications. With the Cato essay, for instance, he issued a clarification that wasnt quite an apology. It was sort of like, Oh, people are making too big a fuss of this. (Ed. Note: Thiel wrote: It would be absurd to suggest that womens votes will be taken away or that this would solve the political problems that vex us.)

But of course, you know, democracy is really important to me. And I think its really important to a lot of people. And the idea of being skeptical of such a core part of America, I think, is worth scrutinizing, especially when he has proximity to these companies that have probably have more power over lives than any private entities in the history of humanity.

More here:
The Black Box of Peter Thiels Beliefs - POLITICO

The most irrelevant lobby in the country today are the libertarians arguing there is no case for lockdowns anywhere of any scale, declared Paul Kelly, the doyen of Australian conservative political commentary, in July.

However, anti-government anger is growing as Australians confront the realities of a dismally slow vaccination rollout and ongoing lockdowns. The right-wing libertarians of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) hope to convert that sentiment into the votes they need to win seats in state and federal parliaments.

Just a few days prior to Kellys declaration, his colleague at Rupert Murdochs conservative broadsheet theAustralian, Janet Albrechtsen, set the hares running. She argued that widespread disaffection with the Liberal Partys pandemic response, both federally and in New South Wales, has led to the rejuvenation of the LDP, the little start-up that never took off. If, Albrectsen argued, they mobilize serious intellectual firepower and keep out the weirdos and gun nuts, the LDP can force the Liberals to remain true to the values they claim to uphold.

Australias low coronavirus case numbers have been the envy of much of the world. These numbers were kept down partly by the strict and lengthy lockdowns that Australians have endured, including a fresh round that are ongoing in NSW, Victoria, and the Australian Capital Territory. Yet lockdown skepticism is on the rise, as are criticisms of the often heavy-handed means with which they are implemented. It remains to be seen whether the LDP can capitalize on this sentiment.

Libertarianism is very much a niche movement in Australian politics. The Liberal Democratic Party was founded in Canberra in 2001 by twenty-two-year-old economics graduate John Humphreys. Then a junior policy analyst in the Commonwealth Treasury, Humphreys despaired that there was no political party that aligned with his libertarian views. Ironically, given the partys anti-statist bent, in its early years it drew support primarily from Canberra public servants.

LDP members and supporters use the terms classical liberal and libertarian interchangeably. Chris Berg, formerly of the free market think tank the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) and author of a book on libertarianism, believes the distinction is insignificant. Both philosophies believe that public policy should be designed to maximise free markets and civil liberties, he wrote in 2018. That is, governments should get out of both the wallet and the bedroom.

However, the differing terms do point to genuine fault lines within the LDP. On one side are the Hayekian classical liberals, who are principally concerned with free markets, low taxation, and property rights. Many of this persuasion find a comfortable home in the Liberal Party for example, Bergs former IPA colleagues James Paterson and Tim Wilson.

On the other side are the social and cultural libertarians, who are more intensely focused on the freedom of the individual to do what he or she pleases, as long as it harms no one else. They strongly support liberalizing drug laws, for example, putting them at odds with the more conservatively inclined wing. Internal divisions like these are common to all political parties, however, and the LDPs factions have had enough in common to keep the party going for twenty years.

In this time, the LDP has only notched up minor electoral successes. Its high watermark came in 2013, when David Leyonhjelm was elected to the federal Senate with 9.5 percent of the vote in NSW. Even so, LDP partisans acknowledge that Leyonhjelm benefited from being placed first on the ballot paper. Additionally, some voters likely confused the LDP with the similarly named Liberal Party. Generally, the LDP tends to win between 1 and 3 percent of the vote.

At the state level, the party achieved successes in 2017 and 2018, with one candidate elected in Western Australia (WA) and two in Victoria. In 2019, however, Leyonhjelm resigned from the Senate to contest a seat in the NSW parliament. He failed. In the federal election that followed shortly after, Leyonhjelms Senate replacement was unable to reclaim his seat.

Just this year, the LDP lost its seat in WA, leaving the two Victorians, David Limbrick and Tim Quilty, as the only LDP members in any Australian parliament. This raises the question: Where can the LDP go from here?

Having stepped down as president of the LDP in 2004, Humphreys reassumed the position in May 2021. For much of the past twenty years, he has played a leading role building Australias libertarian movement, through think tanks and advocacy groups such as the Centre for Independent Studies and the Australian Libertarian Society.

Following Humphreyss return, along with what Albrechtsen described as some serious financial backing, the LDP coordinated a rapid series of announcements that the right-wing media have taken up with relish.

First, the Australian edition of the Spectator broke the not-exactly-bombshell news that the little-known Liberal Party activist John Ruddick had quit the party to run as an LDP candidate. Former Liberal senator (and leader of the failed minor party the Australian Conservatives) Cory Bernardi then used his platform on Sky News to advocate for the LDP. Embracing his inner Lenin, Bernardi argued that Australia needs a vanguard to stick up for the liberty loving citizens who are actually sceptical about an all-powerful government.

The Spectator soon endorsed Bernardi and Albrechtsens argument in an editorial. This was followed by a gushing interview on Sky News Outsiders, hosted by Rowan Dean, who is also the Australian editor of the Spectator.

Next, former Queensland premier Campbell Newman entered the fray. He dropped the news to the Australian that he had quit the Liberal National Party (LNP) and was considering running for the federal Senate as an LDP candidate. As he put it, he wants to apply a blowtorch to people who seek to restrict our liberties and freedoms.

Newman is the son of two former Liberal federal ministers and was a popular mayor of Brisbane before becoming premier of Queensland in a landslide election victory in 2012, in which the LNP won seventy-eight out of eighty-nine seats. However, he managed to squander this enormous advantage in the space of just one three-year term, losing power to the Labor Party in 2015.

Shortly after Newmans tease, former Liberal MP Ross Cameron also announced his defection to the LDP. This may have been bigger news had Cameron not been voted out of parliament in disgrace in 2004 following revelations about multiple extramarital affairs. He has spent much of his post-parliamentary career parading himself on Sky News as a racist, a homophobe, and a moon enthusiast. The serious intellectual firepower that Albrechtsen called for is clearly yet to materialize.

At this point, the conservative old guard at theAustralian felt the need to step in to settle things down. In a typically bombastic editorial, the broadsheet cautioned that Ruddick, Newman, and Camerons treachery would only serve to deliver a disastrous outcome, namely, a Labor-Greens government.

Since then, Newman confirmed his candidacy with the backing of Tim Andrews, an Australian Grover Norquist who spends his days fighting tax increases. The founder of the Australian Taxpayers Alliance, Andrews is the key figure behind the annual Friedman Conference, alongside Humphreys. The Friedman Conference has been instrumental in connecting libertarians across the country. On the day of Newmans statement, Andrews announced that he would be joining the LDP to his more than four thousand Facebook followers, urging them to do the same.

These developments demonstrate that libertarians are agreed about the need to pressure the Liberals. However, it is not entirely clear what strategy the LDP will adopt to win the support of disaffected voters. Those still wedded to neoliberal-era economics Janet Albrechtsen and Campbell Newman, for example want to add opposition to pandemic restrictions to the usual orthodoxies about reining in government spending.

The more radically inclined have taken their cues from recent right-wing populist successes. They want a clearer, simpler message. We will be running an anti-lockdown message like Nigel Farages single-message campaign on Brexit, says Cameron. Ruddick agrees, stating that ending COVID-mania will be the main campaign theme. As he told Sky News,

Come the first of December, once everyones had an opportunity to get vaxxed if they want to get vaxxed we go back to complete normality. No more QR codes, no restrictions in any way.

Vaccination might be the most delicate of all issues for the LDP. Authorities have fined both Ruddick and Limbrick for attending anti-lockdown protests, which are usually populated by high numbers of anti-vaccination conspiracy theorists. The Liberal Democrats have used careful messaging to try to balance an awareness that mass vaccination is our best way out of lockdowns with their desire to appeal to anti-vaxxers. Ruddick told the Guardian that the LDP is neutral on vaccination. Limbrick is on record opposing the possible imposition of travel or other restrictions on unvaccinated people.

Although the LDP is a marginal force, the partys strategy will have major implications for the Liberal-National Coalition. The Coalition performs best when it manages to isolate fringe forces to its right and incorporate their supporters, as former Prime Minister John Howard did with Pauline Hansons far-right insurgency in the late 1990s. Ever since, the Coalition has generally preferred to court hard-right candidates and voters, preferring to keep them inside the tent rather than throwing bombs from outside.

This strategy is not without risks. Liberal MP Craig Kelly quit the party in February after Prime Minister Scott Morrison criticized his quack views on vaccination and alternative therapies. This might have been a relief for Morrison if it werent for the Coalitions razor-thin parliamentary majority. More recently, both sides of parliament united to condemn another government member, George Christensen, for his idiotic comments on masks, lockdowns, and vaccine passports.

It remains to be seen whether the Coalition can continue to appease libertarian and hard-right elements, while maintaining its commitment to managing capitalism and the health crisis, including by authoritarian means. Whether the Coalition can manage this tension will go some way to determining its electoral fortunes in the forthcoming federal election.

Humphreys and his allies once seemed satisfied with the LDPs meager electoral returns and libertarianisms niche status in Australia. Now, however, they have announced a plan to take the Liberal Democrats from a 2 per cent party to a 10 per cent party over coming elections. Can they do it?

Chris Berg believes that increasing anger about some of the most dramatic suppression of civil liberties in living memory presents an enormous opportunity. He believes the LDP can succeed if it can steer clear of anti-vaxxers and the hard-right elements that populate libertarian circles, and instead rely on relatively mainstream figures to sell the partys message.

In 2018, left-wing journalist Guy Rundle wrote that David Leyonhjelms strange neuroses served only to discredit libertarianism as a real political philosophy. Its possible, as Rundle argued, that the crackpot element in the Australian libertarian movement will continue to alienate mainstream voters.

However, this is not certain. To quote twentieth-century Australian intellectual Donald Horne, when times are cracked, the crackpot can become king. The next federal election could be the LDPs chance to make its presence felt in Australian politics.

See the original post:
Australia's Right-Wing Libertarians Are Trying to Capitalize on Anti-Lockdown Sentiment - Jacobin magazine

Michael Stephens| Guest columnist

If you've spent any time on or observing the political right in America, you probably know that just about the dirtiest thing we Republicans can say aboutsomeone is to call that person a socialist.

The slanderous epithet of "communist" doesn't work too well anymore, because everyone knows that real communism the stuff of Marx, Lenin andMao has vanished from the earth so completely that there are more stuffed dodo birds sitting in museums than there are true communists on the loose.

Socialism, on the other hand, is alive and well and open to competing definition by friends and enemies alike. Suffice it to say that democratic socialism(undemocratic socialism being largely limited today to a few temporarily disaffected children of multimillionaires having some fun playing revolutionary atuniversity) entails a comprehensive social welfare state combined with a great deal of government direction in the economy, all of it planned by freelyelected not to say competent officials.

Social democracy welcomes the welfare state but shuns government planning of the economy, reasoning that if you want to tax the rich heavily, theyactually have to be rich, something bureaucratic meddling tends not to encourage.

To modern orthodox Republicans, all this social this-and-that is just socialism, plain and simple, and socialism rhymes with communism.

The Republican Party in the first half of the 20th century was far different from the economic libertarianism idealized by most of its leaders today.

More from Michael Stephens:

Trumpism has exploited the frustration, hopelessness of marginalized conservatives

Where have all the trailers gone?

NIMBYs are not enough: Florida needs NITS

Theodore Roosevelt challenged the hegemony of big business during his 1901-1909 presidency, creating a new economically interventionist conservatism, Progressivism. Wendell Willkie,the1940 Republican presidential candidate,took Progressive ideals to their furthest when he ran to the left of FranklinRoosevelton both economic policy and certain social issues, including desegregation.

But perhaps the most unusual distinction involved a Republican not commonly thought of as a Progressive: President Warren Harding (1921-23).

Harding was certainly no socialist. He wasn't even a social democrat. When confronting a particularly thorny tax reform proposal, he confessed, "I can'tmake a thing out of this tax problem. I listen to one side, and they seem right, and then I talk to the other side, and they seem just as right."

Today that would be modesty unbecoming a president. Harding had the rare courage to express the frustration ofnonspecialistleaders down throughthe ages. And eventually he did what good leaders do: He crafted a compromise.

Harding's idealism lay in an uncommon concern for fairness, including toward those whose ideas differed radically from his own. He had long beenowner and editor of a newspaper in the small town of Marion, Ohio, and perhaps it was the need to regularly consider the opinions and feelings of ordinarypeople as people rather than as members of voting blocs that made him more tolerant than most politicians.

The opportunity for an encounter between political worlds came in 1921. In his enthusiasm to make every American a supporter of our involvement inWorld War I, President Woodrow Wilson had in 1918 locked up practically anyone who spoke out against it. That included Socialist Party leader EugeneDebs, who had coincidentally taken an embarrassinglylarge number of votes from Wilson in the 1912 presidential election. Peace came, but Wilson leftDebs in prison.

Debs might have died in prison, but when Harding became president, he not only freed Debs but invited him to the White House. We don't knowwhat theytalked about. They likely discussed economics, on which they differed widely, although both had a real concern for the common people. They mayalsohave discussed civil rights for Black Americans, something Harding and Debs were both pioneers in championing.

Interestingly, Debs was not Harding's only link to American socialism. Norman Thomas, the Socialist Party candidate for president in every electionfrom1928 to 1948, grew up in, of all places, little Marion, Ohio. As a teenager Thomas worked for Harding's newspaper.

How much the small-town pragmatism of Harding may have influenced Thomas is unclear, but in 1938 Leon Trotsky described Thomas sneeringly asa"drawing-room socialist" with no interest in collectivizing American farms or murdering the capitalist elite. Thomas, a Presbyterian minister before enteringpolitics, no doubt took this as a compliment.

Whenever partisan mudslinging seems particularly out of control, we should remember that crisp winter day a century ago when a pro-businessRepublicanpresident of the United States welcomed the persecuted icon of American democratic socialism for an honest chat, and did so in total disregardfor what the press or political opponents might say.

Would that our modern leaders had that sort of courage and humanity.

Michael Stephenslives in Gainesville.

Send a letter to the editor (up to 200 words) to letters@gainesville.com. Letters must include the writer's full name and city of residence. Additional guidelines for submitting letters and longer guest columns can be found at bit.ly/sunopinionguidelines.

Get a digital subscription to the Gainesville Sun. Includes must-see content on Gainesville.com and Gatorsports.com, breaking news and updates on all your devices, and access to the Gainesville.com ePaper. Visit http://www.gainesville.com/subscribenow to sign up.

Excerpt from:
The Republican Party's surprising socialist connection - Gainesville Sun