The conservative platform in fiscal issues is to lower taxes to keep more money circulating in the private sector. It is argued that money only circulates once in the public sector (government programs) and that money circulates ten times in the private sector.
One of the fastest questions to delineate the liberal view from the conservative view is to ask this simple question. All action taken against poverty is rooted in the beliefs of why poverty exists. So, if there are false perceptions on the part of people and politicians, all action from that will be destructive. Liberals tend to focus more on the rich than on the poor when explaining poverty. Greed, elitism, or some other bigoted form of the strong oppressing the weak, is usually the given reason; for example, a rich businessman not paying his maid enough, his workers enough, or ignoring a homeless person on the street. This is rooted in the notion that there is a finite amount of wealth in the world, and wealth redistribution (as opposed to growing money where it is not currently growing) is the preferred way to solve poverty. At first glance, it would seem that this abandons all hope that the individual could ever be more productive, and therefore produce more money, but this is not the case. Liberals do acknowledge that through investment, the individual can be made to brought to produce more, but only on the notion that blindly spending money (since finance seems to be the only factor); seeing that how productive one is, being based off how much money is spent on him/her; ignoring education, individual potential (and shortcomings), rugged individualism, and treating the individual as a machine, an automaton, instead of a self-realized person. Conservatives tend to focus more on the poor when explaining poverty; not out of blaming them, but out of getting to the real roots.
So, in answer to the question:
Poor people are poor because they have not been adequately educated (i.e. a watered down school curriculum) in life, or have a lack of direction and/or drive due to the broken households and other social problems (i.e. a pop-culture hostile to conventional learning among our young) that plague this nation; not because there needs to be forced wages and other actions through government intervention.
I'll use the following for a more applied, substantive example:
2) the minimum wage issue
One of the most horrible things that I've witnessed was Bill Clinton getting a "God bless you" from a young daughter of a minimum wage worker when he signed the bill that increased minimum wage. He was surrounded by mothers who worked for minimum wage (and their children). This ultimately increased it to 90 cents an hour more, and he is hailed as some sort of champion for the poor. The proponents of this bill seem unable to acknowledge that if your are a single parent working for minimum wage, then you have far larger problems than needing another $0.90 an hour! These problems cross over to the social aspect, which is either trivialized or ignored by these acts of pseudo-justice that don't do any good to even be considered quick fixes! Employers raise their prices to pay for the government forced wages and the employee to live because the value of the dollar has depreciated. When these acts of artificial prosperity are done, the hike in prices doesn't cover the hike in salary. Now, in case this may seem as if I am not properly addressing the issue of the poor needing more money, or ever getting out of the hole, let me for one say that when thinking in the issue of the bottom person or (even in my case) college kid trying to get up in life, and needing more money than 40 hours a week at Burger Shack can provide, I have often stated myself that this minimum wage fast food environment has simply just got to go. I think that the argument that because I don't have a family to support is sufficient grounds not to pay me enough for me to have insurance, go to the doctor, or even get a computer is ridiculous; it seems that some "power that be" is trying to base my wage off of what they think I need as opposed to what I produce. I also think that the Country Club Republican argument that it's OK to pay someone a dollar an hour if they accept is equally ridiculous because no one would willingly do it; it would be a clear matter of working for one meal a day or working for no meals a day; abuse of the underclass (just like the champion Leftist Karl Marx predicted capitalism would end up doing). Conservatives also seem to be campions of making the simple point, that if something doesn't make money, then don't invest in it. So, on that premise, we should either make restaurants a professional-only job and gear vision in building a job market for the age group occupying high school and college, instead of keeping them in the hole and saying "Well, you don't want a hamburger to cost $20.00 do you?" My answer to this incredible mess, however, is not to just blindly want my employer to be forced to give me twelve bucks an hour, but to be in a work environment where I am in some semi-professional atmosphere and actually produce what I get. That is done through much more work and usage of vision than some coercive legal package. This is why liberals win on this issue, and why anyone against the increase is seen as someone protecting billionaires while single mothers and college kids are starving; because it's a lot easier to use government force in a single bill than it is to reconfigure and entire work structure.
I have a quote from Mario Cuomo (that I site later in this paper) accusing Republicans of having the poor settle for what falls from the table of the rich, as if to say that Republicans thought that crumbs were enough for the poor; yet, this is exactly what Bill Clinton and the Democrats have done. One caller on C-Span simply sarcastically asked that if this is such as good idea, then why don't they raise minimum wage to $50,000 a year? The answer is simple: that's not how capitalism or the real world works. Money doesn't just come out of thin air, or from the bottomless pockets of the rich; it comes from unshackling the individual, so that he/she can prosper without government supervision. When the economy is approached with an agenda using the premise that elimination of poverty will occur by working with an already given and finite amount of money, and redistributing wealth, we either see incredible debt or a horrible reduction in growth because we give the rich incentives not to invest. A simple question: How do rich people make more money? Rich people don't make more money by letting it sit, nor do they make more money by loaning it to people as rich as they are (there would be no need); they make more money by investing in people poorer than they are. High taxes and forced salaries hurt the poor, not the rich. One of the most fundamental issues of the 1996 race was Bob Dole's proposed 15% income tax cut. Liberals said that it was ridiculous that a tax cut would generate more revenue. They call it nonsense; we call it capitalism. The way that it works is that when you leave more money to the people, they have more to invest, and that makes money making operations out of entities that wouldn't have existed at all, hadn't it been for the logical act of letter the American workers keep their own paycheck. In the 1960's, 1980's and the 1920's (if I'm not mistaken), taxes were lowered and more money was generated in the economy.
Money circulates better when it is left in the private sector; if government bureaucrats knew how to adequately spend money and make it work, they'd be in business, and not in government. The simplicity of this statement seems so naive and arrogant, for the sole reason that we have been brought up in a world that only sees complex, messy and lengthened answers to the smallest dilemmas.
Now, since it may seem easier said than done to say that the root of poverty is social problems, and offer only rhetoric to explain the social problems. I address this, but in the next topic: social issues.
3) Liberal view of the work structure (The role of government in business)
Here is a quote (that I personally transcribed from a 1996 re-airing on C-Span) from Mario Cuomo in 1984, at the Democratic Convention. He was the governor of New York and the keynote speaker. This was his articulation of Ronald Reagan's economic policy (in the context that the economy would do well without government intervention and that Reagan believed in survival of the fittest: "Social Darwinism"...)
"...government can't do everything (we were told) so it should settle for taking care of the strong and hope that economic ambition and charity would do the rest; make the rich richer and what falls from the table will be enough for the middle class and those who are trying desperately to work their way into the middle class..." (hearty applause)
This is clearly the quintessential liberal/laymen interpretation (I elaborate on the relationship between liberals and laymen relationship later in this paper) of present day capitalism: the notion that the government is capable of combating greed, or that the individuals are incapable of taking care of themselves, or better yet; that the way to help people help themselves is through the aid of Big Brother. Mario Cuomo sarcastically labeling trickle down economics as "what falls from the table" shows that he (like other liberals) has the perception that national wealth exists in a fixed state, and it being (by definition) impossible for others to make more money while those presently rich, stay rich; therefore this finite and fixed amount must be seized by the government, (increased taxes) redistributed and given to the laymen via social programs and forced wages, and rightfully so, since the only way that rich people are rich is through some sort of injustice or foul play. This deceptively anti-greed ideology is rooted in anti-individual sentiment, reflected in an anti-work agenda. No other explanation could hold for this severe disregard for the factor of the individual, or outright contempt for individual responsibility. Note that I am not saying that liberalism in an ideology of blatant harm or malice aimed toward the individual; quite the opposite. It is based on the premise that the individual has no internal initiative, and therefore is not trustworthy to help the poor, and/or not dependable enough to prosper unaided, and must therefore rely on an elaborate network of tax fueled bureaucracies and social engineering for their own safety and well being. Liberals are vehemently motivated by their perception of individualism and civil rights; it's just that they end up discrediting the very conventions and institutions that build the individual. (I elaborate more on this later: liberals emphasizing the individual unit; conservatives emphasizing the family unit).
Also, "economic ambition" and "charity" are clearly regarded as hollow rhetoric by Mario Cuomo. It is also clear that even if he admits that these two very important concepts are in fact real, that they are no where near dominant, and integral factors in the economic prosperity of a nation. If "economic ambition" is a mere flag to wave, or a chant with no substance, the only other way to get an economy going is through the step by step guidance of an all powerful government, making decisions for the people at all given points. Self determination and free will of the individual is sarcastically referred to as "economic ambition", and (in his eyes) amounts to nothing when it comes to putting food on the table in the real world. When "charity" is also referred to, it is as if he is saying that the American people can't be trusted to take care of the poor, and that the government must force them to hand over a percentage of their salaries (income taxes) so that the all benevolent government can take care of the nation's poor, since the masses or either to dim or heartless to do so. Here is a quote from our first President: George Washington...
"Government is not reason; it is not eloquence; it is force! Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."
How odd, that is a day where strip joints are given legal trouble for alcohol, pasties, allegations of prostitution and under aged strippers; where porn pushers are arrested for shoving their filth in children's faces, that we jump to say how unconstitutional it is and warn of a danger to be born of some sort of ruthless dictatorship and say "Whose choice is it to use this force, and by what authority do they have?", yet we merely bat an eye when it is widely accepted that the government seizing 25% of our salaries, and growing by the day in massive and blatantly unconstitutional bureaucracies and uncontrolled spending, all in the name of justice and prosperity. And my grounds for saying that? I look no further than our very own Constitution of the United States Of America: (The tenth Amendment)...
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
Notice that "States" is capitalized; a clear sign that the States are supposed to have power, as opposed to today's liberal interpretation of statehood: being a mere ornament on the national tree. Mentioning military defense, international affairs, and coinage pretty much covers the justified and constitutional powers of the federal government.
Here is a quote (which I shamelessly blew up) that aired on the Rush Limbaugh TV show. I had the honor of seeing the footage, but unfortunately I don't have it on video tape, so I can't guarantee that the quote is exact. It was uttered from the very mouth of a young and forceful Ronald Reagan (quoting a Senator) at the Republican National Convention in 1964, with Barry Goldwater as the nominee:
Here is an excerpt from the speech:
And Senator Clark of Pennsylvania, another articulate spokesman, defines liberalism as "meeting the material needs of the masses through the full power of centralized government". Well, I for one resent it when a representative of the people refers to you and me- the free men and women of this country-as "the masses." This is a term we haven't applied to ourselves in America. But beyond that, "the full power of centralized government"-this was the very thing the Founding Fathers sought to minimize. They knew that governments don't control things. A government can't control the economy without controlling people. And they knew when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. They also knew, those Founding Fathers, that outside of its legitimate functions, government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector of the economy.
He then took great offense to the American public being labeled as the "masses". I originally thought that was an odd tangent, and I had difficulty following it. Later on in that year (1996), I realized the connection and the significance of the young Reagan making that distinction. I instantly get the picture of some 1990 type communist Soviet "bread line" being miles long, with people waiting for their bread, medicine and soap; going back to their manual jobs, being part of some factories or mills, using their back all day, horribly uneducated, and having been brought up in such a dismal home since their parents had the same life, that the notion of starting their own business, implementing a marketing idea, or even having some more constructive past time than alcohol, sex or other types of passive entertainment, has been long written off by them as unrealistic. Big Brother takes care of them; take home pay is small but not even seen as important, because there is food on the table and a roof over your head: all designed, chosen and approved for you by the government (after a long bureaucratic debated safety forum on housing, and an environmental forum on tree killing for the wood used in the home, and pollution debates from the energy that the home uses). All this being justified in the exact way that we justify it today...
If government can't enforce environmental and worker safety laws, do you expect greedy corporations to do so?
We DO admit that this social provisionary bill will be a significant tax increase, but if isn't passed, then how will we pay for the poor's food, medicine and housing?
How else am I supposed to make more money unless the government forces my money-hoarding employer to pay me more?
How can we be guaranteed a home, warm water, a hot meal, and a well paying, secure job unless we have federal laws stating that we must have them, and government mandates enforcing it?
The answer to this mess is simple. The first point needed to be made is: With freedom, comes responsibility. The reason why private entities can take advantage of people is because of a horribly uneducated, and dispassionate public. If businesses were watched more closely, and people had more of an idea of how things got done, and how production can be maximized in an economy (get the government hands off of their necks and let them use their business knack), and how to intimidate corporations (threaten to go to other business, have other private entities display reports showing what they're doing in unwise; lawsuits are still fine because those are for specific actions that have happened on a single date, not some across the board restructuring as you would see in a federal act), we wouldn't see government as the shining buoy in an ocean in which the common man is drowning. Also, it is quite possible to have private businesses that function solely on investigating other businesses; maybe they do already. The post-industrial age in which this country is now in is far more complex than to have regular people make a decent living without certain knowledge. Also, the kind of work that feeds a family and helps it go to college in the 21st century has got to be rooted in kids doing semi-professional work by highschool, and having far more vision and awareness of the job market, economy and politics than we do today. That's how people will be able to answer these previous four questions without government.
Another small point is that these four questions seem to say that the citizen must have their freedom usurped for some higher good, blatantly justifying a dictatorship, in absolute contrast with the notion of democracy or a free society. So, in this context, the public is rightfully labeled as the "masses" to which the young Ronald Reagan took great offense: blind, and powerless cogs in a machine with no vision, and no soul (the socialist version of a ideal economy).
Another way to make the illustration that liberals focus on the materialistic and the immediate when deciding government law is the NASA issue. It is fairly common that under liberals, NASA is seen as a waste of money: Why should we spend billions on rocks in outer space when we aren't answering the plight of the poor at home? That seems to be the general argument. My first response to that is from all the money that we spend on social engineering and bills to "help" the poor and disabled, it is clear that the way we spend the money is the problem, and that is comes from the public sector (government) is the real issue, not the amount. My second response is the point that technology comes out of NASA as a direct result of the money that we spend on it. Fiber optic technology has come out of it, making telecommunications far easier (being able to transmit more information faster than conventional cable), and in this day and age of the information explosion, that turns into real jobs. Also, silica crystal technology (being able to grow it in a zero gravity environment) for computers has come out of it. I am not even qualified to speak of all of the technology that has come out of it, but my point is that through the nearsighted view of liberalism, we can not see the potential of human expansion; we only see a roof over our head, food and medicine. NASA produces much: real jobs for which people have to be educated; technology that spawns off more research in that field, and more knowledge to use in the expansion of science; the spending can be justified (also, the gray area of being linked with the military would make me debate privatizing, since I said privatizing so much would be a good idea). We have not seen and end to the social problems that we have long intended to wipe out with big government; that spending has yet to be justified.
Here is an excerpt from an article by Allen Ulrich, the conservative writer for the Vermilion (our student newspaper at USL):
July 26 1996
To see Bill Clinton's vision of America, one has to only look at Spain. In 1995, Spain had the highest unemployment rate of all of Europe of 25 percent - a quarter of the total working population. But just ten years ago, Spain's economy was the jewel of western Europe. Then a Socialist Prime Minister began social programs to provide free health care, or should I say, government paid for health care, deep subsidies for college education, for all citizens, and businesses were even forced to provide lifetime contracts for their employees. Tax rates increased every year for the next decade, far surpassing our own.
The government and organized labor became, for all practical purpose, partners with spending on social goals doubling. Foreign investment and corporations fled, and the citizens are left to pick up the prices. You see, my friends, this is a trap of modern liberalism. It lays a seductive snare of good services that Americans want, but they never tell you how much it will cost. So when Clinton, or any other liberal touts a new program, your reaction should be "What's it gonna cost me?"
The conservative perception of the work ethic is far more flattering and natural. The businessman (I mean that in a gender neutral context), however oblivious to the needs of the worker, or corrupt, still has to at least have a working economic structure to not starve or to stay in existence; the government bureaucrat is appointed, and stays employed no matter what the results are. They are not obligated to produce, and have to answer to no one. No matter how poorly we may come to regard the average businessman (who isn't nearly always a millionaire) we still have to acknowledge that they can make an operation work; a government social program can still get more money in spite of an increase of the social problems which the programs were originally designed to end; and usually does. A business, however, has to produce results, or else bills aren't paid to hire more workers, buy more branches, or advertise. Other entities don't go along with it unless it has been proven to make money. Therefore, the conservative interpretation of assistance, or production relies on the individual and results, while the liberal agenda is based off of some bureaucrat's vision and opinion, backed with no results or proof. This is also a perfect opportunity for pork; pork barrel projects are jobs that can be done quickly and cheaply that are distorted through reports and testimonies of the job which has unbelievable numbers of workers tacked on, taking ten times as much time and money to complete (a unique, yet old way of stealing and giving money to whomever is currently scratching your back).
To further illustrate my perception of the conservative work ethic, I'll start with the premise of an
old conservative doctrine: the notion that there is a distinct, unchanging right and wrong. On that
premise, I will state that the work ethic must be rooted in a timeless truth. That timeless truth is
that work is not something done to avoid freezing or starving; work is a psychological need and
helps the individual focus, grow, become self aware and analyze their life and environment. When
some commoners in the 18th century spent days building a wooden fence with their own bare
hands, plowed the fields, did housework (clothes, food, etc...) There was a distinct meaning to all
that made up their household. The products were direct results of their labor, which wasn't done
for a boss, but for themselves. There was a distinguishable personal element (the sweat of their
brow and the ache in their back) in the items used in day to day survival. Today, in the post
industrial modernized world in which we live, that is not the case. It is clear that there is a far
more complex need for personal fulfillment; one that can only result in the worker sustaining a
personal need and life ambition under that work; any substitute for that will not work.
The conservative interpretation individual prosperity or "Social Darwinism" (as Mario Cuomo sarcastically quoted from Ronald Reagan) is not a bunch of money hungry immoral ambitious suit sharks with dollar signs in their eyes running around in their briefcases trying to manipulate the money supply to make it harder for the commoner to live, looking down on the poor living in cardboard boxes saying "Hey you lazy bums, because you didn't subscribe to Forbes, Businessweek and the Monthly Yuppy as a child, and weren't memorizing stock quotes and worshiping statues of billionaires through your adolescence, then you deserve to starve. We shouldn't waste money on useless things like medicine and food for the poor while we can be subsidizing billion dollar corporations. This is America! Sink or swim, baby!". That is the liberal interpretation of the conservative interpretation. The conservative interpretation is children and teenagers being aware of a complex job market, a changing world and solidifying in their goals and direction in life. An individual can be exponentially more productive if they go to their place of work with a vigor and passion; if the field is something that identifies with their personality. They choose their routes because they have been given the tools, not having the government attempting to secure the poor routes they choose from being uninformed. Here is a prime example of liberalism being a solely "after the fact" ideology; being based on the notion that the individual has already wrecked their own lives (no faith in individual incentive), so all we can do is try to make the best of a bad situation (government pampering and spoonfeeding). The format or economic hierarchy which Republicans stand for is very real in levels, asserting that certain people will be in management and business ownership, and others will be at lower levels, having various forms of input and influence; however, this does not have anything to do with people trapped at the bottom of a pay scale, or enslaved. Levels exist in society, not based off of moral worth, or supremacy, but off of vision and what you are good at doing. This is an unchangeable constant in any nation or tribe, and can not be undone (nor should it be) by any degree of communism, or powerful government.
4) Taxation ethics?
One day my father and I were discussing some recent issue in the media, having to do with some
Clinton tax increase or another, and he asked me if I knew what caused the Revolutionary War. I
forget my exact words, but it was something along the lines of liberty, God, freedom... He said
"No. TAXES." I was literally stunned. For a man who twisted his face and raised his hands while
turning his head in disgust, when I wanted to watch the 1992 Democratic Presidential candidate
debate (saying he would watch anything but that and how sick the political mess made him), he
sure made a well thought out political point. It is true that the notion and premise of civil and
religious freedoms were pervading elements, but the issue of taxation without representation was
the spark, or window, for the Declaration of Independence (United States saying that they were
no longer part of Great Britain). It seems that more modern forms of aggression aren't brute
force or direct coerciveness, but rather massive over-powerful forces supported by taxes of the
people which they harm.
1950 - 5%
1970 - 16%
1990 - 24%
Source: National Tax Foundation
It is clear that more and more of what the American worker pays for is being seized for the bureaucrats, all in the name of helping this country. Here's a scary thought: Our Constitution does not have a limit on the income tax. If the next generation after the other gets use to paying higher and higher taxes, and use to having an increase, then the future citizens of the USA could be paying half or more of their income and not see it as wrong or inexcusable. Our great grandchildren will be paying off the debt that we've accumulated over the decades, and seeing less and less of what they make. The income tax was originally unconstitutional. It took the 16thamendment:
The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.
I don't know the story behind it but I'm sure it's a real hum dinger. Simple logic tells us that if no limit is set on what authority can do, it will do anything it wants to. All throughout the first two years of the Republican Congress, Al Gore, Richard Gephardt, Bill Clinton, and all of the other spend happy liberals ranted about how the Republicans wanted to starve America, and break the nation because they wanted to balance the budget. Gore said out of his own mouth that the Democrats are for a balanced budget also, it's just that they don't want to do it in a way that hurts America. Is it conceivable that the USA (one of the richest countries in the planet) needs to spend 200 billion dollars more than what it makes in taxes just to survive? Bill Clinton, after campaigning proudly that he wasn't a "tax and spend liberal" like the "old" Democrats, said that Dole's idea of the 15% income tax cut was a "scheme" (the nerve) and that would blow a hole in the deficit. If he says that the only way he keeps the deficit down is through taxes, then he admitsthat he is a tax and spend liberal. They have no resolve in spending 200 billion dollars of our great grandchildren's money; and why should they? They see government as the universal infallible entity that can do no wrong, and without, no justice can be served. I have a simple question for our Democrat opponents: How much is enough? Or better yet, when do you know to draw the line? With the huge debt that we are accumulating, our US dollar is depreciating in value; and that's all that higher taxes are going to get us: broke. No nation in the history of this planet has ever taxed itself into prosperity. When the Democrats justify the over spending, they speak of all of the good that they are doing, and don't acknowledge that this stuff can be done more efficiently in the private sector. Christopher Reeve spoke at the 1996 Democratic Convention from the wheelchair in which he is now and called for more government funding of medical research. Then why stop with that? Why not spend 500 billion over the budget per year and borrow all of the money that we can? When do you draw the limit? When is enough, enough?
Another point that I'd like to make is that when we socialize medicine (as we've done currently in health care) we lay the opportunity for abuse, because the consumer isn't paying it. A cousin of mine said that every time his grandmother went to the doctor, having a medical card (payment covered for her) she came back with bags and bags of medicine because he gave her medicine for stuff that she had 2 years ago! The doctor knew that she wasn't paying the bill, so he used it to make money. This happens on a national scale every day. This is what conservatives warn against; abuse. It's not about letting sick people die on the street. And here it is again, massive waste created through government tax increase and red tape; the American citizen footing the bill. Here's a quote from Chief Justice John Marshall (1755-1835) taken from his speaking on the case McCulloch v. Maryland:
When we give an entity the right to tax us, we are granting ownership of ourselves directly proportional to the amount in which we are being taxed. Right now, the government owns 24% of us. The increasing power of the government, increasing income tax, and loose construction of the Constitution (assuming powers not specifically implied) have been building for quite some time, but can be given a significant landmark in the 1930's. FDR (Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the New Deal. I'll start off with a quote from him:
"A Radical is a man with both feet planted firmly - in the air. A Conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never learned to walk forward. A Reactionary is a somnambulist walking backwards. A Liberal is a man who uses his legs and his hands at the behest, at the command, of his head." (Radio Address, October 16 1939)
By the way, I looked up somnambulist; it means sleepwalker. Radical means far left; reactionary means far right. FDR also spoke of "...the forgotten man at the bottom of the economic pyramid..." paraphrasing or quoting from an 1883 book The Forgotten Man by William G Sumner. There you have the same cries for the pain and plight of the lowly man, and a bunch of opened-ended rhetoric ultimately leading to the use of Big Brother (again going back the Mario Cuomo quote in 1984). The struggle between socialism and capitalism is an old one; and I dare shamelessly say that if more Americans were in touch with what has been going on in this nation since its birth, no one would say that the political system is boring, or that it is a waste of time to be involved in it. Politics is anything but boring! For immediate purposes, conservatism usually
relies on slow movement and old convention; in contrast to that, liberalism tends to be the side of new wave ideologies and quick turns.
USL's College Republicans former Sergeant at arms Richard Denison, brought a photo copy of a World Book Encyclopedia saying that FDR took exact excerpts of planks in the American
Socialist party when he implemented the New Deal. At the (now inactive) internet website
http://www.conservative96.com (Mark Anthony's conservative megacenter) he cited that the
Great Depression put man in a vulnerable state, where he would take food, having an empty
stomach, not caring what strings would be attached. He also attributed the leaning on
government to the loss of influence that the Church had. In making a point that we only feed social problems with government programing and engineering, he simply stated that society gets more of what it subsidizes and that a bad precedent had been set: man no longer needed to strive, he needed merely to ask. Also, I taped a decent portion of the speech in the 1948 Democratic Convention (President Harry S. Truman running for reelection) and thought that I was in for a treat. For years I had been hearing that the Democrats used to be the party of the common man, and before they got to the far left, they were more noble than the Republicans! So I sat down, hit record, and got ready to hear some eloquent speech (since Truman was always known for his uncompromising and stern views), and low and behold... The man sounded like any other Democrat today! Here he was in 1948 speaking of increasing the minimum wage and wanting $300 million from the federal government for schools, and calling the Republicans the party of the few privileged! That was one of the biggest political disappointments of my life. I will admit, however, that he radiated this distinct essence of a commoner rising up against some higher power: the elite, the rich, the strong, and even had a genuine vigor that Bill Clinton will never
possess; but his heart felt convictions were implemented in good old fashioned liberalism. Well, anyway, on the note that these power struggles are classic, very real and very significant to us in our daily lives until the day we die (as for our children), I'll end with a quote from a man that I believe was an absolute genius, Ralph Waldo Emerson:
"The two parties which divide the state, the party of Conservatism and that of Innovation, are very old, and have disputed possession of the world ever since it was made." (The Conservative - 1841)