G.O.P. Whigs Out; Liberty to Pick up Some of the Pieces

The surprise of Donald Trump’s primary sweep is that he secured the majority of southern Evangelicals despite his being the Devil candidate. The question is not whether American religious fervor has diminished, which it hasn’t, but whether it has the political influence claimed by the likes of Ralph Reed and his Christian Coalition.  This weakness of a supposed rock solid affinity group brings into question the Republican strategy to herd discordant single issue constituencies into the corral, especially if the cowboys are fat, nonsense talking and not adept with the lasso. Republican orthodoxies born in the 1980’s have ossified into caricatures of excess rarely tested with analytical rigor so fences are trampled over by mere blowhard comments by a celebrity candidate.  It makes no difference that Trump is the Republican nominee or someone other because by this summer’s national convention the party will reveal it has no truth to coalesce around.

The Republican Party’s tin ear is best described as one which receives few voices from few contributors. The Citizens United decision by The Supreme Court, though considered a blessing for the easy big money it provides, is the root cause of their problem with the message.  Big money from few donors is stupid money.  Stupid in its formulation of low common denominator advertisements, more akin to selling soap, as well as with its reliance on broadcast television to spread the message.  It makes the Party a top down political machine with a hazy view of the electorate.  It’s a structure that is the antithesis of the internet and its new social media communities and given that this is the medium of the young and educated it bodes poorly for the G.O.P. as presently constituted.  Bernie Sanders’ campaign comes from the reverse of a Citizens United funded one where success is measured by the large number of donors of small donations.  It’s not just a phenomenon of the political left since it first appeared on the right with Ron Paul’s 2012 presidential bid and this year this self organized from the bottom up movement is giving fits to Hillary Clinton’s directed from above campaign to its less internet connected group of supporters. Given this upward trend for candidates who bubble up from below the prospects are not good for parties who formulate and direct from the top.    

The Republican strategy of corralling disparate constituencies ranging from libertarian free market to authoritarian evangelical philosophical backgrounds gives no positive message because it’s impossible to develop any other than a negative one from such a discordant grouping. Senator Mitch McConnell, the titular head of the party, called on Republicans to make Barack Obama a one term president and marshal opposition to everything Obama and so cast government as the enemy of everything.  What should be a bipartisan issue, immigration, has been pushed further and further into a corner without solution by strident unreasonable voices encouraged by the Senate Majority leader’s intransigence. It got so that the 2016 Republican establishment candidates felt the full brunt of the mob against them when trying to feather in a hint of minority inclusiveness suggested by the RNC’s Election-Autopsy.  If Ted Cruz the anti-establishment candidate were to win the Presidential election then he too would feel the mob’s resistance because he will embody government, what his constituents have been taught to hate.

The Grand Old Party  is doomed to wither away because it’s rural monopoly power from gerrymandered districts and restrictive voter registration is bad for business.  Rural power pondering issues akin to determining how many angels fit on a pinhead and then forcing that opinion with law onto economically vibrant urban centers is a conflict that the Chamber of Commerce will tire of resolving for the party.  Demographics will cause states such as Texas to fall off the Republican grid as Latinos overwhelm the political fences. Southwest states will gravitate back toward Barry Goldwater's conservatism of live and let live free markets; best represented by today’s Libertarian Party.  The Antebellum South’s strident intolerant tone as characterized by Ted Cruz’s evangelical crusade will embarrass northern Republicans enough to consider an alternative, again the Libertarian Party.  New England's electoral college outcome will be solidly Democrat so a protest vote for a closely aligned third party would be without consequence in 2016 but it might establish a party of the right to self organize in social media;  a party with a young and urban future as well as one which brings Washington back to a civil dialogue over liberty and authority.

                

Washington Dysfunction better than Dumbed down Federal Handouts and Laws

The beauty of Washington dysfunction is that it empowers locals to do what benefits them as described in The Upshot's "Liberals Turn to Cities to Pass Laws and Spread Ideas" rather than depend on dumbed down federal handouts and make others live with dumbed down laws.

Democrats are Authoritarian so Republican answer to their Ying is more?

The GOP is reaping the grains of philosophical discord sowed these past few years where Mitch McConnell determined that the party’s one and only mandate was to make Barack Obama a one term President. The National Review’s rejection of Trump because of his opportunism and lack of an ideology is priceless when one can say the same of Conservatism.  William F. Buckley, the magazine’s founder, broke out into intellectual and political circles in 1951 with his God and Man at Yale written just after his graduation and where he decried the collectivist perspective forced upon his individual one at college. With his publication he drew American Conservatism out of it’s John Birch Society hole and redirected it toward a Libertarian, Classical Liberal, political movement of liberty and individual freedom which moved to nominate Barry Goldwater as a Presidential candidate and culminated with the election of Ronald Reagan.  Conservatism and The Republican Party got off track, however, when with their adulation of Reagan they encouraged activist Evangelicals to politicize their values.  It’s curious that this happened under Reagan because there is no evidence that he was much of a church goer especially when compared to the Baptist sunday school teacher Jimmy Carter, but single issue pro lifers found a welcome in the GOP’s tent and party ideologues thereafter did not understand that these additional neutrons could cause the party to split. It’s a process called fission and in its nuclear form lets loose an awful lot undirected energy.

Evangelical authoritarian capture has redirected the party’s economic narrative to a crony capitalism worthy of the previous Gilded Age. Reagan swept into office after Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose market based celebration of the individual and freedom. Now the party pulse has ossified to the elitist strictures of Ludwig von Mises, a relic of the Austro Hungarian Empire and the ideological Laissez Faire orthodoxy of the previous Gilded Age.  That Theodore Roosevelt as described by Doris Kearns Goodwin in The Bully Pulpit, broke free of his class with a Trust Busting break up of the concentration of power is the greatness of his presidency which The Republican Party as presently constituted is completely blind to. The point of distinction between Von Mises and Friedman is that one has no respect for anyone less than an elite while the other is an egalitarian admirer of the little man and the swarm of individuals described in Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations as working in their own self interest to create society's greatest good.  

The current Republican Orthodoxy is blind to its conspicuous celebrities doling out a cynical message of an equal opportunity ticket to the lottery of life. It supports along with Democrats the concentration of power in Washington because it morphed government largesse under their watch to the benefit of a few who coincidentally, or maybe not, are lead by the same name, J. P. Morgan.  The crux of the Republican problem is if Democrats are authoritarian, Barack Obama being a prime example of FDR authoritarianism, then what is their yang to the others ying; more authoritarianism?  The National Review is horrified by Trump because he his ideologically unhinged but so are they with their support for Ted Cruz.  He is the facile embodiment of a debater who can defend any proposition, even the impossible Conservative one that embraces free market matter and evangelical antimatter who will lead them to an empty annihilating mandate.

Unfortunately for Bernie a “willingness to trust each other” can not be Legislated

As might be expected from boosters whose job it is to promote economic growth and talk up the Twin Cities’ appeal, many Itasca participants express confidence that their project could be replicated elsewhere. Mr. Campbell, though, is less sure.

“My answer is maybe,” he said. “There’s a unique willingness to trust each other here. It’s kind of in our blood.”

Trust fuels the delivery of the public good in commerce and society. It’s what separates Libertarians who trusts the spontaneous self organizing character of markets to the Authoritarian distrust of human nature.  It’s a north south thing from which the generalisation that harsh winter climate breeds a survival characteristic for saving and sharing. On the other hand plentiful food and a moderate climate year round never develops these trusting traits. It’s what allows Northern Europe’s socialism to provide the public good efficiently where on the other hand an easy life in Southern Europe diverts much of the good to corruption.

An apolitical description of a successful society is one that provides the maximum public good with the assets at hand.  Adam Smith’s market economy is the best example but not the only one.  Bernie Sanders has an enthusiasm for “Nordic Socialism” which is a self developed mix of market and communal solutions which apparently works well in Scandinavia.  Here in “Nordic” Minnesota; Itasca, the Twin Cities communal business effort, is an example of a spontaneous local effort but unfortunately for Bernie a “willingness to trust each other” can not be legislated.       

Chris Christie Would Trade Our Liberty For an Illusory Sense of Security

Gov. Chris Christie makes the dubious claim that as "the United States attorney for New Jersey, framing it as a time when he spent his “life protecting our country” against terrorism."   Its the promise of all authoritarians with no real accomplishment other than a governance of the State of New Jersey laced with debt and corruption.  

Let's Not Over React and Exchange Our Liberty for Illusory Security

The death toll from jihadist terrorism on American soil since the Sept. 11 attacks — 45 people — is about the same as the 48 killed in terrorist attacks motivated by white supremacist and other right-wing extremist ideologies, according to New America, a research organization in Washington.