"The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield & government to gain ground." - Thomas Jefferson to Edward Carrington, Paris, May 27, 1788
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The constant reminders of ObamaCare's problems have Democrats all too eager to move on to their natural election-year agenda of demagoging income inequality, expanding jobless benefits, raising the federal minimum wage, & most importantly passing comprehensive immigration reform legislation. These topics are much more pleasing to Democrats than defending ObamaCare because they appeal to their voter base – the poor, the homeless (we use to call them bums), the downtrodden, the poorly educated, & those looking to widen the social safety net. Of course the way Democrats plan to expand all of these topics will keep their respective voter bases poor, homeless, downtrodden, poorly educated, & accordingly needing an even larger social safety net.
It is understandable that Democrats want to run from the effects of ObamaCare but they may not be able to. In their heart of hearts they know there is an underlying pessimism that is threatening to become the new normal unless America can snap out of its trance & throw off everything BO has laid on us. A raise of the federal minimum wage to $10.10 per hour can be a living wage only if it is coupled with benefits from a government program or two, moving into your parents' basement where you help spend down your parents' wealth (your inheritance), & have no dream or possibility for a better future. This is BO's dream & it should not be yours.
Democrats are counting on the tongue-tied flatfooted Republicans not being able to satisfactorily address these topics. They feel it is a political winner for them (with no concern for your well being) if the establishment Republicans (Team A) give in on many of these issues & Tea Party Republicans (Team B) show their (perceived) rigidity & not compromise @ all thereby proving once again their (unjustified) unreasonableness & unattractiveness.
What Democrats are not counting on is Tea Partiers leading a giant change in mindset of the American people to realize their best hope is not more of the same government-dependent-programs' expansions but rather the unleashing of America's entrepreneurs who will really solve the problems of the aforementioned groups. They are not counting on a Tea Party leader inspiring a change from the current apathy & dependence mindset to one of liberty & abundance like it was @ our founding. They are not counting on someone explaining – & the people understanding - the stages of Death Of Democracy – like I did on the radio in March, 2012 to former NJ Assembly Speaker Chuck Haytaian – how throughout all of human history democracies have never been a permanent form of government because apathetic people discover they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury that results in the collapse of the society – this is where we are now. And Democrats are definitely not counting on people realizing they have more skin in the game than they currently think they have in that their entire life will change for the worse if America's free enterprise system collapses. Democrats shudder to think of people recognizing that undoing & eliminating government-dependent programs is the key for returning America to the liberty & abundance stage of our history & improving everyone's standard of living. In short, everything BO, Pelosi, Reid, Sharpton, & Jackson have told people is a lie that robs them of their one chance @ the excitement & pleasure of high achievement of life on this Earth.
The above described mindset change will result in people returning to the excellence & simplicity of our founding libertarianism – a single, quite beautiful concept of the primacy of individual liberty, that, in turn, infuses notions of free markets, limited governments, & the importance of property owners' rights. In terms of public policy, these notions translate into free trade, free immigration, voluntary military service, & user fees instead of taxes. In this world the model of a free market functions as a template for all things – replacing government dependence & central authority. The new mindset will highlight people being concerned about individual rights & responsibilities over government or community rights & responsibilities. The only moral principle from which all preferences follow: that principle is self-ownership – individuals have the right to control their own bodies in action & speech, as long as they do not infringe on the same rights of others. (This paragraph based on the writings of Susan Lee.)
This is the world I see & live in to the greatest extent possible. This freedom is the treasure I wish for everyone.
But this mindset turnaround will not be easy. Long term unemployed who are still in the labor force are being rendered more & more unemployable each day that passes without them finding a job. Discouraged workers who have dropped out of the labor force feel even a lower depth of hopelessness. These people are caught in what Professor Peter Coclanis & many development economists call a "middle-income trap" - meaning a situation where economies stagnate after reaching a certain middle level, usually because their manufacturing & labor costs no longer allow them to compete with lower-cost producers, but their work forces aren't skilled enough to compete higher-up the value chain. To paraphrase – "I'm pretty expensive & not very skilled."
In 2011 I posted the stats that some 50.5 million Americans were on Medicaid, 46.5 million are on Medicare, 52 million on Social Security, 5 million on SSI, 7.5 million on unemployment insurance, & 44.6 million on food stamps & other nutrition programs. Some 24 million get the earned-income tax credit, a cash supplement. In 2010 such payments to individuals were 66% of the federal budget, up from 28% in 1966. This is a lot of momentum toward government dependence & it has only gotten worse in the last two years & ObamaCare will swell the Medicaid, unemployment (& SSI by extension), & EIC numbers.
The first step in correcting this problem – if people are smart enough to want to - is for everyone caught in this middle-income trap to admit being poorly educated with skills so limited that no employer can use them – this will take looking yourself in the mirror & admitting the predicament you are in without casting blame on someone else. You have to confess (to yourself) that you have not adapted to the fact that your old job can now be done by a machine (e.g., if you were a toll collector) or by someone in a third world country who makes pennies a day. Since you always have to make a living – there is no such thing as retirement from receiving bills – you will have to learn new skills & retrain. Part of the cost of freedom is that everyone has to bear the cost of investment in themselves - both time & money – so they can make a living to support themselves. The toll collector could have seen his problems coming if he just looked @ the number of E-ZPass lanes (or other similar electronic toll collection system) & admitted his toll-collecting job prospects were not bright. The government has brainwashed far too many people to think they don't have to take care of themselves.
Take stock of yourself & if you are envious of something or the position someone else has try to figure out how they got it & then go get it for yourself. Throw aside the class warfare that BO has pedaled about millionaires & billionaires – there aren't that many to begin with & how does bringing them down help you?
Something like what is described above is what it will take to restore the excellence of America's heritage in our country – from unleashing entrepreneurs to people facing the realities of the solutions to their own problems. And of course BO will fight this tooth & nail because his idea of success as President depends on his every lie & misunderstanding being carried out while he pretends to be fighting for the antithesis of his actual objectives & pursuits.
As of January 1 BO was joined in his quest by the newly elected Mayor of NYC Bill de Blasio whose announced priorities, that he successfully ran on, included raising taxes on high income earners, reining in the "stop & frisk" police technique, stopping the practice of closing low performing schools, & slowing the growth of charter schools. The new mayor was sworn in by Bill Clinton with Hillary on stage nodding & clapping approvingly in a sign of things they hope to see come. Bill de Blasio joins Cory Booker & Terry McAuliffe as Democrats who won elections this past fall despite BO's seeming unpopularity. To make matters worse de Blasio did not even attempt to cloak his progressive programs during his campaign the way BO did twice during his – although BO's intentions are becoming clearer every day to even the least discerning amoung us.
Still many Republican pundits are counting on ObamaCare's pain & financial stress on everyday Americans to carry the day in November's mid-term elections but as indicated above there are other issues, even now, & ObamaCare will probably work for most of the 2.1 million people who have enrolled so far. After all there is Medicaid expansion & plenty of taxpayer subsidies for paying premiums & co-pays. The jury is still out as to whether or not people care more about price or the doctors & hospitals they are permitted to use – my doctor has told me for years that price will win out. A "failed" ObamaCare could also turn into a single payer universal healthcare system which would be another Democrat political winner & their real goal all along - so anyone looking to displace Democrats next November should not take ObamaCare's "failure" for granted with the fickleness of the American public. Tea Partiers should lead the way back from the socialist wilderness we are in with a better plan based on the freedom of the American people – like described above.
Please look @ the above graph that shows the results of a poll conducted December 4 to 8 – the height of the ObamaCare website's problems & the time people were losing their private healthcare insurance every day. Even then Democrats had a lower negative rating than Republicans & every category on the right side of the graph shows deterioration for Republicans meaning it should be hard to get cocky over one issue ten months before the mid-terms. People hate Democrats until they consider the two-party system alternative – Republicans - which they hate more.
But BO's purposeful misleading & dishonest launch of ObamaCare coupled with its high premiums that lead to high deductibles & high copays for many people gives us the first real chance we have had since BO became a national figure. The pendulum has been swinging away from liberty & toward government gaining ground since the Civil War with only brief slowdowns led by Coolidge, Reagan, & Speaker Gingrich. But now we are deeper into the stages of Death Of Democracy & it will take another exceptional inspirational leader of Galt-like magnificence to turn America's predicament around. Decide for yourself if you think the country is too far gone for anything to make a difference.
Ayn Rand said she wrote about men like John Galt & Howard Roark because she knew they existed. Well, they can't appear soon enough to suit me.
