Political Philosophy

What do American Indians Have to be Thankful For?

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Much of the modern left views the migration of Europeans to the Americas as one of history’s greatest tragedies. This cynicism represents a failure to examine both sides of the balance sheet, to recognize both good and bad consequences of trans-Atlantic colonization, as well as the consequences of having no European colonization at all. The answer to the question posed in the title comes down to at least four items.

Access to advanced technology. Recall this quote from Life of Brian: “All right, but apart from the sanitation, medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh water system and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?” One can nitpick and identify a few things the Judeans already had (e.g. wine), but overall the Romans significantly improved infrastructure that increased quality of life. The technological gap between Renaissance Europeans and pre-Columbian Americans was vastly greater. The Europeans also brought a non-technological advance that benefited some tribes in the short term: the horse.

And end to the constant threat of warfare. Before Europeans displaced the American natives, the natives were displacing each other. Such is life in a continent where one can find little land that isn’t frontier. As nation-states emerged and maintained long-term power, warfare became a less frequent concern.

Rule of law and relative freedom under the law. These principles evolved in Northern Europe and especially in England. They were exported to the Anglosphere colonies where they were developed further. Latin America was settled by the most autocratic region of Western Europe; centuries of existential threat under Moorish rule is not the sort of environment that breeds high-cooperation societies. Democratic reforms eventually came to many parts of the region with varying degrees of success. 

The Chinese did not colonize the Americas. If Ming Dynasty maritime exploration had taken a different turn…

Happy Thanksgiving! 

Differences Between Left and Right Political Viewpoints

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A friend of mine writes with the following thoughts, which I’ve edited for readability:

This election is highlighting a lot of the distinction between the way people on the Left and people on the Right think and feel. For the people on the Right, this election is about whether there will be a world war, whether the economy will be ruined, whether the southern border will be secured, what material steps need to be taken so that bad things will be prevented and some positive things happen. It’s about policy being implemented and government power being used in positive ways and not being used in damaging ways.
 
The Left is much more about personality and feelings. Identifying with Harris because she’s black and a woman, and feeling that she in some ambiguous but nonetheless important way represents some vague ideal that people care about. I have a friend whose daughter is voting for Harris, and he asked her why, and she said: Because she’s black and a woman and she’s not Trump; I don’t need to know what her policy views are.
 
It’s a completely different way of looking at the world. Frankly, it’s female, and I don’t like it, and it’s destructive if it’s given political power. The idea of this type of female mindset operating a system where people are arrested or people with guns show up at the door is terrifying. Such a system would be based on arbitrary female sentiments, and gestures of submission, rather than some agreed-on set of rules.

Let the Games Begin

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The ancient Greeks gave us “democracy,” a set of rules for candidates to compete for the right to rule. They also gave us the Olympics, a set of rules for individuals, teams and ultimately countries to compete in athletic events. The Olympics outlawed certain drugs, standardized the technology and separated males from females (historically) due to genetic differences, but otherwise there is no favoritism due to race, ethnicity, family history, country of origin, etc. Medals are awarded only to the top performers, gold/silver/bronze (all formerly used for money). Capitalism is a comparable set of rules for competition among individuals, teams and countries. Technology and management differences are allowed, even encouraged, as all contestants share in it over time. Similarly, capitalist competition is the source of virtually all human improvement for winners and losers alike. The US Constitution uniquely established rules for a competitive democracy and competitive market economy, historically the source of US economic growth.

 

The Olympics is a big business, with a history of scandals relating to kickbacks to judges, host country officials or Olympic Committee Members that corrupts the competition. Similarly, politicians who make the rules for a market economy that show favoritism to particular industries, firms or people, i.e., crony capitalism, is the corrupt antithesis of competitive market capitalism.

 

Competing with Olympic coverage in France, ironically under the French banner of “equality,” is the current political competition for the US presidency, which both sides agree is “pivotal” for democracy’s future, but the democracy spectrum runs from a limited government representative republic on the right to a majoritarian “peoples democracy” on the left. Each campaign accuses the other of hate, fear mongering, political pandering and the usual lies and misinformation (political spin). So far it has been an entertaining tag team mud wrestling match (even these have rules and limits).

 

But for over a century the fundamental economic choice has been between competitive market capitalism and egalitarian socialism, growth versus stagnation. The divide has never been more clear, although the Democratic Party eschews the socialist label. In 2020, when openly socialist Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders appeared a certain victor, the Party pulled the candidate, but adopted his “democratic socialism” platform. Current candidate Harris, similarly anointed, has either agreed with or been to the left of that platform on every issue, recent flip/flops notwithstanding. Their radical distributional “democratic socialism” goes beyond “to each according to his needs” to require “to each equally.” Their production ideology, eschewing state ownership, calls for a fair degree of state control.

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“A Disease of the Public Mind”

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That is the title of a book about the first US Civil War that resulted in the assassination of President Lincoln. The soldiers in the South hated those in the North and vice versa. Northern soldiers have since been credited with undeserved virtue while Southern rebels were labeled racist enemies of the state, a moniker that still survives in the present day. But neither side was fighting over the abolition of slavery.

 

Trump’s opponents claim he will re-institute Jim Crow oppression, put black people back in chains, end democracy and put people in Hitler’s concentration camps. The continuous character assassinations, legal persecutions, numerous impeachments, unfounded accusations and insinuation caused what has been called Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS), a disease of the public mind resulting in a recent assassination attempt.

 

Follow the Money
The Constitution the North and South agreed upon in 1788 enshrined the economic principles of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations, fostering equality under the law, individual sovereignty and limited government. Slavery was still too contentious an issue to settle. Starting in the next century the British led a moral crusade to eliminate slavery globally. While politically virtuous, Britain could afford to pay off slave owners and generally didn’t face the the vexing question for US plantation owners of whether freed slaves could support themselves and, if not, whether this would lead to murderous riots as had happened elsewhere. Abolition was a contentious issue everywhere slavery was practiced, typically with long drawn out steps to complete. But the long simmering political dispute that came to a head in 1860 wasn’t about abolition, but money. The federal government relied almost exclusively on tariffs raised in Southern ports – most of which went to northern states – on imports financed with the fruits of slavery, cotton exports.

 

Since the Civil War, limited government has given way to big government. The Democratic Party has created many dependent constituencies whose continued prosperity depends upon continuing Democratic power and largess: the bureaucracy, the government at all levels, teachers, labor leaders, academic educators and administrators, trial lawyers, government contractors, social security recipients and what are still euphemistically called journalists, among many others. The current Civil War is also about money. Trump has been in both political parties, fits in neither. But ”you are fired” represents an existential threat to Party members.

 

For contemporary Democratic politicians, almost all trained as lawyers, money beyond what is available by taxing the rich exists in banks, especially the Federal Reserve Banks, to be distributed according to the spoils system. For Republican politicians (but not RINOs), mostly former businessmen, prosperity comes from productive work and from savings productively invested. For those businesses and workers who are not on the receiving end of the spoils system, whose taxes pay for political largess, limited government is the only solution. There is very little middle ground.

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