Categories
Thought

Ralph Raico

All mass murderers — all of the state terrorists on a grand scale, whatever their ethnicity or that of their victims — must be arraigned before the court of history. It is impermissible to let some of them off the hook, even if the acts of others may be characterized as unique in their brazen embrace of evil and their sickening horror. As Lord Acton said, the historian should be a hanging judge, for the muse of history is not Clio, but Rhadamanthus, the avenger of innocent blood.

Ralph Raico, “The Taboo Against Truth: Holocausts and Historians,” Liberty, September 1989.

Categories
Today

Independence Days

September 16 marks the Independence Days for Mexico (celebrating the declaration of independence from Spain in 1810) and Papua New Guinea (commemorating the exit from Australia in 1975).

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Accountability ideological culture local leaders national politics & policies political challengers responsibility

Crazy Like a … Spoiler

spoiler, GOP, incumbents, Republicans, Pro-Trump

Seven Republican members of Congress — three in the last two weeks — have announced their retirement.* The Democrats, needing 24 additional seats to gain a majority, see an opening.

Steve Kornacki, MSNBC’s national political correspondent, calls these seven “pure retirements.” That is, these politicians aren’t seeking another office, they suffer from no scandal, and are “pretty good at getting re-elected”; they’re “just deciding to leave.” Kornacki notes that the GOP had eight pure retirements in 2006 when they lost the House, and the Democrats had eleven when their majority was destroyed in 2010.

On his MSNBC program, The 11th Hour, an exasperated Brian Williams complained, “On top of all that, since down is up and up is down, Bannon [is] threatening to — to use the verb of the moment — primary incumbent Republicans! Which is crazy.”

Williams refers to Steve Bannon, late of the Trump administration and now back at the helm of Breitbart News. Bannon is now working, as CNN reported, with “conservative mega-donor Robert Mercer, who is prepared to pour millions of dollars into attacks on GOP incumbents.” Incumbent Republicans thwarting Trump, that is.

“I don’t think anyone should be surprised,” remarked Ned Ryun, American Majority’s CEO. “It’s a natural reaction by the base to what they’ve perceived as a perhaps intentional inability to pass any Trump agenda items.”**  

Ah, more spoilers! This week we’ve talked about Libertarian spoilers; now, pro-Trump spoilers. And, for years, non-profit groups such as the Club for Growth and U.S. Term Limits have helped a challenger against an incumbent, and been dubbed dangerous to Republican hegemony for their trouble.

Seems what connects all these anti-establishment folks is a commitment to principle over power.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

*  The retiring Republicans are Rep. Sam Johnson (R, TX-3), Rep. Lynn Jenkins (R, KS-2), Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R, FL-27), Rep. John Duncan Jr. (R, TN-2), Rep. Dave Reichert (R, WA-9), Rep. Charlie Dent (R, PA-15), and Rep. Dave Trott (R, MI-11).

** Steve Kornacki responded to Brian Williams: “Absolutely unheard of for a nominee in either party to have that complete lack of support from Capitol Hill and then go out there and win the nomination [for president]. . . . You have this element where all these members of Congress, even though it’s a president of their party on paper, don’t really feel they’re part of this presidency.”

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Categories
Today

After Porto

On September 15, 1820, an uprising occurred in Lisbon, Portugal, following similar insurrection in Porto the previous month. This was no bloodthirsty mob, but, instead, a popular demand for constitutional government. Unfortunately, the country was beset with imperial and monarchical problems for some time to come.

The United Nations established September 15 as International Day of Democracy, in 2007. An Independence Day is celebrated on this date in Guatemala (a Patriotic Day), El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica, commemorating independence from Spain in 1821.

Categories
Thought

Benjamin Constant

Political liberty, by submitting to all the citizens, without exception, the care and assessment of their most sacred interests, enlarges their spirit, ennobles their thoughts, and establishes among them a kind of intellectual equality that forms the glory and power of a people.

Benjamin Constant The Liberty of the Ancients Compared with That of the Moderns, 1819

Categories
Accountability ballot access folly media and media people moral hazard national politics & policies political challengers term limits

If This Be Blackmail. . .

Hillary Clinton, What Happened, Libertarian, 2-party, ranked choice voting

The Republican Party now boasts of more positions of power than . . . ever? And yet the GOP is in danger of falling apart.

The Democrats, now forced to endure Hillary Clinton’s new absurdity, What Happened, appear at wits’ end. They just do not “get it.”

Alas, “not getting it” is not limited to the major parties. The Libertarian Party (which is my subject this week) has been around since 1972 . . . doing the same things over and over . . . with spectacular lack of electoral success.*

Sure, the party has had no small subtle influence — perhaps most notably the change in marijuana policies. Yet it could have even more. Without electing anybody, as I argued yesterday.

But that’s just the tip of the Titanic-killer.

Not only could party organizers threaten the major parties with running — and taking away votes — based on their candidates’ positions, Libertarian organizers could also threaten to run against candidates who will not publicly take up the cause of electoral reform.

Particularly, ranked choice voting.

Because of our first-past-the-post elections, Libertarians tend to take away votes from those most similar to themselves. With ranked choice voting (see a sample ballot), a voter whose favorite is a Libertarian will have his second-favorite choice count** towards that candidate; minor party candidates would no longer work as spoilers.

And that would allow voters to embrace their real preferences, not pretend to like candidates they actually distrust.

Since major party candidates would, in most circumstances, be hurt less by those closest to them, they should be willing to be “blackmailed” on this.

Jumping into the briar patch of supporting fresh reform to stop the spoilers.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

*  The 3 million odd votes for the Johnson/Weld presidential ticket, though a leap ahead from previous outings, was seen by many as a disappointment: that’s all the dynamic duo of former governors could do in a year with the unpopular duo of Trump and Clinton as R and D standard-bearers?

** That is, in cases where only a small percentage of the vote favors the Libertarian most.

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Categories
Thought

Simon Newcomb

A common mistake is that the conclusions of the plain unlettered man differ from those of economists in being more immediately founded on observed facts and less on deduction. The truth is that the plain unlettered man is more prone to rely on deduction from unproved hypotheses than the economist is. All classes must equally use deduction, because it is only by this logical process that we form any conclusion about the future effect of any present cause. Drawing the conclusion that rain will follow a certain direction of the wind with certain appearances of the clouds is an act of logical deduction. The main point in which men’s logical methods differ lies in the care with which hypotheses are formed by induction from observed facts, and the readiness of men to test them. Now it is the plain man who is most prone to form hasty generalizations from insufficient facts, to consider the conclusions which he thence deduces as final, and to be blind to all facts which do not tally with his theory.

Simon Newcomb, Principles of Political Economy, 1886, p. 40

Categories
Today

2 . . . 14

In 1752, throughout the British Empire, September 2 was followed, the next day, by September 14, as the government adopted the Gregorian calendar, skipping eleven days.

On September 14, 1944, Maastricht becomes the first Dutch city to be liberated by allied forces.

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general freedom incumbents local leaders national politics & policies political challengers

The Reverse of the “Spoiler Effect”

leverage, politics, Virginia, Libertarian, influence

“Voter surveys have found the GOP-controlled Congress,” I wrote last weekend at Townhall, “to be more popular among self-described Democrats than self-described Republicans.”

Why? Because Republican politicians are proving themselves unable — even unwilling — to legislate as they have promised. One word: Obamacare. And few dare actually cut spending on anything . . . though they campaign on something (mythical?) called “fiscal responsibility.”

This leaves the GOP open to challenge. By the party I mentioned yesterday on this page.

And that can prove disastrous for the Republicans, for our elections in these United States are not run, on the whole, on reasonable grounds. They are “first past the post” elections, where, if enough people vote for their most favorite candidate it ensures that their least favorite candidate wins.

In those races where allegedly “small government”/“fiscally responsible” Republicans are challenged by serious budget-slashing Libertarians, the Libertarian candidacy can have the effect of electing a Big Government/Pro-Debt Democrat.*

Yet the actual political outcome of these challenges could be positive — yes, for the GOP. As I wrote yesterday, the Virginia Libertarian gubernatorial candidate seems to be influencing the Republican to be less of a “jail ’em all” Drug Warrior.

When Republicans adopt pro-freedom positions they’ll win more votes.

Moreover, this influence need not be ad hoc.

State Libertarian Party officials could identify the most critical issues and negotiate directly with state GOP officials: “These are our issues — if your incumbents vote correctly on these issues, we will not challenge them. But if not, we will take them out.

“And if we help elect Democrats, that’s on your head.”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* There may be cases where the Libertarians — when focusing on issues such as drug legalization and peace — have cost Democrats elections. If so, Libertarians ought similarly leverage Democrats in those areas to improve their positions on those issues.

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Categories
Thought

Ralph Raico

‘Speaking truth to power’ is not easy when you support that power. Perhaps this is the reason why so few Western historians are willing to tell the whole truth about state crimes during this century.

Ralph Raico, “The Taboo Against Truth: Holocausts and Historians,” Liberty, September 1989.