All Things Michael Miles

Is Dennis Prager a closet progressive? I must admit that before reading his November 2nd trollop from NRO/NPR, he was unknown to me. But while writing a response to that op-ed, I perused his website and came away shaking my head in disappointment. I don’t want to spend too much time on Mr. Prager, since he’s not very intellectually stimulating, but there is one point to be discussed.

What’s Up With Closeted Progressivism?

Last week, Prager published a voting guide on his website (I love voting guides, because they assume so much audience knowledge and interest in the author’s viewpoint.) I was surprised to find this:

Prop 19 – Legalizing Marijuana – NO

This is a classic case of liberal Stage One thinking. The results will be nothing like liberals envision. Nothing good will come of this (certainly not “the billions” they claim it will generate in tax revenue) and the quality of life in California will further deteriorate. When government sanctions something, people engage in more of it. Do we really want to encourage Californians to smoke more pot?

Now, it seems pretty impressive to use a phrase like “liberal Stage One thinking,” except that the underlying logic is so convoluted that it’s not possible for us to attribute any real intellect here. And, by the way, “Stage One thinking” isn’t inherently liberal, so the proper construction should be “Stage One liberal thinking.” Just sayin’…

To my conservative friends, do we see the problem here?

Let me illustrate with a quote from Carrie Nation, that tireless and ideological reformer of The Progressive Movement:

[Liquor is] the open sore of this land…the most fiendish, corrupt and hell-soaked institution that ever crawled out of the slime of the eternal pit.

So Prager wants to employ prohibition to affect the quality of life in California. He sanctions the use of government to shape social values and behavior, in order to minimize secondary effects like crime, divorce and religious participation (my examples.) Can someone explain how that is philosophically different from Carrie Nation smashing saloons in order to improve marriages and reduce crime? Doesn’t conservatism place trust in the individual to make choices and live with the consequences? If, as Prager asserts, we can easily affect social behavior through legislation, then why aren’t we doing more of that? Why stop with pot, when we could prohibit divorce, liquor, and public hand-holding?

My politics are not dogmatic, but I think it’s safe to say that conservatives wouldn’t call me one of their own, despite my sharing a number of convictions with them. Still, I believe it’s important to have a real conservative movement in this country, and we just don’t. The right wing has become an arbitrary platform of issues that are labeled conservative, but as this example illustrates, have no grounding in political philosophy. Where are the pure of heart who really want to limit government? The fact is, a robust conservative movement in this country might force the left wing to sharpen their pencils, and the civil debate would be dramatically elevated.

One final note: today’s political landscape is the synthesis of yesteryear’s battle between conservatism and progressivism. It is impossible to analyze contemporary attitudes and actions without paying homage to the contributions of Carrie Nation, Eugene Debs, William Jennings Bryan, Huey Long and FDR. Distancing oneself from this pedigree is the same as denying a crazy parent. In a sense, the Progressive Movement gave birth to modern conservatives. And while you may not want to bring your friends home to meet her, you share the same chin and eye color with your mother.

William F. Buckley called. He rolled over in his grave and can’t light his smoke.

Dennis Prager, a syndicated radio talk-show host and columnist for the National Review Online, wrote a piece that was published on the NPR website November 2nd. It explains his reasoning for straight-ticket voting, and the argument deserves a response.

I’m not going to argue against Mr. Prager’s opinions, although it’s tempting. That is for another venue, and since I’m not a foreign policy expert or economist, it would provide you nothing except a “he said, he said” tussle. Nor is it necessary, for there are plenty of problems with the presuppositions Prager relies upon to make his argument; they are my focus.

Let’s begin with the statement, “With only two parties competing in American elections, each party has had to encompass a much wider spectrum of ideologies.” In order for this to be true, the majority of viewpoints in American society would have to be represented, and there is no evidence this is the case. Nor is the statement intuitive: the GOP experienced ideological purges after 1964, 1992 and 2004. Independent voters, which now make up a majority of the electorate, move back and forth between the parties (the antithesis of Prager’s op-ed), demonstrating their ideology is represented by neither party. I could easily design a party platform which perfectly reflects my views, instead of being forced to compromise and support an existing political party. However, the assertion is convenient for those who want to claim the Democratic Party represents socialists and Marxists, but that is no more valid than claiming all Republicans are fascists. No genuine, intellectual analysis would claim that. If you doubt me, go find an authentic socialist and ask them if they agree with the Obama administration’s economic plan.

And quickly, before I move on, the Republican Party is not – “at long last” – the party of small government. Movement leaders, as recently as last week, are on record supporting Social Security, Medicare and ever-expanding military involvement throughout the world. Even Prager advocates military intervention in Iran, in his own op-ed. George W. Bush refuses to repudiate his use of torture or indefinite detention, and it is uncertain whether the GOP is willing to investigate or prosecute him. The PATRIOT Act is still alive and well. These are not the hallmarks of small government. As I have argued in the past, the GOP – even with its infusion of Tea Party energy – does not behave in a conservative fashion. The mistake made by Prager and others is confusing positions adopted by conservatives as being conservative positions.

He also asserts that small government is required for liberty. I’ve never really understood this. Don’t get me wrong, I’m fluent in Hayek’s economic argument about centralized planning. And my knowledge of American and Modern European history equals or bests the next guy. Maybe that’s where I miss the point: liberalism was a movement to provide more liberty to citizens. It didn’t reject government, it simply decentralized power. Dethrone the monarch and allow the subjects participation and responsibility. The Boston Tea Party wasn’t about taxes, it was about a lack of representation in Parliament. So I have to ask Mr. Prager, do you think taxes are tyrannical, or are you an anarchist?

But my favorite has to be the contemporary trap of political philosophy: equating American exceptionalism with conservative values. Exceptionalism – the assertion of moral superiority and projection of might around the world – gained considerable momentum after World War II, and has advanced unimpeded. It has roots in Natural Law (see Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s A Discourse Upon the Origin and the Foundation of Inequality) and bears a striking resemblance to the Jacobinism that early conservatives and our forefathers were so afraid of. It is a radical belief that we can remake the world in our political image, with little regard for the “cultural gravity” of other societies. By laying claim to it, the American Right betrays its heritage and history in the conservatism of Burke and Adams.

Now, Prager and those of a similar mind are free to believe what they wish, which kind of neuters the argument that Democrats are opposed to liberty. If he wishes to assert that George W. Bush’s knowledge of foreign policy is more impressive than Joe Biden’s, so be it: people can judge that statement on their own. But let’s be clear: when he champions “Sarah Palin [confronting] Iran rather than [placing] her faith in negotiations and in the United Nations” he makes an assertion that has no basis in conservative philosophy. And yet he uses conservatism to provide credibility to his argument, asking people to believe that his path is traditional, reasoned and proven, when it is not. Instead, the contemporary American Right seeks to refashion society in a form that hasn’t existed in over 150 years, if ever. It’s goal is to start over, rejecting almost all of the progress this country has achieved, and discarding the tradition and incrementalism that is the hallmark of conservative principles.

There is a reason that right-of-center thinkers like myself have a problem with the GOP. It’s the same reason that Russell Kirk, who wrote the definitive tome on modern conservative thought, “The Conservative Mind,” broke with them. It is the same reason that Reagan Republicans like Orrin Hatch, Richard Lugar, John McCain and Olympia Snowe are in the crosshairs of the Tea Party: the American Right has radically transformed itself over the past three decades. In the process, it has dragged the rest of the political apparatus along with it. And while I realize the advantage of modifying the frame of debate to cast the Right as defenders of liberty, that does nothing to advance civil discourse. For there is nothing inherently free about small government, or inherently oppressive about big government. It is the reach of government and it’s openness to participation that is important.

I can think of a lot of words to describe the Democratic Party: cowardly, corporate, spineless, disinterested, but radical would not be one of them. Over the next few months, as Mitch McConnell and John Boehner refuse to legislate in order to disgrace the President of the United States, we need to stay focused on what is really the radical agenda. Is it a barely-left-of-center President attempting to meet in the middle, or a Republican leadership wanting to turn back the clock to the Gilded Age? Prager eschews the prospect of European progress; let him honestly argue for third-world economic isolation.

Take away the spirit of Individualism from the people and you at once eliminate the American spirit – the love of freedom, of free industry, free and unfettered opportunity, you take away freedom itself.

Henry Clews, 19th century Wall Street veteran

Individualism, the assertion of the primacy and inherent dignity of the individual, originated in the hazy beginnings of America, and matured during the nineteenth century to the point where Alexis de Tocqueville coined the term. It is fundamental to our mythos, but the ability to actually achieve it has waxed and waned throughout the years for most Americans. Depending upon one’s station in life – agrarian, laborer, professional or elite – professing individualism and practicing it have not always been consonant.

In modern life, individualism is once again the central narrative, and its association with freedom and choice remain unchanged. During my youth in the 1970s and 80s, libertarianism made for interesting political science study, but little of it was found in civic debate. Today, with the advent of the Tea Party factions, most debates center around the libertarian notions of individualism, total government deregulation and the oppression of taxation. In short, social organization equals totalitarianism. In an examination of such an argument’s presuppositions, however, we discover unstable foundations. American history provides a robust laboratory to observe the relationship between individualism, well-being and financial security. When doing so, we find that the natural response of a group under threat or financial pressure is to organize for mutual benefit. Conversely, groups which have mitigated outside threats have more difficulty maintaining ongoing cohesiveness, and have a higher likelihood of disbanding. Which brings us back to the question of today: will public policies for which the Tea Party and GOP advocate, actually prompt a collapse of individualism, causing a resurgence in social organization and mutualism?

Americans foster a manic nostalgia for “the good ol’ days.” But the truth of the matter is that most people found life in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries pretty horrible. A laborer or farm worker averaged well below a self-sufficient income despite working over 80 hours per week. Women and children compensated for the shortfall. Conditions were harsh, and average life-expectancy was short; as low as 40 years. Families could count on experiencing the premature death of a parent or child. The concept of economic mobility was unheard of, despite a couple of exceptions like Andrew Carnegie. If you were born to a working class family, it was unthinkable that your life would be an improvement over that of your parents.

At the height of the Gilded Age, when income disparity equaled today’s level, farmers and laborers had a singular response to their threatened existence: greater social organization. Immigrant populations in city ghettos formed mutual groups that provided child care, unemployment support, food banks and other family services during unforeseen circumstances. Farmers – despite their propensity for individualism – experimented with cooperatives and political movements (while these did not succeed, their creation attests to the validity of my hypothesis.) Even in the face of company militias, Illinois coal miners risked their lives to organize into unions, leaving us the legacies of Bloody Williamson and Mother Jones. Each of these groups favored mutualism over individualism, not because they didn’t share the American dream, but out of sheer desire to survive.

Interestingly, the greatest period of individualism – and the one which right-wing policy makers often cite as an example – is the period following World War II, when personal wealth, innovation and the economy exploded in this country. Obtaining greater financial security allowed populations the indulgence of individualism: blue-collar workers could afford a nice home, children and spouses were not required to contribute wages, an eight-hour work day and five-day work week provided time for leisure, readily available health care extended lives and careers, and ubiquitous public education facilitated economic mobility. Public policies like the minimum wage, union concessions like the 40-hour work week, and government programs like FHA and the GI Bill all contributed to America’s financial security. It was not until mutualism provided for each of these social goods that individualism became a mass movement, allowing Ronald Reagan to launch a systematic attack against mutualism in the early 1980s, finding little resistance.

During the current election cycle, Tea Party and mainstream GOP candidates (and, to be fair, a couple of conservative Democrats) argue for reducing or eliminating the minimum wage, repealing the recent health care reform legislation, privatizing Social Security and Medicare, deregulating the financial sector further, and even facilitating the outsourcing of jobs overseas. These policy planks align with an ideology based upon individualism. But will they produce the desired effect? Are they aligned with the extension of individualism? The history laboratory that is our country indicates they will not. With income disparity almost as high as the Gilded Age, and political pressure being exerted to minimize class mobility, the majority of Americans may find that, while individualism is their philosophical right, practicing it may be a secondary priority. As the middle class shrinks and experiences greater financial insecurity, it can be predicted to resort to mutualism as a strategy for survival.

Actioni contrariam semper et æqualem esse reactionem: sive corporum duorum actiones in se mutuo semper esse æquales et in partes contrarias dirigi. [translate: To every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction: or the forces of two bodies on each other are always equal and are directed in opposite directions.]

Newton’s Third Law of Motion

From Merriam-Webster Online:

Entitlement \-ˈtī-təl-mənt\ n. 3: belief that one is deserving of or entitled to certain privileges.

The word entitlement is popular today, appearing often as the Tea Party and right-wing attempt to refashion its use in our society. There is an existing model for it: the word liberal being successfully redefined to mean socialist several decades ago, apparently to provide the right with an excuse to distance themselves from their roots (remember George H.W. Bush accusing Michael Dukakis of being liberal? I wonder how David Hume would have reacted to that.) However, as I have written in the past, words matter, and we can’t possibly understand the political process if we don’t understand the manipulation occurring behind the scenes.

In April of this year I asked the question, “Is the Right conservative?” I concluded that the right-wing in America resembled the French Jacobins more than any other group; French Rousseau liberals who believed that natural law provided them equality with the aristocracy, a radical notion at the time. Which brings me to the above definition.

The Tea Party meme is about taking back the government, creating a wave of populism, and ejecting the ‘elites’ from power. It’s about electing Christine O’Donnell – a woman with no political experience – to the United States Senate. It’s about replacing knowledge with common sense. While these are all fascinating ideas that have merit, it is important to note that there is nothing conservative about any of them. They represent a radical deflection from current political momentum.

But don’t take my word for it, there are centuries of political theory defining conservatism. Edmund Burke – the father of conservatism – believed that civilized society required classes of people, and that equality only existed in front of God, not within the realm of man. The notion that a common man with an internet connection might feel empowered to influence public policy without gaining the necessary expertise and knowledge was simply radical. Actually, it still is.

So, the next time someone rants about entitlement, point out to them the irony of their position. In American society, it’s pretty hard to avoid the presupposition of entitlement in our arguments. From Manifest Destiny to Christine O’Donnell, Americans have boldly taken what is ‘rightly ours’ in the name of God and freedom and righteousness.