Sleepless in San Diego
I must admit, I don’t get it. We are in the final days of a tumultuous national election cycle and people just aren’t acting in ways that make sense to me. There are certainly some predictable things going on with rats leaving the sinking Trump leaky dinghy of state. The list of people trying to distance themselves from the Loser-in-Chief was inevitable and happens regardless of the politics of the incumbent. History may or may not be kind to any president, but everyone starts to think about their own post-era circumstances sooner or later. I imagine Trumpsters look at Sean Spicer and wince a good deal, imagining how they would look in a one-piece Dancing With The Stars ensemble. Personally, I would like to see Sarah Huckabee Sanders in a tutu leaping and bounding across the stage, or William Barr mud wrestling with Mike Pompeo for the best out of two out of three falls on the Sycophantic Wrestlemania Extravaganza. But I still don’t get it.
This morning in the wee hours (I was restless probably due to hoisting too many 70-pound rocks and 5-gallon plants in anticipation of tomorrow’s patio garden plantathon) I got into a dueling email exchange with two motorcycle buddies who are rabid Republicans. Note that I call them Republicans, a term many conservatives are currently eschewing by virtue of its direct and pervasive connection to the Party-of-Trump.
I, like many of you have heard lots of people say, “I’m more of a Libertarian than a Republican.” That seems to be a popular theme, and it gets accompanied with soliloquies about the power of the individual in American history. There is some truth to that credo that self-determination made this country great. But countries like Canada and Australia, with far less bountiful and easy-to-manage environments, adopted a blend of individualism and collectivism that made the two non-exclusive. I, myself, used to say during my two year residence in Canada (1990-1992), that it was easy to be socialistic and high-minded (especially in healthcare terms) when you all live within eighty miles of the U.S. border and can dip in for a portion of prosperity or cardiac surgery when needed. But Australia is the exception that proves that line of reasoning wrong. It’s not near anyone prosperous other than the puny Switzerland of Southeast Asia, Singapore. Aussies are as fiercely independent as descendants of Botany Bay could possibly be and yet they have still retained their belief in the importance of collective humanity and have consequently inflicted only about 6% of the national deaths (904 – proportionate to population) as we have had in the United States.
So there is some sort of disconnect between the Libertarian excuse and the Republican reality. I go back to not getting it. My two motorcycle buddies have learned how to deflect criticism about their politics. One says he isn’t voting for Trump…..he is voting for Republican ideals. The other says he doesn’t think Biden will likely screw up the country too badly, but he is voting for Trump because it is better for him economically. These are not dumb guys though one of them likes to take on the mantra of just a simple country boy and occasionally does things that qualify as idiotic, just for fun. They are both quite wealthy and probably have more than they or their children need for very affluent lives in perpetuity. Neither is particularly cerebral or highly educated but both have street smarts. Do they just not see the realities and the historical truth about Republican politics and economics?
A Congressionally-issued report says it best, “The Republican Party claims to be “the party of maximum economic freedom and the prosperity that freedom makes possible.” However, an analysis of economic performance since World War II under Democratic versus Republican presidents strongly suggests that claims that Republicans are better at managing the economy are simply not true. While the reasons are neither fully understood nor completely attributable to policy choices, data show that the economy has performed much better during Democratic administrations. Economic growth, job creation and industrial production have all been stronger.” A study of history also shows an almost ubiquitous coincidence of overall prosperity when there is a broadening of the middle class and more even wealth distribution. The consumerism driven by the industrial revolution as we moved into the modern Twentieth Century did more to broaden the economic base and generate more opportunities for wealth accumulation than any other time in the history of man. The era may not have raised personal happiness (studies have shown that early man had more of the elements like leisure time and healthy food and water than any measure of average post-industrial lifestyle), but it sure as hell brought prosperity defined in purely economic terms. What about this do my buddies not see?
I find myself saying “Be long-term greedy” to them. Your grandchildren will simply have better lives if we promote policies of more inclusion and wealth distribution. Put bluntly, pay higher salaries so you can sell them more shit. Feed them so they are healthier and work harder. Keep them healthy so your healthcare benefits don’t go through the roof. Let them in so you have more labor and don’t need to waste money on walls. You can’t build your walls high enough anyway to keep out the burgeoning population of the world. If you invite them and educate them rather than keep your neck on their throat, they are less likely to have nothing to lose in violence. Why is that all so hard to grasp. History bears this all out over and over again. It’s why a non-reading history-denying ignoramus like Donald Trump is unable to comprehend why everything he does works out so badly, if not immediately, certainly in the long run.
So once again, I just don’t get it. Why would someone choose to listen to stupid people rather than smart people (Sean Hannity versus Rachel Maddow)? Why would someone prefer a stupid and corrupt leader over an empathetic and right-minded one? Is “Libertarian” philosophy so blinded by the Siren song of Freedom that it will march off a cliff following a dumpster fire like Trump like lemmings to the slaughter, rather than seek the enlightened path to peace and prosperity? I understand why tobacco-chewing rednecks might not be able to get past the anti-establishment thinking that drives one to the craven image of Donald Trump, but thinking people have no excuse for not thinking through the issues to their logical conclusion. Liberal policies or no policies. Peace versus war. Prosperity versus chaos. This is what makes me sleepless in San Diego.