Seattle's Stimulus Bill Protest

Today, I had the opportunity to attend a protest in Seattle against the stimulus bill. It was an orderly affair with a few speeches, a recording of Ronald Reagan waxing on big government and a kumbaya moment singing the National Anthem. (Mind you, I like singing the National Anthem and the crowd was in pretty good tune. But it's still kumbaya.)

Protests are something usually reserved for the other guy in the ideological war. After all, as it has been often noted, conservatives have jobs. However, the stimulus bill's timing, the availability of some conservatives on the Presidents' Day holiday and my need to be downtown at a client's office provided a rare syzygy resulting in the photos below.

An orderly crowd assembled outside of Westlake Mall in downtown Seattle.

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About 50-60 protesters. Not bad for a bunch of conservatives.


Flags were in abundance.
"Hey! Stop treading on us!"


Beware the Tax Hammer!


Matching mother and child pork hats.


There were also lots of handmade signs.


Who says conservatives aren't artistic?


OK. So not all conservatives are artistic. But the message is all right.


Sign, sign, everywhere a sign...


I don't think that's what they mean by "Yes We Can!".


Protest organizer Keli Carender speaks.


Whipping up the conservative crowd into a frenzy!
Is that an oxymoron?


The intrepid media covers the action.


The counter protest heads out.


Protester? Counter-protester? Observer?
In any event, he joined in the singing of the National Anthem.


Everyone posed for a group photo before it wound down.

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Update—Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Wow! In the past 3 days, American Typo has received over 3,000 hits thanks primarily to links to this post from Michelle Malkin and Instapundit. Once associated with those large blogs, American Typo was linked from all sorts of places, including Facebook, web mail, numerous conservative sites and even one liberal one.

None of this is particularly impressive to those that have popular or even moderately well-known blogs, but it was pretty fun for me. I throughly enjoyed logging the trackbacks via Google and referral page information. It was also interesting to see what others had to say about the post and the pictures both in the comments here and elsewhere.

Among the things that I found interesting:

• Ideology greatly impacts how one evaluates the protest's attendance.
  The actual number in attendance was not in great dispute—at least not along ideological lines. In comments, conservatives clearly regarded the 50 or 100 (depending upon who you ask) strong crowd as being pretty significant. Liberals saw such attendance as "pathetic".


• People are predisposed to seeing what they want to see.
  On TBogg, commenter bonkers said the following about the picture and caption for the man with his hand on his heart:
  

  Oh my f-ing dog. What a funny spread, and I’m not talking about the "organizer." My favorite is when the intrepid "reporter" spots a melanin-enhanced man with his hand on his chest, and gets confused:
  

  Protester? Counter-protester? Observer?
  In any event, he joined in the singing of the National Anthem.

  
  We all know only true Americans (i.e. Repubs) actually care about the National Anthem…and flag lapel pins…and Lee Greenwood. Anyone else is an importer (sic), especially with that skin color. Who does he think he’s foolin?!?
  

  bonkers saw in my observations confusion, racism and exclusivism. He was exactly wrong. I was not confused by the idea that a black man would care about the National Anthem and I harbor no belief that "Repubs" are the only true Americans. However, I was touched that a man who might feel excluded from such an event actually felt comfortable enough with the crowd to stop and solemnly appreciate the Star Spangled Banner.


• I used the word "waxing" incorrectly.
  Again from TBogg, commenter slapshoe notes:

  "Ronald Reagan waxing on big government"–what, with Turtle Wax? Beeswax? I wish these bozos (and countless other bozos) would learn what the hell "wax" means. Grumph.

  
  Thank you for the correction, though I think the attitude might have been a little strong (Karma perhaps for my snark about conservatives having jobs?). I do know the meaning of "waxing" as "increasing", but I didn't realize that it had the same meaning when used in "waxing nostalgic". I took that phrase to allow for the use of waxing to mean speaking. I was wrong. In my defense, this site is named "American Typo"


• People can be pretty unkind.
  I don't really want to repost some of the unkind things people had to say about pictures of people they know nothing of. It's just pretty disappointing.

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Trackback

• Michelle Malkin: From the Boston Tea Party to your neighborhood pork protest
• Instapundit: Help! My first Instalanche!


• 5views.com: Protest the “Friday the 13th Spending Bill” on President’s Day; Update: Pics ‘n stuff


• Flopping Aces: Stimulating Seattle Protest


• Beltway Blips: Seattle's Stimulus Bill Protest


• TBogg: It’ll take a nation of millions to keep us from filling up a Denny’s
  Cool! My first liberal trackback. Actually, it's a whole post about my post and with mocking comments to boot. Perhaps most entertaining is the inability of the commenters to recognize some of the tongue-in-cheek observations as being just that.


• Heartless Libertarian: What Liberal Media?


• Midnight Blue: Protest the Porkulus in Seattle


• merriemarie: Holding Barack Obama Accountable In Denver
• The Clue Meter: I didn't make it...


• Liberty for USA: Protest by Conservatives in Liberal Stronghold


• Obama Foodorama: Is That Pork In Your Package Or Are You Just Trying to Stimulate Me
  I appreciate the link, though the photo attributed to me is not one of mine.

Inauguration Day Musings

I had an exchange today on Facebook with a friend of mine from high-school regarding the inauguration and Obama. I am always preaching. I hope that sometimes people are listening. In any event, it seemed like it might be worth sharing:

Me:
I am following Thumper's advice with regards to the inauguration.

Friend:
And that is...?

Me:
Not a big secret to anyone that knows me well. I am not a fan of Obama for many many policy reasons. Indeed, I have a deep fear that his economic policies will do extreme damage to the long term well being of the United States.

In Bambi, Thumper said:

"If you can't say something nice... don't say nothing at all."

Since so many of my friends are excited about the inauguration, I decided to make just a very small point and leave it at that without ruining everyone else's fun.

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Friend:
Fair enough. I don't mind hearing people say something critical of someone I support, as long as it comes with thought, which I know you always provide.

I understand what your fears are. Big government and overspending, right? It's a legitimate concern. My position is that I would rather have a more responsible and more accountable government, whether it's bigger or smaller. I also think that a president is more than about policy; it's about setting a tone and mindset, not just in Washington but extended to the nation and to the world community. Looking at it that way, it's clear to me this will be a positive change from the outgoing president. I also realize what an idiotic thing it would be to compare the two that way.

Anyway, I think you represent the part of the country that Obama needs to earn the trust of. And I think that's fine. I hope that he will start doing some things that might pleasantly surprise you. I can't prove it, but I deeply believe that he will end up a much more centrist and less liberal president than he was as a senator. I guess we'll have 4 years to find out.

I would think you recognize, whether you like him or not, what a truly significant moment in history Tuesday morning represents.

There is no easy fix for the economy, but we can't do nothing. I would rather spend money building our infrastructure than for using it to bail banks out. I have also heard the position that we should let the US auto industry fail on its own (and who I blame for a lot of their own problems), which is an interesting idea, but we are going to have the largest unemployment in a long time. I am concerned about spending, too, but I don't think doing nothing is an option. What is your solution?

Me:
Thanks for your considered response.

Indeed I do recognize what a significant moment this is for the country. But I believe that people have conflated the significance and importance of a black man becoming president with the significance and importance of Obama the politician. For many, they are one and the same—though I think the vast majority of people could not even begin to articulate what his policies are.

I am certain that he will be more centrist than he was as a senator. That is a given for anyone moving from a legislative to an executive position. However, I am already very disheartened by his domestic plans as revealed through card check (a fundamental violation of free speech) and his proposed crippling environmental policies that are based upon hotly contested and highly specious scientific modeling (as opposed to hypothesis and testing).

I am willing to allow Obama to earn my trust, but it will be difficult. During the campaign, he routinely contradicted himself based upon his then current audience regarding multiple issues, including nuclear power, the second amendment, Israel, Iran, etc.

Additionally, I find no evidence in Obama of substantive accomplishments other than those that are self-aggrandizing. He has written two books: both about himself. He has run one successful campaign: for himself. (I have a hard time counting his state and federal senate campaigns as he ran essentially unopposed for those.) His other efforts including slum rehabilitation and the Annenberg Challenge are completely without any positive empirical results.

You are right, there is no easy fix for the economy. And there need not be. Some things are painful. However, the government cannot solve the problems better than the people. Government spending will soak up all available credit in the market to the detriment of private industry. While there is nothing sacred or perfect about private industry, it has essential advantages over government. It is not rigid. Priviate industry has many actors working to find the best solution in any problem space. Government is one actor working to find a single political solution to a problem. It will not find the best solution or even a good solution. It will find the solution that supports its political ambitions. While some political ambitions are admirable, they are rarely if ever sustainable. Further, government solutions are enforced by police action rather than competition. Numerous absurd New Deal era prosecutions speak the truth of this claim. A deep analysis of New Deal policies is also valuable today for other reasons. Quite simply, they didn't work. The New Deal extended the Great Depression such that the United States suffered for about twice as long as the rest of the world. Obama's current proposals are another New Deal in the making. Keynesian economics is all but dead everywhere except where it matters most: in politics.

Regarding the auto industry: let it fail. If we are over-extended economically (which it appears we are to the tune of about 7-10%) then that bill will have to be paid. You can bail out the auto industry, but that bail out will have to come from somewhere. While you can create money out of thin air, you cannot create value in the same way. Saving jobs in the auto industry means losing them elsewhere. Why should the government decide which jobs are more important? Why should a good business have to pay for a bad? How is that a solution? The reality is, if a bad company fails, other marginal ones will be strengthened. As supply shrinks in a down economy, supply and demand are brought into equilibrium. Rather than have three sick American car companies, why not have two healthy ones?

The choice presented of a bailout or nothing is false. The government doing nothing is not the same as nothing being done. The economy and all of the actors within it will do something. And as a whole, they will make largely rational decisions. All systems seek equilibrium. If false constraints are placed upon it, a system will still seek and reach equilibrium, but with unintended consequences that are almost always much more harmful than the ailment those constraints sought to address. Examples in support of this are easy to find in tarriff, minimum wage and price support legislation—all things contemplated by the Obama campaign.

Obama is smart. And for the sake of argument, I am willing to allow that he is the smartest man in the world and has the smartest people in the world working for him. However, no amount of intelligence can be entrusted to solve problems more effectively than millions of individuals making billions of decisions in real time. To think that I could tell a million people how to run their lives would be spectacularly arrogant. And it's not because I don't have good intentions or good ideas. It's just that it can't be done.

Photos from the Capitol Remodel

I recently had the opportunity to tour the Capitol building in Washington, D.C. As you may know, they completed a remodel this fall and, despite the wet blanket complaints about being millions of dollars over budget, I think you will find that the money was well spent.

Senate drinking fountain


Harry Reid's urinal

53% Proud! 46% Ashamed?

Barack Obama won the 2008 Presidential Election over John McCain 53% to 46%. Though I am not an Obama supporter by any stretch of the imagination, I can share in and understand the pride felt by many Americans that a black man has been elected as President of the United States. But what I cannot understand is the shame that so many Americans profess to feeling prior.

Maya Angelou is one of those people that is hard not to like. Her words and voice are captivating. She says such delightful things as "If you have only one smile in you give it to the people you love."

It also turns out that she weighs in on political issues. In a recent interview on NBC, Angelou said the following regarding Obama's election:

I realized almost within a minute, I don't have to apologize for my country when I'm abroad. I can say, "I belong to a great country," and there are Europeans who say, "Aren't you glad to be here in France where we don't have the racism you live under? Aren't you glad you're here in Britain?" I mean, I've been on the defensive so long. But this time I can say, "I am an American, look at us, look at what we've just achieved." It is amazing.

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She's right. It is amazing. But what about the rest of it? Up until just this moment she had to apologize for her country? America just this very instant became less racist than France or Britain? Neither racism nor its magnitude are uniquely American.

Sean Penn, speaking in Los Angeles, snarked "I have never been able to put the word ‘my’ before president before." Mind you, I don't think that America needs the approval of useful idiots like Sean Penn, but it does show a trend.

And this week in my hometown of Seattle, some people just discovered what so many immigrants from all over the world have known for over a century: America is pretty great. Seattlite Mark Lowney made the brilliant observation "I'm finally proud to be an American again, after eight years of being ashamed."

So let's be clear, on Tuesday morning, November 4, 2008, Americans were ashamed. Later that same evening, Americans were patriotic. The change? 53% of the presidential vote was for Obama.

Are these same people ashamed of the 46% that voted for McCain? What about the people, and there had to be millions, that voted for Bush in 2000 and 2004, but voted for Obama in 2008? Are they still part of America's shame? Have they been redeemed? Do they exist in some sort of purgatory between terrorist and patriot?

In 2000 when Gore won the popular vote but lost in the electoral college, were these same new found patriots flush with popular vote pride but awash in electoral vote shame? In 1992 when Bill Clinton ascended to the presidency with a plurality of the vote, did they swell with the satisfaction that only winning a plurality of the vote can bring?

Of course, these suggestions are absurd. While I am not happy with the results of the election, I am proud that a man of mixed race can be elected as President in a country that enslaved people like him just 140 years ago. But that is how democracy works. There is no unanimity of agreement. And thank God for that. Opinions change. Consensus ebbs and flows.

Any honest reading of Bush's Presidency will reveal that it has not been all bad or all good. Bush took the lead on many issues that are central to his political enemies such as fighting AIDS in Africa and providing low cost prescriptions to the elderly.

Neither will an Obama Presidency be all good or all bad. Some will find it more so than that of Bush, some will find it less. That's okay. In four years, America will have an opportunity to let him know how he is doing. And it can be done without tarring Americans on any side of the vote with a scarlet letter.

What is and always has been available for anyone that wants to take notice, is that America is an exceptional nation. We have a system that has provided its citizenry with unmatched opportunity that attracts immigrants from all over the world. And this has been true for the last 200 plus years because America allows its citizens to reevaluate itself without violence or chaos every four years. Pride in that unparalleled fact is available whether or not one agrees with the results of any particular election.

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Update—Sunday, November 9, 2008

A picture's worth a thousand words:



h/t The Anchoress

What's Up with Pennsylvania?

Now that we are in the post-election denouement, I should probably stop writing about the past when everyone is talking about the future of the Republican party and its continuing self-flagellation. But I wrote about that yesterday and it didn't help shake my consternation over the behavior of the Pennsylvania voters in the 2008 election.

At the beginning of the campaign season, I was confident that Republicans could not and need not win Pennsylvania. After all, George W. Bush didn't win it in 2004 and he was re-elected. However, as the race progressed, I became at first hopeful and eventually confident that Pennsylvania would go red in 2008. The polls be damned. How could it not?

Bush lost Pennsylvania to Kerry by only 2% in 2004. And he did this without the numerous offensive political blunders committed by the Democrats in 2008.

Remember:

• Barack Obama talking about the bitter people clinging to their guns, religion and xenophobia to a San Francisco audience while taking a break from the Pennsylvania primary?


• Joe Biden telling a supporter at a rally that the Obama campaign is not supporting clean coal?


• Obama explaining to the San Francisco Chronicle that he was against coal and that his cap and trade system would bankrupt anyone building a coal plant?


• Congressman Jack Murtha informing the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that his own constituents from Western Pennsylvania are racists?


• Murtha apologizing to his constituents for calling them racists by explaining that he didn't mean it, rather, they are rednecks—an upgrade from five years ago when they were "really redneck"?
  
• Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell suggesting that Pennsylvanian voters are racist?

I'm not from Pennsylvania, not even close. But I was genuinely offended by the blanket comments about racism and was shocked to hear candidates denigrating coal power when multiple key states including Pennsylvania are dependent upon the coal industry.

I was certain that the majority of Pennsylvanians would vote against Obama-Biden and Murtha just to let them know that they will not be treated that way. Apparently, I couldn't have been more wrong. Obama beat McCain by 11 points and Murtha beat his challenger, Republican William Russell, by 16 points.

Pennsylvania, what's up?

I Am a Republican

Note
My last "I Am a..." post was I Am a Racist. Unlike that post, the title here is not rhetorical sarcasm. I would also prefer that the reader does not take the parallelism of the two titles as a suggestion that "Republican" is simply a euphemism for "Racism". Of course that warning assumes two things that cannot be assumed:

• I can dictate the thinking of the people that read this blog.
• People read this blog.

Having gotten that out of the way, please read on...

As long as I have had sufficient self-awareness to consider myself politically anything, I have considered myself conservative. I am not conservative on all issues, but am enough so on many that the label fits me as well as could be expected. Further, I was more than happy to brand myself a Republican when it was conversationally expedient. Democrats were liberal. Republicans were conservative. I was conservative, ergo, I was Republican.

However, branding myself a Republican went from effortless to painful as the Repbulicans went from Ronald Reagan to George W. Bush. It's important for me to note that I am not a Bush hater. On the contrary, I like him. He is personable and honest. My fundamental problem with Bush was and is his Keynsian and big government impulses and the Republican Congress that supported them.

The result of this unexpected idealogical split was that, sometime during the Bush Administration, I stopped calling myself a Republican. As time passed, I started bristling when others referred to me as a Republican, hastily correcting them that I was a conservative and letting them know that there was a difference.

I will be drawing this distinction no more.

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Have I now concluded that there is, in fact, no distinction between Republicanism and conservatism? Not by a long shot. The just completed Greek tragedy masquerading as the 2008 election has demonstrated just how massively wide that chasm of distinction is.

No matter how it is portrayed by the media or the country club Republicans, conservatism did not lose Republicans this election. This election was lost because too many Republicans, the supposed standard bearers of conservatism, bore no conservative standards. When Americans are polled on issues rather than on party or candidate preference, a significant majority fall on the conservative side of each and every one of those issues.

Consider:

• Barack Obama, the most liberal major party general election candidate to ever run for the American Presidency, ticked off support for conservative bullet points such as tax cuts, individual gun rights and nuclear power. To gain credibility as a hawk, he became the country's foremost advocate for carpet bombing the mountains of Waziristan. Nevermind that such policies are in complete contradiction of his prior statements and votes. At least Obama understood the importance of a conservative message to a conservative public.



• John McCain was never the favored candidate of conservatives. The reason is obvious. While conservative on some issues, McCain has populist tendencies and a need for bi-partisanship that trumps conservative principle. Depending upon the particular bent, a conservative was much more likely to have supported Romney, Huckabee, Thompson or even Giuliani. Prior to the naming of Sarah Palin as the Republican running mate, conservative support was directed against Obama rather than for McCain. Within three days of Palin's selection, the McCain campaign raised nine million dollars—a significant spike over the campaign's normal rate of intake. Say what you will about Palin, but she was the only aspect of the McCain campaign that affirmatively animated the conservative base. But people vote the top of the ticket and the top of the ticket did not adequately profess enough conservative positions.



• There have been two recent issues about which the public passionately attempted to influence their Congressional representatives: the bailout and immigration reform. In both cases, the public overwhelmingly demanded that their representatives follow the conservative course of action. The public did not want a bailout of failed businesses (or failed borrowers) and the public did not want amnesty for illegal immigrants. In both cases, George W. Bush and John McCain advanced the liberal course of action—the opposite of that desired by the conservative public.

By pointing out these failings, I am not intending to damn John McCain. He must be admired for his military service, patriotism, humility and foreign policy acumen. But these qualities were not enough to get elected. And more importantly, they are not enough to represent Republicans as their presidential candidate. Strength of character is an essential element of any candidate. Conservatism is an essential element of any Republican candidate. McCain delivered in spades on the former, but was found wanting on the latter.

So given the breadth of the spread between what the Republican Party should be and what it is, why am I re-declaring my fealty to the Republican Party? Because it was and is the best platform from which to spread the conservative gospel. It is a party with a proud history, providing the greatness of Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan. It is the only major party (and let's be honest, there are only two) that even hints at conservative principles. It is the party that must now be brought back into alignment with its conservative base.

A lot of media pundits and Republicans speak glowingly of the "big tent", maintaining in essence that inclusiveness is more important than ideology. They are wrong. The Republican party should not exclude anyone. But neither should it grow itself by compromising its principles. Rather than building the biggest tent, let's build the best tent. Reagan knew that most Americans are conservative and that they would be drawn to the conservative tent. It is now our job to build that tent and grow it naturally until it is again the biggest tent in America.

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Update—Friday, November 7, 2008

Related links:

• Smitten Eagle at ChicagoBoyz writes about the various types of Republicans.


• Dave in Texas at Ace talks about Dick Armey's comments on Squishy Conservatism.


• Michelle Malkin makes it pretty clear that she has no interest in moving away from conservative principles.


• Little Green Footballs recommends backing off on social conservatism.


• Michael Bloomberg is the poster child for RINOs that the Republicans can do without.

America, Not Just Another Pretty Place

In 1981 I embarked upon the first of what have become many pilgrimages to Europe. My mother and her husband were staying in Amsterdam where he was reprising the role of Sancho Panza in the Netherlands Opera production of Don Quixote. As an eighth grader, this Spring break visit was an unforgettable introduction to the beauty and history of Europe. I was and am smitten with its castles, beautifully planned cities and monuments. And no place in Europe has captured me more than Paris. I recognize that praise of anything French is heresy in conservative circles, but it is a feeling that I cannot deny. On that first visit, my mother surprised me with a weekend bus tour to Paris. The tour itself was pretty low budget putting us up in a hotel near Pigalle—Paris' sex district. While it is true that I was then a newly minted teenager with all of the accompanying hormonal rage, it was not the red lights of Pigalle that won me over. Rather, it was the nearby Sacré Coeur and its situation on the hill of Montmartre affording an unrivaled view of Paris' magnificence. It was the Musée du Louvre, the Tour Eiffel and the Arc de Triomphe. It was the spectacular Cathédrale Notre Dame and the beautiful Jardin des Tuileries. It was all of these flourishes of art by architecture and so much more.

When my wife and I married in 1993, Paris is where we went for our honeymoon. It was by then my fourth trip to the City of Lights and yet it still provided surprise. One morning, we were awoken from a jet lag induced hangover by a violinist playing Pachelbel's Canon outside the window of our Paris hotel. Pachelbel's Canon was the song to which my wife had walked down the aisle at our wedding. I joked with her that I had arranged for the violinist as an expression of my love. The truth is I hadn't. I didn't need to. It was just Paris.

I don't believe there is any American city that approaches Paris with a similar grandeur. New York is a miracle of engineering with bridges and skyscrapers that were decades ahead of their time. However, it is largely bereft of the Parisian spectacle—save the French designed and constructed Statue of Liberty. Washington, D.C. is an American city created from whole cloth in the image of a European capital. It has avenues stretching into the distance, impossibly straight. And it has the monuments and museums that befit the seat of world power. But the splendor of Washington is somehow too planned, too inorganic, too sterile.

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And yet, it is Washington, D.C. and America for which I reserve my strongest emotions. In the streets of New York, the plains of "fly-over country", the mountains of the West and my hometown of Seattle I am often overwhelmed by America's greatness. For the monuments of Europe are merely stone and steel. The most significant contributions of any nation are its ideas. America's essence is found in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. It is found in the state constitutions. And it is found in the generosity of Americans that have spilled their blood and given their treasure to help others know the glory of freedom and self-determination. These ideas and this history are what make America great.

Our Founding Fathers had the perspective and deep understanding of human nature that allowed them to construct the most important enduring ideas in human history. While America benefited from a past that bestowed Hammurabi's Code and the Magna Carta, the laws and institutions that arose concomitant with its founding were an evolutionary leap over all of the systems of justice previously articulated. America's exercise of these ideas through self-determination or what Alexis de Tocqueville termed "self-interest properly understood" produced the wealthiest, most just and most free nation the world has ever known. While many will criticize that claim, those criticisms are relatively speaking, on the margins. The damnable actions of other world powers, past and present, have been much more central to those powers' expression of foreign and domestic policies. The truth of this observation is found in the actions of millions, many from Europe, that have risked life and limb and have left their families in order to live in America. Actions speak louder than words. Ideas matter more than monuments.

Of course America is not perfect—far from it. Evidence of this imperfection is readily provided by the Civil War and the necessity of the 13^th to 15^th Constitutional amendments abolishing slavery and establishing, at least in name, equal rights for Black Americans. Perfection was not achieved when we ratified the 19^th Amendment granting women's suffrage. But we were getting closer. Perfection was not achieved in the Civil Rights era either. But it did provide a practical framework for racial equality and the foundation for a sea change in attitudes. America is not and will never be perfect. Man is flawed, but that does not prevent us from striving to meet our ideals.

As I write this, we are six days prior to the 2008 Presidential Election. Like me, both major party candidates declare their love for and their belief in America's greatness. However, between those declarations of love, they have inundated us with information about America's imperfections. In some cases, though in not nearly enough, they have shared their ideas about how to fix them. Given that Americans are the beneficiaries of some of the greatest ideas in the history of man, we cannot blindly accept either the candidates' diagnoses or their prescriptions. We must carefully assess their claims and the likelihood that their proposed change is going to enhance the system they seek to influence. If someone that loves America also believes that it is fundamentally broken, then what is it about America that they love? Is it the mountains, the prairies or the oceans white with foam? Or is it the ideas?

It's not that change is inherently bad. America has needed change in the past and continues to need it today. But is the needed change fundamental or marginal? Though rarely openly, Barack Obama has stated that the required change is fundamental. He hasn't made this statement in those words, but to the extent that he has spoken outside the interests of his campaign, he has unequivocally proposed undermining one of our most important ideas: self-determination. Unfortunately, we have been experiencing a slow erosion of self-determination for decades through the government mandated redistribution of wealth. Republicans and Democrats alike have played starring roles in this effort. But Obama's plans are as aggressive a turn in the wrong direction as has been seen since the New Deal. F.D.R.'s performance during World War II notwithstanding, his policies were among the most harmful ever imposed by an American President. The perspective of time has allowed economists to understand this in a way that the Founding Fathers knew instinctively: an overwhelming government causes overwhelming harm. When the government consumes more of what America produces, America produces less. When America produces less, the standard of living falls. When the standard of living falls, American's lose some of their freedom. Yet despite this truth, Barack Obama believes that the disincentives of wealth redistribution are just the incentives people need to achieve the American Dream.

I love the America of today. It's not perfect, but it's far and away the best thing going. While I am in awe of the City of Lights, it is John Winthrop's Shining City on a Hill that I love.

I have heard many Democrats openly discuss how their patriotism has been wounded by the arrows of partisanship. I have not actually seen the Republican archers and I am not now stepping in to fulfill that role. I am not writing to question anyone's patriotism. I can believe that Barack Obama loves America. But I cannot understand what it is about America that he loves. It does not appear to be the ideas that I hold dear. So what is it?

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Update—Friday, October 31, 2008

Support for my statement that F.D.R.'s policies were bad medicine:

• Amity Schlaes fascinating retelling of the Great Depression: The Forgotten Man


• Article regarding a study by UCLA economists concluding that F.D.R.'s policies prolonged the Great Depression by seven years

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Update—Sunday, November 2, 2008

More related links:

• Wordsmith at Flopping Aces doesn't question Obama's patriotism either, but expresses concern about his inexperience.


• Economists for McCain, a non-partisan group with a highly partisan name reject Obama's economic plan as running "a high risk of throwing the economy into a deep recession."