Why Occupy Wall Street is No Tea Party

An article I wrote for the American Thinker arguing that Occupy Wall Street won't duplicate the tea party's success in influencing the political process because it is at its core a fringe movement, incapable of building winning political coalitions:

As the Occupy Wall Street movement attempts to establish a firm foothold in American society, veterans of left-wing organizing, including former Obama administration czar Van Jones, are urging this fledgling movement to run candidates for office, following the Tea Party model of transforming a grassroots movement into a powerful electoral force.  After all, what good isstorming local bank branches and blocking Americans from going to work if you don't send representatives to Congress who share your core values and goals?  But the prospect of OWS emerging as a viable political force is a pipe dream, akin to similar aspirations held by OWS's ideological predecessors, the 1960s counterculture.

There are fundamental differences between the Tea Party and OWS that made the former a formidable political force and will render the latter an inconsequential soon-to-be historical footnote.  Of course, there are also some basic similarities.  In the abstract, both are grassroots movements dissatisfied with the status quo and bank bailouts fighting for transformative change.  But beyond the abstract, the movements diverge into mutually exclusive entities.

From the beginning, the Tea Party was primarily made up of middle-class, fiscally conservative Americans who opposed government expansion under President Obama and the Democratic Congress.  They organized and rallied peacefully, picked up after themselves, and didn't cost taxpayers a dime.  The Tea Party called for less debt, less spending, and less government intervention in the economy.  They didn't always offer detailed policy proposals, but they did espouse coherent philosophical and economic principles.  And while they understandably made some rookie political mistakes, the Tea Party succeeded in transforming the electoral landscape in 2009 and 2010.  Their success was all the more impressive, given how novel and politically inexperienced this movement was.

Compare the composition and the philosophical underpinnings of the Tea Party to Occupy Wall Street.  Every fringe group seems to gravitate towards OWS.  Endorsed by the American Nazi Party, the American Communist Party, David Duke, Iran's Ayatollah, Hugo Chávez, and Kim Jong-il, OWS is a hodgepodge of fringe radicalism, with no clear and concrete values shared by its members, save for a general aversion to capitalism and economic liberty.  A movement so philosophically muddled and absurd that it garners the support of a former KKK Grand Wizard, an Islamic fundamentalist, and a Stalinist dictator cannot expect to build winning political coalitions.

OWS supporters counter that every movement entails fringe elements that do not represent the movement as a whole.  Interestingly, neither the opponents of the Tea Party nor the mainstream media afforded this benefit of the doubt to the Tea Party; a handful of tasteless and offensive signs at Tea Party rallies were routinely used to disingenuously brand the entire movement as racist, violent, and radical.  Lest we be guilty of inaccurately branding OWS, let's actually examine what OWS stands for.

What are some of Occupy Wall Street's guiding principles?  Pitting people who make over $300,000 (the 1%) against their friends and family who make less (the 99%)?  Pitting employers against employees?  The OWS crowd opposes Wall Street bailouts, but supports massive government intervention in the economy and bailouts for mortgage and college debt.  They say they oppose crony capitalism but support government takeover of major sectors of the economy.  They oppose income inequality but don't explain how making people less wealthy will help the "99%."

The only discernible and consistent message of OWS seems to be that they don't like free enterprise.  Free enterprise and rich people.  You can't win elections on a barely intelligible, anti-capitalist platform, especially when you lack clear and actionable ideas.  The Tea Party rallied against Obamacare, demanded that government reign in its profligate spending, and fought against congressional earmarks.  On the other hand, OWS believes that we should put people over profits, end corporate greed, and bail out $1 trillion of student debt.  This is indeed a far cry from the philosophically cohesive and coherent Tea Party.

Admittedly, it would be fascinating to watch a movement armed with little more than abstract radical leftist talking points, whose members throw bottles at police, occupy ports and bridges, and are endorsed by international anti-American zealots, attempt to navigate the electoral process.  That would be some spectacle.

As a fledgling grassroots movement inexperienced in political advocacy, the Tea Party proved to be surprisingly effective at transforming grassroots energy into political success.  Occupy Wall Street doesn't have a chance of duplicating the Tea Party's success -- not because it's made up of political novices, but because it's primarily made up of fringe radicals, young people who don't know any better, petty hooligans, and people whose political views and intellect are aptly reflected by the ubiquitous Che Guevera shirts.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/11/why_occupy_wall_street_is_no_tea_party.html#ixzz1eMx7Ohd8

Be Wary When the Polls are on Your Side

In this essay I wrote for the American Thinker, I argue that by over-relying on public opinion polls in making the case against Obamacare, Republicans painted themselves into a strategic corner, now having to defend Paul Ryan's plan despite public opposition to its core components. Polls are transient and leaders have to occasionally fight for legislation that is at the time unpopular. Excerpts below. Read the complete essay here.
                                

While ObamaCare remains unpopular, Republicans now find themselves in a strategic quandary over the Ryan budget. Polls show that Ryan's plan, like ObamaCare, is unpopular with the majority of the American people. Herein lies the folly of over-relying on fickle polling to buttress an argument...How do Republicans counter the Democratic talking point that the American people have rejected Paul Ryan's agenda when this was a central argument Republicans employed against ObamaCare? The short answer is that they can't without being exposed to charges of hypocrisy. If ObamaCare was wrong for America in large part because the American people didn't want it, then Ryan's plan is bad for America for the same exact reason.

It is of course imperative for Republicans to lead the charge to win hearts and minds. Persuading the public to support a set of policies or ideas is a centerpiece of democratic governance. But when fierce opposition mounts, it is unclear which side will win the tug of war for public opinion...It was indeed short-sighted for Republicans to make polling data a central weapon in their fight against ObamaCare. They should have anticipated that at some point in the future, some Republican plan would meet stiff public resistance. It would have been more prudent to criticize ObamaCare almost exclusively on substance, and occasionally -- perhaps only in passing -- reference polling data.

It is precisely this feature of republicanism--the recognition that leaders are often called to undertake unpopular endeavors--that makes the over-reliance on short-term opinion polls so problematic. Perhaps through leadership and an effective marketing campaign, Republicans can quickly turn the tide of public opinion. But if the public remains skeptical, Republicans can expect Democrats to highlight the hypocrisy of railing against ObamaCare while promoting the unpopular Ryan budget.

http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/05/be_wary_when_the_polls_are_on.html

Ron Paul: The Populist Libertarian

Ever since running for President in 2008, Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) has emerged as an icon among a broad political spectrum. His rigid isolationism underscored by his opposition to the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars, made him a darling on the far left and the isolationist far right. His radical free-market philosophy endeared him to libertarians. Ron Paul somehow managed to build a coalition so diverse that during the 2008 campaign, numerous callers into C-SPAN's Washington Journal enthusiastically recommended that Ron Paul select Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), one of the most left-wing elected officials, as his running mate.

Now Ron Paul appears to be going after another constituency--a far more numerous and powerful one than all his other allies combined. This time, Congressman Paul has his eyes on the Populists. The populist-wing of the American electorate is so powerful that most successful politicians tailor their talking points to address some populist concern in some part of the country. Populist themes range from anti-free trade to anti-illegal immigration to anti-Wall Street. Populists don't like Big Government, Big Labor, or Big Business. They don't like Big. Nuance is not factored into the populist equation. Neither are economic principles, empirical evidence, or history.

Populists frequently shift their allegiances between Democrats and Republicans, although they tend to be more receptive to left-wing talking points that scorn Big corporations and lament the "outsourcing of American jobs." Although many populists are centrists or independents, populists make up a much larger base than just the unaffiliated Independents or self-described moderates. Populists are, in short, ubiquitous across the political landscape.

Because populist sentiments are so prevalent, one of the most effective political tactics--especially during times of political or economic unrest--is to engage in what I refer to as populist demagoguery. If manufacturing jobs are being lost, blame free trade. If incomes are dwindling, blame banks and their big bonuses. If gas prices are going up, blame Big Oil. Neat and somewhat intuitive slogans trump facts and basic economic principles in elections. This is understandable, since most people are not trained economists, and therefore do not have the knowledge to understand how importing cheap sugar from Brazil or outsourcing labor to a factory in Malaysia can actually have a highly positive economic effect across the board. Politicians prey on these misconceptions to get elected.

Populist appeal only wears of when populist policies are actually implemented and inevitably fail. See protectionism under Herbert Hoover, wage and price controls under Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, and virtually every conceivable populist measure under Jimmy Carter. But such is human nature that as time passes and new economic concerns surface, people tend to forget about the folly of populism and are once more enamored with populist rhetoric.

Which brings us to Ron Paul. I was never particularly fond of Ron Paul , mostly because I could not bring myself to support a politician whose coalition consisted of libertarians, socialists, white supremacists, and 9/11 Truthers. If a libertarian politician could not repel socialists, neo-Nazis, and psychotics from his campaign, I didn't think he could be an effective leader. But until recently, I could not fault Ron Paul's sincerity. His philosophy was for the most part consistent and unwavering. He didn't engage in cheap populist demagoguery to win popular support.

But recently, Ron Paul has started to do just that. Last Monday on Larry King Live, Ron Paul declared that "the Stimulus obviously helped Wall Street. Wall Street is doing very, very well." I'm certainly not a fan of President Obama's now infamous Stimulus, but to say that the Stimulus (not to be confused with the bail outs) either directly or indirectly helped Wall Street is ludicrous. In fact, in the months after the Stimulus was signed into law, the stock market plummeted. The Stimulus was not designed to help Wall Street, nor did it.

Congressman Paul's claim is quintessential populist demagoguery, pitting Wall Street against "Main Street," a cheap and largely meaningless variation of class warfare, which itself is a favorite populist tactic. Ron Paul is suggesting that what is good for Wall Street is bad for Main Street and in doing so, he is positioning himself as the champion of Main Street.

As an informed free-market politician, I think Ron Paul knows that the Wall Street, Main Street dichotomy is tripe. Stock markets rise and investors make money when businesses are profitable, or at least look to be profitable in the future. This leads me to believe that Ron Paul is engaging in populist demagoguery in an effort to appeal to a broader constituency. This is a far cry from a politician who built his reputation by saying things that are unpopular, but true.

I worry that Ron Paul's flirtation with populism is a bad omen for free-market advocates. If those who admire Ron Paul's philosophy begin to imitate his rhetoric, then all hope might be lost for diminishing the insidious influence of populism on American politics any time soon.        

The Libertarian's Fatal Conceit

Over the last several years, I have been closely affiliated with the libertarian movement. I worked for the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, a wonderful organization that supports free-market groups around the country. During my time with CGKF, I had many opportunities to communicate with prominent libertarian thinkers, who were highly intelligent and persuasive. I continue to be active in the free-market movement.

Although there are numerous strands of libertarianism, all libertarians are united by the belief that a just government exists to protect individual rights and do little else. On matters of political economy and philosophy, I see eye-to-eye with most libertarians on most issues. However, there is one area that continues to be a major point of contention.

At the risk of generalizing, most libertarians have a special disdain for Republican politicians who do not fight for transformational change. By transformational change libertarians mean a radical departure from our current mixed-economy that boasts a massive welfare state and is constrained by burdensome regulations. Libertarians vehemently oppose the strategy of incrementalism, advocating major leaps in policy instead.

The brilliant libertarian scholar and historian David Boaz, Executive Vice President of the libertarian Cato Institute, once said that he did not think Ronald Reagan was a very good President because he did not abolish the Department of Education or privatize Social Security. The free-market conservative scholars, activists and politicians who helped drive the Reagan Revolution supported these libertarian proposals in theory, but the President and his Cabinet did not attempt to implement them--and as we shall see, for good reasons.   

To my shock, David Boaz also noted that many libertarians feel like Thomas Jefferson betrayed the libertarian cause by purchasing Louisiana from Napoleon and waging war against the Barbary pirates of North Africa who were terrorizing and hijacking American merchant ships, and often killing or enslaving the ships' crews.

David Boaz represents the majority of libertarian thinkers who believe that any departure from a pure libertarian ideal is a betrayal of that ideal. Furthermore, libertarians believe that political compromise and pragmatism are convenient cop outs that hinder progress towards greater liberty.

I strongly disagree with this view and it is the primary source of my beef with the libertarian movement.

To begin with, impugning Thomas Jefferson for expanding and significantly strengthening the young and fragile republic is naive, for if it wasn't for Jefferson's vision of an American navy that ultimately subdued the menacing Barbary pirates, America might have been fatally vulnerable to British aggression in the War of 1812. Moreover, do libertarians really believe that the Constitution prohibits the Commander-in-Chief from deploying the military against an enemy with a track record of murdering and enslaving Americans? The Constitution is not a suicide pact and neither the Louisiana Purchase nor the just war against the Barbary pirates violated the Constitution or betrayed America's founding principles.

To castigate Ronald Reagan for not achieving transformational libertarian change seems to me equally foolhardy. The political process is highly complex, and all politicians are constrained by precedents, rules, and procedures that make transformational change very difficult if not impossible. We are witnessing this first hand as the Health Care legislation nears its final stages. Barack Obama (and I would venture to guess most Congressional Democrats) supports a single-payer healthcare system. But due to a plethora of political constraints, neither Barack Obama nor Democratic leaders dared to even seriously consider single-payer. In fact, it appears almost certain that even the so-called public option will not be included in the final healthcare bill. And this is despite the fact that the Democrats have a super-majority in the Senate and a significant majority in the House.

Had Ronald Reagan committed political capital to the goal of abolishing the Department of Education or privatizing Social Security, he would have been thoroughly defeated by the Democrat-controlled House and humiliated. Such an ambitious goal would have made the failure all that more dramatic, and rendered Reagan largely inefficacious for the remainder of his term.

Foregoing this political suicide mission, President Reagan instead chose to eloquently defend the principles of liberty, while fighting for significant, but non-transformational change. He succeeded in lowering taxes, growing our economy, stimulating entrepreneurship, and reining in some wasteful spending.

President Reagan wisely differentiated between idealism and pragmatism. What good is idealism if it doesn't affect positive change? Libertarians resent what they view as Reagan's lackluster efforts to rein in the welfare state, but would the country have been better of if President Reagan unwaveringly embraced idealism at the expense of failing to push through any pro free-market initiatives?

The axiom that we shouldn't make the perfect the enemy of the good should teach libertarians an important political lesson: it is better to fight for incremental change than to stubbornly perpetuate the status quo just because the ideal is unattainable. Libertarians cannot ignore the constraints imposed by the political process, and should not view politicians who compromise in order to advance pro-free market change as spineless, or worse, perfidious. The freedom movement should continue to defend the virtues of laissez-faire capitalism and attack the folly of the welfare state. But libertarians ought to accept the immutable law that in politics, if you allow idealism to trump pragmatism, you will not advance the ideal.

      

The Filibuster: Friend or Foe?

Senate Democrats, liberal interest groups, and their allies in the media are growing increasingly angry at the perpetual filibuster threat posed by the Republican minority. Over the weekend, Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) announced plans to reintroduce legislation that would effectively eliminate the filibuster.

To be fair to Senator Harkin, he did introduce similar legislation in 1995 when the Democrats were in the minority. However, news stories and op-eds questioning the wisdom of the filibuster are more prevalent now that the Democrats control both chambers of Congress. On the CBS News Blog, Bob Fuss laments the filibuster in an article entitled "How Filibusters are Strangling the Senate." The liberal columnist Paul Krugman makes a similar argument in his New York Times column. But these columnists didn't object when Democrats used the filibuster during the Bush Administration. This is because the left-leaning media is indignant that the Republican filibuster could derail a liberal agenda, but were all too happy too see a Democrat filibuster undermine a conservative agenda. 

This kind of transparent bias and hypocrisy extends beyond the politics of the filibuster. TV anchors and pundits are quick to echo the Democratic Party line that Republicans are "obstructionists" and label the Republican Party the "party of no." Yet when Democrats were in the minority, Republicans also accused Democrats of obstructionism and the media did not legitimize that talking point.   

In 2005, after the Democrats successfully filibustered ten of George Bush's high-profile nominees to the federal courts of appeals, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist threatened to invoke the nuclear option, which would have required a simple majority to approve a judicial nominee. The Democrats and most in the mainstream press cried foul. Now the tables have turned, and the Republicans (and centrist Democrats) use the filibuster threat, while Democrats ponder some variation of the nuclear option. But as Byron York points out in the Washington Examiner, there is a major substantive distinction between filibustering judicial nominees and filibustering legislation:

The argument was that the judicial filibuster undermined the Senate's constitutional responsibility to give advice and consent on the president's judicial nominations. When legislation is filibustered, it's possible for a bill's sponsors to make changes that will satisfy opponents. But what happens when a nominee is filibustered? No advice and consent. The Constitution does not require the Senate to pass a national health care bill, but it does require it to confirm or deny the president's appointees...So Republicans came up with what was called the "nuclear option"... GOP lawmakers made clear at the time that they were not going after the legislative filibuster...(emphasis added)

It is understandable for politicians to support a parliamentary tactic when it advances their agenda, and oppose it when it does not. It makes sense for those in the majority to label the recalcitrant minority "obstructionist," and then when political fortunes are reversed, turn around and obstruct. This is somewhat hypocritical, but such is the art of politics that self-interest usually trumps consistency. What is not acceptable or intellectually honest is for so many in the media to bemoan the filibuster when it threatens a liberal agenda and celebrate it when it hinders a conservative one.   

The Politics of Fear

A popular charge leveled by Democrats is that Republicans routinely use the Politics of Fear to advance their agenda and win elections. Used throughout campaigns and policy battles, this charge is arguably the Left’s most forceful and consistent talking point vis-à-vis Republicans. Whenever a controversial issue is debated at the national level—be it immigration, healthcare, terrorism, or education—you can count on Democratic leaders and activists to play the Politics of Fear card.

The transparent hypocrisy of this charge is perhaps best illustrated by the Democrats' efforts to portray mainstream Republican policies as being detrimental to the middle-class, minorities, or some other critical demographic or voting bloc. For example, George Bush's agenda of partial and voluntary social security privatization was disingenuously branded by Democrats as "full privatization" leading to severe cuts to social security payouts. As the anti-reform marketing blitz intensified, seniors became increasingly fearful that social security reform could undermine their livelihood. Similar tactics were used to attack and discredit vouchers for private schools, across-the-board tax cuts, and tort reform. The central theme of the left's opposition to most conservative policies is that bad things will happen to the average American if these policies are implemented. This is glaringly the much maligned politics of fear.

Whereas Republicans rely on fear and other negative emotions (e.g. hate, anger, etc.) to advance policies, Democrats are presumably armed only with the self-evident wisdom of their proposals. This is of course a farce. The global warming hysteria that has come to dominate the United States' energy policy is grounded in fear. Climate Change alarmists tell us that we either have to cut CO2 emissions or face a calamity of biblical proportions. Regardless of whether one views climate change as a serious problem, it is obvious that climate change activists use fear to raise awareness.

Throughout the War on Terror, when George Bush would say that there are terrorists who want to kill us—an incontrovertible fact—he was accused of using fear tactics. As Republicans and movement conservatives solidify their opposition to President Obama’s healthcare proposal, they are dismissed as fear mongers.

Yet when Democrats argue that the War in Iraq and a litany of other Bush-era programs have made us less safe and more vulnerable to attack, we are made to believe that this is straight talk and not an effort to scare Americans into opposing President Bush's policies. However, rightly or wrongly, instilling fear is the precise intent of these Democratic talking points.  

But there is a larger point here besides rank hypocrisy, which is that all politics is grounded in fear. The underlying message of every political movement is that bad things will happen unless the movement succeeds. Fear is at the root of political ideology. After all, it would be difficult to gain a passionate following for a cause if your followers did not believe that the alternative to your movement would adversely affect them. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but rather the nature of politics.

Barak Obama's message during the 2008 campaign was that John McCain's policies would further damage our economy, make our country less safe, and not move our country forward. In short, then-candidate Obama's message was that if you elect John McCain, bad things will happen to you. Of course, President Obama had a positive agenda--as do all candidates for office--but beneath the surface of "hope" and "change" was the central implication that John McCain would be bad for this country. This is undoubtedly the politics of fear.