We the People—Part 1

Original artwork by Marisa Draeger

We the People—Part 1

Opinion – Several years ago—much to my delight—I stumbled upon the English version of the official website for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea—more commonly referred to as “North Korea” since it isn’t exactly democratic, nor of the people, nor a republic, nor the entire Korean peninsula, but I digress. At first, I assumed it was a satire site, such as the popular DPRK News Service on Twitter. But as I began to explore the website I soon realized the propaganda was dead serious. On the homepage I found the following declaration:

“The Democratic People's Republic of Korea is a genuine workers' state in which all the people are completely liberated from exploitation and oppression. The workers, peasants, soldiers and intellectuals are the true masters of their destiny and are in a unique position to defend their interests.”

I suppose it’s invigorating for North Koreans to hear that their local peasant population has been liberated from the sorts of exploitation and oppression that befall all the peasants roaming amok in the Western world but—again—I digress. What I want to draw your attention to is the frequency with which the regime’s rhetoric focuses on “the people.” It’s in their hilariously disingenuous name—the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea—and it’s ubiquitous throughout the website.

In their aggressive efforts to keep the people in view, North Korea has succeeded in creating hell on earth. But you can justify creating hell on earth when you’re doing it “for the people.” And those North Koreans foolish enough to argue otherwise risk fatal detainment in Camp 22 for their obstinance ingratitude. If working for “the people” can justify creating hell on earth, you can certainly justify less ambitious goals of economic stimulus, or expanding the welfare state, or protecting the jobs of local coal miners and peanut farmers from those pesky global capitalists. Everything is justifiable if it’s done for the sake of the people; and politicians from North Korea to North Dakota have known this since the revolutionary spirit that began in the late 17th century made “the people” a better powerbroker than the local monarch.

Certainly, some calls to focus on “the people” are laudable—Lincoln’s famous democratic plea for a government “of the people, by the people, for the people” springs to mind. Yet when we’re calling for benefits to befall “the people” it begs several questions: who, exactly, are “the people”? Are they best defined by the collective interests of the majority or the separate interests of each sub-culture? Who gets to decide what benefits “the people”? Who gets to speak on behalf of “the people”? What system(s) of government best protect the rights and advances the interests of “the people”? Those claiming to stand for “the people” are much like those who claim they want to make government more efficient and less wasteful. The implication is that there are others taking the opposing view—that they are implicitly seeking to make government even more bureaucratic, less efficient, and more wasteful. Words or phrases that don’t mean anything in particular can be used to mean anything in particular. If all we know of a political leader’s vision is that he’s “for the people” he may be just as likely to support limiting government and reducing taxes as he would be to support expanding government and raising taxes.

In recent decades the media has treated us to at least one debate every presidential election that features an audience of supposedly undecided voters. Much ado is often made about this venerable assembly of pizza delivery guys, insurance agents, and housewives. They are—or so we are told—representative of “the people”—that great unsoiled mass of purity and political disinterest that can better represent all of us than political partisan hacks. But what makes them that way? Are undecided voters somehow better representatives of “the people” than those who happen to be affiliated with a political party? And what makes them undecided? Apathy? A moderate worldview? An extremist worldview? A particular dislike for all of the candidates? Should they be ethnically diverse in proportion to the population as a whole? Or should minority voices have an equal opportunity to speak as the predominant culture? Would that make them more or less qualified to occupy those seats? Should we just take it for granted that the unidentified group who selected these supposed undecideds did so in a way that best reflects the true spirit of American democracy?

A similar problem comes to light when we consider the presidential primary process itself. Since 1972, the Republican presidential primary began with the Iowa caucus. And yet, it is rare for the winner of this state to emerge the eventual party nominee (the winner of the Iowa caucuses has won the nomination only twice in seven contested races since 1980). Iowan Republicans, we are told, are largely Evangelical and tend to support candidates of similar persuasions. In New Hampshire, which has the advantage of voting right after Iowa on the primary calendar, Republicans, nestled in the liberal bastion that is New England, lean more moderate than most of their Republican counterparts throughout the rest of the country. Is this the best representation of the Republican party? Should deference be given to more conservative states like Oklahoma or Utah, or would the hard-liners of those states insulate candidates too radical to be competitive in the general election? Should deference be given to more liberal states like California or Massachusetts? Would that result in too liberal of a nominee for Republicans to show up on election day? Is it fair to assume that Republicans who happen to live in more liberal states are more liberal themselves, or might those embattled Republicans be even more conservative than Republicans in other states?

These are, of course, rhetorical questions; but I trust that whether we are capable of answering them doesn’t detract from my point: attempts to define the collective interests of any group of people is never as simple as it first appears and often fraught with such mindboggling complexities we’d never arrive at a satisfactory answer. This would at least partially explain why governments that seem hellbent on “the people”—such as North Korea—often only succeed in producing hell on earth which—granted, this is purely conjecture on my part—the people sure as hell didn’t want.

So, what are we to make of all this? If the collective needs of “the people” are so evasive and, perhaps, unattainable, where does that leave us? It leaves us with the following questions that must first be answered: who, exactly, are “the people”? And who speaks on their behalf? Once we have answered those two questions we will be in a better position to understand what to do. And we will attempt to answer those two questions in the following posts in this series.

This post originally appeared in The Millennial Review.

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How does a Conservative differ from an Authoritarian? Part 2

I ended the previous post defining authoritarianism with a loaded question: “are Trump and his followers authoritarians?” To discuss Trump is to invite controversy and throw discretion to the wind; his critics balk at the suggestion he’s anything less than literal-Hitler and his supporters bristle at the slightest slight. As is usually the case, the truth is nestled somewhere between extremities. The gravest danger in the Trump era is that otherwise reasonable, civil adults devolve to political tribalism and never venture outside the silo of media they choose to accept as “fact.” Conservatives reject political tribalism; authoritarians thrive on it.

I will say at once that a distinction should be made between the Trump supporters who blindly follow his ever-changing rhetoric and those who supported him to oppose Hillary and applaud his right-leaning appointments while cringing at his otherworldly Commander and Tweet leadership style. Reasonable people can support the president. And reasonable conservatives can praise the president when he makes conservative policy decisions, just as reasonable conservatives could occasionally praise president Clinton when he ventured right. The complexities of political worldviews would suggest that it is uncharitable to equate praise or support of Trump with authoritarian tendencies.

And while there’s no need to be uncharitable, there is also no need to mince words: authoritarians are a danger to the social order and the liberties that conservatives cherish. While I argued here that conservatives and libertarians are natural allies in the fight for liberty, that sentiment does not hold for authoritarians who would smash liberties to bits in their efforts to freeze in time a vision of some perfectible society. Those who blindly support the president aren’t necessarily authoritarians, but they do have more in common with authoritarianism than conservatism. Perhaps another way to say it is, Trump’s predominant message during the campaign was an appeal to authoritarian appetites. He pledged not to limit the power of government, but to use that power to Make America Great Again!

To blindly support Trump is to support everything and nothing. It is to support a person, not a coherent set of values or ideas. It is to support a Messiah, not a leader. The real danger of authoritarianism is not that a charismatic leader would eventually abuse their expanding powers (that’s as predictable as Democrats suggesting higher taxes and more government regulation is the solution to whatever problems we’ll face in the future), but that we begin to believe all hope is lost unless we vest absolute power in that leader. Those who held America was literally one Clinton away from total ruin and that only Trump could save us were challenging authoritarian fears over conservative prudence.

Let me just say it: Trump isn’t a conservative; he isn’t even a liberal, at least not an ideologically driven progressive like Obama, Hillary, or Sanders. Trump’s rhetoric bespeaks authoritarianism with a dash of nationalism and populism thrown in for good measure. But even still it wouldn’t be quite fair to label Trump an “authoritarian” because he hasn’t spoken consistently about nearly anything, as evidenced by this list of 138 distinct shifts on 23 major issues. Could we confidently discern, for example, precisely what his views on health reform are beyond a vague notion he doesn’t like Obamacare and thinks the Republicans in Congress should do something different?

At times Trump appears conservative (appointing Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court), at times liberal (his “very pro-choice” stances before the 2016 election and his campaign donations to primarily liberal politicians), at times socialist (the Carrier deal), at times protectionist (threatening to slap a punitive 45% tariffs on Chinese imports), at times alt-right (calling for an American judge to recuse himself from a lawsuit brought against Trump because of his Hispanic heritage), at times populist (blaming our nation’s problems on our leaders who are losers, lightweights, and morons), and at times authoritarian (threatening to change the laws to bring libel lawsuits against journalists who say things he’d find unsavory, declaring he’d order the military to violate international war crimes by murdering people related to suspected terrorists, and declaring “I alone can fix” America).

Trump’s constantly shifting policies make any label an awkward fit, but if you had to pin Trumpism with a political ideology, I believe he could best be described as an authoritarian. Let me say at once that I do not mean to compare Trump with the likes of a Hitler or a Mussolini, or even a more benevolent authoritarian such as Francisco Franco. Nevertheless, his insistence that our leaders are losers and morons and that he alone can Make America Great Again!, his blatant disregard for constitutional restraints, his slandering of vulnerable ethnic groups and civilian opposition, his calls for jailing, lawsuits, and physical violence on dissenters, his near-utopian promises of a bright tomorrow, and his admiration of third-world strongmen all point to the underpinnings of authoritarian sentiments, even if a well-crafted ideology or detailed agenda is lacking.

I also want to avoid the pitfall of reducing Trump to some passing fad or bumbling idiot who just happened to pull off one of the most stunning election upsets in American history. To scorn Trump’s buffoonery delights his critics, persuades none of his followers, and, basically, gets us nowhere. To reduce the Trump phenomenon to an inexplicable surge in bigotry, sexism, and homophobia is both grossly oversimplifying and offensively accusatory of the underlying motives of millions of our fellow countrymen. When I suggest Trump’s rhetoric sounds authoritarian in nature my aim is not to dismiss him. My aim is to respect any threat to liberty enough to respond with adequate and appropriate opposition.

But why criticize a man who—for the moment—seems to be advocating conservative policies? As I argued here, conservatism is about far more than a checklist of political policies; and even if we accept that Trump exclusively advocates conservative policies, which he most certainly does not, there is still a grave danger to liberty in handing the keys of power over to a man who shows such blatant disregard for restraint. It isn’t necessary to have a bona fide authoritarian ideologue in power to be creeping towards authoritarianism. Authoritarianism is the default position of a society that doesn’t vigilantly maintain order, peace, and liberty. It’s not so much something you “do” it’s something you allow to happen.

And supporting authoritarians is not a stance taken exclusively by skinheads and neo-Nazis. It can be done by unsuspecting honest and decent people who simply fear their culture is dying and look to a Messiah to set it all back in order. “People may start out with an initial prejudice against tyrants,” warned philosopher Aldous Huxley, “But when tyrants or would-be tyrants treat them to adrenaline releasing propaganda about the wickedness of their enemies…they are ready to follow the tyrants with enthusiasm.” It was disturbing to conservatives when Trump said in his acceptance speech at the RNC last year that he “alone can fix” America. But it was far more horrifying how many were applauding as he said it.

This post originally appeared in The Millennial Review.

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How does a Conservative differ from an Authoritarian? Part 1

Josh Lewis, Politics Contributor

Opinion – “Authoritarian” is both a description of a political ideology and a pejorative as it has spawned some of the evilest dictatorships in recorded history. This is unfortunate because it makes discussing someone’s flirtations with authoritarianism akin to accusing them of the vilest acts of hatred imaginable. To say someone is an authoritarian isn’t to say they are the next Mussolini or Hitler; decent people can errantly wonder towards authoritarianism, unaware of the dark latency of the views they are advocating. You probably have a friend or relative who espouses—ahem—dubious political views on social media. The satire site The Onion hilariously illustrated this phenomenon in a brief article entitled “Aunt on Facebook Casually Advocates War Crime.”

The Art of Losing

This article originally appeared in The Millennial Review

Among the legions of hilariously audacious promisesTrump made during the 2016 elections came the assurance we’d be winning so much we’d “get so tired of winning.”

Now, what ordinarily follows an opening line like the one above is an emphatic statement from Trump supporters that he’s accomplished more than anyone since FDR or from Trump opponents that he’s passed no major legislation while squandering whatever political capital he had on useless Tweeter wars. And each side would come armed with an exhausting list of examples to support their claim. But I’d like to do something different; I’d like to focus not so much on the question of whether we’re “winning” but ask what “winning” means, and whether—perhaps you should sit down for this—whether winning is the most important thing we could be focused on?

How does a Conservative differ from a Libertarian? Part 2

Opinion – In Part 1 I argued that the famous Five Dimensional Political Compass and its related Five Dimensional Political Quiz is based on faulty principles that end up confusing more than clarifying the differences between conservatives and libertarians. Namely, the faulty principles of attempting to measure liberty by a series of political policy questions and the untruth that liberty is the complete absence of constraints. The difference between a conservative and a libertarian can be found in how the two approach the idea of liberty.

The libertarian understands liberty as an abstract concept derived from reason. This sentiment is beautifully captured in Jefferson’s famous declaration, “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Jefferson is appealing to “reason” to argue for specific “liberties” for “all men”. The statement is both abstract and indiscriminate. Jefferson borrowed heavily from philosopher John Locke and many other Enlightenment thinkers who expressed liberty as a chiefly abstract concept.

How does a Conservative differ from a Libertarian? Part 1

In this series I’d like to explore some of the common misconceptions about the differences between conservatives and libertarians. In particular, misconceptions that arise from the famous 5 Dimensional Political Compass or the related 5 Dimensional Political Quiz.

We’ve probably all taken the “quiz” at some point that supposedly tells us where we fit on the compass: liberal, authoritarian, conservative, libertarian, or centrist. The quiz askes various questions designed to measure our preferences in the balance between freedom and security around the broad categories of social and economic issues. The libertarian-leaning Cato Institute even has a page that asks “Are You a Libertarian?” followed by the quiz. It is my belief that this quiz and the compass are based on two faulty principles which suggests to many right-leaning individuals that they are libertarians when, in fact, they are conservatives.

What Conservatives Believe: Bias is a Four-Letter Word – Part I

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The conservative adheres to CUSTOM, CONVENTION, and CONTINUITY.”  Russell Kirk – Ten Conservative Principles

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If we played a word association game around the word conservative I’ve little doubt some imaginations would conjure up a crotchety, elderly, balding, Caucasian male spouting derogatory obscenities while complaining about the minorities down the street.  Conservatism has an image problem.  The intellectual godfathers of the conservative movement were predominantly white males; even to this day the movement is dominated by wrinkly, white men.

To the Millennial generation—the most diverse generation in American history—this alone creates a significant barrier in adopting conservatism as a worldview.  It can be difficult for minorities to fit in with a group that looks so very different from themselves.  Generations have always found things to squabble about and occasionally a defining historical advent will highlight the different mindsets between them, such as the election of Donald Trump.  The majority of Millennials—conservative or not—were aghast that older generations would elect a candidate who—while not overtly racist—frequently said things that were cringingly bigoted.