Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Well, this is a first for this fully operational podcast: we tackle Socialism, the newly hip, but always old school form of government. To cover both sides of the argument, we call on Washington Post columnist Elizabeth Bruenig and longtime Ricochet member (and Professor of Political Science at Skidmore) Flagg Taylor. Also, Manfort, Cohen, and all that jazz, and finally, what’s the most accurate gauge of a robust economy? Easy, it’s the state of Lileks Oil in Fargo, North Dakota. Spoiler alert: business is great.
Music from this week’s episode: Talkin’ bout A Revolution by Tracy Chapman
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I loved this episode. Perhaps I don’t know where to look for it and it already exists, but I’d be very interested in a moderated podcast called something like “Best Ideas” in which two contending points of view are discussed: an idea, policy, strategy, or otherwise contentious notion. I’m borrowing the name from someone else whom I regret I’m unable to credit, but the concept is that “we” put our best ideas (liberty, markets, free speech, etc) up against the best ideas of those who don’t support them or think they have better ideas. Another motivation for this comes from Charlie Cooke, who considered it a turning point in his study of liberty that he couldn’t successfully counter a socialist who was taking him to the cleaners. This put me further in mind of the assertion that if you don’t know the objections cited by the opponents of your ideas, you really don’t know (or only know half of) your idea. So: let’s put our best ideas to the test of the best ideas and objections of those who disagree with them. Let’s hear those ideas in civil, informed, moderated discussion. This episode was a good example, albeit too short, of something I’d like to hear much more about.
Milton Friedman’s “Free to Choose.”
Here’s another explanation of why people want socialism.
I would describe such things as reasons for why people might THINK they want socialism. Because if they actually had it, it wouldn’t be what the expected.
My point is, the dynamic is unstoppable. We use the Fed and government to steal from each other. It goes in one direction and never stops. Obama just outright endorsed Medicare for all the other day. The GOP has no plan to deal with this.
Take, steal, thieve
Government Is How We Steal From Each Other™
“Every election is a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods.” – H. L. Mencken
“True freedom is about forcing other people to do what I want, regardless of whether it violates their beliefs.” — The modern Democratic party.
The best plan the GOP has for slowing down socialism is Trump. That is just reality.
Why Saying Socialists ‘Mean Well’ Gives Them Too Much Credit | Grant Babcock https://fee.org/articles/to-say-socialists-mean-well-gives-them-too-much-credit/ via @feeonlinehis
This is excellent.
Let me begin by apologizing for being so late to the party. Sadly, I am not current in my podcast listening. And unless I can, at my late age, learn to multi-task like a Millennial, I appear to be doomed to not catching up.
I would like to begin by complimenting the hosts on how well you were able to tease out Ms. Bruenig’s not terribly well worked out ideas. I had a couple of comments on some themes that were expanded on during the interview.
Ms. Bruenig claims that men are willing to accept the restraint of government only in exchange for exercising power. The premise is not supported by any political theory, I know of, although, I have shunned the woollier precincts of German Idealism. Hobbes held that men accept government because the state of nature is intolerably nasty. Liberal political theory as set forth in the Declaration of Independence is that governments are created to protect rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Democracy is compatible with this theory, but not required by it.
Ms. Bruenig seems to regard democracy as the ultimate value in the American system of government. It is not, Liberty is. Democracy is a pillar of the structure of the Republic created by the Constitution, but it is far from the only one. There are democratic elements in the structure of the Constitution, but they are specific. There are also strong restraints on democracy such as the roles of the Senate and the Courts.
I wonder if she feels that the Supreme Court decision over-ruling a couple of dozen democratically adopted state laws on the nature of marriage was defective because it was not democratic.
A deeper issue is that Socialists dreams of having every decision made “democratically” are illusory. A century ago a German sociologist named Robert Michels propounded the “Iron Law of Oligarchy” that all forms of organization, regardless of how democratic they are at the start, will eventually and inevitably become oligarchies, and that true democracy is both practically and theoretically impossible, especially in large groups and complex organizations.
Ms. Bruenig’s concern about the ability of the wealthy to influence the political process is interesting, but how does she square that with working for the richest man in the world’s extremely political newspaper.
Further, she and other liberals need to understand that one important counter to the power of wealth was the power of the political parties to set agendas and promote candidates. The parties have been neutered by the campaign finance laws.
Most liberals fetishize the campaign finance laws. Senate Democrats in one of their most appalling moves ever. voted to amend the First Amendment to subordinated freedom of speech and the press to campaign finance laws.
Another issue is her enthusiasm for unions. You alluded to the fact that private unions have almost disappeared because they destroyed the industries that hosted the unions. Her romantic understanding of unions is that they arose out of a process of spontaneous generation. The truth is that unionism as we know it was created by the Wagner Act and left wing politicians who wanted to establish a political base for the New Deal.
Nonsense.
I realize I was too restrained in my earlier response. Any calculus teacher is worth far more than every elementary schoolteacher because that calculus teacher has knowledge and skill that zero elementary schoolteachers have.
The second grade teacher can be replaced by anyone who possesses the knowledge of a middle school graduate. Not so the calculus teacher.
Why don’t we have socialism like Sweden?
Sweden: The Rorschach Nation By Kevin D. Williamson @ NationalReview.com on October 10, 2018
Also: What do we mean when we say: “socialism”:
Socialism Is So Hot Right Now by Jonah Goldberg @ Commentarymagazine.com for Sep, 2018