Tag: economics

Surf’s Up

The Portly Politico6 Comments

Demographer and statistician Steve Sailer has a book review (“Surfer Privilege” at Taki’s Magazine) of war correspondent William Finnegan’s Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life.  It’s about Finnegan’s idyllic youth in Southern California and Hawaii at a time when a working-class Irish family could afford real estate in some of the United States’ most desirable zip codes, while also supporting four children (Finnegan’s father worked in television, but was a pump jockey at a gas station upon first moving to Los Angeles; he could purchase a house and support his wife and child on that salary).

I recommend reading the book review linked above, as it contains classic Sailerean demographic analysis.  The real estate opportunities accessible to working- and middle-class Americans in the 1950s and 1960s are truly astonishing, and Sailer argues that, if you were born in 1946, the world was your oyster (Sailer was born in 1952, which he argues was also a pretty good year to enter into this world).

The real estate analysis rings true.  I’m 33 and earn a modest income as a history and music teacher at a small private school in rural South Carolina, which I supplement with adjunct teaching at a local technical college and with private music lessons (as well as the occasional music gig).  I’m also an extreme budgeter and put a significant chunk of my earnings into retirement accounts (IRAs and a 403(b) through my employer), and I drive a twelve-year old Dodge minivan.  While I live like a king compared to most people in human history, I still rent a little cottage and don’t support any dependents, much less a wife.  I’ll probably work hard for most of my life (though my long-term retirement planning should pay off over the course of decades; I’m definitely “getting rich slowly”), and I’m not counting on Social Security being around when I hit 70.

Had I been born when my parents were, I’d probably have a house, a wife, four kids, a pension, and a convertible, earning six figures in “consulting.”

I’m not complaining.  I highly value hard work, and I don’t think demography is always destiny (just look at all the miserable, divorced Boomers who are trying to figure out what went wrong).  I believe God has a purpose for us, and we live in our respective time for a reason (not that I haven’t, at times, experienced a sense of dislocation from our current era).

But Sailer’s demographic analysis of the period under consideration—a time that was so safe and prosperous, a kid could spend thousands of hours surfing and his parents didn’t much worry about him—is compelling, and points to long-term problems endemic in our culture today, such as mass immigration, an overly-rosy view of diversity, and idealistic subjectivism.

The Boomer generation was blessed to ride a long wave of economic prosperity and expansion.  As a product of the Great Recession, I’m growing more optimistic that future generations will enjoy similar gains.  I’m also cautiously hopeful that economic growth can prevent the unfortunate Millennial tendency toward idealizing socialism.

Hopefully, we’ll all be able to say “surf’s up!” again soon.

TBT: Economics: A Human Science

The Portly Politico10 Comments

The unofficial, unintentional theme of this week’s posts have been about economics in general (other than Tuesday’s SCOTUS piece)—the power of tax cuts, the potential upsides to tariffs, etc.  In that spirit, I thought for week’s post about diving back into a piece that reflects my gradually evolving thinking about economics.

The summer before my sophomore year of college, I read the second edition of Milton Friedman’s Capitalism and Freedom, a work that completely revolutionized how I thought about the world and economics.  Free-market principles became my lodestar, and colored my ideology for a decade.  Indeed, I still adhere to these principles when it comes to economic questions.

However, as I grew older and (hopefully) more experienced, I began to realize that neoliberal economic theory, while elegant, is not always hard-and-fast, and that there are many more wrinkles to economic issues than appear at first glance.  I don’t believe in overcomplicating things—again, cutting taxes tends to stimulate economic growth—but most issues contain a frisson of nuance that is easy to miss.

I’d long held to the idea that free trade is a largely unalloyed good, and that the short-term costs of lost jobs or reduced wages in some industries domestically would be made up for by increased efficiency of production and the rise of new, better industries.  Sure, there’d be some friction in the duration, but people will manage, and we can always throw some funds for reeducation their way.

While I think such disruption is inevitable, I don’t think we should embrace it so blindly that we forget about the people who find themselves out of work, or in a position that they can’t modify their skillsets to find a new job.  I live in the rural South, and there are hundreds of little towns that dried up once the mill the left, the railroad shut down, or the big family farms sold off.  Part of that story is the onward march of Time and economic progress—and the drama of human history.  But part of it is the story of globalist elites selling out Middle America.

This situation is not one merely of tariffs, taxes, and the like, but also of a radical ideology that would see national borders dissolved and massive immigration—even illegal immigration—encouraged.  I am libertarian on many issues, but the pitfall of modern economic libertarianism—and there are many—is that it only conceives of issues in terms of economic efficiency (and, if you get right down to it, it’s inverted Marxism, to the extent that, for Marxists, everything is about economics—or, more properly, materialism).  And, yes, generally greater efficiency means greater quality of life, but economics is not always the clean, elegant science that its proponents claim it to be.

To that end, I argue that economics, properly considered, should be considered part of the humanities, as it deals in a direct, visceral way with the people’s lives.

I don’t know the precise balancing act, or what should be achieved.  I highly recommend reading Patrick J. Buchanan’s The Death of the West for a more complete treatment of how to revive wages for workers while maintaining a high degree of quality and efficiency.  I don’t agree with all of Buchanan’s proposals, which are heavily influenced by Catholic social teachings, but there is an appeal to the idea that, if the government is going to interfere in the economy (and it is, and does), then it should be in favor of workers and families, not at their expense.

Finally, I wrote this essay in the context of the Brexit vote—which I intend to write an eBook on soon—and the arguments I was hearing about the economic catastrophe Brexit would be (that hasn’t been the case yet).  I argued, essentially, that the liberty and national sovereignty are more important than sweet European Union bennies and transfer-of-wealth payments.  The EU is a despicable organization as it currently operates, and as a lover of liberty, I’m thrilled to see nationalist-populist movements rising in major European countries.  I don’t agree with all of these groups or their policies (many of which are socialistic in nature), but the impulse towards greater national sovereignty is, in general, a healthy one in our age of excessive globalization and unelected supranational tyrants.

With that lengthy introduction, I give you 24 June 2016’s “Economics: A Human Science“:

If you’ve read my blog the past couple of weeks, you know that I am strongly in favor of Brexit, or Great Britain voting to “Leave” the European Union.  I’ve laid out my reasons here and here.  As I write this post, results are trickling in on that historic vote, and I am intermittently checking them with great interest–and not a small bit of trepidation.  Right now (about 10:30 PM EST/-5 GMT), “Leave” has a slight edge, but the outcome is too close to call.

Already, though, the British pound and the euro have taken a beating in value, as gold prices soar (this blog is conservative in viewpoint, so I probably should start urging you to buy gold, guns, and freeze-dried food reserves; source:  http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-06-23/pound-surge-builds-as-polls-show-u-k-to-remain-in-eu-yen-slips).  One of the major bogeymen of the “Remain” side in the referendum was the threat of economic downturn.  As I conceded in both of my previous posts on Brexit, there will no doubt be major economic disruption should Britain vote to “Leave.”  However, a (likely temporary) drop in the value of the pound sterling is a price well paid for restored national sovereignty.

God Save the Queen… and Great Britain from the clutches of Eurozone bureaucrats

As conservatives, we’re accustomed to viewing economics–or, at least, economic growth–as a positive good.  After all, we believe in the power of free markets to satisfy human needs and desires, and to innovate new ideas and products that alleviate human suffering, drudgery, and toil.  Conservative politicians tend to focus on job growth and prudent deregulation–often coupled with tax and spending cuts–as perennial, bread-and-butter issues that directly affect voters’ pocketbooks for the better.

 “…these [fiscal] policies are not about making gobs of cash… but about what those gobs can do to improve lives.”

But economics, like much else, is not a means unto itself.  The reason conservatives like economic growth–besides, well, making money–is that it demonstrably improves people’s lives.  Deregulation, similarly, can work beneficially (if you doubt me, just ask anyone who has ever dealt with the Affordable Care Act and the Department of Health and Human Services).  In essence, these policies are not about making gobs of cash–although that is certainly nice–but about what those gobs can do to improve lives.

Thus, we have a stark contrast between the organic, healthy, occasionally unpredictable economic growth of a free market and the regimented, inequitable, limited economic growth of progressive corporatism.  Our current economic environment, I fear, is far closer to the latter than the former.  Complex, heavy regulations benefit larger firms and discourage the formation of smaller, newer firms by raising the upfront costs of entry.  Perverse incentives raise the costs of healthcare for young, fit Americans, while making it unrealistically cheaper for older, sicker, chubbier patients.  Overly-generous social safety benefits (some of which, like the food stamp program SNAP, the government actively advertises and encourages people to use) discourage able-bodied Americans from pursuing work.

I could go on (and on… and on).  In short, conservatives are used to being correct on principle and on economic outcomes.  Typically, conservative fiscal policies align with, rather than try to manipulate, economic realities, so the outcomes of those policies tend to be both principled and positive.

“As fiscal conservatives… let us never lose sight of the human side of economics.”

In the case of Brexit, however, the quest for restored sovereignty–a stand on an important first principle–will result in some negative economic outcomes.  A major argument of the “Remain” side is that staying in the European Union will preserve Britain’s economic stability and ensure it a place in a European common market.

Such an argument is seductive, but it leads to a gilded cage.  Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman famously said that economic freedom is a necessary precursor to, though not a guarantor of, political freedom.  With Brexit, the axiom is almost reversed–by reclaiming its political freedom, Britain will then be able to pursue renewed economic freedom.

As fiscal conservatives–or those that support free markets, freer trade, and light regulations–let us never lose sight of the human side of economics.  We too often treat economics as a science.  Instead, it should find a home alongside the humanities.

Our chief aim should be to unleash human potential.  So liberated, its creativity and ingenuity can lift human life to greater heights.

We already have a model:  we’ve been doing it in the United States for over 200 years.

Q&A Wednesday – Tax Cuts, Trade Wars, Etc.

The Portly Politico13 Comments

Two of my most loyal readers, Megan and Frederick (I highly recommend the latter’s corporate history blog, CorporateHistory.International), both chimed in via Facebook about Monday’s post on tax cuts.  Frederick pointed out a potential downside to corporate tax cuts—what’s to stop large multinationals from investing that money in physical plants and employees overseas, notably in China?  Megan asked me to elaborate further on tariffs in relation to that very question.

Being a conservative, I like to conserve things—traditions, morals, civil society, working institutions, etc.—but most especially effort.  I’m a strong believer in the dictum, “Work smarter, not harder” (although you need a healthy dose of the latter, too).  As such, I’m adapting my Facebook response to them here.

I think the question of tariffs and trade wars is hugely interesting, and needn’t be bogged down in tedious charts and numbers.  What I do believe is that President Trump has ripped the façade from the bipartisan push for globalism, and particularly demonstrated the real, human cost of unbridled free trade.

I used to be 99% a free trader, with 1% reserved for mild tariffs on national security-related goods, like steel.

Now I’m probably more 85% free trade, 15% tariffs. A tariff is a tax, yes, and it’s borne not just by foreign nations exporting goods to the US, but also by American consumers, who have to pay more for goods that are protected (and, thus, more expensive and potentially of a lesser quality than they would be in a competitive, free market).  That disclaimer aside, it seems like paying a few more bucks for your washing machine is a good way to keep Americans employed and earning a decent wage.

If you take that reasoning too far you fall into the dilemma of minimum wage increases, which increase unemployment (especially for unskilled, young, and minority workers) and raise costs, so that any increased wages enjoyed by the beneficiaries are eaten away by the increased costs of consumer goods—all served up with a side of higher unemployment.

That said, judicious tariffs—I’m not arguing for the high, blanket tariffs of the late nineteenth century, which wouldn’t work well in our modern, interconnected economy—especially related to key industries like steel, could keep a lot of Americans working, and would allow blue-collar workers to earn a wage that wouldn’t require years of expensive schooling.

Also, I think targeted tariffs against unequal trading partners—I’m thinking primarily of China—would level the playing field, and prevent some of the outsourcing and capital flight that might occur with a corporate tax cut (or, more likely, increase). It’s unreasonable to expect American workers—with all their labor protections, etc.—to compete with near-slave wage Chinese workers. China’s currency manipulation to make its exports artificially cheaper, as well its rampant intellectual property theft, needs to be combated, and if it means getting our cheap plastic Happy Meal toys from Vietnam (or the USA!) instead of China, so be it.

The current “trade war” with China sees Americans in a much better position than the Chinese. China needs those exports, but the USA can stand to experience some minor drag to its GDP growth given the massive growth we’re seeing with the tax cuts (not just the corporate tax cut, but also the 20% deduction for small business pass-through earnings, which is YUGE for small business growth—a key driver of employment in our country). I see it as a trade-off—pay a little more for some consumer goods, but create imbalance in the Chinese economy and force them to play ball on par with the Western world and Japan.

My only real concern with this approach is there is no limiting principle (although that’s true for any type of tax, and we have to have some of them), which makes me wary as a limited-government Jeffersonian, but the Hamiltonian commercialist in me sees this moment in history as one in which we can uniquely leverage our economic clout to improve our own economy and our position internationally, and we can afford to go through a trade war longer than China (or Mexico, or Europe).

Everyone loses if a trade war lasts too long, but I think the Chinese will blink first. American workers will be the ones to benefit.

One additional thought, which will require more elegant development in a future post:  even with the inefficiencies and deadweight loss that would occur from overly-high tariffs, wouldn’t protecting domestic jobs be a more effective and fulfilling way to provide a living for blue-collar workers than the current welfare system?  Instead of a massive, government-run bureaucracy administering a complex and redundant system of bennies, society could bear the cost through paying a bit more for consumer goods.  Such a system would create more semi-skilled positions in some industries, and I’d rather we subsidize people through work than to subsidize them not to work.  Again, that’s a very rough sketch, but some food for thought.

Regardless, tariffs are not an unalloyed evil, nor is free trade an unalloyed good.  There’s room for both.  Economics suggests that the balance should favor the latter more heavily than the former, but we can temper the massive social disruption that unbridled globalization unleashes.

Tax Cuts Work

The Portly Politico19 Comments

Back in December, I wrote a post on the old blog begging Republicans to pass tax cuts.  When they did, I danced around my house like a silver-backed gorilla on Christmas.

I cannot understand objections to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, other than fiscal conservatives’ fear of increasing deficit spending.  By that I mean I can intellectually understand objections in an abstract, academic sense, but I’m unable to accept those arguments as valid in this case, and many of them are specious.

The historical record is clear:  tax cuts works.  Be it cuts on income, corporate, estate, or sales taxes, cutting taxes, in general, stimulates economic growth and usually increases government revenues.

Take the example of Calvin Coolidge, whom we might call the godfather of modern tax cuts.  As president, Coolidge used his predecessor’s Budget and Accounting Act of 1921 to carefully monitor and eliminate excess government spending.  He also signed into law the Revenue Act of 1926, reducing the top rate to 25% on incomes greater than $100,000.

By the time he left office, the government had increased revenues (due to the stimulative effect of the tax cuts on the economy—rates fell, but more people were paying greater wages into the system), federal spending had fallen, and the size and scope of the federal government had shrunk, a feat no other president has managed to accomplish.

The perennial wag will protest, “But what about the Depression?”  Certainly, there were a number of complicated reasons that fed into the coming Depression, but the stock market crash—really, a massive correction—did not cause the Depression.  Had the government left well enough alone, the economy should have adjusted fairly quickly, although modern SEC rules and regulations were not in place.  That’s a discussion for another post, but I suspect that Herbert Hoover’s signing of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff (1930)—a tax increase on imports—did much to exacerbate the economic situation, and a decade of FDR’s social welfare experiments injected further uncertainty into markets.

But I digress.  Subsequent presidents have championed tax cuts in the Coolidge vein, albeit without the corresponding emphasis on spending cuts.  John F. Kennedy pushed for tax cuts, which threw gasoline onto the fire of the post-war American economy.  Ronald “Ronaldus Magnus” Reagan’s tax cuts created so much prosperity, the ’80s are remembered for hair metal and cocaine; had he not had to spend the Soviets out of existence (and faced a Democratic Congress), he could have cut spending, too.

President Trump’s tax cuts have breathed new life into a sluggish, post-Great Recession recovery.  Jobs growth is increasing month after month, and wages are rising, slowly but surely.  Black unemployment is down from 7.7% in January to 5.9% as of May—the first time it’s ever been below 7% since the government began keeping statistics in 1972.

Leftists object that the cut to the corporate tax rate benefits big fat cats instead of everyday Americans, but the statistics suggest otherwise (see the article linked in the previous paragraph for more good news).  Further, Leftists moan and groan when companies put increased revenues into dividend payments to stockholders, as if this move is detrimental.  On the contrary, as more Americans invest in mutual funds in their 401(k)s or IRAs, they stand only to gain from these investments.  Progressives only see these investments as “big company benefits,” without following through on what that money does.

Of course, that’s because the Left’s focus is emotional (not economic), and worries about all the sweet government gigs that majors in Interpretative Queer Baltic Dance Studies will lose without the federal government’s largesse.  Getting voters off the welfare rolls further inhibits the Democratic Party’s mantra of “Soak the Rich,” as upwardly-mobile workers naturally want to keep a good thing going.

Conservative concerns of deficit spending are more grounded in economic reality, and while the federal deficit seems like an abstraction to most Americans, it does present a looming crisis.  Perpetual indebtedness in a personal sense seems inherently immoral if undertaken as a financial strategy unto itself (taking out a loan for a car, a house, a business, or education is one thing; living off of borrowed money, and borrowing more, with no intention of paying it back is quite another; I’m referencing the latter situation); the government should be held to the same standard.

That said, the problem of the federal deficit is a longstanding issue that has more to do with excessive and wasteful spending.  The stimulative effect of the tax cuts, by putting more people to work, will increase revenues.  The most pressing concern now is for Congress to make the income tax cuts permanent—another no-brainer, win-win move for all concerned.

Taxes are a necessary evil—we need the military, roads, and the like—and there comes a point of diminishing returns with cuts just as there are with increases, but allowing Americans to keep more of their money is, in almost every situation, the better choice, both economically and morally.

George Will’s Self-Destruct Sequence

The Portly Politico9 Comments

Last week, America lost one of its great columnists, Charles Krauthammer.  Krauthammer was a former speechwriter for Democratic VP candidate Walter Mondale, then realized he was no longer a Democrat when Ronald Reagan became president.  Krauthammer was a political conservative, but he wasn’t a slave to ideology.  He remained intellectually-curious and -honest, even that meant he was wrong on a rare occasion (he argued for a $1/gallon gas tax nearly a decade ago).

Long-time Washington Post columnist George Will—a colleague of Krauthammer’s at the paper—similarly has a reputation for intellectual honesty.  Like Krauthammer, Will exists in a cosseted, Beltway-Washington, D.C., and hasn’t quite come to terms with the presidency of Donald Trump.

As such, it was with dismay—but not surprise—that I read Will’s derisive op-ed in the Post, “Vote against the GOP this November.”  Never has self-destructive defeatism sounded so literate.

Will’s specious argument boils down to these details:  President Trump is a borderline dictator; Republicans in Congress are afraid to criticize him for fear they will lose their seats; Americans should vote out enough Republicans that the Democrats take control, but there will still “be enough Republicans to gum up the Senate’s machinery.”

Will points out that Congress has sacrificed its own important Article II powers in order to take the easier path of non-accountability, instead preferring to leave the hard decisions to the President and his power of executive orders.  While this point is valid, it’s not unique to the Trump administration, which, by all accounts, has used executive orders narrowly, and within the framework of existing legislation.  To read Will, this problem is due to Trump’s temperament and personality.

While the President may not enjoy criticism, he’s a big boy—not the coddled man-child that was President Barack Obama—and, besides, it’s Congress’s responsibility to pass and propose legislation.  If the President doesn’t like something, he can veto it.

Where Will’s advice truly goes off the rails is his claim that Democrats should be permitted to take control of the Senate, even if it brings in a “basket of deplorables,” because then a do-nothing Congress… would still do nothing!  He argues that enough Republicans would still be around that they would keep “the institution as peripheral as it has been under their control,” and would “asphyxiat[e] mischief from a Democratic House.”

What a load of malarkey.  As a conservative, which would you rather see:  a feckless Congress controlled by Republicans, or Democrats?  Even if you knew the Congress would be ineffective half of the time, the answer is obvious:  you’d opt for the former.  At least with ineffectual Republicans in control, you’d avoid groundless impeachment votes.

Indeed, look at the record of the current Congress:  the Senate confirmed conservative Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch; the Republican-controlled Congress passed the massive tax cut bill (which Will imperiously dismisses—when one enjoys Georgetown cocktail parties and fancy D.C. brunches for a living, money isn’t an issue); the Congress enacted the Right to Try Act, which will make it easier and cheaper for patients to try still-experimental drugs for deadly illnesses.

Logically, Will’s advice makes zero sense.  If the idea is to send a message to Republicans to be more independent from the President’s agenda—why would they want to be?—the price is too high.  Why make a point on principle if it costs you the future victories of still-higher principles?

I believe Will is sincere in his desire to see constitutional checks and balances restored, but President Trump represents part of the cure to that problem, not the disease.  Congress has the responsibility to step up.

That said, I also believe Will is blinded by a sincere hatred of—or, at the very least, a passionate distaste for—President Trump.  The man left the Republican Party, and urged Republicans to ensure Trump’s defeat, back in 2016—such are the depths of his disregard.  Now that Trump is president—and restoring the nation’s economy and national sovereignty—Will’s irrelevance as a national commentator is even further highlighted, and it seems his anti-Trump impulses grow even further.

Will thinks the ideal President should be balancing a tea cup on one knee while listening attentively to a farmer in Iowa (sadly, I can’t find this quotation online at the moment, but I remember reading it back in 2016).  For better or worse, the era of the Mitt Romney Republican presidential candidate has passed.  We are in the midst of a full-blown, no-holds-barred culture war in which conservatives have played the decorum card for too long.  Trump is a brawler, and while he may be imprecise or distractible, he has the guts to tango with the enemy—and win.

Will’s self-destruction as a conservative pundit is sad to witness, but perhaps it’s overdue.

Fallout 76 Announcement Increases Tourism to West Virginia

The Portly Politico4 Comments

My morning ritual involves drinking coffee from a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles mug (you may want to reconsider how much you take my analysis to heart, dear reader) and watching various podcasts/vlogs on YouTube, usually Ben Shapiro (or one of his colleagues), Steven Crowder, or Scott Adams.

So, one morning this week I saw an ad featuring the tantalizing E3 trailer for Fallout 76.  For the uninitiated, the Fallout series of games posits an alternate future in which the United States and China slugged it out in a thermonuclear war during the mid-twentieth century, and decades (or centuries) later humanity emerges from various “vaults” (elaborate, underground bomb shelters) to reclaim the radioactive wastelands around them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=M9FGaan35s0

The E3 Trailer for Fallout 76.  You should watch it at the very least for the great cover of John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads“

Yes, it’s all quite nerdy, but when you’re a ten-year old boy trapped in a hairy man’s body—and have read a lot of Cold War history—it’s the kind of thing that gets you excited in the morning.

What really excited me about this announcement is that Fallout 76 takes place in Appalachia—specifically, a big ol’ chunk of West Virginia.  Most Fallout games take place in the ash-strewn ruins of metropolitan areas, including Washington, D.C., Las Vegas, and Boston.  Other than the rural deserts of Nevada, the game has not delved much into an almost-exclusively rural region (more die-hard fans will surely object; I’m not as familiar with the first two Fallout games and their settings, other than they seem to be focused on California; respectful corrections are welcome).

I’d always wondered what it would be like to experience a post-apocalyptic South Carolina (digitally, to be clear; fortunately, it looks like President Trump is ensuring we won’t have to do so for real), and have been hoping for a Fallout game set in the rural South.  West Virginia isn’t really the South—I’m sure that will rile up further controversy—but it’s close enough.  I assume that, if nuclear Armageddon were to occur, the best place to be would be somewhere rural enough the ChiComs wouldn’t try to blow it up.

So, what does this have to do with politics, the purported purpose of this portly page?  Vanishingly little, other than it is cool to see a major video game set in the heart of Trump Country.

But the game’s setting has had an interesting economic impact.  Apparently, online searches pertaining to tourism to West Virginia have shot up; the site West Virginia Explorer has seen fifteen times the traffic since the game was announced.  The theme park Camden Park has seen an increase in calls for merchandise and inquiries about ticket sales.

West Virginia has struggled economically, especially during the Obama administration’s war on coal, and while it has enjoyed a mild comeback under President Trump, it’s still a very poor State.

Further, one usually one only sees video games in the news when some specious talking head claims they cause violence (they don’t), so it’s refreshing to see one having a positive effect on a beautiful State that could surely benefit from the tourism dollars.

My recommendation for the next Fallout game?  Set that sucker in the ruins of Charleston, South Carolina… or maybe Cheraw.

Three Years of Excellence

The Portly Politico18 Comments

Father’s Day—16 June 2018—marked three years since President Donald Trump’s now-legendary descent down the golden escalator at Trump Tower, following by his controversial but true-to-form announcement that he would be seeking the Republican Party’s nomination for President.

I was, initially, a Trump skeptic, and I voted for Texas Senator Ted Cruz in the South Carolina primaries the following February.  When Trump first announced, I wrote him off—as so many others—as a joke.  I appreciated his boldness on immigration, but I still thought the PC Police and the campus Social Justice Warriors were firmly in control of the culture, and that no one could speak hard truths.

I also remembered his brief flirtation with running in 2012, and thought this was just another episode in what I learned was a long history of Trump considering a presidential bid.  At the South Carolina Republican Party’s state convention earlier in 2015, I asked two young men working on Trump’s pre-campaign (this was before The Announcement) if he was really serious this time.  The two of them—they looked like the well-coifed dreamboat vampires from the Twilight franchise—both assured me that Trump was for real, and I left with some Trump stickers more skeptical than ever (note, too, that this was before the distinctive but simple red, white, and blue “Trump” lawn signs, and definitely before the ubiquitous “Make America Great Again” hats).

I even briefly—briefly!—considered not voting for Trump, thinking that he was not a “real” conservative.  I still don’t think he’s a conservative in the way, say, that a National Review columnist is (although, the way they’ve gotten so noodle-wristed lately, that’s a good thing; I’ve just about lost all respect for David French’s hand-wringing, and Kevin Williamson went off the deep-end), but rather—as Newt Gingrich would put it—an “anti-Leftist.”  That’s more than enough for me.

But my conversion to Trump came only belatedly.  I can still find a notebook of notes from church sermons in which I wrote, “Ted Cruz won the Wyoming primary.  Thank God!” in the margins.

Then something happened—something I predicted would happen on the old TPP site—and I couldn’t get enough of the guy.  It wasn’t a “road to Damascus” epiphany.  I started listening to his speeches.  I read up on his brilliant immigration plan (why haven’t we taxed remittances yet?).  I stopped taking him literally, and began taking him seriously.

And I noticed it happening in others all around me.  Friends who had once disdained the Republican Party were coming around on Trump.  Sure, it helped that Secretary Hillary Clinton was a sleazebag suffused with the filth of grasping careerism and political chicanery.  But more than being a vote against Hillary, my vote—and the vote of millions of other Americans—became a vote for Trump—and for reform.

Trump made politics interesting again, too, not just because he said outrageous stuff on live television (I attended his rally in Florence, South Carolina before the SC primaries, and I could feel his charisma from 200 feet away; it was like attending a rock concert).  Rather, Trump busted wide open the political orthodoxy that dominated both political parties at the expense of the American people.

Take trade, for example.  Since World War II, both Democrats and Republicans have unquestioningly supported free trade.  Along comes Trump, and suddenly we’re having serious debates again about whether or not some tariffs might be beneficial—that maybe it’s worth paying a little more for a stove or plastic knick-knacks if it means employing more Americans.

That’s not even to mention Trump’s legacy on immigration—probably the most pressing issue of our time, and one about which I will write at greater length another time.

Regardless, after over 500 days in office, the record speaks for itself:  lower taxes, fewer regulations, greater economic growth, greater security abroad.  At this point, the only reasons I can see why anyone would hate Trump are either a.) he’s disrupting their sweet government job and/or bennies; b.) they don’t like his rhetorical style, and can’t get past it (the Jonah Goldbergite “Never Trumpers”—a dying breed—fall into this group); or c.) they’re radical Cultural Marxists who recognize a natural foe.  Folks in “Option B” are probably the most common, but they’re too focused on rhetoric and “decorum”—who cares if he’s mean to Justin Trudeau if he gets results?  The folks in “Option C” are willfully ignorant, evil, or blinded by indoctrination.

As the IG report from last Thursday revealed—even if it wouldn’t come out and say it—the Deep State is very, very real.  That there were elements within the FBI willing to use extralegal means to disrupt the Trump campaign—and, one has to believe, to destroy the Trump presidency—suggests that our delicate system of checks and balances has been undermined by an out-of-control, unelected federal bureaucracy.  Such a dangerous threat to our republic is why we elected Trump.

President Trump, keep draining the swamp.  We’re with you 100%.

 

European Disunion

The Portly Politico2 Comments

Back in 2016, I wrote a series of essays on the then-approaching Brexit vote.  Just like the American presidential election that autumn, there was a great deal of misinformation and obfuscation about the “Leave” side—the Leavers were racist and xenophobic; voting “Leave” would cause the world to collapse and the Universe to fold in upon itself; boorish working-class Brits would rebel once they realized they’d lost their sweet European Union bennies.

Even I—a profoundly pro-Brexit advocate—predicted there’d be a long-term economic downturn as a result of voting “Leave” (but I believe liberty is worth far more than material security).

Of course, the Brexit vote was a major blow against supranational tyranny, and a major victory for liberty and national self-interest.  The European Union does not function like the United States and its federal system of semi-sovereign entities; rather, it’s largely ruled and governed by a small cadre of unelected, hyper-progressive, cosmopolitan bureaucrats with little regard for national differences or interests.

It was this philosophical and foundational tack that I sought to take with Brexit.  Brexit was not a policy matter that presented two sets of pros-and-cons, although that was part of the discussion.  Rather, Brexit posed a fundamental question:  does a nation have the right to determine its own national destiny—to act in its own self-interest, as it and its people see fit?  Further, did the European Union provide a framework in which nations could maintain sovereignty while enjoying the benefits of union?

I believe the Brexit vote—and the ongoing discussions about what Brexit will look like—reflected these timeless questions, and though the vote has long-since passed, the topic maintains a perennial quality for those interested in political philosophy.

To that end, I’ll be compiling, re-editing, and otherwise modifying my 2016 Brexit essays into a new eBook, Tyranny Denied:  Reflections on Brexit.  I’ll also be adding some chapters and historical notes.

That book, along with my long-planned eBook on social conservatism, Values Have Consequences, should appear later this summer or autumn—just in time for Christmas.

4.8% Economic Growth?!

The Portly Politico24 Comments

Remember when President Obama, in Carter-esque fashion, gravely warned the American people that 2% annual GDP growth was the new normal?

The parallels between Obama and Carter’s doom-and-gloom economic forecasts–and between Reagan and Trump’s pro-American optimism–once again come to the fore with the latest predictions from the Atlanta Fed.

A piece at Breitbart notes that annualized GDP growth for the second quarter of 2018 is a whopping 4.8%.  And that’s despite threats of a trade war.

Maybe the scare over tariffs is premature, or the United States is in a position to benefit from playing some hardball on trade.  Free trade is not an unalloyed good, though it is certainly beneficial, and tariffs are not unequivocally bad.

Mostly, though, it seems that the tax cuts are working.  America is getting its economic groove back.  Trump is making America great again by getting government out of the way and letting business thrive.