Liberal policies subsidize counterproductive behavior that ends up destroying black society…
Huffington Post blogger Shelly Garland recently wrote that maybe it’s time to deny white men the right to vote. She points to the unequal balance of wealth in places like South Africa, as well as the supposed reckless white males whose actions led to the 2008 recession, as evidence and suggests that the progressives could get so much done, such as redistributing wealth and atoning for white sins against minorities.
The author assumes the moral superiority of the progressive causes. But there are moral arguments against progressivism. I just wrote about how the fight for higher minimum wage results in higher unemployment. Professional race agitators are making bank as leaders of anti-police movements, but it’s inner city minorities that suffer the most from the resulting higher crime, including an explosion of murders. Thomas Sowell has described how liberal policies subsidize counterproductive behavior that ends up destroying black society.
While capitalism does have its share of problems, it doesn’t deserve the attacks from Garland, as more often than not it’s the government intervention in the free market that creates more problems. It was small government polices enacted by Calvin Coolidge and Republicans that dropped unemployment down to about six percent after the 1929 stock market crash. In contrast, government intervention in the form of abysmal tariffs spiked unemployment above 10% and kept it that way for much of the next decade. Government pressured lenders—often because of mistaken notions of justice—to issue unwise and subprime loans that caused the housing market crash in 2008.
All income levels rise under capitalism, and what opponents of the income gap really argue is that they would rather the poor remain poor as long as the rich were less rich.
– Margaret Thatcher
I have never seen a liberal make the case that some people having more money than others is a horrible thing. They simply assume that some people having more than others must be the result of exploitation or seizing it from others. While it’s true that there are abuses that exist and child hunger tugs on the heart strings, capitalism is the engine that has brought over a billion people out of poverty during the modern era. As Margaret Thatcher argued, all income levels rise under capitalism, and what opponents of the income gap really argue is that they would rather the poor remain poor as long as the rich were less rich. Even the average person defined as poor by the government has modern amenities, lifestyle, and access to food that only kings enjoyed in the past.
Finally, this is a complete double standard. When Republicans try to impose basic voter ID laws supported by most reasonable people, many liberals call it a racist poll tax. But actually calling for the disenfranchisement of white men is considered a progressive ideal. Progressives have replaced the original sin of Adam and Eve with the evilness of the white patriarchy. Just as many on the left don’t appreciate micro-aggressions, I don’t appreciate the macro-aggressions of being judged and possibly denied the right to vote because of my skin color and gender. (Though I suppose I could always self-identify as a trans-black female on Election Day.)
The idea that white men should be denied the right to vote is antithetical to a democracy, hypocritical, insulting, denies the benefits of capitalism, and fails to identify the real problems that face many people. The great part about our country is that the author has the right to share those warped views under the First Amendment. I only wish that she and her progressive comrades would extend that right to all men regardless of race and gender, which is the ideal our country is founded upon.
