An observation on Progressivism

Progressives believe they are “good” and only looking out for others when in reality, they are micro-totalitarians willing to boss, at the end, others at the end of a gun (re: this).  From Café Hayek.  Gee, who does this sound like being described?

The officially proclaimed Terror was, however, no random savagery.  The approximately ten thousand men and women who were killed were selected quite carefully: if the new national assembly, the Convention, demanded such blood-thirsty policies, if its all-powerful committees sent cartfuls of aristocrats, priests, and assorted opponents to the guillotine, it was, they considered, for a good reason, and no one was more coldly logical, or more blood-chillingly threatening, that Robespierre.  The Republic, he explained, was the hope of mankind; if it disappeared, tyranny would prevail forever; thus, in order to preserve liberty, it was necessary to suppress it temporarily.  That line of reasoning, for all its self-evident fallacy, has continued to have enormous appeal.

Of course, no one in the throes of a passion to remake society (always, of course, a remaking that is believed to be ‘for the better’) thinks of himself or herself as evil – as prone to commit sanguinary atrocities that history will properly judge to be utterly inexcusable.  ’Our goal is so great and good,’ the social engineer with power assures himself or herself, ‘that the executions and tortures of today are justified to create the far more just and fair and equal and truly free (and [fill-in-the-blank]) society that we are now using our power to construct.  And anyway, those people being executed and tortured deserve their fates.’

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Data Point – National debt per person

We can blame both Democrats and Republicans for this slow rolling, man-made disaster that is essentially stealing our kids and grandkids’ futures from them. (H/T: Daily Signal)

Notable Quote – Prof. Don Boudreaux

Don Boudreaux

… from page 144 of Anthony de Jasay’s brilliant 1998 volume, The State (original emphasis):

Private property, capital as the source of countervailing power, reinforcing the structure of civil society versus the state, used to be considered valuable both to those who owned some and to those who did not.  Liberal thought no longer recognizes such value.  It considers that democratic procedure is the source of unlimited sovereignty.

This truth is as sad as it is undeniable.  Modern “liberals” – “Progressives” – are both suckered by, and proponents of, what is perhaps the most treacherous political myth to be held by modern humans, namely, that regular corruption-free elections with a wide franchise are sufficient to keep the power of the state within appropriate bounds.  It isn’t only that “Progressives” stubbornly ignore public-choice realities.  They also believe in the existence of a mythical ‘People’s will’ or ‘People’s voice’ that they treat as a god whose desires and commands (always, of course, interpreted by the secular priests called ‘politicians’ and a select few high-church pundits) ought always override the wishes and desires of puny flesh-and-blood individuals.

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NH House, NH State Senator Jeb Bradley, and Medicaid Expansion – an email never answered

Obamacare -Year of the SnakeWell, this showed up in the UL yesterday – it looks like the Repubs in the NH House will put a dagger into Jeb’s favorite program made possible with other peoples’ money (correction: dastardly politicians call it “Free money” in hopes you ARE as stupid they think you are – TANSTAFFL and they know it).  Full post after the jump (reformatted, emphasis mine here):

Medicaid expansion could end in 2016

CONCORD — A House committee voted along party lines Sunday to allow the state’s Medicaid expansion to expire on Dec. 31, 2016. a move a spokesman for Gov. Maggie Hassan called “misguided.”  Hassan had called for the expansion to be extended as part of her proposed fiscal year 2016-2017 budget.  During a Sunday budget review session, members of the House Finance Committee, Division III, voted 6-3 to remove an item from the budget that would have extended Medicaid expansion in the state into 2017 and beyond. Six Republicans voted to end the program, while three Democrats voted to extend it.

“Expanded Medicaid is a huge disincentive for people to work,” said Rep. Dan McGuire, R-Epsom, who voted to let the expansion sunset at the end of 2016. “There wasn’t a lot of debate on it. Traditional Medicaid is designed to benefit people who are deserving of charity due to conditions beyond their control. Expanded Medicaid benefits people who are undeserving of charity. These are people who don’t have any reason for not working.”

I agree with both the observation and the vote – and, IMHO, NH State Senator Jeb Bradley

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Notable Quote – Steve Mac Donald

Shot: from an email, back from 2013, on a report from a meeting where NH Senate plans on endorsing Obamacare were being discussed: I arrived just in time to hear an influential member of the board saying (I’m paraphrasing here) what a great plan it was and the only people who would not want to accept … Read more

All NH State Senator Donna Soucy wants to do is “downshift” the State’s reponsibility to business owners

From the UL reporting on the NH State Democrats trying to mandate state level minimum wage levels:

Sen. Donna Soucy, D-Manchester, argued the bill would increase purchasing power for lower-paid workers in New Hampshire and allow some people to forgo public assistance. Citing Walmart’s decision to increase its hourly wage for employees, she said it is good for businesses, not just workers.  “It’s the right thing to do,” she said.

Scratching head – isn’t it the Democrats that are always touting how many people are on the public dole being helped by the State.  At every turn, their hearts’ desire is to expand the service both in what it does for “the oppressed by society” and how many more people are declared to be “oppressed by society”.  Yet, here she is, actually using the rubric that people would be able to get off said dole?

Or is she wanting to get the State out from underneath the cost?  That would certainly be the “right thing to do” – especially if you want to put more govt muscle onto businesses with the end goal that businesses would merely be agents of the State. Constrain them enough and that’s what we’ll get.

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Picking a President by Political Correctness is just so stupid

Hillary and Obama Demographics and Symbolism

I’ve not much cottoned to the idea of “First Irish” or “First Swede” or “First Woman” or “First Black” or “First <stick the tired descriptor here>” no matter what area of life it is.  Your ethnicity, your sex, your religion, your skin color….meaningless.  It’s what’s inside and the results that count.  Prof Sowell has the right of it – voting for someone just because it would be Politically Correct is stupid.

The fact that Obama is half-black is not the reason we are against him – it’s his political stances and his overwhelming urge to change America to be in the Progressive mold.  The idea that he should be treated as special simply because of his skin tone, that any criticism of him is racist from the get go is simply the argument of those that really have no argument at all.

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Notable Quote – Prof. Thomas Sowell

The very concept of change used by the intelligentsia of the left – which is to say, most of the intelligentsia – is arbitrarily restrictive and tendentious.  It means in practice the particular kinds of changes, through the particular kinds of social mechanisms that they envision.  Other changes – no matter how large or how consequential for the lives of millions of people – tend to be ignored if they occur through other mechanisms and in ways not contemplated by the intelligentsia.  At the very least, such unprescribed developments outside the scope of the vision of the anointed are denied the honorific title of “change.”

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On Planet Fitness throwing out a woman’s membership because…

old way new way…she was upset that a biological man claiming to be a gender woman was in the ladies locker room. At the time, HER locker room.  And because she was not “accepting enough”, her membership was cancelled.  This comment caught my eye:

Rick expresses the fear that eventually any business with a locker room, changing room, fitting room or bathroom will be forced by government to build “Mens” rooms, “Ladies” rooms,” and a “Choose your sex” room. This is one of those areas where political correctness simply has to be put aside and face up to reality. We have blurred the lines sufficiently about who is a boy and who is a girl, but the simple facts of family and biology remain. You may have been born with the “wrong set of genitalia” for some reason, but you still live in the same society with the rest of us. We are under no obligation to accept your definition when it comes to our own privacy and safety.

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Data Point: Fox News is now the most trustworthy news network

There are plenty of reasons that explain Fox News’ ratings dominance over the past decade and a half, but a new poll from Quinnipiac University sheds light on at least one major factor: trust. When voters were asked “Whose news coverage do you trust the most?” Fox News beat out all other television news organizations – on … Read more

2016 Presidential Primary – Lindsey Graham would us the US Military to make Congress do what he wants??

Lindsey GrahamPlease, don’t give Obama any ideas here!  But, he did say this here in NH at the Concord City Republican Committee meeting:

During his remarks before the Concord City Republican Committee last week, Sen. Lindsey Graham(R-SC) suggested that robust military spending is absolutely necessary to defeat ISIS forces abroad, and that, as president, he would use the military itself to force Congress to reverse budgetary cuts to defense and intel.

In brief audio obtained by BenSwann.com, Sen. Graham purportedly suggests he would use the military to restrict the movement of Congress until they complied:

 

…[A]nd here is the first thing I would do if I were President of the United States: I wouldn’t let Congress leave town until we fix this. I would literally use the military to keep them in if I had to. We’re not leaving town until we restore these defense cuts. We’re not leaving town until we restore the intel cuts.

Seeing the high possibility that this could be Graham’s special brand of humor, we’ve reached out to his office and will update if and when we hear back.

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What IS the difference between illegal and legal theft?

Does the act of simply voting someone else’s Private Property to be your’s make it “legal”?  Should Government be allowed to do what we do not let a criminal do on the street?  After all, the result is the same – you have lost your Private Property. Yes, there is a cost to maintain “civilization”, … Read more

Heads up for GrokTALK! – Senator Ted Cruz.

Steve will be putting up the regular GrokTALK! promo page probably on Friday but I just wanted to let folks know that we’ll have Senator Ted Cruz on GrokTALK! this Saturday on a special extended edition (re: going long as he’ll be calling in around 11:30am on Saturday).  On Sunday, he invited us (and we … Read more

Blogline of the Day – Clintonian

HILLARY: CARRYING TWO PHONES WAS TOUGH, SO I JEOPARDIZED NATIONAL SECURITY AND EVADED TRANSPARENCY LAWS It’s always about the Clintons….and maybe she’d had an “accomplishment” if she had used two? (H/T: Big Government)

Liberty & Freedom folks, revisit how & WHY you vote for Republicans

I’ve been calling what the elected Republicans have been doing in Concord (as in “we’ve been Jaspered”, as Steve has coined – Democrats pulling the strings of the Democrat appointed Speaker Jasper to get more favorable bills.  After all, if Jasper crosses the Dems, he’s out.  So we Republican voters are secondary to him and the resulting Democrat appointed Majority Leader Jack Flanagan) and in DC (give the Rs big majorities and they are p****** it away) as Kabuki Theater.  Big talk, no results commiserate with bodies we sent them.  Hot Air has this great image that describes this perfectly:

GOP kabuki-failIt quotes Ace of Spades:

Failure Theater is the process by which the Establishment deliberately fails to do achieve anything, but wants credit from the Dumb Conservatives they’re playing to for allegedly “trying.”

Each of Boehner’s and McConnell’s “defeats” are in fact planned in advance. They are not trying to advance the conservative agenda; they are attempting to con conservatives into believing they have attempted to implement conservative policy, when in fact they were delivering their political deliverables to their Donor Class paymasters all along.

Uneducated, gullible, and easily led

And then the words of warning – it is time to say no to this nonsense:

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