The great faith at the heart of modern conservatism is that it can't go on like this.
Of course, we've been saying that for decades, and yet liberalism seems to go on from triumph to triumph.
Well, maybe it doesn't triumph, but it still manages to keep handing out the free stuff and win votes.
When and how does the music stop? In bus fare riots in Brazil, where the government is now rescinding a 7 percent increase in mass transit fares. Or food riots in Egypt, where food has been price-controlled since the days of Abdul Nasser in the 1950s.
No doubt we'll see the same thing here in the US when they start curbing EBT use.
The trouble with free stuff is that eventually you run out of other peoples' money; but the people on the receiving end of the free stuff have come to take it for granted. So they take to the streets.
I'm wondering how the twentysomethings are going to take to the gigantic increases in health insurance this coming year as Obamacare comes on stream and they find out that they are the guys that are going to pay for it. Do you think they will take to the streets?
David Hogberg has a telling article about this. It's about the impact of Obamacare on the twentysomethings of Portland, Oregon. Think about it. The whole idea of moving to Portland is to live a low-geared life, without the cost of a car or a home or a spouse, and just hang out for a few years in the single-friendly culture of liberal Portland.
But just think what the Democrats are doing to the young singles. First of all there is the repayment of those student loans. Yes, we all know how Democrats care about students, but we also know that the main effect of student loans has been to rack up college fees. One fine day the Susie Goodgirls are going to wake up and realize they've been had.
Now the Democrats are proposing to make young singles pay for Obamacare. You think that somewhere along the line the young singles are going to get it? That they are being played for patsies? That all the stuff about wars on women and Republican bigotry on abortion and gay marriage means nothing compared to the fiscal burden of student loans and mandatory health insurance?
I know. Don't hold your breath.
And then there's education in general. George Will has a retrospective on inequality where he reminds us that education is not really an equalizer. He reminds us of Edward Banfield's 1970 comment in The Unheavenly City:
Meanwhile the middle- and upper-classes are taking their children out of government education and home-schooling them or sending them to private schools.
And meanwhile liberals are pushing an immigration bill that will generate more competition for the low-paid workers.
Now we hear that President Obama is going to do a big push on climate change, starting with regulations to retire coal-fired electric plants. Golly gee, I wonder what effect that will have. I guess it will create lots of jobs for young women with degrees in environmental science, but not much for the low-paid worker that needs cheap energy to create jobs.
For conservatives, "these are the times that try men's souls." Everything that we know and feel tells us that the nation is being propelled to disaster by a cruel and unjust ruling class. Subsidy is piled on subsidy, administrative folly on folly, the government bureaucracy is swung into action to intimidate the ruling party's opponents. The divisive words of election campaigns are extended into the "permanent campaign."
We know that at the end of the Obama era is not just a change of administration but something far more daunting. The future prosperity of America will only begin when the twentysomethings of Portland, Oregon get a life. When the folks that gave up in the Great Recession and got themselves on Social Security Disability get back in the game. When the folks gaming the welfare system get a job. When the single mother gets a husband. When the green energy cronies get into an honest business. When the education system gets a Hercules. When people start to pay for their own health care. When people save for their own retirement.
But the fact is that under the rule of the liberal ruling class every one of these sensible, practical ideas, in which people direct their lives towards responsibility and service, has been shredded to pieces. The fact is that as the money runs out tens of millions of folks are going to be consumed with rage, starting with the twentysomethings in Portland. Just like the folks in Brazil and Egypt. And they'll probably blame the insurance companies and the bankers, and whoever else the liberals set up as a scapegoat.
There's a piece of Wile E. Coyote in every politician. He fearlessly chases after some Roadrunner, confident in the knowledge that he'll catch the little feller around the next bend.
Problem is, when the politician rams into a rock wall or runs off the edge of a western mesa, it's not the politician that ends up in red ruin. It is the political supporters that suddenly find their free stuff snatched away, forever.
Of course, we've been saying that for decades, and yet liberalism seems to go on from triumph to triumph.
Well, maybe it doesn't triumph, but it still manages to keep handing out the free stuff and win votes.
When and how does the music stop? In bus fare riots in Brazil, where the government is now rescinding a 7 percent increase in mass transit fares. Or food riots in Egypt, where food has been price-controlled since the days of Abdul Nasser in the 1950s.
No doubt we'll see the same thing here in the US when they start curbing EBT use.
The trouble with free stuff is that eventually you run out of other peoples' money; but the people on the receiving end of the free stuff have come to take it for granted. So they take to the streets.
I'm wondering how the twentysomethings are going to take to the gigantic increases in health insurance this coming year as Obamacare comes on stream and they find out that they are the guys that are going to pay for it. Do you think they will take to the streets?
David Hogberg has a telling article about this. It's about the impact of Obamacare on the twentysomethings of Portland, Oregon. Think about it. The whole idea of moving to Portland is to live a low-geared life, without the cost of a car or a home or a spouse, and just hang out for a few years in the single-friendly culture of liberal Portland.
But just think what the Democrats are doing to the young singles. First of all there is the repayment of those student loans. Yes, we all know how Democrats care about students, but we also know that the main effect of student loans has been to rack up college fees. One fine day the Susie Goodgirls are going to wake up and realize they've been had.
Now the Democrats are proposing to make young singles pay for Obamacare. You think that somewhere along the line the young singles are going to get it? That they are being played for patsies? That all the stuff about wars on women and Republican bigotry on abortion and gay marriage means nothing compared to the fiscal burden of student loans and mandatory health insurance?
I know. Don't hold your breath.
And then there's education in general. George Will has a retrospective on inequality where he reminds us that education is not really an equalizer. He reminds us of Edward Banfield's 1970 comment in The Unheavenly City:
All education favors the middle- and upper-class child, because to be middle or upper class is to have qualities that make one particularly educable.Yet liberals chunter along, secure in the faith that education is a good thing for everyone. They mean, of course, that education is real good for liberals so it stands to reason that it is real good for everyone.
Meanwhile the middle- and upper-classes are taking their children out of government education and home-schooling them or sending them to private schools.
And meanwhile liberals are pushing an immigration bill that will generate more competition for the low-paid workers.
Now we hear that President Obama is going to do a big push on climate change, starting with regulations to retire coal-fired electric plants. Golly gee, I wonder what effect that will have. I guess it will create lots of jobs for young women with degrees in environmental science, but not much for the low-paid worker that needs cheap energy to create jobs.
For conservatives, "these are the times that try men's souls." Everything that we know and feel tells us that the nation is being propelled to disaster by a cruel and unjust ruling class. Subsidy is piled on subsidy, administrative folly on folly, the government bureaucracy is swung into action to intimidate the ruling party's opponents. The divisive words of election campaigns are extended into the "permanent campaign."
We know that at the end of the Obama era is not just a change of administration but something far more daunting. The future prosperity of America will only begin when the twentysomethings of Portland, Oregon get a life. When the folks that gave up in the Great Recession and got themselves on Social Security Disability get back in the game. When the folks gaming the welfare system get a job. When the single mother gets a husband. When the green energy cronies get into an honest business. When the education system gets a Hercules. When people start to pay for their own health care. When people save for their own retirement.
But the fact is that under the rule of the liberal ruling class every one of these sensible, practical ideas, in which people direct their lives towards responsibility and service, has been shredded to pieces. The fact is that as the money runs out tens of millions of folks are going to be consumed with rage, starting with the twentysomethings in Portland. Just like the folks in Brazil and Egypt. And they'll probably blame the insurance companies and the bankers, and whoever else the liberals set up as a scapegoat.
There's a piece of Wile E. Coyote in every politician. He fearlessly chases after some Roadrunner, confident in the knowledge that he'll catch the little feller around the next bend.
Problem is, when the politician rams into a rock wall or runs off the edge of a western mesa, it's not the politician that ends up in red ruin. It is the political supporters that suddenly find their free stuff snatched away, forever.
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