The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

What’s the Matter with Kansas Massachusetts?

Posted on | February 3, 2010 | 15 Comments

From the BBC, of all places:

The Republicans’ shock victory in the election for the US Senate seat in Massachusetts meant the Democrats lost their supermajority in the Senate. This makes it even harder for the Obama administration to get healthcare reform passed in the US.
Political scientist Dr David Runciman gives his view on why there is often such deep opposition to reforms that appear to be of obvious benefit to voters. . . .

Dr. Runciman, of course, gets around to citing Thomas “What’s the Matter with Kansas” Frank, but not before he gets to this misleading statistic:

In Texas, where barely two-thirds of the population have full health insurance and over a fifth of all children have no cover at all, opposition to the legislation is currently running at 87%.

Dr. Runciman is a political scientist and not an economist, and thus does not connect this fact with another fact, namely that Texas has a stronger economy than states dominated by liberalism. Furthermore, many of those uninsured in Texas are illegal immigrants and their children who (a) would be covered under ObamaCare, but (b) are ineligible to vote.

It evidently does not occur to Dr. Runciman that people — even very poor people — might have moral objections to redistributionist policies, which ObamaCare most certainly would be. Dr. Runciman (and others like him) can’t conceive that people take pride in earning their own wages and paying their own bills, and thus resent the smug insinuation that they can’t get by without government giveaways.

Rather than consulting the professoriate, perhaps the BBC should have asked me to explain this, as I did at the time of the TARP bailout:

Some years ago, I was asked to speak to a Christian homeschooling conference — my wife and I have homeschooled our six children — and during the question-and-answer session after the speech, I faced a question for which I was unprepared.
“How has your Christian faith influenced your political beliefs?”
This stunned me into silence for a second. Then I answered: “Well, I guess it comes down to that part about ‘Thou shalt not steal.'”
From there I proceeded to discuss the basic immorality of the welfare state, how it is wrong for government to take money that one man has worked for and give it to someone who hasn’t earned it.
Whereas transactions in a market economy are voluntary and peaceful, the actions of government are essentially coercive, backed with the threat of violence to those who disobey. What government does, it does “at the point of the bayonet,” so to speak. Therefore, the fearsome power of government ought to be constrained to limited and specific purposes — defending the life, liberty and property of citizens.
When government begins to meddle in the economy, picking winners and losers, using appropriations and fiscal policy to transfer money from one group of citizens to another, it divides society into two classes, taxpayers and tax consumers, punishing the former in order to reward the latter.
Such a policy is not merely misguided, it is immoral — indeed, it is sinful, as I told the Christian homeschoolers — and by displaying the spectacle of government engaging daily in legalized theft, the welfare state tends to corrupt the morals of its citizens.

Academics love to offer us nuanced theories of politics that flatter their own presumptions of superior wisdom. Yet the truth may be far simpler than the “experts” believe. What part of “Thou shalt not steal” is so hard to understand?

Category: Economics, Massachusetts

Comments

15 Responses to “What’s the Matter with Kansas Massachusetts?”

  1. dicentra
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 5:28 pm

    “It evidently does not occur to Dr. Runciman that people — even very poor people — might have moral objections to redistributionist policies”

    You filthy redneck. If it’s going to directly benefit you financially, who are you to object to how it’s done?

    If I mug some rich guy in the street and give you his Rolex, what’s the beef?

    Ingrate. Filthy, filthy ingrate.

  2. dicentra
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 12:28 pm

    “It evidently does not occur to Dr. Runciman that people — even very poor people — might have moral objections to redistributionist policies”

    You filthy redneck. If it’s going to directly benefit you financially, who are you to object to how it’s done?

    If I mug some rich guy in the street and give you his Rolex, what’s the beef?

    Ingrate. Filthy, filthy ingrate.

  3. Chuck Cross
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 6:05 pm

    Pointing out the gun (or bayonet) in the room.

    It needs to happen more often.

  4. Chuck Cross
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 1:05 pm

    Pointing out the gun (or bayonet) in the room.

    It needs to happen more often.

  5. WestWright
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 8:16 pm

    ficentra….Filthy, filthy ingrate. Wow, Stacy you have attracted an admirer.

  6. WestWright
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 3:16 pm

    ficentra….Filthy, filthy ingrate. Wow, Stacy you have attracted an admirer.

  7. Where’s That Groundhog When You Need Him « Obi’s Sister
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 3:44 pm

    […] he should go back to basics and listen to a wise man, What part of “Thou shalt not steal” is so hard to […]

  8. Where’s That Groundhog When You Need Him - Obis_Sister’s blog - RedState
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 3:51 pm

    […] he should go back to basics and listen to a wise man, What part of “Thou shalt not steal” is so hard to […]

  9. dicentra
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 9:05 pm

    WestWright:

    It’s the speedo photo. Can’t get it out of my head.

  10. dicentra
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 4:05 pm

    WestWright:

    It’s the speedo photo. Can’t get it out of my head.

  11. Roxeanne de Luca
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 9:15 pm

    It evidently does not occur to Dr. Runciman that people — even very poor people — might have moral objections to redistributionist policies,

    We also might have principled objections to those policies: although poor (or struggling) now, we want to get to the point at which we can be wealthy, or at least comfortable. We’re willing to sacrifice government hand-outs now so that we don’t have to pay for them later – in the form of fewer job opportunities, and, if we happen to do well in our careers, higher taxes on our earnings.

    Taking from one and giving to another is, at best, a zero-sum game (although I would posit that there is a fair amount of entropy, if you will, in the system: a dollar taken from one person results in less than a dollar given to others); however, a capitalist society increases the wealth and standard of living of all of its citizens.

  12. Roxeanne de Luca
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 4:15 pm

    It evidently does not occur to Dr. Runciman that people — even very poor people — might have moral objections to redistributionist policies,

    We also might have principled objections to those policies: although poor (or struggling) now, we want to get to the point at which we can be wealthy, or at least comfortable. We’re willing to sacrifice government hand-outs now so that we don’t have to pay for them later – in the form of fewer job opportunities, and, if we happen to do well in our careers, higher taxes on our earnings.

    Taking from one and giving to another is, at best, a zero-sum game (although I would posit that there is a fair amount of entropy, if you will, in the system: a dollar taken from one person results in less than a dollar given to others); however, a capitalist society increases the wealth and standard of living of all of its citizens.

  13. S. Wolf
    February 4th, 2010 @ 4:45 am

    It’s better to teach a man how to fish than to give him a fish caught by someone else… poor folk understand that and most refuse handouts from government.

  14. S. Wolf
    February 3rd, 2010 @ 11:45 pm

    It’s better to teach a man how to fish than to give him a fish caught by someone else… poor folk understand that and most refuse handouts from government.

  15. What’s the Matter with Canada? « Scotch Pundit
    February 4th, 2010 @ 1:30 am

    […] It evidently does not occur to Dr. Runciman that people — even very poor people — might have moral objections to redistributionist policies, which ObamaCare most certainly would be. Dr. Runciman (and others like him) can’t conceive that people take pride in earning their own wages and paying their own bills, and thus resent the smug insinuation that they can’t get by without government giveaways. TheOtherMcCain […]