Who’s your Daddy?

This month’s general election brought huge losses for the so-called “moderates. Recently, Governor Edgar tried to explain this debacle by saying, “We’ve got to move to the left; that’s where the Democrats are and they keep winning.” These “moderates” just want to get into politically powerful positions and take care of themselves.

In the meantime, the Libertarians have this idea that a world-wide economy is the way to go, and they don’t want to fool around with the social issues like Right-to-Life, marriage, family, morality or homosexuals. None of that stuff plays into their theme at all. But in fact, this makes them only half a party. With regard to economics, their view is very good; the financial freedoms they advocate have unleashed a much better functioning market economy. But what Libertarian philosophy misses is that a whole lot of the spending done by our government is on the social things, whether its welfare or health or education. They are focusing on the economic stuff but neglect the big spending engine that is driven by all the social stuff.

Then we’ve got the so-called Conservatives who really have a broadband view of all of this. It includes businessmen who are very interested in the mathematics of the economy, many of them are libertarians to a degree. But conservatives also share strong views about the importance of social institutions such as marriage, the family, and the fact that the family has been our culture’s foundational institution for generations.

Now you’ve got this whole bunch, largely in the Democrat Party but also these imitators in the Republican Party, that are pushing for the government to become “your daddy” through such programs as universal health care, and mandatory pre-school and socialized prescription medicine. Well lots of luck with that one. That reminds me of the familiar quotation: “I’m from the Federal government and I’m here to help you.”

If the government- Federal, state, or township- is your new daddy, you’ve got a real problem. Now you’re going to be the kid and he’s going to run you. You’re looking at a socialistic economy with your freedom out the window and the government using its taxing authority to take your money away.

Running any thing from the top, as proven by the collapse of Socialism and a number of Communist governments, is doomed to fail because it ignores the bridge between economics and social values. You have to take both these factors into account. Conservatives are the only ones that seem to have an integrated philosophy that handles all of that.

The Republican Party is supposed to be based on such a complete philosophy. But until it gets back to those concepts that encompass both the economy and decent social structures, it isn’t going to work very well.

These “moderates” that just got defeated in the general election took the whole nation down the path of defeat with their clever brand of political expediency. Karl Rove is really the ultimate “moderate,” a modern-day Rasputin to our President. He outsmarted himself by forsaking sound political principle and going with an ill-founded strategy. Here in Illinois, we have his buddy “Big Bob” Kjellander as well as the “Gay Brigade” which occupies so many positions of influence within the state party and within Hastert’s congressional office. They are carrying us down a road that doesn’t give any recognition at all to the importance of social institutions. You don’t have to be an “extremist” to recognize the fact that the family and social programs are driving a big expensive financial engine that is taxing our prosperity away from us.

Lots of luck with “Big Brother,” the old name for “Who’s your Daddy.”

We better make sure we continue the cleanout of our state and our national government and get rid of these moderates that don’t have the sense to see the whole dimensions of the social and financial problems and how each of these two factors influences the other.