The Antiplanner | Dedicated to the sunset of government planning Fascists will always out. More below the fold. "America needs less democracy to avoid tyranny, says Andrew Sullivan in New York magazine. America “suffers from too much democracy,” agrees Richard Cohen in the Washington Post.
Anyone who supports Donald Trump is a traitor, writes Charles Pierce in Esquire. James Traub in Foreign Policy calls Trump and Brexit supporters “ignorance masses” and says it’s time for the “elites to rise up” against them, or at least to “un-delude them,” perhaps in re-education camps." Hatred of liberty, and republicanism (not actually democracy) are always all the rage among progressives. It is essentially what they are all about, less liberty, and more authority (in their hands). But these people are exactly the people you can never allow to have power. They will certainly abuse power. Without exception the individual these trolls hate are the one we should like, and not seeing Hillary Clinton's name in the pantheon, it is clear they want her. Again making it obvious that she is an unacceptable candidate. "The Antiplanner is as disturbed as anyone else about our two apparent presidential nominees, who seem to be incapable of telling the truth among many other flaws. But the election of Donald Trump won’t lead to tyranny. Not even the election of Hillary Clinton will lead to tyranny. America just has too many checks and balances designed to prevent such a thing." Agreed. "These people are totally out of touch with the realities faced by the other 70 percent. How many people with college educations number among their real friends someone who is working class? How many even talk with working class people other than restaurant servers, retail clerks, and similar workers? How many understand that the policies that benefit the college-educated upper-middle-class often harm the working class? How many realize that the anger among working-class Trump supporters is not a symptom of racism but of resentment towards an economy designed for the elite and that creates enormous obstacles for everyone else? Certainly not those who are advocating for less democracy or claiming that everyone else is deluded or a traitor. If anyone is a threat to American values, it is those who believe in less democracy whenever the majority disagrees with them." And it does not stop here it extends round the world. Adam Smith vs. The Brexit | The American Spectator Ben Stein has a point here. "This is the story of the UK right now. The exit of the world’s fifth-largest economy from a tariff union is interesting. But it’s nothing compared with the crises that this incredibly brilliant nation has beaten. To think that the birthplace of modern self-government would be defeated by the exit from the EU is almost ridiculous. No great nation has ever been beaten down by changes in tariffs and the nation of Churchill and the Spitfire will not be the first. The idea that it’s going to affect the USA is even more ridiculous. The USA GDP is over 18 trillion dollars. Our trade with the UK is less than three-tenths of 1 percent of that. This current panic about the Brexit is like worrying that your watch is one minute slow over a week. There’s a lot to worry about for each of us each day. Britain entertaining its historic right to control its destiny is not one of them. As Ferris Bueller said 30 years ago, “I’m not European and I don’t plan to be European.” Neither do you. Next." Brexit is merely a speed bump on the road back to independence for Britain. Europe needs Britain more than Britain needs Europe. And Germany really needs Britain to maintain its economy. The Southern EU nations are not going to begin strongly buying from Germany. No nation in deep recession/depression can do so. The entire silly EU experiment depends upon Britain continuing low tariff levels for EU goods. Brexit Democracy | The American Spectator Again Ben Stein makes good points. "First, the media are roaring about Britain leaving the EU as if it were a coup by a group of thieves who broke into Westminster at 2 in the morning and stole the UK. They’re talking about it as if it were a crime of some kind. But very far from it. There was a democratic referendum on the issue. There has been months of campaigning out in the open. The newspapers, TV, and Internet of the UK were filled with little else. The people of the UK voted for the Brexit. They didn’t have the EU stolen from them. This Exit was what the voters wanted. That anger we are now seeing in the press is usually the way the U.S. media handles any election that goes the opposite way from what the media wants. So it is with the Brexit. If it goes against the wishes of the beautiful people, it has to be a sin of some kind. But it isn’t. It’s called democracy." The buttplug brigade of journalists, and assorted fancy pants are nonplussed by the fact that the average Brit would rather have British sovereignty than ready access to Italian espresso. Go figure. Watching these thumb sucking sissies throw conniption fits is wonderfully cathartic, and entertaining! "Second, the discussions about the economic fallout from the Brexit seem to assume that the UK will somehow vanish off the earth and become set in some kind of orbit around the earth too far away to do anything meaningful on earth. Far from it. Britain will still be one of the most powerful economies in the world. Whatever Britain exported before, it can still export. The EU will not put up a punitive wall against UK exports for two big reasons: They need the cars and the woolens and whatever else they have been buying, and they’ll still need them in a month or in six months; second, Italy and France and Spain will not want to put up high tariffs against the UK because they don’t want the UK putting up high tariffs against them. That’s why we got the bloc in the first place and it’s why Europe and the world generally will remain a low tariff environment." Mon Deiu! A rational argument in the Brexit debate. A bit of a nice respite from the breathlessly apocalyptic, woolly headed nonsense I usually have to endure. Many forget what progressivism is, and what its goals are, both are antithetical to liberty, and the rule of law. "Many people are concerned about Donald Trump’s commitment to the rule of law, a concern I share. But the other choice in this election is a Progressive one, and Progressivism by its nature lacks that commitment. Moreover, its history shows that it permanently damages the constitutional foundations of the United States. And the United States suffers from the fevers of progressivism more than any time since the 1960s. Thus, this election pits a candidate lawless by virtue of temperament against one lawless by virtue of ideology and emboldened by the spirit of the times. The rule of law is under threat, whoever wins. Progressivism has proved a greater long-term danger than any single individual, because it is born in part out of systematic rather than personal hostility to the Constitution. Federalism and separation of powers are obstacles to the social engineering at the heart of progressivism, and thus progressivism has tried to eviscerate these restraints. Packed with FDR appointees in the 1930s, the Supreme Court gutted the enumerated powers. The administrative state has eroded the separation of powers, making the executive ever more powerful in domestic affairs. The theory used to justify these departures from the original constitution, living constitutionalism, is itself a threat to the rule of law, because it devalues the formal rules laid down by the Constitution." Progressivism Is a Long-Term Threat to the Rule of Law - Online Library of Law & Liberty What could go wrong? "And today we see all across a society a renewed progressive disdain for the rule of law. President Obama has acted lawlessly again and again to advance its signature program of social engineering– Obamacare. Take two recent examples. In response to a complaint by the House of Representatives, a federal judge stated that the President was funding Obamacare insurers without an appropriation from Congress. While there are serious arguments that the House lacks standing to bring this suit, there are no plausible defenses of the substantive merits of the spending. Obama’s administration was flouting the law in hope that there would be no remedy. His administration also by regulation purported “to amend” the Affordable Care Act to eliminate fixed indemnity insurance as an option to satisfy the obligation to purchase insurance coverage. The District of Columbia Circuit recently held that the administration had no authority to go against the plain language of the statute which specifically permitted these plans. To be sure, most Presidents have on occasion tried to exploit gray areas of the law. But these actions are plain violations. The only real defense is a familiar progressive one: the end justifies the means." Well, other than losing our republic?!!! Here is an article discussing some of the other things we could lose, which unsurprisingly includes our humanity. Progressivism is an evil, which attempts to recreate the essential form of feudal serfdom in the industrial economy. Oh, and if you don't know who they intend to make the serf, it is always you. Keynes Favored Eugenics, Migration Restrictions, and Population Control | Phillip Magness The final frontier is always creating regulations which turn free people into serfs, not actual slaves owned by the state, but serfs which can only survive at the states largess. A difference so tiny it is microscopic. The people who believe this pap do not deserve our respect. They will do anything to convert you from freeman to serf, and will do so with relish. Then in retrospect will fall upon Martin Niemöller Lament: "First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out-- Because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out-- Because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out-- Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me." They are little more than foolish simpletons who would exchange their liberty for serfdom for the most ephemeral of reasons. Be bothered not by these scolds, these verbal ruffians, these fascists. Thanks to Don Boudreaux for the last few links: Some Links - Cafe Hayek
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