Silence Dogood Wire

In an unsurprising turn of events, the U.S. foreign policy establishment has found it necessary to spend more blood and treasure in the defense of Afghanistan.

 After the Biden administration facilitated a precipitous troop withdrawal from the region, the situation deteriorated rapidly, forcing the Pentagon to announce that it will send an additional 3,000 troops back into Afghanistan in order to evacuate U.S. citizens and Afghan interpreters from Kabul.

The move was no shocker given that the Taliban are a major threat in the region that refuses to compromise with a moderate government.

 In his book Battlegrounds former general H.R. McMaster critiqued the supreme naivete of those who want to make peace with the Taliban. He sarcastically asked whether a peace deal would only allow the Taliban to bulldoze girls’ schools every other week. The fact of the matter is that no peace deal can legitimize or civilize the Taliban

The new troop deployment is supposedly being sent exclusively for evacuation measures but it is quite clear that this will not be the case for long. Part of the rationale for troop withdrawal in the first place was the assumption that the Taliban would not be able to rapidly gain control. A month ago, Biden claimed that “the likelihood there’s going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely.” 

Despite this, the AP reported that the Taliban has captured “12 of Afghanistan’s 34 provincial capitals as part of a weeklong sweep that has given them effective control of about two-thirds of the country.”

The White House is also sending conflicting messages. State Department Spokesman Ned Price stated that “This is not abandonment. This is not an evacuation. This is not a wholesale withdrawal. What this is is a reduction in the size of our civilian footprint.” This, despite the fact that President Biden has been adamantly in favor of an end to the mission in Afghanistan.

It seems that those in power are realizing an age old cliche; you can’t have your cake and eat it too. 

When fighting a group as savage and powerful as the Taliban, producing a lasting and successful peace necessitates the obliteration of the enemy. 

Artificial cease fires merely prolong the conflict and allow the enemy to regain control. The world-renowned military strategist Edward Luttwak argues that UN imposed ceasefires are ineffective and merely intensify wars when the incentives for war remain in place. In his book Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace– which is required reading at U.S. military institutions- Luttwak writes that 

Unless further diplomatic interventions directly ensue to impose peace negotiations as well, cease-fires merely relieve war-induced exhaustion, favoring the reconstitution and rearming of the belligerents, thus intensifying and prolonging the fighting once the cease-fire comes to an end. That was true of the Arab-Isreali war of 1948-49 which might have ended in a number of weeks by sheer exhaustion, if two successive ceas-fires  ordained by the UN Security Council  had not allowed the belligerents to recuperate till they were ready to resume fighting.

This is certainly the case in Afghanistan where a weakened Taliban was allowed to recuperate after American morale was weakened.

The Biden administration must be forced to make a choice. Either it must make the decision to withdraw and deal with the fallout or it must choose to pursue an effective military strategy to eliminate the threat. Both entail serious costs but it beats the alternative of allowing a wound to fester while remaining in the region for another twenty years.

On July 31 Simone Biles announced that she would withdraw from the final floor competition at the Tokyo Olympics. USA Gymnastics tweeted out that “Simone has withdrawn from the event final for floor and will make a decision on beam later this week.” Biles also claimed that she was suffering from the “twisties” and that it was dangerous for her to compete. Celebrities were quick to support and even celebrate her decision. Biles stated that both Michael Phelps and Oprah Winfrey reached out to her.

Now perhaps competing was dangerous. Most of us are not gymnasts and will never know what a professional gymnast goes through. Maybe, dropping out was the right decision for her.

However, all of the hubbub around her decision serves to distract from an important fact; Simone Biles failed. She failed herself, she failed her team, and she failed her country. And she should feel bad. 

Saying this is not cruel or a license for internet trolls to berate her. It is merely a recognition that what she was striving for was valuable and she did not perform up to her full potential. If what she did was not failure, then why be a gymnast in the first place? If it is so pointless that quitting because of your mental health is celebrated more than winning gold, then what is the point? 

Saying that something is a fail does not automatically make someone a failure. What makes people into failures is telling them that their fails are completely excusable and even worthy of celebration. The concept of failure is valuable because it lets you know that you didn’t perform in a manner consistent with greatness and allows you to change your conduct accordingly.

The fact that people are slobbering over Biles more than the members of USA Gymnastics who won gold such as Suni Lee, illustrates how our society is attempting to eliminate the entire concept of failure.

This is mainly a trend driven by the left and is reflected in the fat positivity movement currently sweeping our country. As with many self-indulgent movements, the Fat Acceptance Movement began in the 60s in order to eliminate bias against fat people and make them feel comfortable with themselves. Now that the movement has become mainstream woke companies like Athleta are bowing to its dictates by dropping trim models and manikins for obese ones in oversized clothing. 

This would be a good idea if the message was “you are overweight and we have made workout clothes for you so that you can go to the gym and get your life together.” However, the message is completely the opposite. In January Athleta announced that it would be training its employees on body positivity language. It seems that Athleta and other woke institutions have forgotten that not being a jerk is different from celebrating an unhealthy trend in society. 

The end goal of the people who attempt to eliminate the concept of failure is to destroy our sense of telos. Telos is a Greek concept developed by Aristotle, positing that things are inherently meant for an ultimate end. In America, the end of humanity is commonly thought of as virtue, strength, courage, faith, and meaning. By eliminating the concept of failure and ushering in an era of unmitigated self-esteem the radicals are destroying the ability of people to improve themselves and lead a good life. This is certainly not compassionate. Failure hurts, but it hurts for a reason. Telling people that everything is ok when they fail is a lie that prevents them from overcoming obstacles in order to better themselves.

Rebels serves many purposes. After all, our first president was a rebel. Rebels can bring about freedom and justice. They do so by adhering to the virtues of courage and humility towards the elders that brought them into existence. 

However, rebellion can also be destructive. “Rebels without a cause” do not rebel in order to promote justice and truth. They rebel because they instinctively dislike their society. Perhaps they will find themselves fighting against something truly awful as the radicals of the 60s found themselves coincidentally fighting with Civil Rights leaders. But fighting against something bad does not necessarily make you a good person. Perhaps you are just as destructive as the evil person you passionately hate. To this day both the communists and the fascists hate each other. I think that every sane person can agree that neither of these groups is desirable.

Throughout history, rebellion in teenage boys and young adults has served a very distinct purpose; it has turned them into men. Benjamin Franklin was a rebel. As a young man he escaped the service of his brother and travelled to Pennsylvania to find work. He then created a calendar of virtues to practice living a good life and established a printing business that allowed him to retire at the young age of forty. John Brown and Harriet Tubman were also rebels who fought against the injustice of slavery with a dedication to scripture. During WWII young boys were rebels. They would lie about their age to fight for their country.

Bucking the system to pursue virtue in accordance with faith, reason, courage, and a respect for the ancestors who made your life possible is admirable. In our decadent age, however, rebellion has taken quite a different turn. It has taken the form of binge-drinking, bogus gender identification, and incessant whining. Rather than turning people into men, modern rebellion has turned teenagers and young adults into perpetual children, shunning discipline and respect in favor of social media pontificating and a disdain for standards. This is echoed in the incessant demand for the god of tolerance to reign supreme in the public square. Unlike the tolerance of John Locke, the new tolerance is hateful, seeking to destroy anyone who believes in standards. The new standard is standardlesseness.

Perhaps the new rebellion is the cause of the high divorce rates in our society. The thrill seekers can never be content with a marriage which has lost its youthful passion. Instead they must seek out new passion for the sake of their  happiness. What about the happiness of their children? What about the happiness of their spouse? What about the happiness of society? What about the happiness of God? The indulgence of the new rebels causes many to disregard these questions.

The old rebellion was sacrificial and manly. It was not rebellion to incessantly indulge yourself in pleasure. Certainly it entailed mistakes and even vice, but in the past, rebelling also meant that you had a vision. To pursue a vision takes discipline. “Rebels without a cause” are not admirable. They are lost and visionless. They attach themselves to grievances without proper evaluation. They seek to break taboos for the mere sake of breaking taboos. 

In the end, the new rebellion brings about the death of man by making him weak and over-indulgent.

In the fight against critical race theory those who still possess common-sense common sense often invoke the apolitical classroom. “Wouldn’t it be nice,” they say “if we could go back to a time before political correctness?” Perhaps it is this “apolitical” classroom that has led us to this mass delusion in the first place. 

 In a public school system bereft of any other goal than “tolerance” or some other lovely phrase, special interest groups and unions will rush to fill the void. After all, a society must have standards and if those standards are not implemented by curriculum, then they will be implemented by somebody else.

 Though well meaning, people who repeat the common refrain for public schools don’t entirely understand the nature of education. A curriculum is by nature political, it leaves out some facts in favor of others and presents some material at the expense of others. It is a political decision to teach that capitalism lifted people out of poverty and communism killed 100 million people.

When individuals call for an apolitical classroom they are merely expressing a desire to return to a time when we could agree politically on what to teach. What this led to was a shoddy educational system which left students devoid of any real philosophy. They were then turned over to a university system which disregarded American values and sought to undermine the Culture and governing institutions of this country.

It is an insult to the idea of education that Aristotle, Plato, Burke, Locke, and Smith, are not taught within the school system. You certainly can’t count on universities to offer a balanced teaching of these monumental figures. Many are doing away with Western Civilization courses.

The left realizes that many have blinded themselves to the nature of education. Therefore, they have politicized everything from Homer to Shakespeare in an attempt to uproot intelligent curriculum while appealing to the sensibilities of the “apoliticals.” Even something as basic as biology must be destroyed by gender theorists in the name of diversity and inclusion.

In the words of G.K. Chesterton “Tolerance is the virtue of those who believe nothing.” We should not tolerate those who attempt to force evil and absurd views upon students. 

Charter schools have always been a first choice for conservatives and libertarians. Unlike our opponents we desire freedom and choice. However, if leftists and former liberals continue to refuse parents the right to choose education for their children, conservatives must start developing their own curriculum that focuses on personal virtue, a respect for our heroic ancestors, and the classic literature and philosophy that has built our society. One must choose a side. The Apolitical classroom was always an illusion and now it is dead.

Why is the West so tolerant? In China you can be imprisoned and tortured for being a Muslim. In Muslim countries you can be imprisoned and tortured for being an infidel. Western Civilization is more tolerant than any other civilization on earth. Many would attribute this tolerance to the destruction of strict social standards. If social standards forbid certain action, then society must be more tolerant when it destroys them… or so the logic goes.

But if this is true, then why are college campuses some of the most intolerant places in the United States. At UC Berkeley you can literally be whatever you want, yet when a conservative speaker comes to town the campus erupts into a show of violence and destruction. What was once a supposed haven of free speech has now become a depressing hellscape.

In his new book Speechless Michael Knowles correctly points out that there is no such thing as pure tolerance. A society must have standards. After all, the idea that there are no standards is itself a standard. Therefore, anyone who promotes a standard, such as the immorality of killing babies, cannot exist in this standardless system. In this light, it makes perfect sense that an Orthodox Jew such as Ben Shaprio, who holds himself to a high moral standard, would spark riots on college campuses. 

Right now conservatives are the most tolerant people in the United States. They don’t burn down cities and not a single mainstream individual supported the storming of the Capitol. And yet conservatives generally hold themselves to higher moral standards than liberals.

Despite the ire that is directed at them from the left, traditional standards are the epitome of tolerance. They create societal stability and meaning by promoting virtue and suppressing vice. This suppression of vice is not intolerant because vice is itself intolerant. A tolerant society can treat vice with nothing other than disdain, otherwise it allows the standardless intolerance of vice to take hold.

If a society is to promote virtue through a dedication to God, family, spouse, and country it is necessarily intolerant to some degree. Although they should not be considered criminals, those who do not believe in these great principles should not be given a share in entertainment, the education of youth, or the media. 

If social standards are necessary in society, then the West is tolerant because of its standards, not in spite of them. By inculcating strict religious virtue in individuals the West was able to promote tolerance by overcoming the disrespect for human life which characterizes barbarian societies. Today it staves off the return of the intolerant heathenism which exhibits hatred towards anyone who attempts to promote any moral standards.

Self-government requires taking responsibility for yourself and others. Taking responsibility requires self-regulation. Self-regulation requires moral standards. Moral standards require intolerance towards some ways of acting in the world. The West is free because of self government which must be preceded by strict moral standards. In the words of John Adams “We have no Government armed with Power capable of contending with human Passions unbridled by morality and Religion. Avarice, Ambition, and, Revenge or Gallantry, would break the strongest Cords of our Constitution as a Whale goes through a Net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” There must be standards. Either we have no standards and become slaves to government or we accept standards and embrace the true freedom of overcoming wickedness.

Perhaps nothing has been scorned more in modern times than faith. It has been derided by Enlightenment philosophers from Rousseau to Voltaire and intellectuals have sympathized with Marx’s claim that it is the opium of the masses. To them faith is nothing more than the superstitious consumption of bread and adherence to pointless cultural taboos. This is no doubt a supreme caricature that could only be created by intellectuals who can’t help but revel in the powers of their considerable, though limited, intelligence. What they fail to recognize is that man cannot live without faith.

So what is faith? As much as it is derided by modern philosophers, the ancient Greeks thought it was essential. In the words of New York Post editor Sohrab Ahmari, they believed that “there must be some unchangeable being in whose absolute being all others participate (Plato), or some unchanged cause that is the ultimate cause of all other change (Aristotle).” Aristotle and Plato believed that in this “system of the supreme being” individuals would work to achieve virtue. They would do this by achieving their purpose (telos) in the world.

Christianity provided the necessary framework in which people could work to achieve their purpose through the use of their reason. It supplied the Greek philosophers with an answer to their question of who was the supreme being in the universe. The Jews and Christians believed that it was a benevolent and loving God who made man in his divine image.

 Of course it required faith to accept it. The Bible was the product of revelation, not reason and was thereby able to supply the deficiencies of human reason. This is the pure view of faith; submitting to a universal moral code that allows you to use your reason in order to fulfill your purpose in the world.

However, as I said before, man cannot live without faith. Therefore, the attempts of philosophers to get rid of faith has led to the spread of a new and perverse form of faith with no resemblance to Judeo-Christian morals. This faith relies on the idea that there is no objective truth in the universe. Rather it is nothing but a social construct. 

Those who make such a claim have one problem. If there is no objective truth, how can your statement that there is no objective truth be objectively true? Therefore proponents of nihilism must have faith. They must have the faith that nothing is certain except uncertainty.

The new generation is the byproduct of the perverse faith encroaching on the true faith. Men of science attempt to stave off nihilism by positing that scientific fact is the ultimate truth. Science popularizers such as Neil Degrasse Tyson love to repeat the poetic line that “we are stardust.” This merely masks the fact that science has no inherent morality. It cannot tell us how to act. Only knowledge within a moral framework can guide our actions.

In addition to this, young people shun church service and engage in pseudo-holy rituals such as yoga and meditation. None of these new personal paths to spirituality can fulfill the void which Christianity was meant to fulfill. They impose no moral code or guiding light. They merely stave off the inevitable realization that you believe in nothing. In the end one must choose. Either you have faith in an objective moral code which allows you to fulfill your telos or you have faith in meaninglessness and succumb to the pit of despair and death.

As with so much of our modern thinking, we are influenced by what Karl Marx called “The tradition of all the dead generations [which] weighs like a nightmare on the brain of the living.” Marx bemoaned the fact that so much of our thinking was influenced by past actors, which prevented radical change. Fortunately, the influence that weighs upon us provides us with more help than hindrance. It is a rich Greco-Roman tradition which has graced us with literature, philosophy, and governmental institutions. Therefore, in order to determine what justice is, it is important to look upon this tradition for wisdom and guidance.

In his sixth-century Institutes, the famous Emperor Justinian codified into Roman law our modern conception of justice. He defined it as “the constant and perpetual will to render each his due.” He believed that it was justice to give a man what he was owed. This definition was also consistent with Plato who defined justice in The Republic as, “doing one’s own work and not meddling with what isn’t one’s own.” Plato believed that in order for a man to be just he had to fulfill his station in life. 

According to these two definitions it is just for a man to fulfill his station in life while giving each man what he is due. In this view, justice does not seem to require any material equality. After all, each man or woman has their own destiny to fulfill. Additionally, each person is due a different amount. It would be absurd to say that Titan of Industry J.D. Rockefeller was owed the same as a man who worked on the assembly line of a Ford factory. If this was distorted, it would actually be contrary to principles of justice. Each is given what he is owed based on his specific skill set, which is consistent with a Justinian conception of justice.

Therefore, material equality is not justice. Our Founding Fathers realized this. That is why they never tried to enforce material equality. Instead, they attempted to establish a respect for equal rights. In the Declaration of Independence Thomas Jefferson stated, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with Certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” In the eyes of our Founders, the whole purpose of government was to protect these natural rights. 

Because the Founders believed that these natural rights were a gift from God, they must have also thought that it was unjust to discriminate against people based upon arbitrary characteristics. This fundamental proposition established the principle of equality under the law, also known as the rule of law, which is the fundamental tenet of American equality. Thus, courts were set up to ensure that justice would be done. In the Federalist No. 78 Alexander Hamilton claimed, “the courts were designed to be an intermediate body between the people and the legislature, in order, among other things, to keep the latter within the limits of its assigned authority.” Therefore, the judiciary was designed to respect the natural equality of mankind by preserving the natural rights that each individual is due.

Unfortunately, America would fall far short of this goal with such evils as slavery and Jim Crow segregation. However, famous abolitionists such as Frederick Douglass would call upon America to recognize its creed of equality and justice. In his fight for equality under the law, Martin Luther King Jr. proclaimed, “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.’” King and other great civil rights leaders harked back to our original notions of justice and equality. They believed that it is just for the government to treat people equally, because God has given everyone natural rights and natural value.

In the end, justice and equality are not bound to be at odds with one another. They are innately intertwined. Justice does not lie in material equality. It lies in giving each man what he is due. Given that each man is endowed by his Creator with innate value, it is just for the government to treat us equally before the law. It is also just that the government should constantly seek to honor our natural rights. This is our Founding creed and it has inspired countless heroes in their relentless pursuit of freedom, justice, and equality before the law.

Around three weeks ago, the only democratic country in the Middle East was bombarded with rockets by terrorist thugs in Gaza. The radical Palestinian group, Hamas, targeted innocent civilians for extermination in a fierce rocket barrage. Meanwhile Iranian leader Ayatollah Khameini cheered and urged all Muslim nations to support the terrorists, “with military development, with financial developments.” The Israeli Defense Force responded with airstrikes targeting Hamas’ military operations. 

In this situation it should not be difficult to determine who is in the right and who is in the wrong. After all, Israel is a multiethnic state whose citizens live under the rule of law. In Israel you can be a minority, a member of the LGBT community, or a Palestinian and have the right to fully participate in society. This is certainly not the case in any other Middle Eastern country.

However, politicians and pundits in the United States have had a very difficult time taking a morally sound position on the conflict. The Washington Post ran an emotional headline titled, “Israel killed 14 of his family members in Gaza. Now he fears he will lose his wife too.” There was no mention of Israeli casualties. Members of our media seem to think that it is more immoral to unintentionally kill civilians in an attack on terrorists than it is for terrorists to place civilian-targeting weapons in civilian areas.

The moral equivalency that is drawn between Israel and supporters of Palestine is ill-informed and ideological. Those who call attention to the supposed evils of Israel fail to mention that the state has one of the most moral militaries in the entire world. The IDF often forces its soldiers to use non lethal rounds or shoot at the enemy’s legs in potentially deadly situations in order to avoid civilian casualties. Additionally, known terrorist outposts are often shot with non-explosive tank rounds in case civilians are also occupying the building. All of this is extraordinarily generous given the danger in which IDF soldiers are in and the fact that the Palestinian population has consistently supported terrorism against Israeli civilians. Over 50 percent of the population of Gaza where the recent strikes occurred support a return to armed struggle.

Additionally, support for violence is not just reserved to terrorist scum. The Palestinian Authority has enacted a Pay-For-Slay program that rewards the families of terrorist “martyrs” with generous financial compensation. The program has currently paid out hundreds of millions of dollars to the families of convicted terrorists. In 2017 a bipartisan bill was passed to financially cut off the PA until payments to this vile program were suspended. However, the Biden-Harris administration has pledged to reopen aid to Palestinians even though terrorism has continued. The administration is also urging moderation on the part of Israel at a time when violence against Israeli citizens has been increasing. It doesn’t take a degree in foreign policy to realize that rewarding terrorism by chastising the vitctim only encourages more terrorism.

The history of Israel and Palestine can be boiled down to Israel extending the olive branch and Palestine slapping it away with rockets and gunfire. At the 2000-2001 Camp David-Taba peace negotiations Israel offered Palestinians virtually everything they had been demanding, including a free state with control over Jerusalem. The democratically elected Yasser Arafat rejected the deal and chose to resume terrorism. Violence has continued ever since illustrating that a Palestinian state would be nothing but a terrorist enclave.

Anyone who claims that Hamas, the Palestinian Authority, or the PLO are engaging in righteous action is either morally bankrupt, ignorant of history, a parrot, or all three. Israel has one of the most disciplined fighting forces in the world and has continually sought to diffuse regional conflict. Faced with individuals who want to murder their family members, IDF soldiers show a remarkable amount of restraint and dignity. A virtually imposed UN ceasefire would merely divert blame away from where it belongs; the terrorists who reject Israeli statehood and want to murder the Jews.

Voluntary association of individuals has been the hallmark of our country since its inception. The government has recognized the rights of people to form businesses, attend religious services, start political organizations, and even create utopian communities. This system has allowed individuals to flourish in voluntary cooperatives that are still individualistic in nature, meaning that people are allowed to live their lives in a manner they see fit, while also partaking in a moral, economic, or political community that lies outside of state coercion.

One fundamental assumption of this system, however, has been the idea that people are rational beings who are able to gauge the risks they face in society. This is true of businesses when people put their money on the line and in charities where the charitable work is often dangerous. At a basic level it is true of religious institutions, which pose the greatest risk of all; if you choose the wrong religion, you could spend eternity in Hell.

The kings of the Middle Ages used this argument in order to burn heretics and force people to participate in state run churches. However, during the Enlightenment thinkers like John Locke challenged the notion that individuals should have religion forced upon them by governmental authority. Locke believed that religion was a voluntary choice that did not infringe upon the civil rights of any other person. The capitalist Adam Smith, another important Enlightenment thinker, extended this idea to his theory of the economy. He believed that individuals should be allowed to accept risk in order to form voluntary corporations with others. 

The idea that individuals are able to accept risk and engage in voluntary action with others is at the bedrock of Western civilization. This philosophy has been used to justify the separation of church and state, the destruction of slavery, and the ability of individual to choose the professions they enter, rather than having family heritage dictate their job.

Despite its utility, this ideal has come under attack by leftist intellectuals who believe that they possess enough knowledge and intelligence to effectively gauge the risk of all others and dictate the actions which they take.

This urge has always been strong among politicians but never has it been more pronounced than during the COVID-19 pandemic. To justify their coercive policies, left-wing politicians and propagandizers often repeated the phrase, “you just want to kill grandma.” What many of them forgot is that “grandma” has free will. If grandma wants to attend mass and even die, then that is her right to do so. The same is true of all others. If people want to party without masks, then why should they not be allowed to? Everyday we gauge risks when we make investments, drive our cars, or get married. It is not the job of others to perform this task for us.

 Third party onlookers have no business hindering mutually voluntary interaction because they think the risk is too great. There is absolutely no justification for this kind of tyranny in everyday life. It evokes images of Dark Ages tyrants who forced people into religious practices, because their mortal souls were at risk. It also evokes images of Soviet Gulags, where individuals were forced to work because the risk that free market enterprise would create inequality was too great. When someone says that the risk is too great, they forget that this is a personal decision, that does not justify governmental coercion. Life would be much better if people focused on personal improvement in voluntary collectives rather than having the government control others every time they think that something is wrong with the world.

It is always amusing to see leftist elites go wild over the consideration of a religious person for public office. Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney-Barrett was recently accused of being a religious fanatic as well as a handmaiden to the patriarchy by major news organizations. Fortunately, however, we had our left-wing politicians to make sure that she would leave her faith at the door of the courthouse.

Stunts like this are amusing (and disturbing) because there is no similar test for secular people, despite the fact that secular ideologies can carry just as much weight as religious beliefs. The 20th century illustrated this fact with the rise of Nazism and Communism.

Why is there no uproar over secular judicial philosophies that differ from originalism? After all, if someone is not an originalist, they are merely using their personal feelings to remake the law. And this, unlike religion cannot be left at the courthouse door.

The encroachment of radical secular ideologies on our government has been one of the most detrimental developments in modern governance and has led to the vast expansion of bureaucracies that are mandated to fulfill open-ended goals. One such goal that has wreaked havoc on limited government is the desire for a “just distribution of income.”

Unlike providing some people with a baseline standard, this is a goal that can be manipulated and distorted to fit the needs of those in power. In fact, the creation of Social Security was based on just this goal. It was not meant to help the needy. If it was, then we wouldn’t all get a check. Consequently, it has grown enormous, underfunded, and extremely expensive. All because bureaucrats decided to let their unregulated whims define policy.

This same, open-ended, subjective, and unjust goal was used as a justification for expansive and unnecessary COVID-19 relief that stole from the rich to give to the not-as-rich. People making well over $200,000 a year were provided with $13,000 in “relief.” 

This could not be motivated by compassion. It could only be motivated by two principles. The first is a hatred for the rich. Left-wing pundits constantly cited the evils of those who made massive fortunes during the pandemic such as Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk. What they failed to mention is that these entrepreneurs did not steal their wealth from the poor. They made it by providing people with valuable goods and services that people voluntarily purchased. Regardless, it is not surprising that so much relief was provided based on this perceived injustice.

The second principle which this obscene “relief” was motivated by was much more sinister; a desire for power. There is no better way to get someone to vote for your party than by bribing your constituency. This seems to be exactly what Democrats would like to do. Increase dependence to the point of necessity and you will never lose power. Social Security also offers important lessons on this point. Not even Ronald Reagan could assail this dysfunctional and broken system, because too many people had come to rely on it. Ultimately, the bureaucracy endured.

Just because the checks are supposedly temporary does not mean that we should not be worried. In the words of Milton Friedman, “Nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program.” Left-wing thought leaders such as Andrew Yang have been openly promoting universal basic income. It is not very hard to see how this idea could be expanded to make the rich fearful, the masses slaves, and the government ever more powerful. 

In a democracy, the functioning of government depends on the people taking responsibility. Everyone who received an unneeded check should be angered at those in power who believed that they would prostitute their vote for money. The importance of limiting government has become ever more acute as those in power have used past precedents to gradually expand their powers beyond anything our Founding Fathers could have imagined. It is time to say no to the ideologically possessed intelligentsia.