Are The Democrats For Real

WHAT IS it that really worries Republicans and conservatives as we lick our wounds after November? It is the nagging fear that the Democrats didn’t just win because it’s an off year election and the voters are in a foul mood.

Not that the voters don’t deserve to be a foul mood, mind you.

But what if the Democrats were executing a secret plan, a grand strategic concept, a new approach to politics and we right-wing foot-soldiers didn’t have a clue what hit us? That is what keeps us awake at night.

Fortunately an evil Republican spy has come up with the answer. She sneaked into the Pelosi victory party with all the heavy hitter Democratic contributors.

And everything is ok. There’s no "there" there in the new Democratic Congress.

Writer Lisa Schiffren talked to a contributor, a real-estate developer, at the party.

I asked the real-estate developer what he thought of Pelosi. “I spent a lot of time with her. She told me she could win. She said she had a plan.” What was the plan? “The idea was that they would just criticize whatever plans the Republicans put out there”. They would tear them down -- like they did with Social Security -- and not put out their own plans. They have been very disciplined.” Indeed. No stray substance at all -- and this sharp businessman had forked over $25 grand in support.

So that’s all right. That six point plan was just what it seemed to be, a lot of nothing.

Of course, the assembled party faithful had some interesting things to say. Take a load of this. Here’s what Schriffen’s real estate developer had to say about the issues.

“All the wealthy people I know, they only care about having their taxes cut. I don’t think that’s right.” “What are the issues you really care about?” I asked. “Rich and poor in this country. It’s not right,” he said, as if it was obvious what that implied.

OK, conservatives, stop laughing and get back to work. When are you going to come up with the next brilliant conservative idea to reform the Democrats’ corrupt and unjust welfare state?

You can’t beat nothing with nothing, you know.

Christopher Chantrill blogs at americanmanifestobook.blogspot.com. His Road to the Middle Class is forthcoming.

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Faith & Purpose

“When we began first to preach these things, the people appeared as awakened from the sleep of ages—they seemed to see for the first time that they were responsible beings...”
Finke, Stark, The Churching of America, 1776-1990

Mutual Aid

In 1911... at least nine million of the 12 million covered by national insurance were already members of voluntary sick pay schemes. A similar proportion were also eligible for medical care.
Green, Reinventing Civil Society

Education

“We have met with families in which for weeks together, not an article of sustenance but potatoes had been used; yet for every child the hard-earned sum was provided to send them to school.”
E. G. West, Education and the State

Living Under Law

Law being too tenuous to rely upon in [Ulster and the Scottish borderlands], people developed patterns of settling differences by personal fighting and family feuds.
Thomas Sowell, Conquests and Cultures

German Philosophy

The primary thing to keep in mind about German and Russian thought since 1800 is that it takes for granted that the Cartesian, Lockean or Humean scientific and philosophical conception of man and nature... has been shown by indisputable evidence to be inadequate.
F.S.C. Northrop, The Meeting of East and West

Knowledge

Inquiry does not start unless there is a problem... It is the problem and its characteristics revealed by analysis which guides one first to the relevant facts and then, once the relevant facts are known, to the relevant hypotheses.
F.S.C. Northrop, The Logic of the Sciences and the Humanities

Chappies

“But I saw a man yesterday who knows a fellow who had it from a chappie that said that Urquhart had been dipping himself a bit recklessly off the deep end.” —Freddy Arbuthnot
Dorothy L. Sayers, Strong Poison

Democratic Capitalism

I mean three systems in one: a predominantly market economy; a polity respectful of the rights of the individual to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; and a system of cultural institutions moved by ideals of liberty and justice for all. In short, three dynamic and converging systems functioning as one: a democratic polity, an economy based on markets and incentives, and a moral-cultural system which is plural and, in the largest sense, liberal.
Michael Novak, The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism

Action

The incentive that impels a man to act is always some uneasiness... But to make a man act [he must have] the expectation that purposeful behavior has the power to remove or at least to alleviate the felt uneasiness.
Ludwig von Mises, Human Action

Churches

[In the] higher Christian churches... they saunter through the liturgy like Mohawks along a string of scaffolding who have long since forgotten their danger. If God were to blast such a service to bits, the congregation would be, I believe, genuinely shocked. But in the low churches you expect it every minute.
Annie Dillard, Holy the Firm

Conversion

“When we received Christ,” Phil added, “all of a sudden we now had a rule book to go by, and when we had problems the preacher was right there to give us the answers.”
James M. Ault, Jr., Spirit and Flesh

Living Law

The recognition and integration of extralegal property rights [in the Homestead Act] was a key element in the United States becoming the most important market economy and producer of capital in the world.
Hernando de Soto, The Mystery of Capital

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