Over the past few decades, America has intervened in a half-dozen countries, from Libya to Grenada to Afghanistan to Iraq. In every case, America has acted in a most un-colonial way. First, America did not take resources from those countries; rather, it expended resources to improve them. Second, America was planning its exit almost immediately after its intervention, looking for the quickest, safest way to get out. Progressives don’t seem to recognize this. They often make lists of countries America has invaded and occupied. But they never consider the simple question, “If America was the evil colonial occupier of all these countries, why don’t we own them?” The reason is that Americans have no interest in acquiring foreign real estate. We never have, and I’m convinced we never will. As Colin Powell memorably put it, the only ground America has sought abroad in the aftermath of war is sufficient ground to bury our dead.8
At its core, American foreign policy is based on two simple precepts: (a) don’t bomb us and (b) trade with us. This is all that Americans want from the rest of the world. A more benign foreign policy can hardly be imagined. America should not and does not oppose the rise of other powers, as long as they are peaceful trading powers and not violent conquering powers. In the future, America should be more cautious about committing troops abroad. How then can we assist other countries to become free? The people in those countries must take the initiative. They must recognize the value of freedom. In general, we won’t fight for their freedom. They must fight, but we can help. This was precisely the Reagan Doctrine of the 1980s. The mujahedeen in Afghanistan and the contras in Nicaragua are the ones who fought tyrannical regimes in their own countries. America did not send troops, but we did assist in other ways. And both resistance movements were successful. The Reagan Doctrine provides a good rule for America in the future: it steers a healthy middle course between reckless intervention and irresponsible indifference.
In the beginning of this chapter, I quoted Jeane Kirkpatrick’s wry remark that “Americans need to face the truth about themselves, no matter how pleasant it is.” Kirkpatrick meant this half-jokingly, but only half-jokingly. On the balance, America has been a great force for good in the world. From World War II to the Cold War to innumerable smaller involvements, America has simultaneously protected its self-interest while also making the world a better place. While America has made its mistakes, in no circumstance over the past hundred years has it gone abroad to conquer and plunder. In no case has America stolen the wealth of any other country. The allegation of some progressives that America is an evil empire is not simply wrong—it is obscene. For foreigners to make such allegations is one thing; for Americans to falsely accuse their own country is another. If America declines, new powers will rise to take its place. Then the world—and perhaps even the progressives—will miss the leadership of the kindest, gentlest superpower in world history.
CHAPTER 14
THE BIGGEST THIEF OF ALL
Any government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the active support of Paul.1
GEORGE BERNARD SHAW
There is a scene in the movie Casablanca in which a suspicious-looking man approaches a tourist and warns him about the danger of pickpockets. He says there are “vultures everywhere” and, while the tourist nods appreciatively, the man reaches into the tourist’s jacket pocket and takes his wallet. In this chapter, I examine the institutional equivalent of that thief: the federal government. While posing as the pursuer of thieves, and the restorer of stolen goods, the government is actually the biggest thief of all. In fact, progressives have turned a large body of Americans—basically, Democratic voters—into accessories of theft by convincing them that they are doing something just and moral by picking their fellow citizens’ pockets.
Imagine a fellow who has worked hard to achieve a good position in a company or who has built a successful firm. He is watching TV one evening when policemen show up at his door and start carrying away his furniture, his TV, and his other possessions. When he demands to know what’s going on, they inform him that he is a thief. Since he has never been convicted of anything, the man is nonplussed, but the police assure him that, while the specific time of the theft is unclear—it could have been through his business, or through his country’s actions abroad, or through something his ancestors did—nevertheless he is no longer entitled to what he has, and the government is now going to confiscate it. Such a man, accused of robbery, will naturally feel that he is being robbed. In the name of correcting a supposed injustice, a grave injustice is being inflicted on him. Such is the situation facing all successful people in the age of Obama. The biggest thief—they are beginning to suspect—is not America or capitalism but the suave scoundrel in the White House. Moreover, he and his fellow progressives are turning honest Americans into thieves.
How does an honest man become a thief? Consider a person who works hard loading luggage at an airport or cleaning the floors of an office building. When such people leave work, they see successful people being driven around in limousines or eating in fancy restaurants. Immediately they wonder, “Why does that guy have what I don’t?” This question is immediately followed by feelings of frustration and inferiority. These are very powerful and natural feelings, and they are worth examining more closely.
We feel inferior to others when we realize we are not as good as they are. Now in an aristocratic society, this type of feeling is actually rare. Aristocratic societies impose superior and inferior status on people, but this does not make the ones lower down feel inferior. If this is a surprise, it shouldn’t be. In caste-bound societies, the lower orders know they are simply there because of birth or ill luck. They just got the short end of the stick. Consequently they can console themselves by thinking: if I were lucky like that other guy, I’d be just as rich and accomplished as he is.
In a free and competitive society, where there are equal rights under the law, and where people perform to the extent of their abilities, such consolations are not available. A society of free competition is like a race where everyone starts on the same line: the guy who hits the finishing tape first really is better. It’s hard for losers to deal with this. Not only do they feel inferior, this feeling makes them hate those who are successful. Thus they begin to secretly nurture the emotion that will guide their political behavior from now on, the emotion of envy. In a sense they become like Iago, who says of Cassio, “He hath a daily beauty in his life that makes me ugly.”2 Because Cassio is beautiful, Iago must bring him down in order to bring himself up, to make himself feel better.
Back to the hard-working fellow who, rather than hate himself for being inferior, begins to resent his successful fellow citizens. At first this resentment is inarticulate, and has no legitimate outlet. Then along comes the progressive, the Obama type. This Obama is no less envious than the ordinary worker. Why? Not because Obama isn’t talented. It’s because Obama isn’t talented in any of the things that it takes to succeed in a commercial society. Obama cannot do what Steve Jobs does. He cannot run a business; never has. Even with the full resources of government, he could not put up a working healthcare website. Consequently Obama develops a fierce envy toward his entrepreneurial superiors. He knows that he has talents, but they are other talents: the talent for rhetoric and mobilization, an ability to work up the mob. He decides to put these talents to use to bring down the hated entrepreneur, to establish his superiority through government control.
So the envious Obama type says to the envious person: You are actually not envious; you are indignant. (This is precisely how he feels himself.) And you have good cause to feel resentful and even enraged. That successful person has been stealing from you. You work just as hard as he does, and yet he makes off with all the gains. Actually you have produced just as much as he has, and so the gains belong equally to you. And I am here to restore you to justice. If you vote for me, I will use the power of the government to take away the other man’s possessions. I will then give some of those possessions to you. Obama omits
to mention, of course, that through this process he becomes more powerful. He, not you, exercises the levers of government control. He is using you to achieve his own objective, which is the conquest of the wealth creators. Yet to assuage your envy and resentment you recruit him to go to work for you, to take money from others and put it into your pocket.
This is how a righteous man becomes a thief. His envy is an invisible vice that had previously traveled in secret. The progressive contribution is to give that envy political cover, to permit it to travel under the passport of morality. Now the man who felt bad about himself gets to feel good about himself, even while indulging his envy. In a triumph of vice masquerading as virtue, the fellow eagerly supports progressives in using the power of the state to confiscate and seize the earnings of those who have contributed the most and earned the greatest rewards. The result is most pleasing: the envious get to enjoy some of that loot, all the while thinking they have struck a blow for social justice. As for the government, in the name of fighting theft—a theft we have shown to be largely nonexistent—it has under progressive rule become itself a burglar. This is burglary of a kind that is normally found in Third World countries; the burglars have the police on their side.
Since Obama was elected, conservatives and libertarians have been making elaborate critiques of government, critiques that seem to go nowhere. Let’s examine why this is so. The first critique is that government is inefficient. This is obvious, as any visit to a post office, department of motor vehicles, or immigration office can easily demonstrate. Government is notorious for wasting money and this is not simply the consequence of bad government; it is a problem intrinsic to government itself. Basically, whatever the government does, it does badly. This is just as true of the Defense Department as of the Housing or Labor departments. Part of the reason is that government means bureaucrats spending someone else’s money. Naturally they are profligate with it; it’s not their money. Besides, they are not subject to market forces—consequently, there is no “bottom line.” Private investors who make bad decisions get punished for them; bureaucrats who make bad decisions suffer no such consequences. Private initiatives that don’t work get canceled, but with very few exceptions—to paraphrase Reagan—government programs are the closest thing to eternal life we’ll see on this earth.
Another reason centralized government is so inefficient is that it just does not have access to the kind of information to make good decisions that people typically have at the local level. This is an argument made famous by economist Friedrich Hayek, and it has never been refuted. Consider this question: What’s happening right now in New York at Lexington and Fifty-Fourth Street? Obama has no idea, and neither do his bureaucrats in Washington. But the guy who lives across the street, or the fellow selling hot dogs at that intersection, or the company that is considering opening a store there—these people have a much more detailed familiarity with what’s going on. Consequently, they are able to make more informed decisions. Even if bureaucrats could be just as motivated as private sector actors to make wise and cost-effective decisions, they simply don’t have adequate information to do so. The point here is that we need rules and decisions—in that sense, we need to be governed—but we are best governed by a decentralized network of private and state institutions. Centralized government is simply ill-equipped to make the innumerable decisions that are best left to local people, local businesses, local civic institutions, and local government.
A second critique of government—one that I have previously made in the context of Obamacare—is that it purports to be fostering moral action among citizens while in reality its policies have nothing to do with morality.
My Obamacare argument will illustrate the point. During a recent debate I was asked why, as a Christian, I didn’t support a program that was a fulfillment of our moral duty to be charitable to our neighbors. I responded with an example. Let’s say that you and I are walking along the riverbank and I am eating a sandwich. You tell me you’re hungry, and you demand half my sandwich. I give it to you. Now—I argued—that is a moral transaction all around. I have done a good deed, and can feel good about it. You are grateful, and perhaps someday if you have a sandwich you’d be inclined to share. But let’s now consider a second case. The situation is just the same as before, but this time I refuse to share my sandwich. At this point, Obama himself shows up on a white horse. He dismounts, puts a gun to my head, and says, “Give that guy half your sandwich.” And so I do.
The result—I pointed out—is identical to that in the previous case. In both situations, each of us has half a sandwich. But in the second one, the moral picture is completely different. I have no claim to virtue, because I didn’t part with my sandwich voluntarily; I was forced to do it. You, the recipient, don’t feel grateful; on the contrary, you feel entitled. Perhaps you are thinking, “How come I get only half a sandwich? That greedy selfish guy should have given me the whole sandwich.” Obama’s actions, which seem admirable when performed by the government, would, if he performed them as a private citizen, get him convicted of assault, extortion, and theft. My example was offered to illustrate how coercive government policies strip the virtue out of every transaction.
None of this is to suggest, of course, that government has no role to play in helping the disadvantaged. There is agreement across the political spectrum that it does. Here the problem with progressivism has to do with its utter inability to identify who the good guys are. Think of society as a bandwagon, with working Americans pulling the bandwagon. A wealthy society can afford to have some of its citizens—presumably those who are unable to pull—sit in the bandwagon. Historically that number was small, but in recent decades it has been growing. The more people who sit in the bandwagon, the harder it is for the rest to pull. Now one might expect a president to praise the people pulling the bandwagon, and thank them for what they are doing for their fellow citizens. Not Obama. He praises the folks sitting in the bandwagon, assuring them that they are the most morally wonderful people in America. Then he castigates the people pulling the bandwagon, accusing them of being greedy, selfish, and materialistic. Through their policies, Obama and the progressives create more incentives to sit in the bandwagon and fewer incentives to keep pulling. Naturally some of the people pulling the bandwagon are going to think, “Gee, maybe I should get in the wagon. It’s so much better than pulling.” So the bandwagon slows down, and at some point it could grind to a halt.
These critiques of government, while telling, have nevertheless not gotten very far. Why not? Because progressives have convinced people that they are fighting theft. If a greedy capitalist has looted your possessions, you would want the government to do something about it. An essential function of government is to bring thieves to justice and to restore stolen possessions to their rightful owners. If the progressive critique is valid, then it doesn’t matter if government does it inefficiently, since there is no one else to do the job: inefficient justice is better than no justice. Moreover, when we ask the police to go after bad guys and repossess their stolen goods, we aren’t concerned with whether we foster virtue among the “giver” and gratitude in the “receiver.” That’s because the giver isn’t really giving; he’s merely giving back, and the receiver has no cause for gratitude since he (or she) is merely being made whole. In this scenario, Americans who are sitting in the bandwagon have earned that right, and the people pulling are the thieves who deserve to be penalized and castigated. This is why I’ve devoted the bulk of this book to refuting the theft critique. If I’ve succeeded, then the whole progressive argument collapses and our federal government, far from being an instrument of justice, now becomes an instrument of plunder. This term may seem unduly harsh; in the rest of this chapter I intend to show that it is duly harsh.
Let’s consider first the issue of plunder. How does progressive government plunder its citizens? It does so by illicitly transferring wealth from one body of the citizens to another. The mechanisms for doing this are confisc
atory taxation, and also regulation and mandates. Taxation is quite obviously a form of “taking” but it’s not so clear how regulation and mandates constitute theft. Imagine if the Obama administration were to say to an American family, “You must rent that extra bedroom in your house for $100 a month.” The market value of that rental is $500 a month. By forcing you to rent for $100 a month, the government is stealing $400 of your money. Similarly when the Obama administration orders businesses to provide this or that benefit, it is basically stealing from the stockholders who have invested in that business.
Illicit taxation is also a form of theft. We are so used to being taxed in this way that we typically don’t recognize this rip-off. So let’s begin with some historical perspective. The core principle of slavery, according to Abraham Lincoln, is “you work, I’ll eat.” In his Chicago speech of July 10, 1858, Lincoln called it “the same old serpent that says you work and I eat, you toil and I will enjoy the fruits of it.” This, Lincoln said, is not only the essence of slavery; it is the essence of tyranny. It is the same argument “that kings have made for enslaving the people in all the ages of the world.”3
For centuries in Europe, people understood that the very freedom of the serf—the main thing that distinguished serfs from slaves—is that serfs got to keep some of the fruits of their labor. Karl Marx points out that “the peasant serf … worked three days for himself on his own field or the field allotted to him, and the three subsequent days he performed compulsory and gratuitous labor on the estate of his lord.” Marx appreciated the clarity of the system: “here the paid and unpaid part of labor were sensibly separated.”4 So at least the serf could recognize the degree to which he was being ripped off. And the thieves were the lords and aristocrats, who lived off the labor of the serfs. The serfs worked, and they ate.
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