It seems as though the politics of envy as skillfully practiced by the left has metastasized to the right.  Mr. Gingrich demanded that Gov. Romney release his tax returns as if something illegal or dirty would come to light, but knowing that the only thing it would show is that Romney is a very rich man, makes a lot of money, is very charitable and pays in taxes precisely what our tax laws require.    Is the former speaker now going to demand that Romney pay his “fair share”?

IRS statistics confirm, as we have written several times, that the top ten percent of earners pay slightly over 70% of federal income taxes and the bottom fifty percent pay no income tax at all, even getting refunds of money they never paid in from various so-called credits.  Indeed, the thoroughly maligned top 1% pays nearly 37% of all federal income taxes. One needs look no further than the marginal rate levels in effect for 2012.  The rate for a married couple (earning $170,000 before all allowable deductions) is 28%, whereas a married couple earning over $379,150 is 35%.

 This leads to a class warfare fallacy to mislead the much less affluent … the so-called “working rich” that the super rich are victimizing them.  President Obama constantly commingles his use of “tax rates’ and ‘taxes paid’ to send a misleading and inflammatory message to the voting public. “It doesn’t make sense that a millionaire’s secretary should pay more in taxes than her boss”, he likes to say. Of course, she doesn’t.

Then there is the President’s favorite straw man, the rich person who flies in private jets. As the American Thinker stated in its August 4^th 2011 edition:

“Corporate jets are rare and already heavily scrutinized.  The only issue is whether they should be depreciated over five years or seven years as required for commercial planes.  The impact on tax revenues and the debt is so minimal it is hard to take such pathetic tactics seriously.

In an effort to play god with the tax purse strings, the tax code is so complex with credits and exemptions that it is no wonder that some companies and filers have figured out how to reduce their tax burdens to a lower level than most of us pay.  But those corporations who are able to pay little or no taxes are still the exception.  Yet these few winners of the tax lottery are held up by the class warmongers as a basis to increase taxes on the many businesses who are already paying more than their fair share.”

The focus on taxes, the left’s attacks on people who are likely to invest in America and create jobs, is more than misguided; it is staggering.

The profligate spending during the Bush (43) years and, of course, the two wars we pursued following 9/11 complicates assessing the effectiveness of the 2003 Bush (43) tax cuts. Nonetheless, from May 2003 until December 2007 (when the recession caused by the global financial meltdown occurred) the economy created 8.1 million jobs, or 145,000 a month. That’s 56 continuous months of job growth. By comparison, after the beginning of the 2001 recession and before the 2003 tax cuts, the economy was losing 103,000 jobs a month

Furthermore, any impartial study of President Reagan’s tax policies shows that the lower tax rates he instituted resulted in a dramatic increase in the number of jobs created, and the simultaneous increase in the collection of tax revenues that resulted from this increase in economic activity..

Just ponder these findings from the Congressional Joint Economic Committee Report released 15 years ago, “Tax Polity, Economic Growth and American Families”:

“With four years of data on the current economic recovery (extending back to the Bush (41) Administration), it is now possible to tally up the scorecard and compare the Bush (41)/Clinton recovery that started in 1991 with the Reagan recovery that began in 1982:

“President Clinton has boasted that his policies have spurred economic growth, added jobs, and helped the middle class. However, the data show that the Bush (41)/Clinton recovery is weak compared to the Reagan recovery along several important measures. Both economic growth and job creation in the current recovery lag behind the Reagan recovery by two full years. The middle class is suffering an actual loss in real median family income, while during the Reagan recovery it gained. Moreover, tax revenues increased more rapidly under Reagan’s tax cuts than under the Bush (41)/Clinton tax increases.

“The most outstanding policy differences between the two recoveries are in the realm of tax policy. Reagan instituted across-the-board reductions in tax rates, while Bush (41) and Clinton both pushed massive tax increases. The most disturbing conclusion is that the 1990 and 1993 tax increases have cost Americans far more than the extra earnings collected by the IRS; they have cost the economy at least two years of growth. Comparing the two recoveries:

• Real GDP grew more in five years under Reagan (23 percent cumulative growth) than it is projected to grow in seven years under Bush (41)/Clinton (21 percent cumulative growth).
• After four years, 4 million more jobs were created under Reagan than under Bush (41)/Clinton.
• Federal revenues, adjusted for inflation, grew much faster under Reagan (33 percent cumulative growth) than projected under Bush (41)/Clinton (20 percent cumulative growth).
• Real per capita disposable income grew more in two years under Reagan than in all four years combined thus far in the Bush (41)/Clinton recovery (8.2 percent versus 7.8 percent).
• Median family income grew in all of the first three recovery years under Reagan, compared to three consecutive declines under Bush (41)/Clinton.”

“In other words, during the economic expansion following Reagan’s tax cuts, the economy grew faster, experienced stronger revenue growth, created more jobs, and saw more rapid income growth than the current expansion under the high tax policies of Presidents Bush (41) and Clinton.”

But the left hates an inconvenient truth that the more wealth that is left in the people’s hands the more the country’s economy grows.

Add to the Obama Administration’s obsession with increasing taxes on the wealthy with the costs of meandering through the maze of maddening and expensive regulations his executive agencies are imposing, some of which are little more that an attempted power grab that could never get legislatively enacted into law, and you find the most anti-business government in the post- war history of the country.

Consider, in that regard, the NLRB’s attack on Boeing, which shifted production from the state of Washington to South Carolina, a “right to work” state.  The next such attack is likely to cause companies not to shift production to another state, but to another country.

It seemed ironic after we saw the recently released film, “The Iron Lady” that class warfare politics brought an end to the leadership of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.  A member of her own party, John Major, challenged her effort to enact a flat tax, sensing that he could replace her as PM if he played the class warfare card.

Taxes are the most effective redistributive tool in the government toolbox.  The left constantly plays it.  If the right also is going to do it, who needs two parties?

If, indeed, we have arrived at a time in our history when the rate at which an American’s income is taxed (consistent with the nation’s tax laws) has become determinative (or even a factor) in his or her electability as President, then we are rudderlessly adrift.  Nearly all taxpayers derive their taxable income either from salary and perhaps a bonus, or from whatever return they earn investing in the economic activity of the nation.  The nation’s tax code is currently structured to encourage citizens who can, to take risks by investing in the commerce of the country.  When how a man or woman is taxed becomes a de facto qualification for public office, it is time to bring on the flat tax for it will be the only salvation from such a social psychosis.

Sure, we understand that the people who run political campaigns and the candidates who hire or encourage them will stretch or bend the truth in return for a bump in the polls.  That’s why, as Harry Truman understood, it gets very hot in the campaign kitchen.  The distortions, however, that have been pedaled about Bain Capital, private equity and Mitt Romney’s career as Chairman of the private capital firm have been beyond the pale.  They are shameful, and shame on those Republican candidates who have perpetuated them, encouraged them or tolerated them.  Investments made by private equity groups such as Bain Capital provide what is, for many firms, the wind in their sails that propels them from troubled waters to clear and profitable sailing.  And, yes, sometimes those investments fail to turn around a sick company or to guarantee the continued success of a company facing tough competition.  Bain had some failures, although relatively few, as has every investment bank or fund in the business of finding equity investors or providing risk capital.

Our impatience over the Bain imbroglio isn’t so much about the poor campaign tactics that were employed to try to make political capital (no pun intended) over the vicissitudes of the role and workings of private equity in the economy, but, rather, of the absurd and dishonest distortions that have been concocted about Bain and Romney’s record there. We’re not even that perturbed about the damage it may have caused to one candidate’s quest for the nomination (Romney will weather this contrived tempest in a tea pot).  We’re in high dudgeon over the damage and confusion this deceitful attack has probably caused regarding the public’s understanding of the critical role of private equity investment and risk capital in the nation’s pursuit of prosperity.

The basic premise of the attack on Bain is, of course, an exercise in sophistry.  Because some companies in which Bain invested failed, Bain (and Romney) is accused of costing communities jobs, and throwing people out of work.  These are tough times and accusing a candidate of being a job destroyer is a direct shot at the jugular. However, for such an argument to stand any scrutiny, one has to assume that had Bain not invested in a company that ultimately failed, the enterprise would have sailed merely on its way, and its labor force would have been secure in their jobs. Nonsense!  Companies that failed following an investment by Bain were candidates for failure and would have failed earlier had Bain not invested its own money to try to save it.   While Bain can be faulted for not having a perfect record of success, it can’t reasonably be criticized for destroying jobs.

Whatever led any of the Republican candidates to believe they could level what are, essentially, scurrilous charges against Romney for his leadership at Bain without drawing fire from reputable and qualified observers who have no axes to grind is almost a mystery…almost, but not quite.  Desperation can turn any political contest into a freak show, and that’s what this spectacle became.

Bain was “never interested in driving companies out of business,” said Howard Anderson, a professor at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, “and certainly to portray that as their modus operandi is unfair and inaccurate. The goal here was to create wealth,” Anderson said. “Jobs were the byproduct, not the product… on day one, they all look good, like the first day of baseball. … All in all, Bain is a remarkable company.”

“Their overall performance was terrific,” concurred Steven Neil Kaplan, a professor at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. “He’s got lots of deals that worked.”

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce chimed in as well.  Bain’s track record was not perfect, but it was pretty darn good, they said.

Now we understand that candidates in the throes of an election can overstate their case or shoot (at their opponents) from the hip. But we believe there was something far more nefarious here.  First there is that 27-minute film that features interviews with former Bain employees, the context of which was so contorted that some of the individuals who were interviewed expressed shock at how their words were misrepresented.  In one case, a former employee who was featured in the film jumped to Romney’s defense, explaining that he did very well while Romney and Bain were at the helm, and it was actually years later, after Bain had sold the company that things went south under new ownership.  This is not a case of shooting from the hip.  This is blatant fabrication of the facts.  It is no less than manufacturing the mud they wished to sling.

USA Today, in a Fact-Check feature, reports that the video often overstates, or outright distorts, Romney’s culpability for job losses or bankruptcies.

•The film talks about layoffs at DDI Corp. and discusses questionable manipulation of stock prices after the circuit board company went public. But Romney had left Bain Capital a year before any layoffs and a public stock offering that ultimately netted Bain and Romney a big payday. The company’s subsequent bankruptcy filing came two years after Bain had largely divested from the company, and was the result of the dot-com bust. Moreover, the company emerged from bankruptcy, and its current CEO credits those early Bain investments for setting the foundation for the company’s current success.

•The film claims Romney was involved in the acquisition, management and demise of the now-defunct KB Toys. He wasn’t. Bain bought the toy company nearly two years after Romney left Bain.

•Likewise, the closing of UniMac’s plant in Marianna, Fla., occurred seven years after Romney left Bain and nearly two years after Bain sold UniMac’s parent company to another private equity house.

Private equity companies such as Bain Capital, and the men and women who create and manage them provide an invaluable service to a free market economy. They invest risk capital in companies in which they believe improved management can significantly add to a company’s value.  Once a company is on its feet and doing well, they generally exit the company by selling their interest at a well-earned profit.  A by-product of this activity is job creation.  Sometimes their judgment is wrong and companies in which they have invested fail.  Jobs are lost when companies fail.  The investors are left with whatever assets, if any, the failed company has.  According to extensive analysis of Bain’s operations, as reported in the press, the company had a nearly 80% success rate.  But even if they had an 80% failure rate, they would not have been responsible for lost jobs.  They would have simply been responsible for making lousy investments.

Compare the outrageous descriptions of Romney made by some of his Republican competitors who call him a vulture and a looter, to the assessment of him made by Jack Welsh, former CEO and Chairman of GE who is widely considered one of the premier CEO’s in the history of American business.

Jack Welch: “In my lifetime, Mitt Romney is the most qualified leader I’ve ever seen run for the presidency of the United States. We’ve got a guy here who’s a leader that’s demonstrated beyond anything we’ve ever had…we’re the luckiest people in the world to have this guy there at this point in time.”

Frankly, we think Mr. Welsh, perhaps, engages in a bit of hyperbole himself.  But between the deplorable and unfounded vilification of Romney by his Republican competitors, and the lavish praise heaped upon him by Mr. Welsh, there yawns a gap in which there is generous room for fair battle in the rough and tumble of party politics.

Sadly, the subject of Bain simply camouflages that some of Romney’s competitors have resorted to tactics that are unbecoming of their candidacy and of the office they seek.

   In last week’s essay, we quoted Winston Churchill’s memorable statement that “Democracy is the worst system there is except for all the others. We also restated Churchill’s observation by noting that we need to revise our delegate selection process and “the sooner the better.”

 This observation is most particularly true for the nominating process of either party seeking to replace an incumbent President or the party of an incumbent who is not running for re-election.

With Iowa’s caucus and the New Hampshire primary finished, we should pause and look at a little history to illustrate how our current process, in effect, disenfranchises a majority of voters.

In 1952, Governor Adlai Stevenson of Illinois (perhaps one of that state’s last governors who did not go on to a career of making license plates)  was selected as the nominee at the Democratic convention through a series of state primaries and won the 1952 nomination at the Democratic convention on the third ballot.  Today, nominating conventions have no real purpose to them except for the public learning the nominee’s vice-presidential choice.  Bringing party professionals into the mix might spare us another Sarah Palin debacle.  Perhaps there is a role for smoke filled rooms, even though smoking would be banned!

In 1952 the process produced Senator John Sparkman as the democratic Vice-Presidential choice, an obvious sop to party bosses who did not trust the candidate Estes Kefauver, who went into the convention with the most pledged delegates. After the first two ballots Kefauver led but was overtaken on the third ballot when Stevenson was nominated.  The 1952 presidential race had earlier been thrown into disarray when President Truman announced that he would not seek re-election.  As we all know, General Eisenhower was elected President in November 1952. In 1956 Kefauver ran again and won the New Hampshire and Minnesota primary over Stevenson.  Although Stevenson was again nominated, this time around the party chose Kefauver as his running mate.

Fast forward to 1968 when President Johnson made his surprise announcement to a nation bitterly divided by the Vietnam War that he would not seek another term.  Senator Robert Kennedy won the California primary in June, defeating anti-war Sen. Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota.  Kennedy in his final words said “on to Chicago” before being shot by a lunatic, Sirhan Sirhan.  In the end, Senator Hubert Humphrey received the nomination, but lost the general election to Richard Nixon, who had stated in 1962, after losing the California governorship, that we wouldn’t have Nixon to kick around anymore.

But for the poorly-thought-out rule change the Republicans instituted for the 2012 primaries, it would have been possible, even likely, that the Republican nominee could have been decided within the next 30 days.  Thus, after the first three or four state primaries, less than three percent of registered voters could have decided the Republican nominee.  Talk about outsize influence.  States that have storied histories associated with their primaries (Wisconsin…always in April and California always in June) will have been effectively disenfranchised as will the remaining US voters in the United States which has an estimated 2011 population of 312 million people. We think the Republican rule change was rather harebrained anyway. If proportional allocation of delegates makes sense prior to April 1^st, why doesn’t make sense thereafter?

What is the solution?  There are numerous ways vastly to improve the system all of which are better than what we now have.  Former President Carter and James Baker, in a report on US elections which contains a mish mash of proposals on voter registration, proposed several serious ideas, one of which recommends four regional primaries, held after the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary at one-month intervals from March to June.  The plan would substantially expand participation in the selection of presidential nominees and give voters the chance to evaluate presidential candidates over a period of three to four months.

The Carter Baker report states:

“Think of a major election in which less than 8 percent of voters cast a ballot, yet millions of other voters want to vote but never get the chance.  While such an election is hard to imagine in the United States, that is precisely how we select the candidates for the highest public office in the land.

In recent election cycles, the races for the presidential nomination of each of our major political parties have effectively ended by March, before people in most states have the opportunity to vote.  As a result, most Americans have no real say in the selection of the nominee. Intense candidate scrutiny by the media and the public is limited to about 10 weeks.  Candidates must launch their presidential bids a year or more before the official campaign begins, so that they can raise the $25 million to 50 million needed to compete.

The Presidential primary schedule has become increasingly front-loaded.  While eight states held presidential primaries by the end of March in 1984, more than three times that – 28 states – held their primaries by March in 2004.

[We have] recommended a comprehensive overhaul of the presidential primary system.  This recommendation was received enthusiastically in numerous editorials, which expressed the view of a great many voters across the country who want a say in choosing their presidential candidates.

We believe that it is important for the parties to maintain control of their own primaries.  Therefore, we would encourage the two parties to make the needed changes in their primary schedule.  If the parties don’t take action, they risk losing that power to Congress, which should make the desired change through federal legislation if the parties remain unwilling to do so.

In the end, voters throughout America deserve a say in the selection of candidates for the most powerful job in the country.”

We would add a provision that over four election cycles, the regions would rotate so each region would have the opportunity to go first. The current system of selecting candidates is not a credit to either American Democracy or our long tradition of American Exceptionalism.  We can do better in selecting candidates for the presidency of a great and exceptional nation.

As the Republican presidential hopefuls slug it out debate after debate, and sound bite after sound bite, and President Obama endlessly drones on from the sidelines with his mantra that the wealthy must pay their fair share (according to CBO and IRS data, the top 10% of households pay more than 70% of all federal income taxes and nearly 50% pay none) we are reminded of Sir Winston Churchill’s assessment of Democracy.  “It is,” he said, “the worst system there is except for all the others that have been tried.”

We believe the 2012 presidential election season, which really began last summer, is, as Sir Winston opined, the worst, but, we would hasten to add, also the best given the clear choices in direction the President on the left and the candidates on the right provide.  These are not the run-of-the-mill choices with which Americans are always presented at election time.  We are faced with truly transformative choices; choices that only a vibrant democracy could possibly provide.

President Obama represents a textbook example of one side of the Liberal/ Conservative divide. That is, collective equality versus individual liberty.  Domestically, President Obama is a strong proponent of a centrally managed, distributive economy and a muscular government forcefully asserting its regulatory authority over a wide swath of American business activity and personal life, greatly expanding its entitlement agenda and aggressively taxing (1) earned income (middle and upper), (2) capital and (3) returns on investment (dividends).  Perhaps, that’s the America to which a majority of Americans aspire.  We don’t think so.

As the nation watches and listens to the spectacle, which constitutes the race for the Republican nomination many spectators, especially among the Democratic left, are, we believe, misreading the edginess and the stridency of the on-going Republican free-for-all as a reflection of uniquely Republican temperament.  We beg to differ.

Recent polling data indicates that 87% of all Americans believe we will fall into another recession within the next two years, and nearly 75% of all Americans believe we are headed in the wrong direction.  Only six percent of the people approve of the job their national legislature is doing. These polls tell us that the electorate has a collective bad feeling about the economic outlook for the country, and that they feel that neither the Administration nor our Congress is taking us in the right direction.  Even more disturbing, a recent Gallup Poll finds that 50% of Americans believe that government has gotten too big and now represents an immediate threat to individual liberty. Gallup also finds that Americans, on average, believe that 51 cents of every dollar the government spends is wasted.

While the Republican debates are providing an impressive, indeed an exhaustive, array of positions and opinions that, at first blush, might seem a colossal free-for-all in the marketplace of ideas, Republicans are not the only voters watching and listening.  Independents and, not a few, disappointed Democrats are part of the surprisingly large viewing audiences these debates are attracting.  Some, no doubt, tune in to scoff at the verbal give and take of what is, essentially, political theater. Others representing that strong swath of voters described by the polling data referenced above tune in to ponder the conflicting messages to determine if they find greater comfort or confidence in what they hear from any of the these candidates compared to what they have been hearing and experiencing from Washington.

Among the Republicans, we have an array of candidates each of whom stresses his or her conservative credentials (they want to promote economic growth at home, reduce taxes on all Americans, and support our allies abroad) while also offering interesting and significant variations on the conservative agenda.  Their message is largely informed by the pervasive discomfiture poll after poll has begun to detect within the American body politic.

Mitt Romney is touted as the most electable of the Republican candidates.  Romney is clearly a man of substance (although he could have been sent into the fray from central casting). He has an impressive record of business success as CEO of Bain Capital, and has demonstrated substantial leadership skills.  He was drafted to rescue the failing and scandal-ridden Salt Lake City Olympics and swiftly and successfully turned around the mess the original organizers had left.  He was a successful Republican governor of one of the nation’s most liberal states.  His signature accomplishment, RomneyCare is also his biggest headache (no pun intended). While it can be argued that ObamaCare largely apes RomneyCare, Romney’s retort is that because it made sense for Massachusetts, doesn’t mean it should be imposed nationally.  He is pledged to repeal ObamaCare immediately upon entering the oval office.   The art of compromise was essential if he was to govern the democratically controlled Bay State, and his willingness to compromise and his skill at working a legislature made up largely of the political opposition has become an albatross he must carry as he fights for his party’s nomination.  Correctly or incorrectly, Romney (and Huntsman) are viewed as the most centrist of the Republican candidates, which may be a major plus in the general election, but which is a distinct negative in the fight to become their Party’s standard bearer.

Rick Santorum, whose campaign momentum has soared after fighting from single digits to a virtual draw with Romney in Iowa, has the wind at his back. He has been articulate and unequivocal on a wide range of issues.  He is an orthodox conservative, socially, fiscally (earmarks aside) and politically.  While all of the Republican candidates give the obligatory nod to being pro life, Santorum goes a step further. No exceptions! A zygote resulting from forcible rape must be allowed to develop to term.   It is the rapist who should be punished, he says, not the egg the rapist fertilized.  Well, no one can argue over his pro-life bonafidies.

Ron Paul, a libertarian, who most liberals consider the archconservative among the Republican candidates is a crusader for individual liberty, as he believes the founding fathers intended when they crafted our Constitution.  He has, however, articulated a stand on a number of issues that would have made Abbie Hoffman stand up and cheer. Opium, cocaine, heroin, marijuana?  He explains that we got along for over 100 years without federal anti-drug laws, and nothing good has been accomplished since the feds stepped in. The feds should step out, he tells us.  Prostitution?  If it’s okay with the states, well, then, its okay.  Gay marriage? Why is that any of the Feds business? Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell? If a homosexual in the military is doing his or her job and not disrupting others, leave him or her alone. Abortion? Ron Paul strongly opposes abortion, but believes the issue is totally misplaced at the federal level.  He believes it is up to the individual states to allow or to abolish abortion.   He is a hard-money fiscal conservative who believes that paper money isn’t worth more than the paper on which it is printed if it isn’t backed by gold.  The supply of gold is, of course, fixed which places unrealistic limits on economic growth, accumulation of wealth and the funding of emergencies such as war and natural disasters.  Paul espouses not only a less expansive foreign policy, but also a policy tantamount to a retreat from history.

Newt Gingrich, after a somewhat poorly organized and sloppy beginning was catapulted to frontrunner status following a series of very impressive debate appearances. He has pledged to make firing Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke his first order of business upon assuming office, notwithstanding that the President has no authority to fire the Chairman of the Fed.  He is probably the best “idea man” in politics today, but has clearly been hobbled by an excess of overweight baggage.

Rick Perry presents a mixed message.  He has an impressive record as Governor of Texas.  Texas leads the nation in jobs creation, low taxes and strong economic growth.   He has shown a less conservative orthodoxy on immigration, offering in-state tuition to illegal immigrants, a practice frontrunner Romney refers to as providing a magnet that attracts illegal immigration. Perry also issued an executive directive (later withdrawn) making vaccinations for HPV mandatory for girls entering their teenage years.  He is smarter than his debate appearances would suggest, but he suffers from one too many “oops” moments.

Jon Huntsman, who has staked everything on a yet to materialize strong showing in New Hampshire, pledged in a recent debate, not to sign any “silly pledges”, a not-so-veiled, but risky rebuff to the anti-tax Norquist Pledge not to support any measure that raises any taxes.  His credentials as a successful business executive, a popular two-term governor and as a Chinese-speaking diplomat are impressive.  His ability, thus far, to inspire any sustained following or to gain any traction among Republican voters has, however, been less impressive.

Given the pre-April 1st proportional allocation of delegates in the GOP nominating process, a decision on who will lead the Party seems a long way off.  That’s both a positive and a negative for the Republicans.  The seemingly endless energy, time and money the candidates are spending to diminish one another does little to advance the conservative cause.  The sooner the candidate cannibalization phase of the Republican selection process ends and the campaigns get back to attacking the policies that have lavished trillions on programs and initiatives that have produced shamefully few, if any, positive results, the sooner the electorate can focus on the alternatives available to them through the 2012 election.  For the sake of the nation, the sooner, the better.

We want to take this opportunity to express our appreciation to each and every one of you, and to let you know how much we appreciate your loyal readership and the time so many of you take to share your views and thoughts with us.  We hope this holiday season is filled with happiness and that the New Year is a time of renewal, good health and peace.

We’ll be back on January 8^th, 2012.  “See” you then.

With the GOP debates mercifully coming to an end, the nation is getting ready for the 2012 elections starting with the Iowa caucuses in January.  At this point, President Obama appears likely to face Mitt Romney (seemingly no one’s first choice within his own party), former Speaker Newt Gingrich who miraculously resurrected his once moribund campaign or Ron Paul whose libertarian views we highlighted in a prior essay.

Has either party been faithful to a consistent set of principles?  The Republicans frontrunners have fallen all over themselves in internecine warfare accusing each other (not without good reason) of flip‑flopping.  Meanwhile the President has escaped the spotlight on the issue of his own constancy of principle.  In point of fact, as the incumbent, he should be closely monitored on this subject since his principles can translate quickly into active government policy.

The criteria used for making appointments to Administration jobs might be a pretty good measure of presidential principle.  Given that Congress is totally dysfunctional, and that the single-digit approval rating our federal legislature has earned from the American people is overly generous, we might have expected the President to be particularly judicious in his appointments to the various executive branch positions that wield such influence in both domestic and foreign affairs.

While it is not unusual for Presidents to reward campaign donors with prestigious federal appointments, many Obama supporters expected better of this President. They were confident that Obama would be as repulsed as they were by the approximately 200 federal appointments of donors and bundlers Bush had made during his eight years in office. Not so.

According to I-Watch, the on-line publication of the non-partisan Center for Public Integrity, President Obama had, at the mid point of his first term, matched Bush’s eight-year record of doling out Administration jobs to donors and bundlers. Overall, 184 of 556, or about one-third of Obama bundlers or their spouses joined the administration in some role. But the percentages are much higher for the big-dollar bundlers. Nearly 80 percent of those who collected more than $500,000 for Obama took “key administration posts,” as defined by the White House. More than half the 24 ambassador nominees who were bundlers raised $500,000.

The big bundlers had broad access to the White House.  In all, during Obama’s first two years in office, campaign bundlers and their family members account for more than 3,000 White House meetings and visits. Half of them raised $200,000 or more.

Bundlers often have ties to companies that stand to gain financially from the president’s policy agenda, particularly in clean energy and telecommunications.  For example, Level 3 Communications quickly snared $13.8 million in stimulus money.

Two of the President’s top appointees found themselves at loggerheads just two weeks ago when Obama appointee, FDA Commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg was over-ruled by Obama appointed HHS Secretary Kathleen Sibelius.  Commissioner Hamburg approved, following two years of scientific study, making the Plan B One-Step pill available to all females of childbearing age without a prescription. Not so fast, said Secretary Sibelius to the delight of the pro-life movement.  So here we have a faceoff between two top Obama appointees, one taking a position strongly endorsed by the liberal pro-choice community, and the other exercising her veto power to over rule FDA Commissioner Hamburg, to the cheers of the conservative pro-life community. While we understand and are sympathetic to Secretary Sibelius’s position given that about 10% of girls are subject to pregnancy at age eleven, the President’s strongly stated approval of his HHS Secretary’s veto serves to temper his heretofore pro-choice image as the 2012 presidential campaign gets underway. Pro-choice women’s groups were steaming mad.

“We expected this kind of action from the Bush administration, so it’s doubly disheartening and unacceptable that this administration chose to follow this path,” said Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America. “We had a major opportunity to improve young women’s access to contraception, which is the best way to reduce the need for abortion, and the Obama administration missed the mark.”

Another example, perhaps the most hideous of them all, was the outright extortion of Boeing to restrict it from what should be its right to move some of its production to a right-to- work state.  The Wall Street Journal in its December 7th editorial put it quite succinctly:

“The damage here goes well beyond Boeing, which presumably understands the tradeoffs.  The NLRB is exposed as one more federal agency that can’t be trusted to make honest decisions.  The ability of the 21-right‑to‑work states, which passed such laws under the 1947 Taft‑Hartley Act, to attract businesses from pro‑union states will also be eroded.  The AFL‑CIO may cheer that message, but in practice the result is likely to be that more companies simply send jobs overseas where there’s no NLRB.  Congratulations.”

Even the National Park Service seems to have been enlisted in the president’s desire to play both sides of every controversy. When the police in most major US cities finally concluded, “enough is enough” and moved in to halt what was becoming a public health problem, Mayor Vincent Gray had local Washington, DC police evict “protestors” across from the District Building (city hall).

Lo and behold the next day, the protesters reappeared at, among other places, “Farragut Square” two blocks from the White House, having erected tents (which were almost completely unoccupied). The explanation given to city officials by the National Park Service was that this was federal land, which the city does not control. Several city council members do not believe that explanation and it is difficult for us to accept the explanation that the Park Service wasn’t co-opted for political purposes.

Interestingly the President has been on a campaign swing, which the White House has billed as an attempt to explain his jobs plan.  This bus tour is taking place in battleground southern states.  Apparently people in non‑battleground states don’t need Mr. Obama’s explanation.  We know that incumbents have the advantage of a bully pulpit, but traditionally it isn’t used solely to advance reelection prospects.

Policies that could not pass Congress have been enacted through expansion of the powers of several agencies.  The EPA, the NLRB, the FCC, and the FDA are all usurping the authority of the national legislature in unprecedented power grabs.

Mr. Obama in an effort to find a long‑term resolution to our ballooning debt appointed a bi‑partisan commission headed by former Senator Alan Simpson and Democrat Erskine Bowles.  The commission recommended a strong pro-growth plan, which included increased tax revenue and spending cuts.  Mr. Obama reviewed the report and never mentioned it again.

The whole tone of this peculiar election year and Mr. Obama’s behavior is best described in Dan Henninger’s December 8^th Wall Street Journal column.  He notes that the press described Mr. Obama’s speech in Osawatomie Kansas as “delivered by the President of the United States, but the person really delivering it was actually the [head of the] Democratic Party.”  Mr. Henninger also noted that:

The Osawatomie speech sounded like what you’d expect to hear in Caracas or Buenos Aires.  As in:  “The free market has never been a license to take whatever you can from whomever you can.

It is quite sad that our first African American leader, the man who hopefully would make race irrelevant in selecting our president, so personally appealing and so promising to many, who was going to bring us together once he took the reins of power, has proven to be just another ordinary politician.

Okay, perhaps a bit of a non sequitur.  But what Germany has and is fighting to instill in the rest of the Euro Zone, as a condition of any further assistance (bailouts) from the European Central Bank (ECB), is simply an ethic that equates hard work, respect for legal tender (a society’s currency) and sound fiscal policy with prosperity. It, essentially, is the ethic that once prevailed (but is rapidly fading) in America, and which had made America the greatest engine for wealth creation the world has ever known, and which was responsible for lifting countless millions here and abroad out of poverty.  It was known as American Exceptionalism.

It is fast disappearing here in America as a succession of administrations continues the drift toward European-style, welfare-oriented statism.  The fiscally responsible nations of Europe such as Germany, the Netherlands, Finland, Austria and, perhaps, Slovakia, have been overwhelmed by the spendthrifts that characterize so much of the Euro Zone.

The European Union with its single currency, the Euro, which 17 nations use (the Euro Zone), and which most of the other nations in the Union are committed to eventually use, has as its foundation a commitment to fiscal prudence that has been, and which probably will continue to be, ignored by various member states. The principle on which the Euro rested was that no member state would allow deficits to exceed 3% of GDP, nor would any member state allow debt to exceed 60% of GDP.  Of course some of the more profligate states have run deficits and debt that have been orders of magnitude beyond EU guidelines.  Now, the proverbial chickens have come home to roost.

Germany, along with the Finns and the Dutch, are, essentially, holding out for something that seems quite radical in much of Europe (and, sadly, much of the United States)…common sense.  Most of the left leaning EU members want to liquefy (monetize) their way out of the current crisis.  That’s the way economic policy wonks refer to having the ECB print enough Euros to buy up the new and old debt of the ailing countries of Europe.  Why worry about inflation, they ask, when there is no evidence of any.  That would be a perfectly fair question if there were a corresponding and enforceable commitment to prevent such out of control spending and debt from recurring in the future. Therein lies the rub.  There isn’t and, in our judgment, there won’t be. That is the Achilles heel of the entire EU.  The weak and fiscally irresponsible nations are entirely capable of bringing down the strong and responsible nations, and as currently constituted, major binding initiatives setting new rules must have unanimous consent.  That is as likely to happen as the Green Bay Packers losing the Super Bowl to a high school team.

Two views are emerging among the Euro Zone nations. The Germans, Finns and Dutch (with the Austrians and Slovaks possibly joining in) want enforceable requirements with stiff sanctions imposed on non-complying member states.  That will require amending the existing treaties and, given the resistance during the original treaty ratification process, the likelihood of securing approval of more stringent rules with penalties for violation would seem to be remote.  France’s Sarkozy has talked about the need to remake Europe, but will not agree to relinquish any sovereignty to Brussels, where the EU is headquartered and certainly not to Germany where the ECB is based.  We should note that while the ECB is headquartered in Frankfurt, it acts independently of any individual EU members.

Regardless of what the EU decides (the leaders of the member states will have met by the time this essay appears) the devil will be in the details, and it staggers the imagination to believe that unanimous consent to EU treaty changes will be forthcoming, especially if those changes require that a nation’s budget be approved by Brussels.   This is the central problem, which calls into doubt the future not just of the Euro but also of the EU.

Many EU members and most investors seem to want what has been dubbed “the Big Bazooka”, i.e. having the ECB go on a massive bond buying binge to detach the risk calculus from the cost of sovereign borrowing.  Some EU members want the IMF to step in to supplement ECB bond buying.  That, of course, would put the United States taxpayer on the hook for a significant piece of the European bailout (the US holds a 17% interest in the IMF).  In our view a second Marshall plan is unwarranted.

All of this would, of course, amount to a European version of “pretend and extend”. An unintended consequence of such a move might be that as interest costs decline because of the pseudo demand created by ECB bond buying, some of those investors who might be expected to buy European sovereign debt might, instead, choose to buy American Treasuries which would be considered a much safer haven.

Another idea being bandied about would be to create a new debt instrument called Euro Bonds. Purchasers of Euro Bonds would be investing in debt of the EU collectively rather than in the debt of any one nation.  Lots of luck with that suggestion. Germany and the other healthy member states would be the deep pockets standing behind such a debt offering, which would probably be illegal in Germany given recent decisions by the German high court.  There is simply no way Chancellor Angela Merkel will agree to such a move.

The ECB has a much more limited role than the American Federal Reserve.  Its job is to mitigate inflationary pressures, not to monetize debt.  Germany has both a work ethic and an historical memory that makes printing money to mitigate debt a truly repulsive alternative.  By contrast, our Fed has been given conflicting assignments by Congress.  To its historic role of maintaining stable prices, Congress added maintaining low unemployment.  We share the view that those roles conflict with one another.

Germany’s Merkel finds herself in a terribly unenviable position.  Germany is the EU’s greatest exporter and the EU is the greatest importer of German goods.  But she and the German people have etched into their collective psyches the lessons of the hyperinflation of the 1920’s Weimar Republic when massive printing of German marks rendered the currency all but worthless.  They also are keenly aware and, no doubt, proud that hard work, post-war sacrifice and the productivity of the German people have turned Germany into the economic powerhouse of Europe. They know that the massive rescue of Europe’s spendthrifts will only discourage the cultivation of a strong work ethic and a spirit of innovation by their neighbors to the south.  And they know that if, over the long term, the coming bailout fails it will be the German people who will suffer the most.  That’s a legacy Merkel doesn’t want and doesn’t deserve.

Given the pathetic response our own profligate leaders have displayed in the face of the current debt and deficit crisis, it is an ironic twist of history that the once “can do” spirit of our people (an intangible it is easier to feel than precisely to measure) that Tocqueville called American Exceptionalism, may find its last refuge in, of all places, Germany.

In all of the discussion about the failure of Congress to reach a deal to reduce our bloated deficit and the angry doctrinaire debate about fixing blame, we need to take into account that the nation now has two minority political parties.  Polls indicate that neither the Democrats nor the GOP has a favorability rating exceeding eleven percent.  That is a staggering and depressing fact.  Historians, economists and political scientists could write volumes on the ramifications of this on American democracy.  Our bet is that no one would conclude that it portends anything good.

Thus, in the short-term future does any party or philosophy hold the upper hand in the 2012 national elections?  Actually, as we see it, with such disregard, even disgust, with our politicians, it is the party that demonstrates it can get out of our private lives that will gain an upper hand.  Essentially it is a libertarian philosophy (albeit not the Libertarian Party) that seems to be most popular even though the only real self-declared libertarian in the race (Ron Paul) cannot seem personally to catch fire among the electorate.

As Mr. Paul stated it:  “Freedom is not defined by safety.  Freedom is defined by the ability of citizens to live without government interference.  Government cannot create a world without risks, nor would we really wish to live in such a fictional place.  Only a totalitarian society would even claim absolute safety as a worthy ideal, because it would require total state control over its citizens’ lives . . . If I want to wear my seatbelt then I will decide to do so.  I personally do because it is what I believe is the safer, and therefore for me, the right choice.  But, I do not believe by any stretch that it is the government’s place to make a law to tell me to do so.  I realize that dead people don’t pay taxes and they must keep their lines of taxpaying citizens full, but what happens to choice of lifestyle.  Let the gays marry, let the smokers smoke, let the people be the people they are instead of the people that you think they should be.  They, the people, will decide what is best for them, not some imaginary authority that mankind has created to help silence their fears”.

But Mr. Paul has tapped into a vein with which many citizens agree even if they don’t know him nor think of themselves as Libertarians.

Many people (we among them) were outraged by a story last week that postulated that some parents should lose custody of their children if their kids are “severely” obese. It is the growing “nanny-state” mentality that provides agency for prominent child obesity experts from the Harvard School of Public Health and Boston Children’s Hospital to opine in the Journal of the American Medical Association that state intervention can serve the best interest of extremely obese children, of which there are about 2 million across the United States.  Really?…remove up to two million children from their parent’s custody because the kids are too fat?

“In severe instances of childhood obesity, removal from the home may be justifiable, from a legal standpoint, because of imminent health risks and the parents’ chronic failure to address medical problems,” Dr. David Ludwig co-wrote with Lindsey Murtagh, a lawyer and researcher at Harvard’s School of Public Health.

We’re not insensitive to the issues of poor parenting, even when the consequences might affect the health of children within the family, but, with few exceptions, we believe these should be family issues, not government issues, at least not in America.  It, perhaps, would make more sense to exclude non-disease-caused obesity from Medicare, Medicaid and private insurance coverage than it would be to “remove children from their parent’s custody”.

And the notion that shopping habits can be monitored electronically seems another step down a slippery road, which can soon lead to more government interference.

On the right, anti-abortion politicians in Mississippi advocated, in a special referendum, that a fertilized egg that has not even yet reached the womb be defined as a human being, a measure the people of conservative Mississippi soundly rejected. And a candidate for the Republican nomination for President has taken the position that women who have been impregnated while being forcibly raped should be required to have the rapist’s child.

This is not to say that government cannot take a leadership role in influencing the thinking of our citizens on what, at one time, might have been the right to act according to his or her private philosophy (or biases).  It is, after all, the national government and the federal courts that took the lead role through the Fourteenth Amendment to incorporate the Bill of Rights to include actions of the States.  Without federal action some states might still enforce the odious Jim Crow laws by which some states and localities tried to reestablish the effects of slavery through an expansive interpretation of “states rights” by which segregation, denial of voting rights and other offensive actions became legal or where, in the case of lynching, the authorities looked the other way.

In 2011 it is hard to believe that the Congress of the United States couldn’t muster the guts or the votes to pass the Civil Rights Act until 1964 (a full century after the Civil War) or the Voting Rights Act until 1965.  Nevertheless, the post Civil Rights law era has brought with it a whole new way of thinking by previously oppressed minorities . . . a way of thinking that often causes some to see themselves as permanent victims.  Rather than earning their piece of the American Dream,  unlike the ancestors of others who did not arrive here in chains, some chose, instead, to rely totally on government action to get their piece of the Dream.  The rationale for this was to gain “equality” by making a fetish of the word “diversity.”

In many instances, diversity certainly has both been positive and long overdue, as, for instance, when barriers were eliminated in our Armed Forces, or when American industry and commercial enterprises began recruiting or advancing qualified personnel into management positions, or when companies saw that it was good for business to include minorities in advertising.  New opportunities opened when African-Americans became a significant part of the consumer market and companies began using black actors in their commercials because it simply made good common sense.

However, to too many Americans, “diversity” became a “rubric” to insist on a percentage of everything.  Even acknowledging the long-term effect upon students (often black or Hispanic) of the public schools they attend or the awful social and dangerous condition of neighborhoods in which they live, demands were and are being made to be hired for jobs where they do not have adequate training.  This has brought about huge social tension.   The left has seized on this issue as an opportunity to expand its political strength by expanding government action to include the absurd.  Although individually many of them are of little importance, consider a few mentioned by George Will in his November 24, 2011 Washington Post column

. . . This year President Obama cited [the example of] an Ohio restaurant [which] benefitted from funds received in the government’s bailout of Chrysler.  One week later the restaurant went out of business.

. . . In several states children’s lemonade stands were forcibly closed in a government crackdown against kids who tried to earn a few dollars without getting permission from bureaucrats obviously [seeking] the substantial taxpayer dollars they earn.

. . . and here is an anecdote too unbelievable to make Ripley’s believe it or not . . . Manning the ramparts on the wall of separation between church and state, a Seattle teacher required Easter eggs to be [referred to] as “spring spheres.”

As Mr. Will noted, “This is not a Golden Age” but, in quoting Randall Jarrell, he states:

“People who live in a Golden Age usually go around complaining how yellow everything looks.”

And so, like the old Dynasties of Europe, the strongmen of the Middle East, who held their respective nations in an iron grip for decades, if not generations, began to fall in a truly historic sweep of history.  The first to fall were the dictators of Tunisia, then Egypt, followed by Libya, with Syria’s Bashar al-Assad still hanging on by slaughtering his angry countrymen as they inch closer and closer to his center of power in Damascus.

Saudi Arabia, meanwhile is maneuvering like a whirling dervish, managing its own anti-monarchist militants, brokering a bloodless exit for Yemen’s president of 30+ years, Ali Abdullah Saleh, and propping up Bahrain’s tottering regime.

Yemeni dictator Saleh has agreed to step down in return for a promise not to be prosecuted.  Adding to the turmoil on the Arabian peninsula is the fact that key players in the opposition in Yemen, especially activists who had camped in downtown Sanaa and Taiz for months, are not happy with the accord that gives Saleh and close aides, including family members, immunity.

“We did not go out to the street and offer sacrifices so Saleh and his relatives are accorded immunity from legal pursuit,” said Fayez Ahmed, a 26-year-old demonstrator who had been camping at Sanaa’s Change Square for months. “We want the killers to be tried.”

Meanwhile, King Abdullah of Jordan last week helicoptered into Ramallah in an effort to reach some accommodation with the Palestinian Authority and Hamas.

This firmament has been poetically and a bit romantically dubbed the Arab Spring.  It calls forth a vision of hope and progress, and some commentators have concluded that the Arab world is at last experiencing a coming of age…a dash to modernity.  That’s a conclusion to which we’re not quite ready to jump.

In Tunisia, where the Arab Spring was born, a liberal, mostly secular and not very well organized protest movement hastily propelled the North African country into an election in which not very liberal, not very secular, and very well-organized Islamists prevailed, as the Islamic Ennahda Party grabbed 89 of the 217 seats in Tunisia’s new parliament.  While members of Ennahda campaigned with promises of moderation, their past pronouncements seem to promise anything but moderation, at least as we in the West would define moderation.

Rachid Ghannouchi, Ennahda’s founder and current leader, didn’t sound terribly moderate when he spoke out against America’s campaign to depose Saddam Hussein, “We must wage unceasing war against the Americans until they leave the land of Islam, or we will burn and destroy all their interests across the entire Islamic world,” he said at the time.

Regarding the long effort of the West to arrive at a two-state solution to the intractable Israeli-Palestinian conundrum, Ghannouchi was unambiguous.

“I think that the approach of Palestinian Islamists must be the liberation of Palestine from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea,” Ghannouchi said. “Any part that is liberated is a gain, provided the price is not the sale of the rest of Palestine. Palestine belongs to the Muslims and must be liberated in its entirety.”

Tunisia has had a long tradition of moderation, at least in its capital city of Tunis.  The North African nation has generally looked westward and the Islamists, as in Algeria, had been held at bay.  Those days may be over for now, and the young, mostly secular protestors who succeeded in chasing their ruthless President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali from power suddenly find themselves out in the cold following the elections they made possible.  The Islamists are disciplined, well organized and well positioned to use democratic elections to achieve power.  Once in control, the policies they will pursue are not apt to be to the liking of the young, liberal protestors who made their ascendancy possible, nor to the Western democracies, which have, for the most part, been spectators to the extraordinary events that have unfolded.

Islamic ascendancy is no less evident in Egypt, where young, liberal, mostly secular men and women succeeded, at great risk to themselves, in toppling the regime of Hosni Mubarak only to find the Muslim Brotherhood and the adherents of the even more conservative Salafis strain of Islam poised to dominate the upcoming elections.

The military, once the pride of the Egyptian people, have now incurred the wrath of the crowds packing Tahir Square.  The military council (SCAF) has been running the country ever since Mubarak’s downfall and has quietly assured Western nations that it will maintain close ties with the West, especially Washington, and that it will honor all commitments made by the Mubarak government, specifically the peace treaty with Israel.  But now SCAF itself seems to be hanging on for dear life.  The people in the Square have been calling for an immediate end to military rule, not in 2013 as promised by the military, not next year, but now.

The demonstrations in Tahrir Square have, however, led to the appointment of an interim Prime Minister, the once popular, Kamal el-Ganzouri, 78, but his long service and association with the old Mubarak regime has left the protestors unimpressed.,

Few doubt that the parliamentary elections, scheduled for this week, will be dominated by the well organized and well funded Muslim Brotherhood and, perhaps, the more fundamentalist Salafists who favor an Islamic state, with Sharia law, as soon as possible. The Brotherhood professes to embrace the separation of state and religion, but no one should expect a Jeffersonian Democracy to rise from the ashes of the still smoldering Mubarak dictatorship.   The Brotherhood speaks one way for western media consumption, but makes little effort to hide its agenda when talking to fellow Islamists.

Dr. Naguib Gabriel, a Coptic Christian and the head of the Egyptian Union of Human Rights Organization (EUHRO), warned of a pattern of persecutions against the Copts and their churches by the Brotherhood. After the overthrow of Mubarak the Muslim Brotherhood declared “ . . . it is impossible to build any new church in Egypt, and churches which are demolished should never be rebuilt, as well as no crosses over churches or bells to be rung.”

During the recent riots at the Israeli embassy in Cairo, members of the Brotherhood threatened to kill Israel’s ambassador to Cairo if he didn’t leave the country. The radical group had been leading daily protests at the Israeli embassy in Cairo, demanding the expulsion of the envoy and a break in relations between Egypt and Israel.  “Revolution,” cried out Muslim Brotherhood activists. “Revolution is stronger than the Zionist attackers. The entire Egyptian people are Hamas.”

The most recent revolution that initially had a promising outcome, insofar as Western interests are concerned, is Libya.  It is too early to tell what the government of Libya will look like once the various tribes whose members brought down Muammar Qaddafi have completed their inter-tribal bloodletting, and elections have taken place.  The interim government just appointed by Prime Minister Abdurrahim el-Keib was a surprise to many in the west and upsetting to many  Islamists.  President Mustafa Abdul Jalil had previously declared that Sharia law would form the basis of a new constitution.  So, already there are signs of tension with members of the National Transition Council who apparently are unhappy with el-Keib’s appointments, which reflect a pro-western leaning. “There are some people who do not accept some of the names,” a source, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters last week.

Prime Minister Abdurrahim el-Keib seems to have chosen western-style democracy for Libya by naming a cabinet of secularists, which, no doubt, has many prominent Libyan Islamists bristling.  We suspect they will not quietly ride off into the sunset.

Revolutions are always messy and never entirely predictable. Our own revolution was decidedly rare among such transformative movements because of that intangible quality with which the citizens of our new nation were imbued. Tocqueville called it American Exceptionalism.  The Enlightenment, which so informed the founders of the American experiment, is still an alien phenomenon in most of the Islamist world, and in its absence, narrow and ultra orthodox forces are alert and waiting to define the future. In summary, no one really knows how the dust will settle as seasons come and go and the Arab Spring morphs into whatever its historical reality will be.

    For very good and valid reasons, Americans understand the extraordinary importance of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the right peacefully to assemble for redress of  grievances.That, of course, is the rationale for the Occupy Wall Street (“OWS”) movement by which thousands of protestors are encamping in various public places around the country.

            Our courts recognize few exceptions for the placing of limits on this exercise of free speech and in fact have themselves studied the issue in cases unrelated to OWS.  Courts recently have been debating whether limits on speech enacted by legislative bodies are constitutional.  As an example, a law prohibiting candidates for public office from lying about their opponents’ voting records during campaigns is drawing judicial scrutiny as an unconstitutional prohibition on protected free speech.  This matter is a serious one and whether we agree or not with OWS protestors (or tea party assemblies) we need to treat the subject based on constitutional principles rather than our own political predilections.  So why have the authorities suddenly stirred themselves to action to clean out OWS sites?

For one thing authorities have suddenly recognized some very important public principles:

First, public facilities are being taken over for the benefit of a few people as part of their attempt to advance solely their cause.  Parkland in central cities is very scarce and has been misused by groups who pitch tents from end to end in these parks and prevent (and in some instances intimidate) ordinary citizens from using public land.  Often these tent cities are abandoned during the day while the occupiers leave and go about their regular lives (going to work, going home, attending entertainment venues, etc.)

Recently, there has been a major spike in violence including shootings.  In Oakland protestors succeeded in shutting down the ports, which are a major, job producer in that city.  According to the San Francisco Chronicle “OWS protestors gathered up for their general assembly meeting and withdrew a resolution calling for future demonstrations to remain peaceful.  A faction of the protest group has advocated violence as a ‘diversity in tactics’ approach to demonstrating.”  Deaths have occurred in other cities as well, including Burlington, Vermont.   Secondly, there is an important public health issue that has arisen.  Protestors have been overwhelming the sanitary facilities at nearby businesses, cleaning and relieving themselves at bathrooms not built for such volume.  Finally, city authorities who have appeared to be looking the other way see that they have to take action.

The Weekly Standard on November 5 noted, “[a real] occupation of Wall Street isn’t going to happen.  Instead, it is something under which the left marches.  For the left, all politics is about occupation.  One country, one class or one group takes from another.  Politics is seen as national warfare or class struggle, or one group grasping for advantages over some other.”

Moreover, Congressman Denny Rehberg summed it all up with an idea to respond to OWS with a call to liberate Wall Street.

“We’re over-taxed in small business, over-regulated, and over-litigated, and you can pick and choose which ones you want to address, but the government should be trying to lessen the tax burden, lessen the regulatory burden, and get the litigation out of the way,” Rehberg said.  More broadly, Liberate Main Street provides a rubric for a conservative agenda that contrasts with Occupy Wall Street.  It would be an agenda that works to foster opportunity, not envy; that seeks change through democratic processes, not mob pressure; that encourages enterprise, not resentment; that enlarges the sphere of personal and civic freedom, not big government; that liberates Americans’ energies, rather than pandering to their weaknesses; that acts to fix Wall Street’s problems, not to demonize American business.”

That violence has been on the agenda of elements within the OWS movement from the get-go is really no longer debatable.  Ironically, the right peaceably to assemble is being compromised by those who want to turn thoughtful assembly into aimless mockery and occasional violence not just because of Wall Street, but also in support of every demand on every radical wish list from abolishment of all debt to the end of capitalism, corporations and government itself. Throw in a cheering section here and there for Chavez, Castro, and a sprinkling of crude anti-Semitism, and you have a movement that isn’t a movement at all, but rather a grand gripe conclave where those with real concerns and legitimate grievances are elbowed aside by those with agendas that serve no constructive purpose.

The time has come for law-abiding people of the left and the right to prevent peaceful assembly from being hijacked.  Police, as happened in New York, cannot standby and look the other way.  Finally, on November 15^th, the Bloomberg administration stirred itself and closed Zuccotti Park (itself not a public park) because of the threat of violence and serious concern over public health.

We frequently write about American Exceptionalism by which we mean the unique opportunity our citizens have to legitimately pursue their dreams free from interference by government.  This kind of opportunity cannot exist without the rule of law, which in the case of America is grounded in our Constitution, the centerpiece of which is the Bill of Rights.  If we Americans want to maintain and protect our Bill of Rights  (from which our right to peacefully assemble derives), all citizens must respect and vigorously support law enforcement that protects both the rights of the assembled as well as the rights of the communities in which these assemblages take place.