Tribalist/Conservative Watch #2

Today, the Barrie Examiner reported that Ontario’s Progressive Conservative Party leader, John Tory, was in Barrie on Saturday. He made the following comment, among others, which I submit for your interpretation:

The McGuinty government isn’t making it very attractive to do business in Barrie…

This implies that, according to conservative ideology, government should pass laws or spend money in an attempt to encourage persons to open/keep businesses in a given community. In other words: according to conservative ideology, the government should centrally plan the economy. This, incidentally, is one of the reasons why you will hear John Tory use the weasel term “free enterprise” (which simply refers to private businesses operating within a centrally planned economy) but not the term “free market” (which refers to a market that is not centrally planned, but shaped by the production and consumption choices of individuals).

The advocate of a free market complains not that the government has not made things “more attractive” to business, but that the government has not “eliminated legal disincentives” to business.

ADDENDUM:

One might ask: “Well, surely the same can be said about the Liberals, so why aren’t you picking on them?”

My answer is: Ontario liberals are openly socialist/corporativist/collectivist.  They’re not trying to fool anyone about their ideology.  In contrast, the conservatives – who likewise are socialists/corporativists/collectivists – try to win the support of capitalists and individualists by using weasel words and by condemning the liberals for being opposed to tax or spending cuts.  Yet, all the while, its a matter of documented fact that the conservatives have raised, not lowered taxes, and have increased government involvement in non-governmental things (like health care), not decreased it.  As a result of this dishonesty and political cross-dressing, the conservatives have achieved three main things:

1. people have been deceived into believing that they are at the “right” end of the political spectrum, even though that is false;

2. the size and existence of the conservatives’ parties have ensured that voters have two choices: socialism/corporatism/collectivism dressed up in red, or socialism/corporatism/collectivism dressed up in blue.

and

3. people have come to associate the word “conservative” with: dishonest, bait-and-switch, say-one-thing-and-do-the-oppositism; with “secret agendas”.

If Ontario voters are going to have the ability to vote for a sizable party that is not socialist/corporativist/collectivist, the the socialist/corporatist/collectivist party that pretends to be a capitalist/individualist party must be exposed as what it really is: pro-socialism, pro-corporatism, pro-collectivism, and willing to falsely claim to be capitalist/individualist in order to ensure that no actual party of capitalism/individualism is believed to be necessary.

Tribalist/Conservative Watch

As reported by Canadian Press, just the latest bit of tribalist ideology from the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario:

Critics say the McGuinty government has done little beyond giving lip service to the issue. Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory said the initiatives so far are just the “bare minimum to look like they’re acting.”

That would create thousands and thousands of jobs and produce hundreds and hundreds of millions in revenue that could be applied to a whole variety of things,” he said. “They’re doing none of that.”

That’s right folks. According to conservatives in Ontario, the purpose of a strong economy is: to raise more revenue for the government to seize and spend on “a whole variety of things”.

Tribalist/Conservative Q&A

Q. Isn’t the improvement of my own standard of living the purpose of improving my own income?

A. Don’t be silly. The purpose of improving your productivity and income is to give the government more money with which to buy your vote.

Q. Don’t I try to earn more partly to secure myself a fund for rainy days?

A. Nope. Taking care of you in bad times is the government’s job.

Q. Don’t I try to earn more so as to pursue my own happiness?

A. How can you think about your own happiness when others are in discomfort?!

All of which self-serving altruism brings to memory this excerpt from Ayn Rand’s “What is Capitalism?” (the first essay in her book Capitalism, the Unknown Ideal):

Now consider the alternative – the tribal society, where all men throw their efforts, values, ambitions, and goals into a tribal pool or common pot, then wait hungrily at its rim, while the leader of a clique of cooks stirs it with a bayonet in one hand and a blank check on all their lives in the other.

…to be continued…and continued…and continued…

Government Employment and Hand-outs

A facebook friend asked me:

What is your view on accepting governmental jobs outside the sphere of what a small state would comprise of, for example worikng as a teacher in highschool or as a nurse or doctor?

On a realted issue: what is your view on using government funded services or accepting subsidies one’s “entitled” to?

I responded as follows:

With respect to your first question:

If not considered carefully, your question might be considered as one that assumes a host of unstated facts. And, if one is not careful, ones answer to your question might wrongly be determined by the unstated assumptions, rather than by the stated facts.

Two unstated assumptions seem likely to be made by a person considering your question:

1. that the government is funded in an immoral way (e.g., with income taxes); and/or
2. that the government has a monopoly on the services in question (or has set itself up with laws that give it an advantage via coercion).

If you assume either of those while considering your question, you will be more likely to conclude that working for a government as a teacher, nurse, or doctor would be wrong. Note, however, that the real issue there is not “jobs outside the sphere of what a small state would comprise” but: evil government funding, or evil protectionism/monopoly.

To properly answer the question you do ask, therefore, be careful not to make assumptions such as 1 and 2. Instead, assume:

1. that the government is not funded immorally (e.g., it is funded voluntarily); and
2. that the government has no legislated monopoly or protection with respect to its educational and medical services.

The issue then becomes clear: is it wrong to work for such a government as a teacher, nurse, or doctor? Clearly, the answer is: “no”. If nobody is forced to pay for the government’s educational or medical services, and if everyone is free to compete with the government’s educational and medical services, then there is nothing morally wrong in the government offering such services, and there is nothing morally wrong in accepting employment from the government in respect of those services.

If, instead of just answering the question you actually asked, we assume that the government is funded immorally (e.g., with income taxes), then the issue is not really “jobs outside the sphere of what a small state would comprise”. Rather, if one assumes immoral funding, the issue is: should one accept any form of employment from a government that is funded immorally (e.g., should one accept employment from such a government even in the role of police officer or warden?).

Similarly, if instead of just answering the question you actually asked, we assume that the government has passed laws that give it a monopoly on health care (as is the case in Ontario), then the issue is not “jobs outside the sphere of what a small state would comprise”, per se. Rather, the issue is: should a person accept employment with an employer that holds an immoral monopoly? Consider as an example whether, in that situation, it is moral to accept a government job as a police officer when your job might require you to arrest the owners of private (i.e., illegal) health clinics. Does the fact that policing is inside “the sphere of what a small state would comprise” make it morally right to accept the policing job, but morally wrong to accept a job as a doctor in the government’s health care monopoly?

Finally, consider that not all legislated monopolies are government-owned. That includes doctors, lawyers, trades, etc., each of which has a guild and a monopoly: a non-lawyer cannot do most legal work; a non-member of a college of physicians cannot do most medical work; et cetera. Thus, the issue of whether the employer is a government is a red herring if what you really want to know is the morality of working for an employer that has an immoral and state-imposed monopoly.

In short, it is very important not to confuse the issue raised in your question by making such unstated assumptions. If, on the other hand, your question was mis-stated; if what you really intended to ask was a question not about “jobs outside the sphere of what a small state would comprise”, but about working for an immorally-funded government, or for an immoral monopoly, then you should re-formulate your question.

With respect to your second question:

If you pay taxes, use those tax-funded government services and take every penny the government will give you. Imagine that it is your birthday, and you are visited by the neighbourhood crook, who we’ll call Tony Soprano. Soprano obtained all of his money by stealing it from others, including yourself. Tony hands you a $100 bill and says “happy birthday”. Assuming that he has stolen at least $100.00 from you in the past, is it immoral for you to accept the money? Answer: no. If, on the other hand, Tony has never stolen from you, it would be immoral to accept the money (unless your intention is to return it to the people/person from whom the money was stolen). Unfortunately, it is unlikely in the extreme that you are not a Tony Soprano victim (i.e., a taxpayer) and, accordingly, it is very unlikely that it would be immoral for you to use government services or take government hand-outs.

Regards,

Paul McKeever

John Tory's Bait & Switch for Gullible Right-Wingers

Realizing that he’s got problems in his own party – those in it who want smaller government and reduced taxes are looking to leave his party – party leader John Tory has resorted to posing as a Harrisite, without actually proposing anything in particular.

In the Toronto Star’s editorial today – laughably titled “Tory Turns to the Right” – the Star reports that Tory yesterday gave a post-budget speech to the Economic Club of Toronto:

Tory’s solutions are right out of the Mike Harris hymnal: Cut taxes and allow “businesses and families to keep more of their own money.” Shrink regulations. And take a hard look at the number of civil servants who are making big salaries and “breathing each other’s exhaust.

Which taxes exactly? Silence.

How much? Silence.

Which civil servants should be canned? Silence.

How much should spending on the civil service be reduced? Silence.

Thankfully, the Toronto Star was keen enough to notice that Tory’s words on tax cuts and spending cuts are of the “Here I sit, broken hearted, paid and dime and only farted” nature:

Tory didn’t help his case by dodging reporters’ questions about what services he would cut to pay for tax breaks. Instead, he criticized the Liberal government for not looking for unspecified “efficiencies” and “waste.” He also suggested McGuinty could have slowed down “other initiatives” to fund tax cuts, although he did not spell out which ones.

Ah yes, “finding efficiencies”, “reducing waste”, “tightening the belt”, yada yada yada. The same schtick he delivered leading up to the election of 2007…and the same one he’ll continue to deliver, because he is actually a defender of Ontario’s health insurance monopoly, a defender of tax-funded government-owned/operated schools, and a defender of Ontario’s various welfare programs. He’s repeatedly said that keeping those programs well-funded takes priority, even if that means raising taxes.

Tory’s real aim is to make it LOOK as though he’s turned hard right so as to shore up support within his party.

He has absolutely no plan to deliver tax cuts or spending cuts of any significant nature or extent. Mark my words. He’s just desperate.

Burn Your PC Membership Card: PCs Give Up Fighting for Tax Cuts

The Ottawa Citizen’s Lee Greenberg today reports that Ontario’s Progressive Conservatives won’t be fighting for tax cuts. Party leader John Tory lacking a seat in the legislature, acting Opposition leader Bob Runciman had this to say:

The reality of the situation is that most of the stakeholders seemed to have rolled over on this, even the ones who were complaining loudly prior to the budget — whether the Canadian Manufacturers (and Exporters), the (Ontario) Chamber of Commerce…

…What’s the point of continuing on this, especially when the people who are most impacted have sort of waved the white flag?

Subtext: the Progressive Conservative party follows the polls, not principles. And, even then, it really only polls interest groups, not individuals: if the Chamber of Commerce doesn’t want tax cuts, but you do, too bad.

Now, for those wondering what to do with their Progressive Conservative membership card, a helpful hint. For those with more flair, here’s another way. (And, please, if you do either, video it and put it on youtube).

P.S.: Freedom Party memberships are $10. Just sign an application and send it in with your $10 and, voila, you’re a member.

A Capitalist's Guide to Ontario's Budget

REVENUES (Billions)

Income/Property Taxes:

• Personal Income Tax $25.2
• Corporations Tax: $12.3
• Employer Health Tax: $4.8
• Ontario Health Premium: $2.8
• TOTAL: $45.1

Retail Sales Tax (8%): $17.2
Gasoline and Fuel Taxes: $3.1
Other Taxes: $3.5

KEY EXPENSES (Billions):

Government Health Insurance Monopoly $40.4
Tax-funded, government-owned/operated schools: $13.1
Post-secondary education/training: $6.2
Welfare of various sorts: $11.8
“Other Programs”: $11.9
…oh yeah, we almost forgot “Justice”: $3.7

ANALYSIS

It doesn’t take a genius to see that all but about $3.7B of the Ontario budget is spent on wealth redistribution schemes (and that’s all they are: it’s not as though health care or education services would disappear were the government to allow people to pay for them directly from the service providers).

Key considerations: notice the total of revenue that is taken in the form of income taxes ($45.1B). Note that income taxes – unlike retail sales taxes – can be imposed with progressive rates (i.e., with an income tax, the rate can be made to increase with the person’s income). Finally, note that health and post-secondary education are funded by an amount almost equal to the total of all income taxes.

Now ask yourself two questions:

1. Should I be free to purchase whichever health insurance plan suits my wants and budget?

2. Should I be forced to pay for my neighbour’s child’s Bachelor of Arts degree in sociology (minor in Soviet film studies)?

If your answers to these questions are 1. Yes, and 2. No, then it should be obvious to you that Ontario could eliminate income taxes without running a deficit…thus joining Texas, Florida, Alaska, Nevada and 3 other U.S. states that do not tax income.

The Conservatives' Disingenuous Calls For Tax Cuts

A three word phrase best describes the words of Canadian federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, and those of Ontario provincial Progressive Conservative Party leader John Tory, concerning the absence of tax cuts in Ontario’s 2008 budget (released today): Blah blah blah. To say more would be a waste of oxygen, for the simple reason that: neither man means what he has said.

Consider, as exhibit A, today’s Toronto Star editorial, which provided some criticism utterly lacking in papers that boost the federal Tories (notably, today, the National Post and the various SunMedia papers):

Flaherty was free with his advice on the revenue side of the ledger – cut corporate taxes – but not at all forthcoming on how to make up for the lost revenue, which would run in the billions of dollars.

At first, Flaherty retreated to the supply-side mantra that “tax cuts pay for themselves.” When a reporter suggested his recommended tax cuts would lead to lower revenues, Flaherty said: “Of course, that’s not so.” He predicted revenues would rise as the rates were cut.

But in response to a more direct question about where he would reduce spending to offset the tax cuts and keep the budget balanced, Flaherty simply ducked: “I’m not going to substitute my opinion for his (McGuinty’s) opinion,” he said. “That’s why (he’s) premier.”

When a government with a more-or-less balanced budget cuts taxes but does not cut spending, it runs a deficit (i.e., it adds to the debt), which is just another way of saying that it doesn’t cut taxes at all. Instead, it merely shifts them onto the shoulders of future taxpayers. To advocate tax cuts without also advocating spending cuts is tantamount to demanding not a tax cut, but a tax delay (at the cost of increased borrowing).

Even more compelling evidence of the disingenuousness of conservatives’ calls for tax cuts are the words of Mr. Tory. In response to the budget today, he gave a four-page speech in which he concluded, in part:

Ontario has all the right stuff to be on top, to be a leader again. All that’s lacking is a government which gets it. A Premier who understands that you need a strong private sector job creation to pay for public services. (emphasis added)

This isn’t a comment taken out of context. Tory has gone on the record again, and again, and again, making it clear that maintaining Ontario’s “social programs” – i.e., the big three: government monopoly on health care (which represents 46% of program spending), tax-funded government-owned schools, and welfare – is his top priority. Using the socialist conservatives’ favourite weasel-words, “free enterprise” (words carefully chosen not to imply “free markets”), Tory has also explained on TV Ontario’s “The Agenda” program, and elsewhere, that his philosophy – and that of the Progressive Conservative Party – is that the purpose of “free enterprise” is to pay for government’s social programs. Well, look: if his first priority is to preserve spending levels, he cannot possibly want a tax cut. This is just posturing.

If there be any doubt left in your mind, consider this bit of hypocrisy: Tory is on the record as refusing to promise not to raise taxes, especially where raising taxes is necessary to preserve social programs (see, for example, the same episode of “The Agenda”, in which he made these remarks).

None of this has stopped Tory from exhuming this old nut:

…the Liberals are “locked in a tax-and-spend” spiral.

Tory neglected to add that he really has no objection of substance to said spiral.

All of this begs the exhumation of yet another nugget. All together now: “Liberal, Tory, same old story”.

"Right Wing" Reality Check

For those who insist on deluding themselves by saying that Ontario’s “Progressive Conservative” party (you know, the one that introduced rent controls, a ban on private health insurance, the provincial income tax, etc.) is “right wing”, “centre right”, “right of the liberals” – or that it is the right party to support if you are pro-free-market/pro-capitalism – here’s more evidence to the contrary straight from the lips of party leader John Tory, as reported in today’s Cornwall Standard Freeholder:

Our party has been steadfast and unanimous in saying that (supply management) is a system that is working for the farmers, it’s working for Canada, and we should just leave it alone.

and

We should be more concerned with the fact that we’re importing Chinese apples, and who knows what kinds of pesticides have been used to grow them there, when we have perfectly safe gown apples here in Ontario.

The most that can honestly be said about the differences between the Liberals and the PCs is that the PCs use socialism as a justification for handing out grants, loans, market protection, and special status to certain alleged nobles in society…all of whose wealth and privilege depend upon regulation of – not freedom of – the market. The Liberals, in contrast, regard a socialist system as the ideal. In short: PCs view socialism as a means to a dishonest and corrupt end, whereas Liberals view socialism as a means to a dishonest and corrupt end.

Objectivist "Political Views" Finally Arrive on FaceBook

Heads up everyone (especially if you are on facebook.com).

A few weeks ago (or is it months now), I wrote to facebook.com and asked that it consider dispensing with the pull-down menu in the “Political Views” field of its member profiles. It allowed things like “Conservative”, “Liberal”, “Very Liberal”, and “Libertarian”, but did not allow Objectivist responses. I suggested, as one of a couple of options, allowing people just to type-in what their political views are.

Good news. I don’t know WHEN it happened, but it appears that it is now possible to TYPE-IN your political views on FaceBook (instead of picking them from a pull-down menu).

I would encourage Objectivists to use the word “Objectivist”, rather than “Capitalist” for one reason: so that people know WHY you support capitalism (i.e., so they do not confuse your metaphysics, epistemology, or ethics to be mystical, irrational, or altruistic, respectively). Let people know that you are impliedly a capitalist because you are committed to the facts of reality, to reason as man’s only tool for obtaining knowledge, to rational egoism as man’s proper ethics, to consent as the requirement for all human interactions, and to capitalism as the only socio-economic system compatible with those commitments.

Cheers,

PM

Environmentalism's Attack on Reason, Individualism & Capitalism

Climate change environmentalists deny that they are motivated by their well-documented opposition to capitalism. Question their motives, and you will often find yourself accused of being ignorant, of being on the take, of being like a Nazi, or of being a criminal.

Fortunately, it is not necessary to question their motives. To know what they would do to society, one needs simply to understand the essential nature of their arguments for restricting or banning the use of technology.

To light a fire, decontaminate water, erect a shelter, bake a birthday cake, or build machines that increase human productivity and broaden human opportunities, requires humans to act in accordance with the facts of nature. To do so requires that someone achieves knowledge of those facts. Only rational thought – a strictly logical process of thought about that for which there ultimately is physical evidence – makes it possible for human being to obtain knowledge of the facts of nature. A belief not supported by physical evidence, or not resulting from ones own rational process of thought, is not knowledge.

All knowledge is the result of rational thought, but not all rational thought results in knowledge. Novel observations and the discovery of new evidence sometimes change the logical mind’s conclusions: what was originally thought to be knowledge may prove eventually to be false belief. That is why scientists never conclude further inquiry is unwarranted. However, the fact that a lack of the appropriate data – or the fact that a lack of knowledge has led someone to consider immaterial facts or irrelevant evidence – does not change the fact that knowledge cannot be achieved except by rational thought.

Those at the forefront of efforts to have the government fight “climate change” ultimately take issue with that assertion. They tell us that, because rational thought sometimes leads us to erroneous conclusions, rationality is dispensable, worthless, or even harmful. Knowledge of the facts of nature, they erroneously or falsely imply, can and should be obtained with faith, consensus, or illogic.

In 2005, Green Party of Canada leader Elizabeth May gave a speech which began with a quote from Bertrand Russell: “Ever since Adam ate the apple, man has refrained from no folly of which he was capable…”. She lamented that, since the commencement of the industrial revolution, humans have “…taken the life-giving, life-creating, life-nurturing systems of Planet Earth and pushed them into reverse.” Making it clear that she believes the Garden of Eden actually to have existed – she, for example, refers to the “location of the Garden of Eden” – she concluded with a hope that “we can re-write Russell’s History of the World to say that humanity rejected folly and that we returned to the Garden”. Taken to its logical conclusion, May’s message is a demand for an anti-human atrocity. Her belief, founded on faith, is that the fruit of rationality – knowledge – leads us always to sin, so we must outlaw productive thought and action, return to a state of naked ignorance, and have a supernatural being provide for us when, where, how, and to the extent that he wants to.

With his foundation’s website, geneticist turned CBC TV personality David Suzuki spreads the falsehood that the “…Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is universally recognized as the world’s most authoritative voice on the science of climate change” (emphasis added). You will not find scientific reports on Suzuki’s web site, but you will see lots of talk about “consensus” that man’s use of technology is causing catastrophic global warming. Suzuki’s implicit message is that a belief is knowledge if an alleged majority of allegedly credentialed people say so. Galileo and Einstein would undoubtedly beg to differ.

In his self-promotional flick “An Inconvenient Truth” Al Gore points to a genuine historical correlation between changes in global temperature and changes in CO2 levels. He implies that changes in CO2 drove the temperature changes with which they were correlated. At least, this is a logical fallacy, because correlation does not prove causation. At worst, it is a lie, because the data he claims to have presented to over 1000 audiences actually shows CO2 levels to change hundreds or thousands of years after the temperature changes with which they are correlated. Encouraging us to accept logical fallacy or plain lies as a means of obtaining knowledge, he is discouraging rationality.

The victims and foot soldiers of Hume, Kant and Hegel frequently can be heard to say “We have to cut CO2 emissions because we simply cannot risk the possibility of a man-made CO2 global warming catastrophe in the future”. To those who deny the possibility of knowledge – or who are too lazy to achieve it – rationality is no virtue. In a misguided attempt to avoid perishing in the distant future, such people would have us all chop off our heads in the present.

The west’s standard of living is highest precisely because western governments have done a better (though hardly good) job of shielding individuals from such irrationality; of ensuring that people are free to conduct themselves rationally and productively, hence consistently with the facts of nature. Western governments have better defended every individual’s control over their own life, liberty and property. To that end, they have also been better at separating irrationality and state.

When a government succeeds in defending rational conduct from irrational restrictions of individual freedom, the result is a capitalist society: a wealthy and happy society in which trade is governed solely by consent. When a government founds its decisions on faith, alleged consensus, or logical fallacy, it merges irrationality and state, fails to defend rational conduct, and undermines every individual’s ability to live and pursue their own happiness. The political result is a collectivist society: a society condemned to rationing, misery and premature death, in which trade is governed not by consent, but by coercion.

It makes no difference whether May, Suzuki, Gore and the others are consciously anti-capitalists, or whether they are simply well-intentioned irrationalists because their expressed or implied disregard or hatred for rationality necessarily implies a condemnation of capitalism and an endorsement of collectivism. However, more fundamentally, their assault on rationality implies a condemnation of human life; of life that depends upon rationality. To the extent that our governments appease these Romantic Savages of the Endarkenment, humanity’s survival on this earth is imperiled.

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