Here’s a letter that I just sent to WTOP radio, here in the D.C. area:
I forget the name of the guest you interviewed earlier today who, praising last-night’s speech by President Obama on health-care, described Mr. Obama as being “a courageous leader.”
Please contact your guest and ask her to read the editorial in today’s Washington Post entitled “Slashing Tires” – and in particular its opening lines: “President Obama has maintained a conspicuous ambiguity about trade policy, sympathetically absorbing and sometimes restating the arguments both for and against free trade but not really committing himself on any particular issue.”
The Post describes here a man neither courageous nor leading-the-way but, rather, a standard-issue politician – which is to say, a shark as duplicitous as he is pompous, and as skilled at fraud and flattery as he is hungry for power and glory.
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
l cannot for the life of me understand the appeal that politicians have for many people. Nearly all successful politicians — approximately 999 out of every 999.00001 of them — strike me as being, at the very best, buffoons. Through less-romantic lenses they are accurately seen to be shameless ego-maniacs driven by gluttony for power and celebrity status.
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“A professional politician is a professionally dishonorable man. In order to get anywhere near high office he has to make so many compromises and submit to so many humiliations that he becomes indistinguishable from a streetwalker.” – H.L. Mencken
Yes — but with this very important difference: the streetwalker gives value in return to all who are affected by her activities.
Which one offers the worst infection?
Amen to that.
Americans love to romanticist about politics. Liberals love FDR and viciously attack anyone that says a bad word about him. Conservatives do the same for Ronnie.
I don’t get it. They are just men/women and are subject to the same temptations as all other men. I wouldn’t say they are buffoons per se, but just subject to different incentives that leads many to think they are just idiots. Although some really are idiots (see Pelosi, Reid, most the the Dems in the Senate and those Cons that keep getting caught having affairs)
Professor Boudreaux:
You are being far too kind in your analysis of the character of politicians. They are much worse than you describe.
I wonder, what is your analysis of government itself?
There will always be amoral individuals, nobody can change that.
However, the system (democracy) that enables this filth to rise to the top, can be changed.
To what?
A constitutional republic would be nice. You know, that thing the Founders wanted to create in order to protect us from democracy.
Constitutional republic got us where we are today vikingvista.
I think this solution is better:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_Junta_of_Chile_(1973)
How?… By a vote??
Yes, by the votes of the well-to-do and landowning men.
white, British, hetero, Christian men, with blond hair and blue eyes… Oh, maybe just citizens… Although, it would be NICE if those who vote and promote economic policy could demonstrate a basic understanding of marginal utility.
Just like many people buying big SUVs to “feel safe”, many are looking for “a courageous leader”, even though neither will save you if you don’t know how to drive, and often quite opposite – increase your chances of being in a wreck…
Marge: “Ooooh! I’ve lost them! I can’t see past all the SUVs!”
Homer: “Don’t worry about the SUVs – there a gentle curve up ahead!”
SUV Owners rolling over gentle curve: “ARRRGHGHGHGHWAHWAHWAHA!!!!”
Why does Mr. Boudreaux give sanction to Chinese officals that erect ever changing non-tariff barriers that are so effective? This is a de-facto manipulation of the beleivers in free trade–I will not buy his party line. The tire issue is pocket lint in comparison to goods and services blocked by Non-Tariff Barriers. Where is the commentary and letters that address these barriers? Are these barriers to complex and nonclassical to warrant even lip service?
When you say “effective”, what do you mean? It seems that your argument rests on that definition.
I can’t buy Seekingexports argument and refusal to answer Don, until he answers the classical question of, “Exactly where in the post above do we see the word Tariff used by Don or in the quote of the letter writer he criticizes”?I see the words Trade Policy which would seem to cover Seekingexports complaint.
I was thinking along the same lines the other day while encouraging my niece about her decision to go to law school. What I wanted to do was warn her that she was in danger of becoming a politician, but instead I just congratulated her. Its just so deeply embedded in the culture that even I had no choice but to congratulate her. The only solution that I can see maybe working is to press on with a campaign of disrespect. If disrespect for political behavior grows, we may reach a day when the announcement that someone we know wants to be a lawyer, teacher, soldier, or police officer (i.e., political conduits) would be met with the same reservations now met by someone announcing a desire to enter the priesthood.
The Military is not a domestic political conduit. The current design of the military keeps it from influencing domestic policy. The Joint Chiefs of Staff have no troop movement authority. That has been separated from them to keep them from taking over the government. What makes this funny that as a Military Officer I have taken an Oath to defend the constitution from all enemies foreign and domestic. I think we lost this battle during the civil war and now we may never get away from a strong centralized government. If the government was scared of the militia that would overthrow it if they strayed from the constitution then it would make sense. A strong centralized military is just a suspect. I love the military but I do struggle with the weight that it puts on my heart, since we have strayed so far from our founding. You made a great point Randy that many of our youth don’t fully understand.
DCE,
I’m retired USAF enlisted, so I feel a strong sense of kinship when it comes to the military, and I hear you when you say that “the military is not a domestic political conduit”. I realize that this is a sentiment quite widely believed within the military, but to which I must point out the fact that the military is a whore. When Eisenhower warned of the dangers of a military-industrial complex he missed the big picture. What we really have is a political, legal, educational, corporational, complex which thrives under the umbrella of protection provided by a massive military organization which profits in return for its compliance. How can liberty survive in the face of this? It can’t.
I can see your point but I don’t see that any politician has very much control of the military as I stated previously. I still hold that the domestic policy is not shaped by threat of the military. I think the department of justice, FBI etc… was created to fill this role. It is under the executive branch of the government, and is much easier to control. Most new weapon systems are not wholly under a few established companies as before, and many foreign companies are now providing weapons as well. I think this argument is far to simplified. Also Obama wanting to form a Civilian Security unit that is as strong as the military also shows that the current regime is looking to centralize more power. I don’t think you will see the military used against civilians again. It doesn’t really matter since I agree with your outcome. Great debate that needs further exploration.
”l cannot for the life of me understand the appeal that politicians”
I think it has something to do with an evolutionary need for a leader they can invest their communal identity in. Hayek thought many of humanities destructive tendencies are left over biological adaptations from a tribal/extended family kind society. That we have now abandoned for civilisation. Of course these instincts will not go away. We are all primitive in our genes. Which is one of the reasons the threat to the extended order is ever present, whatever ism it happens to be embodied in in the moment.
Your name tag helps to give two answers:
1. In the free market the leaders are those who are the most highly productive and therefore hold the highest positions in the economy. People who are near the bottom follow and admire those who are near the top because of their productive skills and wealth creation abilities.
2. Thomas Malthus’ Social Contract reasonably theorises the power hierarchy occurs from the weak who ally themselves with the strong and exchange their freedom for protection from other strong people.
Don, Don!
Obama is not caught up in ideologies, he is pragmatic! Principles are for jerks! They are so limiting, uncreative, dogmatic, and fundamentalist. Silly rabbit!
I wish I could remember who it was that said “politicians are high functioning sociopaths”.
Hah, I googled the two terms and came up with 17,600 hits.
I suggest that a 200,000 year history of hard survival has built-in many behaviors into mankind. There is a strong bias toward following a popular leader and believing the leaders of one’s own group over everything else.I blame evolution.