8/7/2019 Lets Have Some Real Change for a Change

1/4

Let's Have Some Real Change for a Change

For decades, contemporary liberals have stopped conservatives dead in their tracks by claimingownership of the moral high ground. The liberals are the self-declared defenders of the children,

the poor, the infirmed, the handicapped, the aged. They want to give a hand up to the unfortunate

and the victims of discrimination and greed. Liberals will change the era where the rich andpowerful exploited the weak and powerless and give them hope. To oppose such lofty goals is to

be stingy, greedy, corrupt, and just plain mean. And that is how they present conservatives and

Republicans to the voters.

It works because many conservatives have accepted the premises that greed is bad and that

society has a moral obligation to help the children, et al. Then they proceed to counter the

liberals' political programs by arguing that liberals need to temper their idealism with fiscalresponsibility and recognize that they could wreck the engine of prosperity by excessive taxation

and deficit spending. They also argue that too much paternalism will destroy individual

incentives to work hard and create taxable wealth. In other words, they concede that the liberals

own the moral high ground but argue that they need to be practical.

The left will always own the high ground under these circumstances and the political battles willcontinue to be fought only over how to keep from killing the goose that lays golden eggs.

The Christian right argues that life, liberty and pursuit of happiness are God given rights

recognized in the Declaration of Independence and because they come from God those rightshave moral superiority over others. These rights include the exclusive right to the fruits of one's

labors. However, their arguments are inconsistent with the religious ethics of self-sacrifice and

selflessness, to which many Christians subscribe and which should make them eager to supportaltruistic government programs. And the notion that property rights is a principle that is morally

superior to self-sacrifice is not necessarily seen by all Christians as sanctioned by God. Even thePope is a socialist.

Libertarians (including some self-styled conservatives) have much better arguments about

limited government, property rights and individual freedom, but they stop short of supportinggreed is good with an ethical philosophy. They argue simply that the political principle of

freedom allows people to be greedy as long as they to not coerce others. Libertarians lose the

moral argument because they do not make it.

The opponents of the left will never own the moral high ground unless they win it on the merits

of their moral arguments. And unless they own it, they will fail progressively to defend your

right to earn as much as possible and to keep your property and the fruits of your labors.

How can they persuade the majority of voters that their moral and political positions are superior

to those of the left? First of all, they need to subscribe to a morality that accepts rational self-interest as one of the foundations of ethics and morality. The logical consequences of a failure to

do so will keep us on the road to serfdom and cede the political system to those who wish to

pretend that it is moral to redistribute your wealth (i.e., to take your property and give it to their

political favorites, whether they be poor people or Wall Street investment banks).

8/7/2019 Lets Have Some Real Change for a Change

2/4

Libertarians and conservatives need to change attitudes and shine the light of day on the unstated

false assumption that people who are less fortunate than you have a right to your property andyour life. And that change starts with you. Changing popular understanding begins in your

neighborhood, in your business circles and in your associations. It is a daunting undertaking, but

it most certainly will not be accomplished if those who understand its importance shrink from thetask or retreat into cynicism.

Here are some suggestions:

Start using the word force when referring to the government and its actions. Make a point of

noting that whatever the government mandates involves coercion. Taxation, especially taxation

to pay for something that could be accomplished by private individuals, is money extracted fromyou at the point of a gun that would not otherwise be given voluntarily. To understand what

point of a gun means, consider what would happen if you did not pay your taxes or obey

government mandates.

Because the government holds a legal monopoly over force in order to defend your individual

rights to be free from force, taxation is one way to fund the police and military. But taxes shouldbe a way to raise revenue to cover the cost of that legitimate function, not a way to achieve a

social agenda. Social trends should be left to the spontaneity of free individuals.

Avoid collective, anonymous abstractions like public and societywhen you cancommunicate your message better with more specific words like government and individuals

as, for example, in government schools rather than public schools, the individuals in charge of

the government instead of government. Always use the most specific term appropriate.

Point out that there is no positive morality where there is no choice. Even if one assumes that

giving to the poor is an act of moral virtue, there is nothing virtuous about giving to the poor atthe point of a gun. That is not sacrifice. It is being sacrificed. The morality of undertaking to be

your brothers keeper is irrelevant when you are forced to do it. So the left has no moral

argument none, none upon which to base the governments claim to your property to supportthe children, the poor, the sick, homeowners, the banks or anyone else.

Challenge the morality of redistribution of wealth. "Wealth" is not some abstract notion.

Wealth is some persons assets, not a natural resource owned by the government. Governmentbenefits represent money taken from you and your neighbors children by force and given to

someone else (or given back to you less a huge fee for administration). Rush Limbaugh

(http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_110408/content/01125110.guest.html) has comeclose to making that argument -- but he does not go far enough and explain why our right to our

own property is more than a political principle. Rights is a moral principle deriving from our

nature as individual entities. (See, e.g., Is there a Right to HealthCare --http://www.atlassociety.org/is_health_care_a_right_obamacare)

A complete challenge to the left requires an ability to debate the nature of morality because that

is their claimed source of their power over you. And understanding the nature of morality is

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_110408/content/01125110.guest.htmlhttp://www.atlassociety.org/is_health_care_a_right_obamacarehttp://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_110408/content/01125110.guest.htmlhttp://www.atlassociety.org/is_health_care_a_right_obamacare

8/7/2019 Lets Have Some Real Change for a Change

3/4

fundamental to the political system that you want. By what moral principle do they justify laying

claim to the money that you earned to support yourself and your family? What are their premises

that you are the property of the state, that the unfortunate have a claim on your property merelybecause they are unfortunate? The burden of proof of their moral superiority ought to be on those

who propose to take your earnings and property.

Make people define the term greed every time you hear it. Use their attempt at a definition (or

their attempt to evade defining it) to initiate an argument about a persons right to keep the fruits

of his honest labors, no matter how intently he pursues them. Why, you should ask, is it wrong toseek to profit from a voluntary exchange even a huge profit if the other party is willing? (Of

course, if he is not willing, that is his choice. If he is not able, then there will not be a huge

profit.)

Defend every persons right to be self-interested, even greedy. Why are you complaining about

executive salaries and bonuses (unless you are a shareholder or a taxpayer paying for them)?

What business is it of yours what terms strangers have agreed to in their private transactions?

Dont allow the left to appeal to your envy of others to justify their efforts to take money fromthe wealthy. Envy is for losers ambition is for winners.

Be ready to distinguish coercion from voluntary transactions. For example, the antitrust laws are

justified in part using the theory that a seller can force a buyer to purchase something simply

because the seller has it and the buyer wants it. Thats absurd. The government can "force" an

exchange because it has the guns. A commercial seller cant. This is a major left-wing argument:that economic power is the equivalent of a gun, that need gives someone a right to your property,

that your refusal to turn it over is coercion and justifies the application of a superior force (more

guns) to make you give it up at the price the needy want to pay. It is simply not true thatsomeone who possesses goods and wants to charge his own price is the equivalent of a thug with

a gun. The proponents should bear the burden of proving the morality of why need justifies the

use of force.

Demonstrate the foolishness of the but what about . . ., who is going to take care of . . .

argument: But what about the retarded and mentally ill? The answer is, well, what aboutthem? But who is going to take care of them? The answer is, well, whom do you suggest

me? No, the government will do it? Then you mean me; you mean my tax money. What if I

dont want to? What if I refuse to pay? But you cant And why is that? (Silence. Silence

because the answer is we will force you to.) Dont get me wrong. I have spent over 30 yearsworking with private nonprofit organizations that take care of the retarded and mentally ill but I

have done it voluntarily, and that is how it should be done. And there is a similar answer for

every group of victims that the left wants to force you to support.

Stop advocating government solutions to social problems by suggesting that your neighbor needs

to be coerced. "There ought to be a law" is a bad idea. There are already sufficient criminal laws.All other laws are suspect.

8/7/2019 Lets Have Some Real Change for a Change

4/4

The foregoing certainly requires a change in perspective for most people. But unless the majority

of people change their perspective, the politicians will continue to have the ability to fool them

into believing that it is moral to exploit and victimize you and your neighbors.