Liberalism: Going, Going . . .
It may take a few more elections to make its final necrosis universally obvious, but political liberalism in America is almost dead.
Its persistence in reliably liberal jurisdictions – and inevitable collapse – will eventually help everyone understand liberalism’s demise, but, every day, citizens are already witnessing the failures of governments run by left-liberal officials in Washington, and in states, counties and municipalities.
Other people’s money, the mother’s milk of liberal government spending, dried up years ago. Taxpayers are tapped out and angry. Liberal jurisdictions have maxed out their credit cards and reached borrowing limits from all other credit sources. Huge bills are already coming due, while massive invoices for pensions and other entitlements still loom.
There is little to distinguish the U.S. from other sick and failed nations, except that America has an almost immeasurably greater and more toxic national debt.
Nonetheless, left-wing politicians and their enablers in labor and public service unions, entertainment, the academy and in media are pontificating, writing and making, at times somber, at other times hysterical proclamations denying the obvious problems America faces.
In fact, left-liberals who lack self-awareness and a sense of responsibility – i.e., all of them – are dangerously reassuring Americans that there are no problems, while demonizing those who propose and would enact difficult, but necessary remedies to the economic death spiral into which left-wing policies have sent America.
Leftists insist that America will fail unless we continue to pursue and even double down on the same social and spending policies that have already brought America to the brink of ruin.
Advocates of Big Government will hang on – for now – but they have been proven incapable of contributing anything of substance to solving the real problems America faces.
Though they profess to “protect” the interests of others, liberal statists do no service to Americans who have somehow been made or allowed themselves to become dependent upon government. Quite the contrary. The weakest and most legitimately needy among us will be harmed most grievously by the failures of liberal governance.
Institutional failures will force otherwise able-bodied government dependents to face the reality that, ultimately, dependency is a losing life strategy.
Those who were encouraged by liberal social welfare policies to view government dependency as a career choice will be forced into the same world in which productive members of society have lived responsible, independent lives, but without having developed the skills necessary to sustain themselves.
In effect, able-bodied government dependents will be twice victimized by the governments to which they turned for their “livelihoods.”
Liberal immigration policies have also made significant contributions to the financial problems America faces. Indeed, the left’s argument for open borders has been lost.
Leftists refuse to enforce the integrity of America’s borders or accept, as most Americans do, that a nation cannot be sovereign without secure borders.
But, beyond concerns for sovereignty, the burdens that millions of illegal aliens place on American medical and social services, education and criminal justice systems contribute significantly to governmental financial distress.
National, state and local governments and service providers must absorb those costs, taxing, borrowing and spending to meet them, while, at the same time, billions of dollars in untaxed remittances flow back across our southern border to families in Mexico, Central and South America.
Realistically, aside from providing for the national defense, central government is the non-productive element of our economy. Unless and until a majority of Americans agrees that national suicide is a legitimate form of “policy,” it makes no sense to allow government to confiscate even more resources from individuals and the productive private sector to put into failed and failing government programs and policies.
Although some still do, fewer Americans are buying the left’s fiction. A significant majority of Americans agree that fundamental changes are necessary.
The days of cultural “wokeness,” the politicization of America’s criminal justice system, open borders, massive inflation, and unbridled spending will – must – come to an end.
What is most interesting about the demise of liberalism is that, at some level, perhaps even consciously, the left knows the jig is up.
Indeed, there is a dawning realization among certain Democrats that they’ve overstepped, that voters, generally, dislike liberal policies.
Thirty-one House Democrats – so far – have decided to leave office rather than risk being unseated by disaffected voters in November.
They’re the smarter ones.
https://www.pottsmerc.com/2022/04/04/jerry-shenk-liberalism-going-going/
