The case for a New Right

I wrote a post several days ago about the emergence of a New Right. I have no idea how many on the Right fall into this category, but I do believe there are many on the Right who could become part of the New Right if a more people take a courageous lead. For decades the Right has been attacked in the media, universities and Hollywood, and many on the Right have acted in ways which justify the attacks, and many have faltered on principles for political reasons. The Right has a difficult time creating a message and putting together a set of ideas which address our most critical political and social issues.

The Right has been good at slogans, but it hasn't been good at articulating a vision and following through with action. Many of the politicians on the Right are simply status quo statists, just like the moderates and the left-of-center in the Democrat Party. But the Right as a movement of change is something aside from modern politics and the Republican Party. The Right entails journalists, opinion makers, professors, pundits, intellectuals, writers of all sorts, including bloggers, and others who have influence in political, economic and social matters.

For the last month I've critiqued the MSNBC program Morning Joe, because they have as guests many on the Left who frame the Right in the modern popular narrative. I'm giving up on further viewing and posting on each episode, because it's just too biased and I have limited time and energy to write, so now I'll write about what I've observed and leave the Morning Joe crew to their delusions. It's clear that the Left is on a determined campaign of politics to smear the Right and marginalize the ideas of limited government and a free market. Any proposed cuts in spending will be demagogued as attacks on the elderly, children, women and the poor. The Left is stuck in an old political game which many who come on Morning Joe praise as skillful, as do the hosts, but the politics of old cannot survive the Information Age.

The New Right has made a small beginning in reacting to the need for authenticity and honesty which the public craves, and they've taken a hit in the media, but they must continue along this path if we expect to survive financially and as a free country. There's no longer any value in the games of denial and pretension that government is a basically a compassionate defense against the "jungle" of the market -- this lie is no longer believable, so all that's left are games for the statists.

The New Right can transcend the political games and maintain a path of principled resistance to statism, and I believe the public will respond once they know it's authentic and honest -- but it has to really be authentic and honest. Several new representatives in congress are leading the way -- Rand Paul, Ron Paul, Mike Lee, Allen West -- but they have a long way to go. The New Right will be challenged to come to terms with US military operations such as the War on Terror and our interventions in the Middle East. This miltaristic aspect of the establishment Right, among hawks like Lindsay Graham and John McCain, has to be faced and dealt with -- a doctrine regarding intervention would be helpful to clarify a vision of the future as it relates to America's role in the world. Ron Paul has a non-interventionist doctrine which I agree with, but among many of the New Right who are breaking away from the establishment Right there is still ambiguity.

The New Right has done a fair job of making the case for fiscal responsibility, but they have to go further to address fundamental problems -- some have, but most are still vague when it comes to articulating the principles of limited government and a free market. The Left is fond of obscurantism, and this is why Obama can act like a hardcore Progressive and a Centrist in one speech and receive accolades from admirers who love Machiavellian politics, but the problems we face as a nation and as individuals call for honesty and clarity -- we can no longer afford political obscurantism, and the public will not ignore manipulation as they have in the past.

For the most part, I gave up on our two party statist system years ago, but now we're facing a crisis and the only hope immediatey is for one of the parties, or both, to stand up and act heroically, because government has been given so much power, protests in the private sector will not change the fundamental problems. It's going to take elected representatives dismantling statism from within, and this is a tall order that requires a herculean effort. On the other hand, it can't be left entirely to representatives -- intellectuals need to clarify the principles, pundits need to ariticulate the ideas and the fundamental problems, businesses have to soul-search and recognize how far we've drifted from a free market and fair competition, and every individual has to decide if he or she wants to take on the responsibility of protecting our natural rights.

It will do little good to tweak the system which has run up a 14 trillion dollar debt and instituted myriad regulations -- no, it will require the elimination of corporate welfare and limits on the powers of government which make corporate welfare possible, a restructuring of the tax code, an end to the ponzi schemes of entitlements, a foreign policy of non-intervention and strong defense, confidence in the private sector to deal with safety net issues and charity, separation of State and economy, reliance on courts/rule of law and the private sector to regulate industry, persistence in protecting individual rights, free trade, ending our association with the UN and all international institutions which control the global economy, end the Fed, end Fannie  and Freddie, cease all attempts to legislate morality and political correctness -- it will take a national psychic change that embraces diversity and dynamism, the resolution of social problems in the market of ideas, the enforcement of Contitutional limits and the critical use of creativity and innovation to make progress in radical freedom protected by the rule of law.

The question might be -- "Can you give me specifics on how to make this type of world work?" Yes, I can, but so can millions of others, and that is the point. We can either coordinate, co-operate, compete and self-govern with limited government simply protecting our freedom according to the rule of law and the Constitution, or admit we're incapable of self-governing and must be managed and controlled by technocrats in government. The silly argument regarding the meaning of the Constitution and whether the State was intended to manage the economy, or whether individuals were intended to self-govern in freedom as long as they aren't violating anyone's rights, is an old and tired argument, but we must decide which side we come down on and what type of government we want -- statism or a limited government and a free market -- we can't have a little of all the above, because it has not worked. As long as the State doesn't have strict limits placed on power, the State will take more and more power -- it's an anti-social process that feeds on itself, and the more people who become dependent on State power, the harder it is to limit that power. Let's just hope it's not too late.