Category Archives: statism

Cuomo Denies Tradeoffs, Cries Scarcity

12 Tuesday May 2020

Posted by in Pandemic, statism, Virtue Signaling

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Here’s an all-time dumbass bromide: “If it saves only one life, it’s worth it.” New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said it last week in a bit of sanctimonious posturing intended for consumption by the unthinking. A variant on this is, “You can’t put a value on a human life,” and Cuomo said that too. But of course we do that every day. Yes, we weigh lives against costs, and we must. Each and every decision involving any personal or public health risk entails an implicit and sometimes explicit valuation of human life. There are few costless decisions in a world of scarce resources, and lives are often one of those costs. These might be matters of probability in an ex ante sense, which might make it more palatable. Ex post, they add up to real lives.

Imagine a world in which we spared no expense to save lives. We’d shift massive resources into health care to the detriment of all production and consumption that does not save lives. No precaution would be too conservative. No driving or biking, because those prohibitions would save many lives. Many risky construction and maintenance jobs would be off limits. No smoking, of course, and no drinking! No chips! Every BMI greater than 25 and you’re off to mandatory fat camp. Sadly, the effort to save a life is sometimes fruitless, but as long as there’s a chance, we’d try and try, providing mechanical life support to every patient hanging on by a tattered thread. No, we don’t do these things because it’s too damn costly.

We face an infinite number of tradeoffs in medical care and in public health more generally. The question “Who Shall Live?” must be answered every day when deciding how health care resources are to be allocated. No matter how you answer that question, certain lives will be lost as the cost of meeting your preferred medical objectives. You can’t meet them all. Resources are scarce — or in more everyday language, budgets are tight.

So human life is often assigned an implicit or shadow value in decision making. But even explicit assignment of economic value to human life is not uncommon. Valuing lives is a standard practice in cost-benefit analysis. It’s also quite common for life values to be estimated as part of forensic analyses in support of legal proceedings.

Andrew Cuomo surely knows all this. That makes his statements all the more disingenuous. This article in The Nation from the end of March implies that Cuomo has valued life all too cheaply in light of his past budget proposals for health care programs. Along the same lines, see this eye-opening critique of the policies Cuomo has pursued that left NY poorly prepared for a pandemic. And now, he’d like to keep his costly lockdown order in place even if it saves “just one life”.

Beyond all that, Cuomo is a stupendous hypocrite, asserting that life is too precious to spare any expense after signing an order in March requiring nursing homes to accept individuals with active Covid infections. Nursing homes have been the very hottest of spots for Covid infections and deaths, so the order was glaringly dismissive in valuing the lives of vulnerable nursing home residents. The rationale for the order was to save hospital beds, but there was no shortage. 

In fairness, Cuomo was also clamoring for assistance to add hospital capacity. Millions were spent to convert the Javits Center to a temporary field hospital and to bring a U.S. Navy hospital ship up the Hudson, but they went almost completely unused. Why not send the elderly patients there, instead of back to the nursing homes?

Finally, he pouted for weeks about his state’s shortage of ventilators, only to quickly reverse course as it became apparent that the state had a surplus of ventilators.

Recently, Cuomo felt it necessary to demonstrate his anti-Western bona fides by labeling the coronavirus the “European Virus“. He must think that’s a clever poke in the eye to those who prefer “Wuhan Virus”, though it is quite correct (and not the least bit “racist”) to note that the virus originated in Wuhan, China. For what it’s worth, the genome of the European strain, like the others that hit New York, differs by less than 12 out of 30,000 base-pairs of DNA from the original Wuhan strain. And of course the New York metropolitan area has made a massive contribution to the U.S. case load and death toll from the virus. Travelers from New York did much to spread Covid-19 to the rest of the country. So, as some have suggested, perhaps a better name might be “New York Virus”.

Andrew Cuomo is nothing if not a politician, and I suppose he’s just behaving like one. I probably wouldn’t gripe were it not for the minions who fall for Cuomo’s sham virtue. But it’s worse than that: the claim that public intervention at any cost is worthwhile if it saves “just one life” is a deeply statist sentiment.

Francis, Papal Perónista, Courts Redistributional Mirage

15 Thursday Mar 2018

Posted by in Markets, Marxism, Redistribution, statism, Welfare State

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Is world poverty really increasing? Actually, no, quite the opposite, and you can blame economic liberalism, capitalism, and free markets for that. Yet we hear exactly the contrary from Pope Francis who, despite his evident compassion, has an amazingly poor understanding of economics. He misstates basic facts, offers dimly reasoned analyses of human rights, and promotes ill-considered policies. Now that the Vatican is set to release the Pope’s first feature film, no doubt a stirring piece of social justice propaganda, it seems as good a time as any to review the confounded state of Francis’ economic reasoning. This is not the first time I’ve discussed the Pope’s policy views: this link contains three previous posts from SacredCowChips on which Francis was tagged.

The False Narrative

My inspiration for this post comes from Robert P. Murphy, whose recent commentary on Francis’ pronouncements is trenchant. Murphy covers this speech written by Francis for the World Economic Forum, but delivered by a Vatican proxy, in which the Pope asserts the following:

“… governments must confront … the growth of unemployment, the increase in various forms of poverty, the widening of the socio-economic gap and new forms of slavery, often rooted in situations of conflict, migration and various social problems.“

Francis refers to increasing unemployment and poverty, and I could let that phrase pass if he was referring to certain nations or locales that have experienced chronically depressed economic growth. But Francis’ description is rather general, as evidenced by his diagnosis of causes. More on that below. Regarding his statement about trends in poverty, he is flatly incorrect. Here is Murphy:

“As the World Bank reports, the global “extreme poverty” rate in 1990 was cut in half by 2010. Back in 1990, 1.85 billion people lived on less than $1.90 per day, but by 2013, the figure had dropped to 767 million such people—meaning that more than a billion people had been lifted out of crushing poverty.“

After the Great Recession, world unemployment decreased from 2009-2015, according to the World Bank, though it is estimated to have crept up slightly in 2016-17. Again, the Pope’s woeful tale of growing unemployment and increasing poverty is nonsense.

But the world is a difficult place. In the underdeveloped world, the range and quality of goods available is extremely limited, and $1.90 represents bare subsistence, yet it’s a condition that exceeds the historical norm in many places. Movement above that threshold can represent a meaningful improvement in economic well-being.

Francis may lack an appreciation for the general enrichment in material conditions that has been taking place over the last two centuries, which is ongoing, or perhaps he believes that even greater achievements are easily within reach but for certain injustices, though he offers no qualifications. Perhaps he is mistakenly generalizing specific instances of exploitation in the underdeveloped world, which often occur with the explicit blessing of the state apparatus in exchange for kickbacks.

Rights and Markets

Even more egregious is the Pope’s presumption that private markets are at fault for any stagnation that he has identified. A notable difference between countries with successful, growing economies and those mired in stagnation is the degree to which their citizens enjoy freedoms, especially economic freedom. That is a well-established empirical fact, as Murphy explains. But the Pontiff goes further with preposterous dogma on the meaning of human rights. Again, from Murphy:

“Although inspired by concern for the poor and the marginalized, the Vatican’s message is seriously flawed…. On a conceptual level, Pope Francis posits a false dichotomy between economic freedom and human rights. … ‘Economic freedom must not prevail over the practical freedom of man and over his rights, and the market must not be absolute, but honour the exigencies of justice.’ 

What does the concept of “economic freedom” entail? It means freedom to work in any occupation of one’s choice, without permission from the government, and certainly without being conscripted into service against one’s will. It means the freedom to start a business. It means the freedom to keep what you have produced, without having your assets seized by a rapacious regime. It means the freedom to trade with people who live in another country. It means the rule of law, where contracts are interpreted fairly and government officials can’t exercise arbitrary power.“

Economic freedom, more than anything else, means that individuals are endowed with property rights. To deny such rights is to banish any reward for work and differential rewards for work well done. If free individuals are rewarded, it is a matter of their own discretion as to whether they immediately consume the reward or save it in order to accumulate wealth. Yet Francis takes the misanthropic and childish view that economic freedom, private property and markets imply exploitation. He lacks a basic understanding of the revolutionary power of markets as a form of social organization.

Within just a few hundred years, a small fraction of the many millennia during which mankind was mired in poverty and pestilence, markets have dramatically transformed the existence of most human populations. Peaceful, arms length transactions made in mutual self-interest exploit only one thing: gains from trade that would otherwise be wasted. And only a form of social organization that enables those gains can dovetail with the human rights and justice that Francis so strongly desires. The denial of economic freedom, property rights, and self-interest prohibits those gains, however, denying humanity of the wealth necessary to achieve anything like justice.

Pope Francis is a redistributionist, and that goes well beyond the charitable giving, good works and service performed voluntarily by individuals. In fact, he is a statist, advocating an economic system in which property rights are abrogated, wholly or in part, and wages above a politically determined threshold are confiscated.

The Pope and Perón

Francis is often described as a “Perónist”, after Juan Perón of Argentina, the so-called “right-wing socialist” (and sometime associate of the murderous Che Guevara). Anyone familiar with the economic history of Argentina should know that’s not praise. Here is Maureen Mullarkey from the last link:

“Both Juan and Eva understood the enchantments of populism. A charismatic pair, they ruled more by dint of personality—personalismo—than democratic procedure. Ushers of an ‘option for the poor,’ they glorified the lower classes and denigrated the wealthy. (This, while they amassed a huge personal fortune from the Eva Perón Welfare Foundation.) …

When Francis speaks of ‘the people’ as a revolutionary vanguard that ‘overflows the logical procedures of formal democracy,’ he is lapsing toward that ecstatic Peronist vision of a Third Way—justicialismo. That the disposition and design of it ended in economic collapse and misery is nothing against the splendor of the mystique.

In his youth, Francis absorbed the myth but not its lessons. Chief among them is how much Argentina’s fiscal catastrophe owed to an extravagant welfare system that favored enforced wealth redistribution over development. Among the many factors of Argentina’s historic economic crisis, one cries for attention: Perón’s increasing reliance on redistributing income, not only between industries and occupations but between skilled and unskilled workers.“

For further perspective on Francis, Perónism, and the disastrous Argentine “experiment”, see this piece by Daniel J. Mitchell.

For many years, naive Marxists have accepted the myth that central economic planners could and would direct productive and distributional activities with foresight, efficiency, and integrity. None of those is possible. The only form of social organization capable of registering and processing the myriad and dynamic signals on preferences and scarcity is free market capitalism. It is the only system capable of spontaneously harnessing appropriate responses based on the complex incentives faced by consumers and producers, and all at a minimal administrative cost for society, free of the government intervention that typifies the Peronist welfare state and corporatism.

Conclusion

Pope Francis should know better than to make claims having no empirical support. He should also have the wisdom to understand and advocate for the empowering nature of private property rights and markets. Elevating the human condition is possible only by allowing people to be free — economically free — and endowed with opportunities to earn private rewards and build wealth. Francis should realize that the massive private gains afforded by the market mechanism enable rewards which spill over, inuring to the benefit of parties external to a given exchange. On the other hand, state domination and control of economic activity gives over decision-making to selfish and ill-informed public commandants, who are all too pleased to grant special advantages to those in a position to return private favors. Such graft and mismanagement of resources comes at the expense of others. That way lies decay and a return to the much more brutal conditions of the past, unlike the mutually beneficial promise of market exchange.

Clinton Corruption Remedy: Keep Her Out

07 Monday Nov 2016

Posted by in Corruption, statism

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Would I ever vote for Donald Trump? I’ve been critical of Trump’s positions on foreign trade, immigration policy and eminent domain. I think he’s an extremely risky candidate for any supporter of small government. But I’ve been much more critical of Hillary Clinton: she is a statist through and through, and she so often finds herself in close proximity to corruption and some other highly suspicious circumstances. I consider myself a libertarian, and I like Gary Johnson. Unfortunately, Johnson has disappointed me with his selection of Bill Weld as a running mate, his goofs on foreign policy and his often poor presentation of libertarian principles.

FBI Director James Comey has again concluded that there was no intent on Clinton’s part to violate national security with her private email server, but he also concluded that she was reckless in conducting sensitive government business, including the transmission of classified information, on that server. Unfortunately, Comey limited his investigation to the period during which she was Secretary of State. The server, however, was put in place before she was confirmed by Congress. The question of intent makes that time period relevant, but Comey ignored it. She broke the law concerning the handling of classified documents, there is no question about that. No less than five of Clinton’s aides took the Fifth Amendment to avoid prosecution. Evidently, Mr. Comey has been under pressure from a highly-politicized Justice Department. There are other investigations underway at the FBI and by Congress involving the Clintons, however.

The deluge of information via Wikileaks over the past month reflects horribly on the Clintons. I don’t care whether the leaks came from government sources, the Russians, or from other foreign actors. No one has challenged the authenticity of these leaks. Again, Hillary Clinton compromised national security by conducting her duties as Secretary of State on a private computer server. That’s what got her into the email mess. Now, we’ve learned that she gave her housekeeper access to her computer to print documents! At least five foreign intelligence services hacked into that server. Clinton also obstructed justice on the matter by destroying evidence and perjuring herself before Congress.

Wikileaks has shed additional light on the Clinton Foundation as well. The foundation functions as a money laundering scheme intended to disguise influence-buying as charitable giving, with the Clinton’s and their cronies as the real beneficiaries. Foreign governments, including several middle eastern powers, funneled money to the foundation while Hillary served as Secretary of State. Here’s Deroy Murdock on the Foundation:

“… its 2014 IRS filings show that it spent a whopping 5.76 percent of its funds on actual charitable activities — far below the 65 percent that the Better Business Bureau calls kosher. That paltry figure also mocks Hillary’s Las Vegas lie, uttered at the final presidential debate on October 19: ‘We at the Clinton Foundation spend 90 percent — 90 percent of all the money that is donated on behalf of programs of people around the world and in our own country.’ The Clinton Slush Fund . . . uh . . . Foundation seems to be mainly a travel and full-employment program for Hillary’s government in waiting. It’s also a bribe pump that sucks in money and spews out favors.“

The Clintons also have had strong ties to individuals with criminal histories, such as the notorious child predator Jeffrey Epstein. And Hillary Clinton’s reputation for contemptuous behavior toward others was so strong that State Department security personnel requested reassignment. It’s been reported that members of her Secret Service detail called her plane “Broomstick One“.

A Hillary Clinton victory in the president election will not end the investigations. Congressional leaders such as Jason Chaffetz and Trey Gowdy have vowed to press on aggressively, given that Clinton lied before their committees and to the American people about the existence of classified emails on her server. Impeachment by the House might occur, though Clinton’s offenses have occurred prior to her term in office, and the Senate would never attain the two-thirds majority necessary to convict.

It is possible that the FBI investigation into the Clinton Foundation will be damaging, but it is unlikely to bring an indictment. The DOJ under Clinton would be headed by Loretta Lynch or some other Hillary/Obama sycophant. There will be no DOJ indictment or special prosecutor as long as the Attorney General reports to the criminal herself. (The FBI cannot indict; it can only recommend indictment.) There would hardly be a real opportunity to render justice to Hillary at the federal level.

A local jurisdiction could bring an indictment for criminal activity. The Anthony Weiner laptop investigation by the NYPD could be troublesome for Clinton, depending on the extent to which any Clinton dealings with Jeffrey Epstein were recorded there.

There remains only one sure constitutional remedy for Hillary Clinton’s corruption: Tuesday’s election. Preventing her from taking office must be priority one. Hillary Clinton’s days of insider dealing would then be over, as would the politicized government created by Barack Obama, who was just recorded encouraging illegal aliens to vote! But Gary Johnson obviously won’t beat Clinton… the only real option is Donald Trump.

Yes, Trump is risky, and I’ll have plenty to criticize on my blog if he takes office. He is plainspoken but sometimes crude and offensive. Naturally, that “style” is especially offensive to the tender snowflakes who cling to identity politics, but I do not believe Trump is a racist. It’s true, I don’t know exactly what we’d get with Trump. I suspect he has some statist tendencies of his own, but I prefer that risk to the corruption and certain statism of Hillary Clinton.

So I must vote for Donald Trump. Putting Hillary Clinton in the White House would compromise our system of government. She is an accomplished grafter and cronyist, expert at leveraging her position of power for personal enrichment, and she is prone to taking retribution against enemies. The IRS, the DOJ and other agencies have already become partisan organizations under Obama. And as I mentioned earlier, Clinton is a statist who desires centralized power. That is always dangerous.

Read this excellent essay: “The Case Against Hillary Clinton“, by Lisa Schiffren of the Independent Women’s Forum.

Here is a page with a number of past posts about Hillary Clinton on Sacred Cow Chips.

Hillaryeconomics: Swelling the State

30 Sunday Oct 2016

Posted by in statism

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Who cares about Hillary Clinton’s economic plan while her campaign quivers in the shadow of Weiner’s hard drive? Despite all the hubbub over Mrs. Clinton’s sloppy security practices, and her lies and destruction of evidence regarding those practices, it’s a good idea to remind ourselves of some of the frontrunner’s policy proposals and the general philosophy that informs them. Daniel J. Mitchell must have been feeling jovial when he took a crack at deciphering Hillary Clinton’s economic plan. He offered translations of each of 42 Hillary catch-phrases, but the translations were identical:

“Notwithstanding all the previous failures of government, both in America and elsewhere in the world, I’m going to make American more like Greece and Venezuela by using coercion to impose more spending, taxes, and regulation.“

Mitchell highlights two general themes at the start: one is the left’s constant misuse of the term “investment’ to describe spending on almost any government initiative; the other is the still fashionable Keynesian theory that a low-productivity government can make the economy grow by a multiple of any claim on resources it deigns to make.

I’ll try to do Mitchell one better. Here’s a run-down of the catch-phrases he cites along with my own interpretations:

  • “…support advanced manufacturing” — because the government is adept at picking winners with taxpayer money, like Solyndra. Does “advanced manufacturing” involve politically-favored outputs, as opposed to market-favored outputs? Does it involve robots, or workers? Is it somehow preferable to “advanced services”?
  • “a lot of urgent and important work to do” — there oughtta’ be more laws;
  • “go out and make that happen” — we must impose the heavy hand of the state;
  • “enormous capacity for clean energy production” — …if only we can provide our cronies with enough subsidies on your dime;
  • “if we do it together” — …kumbaya; we’ll wreck the private economy together;
  • “things that your government could do” — like, wreck everything;
  • “I will have your back every single day” — …with a sharp knife, in case it’s in my interest to betray you;
  • “make our economy work for everyone” — we’ll redistribute your wealth;
  • “restore fairness to our economy” — be prepared to share your success;
  • “go to bat for working families” — …by punishing your employer; but look, we have freebies!
  • “pass the biggest investment” — mandatory campaign promise;
  • “modernizing our roads, our bridges” — shovel-ready” projects;
  • “help cities like Detroit and Flint” — redistribute resources to poorly-governed communities and impose federal oversight;
  • “repair schools and failing water systems” — because local needs and the federal government are a perfect match;
  • “we should be ambitious” — about government domination;
  • “connect every household in America to broadband” — even if they don’t want it, and even if they’ve chosen to live in the badlands; at your cost, of course;
  • “build a cleaner, more resilient power grid” — reduce carbon emissions by inflating your utility bill; dismantle markets and direct energy resources centrally;
  • “creating an infrastructure bank” — we need another big federal agency, extending control and conjuring opportunities for cronyism and graft;
  • “we’re going to invest $10 billion” — Whew! I thought you were going to say $100 billion. But… can you define “investment”?
  • “bring business, government, and communities together” — …we’ll be as one at the federal level;
  • “fight to make college tuition-free” — so that even the least qualified have a strong incentive to enroll, on your dime;
  • “liberate millions of people who already have student debt” — because meeting the terms of a contract is a form of enslavement;
  • “support high-quality union training programs” — with federal subsidies on your dime; non-union training programs would be so …exploitative;
  • “We will do more” — …cause we’re from the government, and we’re here to help!
  • “Investments at home” — Invest? Can you define that? Do you mean “spend”?
  • “we need to make it fairer” — … by redistributing your income to others;
  • “we will fight for a more progressive…tax code” — reduce those ugly private work incentives and quash the bourgeois tendency to save and invest in physical capital;
  • “pay a new exit tax” — don’t get the idea it’s YOUR company; you didn’t build that;
  • “Wall Street, corporations, and the super-rich, should finally pay their fair share” –because the highest corporate tax rate in the industrialized world is not high enough, and besides, we can pass the booty back to elites in myriad ways, as long as they give to the Clinton Foundation;
  • “I support the so-called ‘Buffett Rule'” — …to quench the thirst of class warriors;
  • “add a new tax on multi-millionaires” — we must tax wealth because a high income tax rate just isn’t enough to encourage capital flight;
  • “close the carried interest loophole” — cause we think that loophole actually exists, and hey, it sounds good to class warriors;
  • “I want to invest” — Invest? Can you define that? Do you mean “spend”?
  • “affordable childcare available to all Americans” — …so that no parent need pay any attention to price; but your tax credit will diminish if you earn extra income, so don’t earn too much, for God’s sake!
  • “Paid family leave” — …because it isn’t expensive enough to hire you already;
  • “Raising the federal minimum wage” — … so the least skilled will be jobless and dependent on the state;
  • “expanding Social Security” — …so what if it’s already insolvent? Oh, you must mean “expanding” payroll taxes!!
  • “strengthening unions” — …because we mean to kill the sharing economy, and it isn’t expensive enough to hire you already;
  • “improve the Affordable Care Act” — if it’s broke, break it more thoroughly;
  • “a public option health insurance plan” — …shhh… don’t say single payer!
  • “build a new future with clean energy” — in our judgement, your inflated utility bills will help all mankind; besides, we want to take control, and wreck something.
  • Bonus: “wage equality once and for all” — because it should be illegal for employers to pay based on occupational risk, demands for paid leave and flexible hours, skill differentials and available supplies.

Lest you think my interpretation of that bonus quotation is unfair, remember: the so-called gender wage gap is almost entirely explained by the factors I’ve listed.

Hillary Clinton’s economic view is straight out of the statist theater of the absurd. Joseph Stiglitz, one of Hillary’s economic advisors, in 2007 endorsed Venezuelan socialism under Hugo Chavez, which proved to be disastrous. Was she forced to the left by Bernie Sanders? To some extent, perhaps. But Peter Suderman notes that Clinton’s current policy agenda constitutes a thorough rejection of Bill Clinton’s economic policies. The irony!

Words of Weasels

26 Tuesday Apr 2016

Posted by in Liberalism, Marketplace of Ideas, statism

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1984 instruction-manual

Take a moment to consider some examples of the horrible misuse of words in political debates. David Harsanyi at Reason provides a few choice examples of the corrupted and misleading language used by Democrats:

  • the absence of a tax that “should” exist but doesn’t is a “loophole”;
  • failure to pay that tax is a “fraud”;
  • denial of “access” occurs when the state doesn’t give something to you for free;
  • “disenfranchisement” means you have to show an ID or wait in line;
  • “full rights” means the entire world must be a “safe space” for your actions or views, even if the rights of others are denied in the process.

These are all recent examples of mangled language from the two candidates for the Democrat Party nomination. But here’s a big one that Harsanyi overlooked: the misuse of the term “liberalism” to describe statism. In fact, he misuses the word “liberals” himself! In “Don’t Call Leftists Liberal; They’re Not!” on Sacred Cow Chips, I offered some thoughts on this bit of Newspeak practiced by so-called progressives. I can’t resist reposting the following quote of Daniel Klein quoting Kevin Williamson, which says it all (links are in the original post):

“Williamson [quotes] two leftist authors writing in The Nation, one decrying ‘unbridled individualism,’ the other ‘unfettered capitalism.’ Williamson concludes: ‘A ‘liberalism’ that is chiefly concerned with the many clever uses of bridles and fetters does not deserve the name. It never has.’”

The following quote from Harsanyi gives emphasis to the wrongful appropriation of “liberalism” by the left, though it relates more specifically to the misuse of the term “loophole”:

“Basically, all of life is a giant loophole until Democrats come up with a way to regulate or tax it. In its economic usage, “loophole” … creates the false impression that people are getting away with breaking the law. It’s a way to skip the entire debate portion of the conversation and get right to the accusation.“

Another behavioral characteristic of leftists is a certain self-righteous satisfaction that they hold the moral high ground on any number of issues. “The Smug Style in American Liberalism“by Emmitt Rensin in Vox takes a poke at this presumption. Of course, Rensin misuses “liberalism”. I find this review of the article by Kyle Smith an effective summary, and it’s even better because it skips what comes off as a long catalog of excuses by Rensin as to why leftists might be forgiven for patting themselves on the back. I give Rensin credit, however, for a good analysis of the origins of leftist “smug”, which he attributes to a backlash against defections from the Democrat coalition by working-class voters in the second half of the twentieth century. And I credit Rensin for his ultimate condemnation of undeserved leftist attitudes of superiority. Here are some difficult realities for the left cited by Rensin:

“Nothing is more confounding to the smug style than the fact that the average Republican is better educated and has a higher IQ than the average Democrat. That for every overpowered study finding superior liberal open-mindedness and intellect and knowledge, there is one to suggest that Republicans have the better of these qualities.“

Perhaps inventing new definitions for words in the service of rhetoric comes easy with pomposity. In the end, assertions that the left is more “caring”, “tolerant” or “peaceful” are balderdash. There are honest policy debates to be had about the best way to solve social problems and respect for the rights of others, but having experienced angry reactions in debate with befuddled leftists for myself, I wholly concur with this Kyle Smith observation:

“Ridiculing opponents is easier than arguing with them. Liberals don’t want debate, they want affirmation.“