No Excitement for 2016 Elections

November 2016 is a long way away, and several candidates have formally entered the fray. With such notables as Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, and Rand Paul testing the waters for the GOP and each offering what on paper seem substantial differences with the anointed Hillary Clinton of the Democrats the prospects for next year should be appealing. But the fact is that it's getting a lot harder to become excited about elections, and that's considering there are things which at one time would have made excitement easy.

Take for example Dr. Ben Carson. It's pretty obvious that many conservative media and social organs like him, and no doubt that he might well be a good right winger. He's surely outside of the Washington loop, which is supposed to make him all the more appealing. Yet it's quite easy to say the right things to an audience which you're trying to cater to. But can you actually translate that into good use of real power?

That's a very difficult thing to do. Outside of the political structure one can say whatever they want. Inside the structure, when there are hundreds of elected officials many of whom are working at cross purposes to you, and millions more bureaucrats who can effectively stymie your efforts, well, how effective can you be?

This is not to let politicians off the hook. When you pledge something you must do your best to make it work. Yet all too often the invariable compromises move you father away from your mark. And that's before the courts allow their various opinions of the non-elected to block your way too. It makes one wonder whether, as many libertarians assert, voting is worth it.

It is, but only because the alternative of long range tyranny is far worse. Sadly, that assertion really doesn't inspire the citizenry very much. That's no doubt in part because of the force everything to the middle thrust which defines American politics. Why get excited when you know the end result will most likely satisfy no one?

Three Things on a Saturday

One sign of a failing Presidency is when it begins to offer small time ideas in a world of big time controversies. President Barack Obama is doing exactly that with his idea about free community college. Against a backdrop of worldwide terrorism, the answer for him is access to low level college.

Please. Don't we have enough schools of higher education taking enough public money as it is? Why not free up the bonds which education imposes upon us and open up the job markets to the poor? How many jobs actually require college anyway? Formal education isn't necessarily the answer to individual economic woes, friends. Getting on the economic ladder to success, learning how to do for yourself in the real day to day world, is the key to prosperity, not guaranteeing jobs for sociology teachers. That's all that colleges are, really, with their core curriculums and all: jobs factories for those who major in areas of little general interest. More of that will not help the poor. It will simply stifle their need to better themselves.

Je suis Charlie? Not us. True, the crime against the twelve murder victims was heinous and despicable, and the perpetrators must be brought to justice (as almost all of them at this writing have been). But when you consider that the writers and editors at Charlie Hebdo were themselves a mean spirited, anti-religious, provocative and proudly secular humanist rabble, it is difficult to defend their publication itself on any rational grounds. We may have to tolerate such drivel, but only because the alternative of state censorship is a worse evil. We are human, and as such have a stake in preventing murderous actions against any other human beings. But we are decidedly not Charlie. We want responsible speech, not self serving cartoons meant to inflame passions and drive sales. That's hardly in the human interest, and not in truth a legitimate liberty.

Mitt Romney says that he's thinking about running for President again in 2016. Third time's a charm, Mitt? We're not so sure. Yes, he would certainly be better than Hillary, and if he were to get the GOP nomination we would vote for him out of necessity. But isn't it about time that the Republicans become, at least symbolically, a broader party by nominating a Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio? Might it be a good idea and move a bit towards the libertarians and look deeply towards Rand Paul? This next election might be the critical one in US History, given the general direction of the world as well as our nation as a whole. Might it be time to show that conservative/libertarian ideals are the right ones, and give the people a real choice that November?

Just our two cents on three current events issues. Have a nice day.