Jonathan Birge

Maybe love is too strong a word. I typically vote for Libertarians and the occasional Republican, and usually consider Democratic primaries like the political version of NASCAR: I don’t care who wins, but enjoy watching the crashes. However, the Republicans have lately forgotten their core values of limited and responsible government, and are spending like drunken sailors on shore leave (back when the dollar was worth something). The most decent man in the race, Ron Paul, was never even given a chance despite being the only one of the lot who actually understands economics or the concept of a republic. On the other hand, the Libertarian party is starting to get on my nerves, as it’s increasingly clear they will never get their act together and be anything more than a loose federation of ineffective idealists drowned out by a core of anti-government shack dwellers who don’t understand the first thing about classical liberalism but simply don’t like paying taxes. Finally, through the dishonesty and mismanagement of decades of administrations BOTH Democrat and Republican (don’t listen to anybody so simple-minded as to tell you that all of our problems are due entirely to Bush) our country is in the worst shape anybody in my generation has ever seen, in virtually every arena possible. You can thank the Bushes for the wars, of course, but you can thank Carter and Clinton for the lax lending policies that were meant to help poor people get homes but ended up turning the middle class into real estate speculators. And we can thank the lot of them for a corrupt government that bails out corporations and throws subsidies at politically powerful industries, devolving us into a perverse version of capitalism where taypayers take on the risks and the owners of capital still reap the profits.

The upside to things being so dire is that they are, in many ways, clarified. In truth, there is much low hanging fruit which honest politicians of any ideology should agree need to be fixed: earmarks, tort reform, corporate welfare, border security, massive government redundancy and inefficiency, etc. People may differ on approaches to economic theory, but I think it’s safe to say that hardly anybody thinks corruption and graft is a good form of government.

From all the partisan rancor, however, you’d think other than baseball steroids and Tibet, all the problems we face are of inscrutable complexity and hopelessly nuanced. But all the partisan heat is just part of the divide and conquer strategy employed by our “leaders” on both sides. Like clever sleight of hand sharps who get you to look at what the Right hand is doing while the Left hand is taking your watch, they hope that if they convince you their opponent is evil, you’ll fail to notice they’re not much better.

At this point, whether or not we have universal health care pales in comparison to whether or not we return to being a society with integrity. It is a common mistake and conceit to think if only we have the right system of government with the right laws, all else will fall into place if we just sit back and watch. This applies to those that think all will be right if we only have more socialism, as well as to those that think more laisez faire capitalism will automatically cure our ills. A government only applies rewards and forces, or the lack thereof. It is a force, not a fate. What matters more, above all, is the value system and cultural dynamics of the people under that government. Capitalism may enable great things, but it is a guarantee of nothing without a society composed of individuals who take responsibility for themselves and their neighbors, and who are thus capable of operating with the trust necessary for free trade to work. Capitalism is merely the absence of interfering artifice, in some sense, and the exposure to natural restoring forces; it will punish a society that does not treat its members with respect and fairness in the long run, but it will not inherently cause anybody to change themselves. On the other side of the idealogical spectrum: to the extent that socialism represents the will of the people to help each other, it is unnecessary, and to the extent that it represents an essential collective coercion of individual actions, it is unsustainable in the long run. I don’t mean to equivocate between socialism and capitalism; that matter is for another time. My point is simply that in either case, the notion that our destiny is in our system is a fallacy. It is in our culture, and a government can either be a road or a bog, but the private sector is the only thing that can do the driving.

This is all a long winded way of saying that what matters most at this point is that we have a leader who will not just manage our government back into an institution that is capable of operating with efficiency and integrity, but who can also lead us as a society back to our better nature. That is, while restoring our faith in government he or she must, ironically, lower our expectations of it and restore our expectations of ourselves. I think Obama is probably the only person running, certainly among the Democrats, who is capable of this kind of combined leadership and management.

The Wall Street Journal, a unlikely source of praise for a liberal politician, recently complimented Obama’s speech about race as exceptionally intelligent and devoid of the typical cheap applause lines that normally dot a candidate’s speech. More to the point, the speech was an astonishingly deft response to what would have derailed most campaigns. After being strongly associated with a preacher who embodies all the worst tendencies of black self-victimization, Obama manages to take control of the situation and leave everybody talking about his speech instead. It is further evidence that he is not the empty suit Hillary and my conservative friends accuse him of. As suggested by a recent piece in Rolling Stone, his almost preternaturally well run campaign, win or lose, will be a model for those which follow it. (Unlike Hillary, he’s apparently ready to lead now.) If the man can run the country half as well as he’s managed his campaign, I’d be interested to see him given the chance.

Despite his leftist policy stance, Obama is not a necessarily the statist most on the right assume. I may be misreading him, but my take is that if elected he will disappoint many a Democrat by being more of a reformer than a “New Deal” type Democrat. If you read between the lines of many of his speeches (such as this one) there is a call for personal accountability that is at odds with typical entitlement rhetoric. His willingness to tell people things they don’t want to hear is in marked contrast to Hillary’s exhausted cliches promising the government will solve all of your problems because she cares just so darn much about you. I think he understands, in a way that completely escapes her, that improvement must come from the governed more than the government. It is tempting to elect demagogues like her in economic hard times—especially as she dangles a $30B bailout for those who speculated on houses they couldn’t afford—but to fall for her sedating bromides may ultimately be fatal. Moral hazard got us into the subprime mess, in part, and creating more of the same will ultimately prolong the recovery. We need a return to fiscal conservatism, and this is one case where fighting fire with fire just gets you more fire.

So, what about McCain? Even as half a conservative, isn’t he closer to what a moderate libertarian would want? In theory, yes. But for now I’m leaning towards Obama even over McCain. For one, if Obama wins it is a moot point; McCain will most likely lose. Second, even if McCain wins, he will be unable to achieve anything in a Democratically controlled congress. (Third, I’m not sure McCain isn’t a Democrat anyway.) To turn away from McCain just because he isn’t everything I want may sound like the perfect being the enemy of the good, but I prefer to consider that as a more effective argument to vote for Obama: he may be too liberal and socialist for my liking, but he will be most capable of taking care of the “low hanging fruit” of government reform which I spoke of above.

I am not so guileless as to have no reservations about Obama. He may prove to be just another smooth talking politician, and his talk of sacrifice and fairness may give way in action as a president to the easy but shortsighted populism of entitlements and looting the minority to ingratiate himself to the majority. But so far I am holding out hope that he truly is a politician of rare integrity and leadership, and not just a politician whose even better than most at faking it. But one thing is certain: when a libertarian is suggesting an effective liberal in office may be a good thing, you know things have gotten bad.