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Knee Deep In Mud

Knee Deep In Mud

March 6, 2020 (1,085 words)

Decorum prevents me from describing the substance restraining our gait with the colorful term of my choice.

There is only one thing more disappointing than the Super Tuesday (March 3) primary voting that has vaulted Joe Biden back into contention for the Democratic nomination.

Okay, let’s make it two things: The way Bernie Sanders continues to be ostracized as a “socialist.” And the way Democratic voters are starting to be taken in by this siren song.

Yes, yes, a thousand times yes, Mr. Sanders has left himself open to such lazy tar-and-feather tactics, by choosing to proudly identify as a democratic socialist. And if this broad-stroke designation ends up costing him the nomination he will have no one but himself to blame.

But that still doesn’t excuse the superficial stereotyping that passes for insightful commentary around the dial, and in prestigious print outlets such as The Wall Street Journal.

Grown men and women, presumably of sound mind and body, continue to stake out their opposition to Mr. Sanders in the most far-fetched ways.

We have our former ambassador to the U.N. announcing, “This is No Time to Go Wobbly on Capitalism.” She has seen firsthand the destructive work of socialism in many countries around the world. Ergo, we have to maintain our present version of capitalism exactly as is.

And we have the eminent economic philosopher F.A. Hayek being routinely invoked, to belabor the point that socialism is a failed model that has no place in the U.S, or any other country, for that matter.

What on earth are all these people talking about? Did I miss something? Is Bernie Sanders proposing to nationalize Google or Microsoft?


serious discussions of stark policy differences…


Of course there are stark policy differences between Mr. Sanders and Mr. Biden, and between Mr. Sanders and the current occupant of the White House. We would all be served by a serious discussion of those differences.

One big difference is Sanders’ support for a single-payer healthcare system, which has been dubbed Medicare for All. When he points out that we are the only industrialized nation on earth without some form of single-payer system, there is no reasoned response offered.

When he notes Americans pay far more per capita on health care than anywhere else in the world, there is silence. Or mentions the number of personal bankruptcies that occur every year as a result of exorbitant medical bills, or reflects on the high prices we must pay for prescription medicines, there is no intelligent rebuttal.

Instead, all we get over and over is a familiar tagline, about how Americans like their present health coverage, and want to maintain a system with more choices and free-market competition.

Which prompts me to ask the same question: What are these people talking about?

When your doctor writes you a prescription for a proprietary medication, what choice do you have in getting that prescription filled?

When you are diagnosed with a growth on your kidney and become a candidate for elective surgery, how exactly does free-market competition enter the picture? Are you supposed to “shop around” with other surgeons, comparing their fees?

Even if you were to undertake such an arduous process, where would it get you? No medical professional seems interested in answering the first question on every consumer’s mind: “How much will this procedure cost me, doctor”?


wanting to keep our doctors…


Instead of a serious discussion of these realities, we get the same old song and dance: Majorities tell pollsters they would rather keep their doctors.

Which begs the obvious question: Where exactly would your doctor go if we were to convert to a single-payer system? Would he or she abandon the practice of medicine and start selling cars? Or maybe go back to school and enter the legal profession?

The people who are championing our present health care system must be very healthy themselves, with little reason to engage it. Granted my evidence is anecdotal, but everyone I know who actually needs medical attention has experienced varying degrees of frustration with how the care is meted out, and invoiced.

It’s a convoluted system that leaves many of us, medical professionals and patients alike, feeling aggrieved. There may be no easy fix, but shouldn’t we at least try?

And of course health care is not the only contentious issue in this election cycle.

Many sensible people across the political spectrum think it’s time to consider some form of carbon tax on the fossil fuel industry. But not The Wall Street Journal, which is sticking to its guns and celebrates how fracking has shrunk the carbon footprint, and provided us with new-found energy independence.

I am certainly not suggesting this topic is any easier to tackle than healthcare. But giving blanket praise to something like fracking seems a bit short-sighted to me. Those who do so must not live in a state where fracking predominates, or live near an actual fracking operation. It’s a dirty business that takes quite a toll on the locals and their immediate environment.

Is Sanders interested in “driving every fossil fuel company out of business”? That strikes me as an extreme characterization, to say the least.


isn’t the hand-writing on the wall?…


Even so, Bernie Sanders or no Bernie Sanders, isn’t the hand-writing sort of on the wall when it comes to fossil fuel? Don’t the natural resources being utilized have an expiration date? Aren’t greenhouse gases responsible for at least some climate change? Isn’t this established industry standing in the way of pursuing “greener” energy alternatives?

“Sorry, guys” is all I can say to the WSJ, if your editorial writers remain stubbornly immune to this being “a moral issue,” as Mr. Sanders and others have dubbed it.

On and on it goes. Please don’t misconstrue my point, though. There are many aspects of the “liberal agenda” which I find misguided and do not embrace. But the reflexive conservative position that refuses to acknowledge a liberal can actually have something of value to contribute in certain important areas of public policy defies reason and logic.

Right along with the WSJ, I too am in favor of our country embarking on an eight-month-long impassioned debate on the issues, as we chart a course for the future.

But I worry the “will of the people” will be unduly influenced by what amounts to a silly smear campaign, waged on the part of respected media outlets, that insist on painting the upcoming November election as “a choice between freedom and socialism.”

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr.
March 6, 2020

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Calling Names, Throwing Stones

Calling Names, Throwing Stones

February 28, 2020 (2,388 words)

There are those who say my commentary suffers from being simple-minded. It’s true, these days I do favor clean lines and straightforward explanations. But in chasing a concise thought one should avoid relying too heavily on cliché.

That’s easier said than done, if you’ll notice, since for much of the prestige press and the new internet blogosphere and podcast universe, it seems cliché is just about everybody’s stock-in-trade.

Is this a form of intellectual laziness? Yes, it is. But ultimately I think it’s more of a language problem, an example of our inability to think in anything other than adversarial terms.

Now that Bernie Sanders has emerged as the front-runner for the Democratic nomination in the upcoming presidential election, critics are tripping over themselves to demonize him as a socialist. (Of course Mr. Sanders opened this linguistic can of worms himself, by proudly identifying as a “democratic socialist.”)

His supporters, too, are being rudely dismissed as favoring socialism over capitalism. But what does this even mean in today’s world?

Whether it’s an uneducated immigrant factory worker of a century ago fighting for union representation, or young people now just coming out of school and entering the work force – when such folks are quoted as identifying as “socialist,” or expressing an interest in “socialism,” all they are really saying is “capitalism has done me wrong,” or “it looks like it will do me wrong,” and “there must be a better way.”

Let’s face it, there is a good bit of evidence to support the view that capitalism has done, and is doing, many people wrong. And frankly that evidence continues to mount on a daily basis, with each new report of corporate maleficence on the part of our largest and most respected financial institutions and international conglomerates.

With all its warts, though, capitalism is the only game in town. Everyone knows this, even if our present vocabulary limits our ability to articulate the problem with a keener eye.

It’s not a question of scraping capitalism in favor of some moribund concept of socialism, regardless of how it’s being caricatured as such in the press. It’s more a matter of figuring out how to clean capitalism up. How do we cut down on the more flagrant abuses being committed in its name, under the cover of its moral-sounding mantle?

Why is it so hard to work any nuance into public discourse? Why do we so readily engage flaccid stereotypes, and constantly search out political heroes and villains to cheer or vilify?

MICHAEL BLOOMBERG

Following this rubric we only ever have two choices. Consider Michael Bloomberg, the billionaire philanthropist and ex-mayor of New York City who is a late entry into the Democratic primary race.

He is either a successful entrepreneur who took his management skills into public service and then started giving his money way to reduce gun violence and climate change (hero).

Or, he is a rapacious billionaire who amassed a gross amount of wealth, who became an authoritarian mayor targeting young black men, and who now is trying to buy his way to national political power (villain).

The truth is more complicated than either thumbnail sketch will allow. Most of us are prepared to admit as much, at least when we’re not letting our televisions and smartphones get us all riled up.

To properly locate Mr. Bloomberg in context, one should first acknowledge the “finalization” of the economy that has occurred, and then recognize his role in that transformation.

During the decades’ long boom that followed WWII, Wall Street did not play a particularly prominent role in the process. Business leaders were people who ran companies that actually made things. Not people who got rich through wheeling and dealing.

That all changed in the 1980s, due to some clever deregulation. Suddenly there was big money to be made in buying and selling businesses. No need to bother with the grunt work of actually running a successful company.

In too many cases the financial deals that made piles of money for the perpetrators left the firms changing hands saddled with crippling levels of debt.

After the dust settled on these transactions, and exorbitant profits were extracted from balance sheets and distributed to new “owners,” these once-thriving companies emerged as shells of their former selves. Too often the end result was bankruptcy and job destruction.

Yes, this familiar path to private equity wealth is being followed to this day.

With the financial sector doubling in size as a share of the economy, it has unfortunately pulled lots of capital and a slew of smart people away from productive activities. There is no evidence this mega-expansion of Wall Street has made the rest of the economy more efficient.

In fact, family income has stagnated as the financial sector has expanded, with a few people getting rich. And let’s not forget it was the runaway expansion of the financial sector that paved the way for the worst economic crisis since the 1930s.

So Michael Bloomberg fits into this narrative how?

He created and sold a proprietary computer system that provides real-time access to large quantities of financial data. A subscription is expensive, but it’s something every wheeler-dealer must have, since it allows the subscriber to react to market events a few minutes faster than those without such access.

The famous Bloomberg Terminal is an example of a very profitable business that has not been especially beneficial to the overall economy. Getting financial information a few minutes earlier does nothing to improve shop floor business decisions that affect jobs and productivity.

While Mr. Bloomberg may not have engaged in destructive business practices himself, he created specialty software for wheeler-dealers who most certainly have. He contributed to a financial arms race that advances the interest of a select few, but leaves most of us still standing at square one.

ELIZABETH WARREN

Though her platform is essentially the same as Bernie Sanders’, Senator Warren has slipped badly in the polls and is faring poorly in the early primaries.

That’s too bad, since in recent years she has established a reputation as an effective crusader in the very area of our economy that has caused so much trouble: fraud and excess in the financial industry. If you remember, she was plucked from academia by President Barack Obama.

No matter how you feel about his administration’s legacy otherwise, we should all be grateful to Mr. Obama for bringing this woman onto the national stage at a time when her expertise and perspective is so desperately needed.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was a key reform instituted after the 2008 financial crisis, and it was Elizabeth Warren’s brainchild from the start. By all accounts it was wildly successful, saving ordinary families billions (with a “b”). Until, that is, the Trump administration came along and decided to undermine its authority.

Whoever gets elected as our next President, Senator Warren should be given a prominent role in the new administration. My thought would be to install her as Secretary of the Treasury. Why keep putting Goldman Sachs executives in this post? Let’s try a financial whiz kid who has NOT manipulated the system to make millions for themselves as a hedge fund manager and investor.

ATTACKING THE FRONT RUNNER

As the clear front runner for the Democratic nomination, it’s only right that Bernie Sanders receive the lion’s share of scrutiny and criticism. After all, if your aim is to be commander-in-chief of this great nation you had better damn well be able to withstand your fair share of abuse.

My only disappointment is how so much of the criticism traffics in cliché.

Depending on who you are reading or listening to, Mr. Sanders is good at shouting from the podium but can’t get anything done. He has been unable to have any of his signature policy initiatives passed from his seat in the Senate.

He doesn’t believe in capitalism. He thinks profits are obscene and equate to greed. And he sees government as a more important source of job creation than the private sector.

Bernie Sanders is someone who doesn’t understand that in the real world businesses earn profits by offering goods or services at a price others are willing to pay. No one is ever forced to buy anything.

He also doesn’t realize that every single business leader, be it a humble bogeda owner or a lofty Fortune 500 CEO, realizes their greatest asset is their employees.

And whether the business has 15 such employees or 15,000, the leader goes to bed each night aware of the hard-working families who depend on the success of the business for their own piece of American dream.

Talk about laying it on a little thick… Can we please just ease up on the platitudes, people?

When Mr. Bloomberg tells us from the debate stage he “got lucky and made a lot of money, and now I’m giving it all away, including a lot to the Democratic Party,” we are not offended. He is merely expressing the healthy ego that’s an important component of any successful entrepreneur’s DNA.

When Sanders immediately responds by saying “I think your employees played a role in your success,” this in no way undercuts Mr. Bloomberg’s singular achievements. But the remark does serve as a counter-balance to the conventional myth of entrepreneurship that is bandied about.

The myth is used as a shield. It staves off a public reckoning. It prevents us from holding our hard-driving free market acolytes responsible for their sometimes-less-than-praiseworthy actions.

And one might add that’s really all the adjustment our current version of capitalism requires – some much needed counter-balance.

It’s not as though Sanders is not smart enough to realize many of Mr. Bloomberg’s employees have been well-compensated, allowing them to buy homes, send their children to college, and retire in comfort.

But using the well-being of a certain strata of employee to defend the status quo is a diversionary tactic, isn’t it? That some employees are being treated fairly hardly changes the fact that most of them – across the board and around the country – do not receive an equitable cut of a successful company’s bounty.

When Sanders calls out Bloomberg’s $60B net worth as “immoral,” he is not passing judgement on the man. But he is most definitely incriminating an economic system that functions apart from basic moral considerations.


we have allowed capitalism to become immoral…


The system itself is not inherently moral or immoral. But ours has become immoral in its practical application.

This is due in large measure to risk-taking, free-market-defending entrepreneurs who have been given a pass on how they look out for the full roster of employees entrusted to their care – and the communities in which they operate – as they march to the top.

Those who support Bernie Sanders are known to admire his authenticity. Now they are being criticized as naïve, of failing to realize Mr. Sanders’ most audacious proposals have little-to-no-chance of ever being enacted into law.

Sanders’ aura of authenticity comes from his saying the same thing throughout his political career. It should also be noted his pet peeves have been percolating since the 1890s. Maybe even since 1848. Yes, folks, our economic system has been broken (or rigged) for quite a long time now.

The challenge is finding an appropriate language which will allow us to carry on this important discussion without resorting to calling each other names, and throwing stones. Of building a vocabulary that can articulate the situation more accurately.

A step in the right direction would be for Mr. Sanders to drop his unfortunate, fraught-with-negative-connotation label of democratic socialist. He should identify himself as what he really is: a follower of FDR. Bernie Sanders is nothing if not a New Dealer for the 21st century.

It would also help if he could bring himself to verbalize a modicum of support for the generic concept of capitalism, while continuing to attack its negative manifestations.

For instance, if the free market is able to reward working families and help them do well, that’s fine with me, he should come out and say.

But an extractive, predatory capitalism that excessively rewards speculators and encourages their greed is corrosive to the common good, and he should continue to pound away on that theme.


it’s never been easy to believe in prophets…


What of electability? Will Mr. Sanders’ message appeal to anyone in the Democratic Party beyond his rabid base, let alone enough Republicans and Independents in a general election?

Will his candidacy at the top of the ticket hurt the down-ballot chances of House and Senate Democrats up for re-election?

His inability to build a coalition in the Senate, where he is one lone voice, should not be held against him, or pointed to as any sort of precursor for his potential effectiveness in the Oval Office.

If he captures the presidency it would constitute an unprecedented event in the history of American politics. It would send an unmistakable signal to legislators from either party in both houses of Congress that the mood of the American electorate has changed.

Then maybe, just maybe, we the people can start to see some real accountability from our fabled “job creators.”

How to pay for the ambitious programs on Bernie Sanders’ agenda? For starters, let’s stop giving lavish tax breaks to those job creators who have achieved out-sized success.

How to right the ship regarding prices and wages? Let’s stop passing every increase in costs on to consumers. This will require the investor class to push the plate of spaghetti away, and stop gorging themselves at the trough.

By that I mean – gasp – be prepared to take less of a return on one’s passive investments, so the rank-and-file can earn a decent wage and benefits.

On the subject of electability, and policies “that will never pass,” I give the last word to Elizabeth Warren, who has said many times in this primary season: “I don’t understand why anybody goes to the trouble of running to be president of the United States to talk about what we can’t really do and shouldn’t fight for.”

She has also said: “It is giant corporations that have taken our government and that are holding it by the throat, and we need to have the courage to fight back against that and until we’re ready to do that, it’s just more of the same.”

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr. February 28, 2020

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Creativity

Creativity

February 21, 2020 (16 words)

Every day is an opportunity to find new ways of expressing our current level of understanding.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr.
February 21, 2020

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The Wrong Reasons

The Wrong Reasons

February 18, 2020 (1,838 words)

We are all entitled to our opinions, and we tend to take great pride in them. Unfortunately the vested interest we show in our present level of understanding is what stands in the way of improving our discernment of the world around us.

Speaking of vested interests, nothing is more curious to me at this stage of life than to look back on the way social conservatives in general, and conservative Catholics in particular, have tethered themselves to the Republican Party over the course of the last fifty years.

The strategic alliance was formed in the 1970s, in response to the sexual revolution of the 1960s, and specifically to the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision of 1973. It helped sweep Ronald Reagan into office in 1980.

So things were already well under way by the time Rush Limbaugh hit the airwaves in the late 1980s. But this effective and entertaining communicator has played a major role in strengthening that symbiotic relationship ever since. I was reminded of this recently when he once again made headline news.

On Monday, February 1, Mr. Limbaugh announced he is suffering from advanced lung cancer. The next day he was awarded the Medal of Freedom by President Trump during his State of the Union address.

Then on February 4, a Catholic priest and frequent blogger who prides himself on being an orthodox defender of the faith offered the following remarks on his blog:

”Please pray for a complete, swift, durative miraculous cure for him, perhaps through the intercession of Venerable Augustus Tolton.

“Every reader here, every committed conservative, faithful Catholic in these USA and elsewhere, owes Rush a huge debt.

“Some of you are young and don’t remember what mainstream media was like back in the day. It was dominated by few, extraordinarily liberal outlets.

“Then came Rush. He busted the liberal hegemony.

“I think he made it possible for the emergence of a new conservative movement in general and, therefore, in the Catholic sphere.

“Talk radio changed everything. And there really isn’t much of a lib talk radio. The same goes in the Catholic blogosphere. When ideas are truly exchanged, libs flee.

“Rush was the trailblazer. He developed a new genre in radio.”

To be clear, I have nothing against Rush Limbaugh. He has always struck me as a genial sort with a clever mind. He started as a popularizer of scholarly political theorists like Richard Weaver. Weaver was one of many such serious writers brought together by a young William F. Buckley, Jr. in the 1950s under the banner of what was then a new magazine, The National Review

As his fame grew Mr. Limbaugh became less of an incisive analyst and more of a predictably partisan cheerleader/critic. Even so, I have nothing but fond memories of my time as a devotee of Rush, and of his take on the “gospel of prosperity.”

But a funny thing happened on my way to the Promised Land. I became a Catholic again in 1994.

Coming face-to-face with decades’ worth of modern-day Catholic social (economic) teaching, as articulated by a cadre of marvelous writers and summarized magisterially by various papal encyclicals, it was hard not to notice a pronounced disconnect between this teaching and that of Rush Limbaugh and the Republican establishment.

It’s not that Rush and the Republicans are dead-wrong. It’s that they are only partially right. He and they show no interest in trying to address the economic question comprehensively, as Catholic teaching does. They are content to break off little chunks of the problem and offer partial solutions that work well enough in isolation, I suppose, but leave the larger landscape unattended.

Many other talking heads came along to join Mr. Limbaugh on his perch high atop the Excellence in Broadcasting (EIB) tower. His followers eventually supplanted him in influence. They have a much broader infrastructure at their disposal to disseminate their opinions, what with Fox News and the proliferation of other cable news outlets, podcasts, blogposts, YouTube, etc.

At the risk of coming off as a bit old-fashioned, I find the new infrastructure to be producing mainly noise – lots of heat with very little light, as they say.

Which brings me back to social conservatives in general, and conservative Catholics in particular, and the way they have allowed themselves to be swept along by this partisan noise.


too easily talked into believing what is not true…


Since their focus is unquestionably on the disintegration of personal morality and the promotion of sexual license, this group is easily distracted away from the subject of economic justice. They are easily talked into believing the party of family values has the right idea when it comes to economics.

This means good people with no particular allegiance to Republican fiscal policy accept that policy, in some cases even defend that policy, simply because the other political alternative has caved on the morality issue.

But this shows a real lack of discernment. If you are concerned about our cultural funk, you must consider how our predatory economic system – based on the freedom of economic actors to do as they please, unbound by scruples or outside regulation – is as much to blame as hot-bottom social issues like reproductive choice and marriage equality.

This opening of the eyes means no longer automatically and consistently identifying as Republican, finally realizing conservative politics and economic policy is NOT a faithful expression of one’s Christian beliefs.

It will not be easy to break this habit of reflexively denigrating liberals as nothing but evildoers undermining virtue and honor, with no redeeming qualities whatsoever. Especially for the petitioners who bring interesting historical antecedents to their argument.

Take as an example the short essay entitled “Liberalism and the End of Virtue,” written by a senior contributor to The Imaginative Conservative, a young man by the name of Paul Krause. He hits all the philosophical hots spots: Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Spinoza, John Stuart Mills, and John Rawls. Then he backs up to the Epicureans, the Platonists, and the Stoics.

Mr. Krause identifies the core of liberalism as “freedom from harm,” and “the pursuit of pleasure.” He sees virtue, on the other hand, as “the anti-pleasure philosophy.” Virtue, he writes, “sacrifices the pursuit of pleasure for the contentment of the soul.”

It’s an inspired little piece, and I agree with everything Krause has to say. But he leaves out two important words from his concluding sentence:

”What does a world absent of virtue look like? Look no further than Hollywood or Jeffrey Epstein.”

The two words missing at the end of Paul Krause’s last sentence are “Wall Street.”

In the similarly short essay “The Liberal Mind: Its Genesis And Propensities,” esteemed philosopher Jude Dougherty (b.1930) covers much of the same ground, and reaches some very familiar conclusions.

”Its propensity to create socialist regimes in the light of its romantic notions of equality leads to expropriation through the graduated income tax and death duties. Equality is defined as equality of reward. Liberty is by its nature non-egalitarian because men differ in intelligence, ambition, courage, perseverance and all else that makes for success. Equality before the law and equality of opportunity cannot guarantee equality of outcome.

“Equality of outcome can only be achieved through massive coercion.. Utopian schemes that insist on the equality of citizens entail despotic authority. There is no method by which men can be free and equal. The propensity of liberal governments to redistribute wealth inevitably subordinates individual rights to group rights.

“Satisfying group claims necessarily enhances the power of the state that acts on their behalf. Welfare, with its sundry entitlements and spurious rights, removes family responsibility and the role of private charity.

“With government interference in the lives of citizens greater than at any period in history, the conservative mind exists to challenge the liberal myths that have governed recent social and economic policy in the Unites States and abroad.”

To read Mr. Dougherty defending his ideal construct of the conservative mind in this way – after years of devastating economic upheaval, and the systematic syphoning of our nation’s productivity and wealth into the hands of a select few – is more than a little disappointing.

Especially since Jude Dougherty is Dean Emeritus of the School of Philosophy at The Catholic University of America,

One wonders what Mr. Dougherty thinks of the report that Apple earned $22 billion in just the last three months of 2019? (That’s “billion,” with a “b.”)

What does he think of the way our tech giants squirm and maneuver out of paying their fair share of taxes? Of the way they pit cities – and entire countries – against one another to see who can offer the biggest tax concessions to attract the business?

Or of the report issued earlier today, that HSBC, the giant financial services company, is cutting 35,000 jobs because its profit plummeted in 2019 to a mere 6.5 billion? (Again, that’s with a “b.”)

All this while municipalities large and small face bankruptcy and can’t afford to pave their roads or rebuild their bridges. And rural areas don’t have access to decent broadband service, this era’s version of electricity. And we remain the only nation in the industrialized world without some form of universal health care.


economic justice and equitable distribution are not utopian or socialist…


It feels a little awkward quoting Catholic social teaching to a dean at Catholic University. But economic justice and equitable distribution have nothing to do with any socialist utopia seeking equality of outcome.

Bitterly complaining about a graduated income tax, death duties, and the “redistribution of assets,” as Republicans are wont to do, carries the righteous assumption one’s prized assets have all been acquired through fair and moral means.

If you believe that, you have simply not been paying attention to what’s gone down in the business world during the last fifty years.

Such as the demise of the social contract between successful businesses and the people those businesses employ, and the communities in which they operate.

In hindsight a healthy middle class was only allowed to exist for a fleeting moment, in the middle of the 20th century. Now things are not-so-slowly reverting to the way they have always been – a small cadre of the well-off, and a burgeoning mass of the out-of-luck, with a widening chasm between them.

Mr. Dougherty’s principled analysis provides ideological cover – whether wittingly or unwittingly – for corrosive economic behavior that ranges from being inconsiderate of one’s fellow man, to being exploitative in the extreme.

To ignore these realities is to live in a bubble, a conservative utopia, where all economic actors are thought to be good and true.

And to harbor a naïve belief that the ones who aren’t will be kept honest by savvy independent consumers who can always take their business elsewhere. Or by that phantom notion still routinely invoked, known as open competition.

Just like the good old days, when Adam Smith first penned The Wealth of Nations in 1776.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr. February 18, 2020

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Pro-Life Presidents

Pro-Life Presidents

February 15, 2020 (1,646 words)

There was a surprise guest at the March For Life in Washington, D.C. last month, a boisterous rally held annually on the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion.

Traveling from various regions of the country, a multitude of pro-life faithful gather in the nation’s capital every year to protest this 1973 ruling and to stand for life. The festivities always begin at the National Mall, where a stage is erected for the day, and various speakers do their best to address the throng.

That’s followed by a march down Constitution Avenue NW, which turns right at First Street NE, and then ends on the steps of the Supreme Court Building.

But just getting from all those chartered buses to the Mall involves a good stretch of the legs.

After that brisk walk, almost a run in some cases, many of these earnest attendees find themselves milling about aimlessly in the cold and the damp and frequently in the mud, since the National Mall is a sprawling gathering place. Unless you are in the immediate vicinity of the stage, you can’t see or even hear the speakers very well.

In all these years there has been one person conspicuously absent from the proceedings: the President of the United States. Even though three Republicans have held the office since 1973, and all three claimed to be staunchly pro-life, none of them ever managed the trip from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue before last month.

In many of those years – a total of twenty-three, all told – our supposedly pro-life commander-in-chief conspired to be out of town altogether on that particular day.

But this time around the iconoclast Donald Trump “actually came out, stood in solidarity with, and spoke directly to the hundreds of thousands of pro-lifers massed for the annual March For Life,” as one effusive Catholic journalist exclaimed.

(Editor’s Note: The March For Life, and the pro-life movement as a whole, has never been exclusively Catholic. But it has always been predominantly Catholic.)

A chorus of similar reports has surfaced in the conservative Catholic press, declaring President Trump’s guest spot to be nothing less than an historic, game-changing event. Take Marc Thiessen, the Washington Post columnist and American Enterprise Institute scholar, who wrote:

”Then along came Trump, a man who doesn’t care what the Republican establishment thinks. He has embraced the pro-life movement in a way no other president has.”

This single sighting, and this one speech, has convinced a coterie of Catholic commentators that President Trump is “not just willing to push pro-life policies, but he also considers himself one of us.” The general consensus after January 24 is that Mr. Trump “is the most pro-life president in history.”

Talk about letting oneself get carried away by the emotion of the moment…

While acknowledging the speech was no doubt written by an aide, one account gave the President high marks for delivering it “with heartfelt passion and a real sense of conviction.” Many passages waxed poetic “in ways that captured the real heart of the pro-life movement.” Passages like this:

”When we see the image of a baby in the womb, we glimpse the majesty of God’s creation. When we hold a newborn in our arms, we know the endless love that each child brings to a family. When we watch a child grow, we see the splendor that radiates from each human soul.”

These sentiments are certainly true and beautiful. But they hardly amount to a bold new statement of principle that will set the national debate on a different course. One might even say all President Trump did was successfully recite a sort of beginner’s boiler-plate.

That this is enough to convince pro-lifers they are no longer being treated as second-class citizens by the Republican Party demonstrates just how delusional they are about their place in the present-day landscape of liberal democracy.

Though these dedicated souls may be loath to admit it, the odds are not in favor of the pro-life movement at this point. We are always being told the general population is “trending pro-life,” or “trending pro-choice,” depending on who is commissioning the poll.

The fact is there is a minority of citizens who have an unshakable belief that abortion is murder. And an equivalent minority that believes in a woman’s right to choose. The vast majority, however, are kind of squeamish on the subject and would prefer not to think about it.

They vacillate between the moral imperative against abortion any decent person instinctively feels, and the pursuit of happiness we’ve all been pledging allegiance to since birth.


a movement that captures the American ethos…


This majority has a hard time refuting the latest tagline of the pro-choice crowd: “If you don’t like abortion, don’t have one.” Because, after all, it perfectly captures the American ethos, doesn’t it?

So infanticide is just another line item on the larger, cultural legal brief of “custom, law, and tradition” versus “we get to do whatever we want.”

As for President’ Trump’s unprecedented January 24 appearance representing an audacious disregard for the Republican establishment, as the Washington Post’s Marc Thiessen would have it – well, I think a more sober analysis of the political calculus is in order.

Let’s acknowledge how Trump steered clear of the March during the first three years of his administration, following in the footsteps of his Republican predecessors. Now, his re-election looms.

Consider, too, how Mr. Trump has already strategically appeased his party’s establishment, by way of his landmark tax cut. The fiscal conservatives have been placated. The stock market is churning along. The abortion question has once again been relegated to sideshow status, of little import to the well-heeled.

From their perspective, if President Trump’s nifty two-step at the March For Life helps lock in a key demographic that allows the Republican establishment to retain its hold over economic policy, then by all means go ahead and throw the poor bastards a bone.

THE NEXT SET OF CONSIDERATIONS

This brings our discussion to the next set of considerations. Not all pro-life advocates are poor bastards, are they? In fact some are doing quite well for themselves, thank you very much. And this complicates the issue no end.

Those who aren’t poor – who are, in fact, cruising along on auto-pilot – are in agreement with the logic behind the landmark tax cut. Their fortunes have risen as a result of those cuts.

They also naturally agree with the latest Republican talking point that “the economy is booming.” Since for them, it is.

As for everybody else’s fortunes, it seems the well-off are easily reassured on this score. Establishment types eagerly gobble up that other new talking point: “Wages are rising, especially among low-wage workers.”

This is the data-driven position of Marc Thiessen and his fellow scholars over at The American Enterprise Institute, for instance.

Here I wish to point out – merely in the interest of being objective, and without wanting to come off as overly critical – the Marc Thiessens of this world get to live relatively high on the hog, and are therefore out of touch with the financial realities faced by the vast majority of their countrymen.

The well-off are blind to how the system that is working so well for them is failing so many of their neighbors.


pro-lifers of modest means and the even-less-advantaged…


What’s strange in all this is the attitude of those “poor bastards,” the pro-lifers who hail from more modest backgrounds, and who in many cases are living a paycheck-to-paycheck existence.

These salt-of-the-earth types are oddly numb to any discussion of economic fair play, and how the lack thereof impacts their righteous cause.

While paying their own bills may be a daunting monthly challenge, they do not fully appreciate how the financial straits the even-less-advantaged confront can seem downright insurmountable.

Financially strapped, with the cards stacked firmly against them, and no prospect for anything better down the road – such folks cannot imagine a scenario in which they could afford the luxury of bringing a child – or yet another child – into this world.

Yes, this still leaves a segment of the population who chose to abort for lifestyle reasons. But I will tell you it is the fiscal libertines who are driving this callousness. It is they who have created and ensconced the culture of me first and the hell with everybody else.

While it has obviously infected a notable swath of highly-educated and career-minded women, it’s actually been our Type A men – movers and shakers who are the stuff of legend – leading the way.

And here we confront a curiosity that has gone largely unnoticed.


the role of fiscal libertines…


Social conservatives rail against the women’s movement and the sexual revolution as responsible for legalized abortion. But they dismiss any consideration of the role fiscal conservatives – a special breed of libertine – have played in this regrettable turn of events.

Fiscal conservatives have engineered an equivalent revolution in the way business is conducted. They have shredded the social contract and wreaked havoc among us. This havoc has paved the way for our current disdain.

To conclude, then, overturning Roe v. Wade remains a worthy legal objective. But if you think that’s going to solve the problem you are sadly mistaken.

If we don’t recalibrate the economic equation, and re-introduce a sense of justice into everyday life, all this long-sought-after repeal will do is kick off a civil war.

So, thank you President Trump, for finally showing up and sharing a few inspiring words with the pro-life diaspora. But forgive me if I don’t give your ceremonial gesture a standing ovation.

This pro-life advocate of a Catholic persuasion will sit up and start to take notice as soon as you push for a steep carbon tax on the energy industry, and suggest stricter anti-trust legislation for our giant tech firms. And that’s just for starters.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr.
February 15, 2020

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All Sorts of Divides

All Sorts of Divides

February 9, 2020 (182 words)

It’s hard for men and women to really talk to each other. It’s difficult for a 65 year-old to easily converse with a 25 year-old. Or for folks who wear blue jeans at work to chat amiably with those who don creased slacks or tailored skirts during the day.

There are all sorts of divides in this world. Developing empathy for others is how we span them.

Figuring this out was a big part of my upbringing, an important part of what my parents taught each of their six children to do. They accomplished this instruction mainly by dint of their example, without resorting to elaborate discourse.

But all that seems to have gone by the wayside. Now that everyone is in full Walt Whitman mode – I celebrate myself, I sing the song of myself – relating to others in any meaningful way has slipped far down the list of priorities.

Since each of us have embraced the pursuit of our own unique definition of happiness, is it any wonder we are encountering so much social unrest, marked by such incivility?

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr. February 9, 2020

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