I know it is the last day, and no one listens to me anyway, but my conscience would not let me rest if I do not do everything I can, every up to the last day. I am not a professional pundit or a political scientist, I am a doctor, but I have been voting for fifty years and following politics for 60 and I hope that if you are, hard to imagine, still undecided about who to vote for in tomorrow’s election you will take a few minutes, less than ten I hope, to read these few paragraphs.
This election involves for me two aspects. One is common to all modern American elections. The other is unique to this particular one.
The core difference between the two parties, between right and left revolves around determining the appropriate relationship between the government and the individual, the most central axis of difference being the economic, financial connection. At its most basic level, it is a question of finding the best, most effective balance between the amount and manner that taxes are taken by the government, and the services it provides with the money it gets from those taxes.
Broadly speaking, those with the most money tend to want their government to take as little as possible, and they do not generally need a great deal services which the government might provide, while those who are farther down the economic chain also would like to have to give up less of their money to taxes, but without as large a fund of resources of their own tend to need more things provided, supplied, or at least subsidized by their government.
While no one can say with total certainty what are the duties of the government to its populace, the Preamble to the Constitution gives us some clue when it says that our government is designed to “form a more perfect union, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare…”. I think we can substitute the words “Well – being” for “Welfare” since the latter is a word so loaded with associations -welfare state, welfare queen, etc – but there is considerable room to discuss what it means to promote well – being.
Although there is debate over what is needed to “provide for the common defense”, most people of any political persuasion agree that in the modern age we don’t depend on farmers with muskets, and some proportion, perhaps even a large proportion of our taxes have to go to create, maintain and when necessary employ an effective and “lethal’ military.
“Promoting the general welfare” (well – being) does not garner so much agreement. We seem to agree there need to be roads and bridges, but how much tax money is needed to maintain and modernize them? We agree there needs to be some basic education provided and public schools reliably offer K through 12, but what about early childhood preparation? To what extent is it the government’s role, and hence a valid use of taxes, to offer the college level and advanced which is increasingly necessary to compete in transformative new technologies on the world stage? Health care, access to internet, clean water – all of these constitute goods and services over which it could be fruitful to discuss their potential value which the government could provide to the society and nation generally, as related to the tax burden which would be required to support those services.
And, parallel with setting expectations for that which a modern government should, could or must provide is the question of how to pay for it. Should each person pay an equal share of their income to taxes? Should the tax rate be progressive – higher earners paying a higher proportion of their high incomes. Or should they actually be able, through deductions, tax credits and other devices to pay a lower proportion of their incomes through taxes? Or should there be taxes on wealth – net worth – regardless of income? Or should there just be consumption taxes, sales taxes, so called “sin” taxes on liquor, tobacco and increasingly drugs such as cannabis.
What is the best way for a government to raise the money it will require and for what services and to whom?
These are the primary issues which separate the two parties. Yes, there are some less consistent differences over the appropriate approach to international power balance and issue solution, with the left tending to look more for compromise and the right tending to look more to assert its view of national interest with power or its threat. And there are some differences regarding the role of the government in regulating private behavior, but for the most part, Republicans tend to represent those interests which thrive on a low tax base and minimal public services, and Democrats tend to represent those for who such services and actually needed to insure a decent life, and believe that from those to whom more has come (the wealthiest among us), more contribution can be expected.
This poses a fundamental dilemma in a democracy. Imagine that you represent the top, say, 5% (or 1%) of the population, and you are trying to hold to the majority of the population that you want to pay as little as possible of your massive share of the wealth to the government in taxes, and that, since you don’t need them yourself, you want that government to offer the minimum possible of services. Do you think the majority of people would rally around your flag? Probably not, so you have to find a way to present your idea to be as palatable as possible.
The right presents, basically, three general baskets of arguments to the populace to influence them to vote for keeping the taxes on the wealthiest as low as possible while using as few dollars on public services as they can get away with – a position which would otherwise somewhat hard to sell. I believe that one of these arguments, while wrong, is nonetheless offered fairly and in good faith.
Two of the arguments are false and not innocently so.
The first, and I think fair argument, is to appeal to the notion of “supply side” economics, or “trickle down”, which suggests that since the wealth tend to be the entrepreneurs, the company creators, the job – givers, then any financial wind fall you give them will “trickle” or filter down to the rest of the citizens. I have discussed these arguments in the past, in some detail, so I won’t dwell on it the day before the election. Other than do say that extensive economic analysis have failed to prove it beneficial, that using the argument has in this country transferred a huge proportion of the nation’s wealth from the majority to the top few percent, and that the one time it was used, by Reagan, he started when the highest tax rate was 70% (!), and with his efforts it came down to fifty and at the end of his second term to the high twenties, still substantially higher than those levels proposed by the republicans today.
Still, whether the argument is a good one, or true or not, it is a good faith arguments.
The second set of arguments used are not innocent.
The first of those two is just school yard name- calling. Now I grant that this occurs on both sides. For the record, although it is sometimes said, Donald Trump is NOT a Nazi. But neither is Kamala Harris a “communist”. Communism is an economic and political system whereby the State owns and controls all means of production. Instead of American Airlines, United Airlines, Delta, and South West, think one government airline with centrally chosen routes, and no profit motive. Instead of private and family farms, think the large collectivized state- run and directed farms of the Stalinist or Maoist eras. You grow what the state tells you to grow, and you don’t get anything more from working hard or not. Be fair, have you ever heard Kamala Harris, or any democrat call for the collectivization of any production industry? No, they never have because democrats have always explicitly and publicly called themselves capitalists, just ones who want more of a balance of taxes and services for the community. Both Biden and Harris have many times said “If you are a billionaire, God bless you, just pay your fair share”.
The second argument is even far more harmful. It is to demonize and dehumanize immigrants and find an “other” a scapegoat to blame for economic woes – even imagined ones.
Some degree of distrust of strangers is natural, it is born into us, it probably had survival benefits for our ancestors, the first humans. It just feels more comfortable to be around people like yourself, and seems a burden to, say, learn new languages to stay competitive in business or adapt to new cultures.
But is is not new. In the movie “Gangs of New York” the native – born English protestant Americans make war on the new “invaders”, the Irish in the early 1800s. That xenophobia persisted even almost to this day. I am old enough to remember President Kennedy having to go on television to assure the voter that as a Catholic he would still represent the US and not the Pope. The fear of strangers, the distrust of the immigrant extended to the Italian, the Jew, the Spanish speaker, be they from Cuba, Puerto Rico, South America or Mexico, and it extended to Asias of every nation, India, China, Japan, Korea and Vietnam and Southeast Asia in their turn. True, it sometimes takes time, maybe even a generation or two for each new immigrant group to become a part of this great nation, which was formed from many into One, “E Pluribus Unum”.
And it might take serious and good faith, focused discussions to find the best way to integrate new immigrants safely and legally into a growing community without compromising the rights and well – being of those already here first.
But when the hatred of the stanger is used, as it is being done now, to represent a new “emergency”, an “invasion”, used to sow fear, distrust, and to take your eyes away from the fact that one party wants to give more and more of the wealth of the nation to fewer and fewer people, tthen his demonization should be recognized for what it is.
Now, to back up, I said that issues over the optimum balance of goods and services, and these ways of talking about the issue, or, rather, to avoid talking about it, were common to every election. There is one issue that is completely specific to this one, and has NEVER happened before.
Let me propose a “thought experiment” – an imaginary situation. Imagine that on that Saturday afternoon in November of 2020, when the associated press, and every network from MSNBC to CNN to NBC, ABC, CBS and FOX announced that Joseph R Biden had been elected President, imagine the then President Trump calling a news conference to congratulate the President – Elect (just as had been done in every single election before), and to say that he knew, say that history would be kinder to him than this election reflected, that no one could have predicted or better weathered the pandemic, and that he fully intended to run again because he knew in his heart that he was right, but that the people had spoken and he offered his support and congratulations to the new president. Imagine that. Just like in every election before.
We would have a much different situation, and although I personally would still have come out on the other side of the first issue common to all elections, that of the best relationship, tax and service wise, between the government and the individual, I would still respect the right of the former president to run, and feel that for many a vote for him was fair.
Sadly that is not what happened.
In this nation, our elections, and the rule of law which govern them, are our most precious treasure. It is that system which makes us America, which makes us envied as that shining city on the hill, as that beacon of freedom. When you undermine and attack our electoral system and the laws which adjudicate its legitimacy, you are undermining and attacking our deepest core essential pillar as Americans, you are attacking the United States itself, its essence. That which makes the US be the US.
Donald Trump had every right to his opinion about the election, and every right to ask that those opinions be tried in court. Courts considered and allowed him to present evidence. But when every single case was thrown out by the justice system which, itself the envy of the world, had developed over the centuries, then Donald Trump had, in the end, had “his day in court”.
And when, given that every case had failed, and every single state legislature certified the electors who reflected the will of their individual states, as was seen and heard on national televised news, Biden was BY DEFINITION the elected president. Not because leftists say so. Because the Constitution states so, and also says that those votes will be reported out at a joint session of congress on January 6.
EVERY action taken by the former president after that week in December was therefore illegal, and was a crime against the United States. Read the report of the January 6th committee. Electing “alternative Electors” was illegal – and those who signed those documents are facing jail time. Pressuring DOJ officials to lie about the results was illegal, and the former president has been indicted in two jurisdictions for this crime. Trying to threaten his vice president to get him to break the law was illegal, and he is facing trial for that. And causing and inciting a mob to attack the capital to disrupt the Constitutionally mandated recognition of the new president was an ATTACK upon the United States, its core and essence.
There are, in my opinion, times when one view of the relationship of state and citizen is more appropriate, and the other not. There are probably times when it is worth taxing more and giving more service, sometimes when we should tax less and provide less. I voted for Jimmy Carter, but I was not sad when Ronald Reagan won and I think in many ways the country was well served to have him. I voted for Michael Dukakis but was not sad that George H. W. Bush won. I wanted Gore, and think George W. Bush did some not-so- good things. But I never thought he was anything but a patriot and I was never ashamed to have him be our president.
The current republican candidate is not a patriot, he has attacked the very essence of our nation.
If God forbid he should win tomorrow, I will be ashamed to have him be president.
And, quite bluntly, ashamed of ourselves as a nation that we let it happen.
I know it is little, and late, and unlikely that anyone will read this far, but if you have, thank you. And unlikely that it will change a vote. But I had to say it.
God bless, and God save, the United States.