A Word to Obama Voters

What one might say to various Obama voters:

To the young voter influenced by social issues:

Yes, the Republicans are often on the wrong side on social issues. Some of their policies and a good many of their voters and candidates are hostile to homosexuals, women’s rights to control their bodies, and even the availability of contraceptives. A couple of their candidates for the senate this year were outrageous yahoos and showed it with their comments on rape and abortion. There are a lot of religious zealots in the party who do want to force their views onto their fellow citizens. However, I suggest that these things are largely irrelevant in terms of actual policy and potential government action and that voting on the basis of them is beating a dead horse. A Republican administration and congress would not persecute homosexuals, restrict women’s rights, or interfere in people’s bedrooms, despite having members and supporters who might want to. That war is over, and the social conservatives lost. On the other hand, threats to freedom from an over controlling, over regulating, and economy strangling federal government and bureaucracy are quite real.  Young people at the start of their careers are the ones who most need a society with freedom and economic opportunity. That is what young people should be voting to secure. The social issues will be okay.

To the low income people who supported Obama:

While it is possible that those receiving subsidies of various sorts from the government will get bigger payoffs in the short run, Obama’s policies will harm low income people in the long run.  His inflationary and anti-growth policies and regulations will retard economic growth, restrict innovation and technological progress, make basic goods such as food and energy more expensive than they would have been otherwise, and push investors to move money, business facilities, and opportunities for employment overseas. Even in the short run, any serious downturn in the economy that his actions might cause will hit low income people first and disproportionally hard. People with high skills and incomes and plenty of money will not be first victims of Obama’s economics, regardless of what he does on tax rates.

To the government employees who supported Obama:

You may do well for a while as Obama squeezes you fellow citizens a bit harder and perhaps shares the loot with you. However his policies will retard economic growth and innovation and in the long run leave less money available for spending in the public sectors than there would have been otherwise. It is also probable that many of his heavy handed policies and regulations will produce a backlash against oppressive government. If that happens, and the pendulum swings back, it will swing back right at you.

To the wealthy who supported Obama:

Whether your motivation was to assuage your guilt over unearned success, to maneuver to get payoffs or favors from the government, to protect yourself from reprisals, or simply because you think a powerful, controlling central government  is a good idea or at least good for you, I can’t find much in the way of excuses for you. I hope he double crosses every one of you, and you get the government you wished on the rest of us, good and hard.