Mug Shot

 Of the things Trumpists have said about Trump’s mug shot, I think the dumbest is the claim that having to face the hombre behind that stern, tough guy visage would put the fear in Putin, Xi, and other bad actors in the world and make them straighten up. The United States does not need a blustering bullyboy in the White House to deal with its enemies. Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan were two old men with sunny public dispositions, one of them a cripple. They directed the destruction of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union (though in each case the final victory happened under a successor). The things needed are competence, knowledge, courage, steadfastness, vision, ability to inspire, decisiveness, and capacity for strategic thought. Trump lacks all of them. I would guess that Putin and the rest would be fine with having him back in power.

Hot, Dead Chicken

Years ago, after the end of AT&T’s monopoly, the company had to adjust to having competition, and some people thought the transition was a difficult and not necessarily well handled one.  A mild joke circulated at the time that the company was so awful at marketing  that, if it  bought Colonel Sanders, it would advertise its product as hot, dead chicken.

I  thought of that old joke recently when I read an article by a conservative describing what he saw as the fundamental difference between his side in politics and its opponents. The profound difference he said was that while their opponents have an optimistic view of humanity and believe people are capable of improvement, progress, rationality, and goodness, conservatives recognize people for the depraved creatures they are and  understand they need to be held in check  by tradition, law, religion, and authority.

 In the first place this is not true. A belief  in the potential of human beings to be good and wise and in the possibility and desirability of improvement and progress through education, reason, and science is an important aspect of the liberal tradition. However  the conservatives’ opponents these days  are more apt to be authoritarian leftists, often of the green variety,   than liberals and to have no more  truck with progress or  trust in the potential of humanity than the most dour of traditionalists. (The most likely place at present to find people holding these liberal notions  is among  libertarians,  though there also are many people on the general left and general right side of politics who do so as well.)  

Besides that it is terrible, hot dead, chicken marketing. It amounts to telling Americans “we think you are inherently flawed, base, and sinful and so is every else, including us, and we’d surely like you to vote to put us in charge of your government.” As an advertising pitch, it doesn’t exactly sing. So conservatives who hold these opinions and want to win elections should keep them to themselves. They should  remember that the most successful Republican politician of the last hundred years was not that sort of conservative, but  in this respect  very much a liberal.

            

1980 and 2012

My generation, the boomers, has been a lucky one. Today, after an election that probably means some rough luck for the country, it is appropriate to honor the man who was responsible for much of our good luck. Thirty two years ago in 1980 the country was in much worse shape  than it is today. The economy was in a debilitating inflationary depression with double digit inflation and high unemployment. Mortgage and other interest rates were in the mid teens.  The country was in a losing Cold War struggle with an aggressive and expansionist Soviet Union. Statist, anti-growth, left wing policies had dominated recent administrations of both parties, and pundits of all sorts were pronouncing that the nation was in a terminal decline. 

That November the country  elected Ronald Reagan president and gave his party a majority in the senate. He gave the government new policies, new directions, and a new viewpoint. Within a few years inflation came under control;  interest rates declined; anti-growth policies were changed; and the nation began a quarter century of growth and prosperity. The Soviet Union was completely defeated in the Cold War, and the occupied nations in central and eastern Europe were liberated.

We early boomers got to spend much of our working years  in times that were more prosperous, more full of opportunity, and freer from the threat of nuclear war than almost anyone would have guessed in 1980 – a lucky bunch of people indeed. Reagan gave us peace and a quarter century respite from many of the depredations of rapacious government, and many of us used that respite to put the lie to the commonplace belief of 1980 that  most of our generation would have less success and lower standards of living than their parents. Now, the country is again plagued by statist, anti-growth, left wing policies and has just re-elected a president in the mold of Jimmy Carter and Richard Nixon.

We can be grateful indeed for the respite Reagan helped give us and hope that our children and grandchildren will someday be as lucky. We owe it to them to try to make that happen. We also owe it to them and ourselves to use our wealth, knowledge, and experience to prepare for the possible rough times ahead and to help the people we care about get through them as well as they can.