Romney No "Silver Tongued Devil"

If Mitt Romney worked for me, which would be the case if he were elected president, I’d want to tell him to just shut up and get to work.  That is because I like his work ethic and his general understanding of business and economics and think he understands that if we don’t get those things right there won’t be much to re-distribute or spread around. 

The problem is that Mr. Romney is not very good at expressing himself in ways that are likely to get him elected.  Maybe it is just because that was when I started paying attention, but it was a little three-word phrase picked up from his Republican Convention speech that first bothered me: “We deserve better.” 

My opinion is that we are getting exactly what we deserve, always thinking of ourselves, wanting more benefits for ourselves and higher taxes on somebody else, applying for federal grants, demanding free physical exams, birth control, abortions, and expensive medical treatments for every known malady in hopes of eternal life free of suffering, lobbying for special tax treatment, looking to the government for dietary advice while using food stamps to buy chips and soft drinks and borrowing money from China to subsidize the beef and dairy industries, and electing a president with no known business experience or understanding of the laws of economics or appreciation for people who have such and who honestly stated up front, before the election, that, “...when you spread the wealth around it is good for everybody.” 

There is probably a good constitutional basis for proportional and even progressive taxation to fund defense and infrastructure and other essential government functions, but there is no constitutional basis for taxation with the purpose of spreading wealth around.  But, we the people have largely given up our right to complain.  We are getting exactly what we deserve because we, liberals and conservatives, have elected and re-elected the politicians, Republicans and Democrats, who have bought our votes with their largesse.

I suppose the reason we have a representative republic rather than a pure democracy is that the founders were wise enough to know already the truth that would be expressed later by de Tocqueville:

“A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been 200 years.”
― Alexis de Tocqueville 

And, given the situation they were in, having pledged "our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor," the last eight words in the Declaration of Independence, they probably didn’t think so much about the inevitable problems, later predicted by the same man, with the republic they had created.

“The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public's money.”
― Alexis de Tocqueville 

The sad truth is that Congress is failing in its responsible exercise of power and, as a result, we have a growing segment of the population thinking of the president, whoever he or she is, constitutionally no more than the head of one of three branches of a checked and balanced government, as a sort of savior or potential savior.  That is only a step or two away from dictatorship.  And lots of people would apparently be happy with a dictator so long as it is the right dictator. 

Still, some of us are in search of candidates for office who, instead of going to Washington in search of exciting and powerful lives, comfortable fortunes, and false honor in the form of statues and bridge names, will pledge their lives, their fortunes, and their honor to service of the United States of America rather than to some group of constituents or donors. 

Who is qualified and will give up a comfortable life to stand up and make such a sacrifice in the face of certain attack, demonization, attempted manipulation and bribery, and probable defeat at the polls?  Only time will tell if Mr. Romney is such a person, but I’m willing to give him a chance just for the opportunity to tell him to shut up and get to work.

You can find these and other Alexis de Tocqueville quotes here.

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