The GOP’s Love Affair with the Nanny State!

The GOP’s Love Affair with the Nanny State!

 

“If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.”

- John F. Kennedy

 

“If those of us in positions of responsibility fail to do everything in our power to protect the right of privacy, we risk something far more valuable than money. We risk our way of life.”

- Tim Cook, Apple CEO

By J.M. Hamilton (2-14-15)

Nothing ticks off libertarians, or some on the political right, quite like the nanny state. The “nanny state” is best defined as the government infringing upon personal liberties to achieve, sometimes allegedly and speciously, some greater societal good. The goal of nanny state laws and programs, in a policy of preemption, may also be aimed at curtailing future pubic spending to remedy a known evil.

Perhaps no single politician better exemplifies the nanny state for Republicans, than former Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who once attempted to enforce an ordinance governing NY city soft drink consumption. The logic was simple: soft drinks are bad for your health; citizens cannot be counted on to make prudent decisions in regards their health (as evidenced by a national obesity epidemic); fatty snacks and soft drinks cause taxpayers to spend inordinate sums of public money to fight obesity related illness, like diabetes, through Medicare and Medicaid; and therefore, the state will enforce high fructose corn syrup consumption limits, and assorted fizzy drink caps.

Mayor Bloomberg is a billionaire, a bit of a political chameleon (having registered as a Republican, Democrat, and an independent), and among his many endeavors owns and operates one of the finest news organizations in the country, Bloomberg Business and Bloomberg Surveillance, et al.

In the interest of full disclosure, I often thought over the years that Mr. Bloomberg might have made a fine U.S. President, but some of his actions and proposals made many do a double-take. His latest proposal, which he shared very recently at the Aspen Institute, is the idea that guns should be taken away from minorities. The logic again, centers around pubic health, to wit: guns are a public health hazard; minorities suffer disproportionately and immensely from gun violence; gun violence costs the taxpayer cash through maintenance of police forces, hospital visits, and the resulting funding of the criminal justice industrial complex; and therefore, there ought to be legislation, or hegemonic executive power, leaving minorities unarmed.

Allison Joyce/Getty Images

Taking Mr. Bloomberg’s proposal to its logical extreme: only one tenth of one percent of the population, the plutocracy, should be allowed to own guns, since the wretched masses can’t handle such an awesome responsibility. To be sure, don’t put me down as either a gun fanatic, or even a gun enthusiast, but perhaps the very well intentioned Mr. Bloomberg may have crossed the Rubicon, or jumped the shark, into a zone that some might label “racist.” (I am certainly not calling the former Mayor racist, but some might say his proposal borders upon it.)  Perhaps the Mayor would be better served had he stuck to baby steps, such as a universal ban on all assault rifles and semi-automatics (regardless of race, religious or political affiliation, class or socio-economic status, etc.).

But I digress, because Mayor Bloomberg is not the point of this piece, he’s just a highly convenient example of the nanny state in action.

Like I said, the political right, in this country, often decries the immensity and power of federal and state governments (and in particular, its taxing authority), and its perceived infringement upon freedoms...except... well.... when it fits their agenda.

“Why J.M.H... what the hell are you talking about? Why everybody knows the Republican Party defines freedom and personal liberty, and wouldn’t dream of using the state to enforce its agenda.  Or subjugate through the law, and the power of the state, persons with various and alternative beliefs, skin tones, sexual preferences, or political affiliations, etc. Nor would the GOP use the taxing power of the state to redistribute wealth to GOP supporters, and Republican nanny/pet projects. Wake up, the GOP is equanimity defined.”

Really?

Let’s look at some examples of where the GOP uses the state, the nanny state (and its taxing authority), to enforce its agenda under specious claims of greater societal good.

1) The DoD. Ironic isn’t it? The GOP used to be the political party that heeded our founding father’s warnings, beware of foreign entanglements. Our political leadership used to have to drag this nation, kicking and screaming, into war. Today, the GOP is the first one to reach for the DoD, for any issue that arises globally. The fact that the GOP encourages the use of force for events that don’t concern this country and are not a threat to our national security, strikes me as shear madness. The simple solution for the GOP, the easy call, always: bombs away. Even after losing Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan... with the credibility and morale of our abused armed forces at low ebb, the GOP still believes the military is one stop shopping for all our foreign policy needs. The fact that the aforementioned wars were completely unnecessary (in fact, the resulting blowback is even more of a threat), appears to be a lesson the GOP, and yes, Dems, is unwilling to learn.

2) The Surveillance State (NSA, FBI, CIA, etc, etc.) Half the nation's discretionary federal spending goes to defense and surveillance; a great deal of that spending is off line, within black budgets, or classified, so who knows how much the U.S. really spends on offense and surveillance. And despite having our freedoms and civil liberties stripped from us daily, all in the name of greater personal safety, why has the world become more dangerous? George Orwell and Phillip K. Dick dreamed it up, and the GOP and the NSA adopted their vision, mixed in totalitarian Stasi tactics, and ran with it. Of course, I am writing of the police/surveillance state. With your every word listened to, with your every computer key stroke recorded... does it get any more “nanny” than this? And don’t forget, as taxpayers, we’re paying to have the state violate our civil liberties and freedoms. The bottom line: the U.S. could defend this nation for a lot less than we are presently paying, but the cost to defend the plutocracy’s global commercial empire is very expensive, and the plutocracy is unwilling to pay.  That means you foot the bill.

3) The GOP, with a nod to faux Christian values, loves to legislate morality. That Christ admonished us not to judge others, and to love our neighbors as ourselves, seems completely lost on the GOP and the Religious right. Christ must be quite upset because over the years, the religion he founded has been used to rationalize all sorts of bigotry and hatred, whether it be Jim Crow, persecution of homosexuals and alternative faiths, or infringing upon women’s health and reproductive rights. The simple solution for the GOP, and the religious right is on full display: if you find a behavior, belief, or practice that is unacceptable to your version of "Christian morality" (say homosexuality or abortion), than don’t engage in it. Last I checked Christians are no longer being fed to the lions; quite the contrary, they are more likely to be dictating GOP social policy (not unlike the Taliban in Afghanistan).

4) The War on Drugs. Inaugurated by Richard Nixon, the War on Drugs is over 40 years old and an absolute failure. More advanced countries have legalized drug consumption, long thought to be illicit in this country, and afford treatment - instead of jail time - to addicts. That drug consumption often tapers off, once the product is made legal doesn’t fit into the nanny state narrative; that more people die from tobacco and alcohol annually than all the illegal drugs combined appears lost upon supporters of this forty-plus year old war; that one of the most powerful opponents of Florida’s recent marijuana legalization effort was a Republican casino magnate and billionaire, who peddles all sorts of addiction(s) within his facilities, should surprise no one. This particular issue accomplishes so many of the GOP’s nanny state goals: the war on drugs feeds the MIC and the Surveillance State; it supports the demagogues of a false Christian morality; and further buttresses the next GOP nanny state favorite....

5) The Criminal Justice Industrial Complex (CJIC). For the last thirty-five years, nothing quite excites the GOP and their supporters, like law and order issues, capital punishment, and swift and often aborted justice. That this drive has been perverted to lock up minorities in disproportionate numbers, take away their voting rights, and that the U.S. locks up a higher proportion of its citizens than any other Western democracy....seems to suggest that the GOP’s true CJIC nanny state goal is Jim Crow maintenance and support.

Bit awkward isn’t it? The GOP despises big government liberals, public works projects, run-away government handouts, and a bloated “borrow/tax and spend” government that has run completely off the rails. But their shouts of derision ring hollow, when we find that Republicans have completely fallen in love with the nanny state.

Makes Senator Rand Paul look pretty damn moderate, among GOP candidates, doesn’t it?  Mr. Paul has taken some hits recently, (some of it justified), but he looks positively sane, compared to the field of GOP POTUS candidates.  (I'm always amazed: 
An insane Caucasian can walk into a Connecticut elementary school and kills two-dozen children and teachers, and the nation shrugs.  An all too common occurrence. But one Arab cuts off the head of one U.S. journalist in Syria, and the entire GOP establishment wants to bring the full weight of the U.S. armed forces down upon a nation that is no more a national security threat to the continental U.S. than the State of Alaska.  The GOP is essentially doing the terrorist bidding, by bankrupting the nation in another useless war.)

Separately, and on a combined basis, these nanny state policies present a threat to human dignity, life, liberty, and the fiscal health of our nation (and arguably, our national security). Hitting a particularly singular issue that the GOP holds dear: the Republican party’s nanny state robs citizens and taxpayers of their personal property, and hard earned income to support their failed policies. Worse still, the nation is in hock over the GOP‘s nanny state.

And what’s the common thread that runs through all these GOP pet institutions? It’s simple really.  Whether it be the DoD, the war on drugs, or the criminal justice industrial complex, the common denominator is this: much of these government operations have been privatized and are now profited from. Which basically, means it will be nearly impossible - no matter how wrong, insidious or wasteful - to shut these government programs down.

You think its hard to roll back government? Subcontract out a government function to a private contractor, and no matter how morally repugnant or wasteful, that government function becomes “indispensable.”

You see, the GOP hates big government, except when its pals are profiting from it, and kicking back campaign contributions their way.

To be sure the Dems are not exactly innocent in their backing of many of the aforementioned institutions; but there appears to be a key dichotomy, between the nanny state policies of the two respective political parties. The GOP views the nanny state as something to profit from, while the Dems take a more humanist tact, and view the nanny state as something to help their fellow citizens by, to the level the playing field by, and to lend a hand up.

The GOP hates Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare, and Romneycare, which have become the foundation of our Capitalist system... for these very institutions keep the pitchforks and the revolution at bay.

P.S.

Put down the remote.  Drop the video game… stop staring at your cell phone, because the world has a far more interesting story.  This story has everything:  economics, politics, greed, avarice, intrigue, nation state feuds, banksters, a currency on the brink, radicals, revolutionaries, and the elite and reactionaries.   And, ultimately, it’s a love story.

All eyes on Greece!

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2015