May 11, 2008
Prosperitarian Exit Strategy
<Senator Clinton Voice>Y'Know,</Senator Clinton Voice> pundits keep asking Senator Clinton and her staff why she is still in the race, asking the campaign to show the math whereby she gets the nomination. Empathy for the dirigisme poster child is not my normal state, but I am starting to feel for her. I've had a worse few days than she.
I'm not out $21 Million, but I've received a lot of political bad news. And if pundits found me newsworthy, they'd be asking me about exit strategies: "With all due respect, Mr. Kranz, how do you see the math working that will preserve freedom and prosperity in this country?" I'd have to stammer and say that I believed my policies to be best for the country, and hope they cut to commercial.
The first wave of pessimism was a fun chat with an old friend (who might be blogging around here in a bit). Looking at the bleak electoral landscape in November, even I -- Mister Optimist -- could not come up with a rosy scenario.
Second was David Brooks's NYTimes Editorial this week. I always liked David Brooks, but he has an elitist, CW kind of conservativism, and has not found intellectual growth at the Times. I can normally shrug him off. But his call for an American Cameronism is too much to bear. Keep in mind I get most of my UK politics from Samizdata so I may be a bit jaundiced, but that doesn't sound like anything I want.
Third was the cover story to Reason "Cult of the Presidency." I found the issue buried under some mail -- it may have been out a while. Gene Healy says "Who can we blame for the imperial White House? Look no further than you and me.:" Healy looks at the Constitution, founders' intent, and the early President through TR, and wonders how we came to demanding a President that is so actively involved. Senator Clinton is quoted that "I'm ready to be Commander-in-Chief of our economy on Day One." Ow. The article opens by quoting ThreeSources Deity, Phil Gramm, saying "I ain't running for National Preacher," then pointing out that he finished fifth in the first primaries with a lot of money and name recognition.
Fourth is Senator Lamar Alexander’s Energy Plan, best summarized by this commenter (linked by Insty):
Good Lord, now we've got Republicans proposing Five Year Plans and Seven Step programs like some 1930's Soviet Beet Kommissar. The last thing we need is the know-nothings in Congress pretending they have the expertise required to plan the future of a market segment as huge and critical as energy. They have no such knowledge because that knowledge doesn't exist anywhere as some type of accessible whole. It takes a market with millions upon millions of people, each with their own intimate knowledge of their own needs and capabilities, participating in an open energy marketplace with free prices to coordinate such an unimaginably huge, ever-changing body of knowledge and action.
I have bemoaned that only 9% of the electorate is libertarian -- I don't know that even that many yearn, like I do, for a "Silent Cal" type President who would not pretend to run our lives.
I can't draw the map or count the delegates to show how we get there, but like Senator Clinton, I'll keep on campaigning.