Deconstructing humans

I recently came across an interesting 2005 article by Tom Bethell in the American Spectator magazine that explains in more detail what the frightening Myerson article (‘Global Safeguards for a Global Economy’) in the Washington Post had alluded to.  Bethell is author of a VERY interesting book entitled, The Noblest Triumph – Property and Prosperity Through the Ages .  See: http://www.spectator.org/dsp_article.asp?art_id=7904
 
The article speaks about the inevitable decline of social liberalism a/k/a big government and how environmentalists and social liberals are desperate to resurrect it. Also, it speaks about how close to one another communism and American social liberalism really are. While we, as a nation, may have defeated communism, we still have yet to adequately address what Czech Prime Minister Vaclav Klaus refers to as the threat of ‘soft socialism’ and other ‘isms’ – contained within the massive European welfare state that is metastasizing around the world like a cancer under the moniker of ‘sustainable development’.  Arguably, the U.S. Democratic Party’s prescription for the future would constitute an American social liberalism that is only degrees away from Europe’s ‘soft socialism’.
 
The following passage from this article seems to say it all:

 
Although its adherents don't like to discuss the point, the liberal faith has much in common with Communism, including shared roots in the Enlightenment. Human nature, philosophers once believed, could be remade in the classroom. People could be improved by "legislation alone," to quote the 18th-century philosophe Claude Helvetius. Influenced by John Locke, he was in turn studied by the founder of Russian Marxism, G.V. Plekhanov, who befriended Lenin in Zurich.

Liberalism and Communism both regarded egalitarianism as an ideal and both were godless; Communism openly so, liberalism more obscurely. Democracy admittedly distinguished between them, but the liberal admiration for an ideological judiciary shows that they, too, would like nothing more than a government that is free to impose its will by fiat (provided it is run by the right people).

The liberal faith fell with Communism. Both were based on extravagant optimism -- admittedly an unwarranted optimism. Human nature was on the verge of transformation. Nineteenth-century thinkers really believed that people would soon be so good that the boundaries of property would no longer be required. The reversal of attitude today is most conspicuous in the environmentalists, whose rise coincided with the fall of the Soviet Union. Man now is widely perceived as a despoiler and menace to the planet.
 
Bethell goes on to speak about how ‘big’ government generates almost half of the GDP of Europe:
 
AN UNWRITTEN PRINCIPLE OF THE LIBERAL FAITH has been that government must expand to whatever extent is needed to get the job done. No liberal has ever been heard to say that the government has grown too large, or should be reduced. But reality imposes its own discipline. At all levels, federal, state, and local, government now disposes of at least one-third of GDP. In European countries it is closer to half, and even some liberal journalists are beginning to accept that therein lies the explanation for the slow or non-existent growth in countries like Germany.
 
Now, is this something we all want here in America?  If we do, as the Democratic congressional majority, our Democratic state Governors recommend (and which the Democratic presidential contenders are afraid to clearly state), and import costly European precautionary principle-based environment and health (welfare state) regulations into America in an effort to reform human conduct damaging to the environment (in the spirit of Claude Helvetius), either directly through our state legislatures or through nuanced changes to our federal laws following the US government’s ratification of UN precautionary principle oriented environmental treaties such as the Law of the Sea Treaty (“LOST”), then this is what we too will become. 
 
It is time for the American people to ‘take a stand’ and work against this disguised effort in defense of their private property and other constitutional rights, and in order to preserve our unique American way of life. It is time to hold our politicians accountable!!  We all need to write in to Congress and demand public hearings for the LOST before the Senate provides advice and consent to the President.

 Eastern Cowboy aka EC aka Lawrence Kogan, Esq.

Dear Roni
 
Thank you so very much in sending this to me.
 
After having lived in Britain from 1993 -2004 I have seen first hand just how demoralizing a nanny state can be for everyone. When you trust "the nanny state to care for your every need," like L.B.J's "cradle to the grave" we will take care of you.
 
People loose all sense of responsiblity and expect our government to take care of us. The younger generation have no incentive to go out and make a life of their own, because the government will take care of their every need.  
 
 That is why Britain has such a high immigrant population. Over 100,000 each year and that is just what they know about. They can not even begin to think how many there really are.
 
Thanks again Roni!
I will be passing this on to everyone I know!
Colleen

Dear Colleen,
 
I very much appreciate your picking up the theme that I began with Roni earlier today following my recent research discovery, which I found as the result of the trail of ‘bread crumbs’ left behind for me to follow by a very wise knowledgeable friend. Your comments about the nanny state in Britain were right on the money $$.
 
I believe that it is critical for the GNF and its readership to better understand what is truly at stake concerning the future of this country, especially as we enter into the next national election cycle. 
 
As my follow-up note to Roni indicates, and which you very clearly understand, Claude Helvetius’ thinking remains prevalent in the European society today, and is being refined within Brussels and the capitals of Europe. Make no mistake about it. No matter how newly elected French President Nicholas Sarkozy has been portrayed as an outlier and a ‘new thinker’, he is still an arrogant French paternalist at heart.
 
And, while the ‘nanny state’ has long been embraced by the U.S. Democratic Party, it has since gained wider currency under the monikers ‘sustainable development’, ‘global economic integration’, and liberals from all professions - academics, scientists and economists. You can see it liberal economist Jeffrey Sachs’ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Sachs recent book entitled, It Takes a Global Village (http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_15/b3928033_mz005.htm); http://www.earthinstitute.columbia.edu/endofpoverty/documents/businessweek041105.pdf , which is reminiscent and a global version of Senator and presidential contender Hillary Clinton’s book entitled, It Takes a Village. http://www.amazon.com/Takes-Village-Tenth-Anniversary/dp/1416540644
 
Mrs. Clinton’s book It Takes a Village was written while she served as ‘First Lady’ Clinton.  According to one long and detailed commentary, it pretty much reflects a campaign platform with clear political undertones: 
 
At this point, I would like to raise the question of politics. In particular, many people wonder if this work isn't just a "campaign book." I think we need to be honest enough to say that it is. After all, the publication of this book was originally intended to aid her husband's campaign. In the book, Mrs. Clinton lists what she believes are her husband's successes: Family and Medical Leave Act, AmeriCorps, Goals 2000, the Brady Bill, and the Direct Student Loan Program. On the other hand, she soft-pedals the radical parts of the Clinton agenda... In some ways, the book provides the most consistent and comprehensive statement available of the First Lady's agenda for the rest of the 1990s Whether the President wins re-election is almost irrelevant to the impact of this book... Even though Mrs. Clinton attempt to soft-pedal some of the more radical aspects of her agenda, controversy inevitably slips through. For example, many of what she claims are the President's successes can hardly be considered successes, programs such as: Goals 2000 and Parents as Teachers. Many of her other favorites indicate a clear endorsement of socialist programs by Mrs. Clinton... Let's look at just one example. Mrs. Clinton believes that the best way to solve what she believes is the problem of adequate day care facilities, is to adopt the French model of day care. She asks us to "imagine a country in which nearly all children between the ages of three and five attend preschool in sparkling classrooms, with teachers recruited and trained as child care professionals." She goes on to say this exists where "more than 90 percent of French children between ages three and five attend free or inexpensive preschools called écoles maternelles. Even before they reach the age of three, many of them are in full-day programs." Her desire is to replicate this system in the United States so that the state can have an early maternal influence on the children of America. She envisions a country in which "Big Brother" essentially becomes "Big Momma." But is this really what we want in the United States?
 
...At this point I would like to conclude by addressing some additional issues related to the book. First, Mrs. Clinton often proposes socialist solutions to the problems she raises in her book. Earlier I noted that she proposed a nationally-subsidized day care system modeled after France as a solution to her perceived problem of quality day care. In other parts of her book she also proposes liberal, government solutions. She writes that "Other developed countries, including some of our fiercest competitors, are more committed to social stability than we have been, and they tailor their economic policies to maintain it." She then goes on to make a case for the German economic model, complete with an industrial policy in which "there is a general consensus that government and business should play a role in evening out inequalities in the free market system." When it comes to education, she proposes a national agenda over local control of the schools. Mrs. Clinton believes education will be enhanced by nationalizing it through such programs as Goals 2000 and School-to-Work programs. And don't think that Mrs. Clinton has abandoned the idea of nationalized health care. She sees nationally-subsidized health care as the solution to everything from infant morality to health care delivery. From start to finish, Mrs. Clinton proposes government as the answer to every problem. In some cases, the government is behind the scenes providing funding and direction to community-based organizations. In others, it is the primary provider. But whenever a problem is raised, the First Lady seems content to have government take care of it.   http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/probe/docs/village.html  
 
The bottom line is this: Through importation into America of their sustainable development (environment and social) -oriented laws, regulations and product standards, especially those based on the Precautionary Principle, which will likely occur via global regulatory harmonization and UN-anchored treaty efforts, the Europeans will provide us with the ‘education’ we need to learn the European ‘ways of the world’.  Americans do not need strong private property rights because they get in the way of pursuing the ‘public good’ – environmental conservation, a healthy diet, national education, healthcare etc.  The Europeans and the Democratic Party are eager to define for each of us what we want out of life and how we should conduct ourselves in society - in legislative codes, judicial decisions and social responsibility standards.  Among our primary social responsibilities is the obligation to simply listen to our ‘philosopher kings’ (the Democratic Party and the Brussels and other European elites) who are much more learned than are we.  They also will watch out for our best interests because they know what is best for us.  In Plato’s Republic, Socrates referred to this as ‘the good’.
 
Therefore, in closing, I once again thank you very much for responding to the post.  Hopefully, others within the growing GNF network will follow your lead and step up and be heard, before it is too late.
 
Sincerely,
 
Lawrence A. Kogan, Esq.
President
Institute for Trade, Standards and Sustainable Development (ITSSD)
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