from: http://www.zolatimes.com/V4.18/bush_principles.htm Click Here: <A HREF="http://www.zolatimes.com/V4.18/bush_principles.htm">"Our" Earth, by Tibor R. Machan</A> ----- George W.'s Principles? by Tibor R. Machan This election year we are hearing George W. Bush refer to his principles in one sentence, only to proceed to speak of disparate special-interest goals in the next. That is what he did during the Republican National Committee meetings over the last few days. The United States of America was founded on a set of principles concerning the nature of human community life. The Declaration of Independence outlined them and the US Constitution was a political effort to put at least some of them into practice, as were many of the state constitutions. These efforts were by no means pure in their adherence to the principles of the Declaration but they came closer to them than have systems of law anytime before or anywhere else. The party politics of American government were to serve as a means to decide, periodically, which group of political leaders will do the better job of implementing America's constitutional principles, granting their watered-down nature. There wasn't to be much debate about those principles, only about their precise meaning and who should be elected to administer them. This situation didn't last very long and shortly after the founding, politicians and intellectuals began disputing the validity of the principles on which the country was founded. Gradually the parties became more and more ideologically divided, along various lines, including secessionism, slavery, populism, imperialism and the like. By now the parties are divided, somewhat loosely, along both ideological and policy lines. By now, however, those major parties that remain have lost sight of the original founding principles. Indeed, by now we have no principles left�the courts and the legislatures across the country have seen to that over the last 200 years. We hear of them, now and then, in civic classes and Fourth of July speeches, but in fact few of them are taken seriously anymore. In certain segments of our legal system these principles make some feint appearance�confined mainly to issues of civil liberties and first, second and fourth amendment issues. But the general idea of individualism, of the inalienability of our rights to our lives, liberties and pursuit of happiness, is nearly gone from any political agenda, be it Republican or Democrat. Now and then a feeble showing of interest in the basic American principles is alluded to by the current crop of political leaders. This seems to be only because talking about having principles still has some PR value in the course of an election. High political ideals of the rule of law, of defending individual rights consistently and loyally resemble the high personal ideals of honor and integrity. So they still carry a bit of weight. But in our time these are but empty references, banalities actually, rather then serious declarations of intention. (Talking of individual initiative in the face of a massive welfare state, for all segments of our society, is hypocritical. Talking about free enterprise in a country that has hundreds of federal, state, county and municipal regulations regimenting commerce is either na�ve or dishonest.) Bush's Confusion His confusing stance was made very evident when he objected to the refusal of Democrats to return some of the projected surplus to taxpayers. He said, correctly, that Democrats tend to think of the surplus as the property of the federal government. They do this all the time, as do their supporters throughout the media and academe. Then Governor Bush proceeded to tell his audience that he, in contrast to the Democrats, wants to return "some of the surplus" to the taxpayers, where it belongs. Now any person with principled political convictions cannot square these two points. Either the money belongs to those who are taxed and then taxation is itself a violation of the principles of private property rights. Or the money does not belong to the people who are being taxed and then the Democrats have it right and the federal government is just taking what belongs to it, not to the people at all. This is just an example of how confused the Republicans are. They have, sadly, fully accepted the role of government as having extended itself, �compassionately,� to every segment of society�meaning, to tax Peter and give, with a completely unjustified feeling of generosity and love, to Paul what has been taken from Peter. The only thing the Republicans do is (a) dispute the level of federal spending and (b) dispute some of the causes on which the monies are spent. But that is not a matter of principle at all. Nor does it show any measure of honesty on the part of George W. Bush and his party to pretend that they have principles at issue in this election. It is entirely duplicitous to make such a claim, as well as insulting�as if Americans hadn't a clue as to what it means to adhere to principles. OK, so in this day and age the principles of the American founders are no longer on anyone's political agenda who is in the mainstream of contemporary politics. This is not a good thing. It is, however, even worse to make it appear that some of the politicians who are holding or running for office actually care about principles. They do not. And George W. Bush is, sadly, among them. If they at least admitted that they don�t care a hoot about principles, some clarity might sneak into the political conversations that are afoot and maybe principles could regain their importance, seeing that no politician has any. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Tibor R. Machan is Distinguished Fellow and Freedom Communications Professor of Business Ethics and Free Enterprise at the Leatherby Center for Entrepreneurship & Business Ethics, Chapman University, CA. He is also research fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and advisor to Freedom Communications, Inc., a media company in Irvine, CA. His most recent books are Ayn Rand (Peter Lang, 1999) and Initiative�Human Agency and Society (Hoover Institution Press, 2000). His email address is Tibor_R._Machan @link.freedom.com. -30- from The Laissez Faire City Times, Vol 4, No 18, May 1, 2000 ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, All My Relations. 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