The Truth about ‘Supermajorities’

American Thinker: In a New York Times op-ed, “The Oppression of the Supermajority,” Tim Wu argues that America is not polarized and divided, as “we are told,” and that there are issues that get absolute support from all Americans — like higher taxes on the rich, guaranteed paid maternity leave, net neutrality, and lower drug prices.  But the execution of the will of the “supermajority” is being stolen.  By whom is not explicitly clarified — although lobbyists are vaguely mentioned: “Entire categories of public policy options are effectively off-limits because of the combined influence of industry groups and donor interests.”  Although finger-pointing is masterfully avoided, it may be reasonably assumed from context that mostly Republican fat cats are to blame, since the issues listed above represent a typical leftist agenda.  Wu then goes on a somewhat expected attack on President Trump, who “with a few exceptions, like trade, has seemed to lose interest in what the broader public wants.”

Indeed, there are major issues that unify all Americans, and not only Americans, in a broad perspective.  People throughout the world want to be richer, to be able to take care of their newborn children without losing jobs, to pay less for medicine, to enjoy high-quality and timely medical services, and to live in a clean and safe environment.  At the same time, one must distinguish between goals and methods, between strategy and tactics.

We all want to live better lives, but how can we achieve that?  There are two fundamental ways to choose from.  The first is the socialist way, which includes higher taxes needed to pay for the Heaven on Earth the Left pictures so alluringly.  The other path is capitalism, which includes mechanisms of the free market along with reasonable regulations, moderate to low taxation for all, and free enterprise.

Socialist methods have a long and proven history of economic inefficiency.  Numerous empirical studies based on stone-cold facts show that high taxes paired with generous welfare provisions slow down economic growth.  This applies even to the Nordic model of the “democratic socialism” that most “progressive” leftists are so obsessed with.  They won’t tell us, however, that these countries, for starters, are not even “socialist,” as they practice typical capitalist broad economic freedoms and, for example, have no minimum wage laws.  Also, they built the wealth their citizens now enjoy long before leftist ideas took hold.  Interestingly, when their economic growth started to slow down, the Scandinavian governments reacted by cutting down taxes and slashing the wasteful bureaucracy in half, and now Scandinavia is slowly “returning to its free market roots,” as the experts put it.

Thus, when Wu dismisses the assumption that the public may be ill informed on crucial issues, he is not entirely sincere.  Leftist politicians and the “fake news” media go the extra mile to misinform people.  Unfair coverage, fact-twisting, and blatant lies have become commonplace in today’s reporting and political rhetoric. more here