Cartoon of the Week

A Tale of Two Cultures

"It's amazing how much you can learn when you shut your mouth and open your eyes." - Wilburt Langhorst

Many Americans are coming to realize that we are in the midst of a culture war. There is Liberal, and there is Conservative, and there doesn't seem to be much middle ground. We are locked in a struggle for the heart and soul of America.

One side thinks more government is the answer. The other side thinks too much government is the problem.

In 2008, America elected Barack Obama as President. He is arguably the most left-wing politician ever to reside in the White House. And since Democrats were also solidly in control of the House and Senate from 2008 to 2010, we finally have witnessed what happens when unrestrained Liberalism rules the country.

Not wanting to "waste a crisis," Mr. Obama quickly set about implementing his liberal agenda by pushing massive government spending bills, taking over huge chunks of the private sector (i.e. GM and Chrysler), creating new entitlements, and ramming nationalized health care through Congress.

This unprecedented national spending spree has inflated our annual budget deficits and our total national debt to catastrophic heights.

In 2009, a grassroots movement of concerned Americans rose up in response to this situation. Almost overnight, "Tea Party" rallies sprang up. Working class Americans, many of whom had never before been politically active, thronged to the hastily-organized protest rallies all across America.

Tea Party activists have been slandered by Democrats and the liberal media since day one. They've been derided and stereotyped as right-wing extremists, racists, and bigoted back-woods fanatics desperately clinging to their guns and Bibles.

But what have the Tea Party folks really done? They have peacefully protested the bankrupting of their country. They took to the streets, lawfully, out of concern for the impact of reckless government debt on the next generation. They exercised their First Amendment rights.

If you go to a Tea Party rally, you will observe young couples with their children. You'll see elderly grandmothers attending the first political rally of their lives. You'll meet college students who understand that their future liberty is threatened by the ever-encroaching power of government.

I met a young Chinese woman at a Tea Party rally who held up a sign that read: "I left Communist China for this?"

At a Tea Party rally, you find peaceful protesters listening to speakers who discuss conservative political ideas. There is no vandalism. There is no trash strewn across the rally site. No one is injured, no one is threatened, no property is damaged. Talk to a cop who has worked security at a Tea Party rally, and he'll tell you it was the easiest money he's ever made.

You will also notice that Tea Party rallies are scheduled for early evenings and weekends. That is because most Tea Party people have jobs. They are too busy working to protest during a weekday.

In the 2010 elections, there was a conservative push-back to the policies of Barack Obama. Democrats lost their majority in the House of Representatives, and also lost their filibuster-proof majority in the Senate.

At the state level, the Democrats' losses were even more pronounced. The most notable example of this was in Wisconsin, a bastion of liberalism for decades. Wisconsin voters were finally so fed up with the fiscal shenanigans of the ruling Democratic elites that they elected a conservative Republican named Scott Walker as their new governor. They also put Republicans in control of both houses of the Wisconsin legislature.

Governor Walker quickly moved to fulfill his campaign promises. He pushed through cost-cutting measures that trimmed back state spending. One of his most controversial measures involved forcing the state's teachers to forgo pay raises and to contribute a percentage of their compensation to their health insurance and pension plans.

For years, Wisconsin's teachers enjoyed some of the most generous insurance and pension benefits in the country, and those benefits were part of what was bankrupting the state. With the election of Scott Walker, Wisconsin voters had sent a clear message that they wanted that to change.

So how did the unionized teachers of Wisconsin decide to express their opposition to the new status quo?

Teachers unlawfully shut down the schools in protest. Massive rallies were staged at the Wisconsin Capital Building. Thousands of "rent-a-mob" union protesters were bussed in from out of state. Angry mobs illegally occupied the state Capital Building for several weeks.

Death threats were made against Governor Walker and some of the Republican legislators who supported him. The state Capital Building was vandalized. (Damage estimates afterwards ran into the millions of dollars.) The scene in downtown Madison after the protests ended resembled a war zone. The city was trashed by the unruly mob.

With this image of liberal mayhem and anarchy fresh in our minds, let's reflect again on the behavior of the Tea Party folks when they were upset and protesting.

On the right hand, you have a group of people who peacefully exercised their rights to protest government policies for the purpose of getting the government to leave them alone and desist from bankrupting their children's futures. No vandalism. No violence. No rent-a-mobs.

On the left hand, you have a group of people who destroyed public property, issued death threats, and bussed in thugs from out of state to help them intimidate elected officials. Their goal was to coerce the taxpayers into maintaining the "Cadillac benefits" package they had become accustomed to, regardless of what it did to the state's budget.

So the question begs to be asked: Which group, and which philosophy, will you support in America's culture war?

Cartoon of the Week

If the Government Ran Auto Insurance

As much as it irritates me the way that insurance companies seem to rule the world, I will grudgingly give them credit -- they operate in the realm of reality, and they respond to real-world market forces.

For example, if you are a careful driver with a long accident-free record, you get discounts and pay some of the lowest insurance rates.

If you are a mad-dog lead-foot with 8 points against your license and a couple of accidents on your record, you are in the high-risk category, and you are going to pay much higher insurance premiums that reflect the consequences of your behavior.

This is as it should be. Good behavior is rewarded. Bad behavior is penalized.

Because each driver pays a rate that reflects an accurate cost of their insurance risk, the auto insurance industry exemplifies a sustainable business model that serves the customers' needs and returns a profit to its shareholders.

This is a perfect example of free-market capitalism. It is a win-win situation that is based upon personal accountability and common sense.

If the government ever got involved in this, it would be a whole different story.

Liberal politicians would cry that it is unfair for the poor driver with the bad record to have to pay such high rates while others, who were fortunate enough to have good driving records, refused to pay their "fair share" so that everyone could have insurance at an equal cost.

So the liberals would implement a program to make all auto insurance premiums the same, regardless of the driving records of anyone in the program. This would make auto insurance "fair." Then everyone would be treated "equally." And once again, our government would have removed personal responsibility from the equation.

The results would be predictable: Insurance rates would rise for all the good drivers, while rates for bad drivers would decline to whatever mandated "average" rate the government established.

Minus the punitive disincentive of higher rates, bad drivers would become worse drivers. Good drivers would worry less about their driving records, since there was no longer any penalty for bad behavior.

Accident rates would increase. More drivers would speed. Insurance rates would have to rise to reflect the growing risk exposure of the insurance companies. Before long, EVERYONE would be paying a rate that was as high as the highest punitive rates that bad drivers used to pay under the original insurance system.

And if the government refused to let insurance companies raise their rates? Companies would begin to go out of business. Auto insurance would become more difficult to obtain.

If the government continued to smother the ability of insurance companies to make a profit, they would cease to operate, and the government would step in and become the auto-insurer for the nation.

Since a government program is NEVER as efficient as a private business, insurance costs would continue to rise. If you thought the private insurance companies (that had to compete with each other) were gouging you, wait until you have to do business with the monopoly of a government bureaucracy.

This is the problem with socialism. It sounds good. It sounds compassionate. But the results are always the same: Socialism eventually ensures that everyone is equally miserable, equally poor, and equally powerless.

Socialism turns responsible free citizens into dependent wards of the state.

That is not the kind of world I want to live in.

Absolutely Not Getting Any Younger

I received a birthday card some years ago with a cartoon of a marching band on the front that said "TIME MARCHES ON..." and then when I opened it the inside page continued "...YOUR FACE."

Tender sentiments like that always choke me up.

You may recall a blog I did some time ago titled The Day I Became Old in which I bemoaned the inevitable toll that the passing years take. Trust me, things aren't getting any better.

I was pointedly reminded of this recently while shopping at the drugstore. Walgreens had a sale on bottled water, so I loaded my cart with seven cases and pushed it into the parking lot. As I started loading the cases into the side door of my van, a thirty-something woman who was walking by stopped and sincerely asked, "Can I help you with that, sir?"

She was so earnest and polite, I didn't hold against her the fact that she had just made me feel about 100 years old. Plus, I reasoned, I might really live long enough that I will appreciate offers like that sometime in the future, so I had better learn to be more gracious.

"Thanks for asking," I said cheerfully, "but I'm fine."

It's just a matter of time before Girl Scouts start helping me across the street.

I've lost count of how many people have asked me if I am retired. In my dreams! Unfortunately, I have worked in the real world, where the majority of Americans work, and we don't have a union pension or the option of retiring after 25 or 30 years. We work, and live economically, and save, and hope we can accumulate enough to "retire" to part-time employment once we are old enough to draw whatever is left of our Social Security.

A while back I was at the grocery store. The cashier couldn't find the code for my Romaine lettuce, and since I buy it all the time, I remembered it and told her what it was. My knowledge of produce impressed the sack-boy, who had to be all of 16 years old.

"Dude," he said, "you should get a job here part-time."

I just laughed. "Man, my life is so busy, the last thing I need is another job!"

The kid looked at me incredulously, and in all innocence said, "You mean you still work?"

Ouch!

Dear Lord, I sincerely hope I wasn't that annoying when I was sixteen...but I probably was.

What if You Lived Like the Government?

Tom McClintock, a Republican Congressman from California, does a great job of boiling the budget debate down to the basic issue - we have to take responsibility for our spending. READ MORE