Strengthening Constitutional Self-Government

No Left Turns

Politics

Required Reading

Tired of the Mitt Romney-Rick Perry food fight?  Me too.  But there are serious Republicans who are talking about our biggest economic problems in a serious way.  Too bad none of them are running for President.

Chris Christie gives one heck of a great speech and describes a tough-minded and realistic conservative reformism that is willing to make reasonable good faith compromises.   

Paul Ryan eloquently lays out the case  for a broad right-leaning health care reform.  As usual, I think Ryan's proposal's move a little too far a little too fast to be the Republican policy agenda of the moment.  But I don't think that Ryan's major speeches are best understood as attempts to get some exact proposal passed either now or ever.  They are attempts to get people thinking about new approaches to solving problems.  Those approaches can then be refined in ways that take into account public opinion and reasonable policy criticism.  If I were the head of American Crossroads or some other right-leaning group with deep pockets, I would put Ryan into two minute commercials explaining some aspect of health care policy.  Such a two minute commercial would do more to change people's minds that ten times as many 30 second ads that don't have a chance to say anything.
Categories > Politics

Discussions - 6 Comments

Christie is going to have a hard time explaining his work lobbying on behalf of the Securities Industry Association which, at the time Christie lobbied, was led by Bernie Madoff.

https://www.theawl.com/2011/09/the-chris-christie-madoff-attack-ad-that-writes-itself

"The bottom line for Obama's communication team: As a lobbyist, Chris Christie worked to remove securities fraud from a consumer fraud act on behalf of an organization run by Bernie Madoff."

This would seem to run counter to emeritus NLT blogger guru Steven Hayward's sage advice for conservatives to "attack the irresponsible rich" (presumably this would preclude hiring their lobbyists) and "attack big business" that he offered in his Nov. '09 manifesto "After Reagan: Five Challenges for 21st Century Conservatives."

https://www.ashbrook.org/publicat/onprin/fall09/hayward.html

It's a good read in general. I like the part where Hayward - he of the home on each coast - goes after a Google founder for having a private plane with a hot tub, but mostly because said Google guy (Sergey Brin) isn't conservative like him.

The reason that Liberals don't like Bernie Madoff is because he gave his investors a choice - they could either invest in his Ponzi scheme or not.

Liberals, however, love Ponzi schemes like Social Security -why - because they are mandatory Ponzi Schemes. Government takes your hard earned money and then resdistributes it to undeserving citizens.

The only choice Liberals like is abortion - the choice to let your baby live or die.

Liberalism is a .........

The reason that Liberals don't like Bernie Madoff is because he gave his investors a choice - they could either invest in his Ponzi scheme or not.

Liberals, however, love Ponzi schemes like Social Security -why - because they are mandatory Ponzi Schemes. Government takes your hard earned money and then resdistributes it to undeserving citizens.

The only choice Liberals like is abortion - the choice to let your baby live or die.

Liberalism is a .........

Craig, I think you're thinking too small. Attacking Christie because a law firm he worked with lobbied for a longstanding business association that had a crook as its head is too many degrees of separation. I mean you'll convince people already on your side (Christie? Madoff? In the same sentence? zounds!) but you have them. You need something close. Something personal. Maybe saying the title of his second book was inspired by a racist loon. Maybe getting involved with a project with an unrepentant terrorist. Maybe having a convicted criminal and influence peddler help him with the purchase of his home. Nothing criminal mind you, just some help for you to play the guilt by association game. Though I don't know why you would want that...

Though if Christie runs he'll have to talk about this (though I think it will be a smaller political problem than his stand on gun control.) But I don't think he is running and while I want him to, I'm not optimistic that he would win.

Look, my "side" (which isn't the Obama side, btw - but it isn't the Tea-Party-led GOP, either, certainly) doesn't even need to get into the Madoff connection (although he did lead the SIA at the time). It's enough that Christie lobbied to "block the inclusion of securities fraud under the state's Consumer Fraud Act."

It would seem that only the most anarcho-libertarians would be against such inclusion. Madoff and Co. did pull off securities fraud, on a grand scale.

(I see that Christie's love for serious, rigorous education also included lobbying to get the mostly worthless University of Phoenix a NJ higher education license, as well. Bravo, Chris! "Sure thing, we'll get you a license! Do you teach about high finance? Good. What about Hayek, Strauss, Reagan-as-the-best-prez-ever, Founding Fathers fetishism, stuff like that? Okay, great. The license should be in the mail by Tuesday!")

Craig, I suspect that "anarcho-libertarians" are pretty rare among ex-US Attorneys. The whole idea sounds like premise for a short-lived TV show. Like the one where Jimmy Smits quit as Supreme Court Justice to become a legal aid lawyer so he could make a difference.

You are free to argue that Christie's ex-employer tired to prevent New Jersey from barring something that was already illegal under federal law or that his law firm tied to get a license for the University of Phoenix(!). That should really rally the troops. to see real real guilt-by-association gold, (and I still don't know why you would) see above

Leave a Comment

* denotes a required field
 

No TrackBacks
TrackBack URL: https://nlt.ashbrook.org/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi/17077


Warning: include(/srv/users/prod-php-nltashbrook/apps/prod-php-nltashbrook/public/sd/nlt-blog/_includes/promo-main.php): failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /srv/users/prod-php-nltashbrook/apps/prod-php-nltashbrook/public/2011/09/required-reading.php on line 573

Warning: include(): Failed opening '/srv/users/prod-php-nltashbrook/apps/prod-php-nltashbrook/public/sd/nlt-blog/_includes/promo-main.php' for inclusion (include_path='.:/opt/sp/php7.2/lib/php') in /srv/users/prod-php-nltashbrook/apps/prod-php-nltashbrook/public/2011/09/required-reading.php on line 573