The Origins of a Political Conversion
Republican philosophy assumes that the pursuit of self-interest will eventually result in the greatest good for the greatest number of people. It relies on a hope that long-run returns to society will outweigh any near-term costs of unregulated activity. It insists that wealth creation, innovation, and personal liberty can only result from a “limited” government. As a bonus to its adherents, it requires little taxation and asks for no personal sacrifice.
I have seen enough of the world, and read enough of its history, to know that those pursuing their self-interest do not usually do so with the public good in mind. More often, their calculations involve maximizing benefits while minimizing investments. If that generates some public good, then so be it. But it is hardly their primary motivator.
Self-interested actors will operate whether the government is large or small. A small government leaves the entire community at the mercy of those interests operating outside the bounds of government. Larger interests, on their own or in concert, will work to minimize the influence of those who might frustrate their ambitions. In competition with one another, they will allocate their resources in ways not always productive to the society as a whole. Very often, little consideration is given to who may be harmed by their actions.
Nonetheless, I accepted that government was an agent susceptible only to the worst abuses of power. Any incremental expansion of its power could only come at the expense of individual freedoms. Regulation stifled creativity. Taxation robbed a man of the fruits of his labors. Bureaucracy was unemotional and anti-democratic. I considered private interests as the healthy and appropriate check on government power. Limited government would allow private interests to thrive, and in such an environment individuals would ultimately have the greatest latitude to achieve their personal ambitions.
Only when I was forced to confront the practical implications of Republican philosophy did I recognize how wrong I was.
For the past year, the Republican Party in Miami-Dade has been suffering from mismanagement and lackluster fundraising. As chair of the Victory 2012 Committee I had a significant concern about the lack of money available for party-building activities. The financial situation of the Party reached a crisis point in the last few months of 2011. By March of this year, it was obvious to the leaders of the local Party that its Chairman, Erik Fresen, had soured relationships with many of its major donors.
We needed to raise a lot of money for the local Party and to do so quickly. I had focused considerable mental energy contemplating why the wealthiest donors – those who could alleviate the situation most immediately – would be interested in making the large contributions we required. While donations to politicians provide a direct relationship to those in power, donations to a party organization cannot. Donors supporting the party could only be reasonably expected to do so because they support its principles. But the principles of the Republican Party, as I accepted them, were only indirectly beneficial to the interests of the very wealthy. In theory, they would lead to a more open sphere where any individual could pursue a competing interest on an equal footing. But what should wealthy donors hope to gain that would justify such an investment in the Republican Party? Quite simply, their returns come from consolidating their position.
Answering that question, I understood that to fully support the principles Republican Party is to support the perpetuation of only the wealthiest and most powerful interests in our society. While they certainly have a right to pursue their self-interest, where a compelling public interest exists there must be government. And it must be a government that is as democratic as possible. We must all have the opportunity to express an opinion regarding those matters where everyone’s interests align and where they diverge.
Such a government must be based on the broadest participation. All those eligible to vote should be enabled and encouraged to do so. Such a government must be subject to the highest degree of public oversight. Sunshine laws must be expansive, and transparency must be imposed on all the processes of government. Such a government must represent the ultimate will of the people, real citizens who vote. Corporate investments in the outcomes of government actions must be strictly limited, and the political process itself must be free of undue influence A limited government provides too great a sphere for the operation of anti-democratic interests. And a limited government itself is subject to a higher degree of influence from interests which otherwise prefer to operate outside of government control.
It occurred to me that politicians whose primary political goal was limited government would hardly raise money from the very wealthy without hope of some reward for their service. Venal men who support these interests hope to benefit from a society in which their tenure in government alone grants them status and position – politics itself is their entrée into ranks of society they might otherwise be unable to access. Honest men who hope for no such rewards nonetheless enable a society in which entrenched interests derive the greatest benefits. For their part, powerful interests exploit this situation to get the form of government they most desire. That is to say they finance willing agents who are complicit in expanding the sphere of influence over which democratic government has no claim.
In contrast, wealthy liberals who support liberal politicians are supporting a notion of government that allows for the greatest degree of participation. They are funding a society in which the working classes, minorities, women, the LGBT community, and others are given a voice. They want citizens, acting in their collective self-interest, to be the driving force in politics. When they support the Democratic Party and its candidates, their actions are implicitly consistent with the highest ambitions and ideals of a democratically elected republic. And whatever the personal motivations of liberal politicians, the outcomes of liberal policies are consistent with those ideals.
It is not my ambition to be the political agent of anti-democratic forces. I have no desire to gain the friendship of those whose main interest in government is to make the poor, the disadvantaged and the dispirited less able to influence the shape of the world we live in. Nor do I want a government that simply acts for those who can promote their self-interest well enough on their own.
I have every intention of remaining an active member of our participatory democracy, but I cannot support the Republican Party. In fact, I am strongly convinced that it must be opposed. For this reason, I have become a committed liberal.
