In just three weeks, and I just found about it a couple of days ago. It will cost 315 bucks, plus transportation and lodging. I doubt that I will attend.
It looks to me as though almost every public intellectual who has ever had a kind word to say about Donald Trump will be there. One of the more interesting people on the list of speakers is Batya Ungar-Sargon, who has said
I, too, have been shocked at the refusal to acknowledge Trump’s wins, many of which were actually really progressive. Thanks to his economy, the base pay of the lower 25% of wage earners rose by 4.5%, which is unprecedented in recent history (certainly, nothing like this happened under Clinton or Obama). He brought truly unprecedented unemployment to marginalized communities and gave millions and millions of dollars to HBCUs. He freed over 4,000 Black men from prison; men sent to prison because of Joe Biden’s crime bill, the irony of ironies. Had the Democrats not been so totally committed to their loathing of Trump, they could have gotten much more out of him.
I recommend the whole interview. The title of her scheduled talk at the conference is “America’s Hidden Class Divide and Our Terrible Media.”
The political party I want would be:
(a) anti-Woke culturally
(b) respectful of working- and middle-class voters without pandering
(c) determined to cut Federal government spending, including on entitlements
(d) determined to shake up bureaucracies (like the FDA and CDC) so that they solve problems instead of operating as self-licking ice cream cones
The National Conservatives are anti-Woke, but they want to pose as working- and middle-class champions. Pandering includes ignoring the out-of-control growth in entitlements. And I don’t see anyone stepping up to the plate on shaking up Washington. In the case of Mr. Trump, the swamp drained him rather than the other way around.
I’ll just say amen to your ideas.
I think one route with our sclerotic bureaucracies is to close them down and start new ones.
I too really like the ASK platform.
Two issues that might be missing:
1) immigration policy, particularly among lower skilled migrants
2) drug policy
How much is Arnold willing to diverge from the libertarian secret sauce on these issues?
Side note: hopefully a good portion of this conference will be posted on YouTube or similar platforms.
https://youtube.com/c/NationalConservatism
Entitlements aren’t getting cut until it’s forced by fiscal deterioration, and “cut” will probably mean stealth rationing and quality deterioration. Whatever ones moral qualms, it’s clear that harping on entitlements bu the GOP did little to cut them or even reduce new ones being added.
The rest is at least popular politically, it’s where I’d put my political capital.
Agree about entitlements. Why harp on things that you aren’t going to pass and that are going to lose you a ton of votes when you talk about them?
The Trump administration did many great things, and it was Trump’s responsibility to act like an adult and not sabotage public perception of these good things. It would have been a simple thing for him to keep his mouth shut, not act out, and leave the promotion of his policies to public relations professionals. It wouldn’t have killed him to play the game, and show some self-discipline in the face of the media enemy. Instead, he gibbered unrestrainedly, and destabilized American politics for a generation.
+1 yep.
Let’s see. The Obama administration, followed by holdover unelected bureaucrats, turned the government into a weapon to try to destroy an outsider who was elected President, and what some people take from that is that the President destabilized American politics.
You’re off target. Recall how Obama used the IRS to attack his political opponents. (And amazingly no one went to jail…) That is the tip of the iceberg.
Trump stands out because he fought back. And we’re better for it. Not because Tump is a savior. But because we need more people to recognize the dangers present and his style and goals brought them to the forefront.
Fighting is ugly. But believing that the grifters in the government will change or be rooted out without someone fighting back against them is a fairy tale.
“You’re off target. Recall how Obama used the IRS to attack his political opponents.”
Obama did no such thing.
” immigration policy, particularly among lower skilled migrants”
Stop importing immigrants and a lot of the entitlement problems will lessen in magnitude. Education costs will be cheaper, fewer welfare recipients, and low skilled Americans willl get paid more, making their demands less as well.
I like a) b) and d).
There’s a case for c), namely the government’s track record of ineptitude. That being said, since it’s politically infeasible to expect meaningful entitlement cuts (if you couldn’t do it in 1995, you can’t do it now), I’d rather have entitlement spending to be rearranged so as to align with my political goals. Aside from that, large amounts of spending seem necessary now. This isn’t the America of a century ago. Fraternal societies are largely gone. Families are smaller and scattered across the country. Communities have frayed, as the country has become more atomized. Economic needs have also changed, particularly as health care has become more expensive. Generally speaking, a regular lower middle class family just can’t pay for for their own health care if something bad happens, much less a poor one. Even for those with additional means, health care costs can still be eye popping and insurance companies still terrible to work with.
We’ve spent a half century with our welfare and entitlement policies encouraging more atomization. The state raises the children, and takes care of mom when she’s old. If you’re a traditional family with moderate to high earnings, there’s nothing for you, but plenty of benefits, including cash benefits, to those who make poor social decisions and who don’t want to work. 21st century social spending should try to use those dollars to ameliorate those ills.
Here a few thoughts, much of which I’ve mentioned here in the past:
Dovetailing with a), public school seems to have become a cancer on American society in many places. I’d rather state/local education systems be replaced by federal education vouchers, with some adjustment for cost of living. Here’s the kicker: if you’re in a married two parent household, you can elect to receive the entire voucher in cash if one parent agrees to stay home and raise the children. If you have three kids, you get three vouchers worth of cash. Single moms, however, will have to use their vouchers to send their children to school. The goal here will be for there to be larger families and more families in which parents directly raise and educate their own children, actively favoring the nuclear family over single parents, while at the same time making it nearly impossible for woke institutions to control education for most children.
Ideally, with the exception of severe disability and retirement, there should be no money for not working, with publicly funded jobs at a living wage available for all adults who want them. So that those who for whatever reason can’t work don’t starve or get stuck on the streets involuntarily, low status basic dorms which won’t fall into disrepair because there will be maintenance staff and rules of behavior. No section 8 housing, no TANF, no food stamps. If you have no food, go to a food bank or check into one of the basic dorms. Coincident with this, child support should be eliminated except in at-fault divorce cases due to paternal infidelity or physical violence. Having three kids from two baby daddies doesn’t get you cash and prizes, you either work while the kids are at school or instead you get to live in a very small apartment, eat from a menu you didn’t pick and share a bathroom with your neighbors.
At this point, I think there should be a public healthcare system open to everyone, but with a fully cash private parallel system in which third party payment is prohibited. I’m open to public clinics & hospitals or some type of federal insurance system for the public system, but I want there to be a strong safety net for those in need, while a parallel system with strong market forces for those who want more.
On (d) the failure of government agencies is prolific. The problem is there is no correction to when the agency sells out to the very people it is supposed to be monitoring. So the FDA doesn’t protect the health interests of citizens, it protects the profit interests of corporations. The teachers unions don’t promote the education of students, they don’t even protect teachers! Rather they promote political ideologies depending on who butters their bread.
Ideally Congress would provide oversight of government agencies but again, they are bought by corporate & political interests such that (1) No effective oversight takes place and (2) the law has been so corrupted that whatever malfeasance bureaucrats do they skate free of any punishment..
As great as the American Constitution is, it never provided an answer to the question of “what happens when the government is lawless and ungovernable?”
The only solution is a return to federalism where the government that matters most is more directly controlled by the people, and the role of the federal government is strictly confined.
A quote… “Thanks to his economy, the base pay of the lower 25% of wage earners rose by 4.5%, which is unprecedented in recent history (certainly, nothing like this happened under Clinton or Obama)”.
It’s not “his”. It’s not Trump’s economy. It wasn’t Bush’s GFC (global financial crisis). It wasn’t Clinton’s internet boom. It wasn’t Obama’s GFC recovery. People have to recognize circumstances instead of making positive and negative associations like circumstances don’t exist.
“Trump’s era of uncontrollable communicable disease” is an thing as much as “Trump’s economy”.
To be clear it was Batya Ungar-Sargon that is being quoted above.
I have a sincere criticism for Kling here:
Kling lists clear policy objectives. But Kling seems more interested in making snarky self-pleasing political jabs than advancing the policy objectives he claims to support.
A serious issue driven pundit articulates their issues and policy objectives, makes a serious attempt to objectively and transparently scorecard competing political options, and support/oppose political figures on a strictly transactional basis.
The opposite of serious issue driven punditry is focusing on which political jabs are fun to write and using highly malleable criticisms like “pandering”. Pandering is a flexible word that one can use to give a negative connotation to almost anything politicians or leaders do to make constituents happy.