“… he raised [economic growth] to a first principle — not a result of the free economy…”

As usual, your observant eye highlights the insurmountable wall for modern day libertarians. Jack (R.I.P.) was a “small government” politician, but he was still a politician. To garner noticeable support, a pol must sell his ideas and, like Reagan’s team, he sold support for Republicanism via the utilitarian argument. Even today, you will hear so-called conservative talk-show hosts discuss low taxes in the context of revenue gains for the Treasury. This paradigm is the libertarian’s albatross. If the “promised land” is “higher economic growth,” then success is measured as a conglomeration of transactions, distinct from the personal paradigm of a human being — my life and my lifestyle, my home and my hearth.

Try watching CNBC, if you can stomach it, and tune in to the so-called issue debates with side-by-side windows of pro vs. con Obama supporters arguing tax policy. Sure, sometimes a Cato speaker will insist that government is too big, but most of the time the talking heads are one-dimensional characters from a sci-fi morality play. The two sides continually interrupt each other in terms of the U.S. Treasury impact. Immediately, the libertarian fundamental is lost, ignored like the ghost of Thoreau wailing against the mass of men. As the debaters argue economics on flip sides of the utilitarian coin, there is no third side. The collective (i.e., the “economy”) is ostensibly embraced as more significant, more important, more worthy of intellectual analysis than the impact on a specific individual.
Thus, the moral argument for freedom is gone. Now a statist would reject this and argue, “No, on the contrary, the moral argument is pervasive because we are discussing the impact of policy on human beings, and freedom is measured by the economic power of each individual. Thus, as economic freedom is expanded via governmental policy, the opportunity for greater freedom is discovered by more human beings.”

So how does one advance the cause of liberty in the context of inescapable utilitarianism, muddied by the generally-accepted belief that the government legitimately promotes the “general welfare”?
In only one way that I can think of: leverage utilitarianism in the context of the one, not the many. Every policy decision has an impact on a person, a person with a name and a family. And usually, policy is a restriction on the behaviors of particular individuals.
Just be prepared for pithy and emotional response, which instigates great applause among the masses: “We are promoting _every_ family, not just one!”

The data do not back up your assertion, David.

In Freedomnomics, John Lott points out that if politicians were merely after money and power, then politicians not running for reelection (and thus facing no voter reprisal) would essentially whore their votes to the highest bidder.

But politicians do not behave this way. The average politician’s voting record changes very little in his final term in office.

As difficult as it might be for us to accept, the vast majority of politicians do not view themselves as mustache-twirling villains. Instead, they are people who are trying to do good (inasmuch they understand how to do so). Their egos depend upon this worldview.

As a stark example, when I called my Representative to urge him to vote against the original TARP bill, his aide asked me, “What should he do instead?” Meaning, in his worldview, government was a kind, beneficial force, ready to spring into action to help. Not only did the notion that government should instead be sitting in the corner wearing a dunce cap (for its role in creating the housing bubble) never occur to him, but such a notion would be incompatible with his worldview and thus summarily rejected.

Thanks for that fair commentary on Jack Kemp, a hero of mine.

Kemp is the biggest influence on my conversion to a more consistent libertarian outlook. He showed me how my libertarian/civil rights sensibilities that fit my hippie-lib-lifetime-Dem-Jewish-New Englander youth were naturally attuned to a more politically conservative.

I heard him speak at 2 gatherings. One was at the Waldorf as a replacement for the scheduled speaker Bill Bradley. There Kemp spoke about the State of Israel and its purpose in the world. The second was in San Antonio where he spoke on tax policy. At each one I was brought to tears as he explained that ideals of freedom and opportunity were legitimate results of pro-growth tax-cutting policy. And he explained these esoteric concepts with real-life examples and humor.

Just a few I can recall:

1. Regarding government provided housing: “Does anyone bring a rental car to the car wash prior to returning it?”
2. His father was a trucker in Ca. He finally saved enough money (while raising Jack and I don’t know how many other kids) to purchase a truck. He named his San Diego company “International Shippers” (quite a name for a guy with one truck). He continued to deny his family all luxuries (and still the kids turned out great), saved and bought a second truck. He, of course, had to hire someone since he could not drive 2 trucks at once. This hard work and saving led to a new job for someone else. That formula was continued as Kemp’s Dad grew his business and created more jobs. This formula would be more readily available to all with a lower tax structure (especially on capital gains).

Kemp was unapologetic about his low tax/high growth values and he was willing to go directly to minorities to explain how this policy was to their benefit.

I learned from Kemp that man is driven by an entrepreneurial spirit that is too often destroyed by governmental regulations.

Besides all of this, he was a helluva athlete, a seemingly great guy and was moved by the spirit of Lincoln (though on a superficial level in many ways).

Where is the next Jack Kemp? Someone who led me from my ambiguous liberal views into a clearer understanding of economics and the necessary reduction of government for people to realize their potential.

If you want a silly “tribute” to Jack Kemp, read Bob Herbert in the NYT:

The bad idea, advanced by Kemp with fanatical energy and devotion, was supply-side economics — “voodoo economics,” as George H.W. Bush so famously and rightly derided it. Supply-siders saw tax cuts as the answer to every prayer. Cut taxes, they argued, and watch the economy take off like a rocket.

What they never spelled out for the electorate was that most of the tax cuts would go to the rich, that the rich would harvest most of the money from the increased economic activity, and that the radically reduced tax revenue would send government budget deficits streaking toward the moon.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/05/opinion/05herbert.html

Bob,

MY APOLOGY!!!!!!!!

I did not realize you were quoting Bob Herbert. I already knew he doesn’t know anything about economics.

Sorry, I over-reacted and shot from the hip.