Rush Limbaugh, the Pilgrims, and the American Dream

Today I'm in my car eating lunch, listening to Rush Limbaugh; I listen to him because I want to understand those who disagree with me, and where they are getting their information from. As I eat my Taco Bell, El Rushbo proceeds to tell a story about the Pilgrims, William Bradford (first Governor of the Plymouth Colony) and the first Thanksgiving - and uses it to set up the right wing straw man argument against "socialism".

Rush's account comes from his first book, in which he relates Bradford's tale of the first Thanksgiving. First, Limbaugh sets up his idea of what children are being taught about Thanksgiving by the Liberal education system - that the helpless Pilgrims were saved by the friendly Indians they later unfairly swindled and slaughtered. I don't know that I was taught it the way Rush thinks it is being taught, but I can draw a sweet turkey with my hand. He goes on to explain how Bradford wrote that the first experiment the Pilgrims tried was to give out parcels of land to all the Pilgrims, and to place all the bounty of the harvest into a community store - where all could share in the fruits of the labor. Well this communism, Rush says, failed because it led to a plague of slackers, choosing not to work but to leech from the labor of the others. This is what would happen under an Obama presidency and Democratic "socialism", he implies.

Bradford's writings then tell us that he made changes to the system. People were still given parcels of land to farm, but they did not pool the harvest. The result was that individual productivity skyrocketed, and there was so much food produced that the Pilgrims invited the natives to share it with them. They thanked God for the blessings of the land.

But what does this have to do with modern America? See, what struck me was that every one of the Pilgrims was still given a parcel of land to farm! And, while Rush did not go into the details of this aspect, I gather that the parcels were relatively equal in quality and size. People were given equal opportunity to succeed for themselves. They probably had to share whatever equipment was brought over on the Mayflower. They must have shared the seeds, and perhaps what animals had survived the trip.

Fast-forward this situation to current times: a rich and powerful few on board the Mayflower would take the largest and most fertile land for themselves. They would take the best equipment and healthiest animals for their land, and let the common folk divvy up the rest. Those few would still have harvested a great deal from their efforts - but their opportunity to succeed was considerably greater than that of some schmuck who had half an acre of swamp and a three-legged goat to work with. The wealthy Pilgrim would survive and pass on his farm to his children, and he on to his children, and so on. The poor guy in the swamp - if he survived at all - would pass on nothing to his offspring. Three generations later, the rich children would wonder why the poor bums in the swamp are so lazy.

This is the inequality that is holding America back from being even greater than she already is. It is fair and right to tax those more who have benefited most from decades and centuries of institutional inequality, in order to provide an equal chance for the opportunity to succeed on one's own. That is the inequality that Barack Obama speaks of. Give people some land and some seeds, and let them grow. Provide jobs with decent wages, health care and education and people will succeed on their own - and we as a nation will prosper from the increased productivity and achievement of our countrymen. Had Bradford and the Pilgrims chosen to allow a privileged few to succeed at the price of those deemed less fortunate, then I'm willing to bet that the colony would have failed.

You can't pull yourself up by the bootstraps if you have no boots, you can't climb the socio-economic ladder if the bottom five rungs are busted out, and you can't feed your family at Thanksgiving if all you have is a three-legged goat.

McCain - Palin Ticket Saving Money Already

Today's announcement that John McCain has chosen Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate, should be great news to fiscal conservatives around the nation. Seeing as how Senator McCain opposes legislation to help women achieve equal pay for equal work, we can assume he will offer her a salary of 77 cents to the dollar, compared to what Dick Cheney makes. By paying Vice-President Palin $163,400 instead of $212,208, John McCain will save taxpayers nearly $50,000 a year.

What a maverick!

Good News, Bad News for Livonia Dems

The good news first - there are at least 10,000 people in Livonia willing to vote on the Democratic side in a Primary. I cordially invite all of you to the next meeting of the Livonia Democratic Club - I'll even buy the punch and pie. Senator Carl Levin received 10,605 votes according to the City Clerk. What is the bad news, you ask? Well, maybe it's not "bad", so much as "odd". Of the nearly 9000 people voting for Democratic candidate for State House (19th District), more than 48% of them chose an unknown candle-selling event coordinator, with no experience in office but a great deal of it selling womens' intimate apparel, over Livonia School Board Trustee Steve King.

Two years ago, a great deal of hostility was created in Livonia over the controversial "Legacy Initiative", which dealt with declining LPS enrollment by closing some schools and creating a system of upper and lower elementary schools. Steve King was elected in that election, unseating a 10-year incumbent. It seems that there is still a lot of animosity towards Mr. King; so much so that he could not muster 52% of the vote against a candidate who never responded to newspaper interview requests.

I mean no disrespect to Jennifer Rutkey - I wish her the best, and congratulate her on a fine showing yesterday. I hope to see more of you in Livonia Democratic politics in the future. I'd just like, for once, to see Livonia Dems put forth a candidate we can all rally behind to defeat the Republicans! I fear that Mr. King will never get the full backing he needs, and Livonia will be resigned to another six years of GOP mis-representation.