Shades of Tammany Hall

As the baby boom generation ages, it’s been interesting to watch the slow shift in beliefs touted as gospel by The Left. In the 1960’s and 1070’s, it was about freedom and individual expression. Now, how ironic is it that, the hue and cry is for more government and lamenting the rise of true individual expression.

This was driven home to me by two discussions in as many days.

The first was on a local radio program. The host and guests were lamenting term limitations and the fall of the old-boys’ network in the Arizona state legislature. Was this on the conservative talk radio that Hillary Clinton wants to impose limits upon? No, this was on local NPR affiliate KJZZ, broadcast from the campus of the Arizona State University in Tempe.

Two former state-level politicians were telling the world how sad it is that members of our legislature don’t spend their first few terms mute, literally not allowed to introduce any measures and rarely allowed to join in debate. In the "good old days," you had to earn the right to represent the people who elected you, and you had to get your campaign money through one man. Sure, it was bad if you were at odds with that powerful figure, but, really, that was your own fault, wasn’t it? It made things soooo much easier and efficient. To add insult to injury, freshmen senators now have the audacity to think that they are an equal of the majority leader because their votes carry the same weight. Yes, those halcyon days of yore were so much better. New members of the club could be ushered in to all the secrets of the inner workings, shown the path to life long political power, and the establishment had continuity and a sure hold on the legal process in Arizona.

The second discussion was a BBC podcast where a Silicon Valley pariah was claiming free content on the internet is destroying society. Why anyone could publish anything! This is having the terrible consequence of destroying the "legitimate" media. And, it undermines traditional education where students are spoon fed selected facts by the government system. Who is there to censor and decide what the public sees and reads? Why, the society is going to crumble because we will be unable to distinguish fact from lie if anyone can say anything. At it’s core, says this expert, is the lack of money. No money is being exchanged for information and this upsets the dynamic in an unacceptable way. I can’t help but wonder if he was recently turned down from a job with a newspaper. It never occurred to him or the interviewer that maybe the public is tired of the left wing slant and selective culling of the news by the major media outlets, so that we gladly adopt new sources of information.

What happened to the idea of the freedom of expression, once held so dear? What happened to the values of a free market? What happened to the idea that a free flow of ideas is healthy for government, society, and commerce? What happened to over throwing the man and power to the people?

While the party line has changed over the years, both of these articles find themselves still firmly planted in the fields of current Liberal thought. Rather than the old Liberal "I just want to be free," it’s the now, "the public is too stupid to take care of themselves, and an intelligent person such as myself has to tell those poor sods up from down."

It’s this basic distrust of the average person that fuels the Ruling Elite mentality of the Left. They are distrustful and scared of what a society unfettered by an "enlightened", stranglehold rule might get up to. I can understand that to a bit. After all, the old saying goes, "an individual person is smart, but the general public is stupid."

But so what? In this great experiment in democracy, the common man eventually finds his feet no matter how fast the waters of change are flowing. And, 99 out of 100 times, they find not only solid ground, but profitable, solid ground long before the government or educational institutions are even aware there is a flood. In doing so, the common man pays the taxes that allow the Liberal Elite to gripe about how stupid the common man is.

Times may change, and those who feel they are being denied their place in a structure they are used to are going to be spitting out sour grapes. That’s fine. Change brings opportunity and our modern age is constantly bringing more voice and influence to the average, stupid, common man like myself. If someone is afraid of that, then maybe they have something to be afraid of.