My son Liam turned 1 last week. It’s probably cliché to say, but it does put things in perspective.
Obviously it makes me feel kind of old, even though I’m only 24. And it makes a lot of my other accomplishments feel a lot less important in comparison.
But what I want to focus on (unsurprisingly?) is how it related to my thoughts on politics, specifically how I prioritize issues.
If you look at my personal blog history you probably can see an evolution in my thought and what issues I focused on most.
For example I used to focus a lot on somewhat abstract philosophic issues and things like tax policy and have since shifted to immigration, along with the drug war and land use policy.
Thinking about Liam’s birthday has helped clarify in my mind why I’ve come to care about the issues I do.
While my concern in politics was, and remains to be, the defense and promotion of individual liberty, there’s a lot of room for varied priorities under that umbrella. What has come to concern me the most is what I think of as “experienced liberty and tyranny.”
What do I mean by this? Let’s go back to the evolution in thought over the course of this blog.
Taxes matter, I certainly won’t dispute that. However, given the current political realities, changes in our tax code will have minimal impact on the lived experiences of almost everyone.
On the other hand, things like our current immigration policy or the War on Drugs have a massive impact on people’s lives, one that is far more visceral and destructive than the tax code.
Marginal tax rate brackets creep up a few percentage points? That’s a negative change and one I’d just as soon Liam could avoid. But the War on Drugs? Statistically speaking it’s a pretty good bet he might end up trying marijuana some day and that choice could land him in jail, unalterably changing his life for the worse.
Given that kind of disparity, I think it is far more important to focus on working to change those areas where government is actively destroying people’s lives, or at least significantly harming or limiting their well-being.
As a young man still in college or just out of it, it’s easy and fun to spend time worrying about abstract questions of philosophy (actually it still is and I do think it’s important to engage in the exercise).
As a Republican, particularly one who holds office within the Party, it’s easy to go along and be vocal about the mainstream issues like taxes and spending.
But it’s not enough to do what’s easy and being a father has made that clearer than ever to me.
I want to work to make a world I can feel better about Liam and others his age growing up in. And that means focusing on the issues that are doing the most to limit individual liberty and harm people’s well-being, things like restrictive immigration policy, the War on Drugs, prohibitions on same-sex marriage, pointless military adventurism, and occupational licensing that helps incumbent businesses & stifles competition.
These aren’t sexy or high status issues and I don’t begrudge anyone their priorities. But I hope others will come to see things the way I have come to; positive changes in these fields can yield immediate and significant improvement in the lives of many and make the world a noticeably better place for those who will follow after us.
Stephan Sonn says
The world certainly would be a better place
if compassion were not treated like a commodity
and the safety net be damned.
Loving your children is one thing,
caring about the kid losing food stamps
is quite another isn’t it.
The problem is overpopulation strangling access
Which is not a Republican problem
Given the birth control is modern day book burning
At the heart of the Republican party mantra.
Dick Hawkins says
Great analysis, and from a 24 year old. I’m not a Republican but can buy into everything Kevin said. Nice to be reminded that there are people out there, regardless of party, who can see beyond the next 6 months and are willing to suggest topics for debate that effect all our lives in important ways (to say nothing of the lives of our children and grandchildren). Thanks Kevin.
Gren Whitman says
It’s sad when anyone is a Republican, but it’s extra sad when he’s such a young person!
joe diamond says
All right Kevin,
You are finally getting it! I remember in 1990, television shows were interrupted to announce Desert Storm was starting. CNN had folks in Iraq and they had great shots of only AA (anti aircraft shooting……….it comes back down and kills people) and my son, being three at the time asked me to explain what it was. So how do you explain war to a three year old?
Congratulations! Now you have a son. You will see the world through a different lens. Now every political action…esp foreign policy will be viewed by answering the question…Is this worth the life of my child?
Skipping the part about light casualties and minor collateral damage…………..like the AA faling on Bagdad.
You will be ok. I really objected to your piece on Right Thinking People Should Skip Democrats or whatever the title. The editors wouldn’t publish my first attempt to respond to your piece…let the second effort through. I didn’t object so much to what you said as the rhetorical crap you larded your statements with. I get a knee jerk reaction when I see the stuff. I immediately think….this is going to lead to a war and there is no way the political wonks are getting my son!
So, trim the rhetoric…be good to your son……you get it already.
Twenty four years ago you could have been on my other knee……..I couldn’t have explained war or the reasons for Desert Storm to you either…..or why our Kuwait allies are important….
I am just a cranky old fart who has been overfed on government explanations for the VietnamWar or Granada (poor Mr. Eastwood) or the War on Drugs and especially Homeland Security. I over reacted to your electioneering.
Joe
Kevin Waterman says
Joe,
Thanks for the response.
I know the piece on Democrats and civil liberties was a bit rhetorically loaded, but it was intentionally so.
Some of the purpose was because I care a great deal about the issue and an improvement in civil liberties was one of the few things I looked forward to with the Obama presidency and not did that not materialize, things actually got worse.
Some of the purpose was because a more provocative approach can push people out of their comfort zones and get them talking, whereas something more milquetoast just gets a few head nods. Given the volume of comments on that post I’d like to think I was somewhat successful on that count.
And finally, some of the purpose was to pull more people in to see it since the more people that see it, the more people thinking about the topic and perhaps the better a chance of seeing some sort of change.
On the other hand, I do recognize I severely underestimated the degree to which the piece would be seen as crass electioneering as opposed to an honest statement.
Ken Noble says
I thought that Republicans didn’t believe in evolution, even with respect to thought. You are WAFFLING, not “evolving”. I could never understand this charge of “waffling” that they (yes THEM) frequently bandy about. I always thought that good wafflers, when spun another way, were just very good multi-dimensional thinkers. You know, like George “W” Bush WASN’T when he pulled the USMC back from Torra Bora and sent them onto Baghdad after he remembered that there was more oil in Iraq and his daddy had not finished a job THERE. Are you now WAFFLING, Kevin? I miss the arguments for and against “central planning” of oh so long ago…before EVOLUTION, I mean. Did you just LOSE that argument and move on….I think so, dude. You lost that argument and now you are hiding behind an editor who calls for all to be “kind”, when being right may be considered “unkind” in his view. I never got a reply from the point that Heurich, or whatever that disgruntled economist’s name was whom you adhere to, was referring to NAZIism and Communism between the wars in Europe, not medicare, social security and job training/”welfare’.
Hey we can settle this over a manno a manno game of whiffle ball…there dude. See website for the rules. (This is safer than dueling and…more fun: https://www.wiffle.com/about_rules.htm)
The main thing, though, is that it doesn’t really matter what your philosophy is when you have to respond to crying baby at 2 a.m., right? What was the “topic for debate” that was presented here? I missed that. May I suggest one…the young Waterman will now see a doubling in the Stafford loan interest rate. This may not be a big deal for the “one percent” or even top “ten percent”, but I am glad that my first son had the option of the lower 3.1% rate AND, I would like to send a tuition bill to John Boehner, if he is still in office in 2013.
I missed which “topic for debate” was presented in this opinion piece…that your world view changes when you have to change diapers? Guess what, it will change again when your child needs a Stafford Loan which will have a doubled interest rate. Thank you, Mr. Boehner.
I would like to see the word “evolution” replaced with “maturation”….I mean respectfully, civilly and KINDLY speaking…of course. This is after all a FAMILY channel. No, let me be KINDER…Kevin is MATURING, not EVOLVING (that Darwin is banned when speaking with the Right, I believe.)
MBTroup says
Interesting discussion on thoughts and positions that “are evolving.” Seems en vogue lately.
Kevin Waterman says
Ken,
Sorry if I never responded to your point on Hayek. I had a piece I wrote up that was responding to various points raised in comments, but I could never get it worked out to my satisfaction so it never got published.
But to answer it, Hayek, in The Road to Serfdom, may have been reacting to the Nazi and Soviet planned economies, and the significantly more planned British economy of his time, but much of the rest of his work was focused on broader themes and it was both that work which won him his Nobel Prize in Economics and that I was relying on, particularly his essay “The Use of Knowledge in Society.” My point wasn’t that PlanMaryland is going to turn Maryland into a totalitarian state, it was simply there needs to be more recognition of the limits of human knowledge and the capacity of men to centrally plan huge sectors of the economy.
Looking to this piece, if you didn’t see a “topic for debate” then it is likely because you weren’t really the target audience for it. Primarily this is targeted at libertarians and small-government conservatives, encouraging people to focus less on issues with smaller impacts on peoples’ lives (for example taxes) and more on the issues that have huge impacts on peoples’ lives (the drug war, occupational licensing, etc.). If you’re not in that basic ideological framework, then there’s a good chance there might not seem like much point the post.
Ken Noble says
All points well taken, Kevin. My diaper changing days are about 15-20 years in the past. Cute kid. Congratulations. It only gets better and better. I must say that some of Hayek, taken out of context, DOES explain even MY frustration with bureaucracy from time to time.
I recently had to go full circle THREE times with the Maryland Comptroller’s Office on a tax issue regarding my sister’s estate. The SECOND time around, I asked all parties in the discussion (about $500,000 in State salaries spread among three people in Elkton, Annapolis and Baltimore….) to tell me exactly WHERE on the organizational chart they came from, because my next call was going to be to Peter Franchot’s office to get advice on how to nudge the effort along. To the Comptroller’s credit, I did make that call and the .problem was solved within the week! IT was a case of nobody having a “The Buck Stops Here” sign on their desk and three people too close to retirement to try to help me……oh,.then there is my Lead Abatement Law case where the Maryland Department of the Environment uses the MDAT property file to extract “DATE BUILT” even though MDAT uses “1900” to signify “we don’t know when it was built”…that’s a novel actually involving most of my family, a historian in Annapolis, and my remembrance of a PLANNING meeting in 1991 when the MDAT analysts clearly told all other bureaus in the room NOT to depend on their data base for regulatory purposes and, THIS IS THE BEST, me finding that analyst 21 years later to verify that statement…..about two months before his retirement. So SOME bureaucrats can come through, despite Hayek.
I also may have been confusing “planning” in general with the specific effort of land use planning, which is still in the hands of local governance in Maryland at the unit comprehensive and site level at least. This was well documented by Atty. General Gansler’s response to Senator Jacobs (R-Cecil, etc) request for a clarification on the Local and State roles in LAND USE PLANNING after PlanMaryland. This document is on the Atty. General’s web site and clears up 99.9% of the false charges made prior to the last legislative session along the lines of “a war on rural Maryland.” That opinion must have carried some weight, because we quit hearing the “war on rural Maryland” drumbeat about two weeks into the past session.
Another very good Nobel Prize winning author that you may find useful was Kenneth J. Arrow. His “Impossibility Theorem” made committee work miserable for me…well pointless is a better descriptive. I frankly came to prefer the “Just Do It!” and “Gitter Done!” philosophies of the Eas’Sho’men after reviewing that grad. school material!
The whiffle ball challenge still stands, ahhh DUDE! Best wishes.
.