Cal Thomas Quotes
Don't liberal Democrats ever learn economic principles, or does their class warfare trump all else?
Thomas, Cal. "Don't Liberal Democrats Ever Learn Economic Principles." Tribune Content Agency, 2011.
Stockman was the member of the Reagan staff who was in charge of the budget. The President however chose not to take Stockman’s advice and the result which will always be a black mark on the Reagan Administration was the then largest budget deficit in American history.
Socialism in its then pure form had the state owning and controlling all the major assets of the nation. In this sense it was contradictory to individual freedom and hence democracy. However, in the years after Tocqueville’s quotation and the industrial revolution, socialism has gradually moved away from state ownership and operations of all institutions and resources. Democracy has tended to adopt a more regulatory view to control the excesses of unbridled capitalism. The range of democratic nations by the 21st century encompassed differences but some were described as “social democracies” and had some state ownership but were basically capitalistic economies. Even the self-described Communist nations had become heavily capitalistic albeit with less political freedom. At the same time, even the United States—the epitome of 21st century capitalism, owned and controlled a few of the resources and means of production and tended to regulate the others—a substantial difference from the American democracy which Tocqueville studied.
Under the Republican George W. Bush administration, the economic meltdown of 2008 triggered the Great Recession where the middle class bore the economic and emotional brunt. In 2012, the Republicans were in the midst of their primary elections for their Presidential nominee. There were 4 candidates in a vicious campaign where they trashed and attacked each other trying to pander to the right wing of the Party who tended to control the primaries. So all of the candidates were opposed to all the laws that Congress had made to prevent another economic disaster and in addition to repealing those, would roll back most of the executive orders and regulations to prevent another Banking debacle.
John Calvin Thomas is an American syndicated columnist, pundit, author and radio commentator.
