Vulgar Conservatism

If you ever venture around the LeftLibertarian Yahoo Group, or read much from the left libertarian blogsphere, you'll notice a term we use quite often - "vulgar libertarianism".

Vulgar Libertarianism is a term coined by Kevin Carson and it refers to those who use libertarian words and ideas to promote or excuse definitely unlibertarian actions. The Cato Institute and the American Enterprise Institute are examples - they say they promote free markets and enterprise, but have no qualms with government bailouts or the enforcement of laws and regulations designed to favour certain companies or industries to the detriment of others. (Update: To be fair in this instance, the Cato Institute is against the bailout. However, they have been known to indulge in vulgar libertarian at other times, which is why they are included in this.)

For all their talk, these people aren't libertarians, but economic fascists who merely want the state to work for their enrichment and benefit, rather than removing state barriers and enhancing liberty.

With the current meltdown in the US economy affecting our election, we are witnessing the rise of what I call Vulgar Conservatism. That is, the use, by the Conservative Party and their supporters, of the myth that the CPC is a party of small government and free markets. Even some Conservatives I respect and that are normally quite intelligent, are repeating this talking point.

The most obvious example is the idea that only Harper and the CPC are fiscally conservative and responsible to ride out tough economic times. And while Harper talks that way, he and Jim Flaherty act different. As Andrew Coyne pointed out a year-and-a-half ago:

The budget maintains, notwithstanding a $25-billion increase in spending over two years, that the government is showing unwavering fiscal discipline. How? Because it has kept the growth in spending to no more than the growth in the economy, “on average.”

Now, people like me would argue the percent-of-GDP measure is misleading: it implies that, so long as spending has not grown faster than the economy, it has not grown at all. But I suppose that’s within the bounds of acceptable political chicanery.

Or would be, if in fact spending had grown slower than the economy. But, again, the budget’s own figures show that it hasn’t. Program spending was 12.8% of GDP in fiscal 2006, 13.1% in 2007, and will be 13.3% in 2008.

How, then, do the Tories maintain that spending has grown no faster than the economy, even “on average?” By including in the average fiscal 2006, a year in which nominal spending actually declined slightly (though only after a nearly 15% gain the previous year). Just one problem: the Liberals were in power in fiscal 2006, or all but the last two months of it. The Tories are claiming credit for Liberal “restraint.”

Or, as he put it a few days earlier:

"With this budget -- including another 6% increase in spending, on top of last year’s 8% blowout -- Jim Flaherty officially becomes the biggest spending finance minister in the history of Canada.

It’s true. The $200-billion in program spending Mr. Flaherty has budgeted for this year works out to about $5,800 for every man, woman and child in Canada. Even adjusting for inflation and increases in population, that’s more than Paul Martin spent in his frantic last hours. It is more than the Mulroney government spent in its last days. It is more than the Trudeau government spent in the depths of the early 1980s recession. All of these past benchmarks of out-of-control spending must now be retired. Jim Flaherty has outdone them all."[emphasis mine]

That is "vulgar conservatism". Say you are for fiscal responsibility and restraint and act completely the opposite. His assessment of the 2008 Flaherty budget wasn't much better.

This is fiscal conservatism, apparently - outspending Paul Martin, Brian Mulroney and Pierre Trudeau at their worst, while cutting taxes (or claiming to). I was under the impression fiscal conservatism was about reducing taxes and spending, keeping the books balanced and getting government "out of the way".

Then this same Prime Minister and Conservative Party claim that it is the opposition that will drive the country into deficit and only they can keep us afloat. Even after their actual record while in office and even after their own "orgy of pre-election spending", amounting to $8.8 billion or $94 million per day. And after years of massive surpluses under the Liberals, it was the Conservatives that sunk into deficit this spring for a few months. It is the Conservatives that cut $45 million in arts funding under the guise of fiscal prudence while maintaining $1.5 billion in subsidies to the most profitable industry on the planet, oil and gas.

Reminds me of when Jim Flaherty was the Finance Minister in Ontario under Harris and Eaves and drove us into deficit, while telling us we were in surplus. Deja vu?

This is nothing compared to the very idea that someone can be a small-government fiscal conservative on one hand, while demanding the state intervene in private matters such as marriage or abortion on the other. They wish to move the state out of the boardroom and into the bedroom.

Now that is a lot of things - populist, authoritarian, reactionary - but it is not "conservative". It is a repeat of both Reagan and Bush, where promises of small government and fiscal prudence gave way to growth in government and massive debt and deficit.

Right now, no party is fiscally conservative and no party has sensible plans to manage government finances well. But only the Conservative Party is trying to tell you that they are the "natural fiscal responsibility party" when they are not.

Ask your self this - if you suddenly found yourself in a lower paying job, with less income than last year or the year before, would you opt to spend more money or less? Seems Stephen Harper would spend more, but have you stop buying one coffee a day and call it fiscal conservatism and think that will get you through the hard times.

That is vulgar conservatism and that is what the Conservative Party is.

The Principles of Fundemental Justice

This is a phrase that no Conservative or their supporters understands, it seems. It was based on this part of our protections under Section 7 of the Charter that the Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional the reverse onus clause of the Youth Criminal Justice Act (formerly the YOA).

The decision states that provisions of the act requiring youths convicted of serious crimes to prove to the courts that they should not be treated as adults for sentencing, that they should, in fact, be treated as youths, is unconstitutional and violates the rights of due process of the Charter.

Its a good decision and very straightforward. It means that if the Crown wants to sentence a 14 - 17 year old to an adult sentence, they need to prove they deserve this sentence. Just as they need to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the teen committed the crime in question, including the mens rea (literally, 'guilty mind' or intent) of the crime. This has been a requirement of our criminal justice system since at least the Magna Carta.

But, if you read the comments section on the CBC link above, you can see conservative hand wringing, pearl clutching and ignorant anger on display:

" kids know they can get away with murder."

"The 'Supreme' Court has, once again, through their decisions declared open-season on the law-abiding citizens of this country."

"Time to bring back corporal punishment."


You get the idea - more slack-jawed yammering from ignorant troglodytes who, curiously, have no problem at all treating teens differently and NOT like adults, when it comes to say, driving a car, buying a drink or having sex with the partner of their choice. Funny that.

Nothing in the ruling says that a teen who commits a serious crime can't be tried or sentenced as an adult, it merely states that the Crown must prove that they are mature enough to be held as culpable as an adult, rather than the defendant prove they are not (since, technically, its impossible to prove a negative). Indeed, I would posit that this ruling forces the courts to treat youthful offenders in the same manner they treat adults - that is, it is up to the Crown to prove all aspects of the case, including the appropriate sentence, rather than assuming the defendant must prove they are NOT worthy of a sentence, just as they do with adults.

The logic of the law, before the Supreme Court decision today, was this:

"Teens are mature enough to make moral decisions regarding criminal acts and therefore they must prove to the court that they are NOT capable of making those decisions, so we should treat them differently in regards to charging and sentencing"

Now lets apply the very same reverse onus logic to the way we treat teens in other aspects of life and law:

"Teens are mature enough to make moral decisions regarding sexual acts and therefore they must prove to the court that they are NOT capable of making those decisions so we should treat them differently in regards to the age of consent"

"Teens are mature enough to make moral decisions regarding drinking and therefore they must prove to the court that they are NOT capable of making those decisions so we should treat them differently in regards to buying and consuming alcohol"

"Teens are mature enough to make moral decisions regarding voting and therefore they must prove to the court that they are NOT capable of making those decisions so we should treat them differently in regards to the enfranchisement"

I don't think there is a Conservative or conservative out there that would agree with any of those. It takes some kind of cognitive dissonance to think its ok to apply that logic to crime.

The ruling recognizes that we treat teens different, because they are different. They are not adults, nor are they children with no culpability. And if the Crown wants to treat them as adults, because a particular teen offender is mature enough, they ought to be forced to prove why they should, on a case by case basis, in a court (which, incidentally, was an integral part of the original YOA in 1984 and was not changed until this reverse onus was brought in - by the Liberals). Even kids are innocent until proven guilty and the sentence should fit both the crime and the offender.

Considering our crime rate is at a 30-year low, including youth crime, I'd say most of this hand-wringing by Conservatives over this is out of proportion with reality. But since when have they used reality for the basis of their dogma?

Once again, the Conservatives are wrong.

Your 'Liberal Media'...

The following is a letter I wrote to the Ottawa Citizen, which I do not expect to be published. I submit it here, for what it is worth:

I'd like to thank Margret Kopala*, CanWest columnist, for demonstrating, once again, the angry, moralizing, mean-spirited ignorance that passes for "conservatism" in this country today. Her latest diatribe against Insite was long on narrow minded ideology and emotional appeals to tragedy but short on actual facts and logical arguments.

Firstly Insite works at what it is supposed to do - reduce the harm to junkies but giving them a clean and safe place to inject. This prevents them from contracting major medical conditions like Hepatitis, HIV and other infections which they can then spread and burden our already over extended medical system with. Insite also gives them a place to have safe encounters with medical practitioners and addictions counselors, resources that are sorely lacking in the back alleys and flop houses of Vancouver's East end.

Kapala seems to be under the mistaken belief that Insite encourages drug use and abuse. What nonsense. IV drug users that use Insite are going to be shooting up anyway, either at Insite or the aforementioned alleys and flophouses. Kapala seems to think that they should not have safety or contact with addictions counselors, but must be punished and made to live miserably in order for them to be "encouraged" give up their ways. Funny, if that were true, considering the horrible conditions of life a junky currently lives and that Kapala herself described, it would have worked by now, wouldn't it?

She then goes on to praise the Conservative government's latest "War on Drugs" legislation and quotes some specious stats about marijuana usage among Canadian youth (the same demographic that scored 3,4,and 5 in the world, respectively, in Math Science and reading according to the latest OECD report). Again, "conservatism" has forgotten basic economics.

Demand drives supply, but supply rarely drives demand. When a supply of something is restricted but demand remains the same, the price goes up. Restricting supply never reduces demand. Conservatives seem to know this when talking about alcohol, cigarettes or any other commodity, but completely forget this when talking about "drugs" .

Based on these economic truisms, it is the act of prohibiting drugs that has created the very crime and socials issues Kapala and other conservatives say they want to battle. With a restricted supply and a high price, the profit incentive attracts those willing to supply and illegal commodity - street gangs, Hell's Angels, Montreal Mafia - while the smaller, more honest producers are driven from the market. Add to this the inability for business conflicts to be resolved in socially acceptable fashions such as using the police or the courts or even simple insurance, then violence and other less socially acceptable means are used.

The high price of illegal drugs that attracts the unscrupulous criminal element also means that users and addicts need more and more of their money to support their habit. they must turn to crime such as fraud, robbery, or degrading street prostitution and even drug dealing to support their habits.

That is the result of currently having drugs illegal. Getting tougher will only make it worse, not better and further drive the profits of the organized crime that runs the trade. Kopala and her ilk are the Hell's Angels best friends.

Imagine if a person with a drug habit could easily support that habit by working even a minimum wage job, because the price was so low? Imagine that the LA Crypts or the Hell's Angels aren't involved because there's no profit, because the price is so low? The addicts can merely seeks help, as an alcoholic would do today. Imagine all the money now spent to fight the "drug war" was spent to just treat addicts and do drug education to reduce demand?

If Kopala and the Harper government get their way, we will have more disease and addicts, more crime to support dug habits and more profits to the organized crime. Is that what we want? I know i don't.

I want drug abuse treated as a medical problem not a criminal one, so the police can concentrate on catching real criminals - like guys who run pig farms and murder people - rather than wasting time on hapless victims of addiction.

*Unfortunately, Kopala's screed from Saturday's Citizen is not online. Readers of the Ottawa dead tree edition will know of the half-page screed in the Editorial section I am referring to. I can only hope Dan Gardiner takes her to the woodshed next week.