Let us count the ways:

A.  The Economics.

This list is well known by now – but that doesn’t mean it is highlighted by the Media as it would be of a Republican was president.

1. Unemployment at 9% for a historically long time.  According to Obama he inherited this mess and blames President Bush and ATMs.  Yes Obama believes automation, like ATMs, is to blame – as if such automations like automobiles (accounting for nearly 20% of our economy) and computers (creating employers like EBAY and Microsoft)  are the cause of our unemployment.  Beyond that, Obama joked that he was wrong about “shovel ready” projects, created the “Saved” jobs category out of thin air, and claimed that the stimulus bill would prevent unemployment from going above 8%.  What’s missing, of course, is a plan to lower unemployment – let alone actually lower unemployment.
2. Gas Prices.  They are currently 85% higher than when he took office.  He shut down our Gulf oil production for ideological not actual reasons and delayed a Canadian pipeline for political reasons.  When Bush 43 saw high gas prices, the Media told him to go his friends in the Middle East to ask them to raise production.  Since Obama wanted $5 gasoline all along, he has no plan to lower energy prices and the Media doesn’t harp on the issue.  Meanwhile the economy is hurt badly because of the higher costs of energy that reduce purchasing power and hurt employers everywhere.
3. Foreclosure/Home Mortgage Crisis.  This is the one part of the economy that actually is in a crisis that is “the worst since the Great Depression” – a phrase Obama is fond of overusing.  Obama has continued the policy of bailing out the Banks for foreclosure related losses, encouraged Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bailouts instead of reforming them and now he has sued the very Banks he bailed out because of their foreclosure practices – and no, there is no plan in sight let alone true relief.
4. The Deficit.  It has quadrupled under Obama.  Yet he says inherited it – and rather than change it, spending has actually gone up each of this 3 years.  Obama’s solution: have other people come up with a plan – he was traveling or on vacation. When it failed, he said he knew it would fail.  So Chris Christie rightfully asks:  What are we paying Obama for?

B.  Foreign Policy.

1. Missiles.  In his first year, Obama scrapped a missile system – thereby telling Poland that years of such work and friendship with the US are not all that important.  It also told many others the same thing.
2. Libya.  We are not at war – just facilitating war.  What was the national security principle at stake?  The Assassination principle?  How very Nobel.
3. Egypt.  For years Mubarak was a reliable partner that kept peace with Israel. He was kicked to the curb under Obama and Egypt has descended into chaos.
4. Israel.  I don’t quite know how much more you can disrespect an ally.  Obama, however, managed to get caught doing what we already suspected – bad mouthing an allied leader.  If that doesn’t make you wonder what other leaders think he is doing – this combined list should.
5. U.S. Image Abroad.  Remember when Obama said Bush ruined our image abroad?  Yet today effigies of Obama are hung or burned across the Middle East and Europe has lost faith.  Wouldn’t you think of Nobel Peace prize would buy you more credibility than that?

All of which brings us to the Presidential meter. Just how Presidential has he been?  I remember when Reagan would never take his jacket off in the Oval Office out of respect.  FDR has serious fireside chats.  Washington rode on a white horse.

As for Obama:

He just played golf with his friend who was busted in a prostitution sting.   How very Presidential.  We hear he did so out of loyalty.  Nice.

As for his other loyalties, he bought a house from a criminal to be, Tony Rezko.  Obama got a great deal to boot.  At least is suffering from a foreclosure crisis – and let us not forget that he had a proud terrorist, Bill Ayers, raise money for him.

With friends like that, it kind of makes you miss Bebe Rebozo doesn’t it?

Of course, we can’t forget the wonderful Reverend Wright – someone he was loyal enough to attend his “church” for 20 years but not loyal enough to really listen to him.

Obama doesn’t much listen to the American people either.  How else do you push ObamaCare down voters’ throats and wind up with 26 states suing and others all but nullifying the legislation?

All of which brings me to the final point:

Obama’s Miserable Consensus Building.

While some Presidents are known for courageous and tough stands that pay dividends in the years to come, most all of them are judged, at some level, by whether their coalition of supporters is larger after they take office then before.  We have already seen what the World has thought of Obama.  We know that, at home, his 2008 coalition is gone and it is not just because of the bad economy.

Obama has been picking fights with the American electorate from day one.  The Stimulus Bill cleaved off his Republican support and fostered the Tea Party – which he then vilified on the way to ObamaCare. In between, he tried to legislative enact Cap & Trade, lost and crammed that down America through the EPA. He wanted to “prosecute” 911 enemy combatants in a New York court room and yielded only when even liberal New York said no.

Since then, Obama has engaged in class warfare over taxes in such a way as to only convince Americans he missed economics class.

In the final analysis, of President’s seeking re-election, two basic questions are asked:

(1) Is the Country better off?   and,

(2) Have you brought the Country closer together?

In fact, Obama has not and, quite frankly, it hasn’t been pretty watching it either.

Keep in mind that the battle between those who create wealth and those that want to redistribute it, mainly politicians, is as old as civilization itself.  We read of tax battles and even reform in every age, like Urukagina’s tax reductions in Babylonia/Sumer in 2350 BC.  Equally venerable are the constant set of demagogic lies by those against tax cuts and simplification.  It is important to note that politicians like complicated tax codes and high tax rates because they control those rates and dispense the loopholes and regulations that complicate the tax code.  Tax simplification means they lose power.  As a result, resistance to tax reform is more often the rule than reform. As for the lies, they abound, so let’s consider just a few:

Lie # 1: Tax cuts cause deficits/Tax hikes balance the budget.  The Media and the Left often say that the Reagan and Bush tax cuts led to deficits while Clinton’s tax hikes led to a balanced budget. In truth, according to the IRS, federal tax revenues rose dramatically after the overall Reagan tax cuts/reforms (98%) and the Bush tax cuts (a record $700+ billion). This is just as they did after the Harding/Coolidge cuts (61% revenue increase) and after the Kennedy/Johnson cuts (62% revenue increase).  Those are the four major income tax reductions we have had since the inception of the income tax in 1913 and every time revenues rose after they were in place – every time.

So did the tax rate cut cause a deficit? The lie, of course, is to blame the revenue gathering mechanism (tax code/rate cut) instead of the revenue spending mechanism, i.e. Congress/Presidents.  The spenders kept spending – often at an accelerated rate when they saw the new revenues.  Thus, the fault for continuing deficits lies not with tax rate cuts, which produced higher revenues, but with politicians who spent too much.

Wasn’t there a surplus after the Clinton tax increase? Indeed there was – but only temporarily. First, it must be said that the economy had recovered from the short, Bush 41 tax-increase-induced recession by the end of his Presidency. It then resumed the Reagan recovery that was based on the dramatic reduction in tax rates a decade earlier.

Clinton then raised taxes on the recovering economy, and by the end of his 2nd term, we had the highest tax burden in American history considering federal, state and local taxes combined. To no surprise, we slipped back into a recession by the end of Clinton’s Presidency because of that record tax burden. As a result of the recession, federal expenditures went up (as welfare-related payments rose automatically) and tax revenues faltered along with the economy. The deficit reappeared, fulfilling John Maynard Keynes warning that “high tax rates defeat their own object” — to collect revenue. Thus, the Clinton tax hike temporarily gathered more revenue and, when combined with spending slowed by the Republican Congress, a surplus emerged. But over time, the Clinton tax hike weighed down the economy and reproduced deficits just like the Bush 41 tax increases that also weakened the economy and wound up doubling the deficit during his term.  To give Clinton credit for the surplus, but not the later deficit, is to credit a pitcher with 6 good innings of pitching and fail to report when he lost the game in 7th inning.

Lie #2: Tax revenues would have risen even without a tax cut.  This lie posits that tax rate cuts cost the government money because the revenues would have increased without the cuts as part of a natural business cycle uptick.  Nothing can be further from the truth.  First, as the current economy proves, recoveries are not automatic nor do they necessarily significantly increase employment and/or revenues.

Second, prior to the Reagan tax cuts, the 12 years of combined Nixon/Ford/Carter bad policies resulted in stagflation and tax revenues dropping at a rate of 2.8% per year.  By the end of Carter’s term, the economy was dreadful and showed no appreciable signs of a turnaround. Reagan then dramatically cut tax rates and reduced regulations.  The lie is to assert that the Reagan tax rate cuts had no influence on the economic turnaround that resulted in more employment, more business transactions and therefore more tax revenues.  In truth, without the Reagan tax cuts, especially given the Federal Reserve’s inflation fighting tactics at the time, the economy would not have magically turned around and produced 92 straight months of growth, let alone led the revenue growth. Claiming otherwise is just silly.

Want more proof? Consider the tax rate cuts that produced the Roaring 20’s.  By 1917, just over three years after the income tax code was instituted with a top rate of 7%, Democrat Woodrow Wilson raised the top rate to 77%!  Not surprisingly, we were in a deep recession by 1918.  During the 1920’s, however, the economy turned around and after the tax rate reduction to a top rate of 25%, revenues jumped 61%. So, did the Roaring 20’s just happen to occur or did the tax cuts cause them? The tax rate cuts reversed a dynamic of capital being placed in tax-free government bonds and encouraged capitalists to put their money at risk.  As a result, people were employed, more business transactions occurred and – of course – tax revenues rose.  That changing dynamic would not have magically occurred without the tax reductions.

In sum, tax rate reductions produce more revenue over time because they provide incentives, which result in more business transactions, more income and more sales tax.  It worked in 2350 BC and it will work again once Obama is defeated.  On the other hand, tax hikes produce less revenue over time, because they reduce incentives and weigh down economies.

Lie #3:  Tax cuts  don’t lead to economic growth.  The four major tax cuts (Harding/Coolidge, Kennedy/Johnson, Reagan, and Bush 43) all were followed by economic growth.  The Harding/Coolidge cuts were followed by The Roaring 20’s, the Kennedy/Johnson cuts were followed by three years of growth averaging over 6%, and the Reagan cuts were followed by 92 straight months of economic growth. The Bush tax cuts were followed by 52 straight months of job growth.  Was that all just a mere coincidence?  Given that tax reductions were the only major policy changes shared by those times, the answer is no. Tax rate cuts do lead to economic growth.  Not only that, according to IRS figures, after each of those major tax cuts, the top earners paid a greater percentage of income taxes not less.

Lie #4: The rich don’t pay their fair share.  This is the rallying cry of those who want to raise tax rates.  According to the IRS, however, the top 1% pays nearly 37% of all income taxes.   The bottom 50% pays just over 2% of all income taxes.  For those that claim that is not a fair share, I submit to you that no percentage would be fair.  By using the “fair” card, they are seeking a rhetorical advantage and that will continue to be effective unless these lies are rebutted.

Lie #5:  The Bush tax cuts led to a bad economy in 2008.  It is true that there was a bad economy in 2008, something that occurred 5 years after the Bush tax cut.  So does that mean that those tax cuts caused the bad economy?  Certainly not. The main cause related to government distortion of the housing market combined with bad business practices and mistakes by the Federal Reserve.  There is no plausible economic theory as to how lowering tax rates across the board by a few percentages points (and removing millions from the tax rolls) led to the Wall Street/housing problems 5 years later.  In other words, it’s just a lie.

Lie #6:  The current American tax burden is lower.  That statement is partially wrong and used to demand higher taxes on the rich.  It is true that the federal tax burden has dropped to an abnormally low 14%. It generally is closer to 18%.  The biggest cause for that drop, however, is the prolonged and deep recession.  When a nation has considerably less income for such a prolonged period, tax burdens tend to drop because they are paying fewer taxes then when they had higher income.  Lower incomes leading to lower tax burdens is hardly something to crow about.  Beyond that, the current 14% refers to federal taxes and that number fails to take into account the massive growth in non-federal income taxes such state and local taxes.  Those non-federal taxes have replaced the federal burden.  So, the next time you hear that the top federal income tax rate is lower than in 1950 (true) – tell that person we didn’t have gas taxes, cell phone taxes, cable taxes, cigarette taxes in 1950.  When they say the tax burden is lower than before, tell them it came at the expense of a lower standard of living and that the way to raise tax revenues is to create a vibrant economy.

One last tidbit for your bushel of truths:

The last 8 Presidential winners were the perceived tax-cutting candidate.

1. Reagan over Carter,

2. Reagan over Mondale – who threatened to raise taxes,

3. Bush 41 (read my lips) over Dukakis,

4. Clinton (middle class tax cut) over Bush (who broke his pledge),

5. Clinton (promised to do it again even though he raised taxes) over Dole (who refused to take the No New Tax Pledge and made a career of brokering tax deals as the Republican Senate leader – and whose reputation overrode his tax plan which came too late in the game),

6. Bush 43 over Al Gore (who called tax cuts a risky scheme),

7. Bush 43 (who cut taxes) over Kerry,

8. Obama (promised to cut taxes for 95% of Americans) versus McCain who didn’t believe in the Bush tax cuts.

Knowing all of that, will the 2012 Republican nominee support tax cuts against the tax-raising Obama?  It seems likely if this discussion of tax code simplification continues.  To get it enacted, however, that nominee has to be able to make the case for tax cuts and expose the lies.  Not just in passing, but with all the passion of a true reformer.

Around the country, the numbers all point to Obama losing in next year’s Presidential election.  Generic Republicans beat him in polling match ups.  Following Democrats’ loss of the House last year, Republicans just won a special election for a seat in New York that they haven’t held since 1923.  Perhaps the most telling number, unemployment is above 9% (with no real improvement in sight) and no President has won re-election with unemployment above 8%.

In California, however, a majority of voters have stood by Obama.  For most of this year, a strong majority of voters approved of Obama’s job performance.  Now suddenly, Obama’s ratings took a sharp turn for the worse and, for the first time, less than a majority of voters in California approve of his job performance – just 46% to be specific.

Given that the economy has not changed much over the last year, the question could be asked:  Why have California voters suddenly turned on Obama?

First, the economy has been stagnant for a long time and it is wearing more and more on voters.  Prosperity is usually the number one issue in presidential politics.  Most Americans and even Californians now accept that none of Obama’s much-heralded programs have improved people’s fortunes.  Worse yet, they don’t have much confidence in the future as reflected by low consumer confidence numbers.

The recent turn, however, reflects three things:  (1) months of Obama blaming others; (2) months of Obama looking indecisive; and (3) the fact that Obama is out of ideas.

It is well chronicled how Obama has blamed everything from tsunamis to Congress for the nation’s economic troubles.   That may work for a year or two, but after three years it starts to fall flat and doesn’t look Presidential.

Recently, Obama was marginalized during the debt ceiling debate.  He never gave a proposal of his own and let others lead on the issue. Americans expect more from a President.

After an unsatisfactory end to the debate, Obama then held a huge birthday party for himself.  Not long after that, Obama went on vacation and told the country that his next speech on a job’s plan would have to wait for his vacation at Martha’s Vineyard to be over – as if their economic condition was secondary to his comfort.

As for his plan?  There was nothing particularly new – and people needed to see something new.

In the final analysis, the buck stops with the President on the economy. It IS his pay grade.  Blaming others may be expedient, but for the unemployed it is unpersuasive after three years and will be continue to be on Election Day.

In California, where rationality doesn’t always win out, we are facing record poverty levels.  Homeowners have lost close to $2 trillion in homeowner equity in the last 4 years.  Like the rest of the Country, Californians want answers.  They want a roadmap to the future.   The latest polling also shows, like the rest of the nation, they are also starting to demand accountability from Obama.

Our so-called brilliant, Nobel Prize-winning President, for months, has exhorted American businesses to hire employees and invest – as if wishing for an economic recovery would make it so.  Recently, however, Democrat and mega-businessman Steve Wynn told the country – and Obama, if he was listening – why cash rich business is not hiring and investing.  According to Wynn, “this administration is the greatest wet blanket to business, and progress and job creation in my lifetime . . . those of us who have business opportunities and the capital to do it are going to sit in fear of the President . . .”

President Calvin Coolidge used to say, “The chief business of the American people is business.”  Even so, business doesn’t invest just for fun – they invest for profit – and they don’t invest if they think the risk of not making an acceptable profit is too high.  I wrote “acceptable” because business weighs the fact that even if they make money, it will be taxed.  As such, a business must decide not only if it will be able to make a profit, but will the profit be so much that it would be worth the trouble/risk after taking taxes into consideration.  Keep in mind business knows that it carries all of the downside risk and that government will take a good portion of any upside.  If at some point the risk gets too high, business investment and spending is stalled.

Today, Steve Wynn, and much of American business, believes that the risk of not making a decent profit is too high for several reasons.  For instance, business doesn’t see sufficient consumer demand – so they don’t stock their shelves or expand production as they otherwise might.  Regulations and the threat of more regulations are so high that they hold back money to pay for future costs.  Taxes and the threat of higher taxes are also high – and that too causes business to hold back spending in order to pay those future taxes.  As a result, business investment and spending is stalled.

All of which brings us to the early 1920’s.  Back then government created unacceptable risk because it was taking too much of the upside.  Democrats under Woodrow Wilson instituted the income tax in 1913 with a top rate of 7%.  Just over 3 years later it was 77%.  In other words, the federal government was telling Capitalists, “You risk the downside and, if you are lucky enough to make money, on that last, top dollar, we will take 77%.”  Not surprisingly, by 1918, we were in a deep recession because of a reduction in war spending and the high tax rates.  By the early 1920’s, poor consumer demand and high tax rates caused investors to believe that there was too much risk for them to spend or invest very much.

So what did they do with their money?  They parked huge amounts of it in tax-free, risk free, government bonds.  Incredibly, rather than risk their money, the rich were being paid tax-free interest by the government.  Also not surprisingly, government revenues lagged because business transactions and profits had been greatly reduced by the high tax rates.

Treasury Secretary and Republican Andrew Mellon saw all of that.  It confirmed what he knew; namely that the “history of taxation shows that taxes which are inherently excessive are not paid. The high rates inevitably put pressure upon the taxpayer to withdraw his capital from productive business.”

Mellon and his President, Calvin Coolidge, wanted the rich and business to take risks again.  To get them to do that, Mellon knew that the risks had to be reduced enough to jump start investment – and like a boulder at rest, Mellon knew it would take a big push to get the investment ball rolling.  To do that, they had government lower income tax rates to 25%.

With that, the rich and business decided that, while it wasn’t normally worth taking risks during a recession with those high tax rates, the new rate was sufficiently low enough to take a risk. They believed that they had the opportunity to keep a sufficient amount of the profits they might make.  Sure enough, they took risks, they invested and the Roaring 20’s ensued. The subsequent surge in risk-taking created the greatest period of innovation in American history and federal government revenues jumped over 60% because profits soared.

Today, the risk is too high for American business and the rich.  They have withdrawn their productive capital from the market place. Government spending, as the failed stimulus bill proves, only increases risk because it is temporary and leads to demands for higher taxes.

The only thing government can do is to truly change today’s psychology of risk.  The ONLY way to do that is to lower the costs of regulations and the rate of taxes – not temporarily and not just a little – but as far as the eye can see and substantially.  They must do it enough to convince business to take risks again – just like Coolidge and Mellon did in the early 1920’s.

For those that have been following, it turns out that certain bonus income of money managers is taxed at a 15% rate (like dividends) instead of potentially 35% (like ordinary income).  The tax laws allow for that lower rate if they hold onto the bonuses for a certain period of time.  Non-Real World politicians and economists are crying foul – asserting it is unfair they get that break – and claiming that as much as $20.7 billion could be collected if that loophole is done away with.

Such is the state of “good enough for government” thinking.

You see, Non-Real World politicians and economists see the world like a calculator: change a tax rate and collections rise.  In the Real World, human behavior adjusts to laws that change – sometimes dramatically so when it involves taxes. Just ask American Founder and Supreme Court Justice John Marshall who stated that “the power to tax involves the power to destroy.”

Take the 1920’s for instance.  The Democrats had increased the top marginal tax rate to over 70%. That increase greatly diminished or nearly “destroyed” incentives for individuals.  Indeed, Secretary of the Treasury Andrew W. Mellon noticed that rather than taking risks with their capital, capitalists were parking their money in tax-free government bonds.

Mellon argued that it was silly for government to pay capitalists tax-free interest on money that should be working.  According to Mellon: “The history of taxation shows that taxes which are inherently excessive are not paid. The high rates inevitably put pressure upon the taxpayer to withdraw his capital from productive business.”

Mellon advocated lowering the top tax rate to 25% so that capitalists would put their money at risk, make money and pay taxes instead of the government paying risk-free and tax-free interest to capitalists.  History knows that those tax cuts worked, and despite lowering rates from over 70% to 25%, revenues jumped over 60% in the low-inflation Roaring 20’s.

Turning back to the money managers, if they woke up tomorrow to news that the law changed and those bonuses would be treated as ordinary income, those very smart people who are making that money would not just sit pat and hand over the money to the Feds.  Instead, they would change the manner in which they conduct business to avoid the higher tax.  They would do so by creating numerous corporations or LLCs, granting ownership interests, and distributing the income as dividends instead of bonuses.  By doing so, they would be changing their behavior to avoid paying taxes – easy as pie.

As a business start-up attorney who has worked with countless accountants over 24 years, I can tell you that business people are consumed with making decisions based on tax implications, not business reasons.  Indeed, I often tell them that once we learn from the accountant the tax consequences of their proposed transaction, i.e. the best way to pay the least taxes, I will provide them the legal framework for that transaction.  That happens every day across this country countless times.

It is a maxim of history that the more complicated the laws, the more it benefits the rich and powerful because they can afford to hire someone to figure it out. The non-rich don’t have that luxury. Rather than encourage that, and to discourage decisions based on taxes instead of sound business reasons, the tax code should be dramatically reduced, deductions eliminated en masse and low flat rates enacted for individuals and corporations.

When Communist China has lower tax rates that the US (and higher growth rates), the real world should start to creep into our policymaking.  Searching for fool’s gold in the form of taxing bonuses won’t cut it and demonstrates just how out-of-touch with reality our government is.

In April of 2010, the Federal Reserve Chairman said the economy had “staying power.” In August of 2010, Bernanke said, “The economy remains vulnerable to unexpected developments.”  Early last month he stated: “U.S. economic growth so far this year looks to have been somewhat slower than expected.”  Later in the month, he let us know that “We don’t have a precise read on why this slower pace of growth is persisting.”

On the other hand, we hear stories of banks and corporations flush with cash.  For his part, Obama appears focused on luxurious corporate jets and the Left tells us (falsely) that taxes are at the lowest they have been in 50 years.

So why is the economy underperforming to their great confusion or surprise?

There are many reasons – but one central one.  First, among the many reasons, are businesses’ fears of the costs of doing business in the future, including the costs of Obamacare. Adding to those fears are the costs of regulations (Obama’s and state regulators) and, of course, higher taxes.  Also among the many reasons are the national debt and the debt of our states.  Those amounts are so far past rationality and are paired with future entitlement requirements that are way beyond unsustainable.  Combined, they produce economic fear, which translates quickly into economic caution which equals less economic activity.

No one is more fearful, however, than the average American consumer. The broader unemployment index is above 16%.  The more narrow measure has hovered around or above 9% for a record period of time – years in fact.  That takes a heavy toll on an economy based on consumers – a 70% consumer economy at that.

Reading from the 2009 Consumer Expenditure Survey, by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, we find that:

Spending on housing and transportation fell 1.3 percent and 11.0 percent, respectively, contributing to the overall drop in spending in 2009. Healthcare expenditures rose 5.0 percent, the only increase among the major components of spending. Among the other major components, food dropped 1.1 percent, apparel fell 4.2 percent, entertainment dropped 5.0 percent, and personal insurance and pensions fell 2.4 percent.

Get the picture?  Discretionary spending plummeted while healthcare, never a desired expenditure, took a bigger bite out of people’s budgets.  Since then, consumer spending has been as inconsistent as the economy or, more accurately, the inconsistent consumer spending has produced an inconsistent economy.  Historically high unemployment will do that sort of thing.  So too will the $6 trillion loss in homeowner equity over the last 5 years.

In plain truth, the American consumers, the focal point of our economy, do not have the money or savings or wealth they had before. They have much less and cannot sustain our economy right now let alone afford to bailout government.  They are fearful – as consumer confidence surveys confirm – including a two-year low recorded, on July, 14, 2011, by Rasmussen for their Consumer Index .  Threats of tax hikes, Obamacare, debt and the like, i.e. more government, only make matters worse.

The only thing that will help is if they have confidence that tomorrow will be better for them economically than today. Government programs simply can’t provide that; they never have – and that shouldn’t be confusing to anyone.

As the newly elected Republican Party Chairman of California, agreeing with Nancy Pelosi on anything is hardly something I could have imagined.  Recently though, she suggested “that elections shouldn’t matter as much as they do.”  I agree with that statement – they shouldn’t – and our Founders would have too – but not for the reason Nancy Pelosi offers.

Pelosi was decrying the influence of the Tea on the Republican Party – an influence she thinks is too partisan.  She wants the Republican Party to be less partisan, i.e. more like the Democrats when it comes to spending.  According to Pelosi’s thinking, if Republicans were less conservative and went along with Democrats, Republicans and Democrats would be more alike – and elections wouldn’t matter as much as they do.

In believing that, Pelosi could not be more wrong. It is the monolithic and growing size of government that causes intense polarization, raises the stakes of politics and makes elections matter so very much.

Keep in mind that politics is the competition for and division of power.  As government grows, so too does the realm of politics over the economy and peoples’ fortunes.  In that same vein, as government grows, the number of those receiving government benefits, whether by employment or the dole, grows along with the cost of government.

Whether in Diocletion’s Rome or America today, as the amount of those dependent on government reaches an unfortunate equality with those funding government, political competition peaks and division becomes commonplace.  That is so because, throughout history, democratic governments descend into a process by which an elected few, often for their own political gain, redistribute the earnings of one societal group for the benefit of another.

That dynamic, more often than not cast in compulsory terms, can’t help but be divisive.  As that chasm of envy and resentment grows, and it has throughout all of history, ever-greater partisanship is sure to follow and elections become all the more important.

Our Founders understood that dynamic and wanted none of it.  Keep in mind that they fought against a powerful government and the notion government should rule our lives.   They also knew, as studied as they were, that the Utopian chase of a better life through government fiat was not only illusory but necessarily fracturing.

In part, that is why Washington initially eschewed party affiliation – hoping that Americans would unify behind our experiment in freedom not wrangle over partisan government.  Within that unity, elections would matter much less.  By intending to set up a limited government, of enumerated powers, they sought to limit political competition and compulsory envy.  In other words, and ultimately, they didn’t want elections to matter so much because they never wanted government to matter so much.

Now that it does, and because the likes of Nancy Pelosi advocate for even more government, elections that seem to matter ever more can’t help but follow.