I think we all are Kari. Great post on a great American.

Excellent post, Kari.

One tribute said Kemp was incapable of making enemies or holding a grudge, another said that he viewed everyone he met as either a convert or a potential convert. Kemp was someone I always liked even though I wanted to argue his issue positions.

Someone said he was the flip side of Hubert Humphrey--truly a "happy warrior".

This should be a lesson to all who run for office in 2010. Kemp wasn't one of those who followed the advice of consultants and said things like "negative campaigns work". He was an eternal optimist (one reporter said he may have been the only person to believe he would be elected VP) and ideas were important to him.

If Democrats have a 2010 optimistic candidate who views voters and activists as people to befriend and discuss ideas with rather than someone to browbeat with ideology or paid media, it is hard to see how they could lose.

If, by some miracle, Republicans were to find an optimistic, idea-oriented candidate for Gov. who wanted to make friends of everyone (rather than browbeat them or use attack ads as a strategy) and debate ideas like a 21st century Tom McCall, while the Democratic candidate let consultants make all the decisions because paid media is really more important than serious issue debates, Democrats could have a fight on their hands.

Same if there were a well organized 3td party candidate.

Kemp was one of a kind, in the same way former Gov. Barbara Roberts is and Frank Roberts was. One might call them people with true grit (The movie True Grit was filmed in Colorado, but the sequel was filmed in Oregon--Deschutes County and along the Rogue River.) We could use more people like that in public life, regardless of party.

I was hoping someone would do a post like this. Once when I was a banquet waiter, Jack Kemp came to Portland and I worked the party. It was right after the Super Bowl and he had just come from watching it in person. I believe it was the Steelers and Dallas with Neil O'Donnell as QB but that's memory.

 What I do remember is he hung around after the gig and I, along with a couple other waiters, got a chance to break the game down with him - and here he had been an actual pro quarterback. That was a fun shift. He was tremendously passionate about football as you can imagine.

My impressions were that he was 100% genuine and decent. He also had the coolest gruff voice.

 My condolences to his family.

Air Jordan 2

I don't often find myself wanting to be complimentary about one of your posts ;-) ...but today I think I'd be remiss if I didn't say you've done a fine job of writing about Kemp. I enjoyed the post through out.

I do, of course, think you're wrong about him being the last great conservative - along with the coordinate implication that no other conservative thinkers today share his belief that "we the people," or the government, should be looking out for those of our citizens in the margins or "shadows."

Regardless, a fine post about a man I too admired.

Best regards, S

"it was a fight between conservatives like Jack Kemp and conservatives like Tom DeLay and Rush Limbaugh."

Another way of putting it is that it was a fight between the Northern and Southern wings of the Republican Party, and the Southern wing won. The Republicans struck a Faustian bargain with racism, ignorance and religious intolerance in order to make the South turn away from the Democratic Party. It worked for a while, but ultimately it destroyed the Republican Party and damn near destroyed the country.

From: Jack Kemp Partners

A Letter to my Grandchildren

November 12, 2008

Dear Kemp grandchildren -- all 17 of you, spread out from the East Coast to the West Coast, and from Wheaton College in Illinois, to Wake Forest University in North Carolina:

My first thought last week upon learning that a 47-year-old African-American Democrat had won the presidency was, "Is this a great country or not?"

You may have expected your grandfather to be disappointed that his friend John McCain lost (and I was), but there's a difference between disappointment over a lost election and the historical perspective of a monumental event in the life of our nation.

Let me explain. First of all, the election was free, fair and transformational, in terms of our democracy and given the history of race relations in our nation.

What do I mean?

Just think, a little over 40 years ago, blacks in America had trouble even voting in our country, much less thinking about running for the highest office in the land.

A little over 40 years ago, in some parts of America, blacks couldn't eat, sleep or even get a drink of water using facilities available to everyone else in the public sphere.

We are celebrating, this year, the 40th anniversary of our Fair Housing Laws, which helped put an end to the blatant racism and prejudice against blacks in rental housing and homeownership opportunities.

As an old professional football quarterback, in my days there were no black coaches, no black quarterbacks, and certainly no blacks in the front offices of football and other professional sports. For the record, there were great black quarterbacks and coaches -- they just weren't given the opportunity to showcase their talent. And pro-football (and America) was the worse off for it.

I remember quarterbacking the old San Diego Chargers and playing for the AFL championship in Houston. My father sat on the 50-yard line, while my co-captain's father, who happened to be black, had to sit in a small, roped-off section of the end zone. Today, we can't imagine the NFL without the amazing contributions of blacks at every level of this great enterprise.

I could go on and on, but just imagine that in the face of all these indignities and deprivations, Dr. Martin Luther King could say 44 years ago, "I have an abiding faith in America and an audacious faith in mankind." He described his vision for America, even as he and his people were being denied their God-given human rights guaranteed under our Constitution.

You see, real leadership is not just seeing the realities of what we are temporarily faced with, but seeing the possibilities and potential that can be realized by lifting up peoples' vision of what they can be.

When President-elect Obama quoted Abraham Lincoln on the night of his election, he was acknowledging the transcendent qualities of vision and leadership that are always present, but often overlooked and neglected by pettiness, partisanship and petulance. As president, I believe Barack Obama can help lift us out of a narrow view of America into the ultimate vision of an America where, if you're born to be a mezzo-soprano or a master carpenter, nothing stands in your way of realizing your God-given potential.

Both Obama in his Chicago speech, and McCain in his marvelous concession speech, rose to this historic occasion by celebrating the things that unite us irrespective of our political party, our race or our socio-economic background.

My advice for you all is to understand that unity for our nation doesn't require uniformity or unanimity; it does require putting the good of our people ahead of what's good for mere political or personal advantage.

The party of Lincoln, (i.e., the GOP), needs to rethink and revisit its historic roots as a party of emancipation, liberation, civil rights and equality of opportunity for all. On the other hand, the party of Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy and now Obama must put forth an agenda that understands that getting American growing again will require both Keynesian and classical incentive-oriented (supply-side) economic ideas. But there's time for political and economic advice in a later column (or two).

Let me end with an equally great historical irony of this election. Next year, as Obama is sworn in as our 44th president, we will celebrate the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birth. I'm serving, along with former Rep. Bill Gray of Pennsylvania, on the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Board to help raise funds for this historic occasion. President-elect Obama's honoring of Lincoln in many of his speeches reminds us of how vital it is to elevate these ideas and ideals to our nation's consciousness and inculcate his principles at a time of such great challenges and even greater opportunities.

In fact, we kick off the Lincoln bicentennial celebration on Wednesday, Nov. 19, in Gettysburg, Pa. The great filmmaker Ken Burns will speak at the Soldier's National Cemetery on the 145th anniversary of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. On Thursday, Nov. 20, at Gettysburg College, we will have the first of 10 town hall forums, titled "Race, Freedom and Equality of Opportunity." I have the high honor of joining Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., Professor Allen Guezlo and Norman Bristol-Colon on the panel, with Professor Charles Branham as the moderator.

President-elect Obama talks of Abraham Lincoln's view of our nation as an "unfinished work." Well, isn't that equally true of all of us? Therefore let all of us strive to help him be a successful president, so as to help make America an even greater nation.

Nice post, Kari. I hope Kemp's family sees it.

It always surprises me how many Democratic activists/staff in our generation were once young Republicans, and I was one of them. I suppose it was because Reagan projected a great image and, on TV, SEEMED like a much better candidate/leader than, say Carter or Mondale. Living at home with Republican parents was an influence, too

When I was a sophomore in '87/'88, I sometimes wore a Kemp for President button. He seemed like a cool candidate, a Kennedyesque candidate, and a candidate who could appeal to young voters. As I recall, in the early stages of that cycle, many thought he would be Vice President Bush's strongest opponent. As a Congressman, though, albeit a well fairly well known one, he didn't have the name ID and position of power that Bush or Senator Bob Dole did, and wasn't able to break out of the pack. Pat Robertson cut into Kemp's base, too. Kemp still remained one of the most popular and appealing Republicans after he dropped out.

Kemp's passion for Civil Rights was real. He stuck his neck out politically as one of the few Republicans to oppose Prop 187, the 1994 anti Immigration initiative in CA.

Thanks for a great post (notwithstanding your views on conservatives and the GOP). The first time I ever lost my voice screaming at a political rally it was for Jack Kemp's presidential campaign. When Dole and Kemp arrived in San Diego in 1996 for the GOP convention, the assembled crowd (in a park, they arrived by boat) was clearly chanting KEMP Dole KEMP Dole KEMP Dole. I'll never forget it.

Grant Schott:

Kemp's passion for Civil Rights was real.

Bob T:

Yes, and it included the right to make an honest living (like being a casket dealer despite state regulations protecting a good ol' boy system, as mentioned in earlier posts) and was not dominated by welfare and group rights. That's the difference. Because Reagan chose GHW Bush as his running mate instead of Kemp (leading to three Bush terms out of the last five), the Repubs failed to get anywhere on that one because they didn't think they needed to.

Bob Tiernan Portland

Well put, Kari.

As a newspaper reporter I interviewed Kemp in '80 or so, and what interested me most about him was his very different take on what conservatism was and should be about, than most of the other conservatives I knew (this was in Idaho). He was very much of a mind that our social ills should be attacked in specific ways, and that "leaving it to the marketplace" was not an adequate answer. There wasn't a lot of selfishness in his brand of conservatism, and a good deal of social awareness. That's not to say I'd agree with all of his answers. But his perspective might have had some real usefulness had it not been drowned out by others. One of the great might-have-beens of recent history.

Paul Craig Roberts, who worked for Kemp and Reagan but now writes for CounterPunch, has a memoir on Kemp that is worth reading. I would go to the trouble of providing a link but have been experiencing that as a waste of effort lately. Try counterpunch dot com for today's (5/4) articles.

"But Jack Kemp lost his fight for the soul of the Republican Party. And America is a worse place for it. We now spend our days arguing about the goal - should we help the poorest and sickest among us? - rather than arguing about the means to achieving that goal."

Oh come on. That's the left's new definition. Just as you have re-defined every living conservative and declare their's no more Kemps around.

And here you use Kemps demise as another opportunity to pile on the Democrat politics.

Get real. Who's the Republican or Conservative who argues not to help the poorest and sickest among us?

Most argue that the mission creep of BIG goverment hobbles and lessons the ability to effectively help the poor and sickest among us. Along with all other core functions of government that suffer as it swells.

And swelling it is under this fresh dose of massive liberal caring. Free health care insurance for all, including the not so poor and not so sick appears to be following the prescription drug coverage expansion without means testing. That means the wealthy get it too. Nice.

You can't even get your blues to run Portland with any common sense yet here you are, again, making your sweeping, inaccurate declarations about conservatives.

Here's the Counter Punch link: Working With Jack Kemp by Paul Craig Roberts

Duh! Let me try this again Here's the Counter Punch link: Working With Jack Kemp by Paul Craig Roberts

I think I got it this time.

Kari,

I really wasn't referring to the GOP, I was referring to the "conservatives" ...you know, "last of the great conservatives" and all that :-)

I'm not a part of the GOP, but I am a moderately conservative kind of guy (geez, you people here need to smile more).

Cheers, S

Richard sez: Most argue that the mission creep of BIG goverment hobbles and lessons the ability to effectively help the poor and sickest among us.

Most--no, ALL--writing teachers would tell you that a framing like "most argue" is nothing but a hollow appeal to authority.

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As far as Jack Kemp goes, I find Kari's post, and the commentaries here, perplexing to say the least. Kemp was FULLY on board with--indeed, one of the architects of--Reaganite supply-side economics. So what gives? We criticize Reagan, but pat Kemp on the head for helping put Reaganomics into action? Sorry, no can do.

As for the 1996 presidential campaign, Kemp joined Bob Dole, whom nobody would ever mistake for a nice guy.

The praise for Kemp in this thread boils down to "gee, he wasn't a screamer and a bigot like his GOP compatriots."

So I'll give my condolences to Kemp's family, of course, but sorry, but I can't join the political lovefest.

Nice remembrances of Jack Kemp. It's really too bad the GOP embraced the 'dark side' of conservatism instead of the more 'bleeding heart for the little guy' version that Kemp championed.

The little guy, is someone both parties seem to have forgotten. Thank you Mr. Kemp, you cared.

”I guess Joe the Plumber and Sarah Palin are the biggest idiots for which Jack Kemp should take blame. In a very real way Jack Kemp, through his promotion of the simple supply-side economic theory, paved the way for dolts like them to become heroes of the GOP. Palin is the prime example that one can spout the supply-side theory without needing any brains, and be popular enough to get elected, while then promoting some pretty hateful social agendas. Whole swaths of the country take the supply-side notion seriously because of Jack Kemp’s leadership in popularizing it.Alas, Kemp’s strong advocacy for equal rights for African Americans relatively open immigration will not be his legacy.”

Note also that while Kemp liked to make noises about a non-interventionist foreign policy, he was a vigorous proponent of US subversion of the Nicaraguan revolutionary government (remember the “freedom fighters” we paid to commit murder and mayhem?).

Bill Gallagher: personal note - you host my buddy Lewis Mehl-Madrona, don't you? I just gave him an exquisite juvenile coyote pelt with beads and pendleton treatments... just checking to see if I've got the connectors aright.

Richard, you are saying I am a member of "the left" because I admired Jack Kemp, voted for Pres. Ford, campaigned for Tom McCall's re-election, but was never a fan of Reagan, DeLay, Armey, Limbaugh, Rove, Cheney, or anyone named Bush.

Contrary to that attitude is someone I heard on the radio today saying, "I agree with 100% of what the caller just said. But depending on the poll being used, we are either one in 3 Americans or closer to 1 in 5. That is not a governing majority and we need to figure out how to reach out towards those in the center."

How many "conservatives" talk about making programs for the sick, poor and needy more effective rather than just calling them boondoggles which cost taxpayer money? When Republicans totally controlled DC, what did they do to advance those causes?

Posted by: The Skald | May 4, 2009 12:50:13 PM---the answer is that people who totally disagreed with Kemp on almost everything still liked the guy because in the words of one tribute he was incapable of making enemies. I'll take someone pleasant I disagree with over someone I agree with on issues but frequently yells at anyone who doesn't adopt their proposal without question any day of the week.

My candidate for president in 1980 was Cong. John Anderson who ran as a 3rd party candidate after losing primaries to Reagan. Lots of women on that Anderson campaign because of a platform plank on the rights of women which had been in the GOP platform since Oregon's McNary was the GOP nominee for VP.

Now Richard, you can call all those of us who supported someone other than Reagan for President members of "the left". What would that accomplish? The Republican friend I sent this link to was very impressed with Kari's writing. He also said that now there would be many Republicans who would yell RINO at Kemp if he had been active in politics today.

Richard, you are obviously in the ideologically pure wing of the GOP. If you want to say that everyone not of your persuasion is a member of "the left", go right ahead. Might not win any elections that way, but if it makes you happy.....

The Fair Housing Act was supported by Cong. John Anderson. If supporting that bill meant being a member of "the left", Richard, by all means say so. That way we will know your true colors. You sound more enemy-oriented than solution oriented, if not just plain angry.

My candidate for president in 1980 was Cong. John Anderson who ran as a 3rd party candidate after losing primaries to Reagan.

That would be the same John Anderson who cut his teeth as a Congressman by introducing constitutional amendments to have the United States declared an officially Christian country.

Posted by: LT | May 4, 2009 4:13:33 PM-----the answer is...

I'm not sure what question I posed that prompted your "answer," but, um, OK -- I liked your answer.

Cheers, S

Kari, I never agree with you on anything....until now. Jack Kemp was a very classy leader. Democrats and Republicans could learn alot from his words. Sad part is I do not think they will. I was truly saddened to hear he is gone. Somewhere out in the USA he must have a truly proud family. He was a great inspiration and a master communicator. Jack Kemp reminds me of Rick Dancer. Rick has that same message of tolerance and common sense government. If you are ever lucky enough to know Rick you will find that out.

Before moving to Portland, I worked for The Employment Connection in St. Louis. Jack Kemp and Tom Eagleton were gracious enough to join our organization as honorary board members. Their involvement helped show that helping former addicts and former offenders change their lives was indeed a very bipartisan endeavor that encouraged redemption and increased public safety. Both of these men have done much for humanity. May they rest in peace.

Randy Stapilus:

He was very much of a mind that our social ills should be attacked in specific ways, and that "leaving it to the marketplace" was not an adequate answer.

Bob T:

"Leaving it to the market place" is definitely not adequate so long as we have zillions of laws (national, state, and local) that strip away opportunities to make an honest living, all under the guise of "protecting the consumer". And Kemp understood that. Again, I've previously mentioned the case in which a black minister from Tennessee tried to open a discount casket business but long-standing state laws (one of those pesky regulations allowed the state to shut him down (to protect the people, I guess), but he fought back, making him the Rosa Parks of casket dealers.

Too many in this country aren't aware of such stuff, and would merely look at the state-protected high prices of caskets and whine about how "the free market is ripping off people". Well, no, government makes that possible, while also stripping people of opportunities and making people dependent on them. Pay attention, people.

Bob Tiernan Portland

The more I read these comments and ponder this, the more the road not taken idea fits.

  When I talked with Jack Kemp about football, he was here as an advocate of the flat tax. I disagreed with most everything he said but he came off as a truly good person. He was not weirdly surreal like when I heard Ronald Reagan. He was genuine like one of the people in your town that you would automatically turn to for leadership in a crisis.

   By the way, there was a negative comment above about Bob Dole being so grouchy. That was one of the real surprises when I met him. He had a good sense of humor and was fun to be around even as he projected the grouch publicly.

Mainly he had the gravitas of a statesman compared to the twisted low-life mediocrity of Bush and Cheney. (I never met Cheney but I did chat with W one time.)

  The main thing about Dole and Kemp from being around them in person, was that you ended up really admiring them as people. They were not faking their leadership skills.

   The GOP, by following Reagan, and then Bush turned their back on the true meaning of leading and committed themselves to spinning for success.

 Just imagine these guys in high school. Do you think Karl Rove would ever be sitting with Jack Kemp? No way. I picture Bush and Rove over at a whole different table, scheming about how to one day convince everyone they were popular.

  The GOP picked the wrong crowd to idolize and Jack Kemp's death is a sad reminder of that.

"I find it sad for Kemp knowing he couldn't see his party get turned around before he passed away. Maybe someone will actually listen to some of the stuff he said."

But as I've already noted, Kemp's supply-side, trickle-down dogma is what EVERY REPUBLICAN on the national stage keeps repeating. Tax cuts and more tax cuts. "Couldn't see his party get turned around"? That's an absurd remark. Kemp saw the GOP get firmly onto the path he advocated.

Give it a rest, people. Your eulogy for Jack Kemp boils down to "Wow, he wasn't a flaming asshole like all those GOP hacks." So he wasn't a screamer; so he was a guy you'd actually like to have a beer with. Fine. Maybe he also was kind to stray kittens. Doesn't mean you'd want him as president inflicting his supply-side nonsense on the country.

And I've no doubt that Limbaugh, Hannity and the right-wing blogmeisters spent a lot of time eulogizing Paul Wellstone as an authentically decent guy. Right? Right?

Bob Tiernan sez: "Leaving it to the market place" is definitely not adequate so long as we have zillions of laws (national, state, and local) that strip away opportunities to make an honest living, all under the guise of "protecting the consumer".

Mr Tiernan, FWIW, in the world at large--I'm thinking in particular of the social-democratic societies of Europe--those "laws...that strip away opportunities to make an honest living" may not in fact have much to do with "protecting the consumer". Commonly those laws--and I state this without actually agreeing with how you characterize them--have a lot to do with protecting workers and protecting the broad social fabric. Thus in France right now, as just one example, a lot of the social unrest has to do with people threatened with job losses. France has strong labor unions, and French law makes closing a factory, say, considerably more complicated than just calling in the rent-a-cops to escort the workers out and then locking the door. And when a factory does close and throw people out of work, the unemployment benefits are way, way better and longer-lasting than anything available in the US.

My point is not to argue that we ought to do things here the way they're done in France. My point is simply that your libertarian framing--that laws distort market forces and "strip away opportunities to make an honest living"--is only one possible framing, not a self-evident, immutable principle. There are many ideological stances; your libertarian stance is only one of them.

Hey Kari-

I apologize that this comment is off-topic, but I don't have a better way to get ahold of you. You saw that Springfield Mayor Sid Leiken has filed to run as a Republican for the 4th District seat? This would be a great time for Dems in the 4th to talk on Blue Oregon about who they want to represent them. Of course, this all depends on whether our current (and extraordinary) representative Peter DeFazio chooses to run, as you have urged, for the open Governor's seat.

Me, I have my own views, but I think now's the time to start talking about DeFazio's potential successor.

The only reason George Bush barely lost in 2000 (!) was that he claimed he was a "compassionate conservative" and put on the Jack Kemp cloak.

It all turned out to be a Karl Rove lie, as we now know.

Best post ever on Blue Oregon! Thank you for writing this Kari, and thank you to all the great comments that followed. Thank you too to the Soul of Portland and my friend, Chip Shields, for your comments on Kemp.

Jack Kemp was the best of the best, the Happy Warrior who could disagree without being disagreeable. The self-ascribed bleeding heart conservative who worked hard to reach out to women and ethnic minorities - good advice for both parties. The man who, rightly, advocated for DC voting rights.

One of the best books ever written on tax and economic policy was Kemp's 1979 book "An American Renaissance." And whether you agree or disagree with Kemp's tax policies, I think all agree that he was an optimistic and eloquent voice in support of individual entrepreneurism and economic growth. Simply put, Kemp believed and argued passionately that taxes mattered and tax rates effect individual decisions to work, save and invest.

There are only a few people that should have been president but never were. Kemp is one (and to be bi-partisan, William Jennings Bryant was another).

The world is a better place because Jack Kemp lived.

Scott Bruun:

(and to be bi-partisan, William Jennings Bryant was another).

Bob T:

Nah -- he supported alcohol prohibition for many years before it was finally implemented. Anyone with that level of distrust of the people didn't deserve to be county dog-catcher.

Adlai Stevenson would be a much better choice for your other pick.

Bob Tiernan Portland

joel dan walls:

But as I've already noted, Kemp's supply-side, trickle-down dogma...

Bob T:

"Trickle down" is not what any Republican called it -- it's a derogatory term coined by opponents. "Trickle down" isn't even close to accurate so it's best ignored.

Bob Tiernan Portland

I went to a lecture by Paul Krugman where he said the "compassionate conservatism" phrase is really just code for letting the weak struggle and fade. The "compassionate" part is that you don't help them and society as a whole is better served.

 So unless he's wrong, using that term to describe Jack Kemp in a comment above doesn't apply. It wasn't a Karl Rove lie - it was Karl Rove speaking to the base in code.

I saw Jack Kemp, once.

It was a Sunday night on the plaza at the Rose Quarter, after he and Bob Dole had accepted the nomination in San Diego the night before.

They came to Portland, to give word for word the same speaches in front of a crowd of 500 in Portland.

I have always been a groupie of American presidential politics. If they come to Portland, Democrat or Republican, I am inclined to attend.

After the speeches, on the rope line, two fuzzy boom mikes over his head, Jack Kemp smiled broadly, looked out over the crowd, and said at the top of his lungs, "There sure are a lot of good looking women in this town."

Clinton was in the White House.

Someone has the tape.

Great line, Scott!

"the Happy Warrior who could disagree without being disagreeable."

Democrats could learn from that!

But Bob T. is right--Adlai Stevenson is a better Democrat in that scenario.

Had Wm. Jennings Bryan won, we might never have had President Teddy Roosevelt.

"But Jack Kemp lost his fight for the soul of the Republican Party. And America is a worse place for it. We now spend our days arguing about the goal - should we help the poorest and sickest among us? - rather than arguing about the means to achieving that goal. "

is there an issue, any issue, on which the republican party today isn't to the left of where it was in 1996? calling anyone you disagree with an extremist is not conducive to civil political discourse. being civil to the dead is not being civil to the living. there is always more than one way to solve a problem (or help a person) and the continual barrage of claims that nobody will disagree with your method unless they disagree with your goal is childish nonsense.

joel dan walls:

Bob Tiernan sez: "Leaving it to the market place" is definitely not adequate so long as we have zillions of laws (national, state, and local) that strip away opportunities to make an honest living, all under the guise of "protecting the consumer".

Mr Tiernan, FWIW, in the world at large--I'm thinking in particular of the social-democratic societies of Europe--those "laws...that strip away opportunities to make an honest living" may not in fact have much to do with "protecting the consumer". Commonly those laws--and I state this without actually agreeing with how you characterize them--have a lot to do with protecting workers and protecting the broad social fabric.

Bob T:

I've previously made a distinction between regulations about health and safety, and those that are supposedly all about "protecting the consumer" from being "ripped off" price-wise or by shoddy work etc. There's also the tinkering and fine-tuning (so-called) of market activity (usually by politicians and bureaucrats who know as much about sound, basic economics as they do about nuclear physics) to supposedly get "fair" results and stuff.

In the case I cited, neither workers nor consumers benefitted from the casket-dealer regulations. Only the good old boy dealers and their control-freak politicians and bureaucrat friends did. The consumers were ripped off, and they didn't know why or how. They probably thought it was free-market casket dealing taking advantage of people. Wehre was the Democratic Party all these decades regarding that rip-off law? We already know the Republicans didn't care (because they're not that interested in free enterprise, either). But the Dems are supposed to care about the consumer. Well, that's the rhetoric, at least. 'taint true.

You know, if anyone had tried to get that law changed in previous years, the casket dealer cartel (state-created and protected) no doubt put out propaganda about how "de-regulation" was gonna lead to toothpick and Elmer's glue caskets, and cardboard and tin-foil caskets and all that. Such laws remain far too long because most people remain unaware of them and have no idea how much manipulation of the market is out there. The small group of people who have the most to gain by preventing reform have every reason to know when their cushy positions are threatened, and they act on it. The progressives are no-shows because they think it's just free-market rip-offs, or are afraid to challenge "regulations".

joel dan walls:

Thus in France right now, as just one example, a lot of the social unrest has to do with people threatened with job losses. France has strong labor unions, and French law makes closing a factory, say, considerably more complicated than just calling in the rent-a-cops to escort the workers out and then locking the door.

Bob T:

Those are stupid laws, just like the French laws that make it pretty much impossible to fire and lay off anyone. What if it was a buggy-whip factory in 1904?

joel dan walls:

And when a factory does close and throw people out of work, the unemployment benefits are way, way better and longer-lasting than anything available in the US.

Bob T:

Translation: too much incentive to sit around for too long collecting unemployment.

Ever hear of that Dutch program of allowing people with "bad backs" to retire at full pay no matter how young they were? They had to build new office buildings and hire many bureaucrats just to handle all of the "bad back" cases that materialized. Or the Dutch program that promoted art by telling every citizen that they could paint and if no one would buy their paintings the government would buy them. Warehouses had to be built in which to store the crap people were painting that no one would buy. Gosh, they meant well, though, in both cases.

Anyway, joel, I mentioned the casket dealer case as a specific example. Don't confuse it with other types of examples. Did you think the Tennessee law, and any other similar law in any other state, was wrong to begin with? I could ass to that type of example another one in which a teen-age black girl in Kansas in the early 1990s was making some money doing corn-row hairdos at home and was threatened by state regulators. Apparently the regulations (also designed to squash competition) would have forced her to pay loads of money at a beautician school learning many things that she didn't need to know in order to just do the corn-rows. Free market think tanks and the Wall St Journal were on her side, but not the Democratic Party. They're too in love with regulatory powers no matter how stupid they are, and they can't have them questioned.

Bob Tiernan Portland

Bob Tiernan--I appreciate the lengthy response. I have a few comments in response. Most obviously, your buggy-whip-factory-in-1904 allusion is a straw man. France in 1904 did not have strong labor unions, had never had a socialist party in power, did not have today's laws.

You state that having generous, unemployment benefits--as in France--amounts to "incentive to sit around for too long collecting unemployment." If you read or listen to the US domestic news, you will hear about many people who are now homeless, some living in shelters with their families, because they lost their jobs and their unemployment benefits ran out. I don't know how you feel about this fact, but your comments suggest to me that you regard homelessness as an "incentive" to look for work more diligently. That's not an attitude I will ever grasp.

I suggest you are making way too much of the casket issue. No, I don't see any point in having casket prices subject to cartel control, and I doubt that any Blue Oregon contributors does, either. In other words, another straw man on your part. (On the other hand, I'd sure like undertakers to have to demonstrate competence and be licensed....)

I had a flirtation with the Libertarian Party in the early 80s. I was involved in antiwar activism at the time, disgusted by all the Cold War Democrats who enabled Reagan's foreign policies, and attracted by the Libertarian Party's unflagging and principled opposition to foreign intervention. But I learned soon enough that many other Libertarian Party principles profoundly offended me. My ungenerous caricature of LP economic ideology is summed us this way: I've got mine, Jack, now you fuck off. The LP looks to me like a group of fundamentally self-absorbed folks in search of an ideology to justify their crass disdain for "losers", for "the lazy", for anyone fallen on hard times. That's the attitude I hear coming across loudly and clearly in your remark about the alleged "incentive to sit around for too long collecting unemployment."

Jack Kemp was characterized (and characterized himself?) as a bleeding-heart conservative. No Libertarian is ever going to be called a bleeding heart. I suspect your response would be "damn straight we're not." My response would be to say that the LP attitude is tragic.

Kemp also was instrumental in creating enterprise zones in the Reagan era, which encouraged businesses, through tax breaks, to invest in inner city neighborhoods with high unemployment.

I saw them work in 1980's Baltimore where I lived at the time.

He was a good guy. Rather I agreed with him on all issues or not is beside the point.

Joel, if you hung out with the LP long enough, you'd have discovered how mistaken you are. You put zero effort into your libertarian flirtation and it shows.

It's posts like this that remind longtime readers that, despite the Sam feuds and the enviro-babble, Kari gets it.

It's funny that you quote HH. As a LLLibertarian, I love to try to formulate what the essential Democrat is, and always thought the closest I've ever found was a woman that I characterize as "always a little sad that HH isn't on the ticket".

As definitions spiral around, perhaps HH is the black hole at the center of the Democratic Party, defining the fabric of spacetime all throughout. You leave one question that progressives would ask, though. Who, in the Party, carries that vision forward today? Isn't the critique that you describe equally valid to the Democratic malaise? Yes, theirs was a quick bout with a humungous, malignant tumor, but death by slow poisoning is just as dead.

One weird aside, I would add. For those studying British history, I think you can understand a lot about Benjamin Disraeli and the period that Kari describes, by thinking of Newt Gingerich as an American Disraeli. People look at Gladstone's personal attacks and say he was anti-Semitic, but the disgust he voiced was absolutely the same set of facts, personalities and values that Kari articulated. Gladstone was HH and Disraeli was Newt. There's also an ego v service difference in that dichotomy as well. That's what progressives really wonder about being totally absent, as a choice, today.

joel dan walls:

Bob Tiernan--I appreciate the lengthy response. I have a few comments in response. Most obviously, your buggy-whip-factory-in-1904 allusion is a straw man. France in 1904 did not have strong labor unions, had never had a socialist party in power, did not have today's laws.

Bob T:

And if it had? Point is that whether buggy-whips or products still in demand but either more efficiently produced by competitors or displaced by alternatives, the company should not be treated as a socila program that must stay in business in order to employ people. Had the buggy whips kept being made either through subsidies (and mostly kept in government warehouses) or by limiting auto production, resources would be going into a black hole instead of better uses.

joel dan walls:

You state that having generous, unemployment benefits--as in France--amounts to "incentive to sit around for too long collecting unemployment."

Bob T:

I didn't say it amounts to that. But for many people, that's what it is. And I don't consider someone on unemployment as a sign of success or a good economy.

joe dan walls:

If you read or listen to the US domestic news, you will hear about many people who are now homeless, some living in shelters with their families, because they lost their jobs and their unemployment benefits ran out. I don't know how you feel about this fact, but your comments suggest to me that you regard homelessness as an "incentive" to look for work more diligently. That's not an attitude I will ever grasp.

Bob T:

Your imagination has run wild again in reading what others write. This was brought on by trying to compare the US to France, citing what I call stupid laws controlling when factories can close, and including a more generous unemployment program. I simply don't care what France does.

joe dan walls:

I suggest you are making way too much of the casket issue.

Bob T:

No, I'm not. It's an example of what we have at many levels throughout this country (it's not noticed at all by those people who think that only presidents and/or the US Congress effect the economy and millions of individuals within the economy.

I believe in a system (which we were much closer to at one time) in which individuals like Mr. Craigmiles sees an opportunity and creates his own niche in the economy, and which happens to benefit consumers at the same time. Millions of such opportunities are squashed before they are even thought of because most of us are conditioned to accept arbitrary boundaries that protect a few for no reason other than to protect those few, and who use propaganda to keep it that way.

joel dan walls:

No, I don't see any point in having casket prices subject to cartel control, and I doubt that any Blue Oregon contributors does, either. In other words, another straw man on your part.

Bob T:

But it's not about casket prices per se, but also about limiting the number of people in that business. Without attention brought to this (for those who know about it), the prices and the cartel would be seen as "the market in action", and more anti-free market converts would be generated.

What would be the progressive solution to Mr. Craigmiles' problem? Don't tell me -- an "affirmative action" law allowing him to enter the cartel, like the way the Ethiopian airport shuttle drivers were allowed to enter the taxi caartel here in Portland (afterwards, they lobbied to deny the same opportunities to others -- I was there in Salem to see that).

joel dan walls:

(On the other hand, I'd sure like undertakers to have to demonstrate competence and be licensed....)

Bob T:

Uh-oh, here's the "fear of de-regulation" again. How far would you go? Did Michael Powell have to demonstrate competence at selling books? Did the lead singer for AC/DC have to demonstrate competence at singing (he would have been denied a license, by the way). Clearly the rules Mr. Craigmiles ran into were beyond common sense.

Now imagine hundreds of other categories of niche businesses and the jobs from them and the better prices for people, and imagine what it would be like. With thousands and thousands of market-snuffing laws remaining, like the one Mr. Craigmiles fought to get rid of, all bets are off. Anyone who claims that free enterprise has failed doesn't know the first thing about it. In this case, the judge in Tennessee who saw that the law violated Mr. Craigmiles' economic liberty said that all this was about was the selling of what amounted to "a box". The only thing that should limit Mr. Craigmiles' career as a casket dealer should be his level of competence as a businessman. Any fraud he may commit (indeed, like with any fraud that might be committed by the "Newman's Own" food product company, can be dealt with using existing laws that are a part of the free enterprise system (which seems to surprise too many people who apparently think that laws against murder [of a competitor] is a business regulation).

joel dan walls:

...many other Libertarian Party principles profoundly offended me. My ungenerous caricature of LP economic ideology is summed us this way: I've got mine, Jack, now you fuck off.

Bob T:

That's very simplistic. What we have too much of in the managed economy is that attitude coupled with seriously diminished economic liberties that exacerbate the situation many times over. That's what I don't like--telling a Mr. Craigmiles that he can't enter the casket business but he can file for welfare or unemployment if he wants. I don't see the number of people on relief as a sign of success--I see success in the number of people who no longer need it. That was once used to show the difference between Repubs and Democrats but as we all know the Republicans threw away their part and never really had much interest in it.

joel dan walls:

The LP looks to me like a group of fundamentally self-absorbed folks in search of an ideology to justify their crass disdain for "losers", for "the lazy", for anyone fallen on hard times. That's the attitude I hear coming across loudly and clearly in your remark about the alleged "incentive to sit around for too long collecting unemployment."

Bob T:

I could care less what you think of them. I'm not a member of that party, nor any other. As for my remarks that annoyed you, again, they need to be said because I'm interested in the loss of opportunities and how the loss of same effect the level of unemployment and under-employment, as well as the pocketbooks of consumers. Unemployment is not a goal. It needs to exist, but we have far too many programs. I believe in a safety net, not a safety hammock. But let's also deal with the squashing of economic liberties under the guise of protecting the consumer. Doesn't it tell you something that in Tennessee where Mr. Craigmiles fought for his rights that it took a judge to deal with this instead of the voters? I want those opportunities to exist once again. That's a better way to be a "bleeding heart" than to brag about the extent of the welfare or relief program you want.

Bob Tiernan Portland

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