Last night (11/30/23), Gov. Ron DeSantis (R, Fla.) squared off against Gov. Gavin Newsom (D, Ca.) in a debate. It was interesting to note that Newsom tried to use Trump against DeSantis. It’s true that Trump prefers to tear down his opponents early and often with any tool at hand, usually with a huge dollop of balderdash, so there’s much on the record for Newsom to use. Ironically, Newsom’s exploitation of Trump’s hostile words about DeSantis underscores a deepening divide within the GOP that can be summarized as MAGA v. Reagan. You may or may not be aware of it but it is happening before your eyes.
Let’s face it, and here’s the point, Donald Trump is no Ronald Reagan in thought and comportment. Trump has come to symbolize a rising isolationist element in the GOP. Reagan was a patriot but no isolationist. The dividing lines within the GOP are becoming starker by the month as one part of the party coalescing around Trump pays rhetorical homage to Reagan while they are busy tearing down his legacy.
It’s a battle between big-government isolationism (MAGA) and a philosophy of governance built on smaller government combined with international engagement (Reagan). A couple of weeks prior to the Newsom/DeSantis face-off, David Bahnsen (of the Reagan philosophy) engaged Oren Cass (of the emerging MAGA philosophy) in a debate about this growing rift. This chasm has a greater impact on the future of the GOP than the spat between Newsom and DeSantis.
They debated over this proposition: There should be a greater role for public policy (government) in markets. Oren Cass in the affirmative (MAGA), David Bahnsen in the negative (Reagan).
If you are a Trump supporter, you must ask yourself one simple question: Where would he lead us if elected again? Yes, his first term was Reaganite because he drew from the GOP’s ample stable of Reaganite thinkers, but he burned bridges with them long ago. A second term would draw from the coterie of big-government isolationists such as Oren Cass. You would be voting for this.
Here’s a few takeaways from the Bahnsen/Cass challenge:
#1 – To set up the big-government approach, you have to tar the alternative. The alternative is a more restrained government in order to let markets breathe, what is called free markets. A market is merely a spontaneous arrangement that brings together buyers and sellers, voluntarily and thus free. So, a host of problems are assigned to markets by people like Cass to gouge out a bigger role for government to manipulate and direct them. Though, can stagnating wages, a languishing standard of living, and outsourcing of some American manufacturing justifiably be laid at the feet of markets? That leads me to #2.
#2 – Cass and his cohort in and out of government won’t say it but they’re into central planning. Central planning is government actors – bureaucrats, public employees, and politicians – directing the buyers and sellers. What does this smell like? It smells like politics being injected into people’s private decisions on what they produce, how they produce it, and what they buy. If it was a medical treatment, it’s a poor one. Politician-witchdoctors overriding our individual judgments turns us into serfs and causes more of what they are blaming markets for. That leads me to #3.
#3 – The knowledge problem. Cass and the politicians on the other side of the fence like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren believe that government is filled with wise demi-gods. Do you, or anyone for that matter, actually believe that politicians and public employees possess the knowledge and wisdom to substitute their decision-making for that of millions of people in millions of individual circumstances? It’s been tried before. It’s the culprit behind the implosion of the Soviet Union. North Korea’s misery is caused by it. FDR’s New Deal turned a depression into a Great Depression. For the old timers like me, the 1970’s stagflation was caused by it. Those kvetching about today’s stagnated prosperity don’t realize that it is rooted in it. It’s amazing that the MAGA coterie want more government to cure the ailments caused by government. How’s that supposed to work? That leads me to #4.
#4 – The subsequent lawmaking and enforcement are infected with fatal pathogens, the fingerprints of government, i.e. politics, at work. Let’s take a look at the heralded CHIPS Act. The intent to replant chip manufacturing in the U.S. was larded with ESG, DEI, eco-nuttery, child care mandates, etc. Billions of taxpayer dollars are to be showered on billion-dollar corporate biggies while hitting them with the kind of thing that drove them from American shores to begin with. Go figure. The Cass/MAGA approach has been around for years. Speaking of Gavin Newsom, California is a microcosm of the consequences of this state of mind. Currently, it is causing Californios to flea the state (800,000 between 2020 and 2022) in like manner as American companies found the grass to be greener in China and the Philippines. You don’t need to shower taxpayer largesse on a handpicked industry and its towering players to entice them back. Try not punishing them. Try acting like you actually like them. Dah!
This is the debate that we ought to be having in the GOP. We need more face-offs between the MAGA and the Reagan philosophies so Republican voters know what they’re getting into. I’m afraid that it’s not happening often enough. We’ll end up with a lose-lose. If we win, we’ll get the misery from big-government foolishness under a Republican label. If we lose, we’ll get it from the Democrats. Are we even aware of it?
Please watch the Bahnsen/Cass debate below.
RogerG