GOP Endorses
Life-Long Bread Lines
Tom DeWeese
Issue CXXIII - October 20, 2007
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I've been
waiting for the disbelief and outrage to emerge from
Republicans across the nation over the Republican
Party's recent announcement. Incredibly, the
RNC announced that
it is endorsing the poverty eradication program of
rock star Bono. There hasn't been any outrage yet
from GOP rank and
file. Is there nothing left of the old GOP?
For those who missed it, in August, the
Republican National
Committee took steps to endorse Irish rock
star Bono's proposal to spend $30 billion in U.S.
taxes to eliminate global poverty. Bono, lead singer
of the rock group U2, has dogged political leaders
around the world, using his rock star status to
pressure them into accepting his brand of global
guilt. However, the GOP's
capitulation to Bono's charms goes much deeper than
getting excited about the passions of a rock star.
This time, Bono is acting as the messenger boy for
the United Nations.
You see, back in 2000 every head of state in the
world agreed to the UN's Millennium Declaration
which calls for the end of poverty by the year 2015.
There, the world's leaders agreed to put up the
money for UN poverty programs. Now the UN is working
to collect. Bono has declared himself to be the
collection agent. And the Republicans jumped when he
called.
How can it be that the Republican Party, which once
advocated free enterprise, limited government, and
individual liberty, could fall for such a wealth
redistribution scheme, and at the request of an
avowed Marxist like Bono? The two should have
nothing in common, whatsoever. Or don't they?
Eradication of poverty is certainly a noble cause.
People throughout the world are suffering from
hunger, poor health and filthy water. The number of
poor in the world is growing higher each year. There
is no doubt that something must be done.
Of course, there are thousands of efforts in the
world aimed at eradicating poverty or feeding and
clothing the poor. From churches to charitable
organizations to local, state, federal, and
international government programs, billions of
dollars are collected and presumably distributed to
the poor.
Yet, every day, we have more poor. Why? Because none
of these efforts focus on the source of poverty.
None of them take steps to reverse the situation and
help the poor to help themselves. And neither will
the GOP's new
Bono-inspired scheme. And that is what's so
astounding about the GOP's
announcement. It should know better.
Poverty, as run by the international poverty cartel
headquartered in the United
Nations, is big business. As in almost every
case where there is unlimited cash and little
accountability by mindless, faceless bureaucrats and
all-powerful potentates, corruption, embezzlement,
exorbitant salaries, and inside procurement deals
fatten the pockets of a few and leave the poor
hungry and left out.
Adam Lerrick, visiting scholar at the American
Enterprise Institute (AEI) told the U.S. Senate
Subcommittee on Security and International Trade and
Finance that he estimates between $100 billion and
$500 billion in World Bank funds intended for
African development have been smuggled into offshore
accounts.
As poverty grows ever greater, Bono establishes
himself as the self-proclaimed savior of Africa. He
uses his concerts to enflame young audiences to hate
the rich. He postures. He snarls. He marches up and
down the stage waving a red flag while the music
pounds a steady, military beat. And political
leaders cower as he shakes them down for the cash.
Yet, where is Bono's indignation over the theft by
the very organizations he promotes? Where are his
revelations of radical environmental groups who
openly advocate that African villagers must continue
to live in mud huts and walk five miles for water,
because that is "sustainable?" In fact, Bono, and
the ilk he supports, arrogantly deny the poor the
opportunity to live in the Twenty First Century
because they don't want them to have electricity,
cars, better roads, and modern homes. This, they
say, would damage the environment. And this is
the policy the Republican
National Committee has chosen to support?
Even as the poverty cartel demands the eradication
of poverty by 2015, how do they propose to achieve
that success? How are the poor supposed to climb out
of poverty? They aren't. Ending poverty would mean
the end of the stolen funds and the political power
that the poverty cartel has come to expect.
Instead, they have condemned the poor of the world
to live in life-long bread lines, dependent on
others for daily existence, no hope for a future of
betterment. The poor are mere pawns in the game.
And this is the policy the
Republican National Committee has chosen to
support?
Moreover, even without the corruption,
redistribution schemes are not the answer to saving
the poor. The GOP
should know that taking money from hard-working
people and giving it to those who must instantly
consume it solves nothing. It's a momentary
band-aid. Tomorrow the poor and hungry will need
more. And more will be taken from the providers.
Anyone who has ever studied Economics 101 should
know that the only possible outcome of such a scheme
is to make everyone poorer. And this is the
policy the Republican
National Committee has chosen to support?
So why are some nations so poor, and others are so
rich? What is the real answer to eradicating
poverty? The "2007 Index of Economic Freedom,"
published jointly by the Heritage Foundation and the
Wall Street Journal, may hold the answer. It
examines 10 economic characteristics of 157
countries. Those include property rights; monetary
stability; freedom from government, trade
restrictions, business regulations and government
corruption.
The report includes a color-coded map showing the
nations that are free, mostly free, moderately free,
mostly unfree, and repressed. Does it surprise
anyone to discover that the most repressed nations
also contain the poorest people in the world? People
who lack freedom have no ability to produce wealth.
As Economist Walter Williams points out, "Extensive
government control, weak property rights, and
government corruption almost guarantee poverty."
Those three factors are almost universal in
United Nations'
anti-poverty programs and the very reasons why none
of it programs will ever achieve the goal of
eradicating poverty.
If the GOP was
actually interested in helping the poor and making
itself a hero to the masses it should abandon any
connections with Bono and the UN. It should renounce
any such wealth redistribution schemes. It should
advocate the policies that made the United States
the wealthiest nation on earth - the policies of
private property ownership, limited government, and
free enterprise.
The United States isn't wealthy because of an
abundance of natural resources or good Karma. The
United States is rich because it's free. And any
nation on earth could be as wealthy if it, too,
allowed its people to live their own lives without
interference from busybodies who want to dictate how
others should live - or seek to confiscate the
fruits of someone's labor. Every nation could have
it, no matter the education level of the country or
the population.
If the GOP needs a
hero to follow, why not choose a real one - with
real solutions - those which actually reflect the
freedom the GOP
insists it promotes? Peruvian economist
Hernando
de Soto
is such a man.
De Soto wrote a book, "The Mystery of Capital:
Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails
Everywhere Else." That book has become an
international phenomenon with those who truly want
to do something about eradicating poverty. De Soto
has been sought out by at least 50 heads of state,
each asking him to come to their country to help
establish programs and guidelines for eradiating
poverty, helping the poor build their own wealth.
So why hasn't the GOP
endorsed de Soto's brand of freedom instead of
Bono's tired old socialism? The answer may surprise
most GOP supporters,
for it is no accident or miscalculation.
Few Republicans are aware of an organization called
the International Democrat Union (IDU). But they
should know it because the
GOP is a major player in it. It's no accident
that every four years, at the same time and in the
same city as the GOP National Convention, the IDU
holds its own meeting.
Formed in 1983, the IDU says it's a "working
association of over 80 Conservative, Christian
Democrat and like minded political parties of centre
and centre right." Some of the political party
members of the IDU include the German Christian
Social Union; British Conservative Party;
Norway Conservative
Party - and the U.S. Republican Party.
Now one would expect that an organization which is
made of "centre and centre right" organizations
which advocate "free enterprise, free trade and
private property," as the IDU claims - an
organization with the Republican Party as a major
active member, would also advocate the greatest
collection of ideas for freedom ever written - the
Declaration of Independence and the U.S.
Constitution. What an opportunity for the
GOP to advance
American ideals for eradicating poverty throughout
the world.
But such is not the case with the IDU. A careful
look at the group's founding Declaration of
Principles reveals a very different message. The
second paragraph of the IDU Declaration states:
"Being committed to advancing the social and
political values on which democratic societies are
founded, including the basic personal freedoms and
human rights, as defined in the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights..." That, of course,
is the United Nations' Declaration of Human Rights
that the IDU is promoting.
There are two conflicting philosophies of governing
in the world. One, the American view, as outlined in
the Declaration of Independence, states that all
people have rights they are born with and that
government's main job is to protect those rights at
all costs. America's founding document says that
these rights exist forever and unquestioned. It is
the foundation of human freedom.
The other view says that government decides the
rights we should have, professing that all such
rights give way to an unidentified common good
whenever the situation is warranted. That means that
all so-called rights are subject to the whim of
whatever gang is currently in power. This is the
position promoted in the UN's Declaration of Human
Rights. Moreover, Article 29, section (3) of the
document says, "These rights and freedoms may in
no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and
principles of the United
Nations."
To understand why the Republican Party has embraced
the socialism of Bono instead of the freedom of de
Soto, one only has to connect the dots. As an
organization advocating human freedom, the
Republican Party is a fraud.
Tom DeWeese
is one of the nation’s leading advocates of
individual liberty, free enterprise, property rights
and back-to-basics education. For over thirty years
he has fought against government oppression.
In 1988, Mr.
DeWeese established the
American Policy Center (APC), an activist think
tank headquartered in Warrenton, VA. In 1992 Tom
DeWeese became passionately involved in the fight
for the preservation of American private property
rights and against intrusive environmental
regulations. He is also a recognized leader in the
fight to preserve American national sovereignty from
intrusive United Nations policies on global
governance. APC has also joined the fight to rescue
American education from federal intrusion and the
fight for American privacy rights against intrusive
government data banks, and a national identification
card.
Mr. DeWeese
makes regular appearances on radio and television
talk shows and has articles published in several
national publications.
Tom DeWeese
is the publisher/editor of
The DeWeese Report. You can contact Mr. DeWeese
here.
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This TRA feature has been edited in accordance with
TRA’s
Statement of Policy.
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