The Parable of the Coat-Giving Father

The Democratic Party answered the State of the Union speech with a view from another world.  In Stacey Abrams' world, Americans were in good shape financially under Obama, but are now living in a deep depression.  On behalf of the Democratic Party, she made a plea that we all work together to take care of one another as we once did when we brought an end to Jim Crow laws.  In this vein, she demanded that we terminate the use of fossil fuels to prevent the end of the world by global warming and that we use the force of government to end all discrimination against LGBTQ persons.

Oops, the main opposition to Jim Crow was always the Republican Party!  Oh well, hardly anyone knows anything at all about history anymore.  The Democratic Party controlled education system has seen to that.

Oops, there is mounting evidence that the Earth is cooling, particularly in the thermosphere, and will continue cooling for the next few decades due to a great reduction in solar activity.  Additions of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere does virtually nothing to change the temperature of the Earth's surface or troposphere.  Ending the use of fossil fuels will only make energy more expensive and less dependable, hurting those with lower incomes the most.  The Democratic Party is all in for hurting people with higher energy costs.

Oops, the Democrat Obama administration fought hard to maintain Don't Ask, Don't Tell in the courts against veterans backed by the Log Cabin Republicans.  The Obama administration lost the court case at the Appeals Court level and their next defense of DADT would have been before the Supreme Court.  They gave up the case because it looked like they would lose again in the Supreme Court and at about that time polls showed that Americans did not support DADT and were supporting gay marriages.  The Democrats are hardly winter soldiers on matters of principle, despite their pretensions.

In emotional support for her take care of one another thesis, she offered the parable of her Father Giving Away His Coat to a man on the highway on a cold and rainy night.  He was walking home from work and came upon a man cold and shivering who had no coat.  He gave the man his coat because he knew that he was not alone -- his family would come to get him.

Is this freedom to choose your own values and to act on those values what the Democratic Party stands for?  What that party stands for is actually this story:

A man on the highway is alone, cold, and shivering.  A government strongman in body armor and armed with a semi-automatic weapon is patrolling the highway and notes the condition of the cold, shivering man without a coat.  He waits for another man to come along who has a coat.  He confronts that man and points his weapon at the man and demands that he give his coat to the cold, shivering man.  He then demands the now coatless man's wallet and takes 40% of the money in the wallet.  He takes a quarter of that and puts it in his own wallet.  He turns over a half of what he originally took to his department claiming, without any need for evidence, that it was taken because the man who had it was engaged in crime (the Father did often hitchhike).  What happens to the other quarter?  The Democrats in control of the government give it to Solyndra or some other scheme by rich and connected people to take advantage to the American people.  This is the actual pattern of Democratic Party controlled governments.  See New York state, California, Illinois, Connecticut, New Jersey, Detroit, St. Louis, Baltimore, Chicago and many, many other examples.

This is the party of Jim Crow laws, so it is capable of doing terrible harm to many Americans, always justified by the claim that you have to harm some people to help the greater number or the most needy.  There is no surer path to power than that paved by the claim that you will use the power of government to help most of the people, while ignoring the fact that most people are far better at choosing their own values and managing their own lives than are government legislators and bureaucrats who do not know us as individuals and do not even care to do so.  After all, they see most of us as Deplorables, which is natural given that they really do believe that most of us have no business choosing our own values and managing our own lives in accordance with our own values.

Stacey Abrams would not allow her own Father to choose his own values and manage his life in accordance with his values,  She is blind to how important that very likely was to him.  I am not endorsing self-sacrifice, but men need to be free to choose their own values.  There is no freedom if we are not free to do so and, if having done so, to be free we must be free to act in pursuit of our own values.

It was refreshing to hear Trump endorse freedom and clearly condemn socialism.  Unfortunately, his advocacy of a law to require paternity leave is inconsistent with freedom.