Campaign Aftermath: a University President Speaks

The presidential election of 2016 produced results which were a surprise, if not to everyone, then at least to many observers. Many African-American voters, Latino voters, and female voters chose not to vote for Hillary Clinton, and thereby handed the victory to President Trump.

On many university campuses, a vocal segment of the student body could not understand how Trump’s presidency would eventually benefit not only college-age citizens, but average citizens from all social classes, races, and ethnicities.

President Trump came into office, after all, due to millions of African-American and Latino voters who chose not to vote for Hillary.

Yet universities, often hailed as centers of free speech and free thought, became quite hostile to anyone who admitted to having supported Trump’s candidacy. Students who were even suspected of voting for Trump were bullied.

At the University of Michigan, at a meeting of the campus senate, university president Mark Schlissel pointed out that saturation of socialist viewpoints had removed both faculty and students from an accurate assessment of reality:

I would argue no matter how [the election] turned out, our community has an awful lot of work to do to try to understand the forces at play in our society and how we've ended up with such large degrees of polarization. Why was this a surprising result in Ann Arbor and not a surprising result in other communities around our nation? I think as an academic community, we have to ask whether we're really in touch with the full breadth of the society we're serving and how they're thinking and what's important to them. Do we have in our student body, on our faculty, and adequate breadth of diversity of thought?

Because students and faculty had been living with an illusion, the election presented a moment of disillusionment. Having silenced the viewpoints of ordinary citizens on campus, the university was surprised when those same viewpoints made themselves felt off campus - at the ballot box.

The rage of the campus socialists vented itself on the hapless Trump supporters, who merely wanted freedom of speech. Mark Schlissel, speaking of students who voted for Trump, noted that

They feel marginalized. This is a challenge for the community and they need to feel included and involved in the discussion. Their opinions need to be considered and discussed as opposed to marginalized. We need to try, I think, to have ideas included in our community for discussion that are more representative of the ideas in the world at-large as compared to the academic part of the world at-large. I think that's a way to understand what is happening in modern society – here and globally.

As the post-election lunacy accelerated, leftist students began fabricating fake “hate crimes,” and to claim that these crimes were perpetrated by Trump supporters. A woman wearing a hijab claimed that she had been assaulted.

The National Review reports that, after investigating, “Ann Arbor police lieutenant Matthew Lige” announced that the woman had filed a false police report, and that no “ethnic intimidation” or any other form of assault had occurred. Indeed, video surveillance records showed that the entire incident was a fiction.

Faked “hate crimes” are nothing new. For more than a decade, individuals hoping to identify themselves as victims have falsified evidence and filed false police reports. Such fraud reveals that the very people who want to be seen as “victims” are, in fact, the oppressors and aggressors.

The bullying, intimidation, and harassment of Trump supporters on campus is merely the latest instance of such deception.

What Makes History Tick

In any narrative about events past or present, the reader wants to know: what was planned and intentional, and what was mere coincidence?

The answer is that much which seems coincidental was in fact planned.

Was it mere coincidence that the Japanese military launched a surprise attack on the United States on a Sunday? No; the Japanese officers were well aware of which day of the week might offer the best chances of catching the military defenses at a low level of alertness.

Was it mere coincidence that President Lincoln was assassinated at the precise moment that an actor onstage delivered a comic line in a play which the president was attending? No; the assassin had planned to kill the president on cue.

If we look at other events, then we can begin to see the effects of a grand conspiracy. Problems facing society endure despite actions taken to address those problems. Perhaps the actions are deliberately ineffective: someone benefits from the duration of various forms of social misery.

In domestic matters, the persistence of inner city poverty not only withstands governmental efforts to alleviate it, but it thrives on those efforts. Poverty is intensified by government programs designed, or allegedly designed, to end it.

The main causes of poverty are government programs intended to end poverty - or at least, programs presenting themselves as having such intentions.

In foreign policy, relations with our true and natural allies are damaged or soured by unwitting gaffes by diplomats. But were those blunders so accidental? Was there not a larger plan designed to weaken the international status of the United States?

Likewise, actions that inadvertently help our enemies seem to be the State Department’s miscalculations, but are in fact quite calculated and in no way inadvertent.

Not all of history is determined by conspiracies, but much of it is. As historian Gary Allen notes, “Because the Establishment controls the media, anyone exposing the” the national and international conspiracies

will be the recipient of a continuous fusillade of invective from newspapers, magazines, TV and radio. In this manner one is threatened with loss of “social respectability” if he dares broach the idea that there is organization behind any of the problems currently wracking America. Unfortunately, for many people social status comes before intellectual honesty. Although they would never admit it, social position is more important to many people than is the survival of freedom in America.

Large conspiracies bring together actors of opposite and seemingly incompatible categories. Conspiracies often escape detection because it would not occur to many observers that a capitalist and communist would work together.

In secret, however, there is collusion between members of the international communist conspiracy and certain key figures in the financial and monetary systems of industrialized nations. The unlikeliness of this combination is its camouflage.

Of the several levels of deception at work here, one of them is linguistic: the communist conspiracy is not about achieving of some socialist worker’s utopia in which every laborer receives the same pay as his manager. The word ‘communist’ is robbed of its original meaning, and used as an excuse to obtain and maintain power over governmental and economic systems.

Likewise, members of the conspiracy who seem to represent ‘business’ or ‘capitalism’ do not, in fact, have a devotion to the concept of the free market or of property rights, and thus the words are again used inaccurately to disguise a naked grab for power.

A far-flung and wide-ranging conspiracy is, and has been, at work in many different events and trends which threaten to weaken the United States. A network of individuals and groups from an incredibly diverse spectrum of institutions strive in concert to damage the freedom which is the foundational identity of the nation.

Thus seemingly incompatible combinations appear: billionaire investors and slum-dwelling rioters; leftist politicians and bankers.

It is incumbent upon those who value freedom to continue to uncover and expose conspiracies. The alternative, however it may be named, is a form of slavery.

Understanding Trump: Categories of Language

When two minds independently come to similar conclusions, or to the same conclusion, it’s worth noting. Analyzing President Trump’s victory in the 2016 election, a theme emerged amidst the seemingly infinite volume of reporting.

In September 2016, The Atlantic magazine included an article by Salena Zito titled “Taking Trump Seriously, Not Literally.” Moving through various examples of Trump’s campaign rhetoric, Zito notes how the news media carefully parsed the candidate’s words and subjected them to “fact checking.”

The media’s scrutiny didn’t sync with the popular enthusiasm which met Trump’s speeches. As Zito writes,

It’s a familiar split. When he makes claims like this, the press takes him literally, but not seriously; his supporters take him seriously, but not literally.

Whether Trump spoke of the border with Mexico or dealing with “Islamic State” terrorists in the Middle East, the voters responded to his sentiment and attitude, not to the specifics of any alleged “plan.”

Voters were not content with the rather spineless image which the Obama administration projected to other nations. The voters wanted a general feeling of a representative who would act in the interests of the average American, not an Obama-like figure who worked to cultivate a charm among foreign leaders.

Trump seemed to be someone who would work on behalf of ordinary Americans. Crowds cheered that feeling, rather than the details of particular policies.

When Trump talked about a “wall” on the border to Mexico, the news media went to work making calculations about physically building a wall; Trump’s listeners heard a metaphor - they didn’t know or care whether or not Trump would build a literal physical wall. They knew that he understood the concepts of national sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Separately, another journalist, Margaret Sullivan, writing in The Washington Post in November 2016, described an interview she had with Peter Thiel:

It’s a familiar split. When he makes claims like this, the press takes him literally, but not seriously; his supporters take him seriously, but not literally.

Just as Obama’s supporters had reacted to slogans like “Yes We Can” and “Hope and Change,” Trump’s supporters embraced the concept of a president who would act on behalf of the ordinary citizen.

Voters perceived that the Obama administration had prioritized diplomatic relationships and climate concerns over safety and prosperity. Domestic violence and international Islamic terrorism left U.S. citizens feeling unsafe. The ongoing economic doldrums of the Obama era had left Americans with lower wages and a smaller net personal worth. Margaret Sullivan writes:

And although many journalists and many news organizations did stories about the frustration and disenfranchisement of these Americans, we did not take them seriously enough.

The voters wanted a change of leadership. They didn’t really care whether or not a wall was built along the Rio Grande. But they wanted someone who spoke, and who would act, with directness:

Again speaking of the news media, Sullivan writes:

Although we touched down in the big red states for a few days, or interviewed some coal miners or unemployed autoworkers in the Rust Belt, we didn’t take them seriously. Or not seriously enough.

Voters really don’t care about the nuts-and-bolts of some policy decision. Analysts for newspapers and television networks tend to wrestle with statistics, definitions, and technicalities. The average citizens simply want to know that someone is looking out for them.

That’s why the endless hand-wringing on the editorial pages and opinions shows didn’t bother the voters. Many who voted for Trump didn’t take seriously many of his statements:

A lot of voters think the opposite way: They take Trump seriously but not literally.

What voters embraced in Trump was a simple premise: that a government should act on behalf of its citizens. The ordinary citizens want government which will protect their lives, their liberties, and their property.

Obama had failed to create the impression that he was doing that. Hillary failed to create the impression that she would do that.

Trump signalled that he would watch out for American lives, liberties, and economic opportunities. The details might be fuzzy, exaggerated, inexact, or nonexistent. But the voters didn’t care about the details.

Who Voted for Trump? Who Didn’t Vote for Hillary?

Historians and statisticians will spend years analyzing the U.S. presidential election of 2016. The dynamics and demographics in that vote were unforeseen and manifested the beliefs of the citizens.

Elections are about perceptions. What a candidate “really” is, how that candidate “really” thinks or would act in some future hypothetical situation, is unknown and, to the average voter, unknowable.

Citizens vote, therefore, based on what they believe or perceive about a candidate. The surprise was that the U.S. voters believed different things about Hillary and about Trump than what the news media were telling them to believe.

While most newspapers and cable TV networks were telling the voters that Trump was a racist, and that Hillary was tolerant, it seems that the voters believed quite the opposite.

Trump actually got a smaller percentage of the “white” (European-American) vote than the Republican candidate four years earlier (Mitt Romney) had gotten. Apparently, Trump was favored by African-American and Latino voters.

Trump got nearly double the percentage of Black voters that the GOP had gotten four years earlier. As historian David French writes:

Would you believe that Trump improved the GOP’s position with black and Hispanic voters? Obama won 93 percent of the black vote. Hillary won 88 percent. Obama won 71 percent of the Latino vote. Hillary won 65 percent. Critically, millions of minority voters apparently stayed home.

Comparing the 2012 election to the 2016 election, Trump, as the Republican candidate, gained African-American voters and Hispanic voters.

Millions of Black and Latino voters decided that Hillary was not reliable. They didn’t trust her; they didn’t want her in the White House. Although Hillary’s allies wanted to label Trump as “racist,” it turns out that, in the minds of many voters, Blacks and Latinos did not trust Hillary.

The Clinton campaign patronizingly assumed that Hillary would automatically receive the vast majority of the African-American and Hispanic vote. That assumption was a form of racism.

A Generous Governor

Those who analyze economies often overlook the powerful factor of private sector charity. An example of this significant variable is Rick Snyder, the governor of Michigan.

According to a Detroit Free Press report, he and his wife earned a bit more than $400,000 in the year 2015.

During that same year, they donated approximately $95,000 to charities. (This is the sum which went to true charities, i.e., not to professional organizations or political causes.)

By this reckoning, Snyder donated around 25% of his annual income.

For that same year, he paid approximately $31,189 in the form of income taxes. He paid many thousands more in sales tax, property tax, and other taxes.

By far, the greater impact was in the private sector, and this for three reasons: first, the actual dollar amount was greater; second, the private sector charities have lower overhead administrative costs than government programs; third, much government spending is counterproductive, i.e., it exacerbates the very problems it is designed to address.

Private sector charities have a greater, more efficient, and more effective impact than government spending.

The History of Taxation in the United States: An Unnecessary Evil

From the Han Dynasty in ancient China to the Roman Empire, people have demonstrated a strong antipathy toward taxation. Both government and taxes are necessary, but humanity is happiest when both are kept to an absolute minimum.

For several decades leading up to the 1770s, most of the grievances which caused the United States to declare itself independent of the British Empire were tax-related, from the quartering of soldiers to the Stamp Act to regulated imports.

After achieving independence, the U.S. government largely avoided taxing the citizens directly, as Steven Weisman, writing in the Washington Post, notes:

The American Revolution began as a protest against unfair taxation. In our early history, leaders avoided the question of income tax altogether, choosing instead to raise federal revenue with import tariffs.

One notable exception was a direct tax on distilled beverages, which led to the bloodless ‘Whiskey Rebellion’ of 1794. Although major violence was avoided, the rebellion demonstrated that U.S. citizens were strongly allergic to taxation.

The first income tax of note was imposed during the Civil War. Its top bracket levied as much as 10%, but approximately 90% of households were totally exempt, having incomes which fell below the lowest bracket. Weisman writes:

Since the federal income tax was introduced during the Civil War, U.S. citizens have complained about their taxes.

By 1872, the Civil War income tax was phased out. The people had tolerated the tax long enough to end the war, and pay war-related expenses in the first few years postbellum.

Public outcry against income taxes had grown by 1872, and in 1895, the Supreme Court ruled, in Pollock v. Farmers’ Loan and Trust Company, that income taxes were unconstitutional.

Less than two decades later, Woodrow Wilson and his ‘Progressivist’ movement would avoid both the Supreme Court’s decision and the popular vote, enacting an income tax of a much larger proportion than the short-lived Civil War tax.

Steven Weisman reports:

The income tax disappeared when the war ended. But it returned on the eve of World War I, enabling President Woodrow Wilson to raise the marginal income tax rate to 70 percent. Wilson called paying taxes a “glorious privilege” and a way for the businesses profiting from military buildup to give back. Sen. Hiram Johnson of California even attacked “the skin-deep dollar patriotism” of those who favored war but opposed taxes.

The citizens got a brief respite from the shocking tax burden during the Harding and Coolidge administrations. With the help of Congress, Coolidge brought Wilson's draconian 70% rate down to 25%.

The federal government, held hostage to ‘Progressive’ ideology savaged the citizens with income tax rates as high as 91% in peacetime and an astounding 94% during WW2.

The 94% rates applied during 1944 and 1945, and might be excused because of wartime urgency.

But a 92% top rate, during 1952 and 1953, was not justified by the Korean War, inasmuch as that conflict consumed a smaller segment of the total defense budget.

The long reign of the 91% rate, from 1946 to 1963, cannot be excused. It was this era which gave birth to creative accounting, tax shelters, loopholes, and offshore accounts.

For almost two decades, confiscatory rates were used against citizens. No war or natural disaster created a justifying urgency. The government was simply savaging its people.

It was only logical, therefore, that financial systems were developed to help citizens avoid as much income tax as they legally could. From this we have inherited both a large tax accounting industry and bullying IRS with its thousands of pages of Byzantine tax codes.

Black Voting Rights in the South

The Civil War ended in 1865. For the next several decades, African-Americans not only enjoyed their right to vote in large numbers, they were also elected to major offices, including the Senate and the House of Representatives.

During these decades, Republicans worked hard to protect the civil rights of the Blacks in the South. In Congress, the Republicans made the Civil Rights Act of 1866, the Civil Rights Act of 1871, and the Civil Rights Act of 1875 into law.

By the end of that century, however, the pro-slavery Democrats began to take power in the South.

As the Democratic Party asserted itself, it found ways to prevent African-Americans from voting. By the early 1900s, fewer Blacks were voting in the South than in the late 1800s.

With fewer African-Americans voting, the Democrats began to win elections in the South. Blacks had traditionally voted Republican.

The Democratic Party accumulated a string of victories by preventing African-Americans from voting in the South, as historian Patrick Buchanan notes:

In the two presidential campaigns of Wilson and the four of FDR, Democrats swept every Confederate state all six times. The Democratic candidate in 1924, John W. Davis, carried every Confederate state and, with the exception of Oklahoma, only Confederate states. Truman took seven Southern states to Strom Thurmond’s four. Dewey got none. In 1952 and 1956 most of the electoral votes Adlai Stevenson got came from the most segregated states of the South.

Some of the Democratic presidential candidates spoke in favor of segregation, like Woodrow Wilson. Some of the candidates were silent on the subject, like FDR, but allied themselves with segregationist vice-presidential candidates.

John Davis, the Democratic candidate for president in 1924, was an attorney who argued for segregation before the Supreme Court in the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka in 1954.

The Republicans did not give up. They worked to help Black voters get back to the polls.

Against opposition from the Democrats, the Republicans in Washington passed the Civil Rights Act of 1957 and the Civil Rights Act of 1960, both of which were signed into law by Republican President Eisenhower.

The Republicans continued with the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Civil Rights Act of 1968. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 helped millions of African-Americans get their right to vote.

The return of Blacks to the voting booth eventually began to break the stranglehold which the Democratic Party held on the South. Over the next few decades, the monopoly held by the Democrats in southern politics ended.