December 22, 2012

Pro-Red State policies

Republicans have a greater tendency to drink their own Kool-Aid than Democrats. For example, if you look at a map of where people who vote Republicans live, you'll notice that they congregate (if that's the right word) in the more open parts of the country. The Democrats assiduously try to increase population density via immigration and environmentalist policies, such as declaring large swathes of lands wildernesses. (You might think that immigration promotion and wilderness preservation are contradictory impulses, but in terms of increasing population density and thus Democratic-voting, they're all good.)

An intelligent GOP would tend to promote policies that benefit its own kind of people and make life better for people who choose less densely populated regions over more densely populated ones. But too often Republicans are ham-strung by libertarian ideology. 

For example, consider the pipeline between the Ivy League and Wall Street, which is a major engine in sucking talent out of Red States and bringing it to the northeast. It's much easier to get a job interview with Goldman Sachs if you are an Ivy League senior than if you are a senior, with the same qualifications, at a State Flagship U., so ambitious Red State high school students better try to scramble their way into the Ivy League.

Wall Street firms interview much less outside of the Northeast. What with the price of airfare and hotel rooms these days, they couldn't possibly afford to interview at many colleges more than few hundred miles from New York. Think of how Goldman's thin profit margins would be endangered by the rent-a-car costs alone. The government shouldn't interfere with the free market!

Yet, if I were a Republican congressman from, say, Indiana and were on the House Financial Services committee, I would let Goldman, Morgan, and the rest know that the great state of Indiana has three major universities -- Notre Dame, Purdue, and Indiana -- and I expect you to spend a day at each one interviewing, and sometimes hiring. You will notice from my tone of voice when you call up asking me for favors that I am keeping track of your hiring from my state.

Or, what about high-speed Internet for more rural Red Staters? Generations ago, rural Congressmen got the ATT monopoly to subsidize phone service for people in the country. Now, we're increasingly close to an ATT - Verizon duopoly over telecomm, so why not lean on the big telecomm firms to get more of Red America wired up with fast web access so people don't move out in frustration over being stuck with 20th Century Internet in the wide open spaces? Sure, that would violate libertarian principle and maybe hurt your chances to become a Verizon lobbyist after you get voted out of office, but maybe you should try policies to keep you from being voted out in the first place?

34 comments:

  1. Orestes Brownson12/22/12, 3:14 PM

    "...But too often Republicans are ham-strung by libertarian ideology..."

    From your lips to God's ear.

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  2. The Repubs are too busy making themselves unpopular with the white working class to bother with your suggestions (that ol' debbil libertarian ideology again).

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  3. Rural broadband was part of the Obama administration's first stimulus package. http://www.dlapiper.com/obama-administration-enacts-unprecedented-broadband-initiative/

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  4. Slightly OT, but why is there no traction at all on immigration restriction? Every mainstream story is relentlessly pro-immigration. No nuance, just more people is better. Dissenters get relegated to a line or two at the end of the story, and they are portrayed as creepy crazies. With unemployment so bad, and all the worries about the environment, you'd think it would be a real issue.

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  5. Agreed.

    But:

    1. Why do we assume that big cities vote blue because of population density in se, when the real answer is racial demographics?

    2. Why do we presume that the ultimate life ambition of every young person in America in every place is to move to New York and work for Goldman Sachs?

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  6. Roland. I wish I knew!

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  7. Steve said that too often Republicans are ham-strung by libertarian ideology.

    Hunsdon begs to differ: The Republicans only embrace libertarian ideology in one very particular part of their governing philosophy, to wit, on economic policy.

    One may disagree with the libertarianism of, say, a Murray Rothbard, but that libertarianism is a fairly cohesive and thought out ideology.

    I would argue that calling the GOP economic policy an ideology pays it rather too much of a compliment; to my eye it is a thin excuse for nakedly stoking the worst elements of capitalism.

    In any event, the GOP does not adhere to libertarian ideology on issues of foreign policy, drug legalization, or general social liberalism (of the "leave-them-alone-ism" variety).

    A libertarianism that starts and ends with low tax and low regulation isn't much of a libertarianism at all.

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  8. Hundson you omitted the main issue where isteve readers take their animus to libertarians from: immigration also to a lesser extent blank slatism

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  9. "Slightly OT, but why is there no traction at all on immigration restriction?"

    Citizen! Have you no decency? Immigration to the US is a universal human right! I'm sure it says so somewhere in the UN charter. Liberals in the US have obtained so much of the goodness in the universe and are so blindingly good that unless the poor downtrodden of the world come here to bathe in the liberals good-penumbra the world will be doomed to evil and darkness. Only counter-revolutionaries full of hate would deny open immigration to the US and consign the world to such a harsh fate. Remember, citizen, only the ultra-doubleplus-good can tell the rest of us what to do. It is only right.

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  10. Derek Brown said: Hundson you omitted the main issue . . . .

    Hunsdon agreed: Indeed! Like the Shias of the Mussulman, I have followed a less traveled path. When I think of libertarianism, I think more of Ron Paul and Murray Rothbard, and not so much of that guy from Reason in the black leather coat. "Liberty, not license," unless that one is taken.

    At least at one point in his journey, Rothbard was fairly anti-immigrant, and I perhaps defaulted to that mode in framing my response.

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  11. San Franciscan non-monk12/22/12, 7:25 PM

    Regarding your example of the Ivy League sucking up too much red state talent, didn't we just learn from Ron Unz that non-jewish whites are heavily discriminated against in Ivy League admissions and only represent a tiny minority there? Surely non-jewish whites account for most red state talent.

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  12. Steve said: But too often Republicans are ham-strung by libertarian ideology. 

    TBG, ala Hunsdon, begs to differ. Name two Republicans, who do not have the last name Paul, who are hamstrung by libertarian ideology.

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  13. Yet, if I were a Republican congressman from, say, Indiana and were on the House Financial Services committee, I would let Goldman, Morgan, and the rest know that the great state of Indiana has three major universities -- Notre Dame, Purdue, and Indiana -- and I expect you to spend a day at each one interviewing, and sometimes hiring. You will notice from my tone of voice when you call up asking me for favors that I am keeping track of your hiring from my state.


    But if you were a Republican Congressman, you might have one eye on the prospect of a cushy job as a lobbyist or consultant for Goldman Sachs, with salary and perks far in excess of what you get as a mere legislator.

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  14. It's an interesting game theory question: I'm not sure that being a total pushover Congressman for Wall Street would maximize your wealth versus being prickly. But I could be wrong.

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  15. 2. Why do we presume that the ultimate life ambition of every young person in America in every place is to move to New York and work for Goldman Sachs?

    A red state senator could also try to get elite blue state cos to open offices in his state. Most of Goldman's regional US offices are in blue states. Granted, Goldman goes where the money is, but Google supposedly goes where the talent is, and most of its regional US locations are in blue states too.

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  16. That's true Steve, urban areas are really bad for the GOP. Romeny only one two counties over 3 million, Maricopia and Orange. In fact, in liberial Calif Romeny won Modoc around 70 percent, its small and rural and has a small hispanic population. Romeny won big in Texas in counties bordering Oklahoma but lost Travis, Dallas and Harris counteis. ROmeny won some of the Catskills of new York but lost Atlanta Georgia. The most suburban and rural the state versus the more suburban and urban the state the Republicans won better in the former.

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  17. Good point Steve, if the internet could be wired more in rural ares, even in blue states, then they might become purple states. If you were a white person who were prefer to moved to the interor of Washington and Oregon than red states with a lot of minorties you don't have a chance, since the rural areas have few job openings.

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  18. Its true Steve, Republicans are influence too much by the market but some libertarians like Rothbard were better on issues than others. As for Ron Paul, he favors open borders, he went against a border fence about 8 months ago, and his son Raul has a legalizing bill but claims no more immirgation how will that work out.

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  19. Well, some of the high density back east the Dems didn't have to do anything, New York or Chicago developed that way by the 19th century. Maybe you are talking about dem politcians pushing for immirgant groups like the Irish in the 19th century.

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  20. "Every mainstream story is relentlessly pro-immigration."

    Who controls the mainstream? Who benefits from mass immigration?

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  21. Well Steve, New York city is probably as mention a bad example. Probably the Indiana kid now is going to Austin Texas since their are more jobs out there and Austin is cheaper than New York City.

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  22. On the other hand, plan cities may be Repubilcan take Mission Viejo which has more restrictions than either Santa Ana or Anaheim. Mission Viejo wants republican while Santa Ana or Anaheim votes Democratic. Santa Ana and Anaheim developed before the plan community would limit hispanics that could double or triple up on housing with relatives.

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  23. Game theoretical twist:

    The red state congressman that wants to apply pressure to financial firms could do so by sending them anonymous messages containing the content "help my state and hire in it, or else!"

    The message must contain some information that can be used to verify that the sender is someone with a lot of pull, still not contain enough information so that the company guy who recieves it can identify the sender.

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  24. Two Republicans hamstrung by libertarian ideology? How about all those who support massive immigration and free trade (more on the order of two million rather than two).

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  25. "A red state senator could also try to get elite blue state cos to open offices in his state. Most of Goldman's regional US offices are in blue states. Granted, Goldman goes where the money is, but Google supposedly goes where the talent is, and most of its regional US locations are in blue states too."

    Goldman's site lists 15 offices in US cities, and they are all in blue states save for the offices in Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, and Salt Lake. Many of their employees, though, are Indian. I know this because, until they moved into much nicer digs, I shared an office building with them in one of the red states.

    Twisting the arms of financial firms by getting them to diversify their hiring pool could work, though. They definitely depend on lobbying to keep their profits up, and the fed govt is already neck deep in this sort of stuff. If we're allowed to insist on diversity for blacks and Hispanics why not also for red states and non-Ivy League U's?

    A congressmen who twisted their arm this way is a prime future Goldman lobbyist. Goldman doesn't want to hire pussies. They want to hire ball-crunchers without a shred of scruples.

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  26. Steve makes a good point here. Rural working class white American has swung as solidly behind the Republican Party as much as it backed the Democrats during the New Deal era. Romney's margins in some rural areas approached in some places what the Democrats are ringing up in central cities.

    But what exactly are the voters in these places getting for their loyalty?

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  27. Here's idea what about supporting the interior rural areas with start up business thru the home and the computer. Its a start. Personality, it would changed things. Why not rural areas get away on having to have a lot of illegal labor because of the agri-business or meatpackaging places.

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  28. A congressmen who twisted their arm this way is a prime future Goldman lobbyist. Goldman doesn't want to hire pussies. They want to hire ball-crunchers without a shred of scruples.

    Goldman is probably less dependent on lobbyists than other cos because of the presence of Goldman alumni in key roles in government. Red state senators out to crackdown on that as well. Vote against Goldman alumni when they're nominated for any position that requires senate approval. Agreed, though, that Goldman would respect a hard ass senator.

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  29. Dutch Boy: How about all those who support massive immigration and free trade (more on the order of two million rather than two).

    Hunsdon: If you're a corporatist who likes paintings of dandelions, your ideology is not "dandelions."

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  30. I live in a rural part of Western Illinois in a part of the state that is often jokingly called "Forgottonia." This is due to the lack of attention it gets when money for things like road building projects etc. comes into the state. But even though I live way out in the country, on an unpaved road, we do have high speed internet via a fiber optic T1line buried under our road.

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  31. Another thing that might helped Republicans go back to the plan community or city. Orange County in the late 1960's when it was the Republican Capital had different developing companies like Mission Viejo which was apart of the O'Neil family which were Democratics but the Mission Viejo company developed cities that usually voted Republican like Mission Viejo. Its swim team is known throughtout the US. There was recreation in the city and a big man-made like and a green belt area and it has business not a bedroom community. Its hispanic population is only 17 percent versus a county average of 34 percetn. Instead the Republicans now are mainly into tax cuts and yelling at this socialism and that socialism. Well, why not go back to doing any socialism at the local instead of the national level.

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  32. I mean made made lake.

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  33. The easiest way for the GOP to make inroads among younger white Americans and so called "SWPLs" of all backgrounds: end support for the War on Drugs, which the Dems now generally support. (Perhaps Dem support for the WoD reflects African-American support for drug criminalization, see Dan Kahan's Cultural Cognition blog http://www.culturalcognition.net/blog/2012/12/24/the-black-and-white-but-mainly-gray-of-gun-control-and-drug.html)

    That would widen the pool of Republican voters while taking voters away from the Dem coalition.

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  34. Half the comments seem to be submitted by folks who refuse to proofread.

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