Week 37 2013 So, Are You Really Conservative?

My wife and I had a good discussion this morning on government policy and our national economics.  She is trying to understand all the hullabaloo over the debt ceiling.  I’m not sure that I have the answer.  From my simple mind it simply means that the more we borrow, the more we have to pay back, along with more interest.  So, it seems like a bad idea.  Having said that, it is also a bad thing when we can’t pay our debts.  Long term, it would seem that if our nation will make cuts in the budget we will have the means to pay our debt down.  Short term, the cuts can’t come fast enough.  This is where it goes beyond my simple mind.  The numbers are too staggering.  Which leads to a broader discussion on what it means to be a conservative.

The rhetoric coming from most conservatives would have one believing that we support less government.  I hold this position.  However, what do we do when the rubber meets the road?  For instance, when fuel prices starting increasing, how many of us echoed the mantra saying that our government needs to intervene?  Issues like this seem to be so overwhelming we feel helpless, so we turn to something bigger than ourselves.  Hence, the government becomes our big brother who will go to bat for us and force the bullying oil companies to quit beating up on us.  Thus the real question is, how do we accomplish this without big brother?

In a free-market economy the consumer has the power to regulate prices and quality.  In order to exercise that power, consumers must come together.  Unfortunately, we aren’t very good at doing this.  In the early eighties car manufacturers were alarmed when consumers quit buying new cars.  By not buying Americans were saying that prices were too high.  As it started to become critical for the suppliers, they came up with a strategy to encourage the public to start buying cars again.  They offered rebates, and people started buying new cars again.  I was shouting, “Don’t do it!  Rebates aren’t enough.  They need to lower prices!”  However, even though we didn’t go far enough in our boycott, it did demonstrate that we can have an impact when we will work together.  As to fuel prices, we obviously cannot boycott the oil companies collectively.  But, we could choose to target one at a time for limited periods of time.  You can be assured that a month long boycott of Shell would hurt enough to give all oil companies pause.  These corporations have the financial resources to hire lobbyists that can effect legislation barring the use of our own natural resources, thus impacting our government in ways that we are not able.  The end result is less government, lower fuel prices, and less dependency on nations that delight in hurting the American consumer.

The government bailout of General Motors was fueled by another American consumer boycott.  This one came about in response to inferior products.  Foreign manufacturers were putting out higher quality vehicles with better fuel economy at competitive prices.  Instead of responding to this crisis by giving the buying public what we were demanding, GM looked to the government for a handout and got it.  Ford, on the other hand, didn’t take government money.  Instead, they began producing cars that can compete with the foreign producers.  The new Fords have gone head to head with Toyota with vehicles that match or exceed in quality, fuel economy, and price.  The end result has been a win win for consumer and producer.

These examples challenge us to either live out our conservative views or quit calling ourselves conservative.  Or, the reality that true conservatism is merely an ideal.  My purpose is to merely encourage each of us to examine ourselves before we start using labels to provide our personal identity.