mgroves

Cathering Vogt noticed that Obama was very popular among her 8th-grade colleagues.

So, she tried an experiment. She wore a homemade t-shirt with “McCain Girl” written on it to school one day just to see how tolerant Obama’s supporters were.

Here are some responses:

• Classmate(s) suggested that she be be “burned with her shirt on” for “being a filthy-rich Republican.”
• One person told her to “go die”.
• Some people were “calling me very stupid”
• And finally, one person said that “she will not judge me for my choice, but that she was surprised that I supported McCain”. Her teacher.

She wore an “Obama Girl” shirt the next day and got less flak.

Not all that suprising: these are 8th graders who are bombarded with The Daily Show and Green Day and the agenda of the NEA and what not every day.

But the most bothersome quote to me was that she was a “filthy-rich Republican”. There is clearly a populist perception that Republicans are all greedy and rich, and got that way by “exploiting the common working family” or some such tired rhetoric. This is a very dangerous thing, because it leads to very stupid laws that are meant to “reduce economic inequality”. And they will reduce economic inequality: they will make us equally miserable.

The way to improve economic conditions is not to make conditions worse for the rich–it’s to improve conditions for everyone. It’s not by envy and soaking-the-rich, but by reduction in government interference: subsidies, price controls, taxes, bureaucracy, tariffs, bailouts, entitlements, protectivist trade, and monopolies (government and private). Let’s be very skeptical about central planning and err in the favor of markets.

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