The Fight Ahead

I can’t tell you how many friends I have who think we are in a post-constitutional order. Some of it from some of them is wish-casting. Some of it from some of them is dread. In my opinion, they are wrong. As cultural winds shift and the media and left dominate mainstream media voices, it is easy to think we are in a post-constitutional order. What I find remarkable is the nation just went through four years of Trump with a Republican wave coming this November, a majority of states under Republican control, and a minimum 5 to 4 conservative split on the Supreme Court, but a bunch of conservatives are convinced we are in a post-constitutional order. If we are, don’t give exclusive blame to the left.

But we are not.

I can’t tell you how many friends I have who think cultural issues should be ignored. Government is about governance and the Democrats want to push the buttons and turn the knobs in one way while Republicans will push the buttons and turn the knobs in another way. All we need is a good, competent Republican manager to come in, push the right buttons, turn the right knobs to the right degree, and presto! We will have good government and the social issues can be fought elsewhere.

They’re managerial class fools.

We actually live in a constitutional order where the left has seized on the constitutional order of the right to steer culture off a cliff. Conservatives view the constitution as a document on a printed page that sets out the powers of the government and the limits thereof. It restricts the government to the public sector and provides the metes and bounds description of the barrier between the public and private and the intersections of the two.

Progressives view the constitution as a living and breathing document that gives order not just to the structure of government, but also to society at large. They have largely lost the argument because they decided to score their victories in the judiciary, unable to win at the ballot box, and now Clarence Thomas presides over the Supreme Court.

As a result, progressives are playing a long game in the private sector even as conservatives are reversing the judicial fiats of the left. Now progressives have capitalized on a conservative vision of society.

Conservatives think the public sector should be constrained in its regulation of the private sector. Progressives have slowly been hiring progressives into the ranks of the Fortune 500 and are now abandoning the public sector to have the private sector do its bidding.

They would use Disney to bully Florida’s citizens as a major employer in the state. They have shaken down corporations to fund Black Lives Matter, an organization opposed to the private sector. They have used social media companies to silence conservatives where the government cannot. They have pressured companies to stop advertising in conservative spheres. They’ve advanced their agenda across corporate America and academia taking advantage of the right’s rules of lax regulation and constitutional parameters. They have seized on the libertarian argument of “if you don’t like it, go build your own” to push conservatives out of social media and private spaces while depriving those conservatives of the means to build anything new without extraordinary sums of money.

Some on the right feel a bit helpless by all this and that, I think, has pushed some into the “post-constitutional” mindset. Some see the players in Congress as unwilling to defend their own constitutional interests as members of Congress from a president of their own party. Look at Kevin McCarthy who would be Speaker of the House of Representatives and is now perfectly content a mob tried to break down the doors of the Speaker’s Lobby and storm the floor of the House of Representatives. Look at Senator Chuck Schumer who will let the President scrap Title 42 and flood the border with illegal immigrants and put his own power in jeopardy as majority leader just because Joe Biden has a “D” next to his name and progressive lobbyists would rather an illegal alien invasion than Schumer as majority leader.

We are not in a post-constitutional order, though admittedly both sides play loyalty to their party over loyalty to the constitution. Conservatives, if they want to fight back without sacrificing their values and principles, have some powerful tools at their disposal.

First, they can stop giving special interest tax breaks.

They do not have to give Disney preferential treatment. Nor do they have to extend Disney any sort of copyright protections and extensions beyond what it already has. Conservatives have long given preferential treatment in federal law to big companies because big companies were better companies. Stop.

The Fortune 500 is being used by the progressive left to advance their agenda. The Fortune 500 funds their institutions, forces its employees to suffer through the DEI training of the progressives, funds the progressives’ causes, etc. Stop allowing favorable regulation that gives the Fortune 500 advantages over smaller businesses.

Second, start looking at restrictions on private equity. The left keeps saying there is a wealth gap in the country. There actually is a growing wealth gap. In large part, it is because the rich donors of the Democratic Party have gotten out of the stock market and into private equity markets where they skirt past SEC regulations and other regulations. There is going to be serious instability. When it comes and the bubble bursts, do not bail them out. Let them go bankrupt. Republicans should avoid picking winners and losers and let them all fail, while structuring the system to make it easier for the little guy to take advantage of the creative destruction of the marketplace.

Third, legislate smartly. Much of federal control in education, etc. comes through federal funding at the state level with strings attached. Through reconciliation to bypass a filibuster, restructure that funding, and curtail what programs money can be spent on to shut out the social justice nonsense. Additionally, prohibit states that get federal funding from passing rules, orders, or laws that prohibit travel to states with competing world views.

Fourth, reject the managerial class of the GOP. Frankly, the managerial class is on the rise right now as the media gives them disproportionate attention. Whether it is Larry Hogan in Maryland or former Congressman Will Hurd of Texas, the GOP cannot push buttons and turn knobs to right the ship. The left has dragged us all into a culture war. The media says the right is the culture warrior. That war is turning black and Hispanic voters into Republicans. Push for limited government, common sense, and protect daughters and 401(K)s at the same time. Republicans can grow their tent on these social issues even as the managerial class thinks they are icky and moves left. Let them. The more the upper income white secularists go to the Democrats, the more black and Hispanic Democrats become Republican.

Fifth, be willing to recognize crazy is crazy. It absolutely is crazy to put boys on girls’ teams. It absolutely is crazy to sexualize kindergarten. It absolutely is crazy to bend to progressives because Fortune 500 companies demand it. It absolutely is in the federal government’s interest to stop giving contracts to federal contractors who force employees into DEI training sessions.

Conservatives can operate within our constitutional order, through the framework conservatism has given us of limited government, and work to level the playing field in corporate America between big and small businesses and stop humoring lobbyists. Decline is a choice. Conservatives can choose not to decline and can choose to make us thrive in our existing order and systems.

The chief power of Congress is the power of the purse. Conservatives can and should withhold federal funding and make this a fight. They need not have the White House. They can take back Congress in November and put the White House on the side of anal sex in kindergarten and boys taking over girls sports and watch the voters put a Republican in the White House.