If
you are a member of the conservative movement who has been paying even a
modicum of attention, you have no doubt noticed the rise of the “Draft Ben
Carson for President” movement. The group made their first major statement by
coming in 3rd place in the CPAC 2014 straw poll, just 2 points behind the 2nd
place finisher, Texas senator Ted Cruz. Carson beat out well organized, well
known names such as Chris Christie, Paul Ryan, Rick Santorum and Marco Rubio
for the third place finish. Since that point, Carson and his loyal group of
followers have begun to create quite a wave within our movement, winning straw
polls (on the FreedomWorks Online Straw Poll he is currently in
1st place) and raising millions of dollars in the process. Anybody who listens
to Sean Hannity has undoubtedly heard the “Run, Ben, Run!” commercials on his
radio show, and anybody who goes on comment threads online cannot possibly deny
Carson’s reach and influence.
Despite
all of this excitement around a potential Carson candidacy, there exists a
major lack of knowledge about Carson’s positions on core issues. This
manifested itself most famously on the Glenn Beck program, where Carson stated
his preference that people who live in cities, not own semi-automatic weapons.
Many conservatives considered this to be a deal breaker, prompting Carson to
tack hard to the right in future statements on guns. That being said, there are
several examples of far less well known Ben Carson quotes which could prove to
be even more damaging to his potential presidential candidacy. Indeed, one
scroll through Ben Carson’s On the Issues page reveals some startling deal
breakers for any movement conservative.
Perhaps
one of Carson’s biggest challenges will be explaining to conservatives his
proposal to implement price
controls for health
insurance, a proposal that is in many ways to the left of Barack Obama’s
healthcare law. Carson calls health insurance “an ideal place for the
intervention of government regulators”, and calls on the government to
establish “standardized, regulated profit margins” for all health
insurance providers. He responds to his would be critics by asking if his plan
is “as radical as allowing a company to increase its profits by denying care to
sick individuals?”, a line of logic no different in principle than the one
given for Obamacare.
This
argument seems to demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding of how price
fixing creates shortages, leading us to the very death panels that many worry
Obamacare will lead us towards. Carson also ignores the very core value of
conservatism; the notion that free markets provide goods and services at a less
expensive rate and in a more efficient fashion than the government possibly
could. Could we expect a President Ben Carson to implement price controls on
the health insurance market? If so, it would be one of the most progressive moves
in our nation’s history.
Unfortunately,
Dr Carson’s healthcare problems do not end there. Equally disturbing is his
proposal to “remove from the insurance companies the responsibility for
catastrophic health-care coverage, making it a government
responsibility”. This
is literally the nationalization of a significant portion of the health
insurance industry, a proposal that would be far to the left of even Obamacare.
Once again, Carson seems to ignore the fact that government is inherently
inefficient, and as a result his plan would cause healthcare spending to
skyrocket. He touts his proposal as being similar to national flood insurance,
which confusingly implies that the heavily subsidized flood insurance program
(which conservative senators like Rand Paul have consistently opposed) is a
good thing for our economy. Does Ben Carson think that nationalized
catastrophic insurance will lower the cost of healthcare? If so, where else
does he think central planning is superior to the free market? Could we expect
a President Ben Carson to nationalize this part of the insurance industry? If
so, this too would be one of the most radically progressive moves in our
nations history.
Unfortunately,
Carson’s liberal attitudes towards economic policy do not end at healthcare.
Indeed, Carson has made troubling statements regarding free trade as
well, calling for “a stiff tariff on products that are manufactured in other
countries and are shipped here fully assembled, while reducing tariffs on
products that will require assembly once they reach our shores.” Carson ignores
the impact that such a policy would have on our exporters, who would likely
face retaliatory tariffs, as well as on the consumers of this country who would
be forced to pay higher prices.
We
see another example here of Ben Carson accepting a liberal premise, the notion
that the government must interfere in the marketplace to stimulate job growth,
which is of course totally at odds with any free market economic theory
imaginable. This protectionist line out of Carson makes this observer curious
about his opinion on the Burger King tax inversions. Could we expect a
President Ben Carson to crack down on companies whom he considers to be
“exporting jobs”? Such a move would lead to even more economic difficulty as
both American consumers and American exporters would suffer.
While
we have covered several economic head scratchers out of Ben Carson, probably
the most damning of all is his backwards analysis of
the 2008 financial crisis. It is Ben Carson’s contention that “we decided to
deregulate during the 1990s, paving the way for the economic meltdown in 2008”.
In other words, the free market caused the crash. This is the line of logic
that was embraced by Chris Dodd and Barney Frank when they passed the
Dodd-Frank Act, as well as pretty much every progressive on both sides of the
aisle in the wake of the financial crisis. It is, of course, completely
distorted and ignorant of the government’s role in creating the crisis through
passage of the Community Reinvestment Act, which encouraged the subprime
lending.
The
fact that Carson so readily embraces the notion that deregulation caused the
economic collapse causes you to wonder if he would cut any regulation at all as
president. The fact that he believes the free market, left unchecked, is what
caused the crisis causes you to wonder about his commitment to conservative
economic principles in general. Would Ben Carson rein in the IRS, or would he
be too crippled by this false notion in his head that deregulation creates
chaos? Would Carson make any push at all to repeal Dodd-Frank, or would his pro
regulatory stance lead him to support such a bill? When a potential presidential
candidate does not stand up for the core economic principles that our movement
stands for, it should be a deal breaker to anybody who values those principles.
Ben
Carson’s seeming distrust for freedom extends past the economic realm, and into
the constitutional realm as well. When discussing the
Westboro Baptist Church’s picketing of funerals, which the Supreme Court
(rightfully, for once) has ruled is protected under freedom of assembly, Carson
stated that “I actually have some doubts about that legal decision, because the
signs, obscenity, and noise infringe upon the rights of other Americans to
assemble peacefully for the burial of one of their loved ones.” Ben Carson
believes in changing the 1st Amendment in this case, saying “if my right to
free speech causes you actual harm, it becomes time to curtail my speech.” If
Ben Carson does not believe the Westboro Baptist Church should have their right
to assemble uninfringed, can we trust him to protect Tea Party groups who are
targeted by liberal elements of their government? Can we trust him to protect
any form of unpopular speech by any ideological minority? Between this callous
lack of respect for the first amendment and his prior comments regarding
limiting the second amendment, Carson’s commitment to constitutional principles
is seriously in question.
Ben
Carson’s comments on gun control caused a splash in the media because they were
broadcasted over a major radio show, but should he decide to run for president
he will have to answer for much more than that. His stated liberal stances on
health care, government regulation, free markets and the constitution make it
hard to imagine many tea partiers sticking around once they learn more about
Carson’s positions. A tea party movement born in the wake of the financial
crisis will not like to hear that it was the free market and not government
policy which caused the crisis. A tea party movement that largely grew as a reaction
to Obamacare will not like to hear that the solution to the healthcare crisis
is to regulate the profit margins of insurance companies and nationalize
catastrophic insurance. A tea party movement that sustains itself on
constitutional principles will not like to hear that we need to restrict the
first amendment rights of groups whom we find abhorrent. The bottom line is
this: Ben Carson has a history of extreme liberal statements that will
undoubtedly cause a problem for him should he decide to run in 2016. The
question is, when will it happen, and how?
Source:
http://blog.libertyconservatives.com/ben-carson-counterfeit-conservative/
No comments:
Post a Comment