from my blog at http://theatleeappeal.com

Kirsten Powers is a liberal contributor to Fox News and she was interviewed by AOL’s Matt Lewis this week. Matt asked Kirsten how her faith has shaped her politics. Fair question. Her answer was the quintessential foundation of modern-day liberalism: “I also now see humanity as totally interconnected and am completely anti-individualism. It’s sad that Americans believe that individualism is so great, because I really do believe we would be a better country if we held the concept of community as a higher value.” Yes. That warm, fuzzy feeling that sends “tingling sensations” up the legs of Chris Matthews, the concept of ‘we are one’. Now, on the surface it does sound utopian and wonderful. Who wouldn’t want to be in a country where everyone is stress free and happy? Reality is a female dog though. This kind of society can’t work. Ask Cuba, Venezuela, The Soviet Union, or North Korea how their extreme anti-individual, collectivist society is working or worked out.

It’s no secret that liberals loathe the individual and worship collectivism. Barack Obama claimed he wanted to “spread the wealth around” so “everyone has a fair shot“. Hillary Clinton has a couple famous quotes regarding collectivism such as: “It takes a village to raise a child.” and “We’re going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good.” Nanci Pelosi on spending tax dollars on the ‘poor’: “Stock market windfall profits taxes could go a long way to guarantee these [poor] people the standard of living they would like to have as ‘Americans.” – Of course. We must guarantee people who are too lazy or too incompetent to provide their own standard of living some sort of assurances that they will be taken care of by Big Brother. But, the most famous anti-individual in the last couple of centuries is the father of modern Communism himself, Karl Marx: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.” This is just one glaringly obvious similarity between the thought process of liberals and Karl Marx.

There are a lot of parallels you can associate between sports and political or economic philosophies. In sports, the goal is to win. However, wins are not simply guaranteed. One must put in the amount of effort necessary to put themselves in a better position than their opponent for victory. In life, a comfortable standard of living, or even riches is not guaranteed. Unless of course you are born into royalty which is a percentage of people so small it is basically meaningless. One must put in the necessary amount of effort between education and hard work in order to achieve his or her desired outcome. Now take for example the idea of collectivism where “nobody loses”, and apply it to sports. How boring would it be to watch? If you are not allowed to win, or allowed to lose, what purpose does it serve to even compete? Let alone practice. Athletes would have zero incentive to participate and you would eventually end up with no sports at all.

Switch directions. Now apply collectivism to a society. Everything is going to be great. Everyone will have a comfortable standard of living, nobody will be poor, nobody will go hungry, everyone will have a place to live, and the beer will never run out. Utopia! Well, wait a second, who is going to supply the services necessary for this type of environment? If everyone is guaranteed a place to live, who is going to put in the necessary work to build you a house or develop the materials necessary to construct one? Who’s going to put in the necessary hours to harvest crops in order to provide food? Who’s going to go through med school so they can treat diseases? Who’s going to develop new vehicles so people will have something to drive? Who’s going to develop new technologies that make life easier? Most of all, who’s going to pay for all of this? Who would want to provide a service if someone can guarantee you the exact same thing? If everyone is guaranteed a certain standard of living, there is no incentive for anyone to achieve or create anything.

Now, apply individualism to a society: If you work hard enough and smart enough, your success will be limitless. If you choose to be lazy, your poor standard of living will be of nobody’s fault but your own. Individualism is competition which is capitalism. Take cell phones for an example. This has been one of the most competitive markets of the 21st century. Apple seems to come out with a new iphone every couple of years. Why do they keep creating new products? Because there are numerous other companies who are developing the same technology at the same time. All of these companies want the same thing: To have the best technology available to their customers. The customers (you and I) benefit greatly from this. How? With so many options to choose from (iphone, Droid, Blackberry, MyTouch…etc), the overall cost of these advanced products are cheaper because of high supply, and you are able to hold more computing power in the palm of your hand than NASA had at their disposal during the Apollo launches – all in 40 years time. Now, what if the cell phone industry was based on collectivism? There would be one company (government) with one product so everyone would have the same thing. What incentive would there be to advance the technology if there is no threat of losing your customer base?

Liberals think of capitalism as a dog-eat-dog, cutthroat, and cruel-to-the-poor way of living. Capitalism is the only way for the poor to make it out of poverty. In liberalism, socialism, statism, Marxism, or whatever you want to call it, the poor have no shot at a better life. Take Ben Carson for example. He was born into poverty in Detroit. Ben graduated from high school with honors, was able to attend Yale, and went through med school at the University of Michigan. At the wizened age of 33, he became the director of Pediatric Neurosurgery at John Hopkins Hospital. Let’s just say this guy isn’t hurting for money. The best part is, you can find story after story of someone in America who went from rags to riches through hard work. Not only did Ben Carson become wealthy in the process, but his genius in neurosurgery has saved countless amounts of lives. This is the by-product of competition. He grew tired of being picked on at school at an early age for being a failure. He outworked his classmates to become an amazing success story.

America was founded on the principles of individualism. The Declaration of Independence states that “..all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” You cannot have liberty in a collectivist society. You cannot have the pursuit of happiness in a collectivist society. Why? Liberty is tied to individualism. The pursuit of happiness is tied to individualism. In collectivism, happiness is determined by the state, not by the individual. Liberals believe that government knows what is best for society and should therefore dictate the needs of the people on the basis of the “common good”. We conservatives believe that the individual knows what is best for him or her. It is the individual that created Microsoft. It is the individual that created Google. It is the individual that created Apple. It is the individual that created Wal Mart. It is the individual that created the car. It is the individual that created the plane. It is the individual that created the light bulb. America must maintain its competitive edge which allows the individual to become successful on his or her own merits if it wants to still be the world’s beacon of freedom and prosperity. The implementation of collectivism would only lead to America’s demise.