Pragmatic Morality

Conservatives are all up in arms over what they perceive as the return of the "nanny state" because of the stimulus package. They fear near permanent status of many of the spending programs in the ARRA. Whether they are right or wrong remains to be seen.

A lot remains to be seen over the coming years. Severe economic downturns produce sea changes in mentalities and I am fascinated (both from a positive and a negative viewpoint) to watch and participate it.

On the negative front, I'm worried that the drop in fast food prices will force lower income people to make horrible dietary choices because organics are too expensive. Fundamentally changing our agricultural business model to enable better food might not rise to the top of the priority list and in a generation we'll have even worse problems with yet another round of kids being raised on the poison that inhabits the average American diet. I also worry that many states (as well as the federal government) will raise the "vice" taxes to increase revenue. I actually don't have a personal problem with increased taxes on cigarettes and alcohol (and I consume both), but tying critical projects to consumption of substances that states are also trying to decrease will be problematic.

But on a positive note, I'm already starting to see some of my pet issues get looked at in the name of pragmatic budgeting. Five states are considering repealing the death penalty due to its cost. I am ideologically opposed to the death penalty, but if budget cutting that gets it off the books, I'll take what I can get. Connecticut is looking to repeal its Sunday ban on alcohol sales to increase tax revenues. This puritanical holdover should go the way of the dodo as it always seemed to encourage drunk driving since the dawn of the Sunday football game. And Washington is considering privatizing liquor stores so as not to have to take the cost on the state budget. Why a state would want to run a liquor store rather than just set the regulations has always been confusing to me.

How far behind can the legalization—or at least decriminalization—of marijuana be? The cost of prosecuting pot simply doesn't seem to be pragmatic in these times. For the record, I don't really enjoy pot and wouldn't even if it was legalized. I just think it's a ridiculous substance to prohibit to adults. The only reason I can see to keep it illegal is that it's not currently possible to test whether someone (a driver, an airline pilot, a doctor) is impaired at this moment in time, the way you can with alcohol. But once that can be established, what is the remaining argument against legalization? I'll be very surprised if we don't start seeing this debated seriously as a cost-cutting/revenue-raising issue.

Of course all of these types of issues will give rise to a huge outcry from the social conservatives that bad economic times shouldn't degrade our "moral fiber." And the responsibility of constraining the social conservatives will fall to the fiscal conservatives who claim that Republicans aren't really representative of conservatives. Because all of these small examples are as illustrative of a "nanny state" as are the programs liberals pushed for in the stimulus package. If conservatives want to seriously take back their party, they need to be consistent on all aspects of the limited government they claim to want so much.