Marshall Dillon – Doing the Wrong thing for the Right Reason

Some of us older folks grew up watching a television show named Gunsmoke. Marshall Dillon was always the good guy. Inevitably there were always at least two bad guys getting into an argument in Miss Kitty’s bar, the Longhorn Saloon. She and the Marshall seemed to have a thing for each other. Anyway when the dusty bad guys would drink a little too much firewater at the Long Branch Saloon they inevitably got into highly intellectual discussions and heated debates. On many shows the first cowboy accused the second of having an ugly horse. Can you imagine such a provocation! This led to both cowboys going into the street, drawing their six guns, with the result that one of them ended up being dragged away by Chester, Mr. Dillon’s sidekick. This was where we Boomers first learned about doing the wrong thing for the right reason. No good man could let the reputation of his horse be soiled. So the right thing was to protect the reputation of your steed. But please, killing someone to protect your horse seems a little extreme. I don’t know if this kind of thing really happened out West in those days, but if it did, it seems pretty hard to defend on the surface of it.

Don’t get me wrong. I am not against extreme actions and even killing has its place. Getting Hitler and/or Bin Laden are examples of doing the right things for the right reasons. But I am against wrong things even if they are for the right reasons.

So let’s get to it. Many democrats often say they stick up for the poor and the middle class.  That’s almost a way to identify or define democrats. They never let a good party or a drink go by without mentioning all the good things they want to do for the poor. I think it is a good thing that democrats play this role. It is the right thing for the right reason.

Republicans often stick up for entrepreneurs and investors – big or small. They worry about the free enterprise system and they defend the Constitution. You won’t be in a golf foursome of republicans and not hear how they defended the capitalist system. I think this a good thing that republicans play that role.

So let’s begin this little story by admitting that our government representatives have good goals. I doubt that you would ever hear many democrats say that he or she wanted to ruin the capitalist system. And I don’t think republicans want to hurt or punish the poor. Both sides have admirable goals.

While there are often political and economic tradeoffs as the democrats and republicans duke it out for their chosen constituencies year after year, the result of all this politicking is an economy that generally grows and provides jobs and is one in which some groups get more entitlements than others and some people pay higher taxes than the rest. These results kind of ebb and flow: During one time period the pendulum may swing toward more benefits for the poor and middle class and typically that phase will be followed by a time when the opposite occurs.

The trouble comes when we have years like this year in which these politicians simply do the wrong thing even though they are, as usual, doing these things for the right reasons.  Take the republicans first. In trying to protect the economy they want to see major cuts in government spending. They believe that taxes should not be part of the solution for a large debt because they believe future government will figure out ways to spend all that tax revenue and more and soon we will be back with debt growing. I see nothing wrong with that position. But in a time when republicans are a minority of the government they cannot enforce their will. The usual thing when you are a minority is to forge a compromise where you try to get most of what you want. Trying to do more than that can be very harmful. In addition, while the long-run health of the economy requires a significant cut in spending, doing so too much too soon could jeopardize the speed and strength of the current economic recovery. They were doing the wrong thing when they held the debt ceiling hostage.

You Rs are now wanting Marshall Dillon to shoot me down on Main Street. So let me now turn to the D’s. In trying to protect old people, college students, poor people, union people, and people who do not own their own jets, they are doing the right thing. Those people have seen their incomes and wealth fall both in absolute and relative terms. These people are struggling and it is good that the Ds point this out and represent their interests. 

But even some of the wackiest Ds have to appreciate that the poor, the elderly, students, and others regular folks would do a bunch better if the entrepreneurs and investors were a lot more optimistic about the future. Aiming their ammo at higher taxes for the latter does little to help the people they really want to help. And a lack of sincere and specific attention to limiting government spending does not help solve longer-term issues. Sticking their heels into the mud on entitlements and holding tightly to higher taxes on the rich seems the wrong approach. While the Ds hold the majority of the government now, their own tenacious approach just hardens the rigidity of the Rs. The Rs cannot win but they can surely make sure that we all lose.

Why is it so hard for all of these government representatives to see what history shows us? The rich and the poor are not mortal enemies. If anything they are co-conspirators and jointly derive benefits when the right things are done for the right reasons. It is true that in any given time period, they do not share equally in the benefits, but I am guessing that they do better when they work together than when they treat each other like the cowboys did in Dodge City. When the economy is doing well most of this stuff happens:

                

                Employment and incomes rise across all income classes

                

                Poverty in both absolute and relative terms declines

                

               Government spending on entitlements automatically decrease as fewer people are unemployed and people move out of poverty

               

                Government revenues increase as people and companies earn more incomes and pay more taxes

None of these things are happening now and won’t be happening in the near future so long as both parties do the wrong things for the right reasons. A deal has been made and so far the economic consequences suggest that doing the wrong things for the right reasons is not fooling anyone. As we move to the next stages of debt and deficit resolution we can only hope that all sides come to understand that a divide and conquer approach will do nothing but impoverish us all.