Another great day for stocks as the S&P 500 and Nasdaq make new yearly highs:
The biological determinism bull market and economic expansion rages on, with those unfit to participate being swept under the rug. There’s certainly no secular stagnation in tech as Google, Microsoft, Apple, Intuitive Surgical, and Facebook crush earnings yet again. Where’s the double dip recession the left promised? Where’s the Russian contagion? Why isn’t the consumer maxed out like it’s supposed to be due to wealth inequality being too high? lol Now more than ever, it’s a great time to be smart and rich in America. A great time to be an economist, physicist or a STEM major. So much wealth being created this year it’s mind-boggling. Everything is wonderful and nobody is happy.
I was right about Herbalife bulls stepping all over the cockroach that is Bill Ackman. The stock surged 25% after Ackman’s highly anticipated presentation fell short. Just another day of the free market winning and the libs losing.
Ross Douthat and Peter Brooks have become champions of the revived neo conservative movement, following a seven-year slump that began during Bush’s final term up until around 2013. Since 2013 with the huge rally in stocks, real estate and treasuries – in addition to the unstoppable web 2.0 boom, Obama’s falling polls and the inevitability of more high tech immigration, neo conservatism is making a comeback. Laissez-faire conservatism tends to thrive in times of wealth expansion such as today, versus traditional conservatism in bad times. These optimistic conservatives, unlike the occasionally acerbic tea party traditionalists, support globalization, deficit spending for pro-growth policy, higher education, and self-actualization. They see web 2.0 not as a useless waste of time, but a great catalyst of wealth creation that is improving our lives. They support high tech immigration, which helps drive up Bay Area home prices and, in the context of a meritocracy, allows the best and the brightest to succeed, regardless of national origin. They are open to the concept of biological determinism and how it applies to socioeconomics, as opposed to outright rejecting it – as many on the left and some on the Old Right do. The want more STEM majors, lower taxes, and support the fed in its efforts to create economic conditions optimal for the creation of wealth with QE and other programs. They want creative destruction, instead of clinging to the old obsolete ways of life and keeping dying industries on life support.
As I wrote in Roadmap for 2016, Neo conservatism or pragmatic conservatism as practiced under Reagan and George W. Bush not only represents the future of the GOP, but the best ideological path for winning national elections. George W. Bush got into office against an opponent that was arguably more competent than Obama, and on the heels of an economic and stock market boom that many attributed to Clinton and Gore. In the voting booth, Americans tend to choose tax cuts and defense over deficit reduction. Americans complain about inequality and deficit spending, but they want tax cuts and to feel safe, too. Hence, there is a disconnect between expressed voter preferences and how people actually vote, and this is how neoconservatives win. Only during the final year when the media exaggerated the supposed problems in Iraq and the overblown financial problem to get Obama elected, did Bush’s approval rating begin to nosedive. Others attribute the decline to what some perceived to be a weak response to the Hurricane Katrina disaster, but according to a bi-partisan panel experts, he did the best he could with the information and resources at his disposal. He’s not psychic.
Decades ago, liberals were the self-actualizers, now self-actualization has become appropriated by conservatives, in particular by neo conservatives. Like the agrarians of the Old Right, welfare liberals and civil libertarians (as opposed to neo liberals) want to cling to the old ways of life in the face of unrelenting prosperity and innovation. When you have some cool technology like Tesla or Facebook, without fail, its the left that has the most vocal criticism over the potential displacement of overpaid jobs, alleged crony capitalism, pollution, loss of privacy, etc. For everyone who creates, there’s a lib wanting to tear it down. The tradeoff between improved living standards and more productivity versus disruptions of the old ways of doing things is worthwhile one.
The good news is with stocks surging and the economy of Silicon Valley booming, the left is losing their war on success. With the ever-growing wage premium on high-IQ and test scores, they are losing their war on individual exceptionalism. And with America still the most important economy in the world with the lowest borrowing rates, the best consumers, the best stock market, the best fed and the best free market, they are losing their war on American exceptionalism, as well. On Wall St., in the tech companies, or on the research campuses, biology ultimately plays role in selecting who is admitted and who is rejected. How biology effects our life is inescapable, and from the moment conception, who we are cannot be changed, as much as the libs – in their war against biology and the troublesome inheritance – wish it weren’t so.