The Rod Martin Report – May 1, 2017 

The Best Presidential Tax Plan of Our Lifetime
100 Days Wrap-Up (including our Top 75 Accomplishments list)
Polls Polls Polls
What’s Next?
Obamacare Repeal: Who’s to Blame, How to Stick It to Them
“Hacking” North Korea’s Missiles (?)
Our Schadenfreude Section
May Day



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Dear Friends,

As with every week in the Trump era — and we are the proverbial 100 days into it now (more on that in a bit) — there’s simply more to talk about than we can cover. So let’s dive in and see how much damage we can do.

On Wednesday, Donald Trump announced the best, most conservative tax plan of any President in our lifetime. That may sound like an overstatement. It genuinely isn’t.

Rod D. Martin

The brilliance of this plan — as much politics as policy — is that it doesn’t appear to do exactly what it does, which is, it creates a de facto 15% flat tax for virtually anyone who wishes to opt in. It does a lot more than that, but let’s start there.

1. By taking the highest corporate tax in the industrialized world and slashing it to the lowest (15%), plus providing a one time chance to repatriate income and a territorial system thereafter, Trump will immediately bring home about $2 trillion in American capital for investment, and incentivize the whole world to follow.

That’s a very, very big deal, that will make it difficult for America’s competitors to keep up.

2. By then applying that same 15% rate — which is less than most people tip these days — to small businesses (which is to say, pass-through entities), he adds a dose of populism: who is going to want to argue that Mom and Pop’s Grocery should be taxed at 39.4% while ExxonMobil gets 15%?

This is just brilliant: it puts Democrats and RINOs (but I repeat myself) in a no-win situation.

3. That 15% rate incentivizes the formation of countless small businesses — the companies that create the large majority of America’s jobs — and gives their owners a big, personal stake in the free market and the philosophy of Capitalism. It also incentivizes as many employees as can manage it to become independent contractors (as the leftist New York Times laments here).

If vast numbers of people become independent contractors (think Uber), that helps force the transition to portable health coverage. It also drives a stake through the heart of leftist labor unions.

4. By eliminating all but the two most important deductions (charitable contributions and mortgage interest), Trump’s plan provides massive tax simplification, which will dramatically reduce the size of the tax code and the cost of compliance. Most Americans will literally be able to fill out their taxes on a single page.

Accountants, tax lawyers and lobbyists will need to find actual productive work, which is a very big step toward #DrainingTheSwamp.

5. Finally, by leaving a steeply progressive system in place — a standard deduction of $24,000, with brackets of 10%, 25% and 35% — Trump gives the appearance of doing nothing truly radical, and further incentivizes everything I just said (because who will be dumb enough to pay 35% when they can pay 15%?).

Did I mention that $24,000 standard deduction? Trump’s plan also kills the abominable Death Tax and AMT, about which I’ve written in horror for years. Throw in immediate full expensing instead of the byzantine depreciation schedules and Trump’s plan would skyrocket investment, entrepreneurship, and employment like nothing we’ve ever seen, even Ronald Reagan.

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Oh, and just for good measure? To quote my buddy Jack Wheeler, “the kicker is that it screws the high tax Blue States. Being unable to deduct state income taxes from your federal is a great incentive for the Blues to reduce their tax thievery, or for you to move out of them.”

Yes, every part of this plan is designed not only to ease its own adoption, but to undermine the left while incentivizing productivity, creativity and independence from the statists.

And even at all that, I’m leaving out the best part: it’s the biggest tax cut in American history.

Will it pass? Well, let’s ask that another way: after all we’ve been through, are you really ready to bet heavily against Donald Trump?

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Not shockingly, the Democrat-NeverTrump Axis was pretty unimpressed with Trump’s first 100 days. But that’s more sour grapes than reality.

We’ve already talked about the tax plan. There’s also Trump’s budget, the most conservative budget in our lifetime. That budget entirely eliminates 19 federal agencies, nearly all of them giant leftist slush funds or propaganda arms like NPR, the NEA, Legal Services Corporation and the Orwellian “U.S. Institute of Peace”, your tax dollars being used daily against you.

It’s a start. And it’s a start you never got from the Bushes.

Trump’s opponents say that mere proposals aren’t achievements. But neither of those proposals can become law if a President doesn’t first propose them, and let’s be honest: no other Republican President in our lifetime — and certainly no Democrat — has done any such thing.

Ergo, both are already a pretty big deal. “Big league” even.

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Speaking of NPR, the state media organ ran a story this week called “In Trump’s First 100 Days, A Dramatic Reduction in Immigration“, in which leftists are Shocked! Shocked! to discover that enforcing the law works, and clearly stating your intent to enforce the law deters people from breaking it.

Amazing stuff, huh?

Meanwhile, while Trump fought the Democrats and RINOs to get funding for his border wall — McCain and company complain that it busts the budget, even though they were utterly unconcerned about Obama doubling the national debt, and even though it would be just 0.035% of federal spending — Ted Cruz offered up a solution that reminded everyone why we love him: build the wall with $14 billion in assets seized from Mexican drug lord “El Chapo”.

Nice.

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It wasn’t just the southern border that improved significantly in Trump’s first 100 days. According to The Guardian, ISIS is suffering from “an exodus of foreign fighters as its ‘caliphate’ crumbles.” This comes on the heels of news that Trump is pounding ISIS so hard that the U.S. is literally running out of bombs.

That’s pretty cool all by itself. But I note this for a completely different reason: the long-running assertion last year by Hillary Clinton, NeverTrumpers and the Enemedia that “Donald Trump is ISIS’s best recruiter.

100 days in, I guess we can chalk that bit of absurd demagoguery right up there with “Nobel Prize-winning economist” Paul Krugman’s promise that if Trump won, “markets will never recover.”

In case you missed it, the NASDAQ hit an all-time high this week.

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Larry Elder adds convincingly to these points that Trump’s biggest 100 days achievement is stopping the left. I encourage you to read his piece. But some of you may be looking for something more concrete.

Obviously, I aim to please. So how about a few of the highlights (in part, courtesy of my friend Gary Bauer), in the form of a list of Donald Trump’s Top 75 Accomplishments in His First 100 Days:

1. Justice Neil Gorsuch, an originalist committed to the Constitution, whose appointment means the left won’t tip the balance of power in America permanently against the Founders’ vision and won’t be able to shred the First and Second Amendments. (Oh, and note well: just yesterday, Trump announced his next Supreme Court pick will come from the same list he announced during the campaign.)

2. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, a conservative committed to the rule of law.

3. Counselor to the President Kellyanne Conway, perhaps the smartest, savviest conservative I know.

4. Legislative Director Paul Teller, former leader of the conservatives in the U.S. House and former Chief of Staff for Ted Cruz, a real warrior for the cause.

5. The extraordinary team of Defense Secretary James “Mad Dog” Mattis, National Security Adviser Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster and Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly.

6. The truly excellent U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley and U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman.

7. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, a former CEO who understands how the real world works.

8. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson, a brain surgeon from an humble background, who has already uncovered over $500 billion in Obama-era “accounting errors” at HUD.

9. Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price, another doctor and committed conservative healthcare reformer. And perhaps even better than Price, Charmaine Yoest, former President of Americans United for Life, as Assistant Secretary.

10. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, a top advocate of school choice and educational reform.

11. Energy Secretary Rick Perry and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, men who know how to get things done and who are committed to ending Obama’s war on business.

12. EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, the committed Christian conservative and former Oklahoma Attorney General who repeatedly sued the EPA over its unconstitutional overreaches.

13. White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon, a conservative warrior and brilliant communications strategist, whatever his detractors may say (and regardless of whether I always agree with him).

14. Restoration of America’s alliance with Israel and hosting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for talks at the White House.

15. Enforcement of Obama’s “red line” against the use of chemical weapons in Syria and the brilliant master stroke against Russia, China, Iran and North Korea that simultaneously represented (see our April 15 “Rod Martin Report” for details).

16. Succeeded in getting our freeloading NATO allies to boost defense spending by $10 billion so far, with more to come.

17. Secured Chinese cooperation in pressuring North Korea, something all his predecessors had failed to do.

18. Secured release of Aya Hijazi, an American charity worker held in Egypt since 2014, left to rot by an incompetent and unconcerned Obama.

19. Imposed a five-year ban on lobbying the U.S. government by former White House officials.

20. Imposed a lifetime ban on lobbying for foreign governments by former White House officials.

21. Repeatedly stood up for conservatives and called out the liberal media for their dishonest reporting, something you can rest assured few other Republicans would be doing.

22. Halted more than $180 billion in regulations.

23. Repealed Obama’s unconstitutional mandate forcing states to fund Planned Parenthood.

24. Signed executive order reinstating Reagan’s Mexico City Policy banning taxpayer funding of overseas abortions.

25. Cut off all U.S. funding of the evil United Nations Population Fund, which promotes forced abortions and “population control”.

26. Signed executive order establishing “extreme vetting.”

27. Signed executive order requiring a comprehensive plan to defeat ISIS.

28. Signed executive order for construction of the border wall and 5,000 new border agents.

29. Signed executive order directing the Justice Department to cut off funding to sanctuary cities.

30. Signed executive order initiating a federal hiring freeze.

31. Signed executive order withdrawing from the abominable Trans-Pacific Partnership.

32. Signed executive order reducing enforcement of Obamacare to the greatest extent possible.

33. Signed executive order requiring two regulations be repealed for every new one issued.

34. Signed executive orders requiring a comprehensive approach to illegal immigration and crime and increased penalties for crimes against police.

35. Signed executive orders promoting energy independence, just this Friday reversing Obama’s restrictions on offshore drilling, and prioritizing American companies and workers.

36. Signed executive order mandating review of federal education regulations.

37. Signed executive order investigating national security impact of foreign steel imports.

38. Signed executive order requiring an audit of executive branch agencies.

39. Signed executive order creating a regulatory reform task force in every federal agency.

40. Signed executive order rolling back Obama environmental infringements on private property.

41. Signed executive order to prevent future taxpayer-funded bailouts.

42. Signed executive order calling for a major review of national monument designations on federal lands, which have been greatly abused by both Clinton and Obama to “permanently” nationalize large areas and prevent energy development.

43. Signed executive order establishing a new office to reform the Veterans Administration bureaucracy.

44. Signed executive order establishing White House Initiative on Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

45. Signed executive order creating a commission on the opioid crisis, which as we’ve reported is in too large part a function of our unlawfully open border.

46. Signed executive order to combat transnational criminal organizations and international trafficking.

47. Repealed the transgender public school bathroom mandate.

48. Repealed the fake “Stream Protection Rule” aimed at destroying the coal industry.

49. Repealed the Social Security Administration’s gun ban.

50. Repealed the Labor Department “blacklisting” rule with $500 million in regulatory costs.

51. Repealed Interior Department rule that restricted state and local authority in land use decisions.

52. Repealed unfunded education mandate that imposed ludicrous overreaching “standards” on teachers, and repealed education rules undermining state and local control.

53. Repealed regulation that prevented drug testing for unemployment compensation.

54. Repealed an Obama hunting ban in Alaska.

55. Repealed regulation that created vastly more paperwork and reporting of worker injuries.

56. Repealed regulations on Internet Service Providers.

57. Repealed rule that allowed states to force workers into government-run savings plans.

58. Repealed Dodd-Frank regulations that disadvantaged domestic companies.

59. Imposed sanctions on Iran for its ballistic missile violations and for human rights violations, both of which Obama pretended to care about but actually did nothing.

60. Ordered a review of Obama’s horrible Iranian nuclear deal.

61. Approved construction of the Keystone XL pipeline.and the Dakota Access pipeline.

62. Shut down Obama’s illegal immigrant advocacy program at the Department of Justice.

63. Established Victims of Immigration Crime Engagement (VOICE) office.

64. Reduced illegal immigration by an unprecedented 73%, even before building the wall.

65. Initiated a “major investigation” of voter fraud led by Vice President Mike Pence.

66. Sought repeal of the evil and unconstitutional Johnson Amendment, which limits free speech of pastors and churches.

67. Called for a 50% cut in funding to the United Nations.

68. Signed legislation expanding private healthcare options for veterans.

69. Relaxed Obama’s obscenely restrictive Rules of Engagement in the fight against ISIS.

70. Imposed sanctions on the socialist Venezuelan vice president for international drug trafficking.

71. Named former Congressman Scott Garrett, an outspoken critic of the Export-Import Bank, to be the bank’s Chairman and President.

72. Ordered renegotiation of North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with Canada and Mexico.

73. Supported English as our official language by dropping the Spanish version of the White House website.

74. Purged “climate change” alarmism from the White House website.

75. Returned the bust of Winston Churchill to the Oval Office.

Woohoo!

And that’s in addition to the budget and tax proposals we’ve already discussed. It also ignores the obvious results of the new order, in which businesses don’t have to assume their government is waging war against them.

The NASDAQ is at an all-time high
, and the Dow has set an all-time high, with markets up over 15% since the election. Consumer confidence is at its highest level in 17 years; small business confidence is at an 11 year high.

Seemingly every day, companies announce huge new investments in America: ExxonMobil just announced a $20 billion, 45,000 job expansion in the U.S. Charter Communications announced a $25 billion expansion, creating 20,000 U.S. jobs. Accenture announced a $1.4 billion expansion, creating 15,000 new U.S. jobs. Intel announced a $7 billion expansion, creating 10,000 U.S. jobs.

The list goes on and on. And what’s truly remarkable — especially to me, a reluctant Trump supporter who exclusively backed the Southern Baptist candidates in 2016 — is that it’s a list of promises kept.

In politics more than in most things, that’s…extraordinary. But while we’re extolling truth-telling, we also need to scold those who would pretend Donald Trump’s first 100 days was uneventful, or even a failure. In point of fact, it would be hard to think of a more successful, more jam-packed 100 days in modern times.

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By the way, if you listen to the Enemedia, you’ll start to believe that Trump is losing his base. But then, if you’re still listening to the Enemedia after last year, you’re too dumb to live.

If you’ve been reading the Rod Martin Report over the last year, you know my criticisms of several of the major polls. All of those — which center above all else on a constant and dishonest oversampling of Democrats — still apply, especially to the awful ABC/WaPo poll.

So when that nightmare presents good news for us, it’s not just a miracle: it’s probably true (and truer than stated).

The latest edition puts Trump’s approval at 42%, which is about 5 points lower than the more accurate Rasmussen. So that’s our baseline for this discussion.

The ABC/WaPo poll finds that only 2% of Trump voters regret their vote, which means all the unceasing negativity is coming from the losers. And the same poll finds that if the election were re-run today, Trump would beat Clinton in the popular vote by a substantial margin.

Now, just imagine if they took an honest sample.

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Speaking of Rasmussen, the good news is that, contrary to what you’ve been told, nearly two-thirds of Americans still believe in Capitalism, while just 14% prefer Socialism, though only a minority of Democrats say Capitalism is better and 24% consider themselves Socialists.

42% of Democrats believe their party’s efforts to oppose Trump are a flop; just 16% are happy.

Voters are broadly supportive of Trump’s tax plan, as a whole and in detail.

Oh, and a year ago, just 29% said the U.S. was on the right track. Last week, that number hit 42%, for the first time in memory.

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So what’s next? Well, almost everything.

Rumors are rife in Washington of another Supreme Court vacancy this summer, and as I told you, Trump just promised to stick to his public list beyond merely replacing Scalia. That could mean the most dramatic shift in the Court since 1937, and a new era of Constitutional government.

There will surely be more #DrainingTheSwamp. Just this past week, Secretary Tillerson announced plans to clear out 2,300 career bureaucrats at State, and slash the department’s budget by 31%. This is revolutionary, not just in efficiency but in getting rid of a huge number of people who represent anything but America’s own interests.

And of course, there are bigger reforms ahead. Trump just won over the Freedom Caucus on the new and improved healthcare reform bill. The reports of that effort’s death were greatly exaggerated. He’s also taking a serious look at breaking up the over-large, overly-leftist Ninth Circuit, a reform long overdue.

Oh, and yesterday, House Financial Services Chairman Jeb Hensarling said that he and the President fully intend to repeal Dodd Frank, and even consider privatizing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, ending “Too Big To Fail” and a host of other regulatory and economic nightmares.

Trump won’t get everything he wants. But six months ago I had my doubts about how much he’d even try.

I don’t anymore.

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You were probably pretty frustrated — as I was — over the first round of “repeal and replace”, which obviously didn’t get anyone where they wanted to go and died an ugly death. Trump’s agreement with the Freedom Caucus is a great step forward (and Paul Ryan’s failure the first time around was a great blow to his speakership).

It’s important to understand why things are going more slowly on this than the Pubs repeatedly promised us: RINOs of the “Tuesday Group.”

These are the so-called “centrists” who happily voted to totally repeal Obamacare in January 2016 — when it cost them nothing — but now join with Democrats in claiming any meaningful reform is “extreme.”

As if a system that hiked my personal insurance premiums 126% last year alone isn’t “extreme”.

As my buddy Jack Wheeler puts it, “Obamacare is a 2,300-page law with 20,000 pages of rules, all of which have no Constitutional authority whatever. The whole stinking cowpie should be buried in a deep hole – but it can’t because the UniParty needs the life-support of the $3.1 billion K Street lobbyists spend on them, and K Street wallows in cowpies.”

To which I would just add that it ain’t all of them: just these RINOs. And there’s an election coming sooner than you think.

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But Jack also points out that it would be easy to stick it to these guys, with the most poetic of justice.

As you know, Congress is exempt from Obamacare. But the exemption is illegal: “In 2013, Zero ordered the OPM (Office of Personnel Management) to classify Congress as a small business with less than 50 employees (it has thousands), making it exempt from Obamacare rules.”

As Jack says, “All Trump has to do is order the classification withdrawn – and note that those Congressmen and Senators who fraudulently applied for the House and Senate exemption as a small business broke a law punishable by five years in prison.”

And that’s one of oh so many reasons I love Jack Wheeler. Check him out, at To the Point News.

 

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By the way, on Friday, Donald Trump became the first President since Ronald Reagan — in 1983 — to address the NRA‘s annual convention. If you missed the speech, you missed out (my favorite bit? “You came through for me, and I’m going to come through for you”). Take a look.

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In case you missed it, the North Koreans attempted another missile launch, which plunged into the sea just like the last one.

Various parties are suggesting America hacked the NORK missiles (which is odd, because I thought the only people who could possibly hack anything, ever, were the Russians).

I honestly have no idea whether this is true. But it’s terribly significant.

As we’ve detailed previously, the NORKs are likely bluffing about the threat they claim to pose. We have to take them seriously, of course, because when someone’s pointing a gun at you, you have to assume it’s loaded. But even if it is, there’s a very real limit to the North Korean threat.

There is not, however, a meaningful limit to the threat posed by Russia and, to a lesser degree, China. Their nuclear arsenals could literally wipe us out, and our current generation of missile defense is not capable of shooting down everything, or even most, of what they can launch.

So while neither country is the sort of threat they were during the Cold War, neither is exactly our friend, and both have to be taken seriously. To that end, deterrence is key: the certainty that if either attacks, (a) we can attack back, and overwhelmingly so; and (b) we can shoot down at least some of what they can launch, reducing certainty that they can achieve a knock-out blow.

The idea that America can hack the NORKs’ missiles greatly enhances deterrence, because it introduces a stark element of uncertainty. Can Kim — or Xi, or Vlad — afford to shoot their wad to no effect, and then wait helplessly for Trump to burn them down? No, they cannot. And whether or not the capability exists, now all three have to wonder.

It’s that sort of wondering that kept the world in one piece for the last 70 years. And this particularly brilliant sort of doubt/persuasion is pretty much classic Trump.

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Only a short Schadenfreude Section this week, though the NORK news above has to count. A few highlights:

1. Barack Obama announced plans to deliver a $400,000 speech to a top Wall Street firm last week…and oops he did it again, with a second speech announced this Thursday, presumably with more to come.

Top Democrats — who supported the Clintons class warfare hypocrisy, cashing out everything they could get their hands on — were aghast. Apparently they believed Obama’s socialism was “pure“.

Oops.

2. At a moment when even half of Democrats think their party is out of touch (and Obama just added a few more of them), it’s no wonder that Nancy Pelosi just drew a Sanders-supporting primary challenger. No polling on that race yet, but hey, it’s San Francisco.

3. Meanwhile, no doubt in an attempt to shore up the Sanders-loving base, new DNC Chair Tom Perez delivered a curse-laden speech in which he declared that pro-lifers are unwelcome in and will receive no support from the Democrat Party.

Obviously that’s not a shock to most of us. But it’s such a “little tent” approach in a party that’s shrinking so much it lost Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin to Donald Trump that even Pelosi felt the need to correct Perez.

Problem is, Perez is right. And it gets worse:

4. Barack Obama took a moment in his first post-White House speech to explain that everyone who’s against illegal immigration isn’t “automatically racist.”

Gee, thanks there fella. Appreciate that.

5. And while Dem leaders were doing their best to alienate everyone in sight, a new report finds that, contrary to their (delusional, widespread) belief, Hillary did not lose due to a failure to turn out the base: rather, she lost because she could not persuade outside her base.

Key quote from the story: “I really do believe that we should reject this idea that if we just focus on turnout and the Democratic base that that will be enough. If that really is our approach, we’re going to lose six or seven Senate seats in this election.

Why is that the key quote? Because of this one: “That debate is complicated because some Democrats think winning over voters is already a lost cause.

It’s always nice when your opponents commit suicide.

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Today is May Day, and so we conclude this Report with a remembrance of what that means, and why violent “protester” thugs are wrecking things all over the world today (as they do every year).

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You would probably never have heard of Karl Marx had it not been for V.I. Lenin. Marx was neither terribly successful nor terribly important in his own right, and had it not been for a revolution carried out three decades after his death, he would be a footnote at best.

But on this May Day, the high holy day of Communism and Socialism, it is important that we remember.

You still hear it said from time to time that “communism wouldn’t have been so bad if it had been carried out like Marx suggested, without all that junk from Lenin and Stalin.” And in a sense, one can forgive these apologists for their ignorance, because in fact, Marx never produced a political program per se. The entirety of his plan for his new world order was contained in ten short points — nothing more than slogans, really — in his very first “book”, the Communist Manifesto. He never defined them further. He never saw a need. Marx had grander work in mind.

He was producing a religion.

Marx, the anti-Semitic Jew, the hater of Christianity and all it stood for, created an entire atheology. It was, in the words of James Billington, “fire in the minds of men.” Marx sought to turn the old order on its head, to regenerate mankind through chaos. He preached a dialectical view of history which he claimed had turned Hegel “right-side up” and which, at root, embraced ancient dualism. He propounded a materialism borrowed from Feuerbach which reduced man to a mechanistically-determined automaton, mere “matter in motion.” He wedded to this a naively classical interpretation of the labor theory of value to produce his economics, and a utopian view of the state which said man, morally neutral and therefore perfectible, could be utterly re-made — regenerated, or saved — by a state or party empowered to completely mold his environment.

To all of this he added an eschatology of victory, a certainty of success raised to the level of first principle, of dogma, of prerequisite faith. It is forever worth noting that Whittaker Chambers, even when he embraced freedom, believed without question that he was abandoning the winning side. The contagiousness of the Communist faith was such that virtually everyone at the time agreed.

The tenor of the “worker’s paradise” to come was already apparent in Marx’s own dictatorial leadership of the International Workingmen’s Association. But once in the hands of a state, Communist atheology became thoroughly consistent with its presuppositions. Since the individual man was just a biological machine, he could be discarded at will. Since good and evil were entirely relative, they could be defined entirely by the party and therefore by the state. Since the state/party could and must regenerate man and build the paradise to come, its power must be absolute and unquestioned.

And since victory was inevitable, millions could and would surrender their individuality, their families, even their lives, without a fight.

Marx’s atheology produced the greatest idol of all, the omnipotent state. This idol appealed to men more than any other in history, because it made all morality relative and gave ambitious men the means to become gods themselves. But it also appealed precisely because it was not an idol of stone or wood, but of power: prayers to it could be answered, needs and greeds fulfilled. And because it indulged all of man’s basest instincts while ever appealing to his noblest motives, it was exactly the sort of god man wanted to create: a god in his own image, a god in whom he could participate, dictating to his neighbor.

The pieces of Marx’s puzzle weren’t new: his work was but the logical conclusion of left-wing Enlightenment humanism, and had roots as old as Pharaoh; and it was left to others — Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Che — to carry out his vision.

Yet Marx’s creation proved to be one of the most successful false gods of all time. In its heyday enslaving more than half the world (and nearly taking the rest), its tenets remain the dominant faith of much of the world’s ruling elite.

That is itself a terrifying thought. Marxism in the 20th Century killed a hundred million people, and sent easily two billion more to hell. It withered whatever it touched; and it frankly touched us all.

Nothing has taught us better than Marxism the danger of holding false presuppositions, even in the absence of a clear political program. Men may embrace the truth, or embrace a lie. The difference between the American Revolution and the Russian is the difference between worlds; and it is that better world — Reagan’s beloved “city on a hill” — which we must advance, for the sake of all mankind.

That is the real lesson of May Day.

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You can read about the world anywhere. You come to RodMartin.org to understand it
. The Rod Martin Report was the most accurate analysis of 2016. Do your friends a favor and pass it along; and remember, there’s a lot more we publish each week that doesn’t make the newsletter.

For Freedom,

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You can read about the world anywhere. You come to RodMartin.org to understand it.

 

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