Is it immoral to vote for either Obama or McCain?

Imagine if Barack Obama were running on a platform of confiscating 75 percent of the income of Chinese Americans as punishment for being too studious. Also imagine if John McCain were running on a platform of confiscating 60 percent of the income of East-Indian Americans as punishment for being too industrious.

Would you vote for either of them?

I assume that you’d say no, because you’d find both platforms to be reprehensible and immoral, even if the confiscation were allowed under the law and supported by a majority of voters. Moreover, I assume that you wouldn’t vote for McCain just because his confiscation would be less than Obama’s.

Okay, if my assumptions are true, we’ve now established three principles:
(1) that it is wrong to vote for a candidate who advocates an immoral policy;
(2) that just because a policy is legal and supported by the majority of voters in a so-called nation of laws, it is not necessarily moral; and
(3) that it is wrong to choose the lesser of two evils.

Having established the three principles, let’s now look at the actual platforms of the two presidential candidates. We’ll focus only on the moral question of confiscation and not on other moral questions, such as war and abortion. The reason for this selectivity is that if the candidates’ platforms don’t pass moral muster on confiscation, there is no need to examine the more complicated questions, for a failing grade on the one question would be reason enough to withhold your vote.

Both candidates advocate confiscatory policies that are similar in kind but not necessarily degree to the hypothetical policies in the opening paragraph--that is, they advocate confiscating money from politically weak or politically out-of-favor classes of Americans for the direct benefit of politically strong and politically favored classes and special interests.

The most egregious example is their policy of sending a bill of nearly $1 million to each American under the age of 18 for the unfunded liabilities of entitlements. In other words, they are planning to confiscate the future earnings of children in order to appease the well-organized members of AARP, many of whom are financially well-off and don’t fall under the Christian precept of helping the poor. As a result, today’s children will face tax rates of 60-75 percent as adults, according to reliable estimates.

If you believe that it would be wrong to confiscate 60 percent of the income of East-Indian Americans and 75 percent of the income of Chinese Americans, then to be morally and intellectually consistent, you must also believe that it is wrong to confiscate the same percentage of future earnings from children.

Granted, McCain advocates the partial privatization of Social Security, but he has said that the much larger unfunded liability of Medicare would not be touched. This makes him the lesser of two evils on this issue but evil nonetheless.

Other examples abound, including subsidies, handouts, tax breaks, protective tariffs, transfer payments, racial spoils, and bailouts for a variety of organized and influential special interests, such as farmers, rent-seeking corporations, teacher unions, ACORN, the NAACP, La Raza, sub-prime borrowers, and Wall Street scoundrels.

Where does the money come from? It comes from the studious, the productive, the frugal, and the law-abiding--from individuals who have deferred gratification, invested their own money in their future, and lived below their means. Outnumbered and out-organized, they are no longer the Silent Majority but are the Pillaged Minority.

The country’s moral compass is so askew that the thousands of empty talking heads on network TV, 24-hour cable news, and talk radio don’t raise a moral objection to the confiscation or point out that Congress has become a huge chop-shop operation, but without the honesty of tattoos, razor wire, and pit bulls. Instead, they treat the thieves with respect.

Recently for example, a young woman said to an empty head that she shouldn’t have to pay college tuition. It didn’t dawn on the empty head to ask her why she thought it was moral to confiscate money from other people for her college expenses, including from people of modest means who don’t attend college.

Without a properly functioning moral compass, we get a nation that thinks like the young woman. We also get housing bubbles and economic meltdowns. The compass will never be fixed as long as we keep voting for candidates who advocate immorality.

By Craig J. Cantoni
Oct. 18, 2008

An author and columnist, Mr. Cantoni can be reached at ccan2@aol.com.

Posted October 19, 2008 09:47 AM
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