Where is Common Sense?

Thomas Paine published his pamphlet called Common Sense in January of 1776, laying out the arguments for independence from Great Britain. Among his arguments, “I offer nothing more than simple facts, plain arguments, and common sense....” I wonder what common sense thinking he would offer in today’s political climate? I have a few thoughts on that.

“A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom,” wrote Paine. Ironically, it is not those called “conservative,” who represent “the superficial appearance of being right,” but those wrongly named “liberals” (better labeled “secular progressives,” who are the entrenched defenders of custom. I wonder how many items we could list, where common opinion stands opposed to common sense? Here’s the beginning of that list:

1) Common sense says that you must kill those who would kill you. As a Christian, I don’t enjoy the idea of war, but when we are attacked, we must fight back. I support every other effort to find peaceful solutions, but a nation cannot pretend that the enemy isn’t serious in his desire to destroy, especially when he says it, over and over again. There is no common sense in thinking that we are responsible for what the enemy chooses to do, particularly when his own statements prove otherwise. Self-hatred is suicidal, and suicide defies common sense. Suicidal people have no business leading or influencing the leadership in a time of war.

2) Common sense also suggests that many who follow charismatic or oppressive leaders may be won over, if we give them a chance to know us and what we really stand for. The enemy lies about us, and our own media support the lies. The American way of life is, without question, preferable to the third world poverty of most Islamic societies. They aren’t poor and uncivilized because of us; Arab countries control a huge part of the world’s oil supply! Their people are poor because their leaders keep them poor and backward, not so different from the Soviet Union under Communist leaders. That’s the nature of fascism, oppression, and tyranny. Common sense is supported by the millions of people from virtually every country and culture wanting to come to the United States to have the freedom and opportunity we have, and more would want the same, if we can show them what we are really about.

3) It defies common sense to think that the government can tax our country into prosperity. Playing on the jealousy of those who would like to be rich toward those who actually are rich, socialist-leaning, big-government types promise to tax the wealthy. Tax cuts have created both a booming economy and a net growth in tax revenue, but Democrats promise to raise taxes anyway. Common sense says that this isn’t about what’s good for the country or for the poor; this will be good for the people in Washington gaining power.

4) Common sense says that bigger is not better, and anything run by the federal government from Washington will be bigger, more costly, and less effective. National health care, public education, welfare, or any of perhaps 7 other departments in the President’s cabinet—interior, agriculture, commerce, health and human services, housing and urban development, transportation, energy—as well as several other lower level agencies such as OSHA and the EPA. We have no precedent of a big central government doing a better job with a huge, costly bureaucracy and an unending progression of burdensome regulations than the people and more local governments taking care of business, closer to the activity in question. There is no common sense in consolidating power and money which only invites people to gravitate to the centers of power and money in order to help themselves to some of both.

5) Where is the common sense in a government-run, union-dominated educational system that performs more poorly as the amount of money spent increases? Only in government is failure rewarded with a raise. Here is a prime example of a “long habit of not thinking a thing wrong.” It’s for the children, they say, but everything other indications says its for the union, the ideologues using schools to indoctrinate rather than educate, and the so-called “educators” who treat school children like lab rats to test their bizarre theories and continue even after the results demonstrate that their theories are wrong. Where is the common sense in giving a teacher a raise based on seniority rather than performance? Where is the common sense in preventing parents from choosing the best school for their kids, regardless of a private or public label?

6) Is there any common sense left among those in government regarding immigration? Close the borders, punish the employers of illegals, and deport illegals who commit more serious crimes, ASAP. It’s not rocket science, and the vast majority of ordinary citizens, including a majority of legal immigrants already get it. Variations on amnesty have been tried, several times, in the last 25 years, and the result has been a steady increase in illegal border crossings.

7) Is there any common sense in thinking that a 1 degree increase in global temperature over the past one hundred years will cause New York City to be flooded in the next 10? The global warming debate is so irrational that common sense is hard to find or even offer. The public schools are indoctrinating the children who have no defense against teachers they trust. Nobel Prizes and Academy Awards, neither of any scientific credibility, fool common folks into ignoring common sense. Teary-eyed children testifying about the loss of culture and livelihood play on the emotions when common sense says, “Move.” In what world do we think we can stave off all changes? In fact, in a living world, when changes stop, the living die! Life is change, and sometimes the changes are unpleasant. Attempting to misuse science and seeking to abuse national economies and lifestyles in order to prevent change on a global scale is the most absurd breech of common sense!

8) Free speech means very little if we can’t understand each other, and simple common sense says we need to adopt English as a single national language that all citizens must learn. I see little sense of any kind in encouraging national and community division by fostering enclaves of people who are isolated by language from the communities and neighborhoods around them. I dispute the slogan, “Our strength is in our diversity.” Our strength is in our unity; diversity may enhance that strength but only if it can communicate. Diversity with disunity leads to weakness and self-destruction. Multiculturalism is largely a utopian notion with no real world support, and utopian thinking is dangerous when you must live in the real world.

9) Political correctness has nothing to do with common sense or free speech. Long before I became aware of political correctness, I had to deal with spiritual correctness, the idea that right doctrine is reflected in saying and believing the prescribed beliefs of the group. Now, an even more potent attempt at mind control is masquerading as a positive influence, especially in high school classrooms and on college and university campuses. Political correctness has supplanted academic freedom in a manner more reminiscent of Communism than American liberty. Given the chance, like-minded politicians who cannot win elections in a free and open dialogue, would mandate similar restrictions on media, especially talk radio and the Internet. There is little common sense in free speech that is restricted by offense; by its very nature, free speech will offend somebody. (Likewise, freedom of religion: Common sense says that restricting religious expression by assuring that no one is offended destroys freedom of religion.)

10) Common sense says that the strong protect the rights of the weak. Gays who are often successful and financially well-off are strong; unborn children who cannot speak, let alone speak for themselves are weak. Adults who choose to have sex and get pregnant are strong, but the babies they conceive are weak; privacy is not more important than life. When real Africans can come to the United States, learn English, adapt to our culture, get an education, and prosper, then we no longer have a significant racial problem; we just have race whores[*], using race to make their illicit living off of their own people’s misery, misery which they help perpetuate by crying “racism” at every opportunity.

11) It is just common sense to recognize that freedom of opportunity is preferable to certainly of outcome. Free people find ways to make a good life. Governments restrict freedom to offer rationed living. The more politicians, bureaucrats, and victims dependent on the government the less ordinary people have. I have my problems with Ayn Rand, but she’s right when she says, in Atlas Shrugged, that “independence and individual achievement enable society to survive and thrive, but coerced self-sacrifice causes any society to self-destruct.” I also recommend reading her book, We the Living, for a strangely prophetic expose of life in the Soviet Union, a life toward which many progressive leaders seem to want us to go.

12) Common sense warns that an amoral, self-indulgent society will eventually fall, unless it changes. The issues and lifestyles we are currently debating place the United States at the threshold of either collapse or renewal. Many fear we are moving toward collapse, and I cannot deny their concerns. As much as I write about the social and political areas, my concerns center on American churches and Christians. I believe the future of our nation hinges on what we do. If we adopt the selfish hedonism and narcissism of our secular neighbors, then the future is lost. If we seek and find the courage of our forefathers who created the freedoms we enjoy, the common sense promises a blessed and influential future, to the glory of God and our Savior Jesus Christ!

Well, that's twelve. Any suggestions on others that I should include? Just let me know in the comment section.

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[*] I’m not usually so blunt, but I am really disgusted with both black and white leaders who encourage this angry, counter-productive mentality of victimization and hatred. I tutor kids from all over the world, including Africa, and I don’t have a prejudiced bone in my body. My African kids don’t understand the claims of racism, and they will tell you that white people have helped them, more than anyone. We all face prejudices of various kinds, unfairness, and worse, and sometimes the only reasonable course is get over it, work hard, and “don’t let the turkeys get you down.” For any unintended offense, I apologize.