“Common Sense – Where Has It Gone?” Sydney Williams
Common sense: noun – sound and prudent judgement. Its best antonym: unreasonable – without reason.
Common sense is a phrase we all know but rarely practice. So why is it called common? In A Pocket Philosophical Dictionary, Voltaire wrote: “Common sense is not so common.” It does not appear to exist among our cultural and political elite, where reason has given way to ideology. Ralph Waldo Emerson is alleged to have said: “Common Sense is genius dressed in working clothes.” That is, perhaps, what William Buckley meant when he said he would rather be governed by the first four hundred names in the Boston telephone directory than the Harvard faculty? Today, politicians, professors, CEOs, the media and many in the world of entertainment dress more informally, which may be sensible in terms of personal comfort, but a lack of common sense pulsates through their daily activities and commentaries.
Common sense has been banished by the self-righteous. This part of Connecticut is not immune. Last week, in my local paper The Day, appeared an article about the sensible (my word) refusal of Old Lyme’s First Selectman (a Republican) to bring to a vote a resolution proposed by the Democratic Selectwoman which would identify racism as a public health crisis. His refusal was based, first, on the question: What does racism have to do with public health? Secondly, he pointed out such a resolution would imply the town has a race problem. Even the Democratic Selectwoman has said that she does not believe the people in Old Lyme are racist, yet she wants this resolution. Admittedly, the town of 7,000 is estimated to be 97.4% white, but that does not mean the community is racist. Certainly, the Republican First Selectman is not. His daughter is married to a black man whom, with his wife and children, we often see at our beach club. And Old Lyme is among a handful of Connecticut towns that welcome refugees.
So, why does she insist on such a resolution? Does she feel pangs of “white” guilt because of who she is and where she lives? Does she believe systemic racism infests Old Lyme? Or does she expect that accusations of racism will help Democrats’ cause? The answer seems obvious. She is motivated by politics and a lack of common sense. Social justice, systemic racism and anthropological-caused climate change are lightning rods, which activate the juices of hypocritical progressives. Common sense be damned.
We see this lack of common sense everywhere. Does it make sense to say that the “rich” should pay their “fair share,” and then say you want to reinstate SALT (state and local taxes) deductions, when 95% of the benefit accrues to the top one percent of wage earners? Or is that simply hypocrisy? Corporations have adopted to this new world by claiming support for all “stakeholders.” It is a feel-good word, but does it say anything new? Years ago, the Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973) observed: “He who serves the public best, makes the highest profits.” In Iacocca: An Autobiography (1984), Lee Iacocca wrote: “In the end, all business operations can be reduced to three words: people, products, profit.” Over four million businesses were created in 2020, with about 600,000 failing. According to the Center for M.I.T. Entrepreneurship, most new businesses are not cash flow positive for 3-5 years. If a business is not profitable, no one is served – not the employees, customers, suppliers, tax agencies or owners. Consider, when the Left decries the inequities of capitalism, the words of Thomas Sowell in Controversial Essays: “No government of the left has done as much for the poor as capitalism has. Even when it comes to the redistribution of income, the left talks the talk, but the free market walks the walk.”
Bjorn Lomborg, in a recent op-ed in The Wall Street Journal, wrote that according to a forthcoming Lancet study: “More than 45% of people 16 to 25 in the ten countries surveyed are so worried (about climate change) that it affects their daily life and functioning.” Does that reflect sensible behavior on the part of their teachers? Was it common sense that allowed an uncompromising focus on renewables to cause electricity prices in Connecticut to rise by 14% last June? Regarding the stalled $3.5 trillion spending bill, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) recently tweeted: “Paid leave is infrastructure. Childcare is infrastructure. Caregiving is infrastructure.” Common sense tells us they are not. Bridges, tunnels and roads are infrastructure, not entitlements. Her comments are part of a narrative that lacks reason and truth. It was “virtue-signaling that led to pride flags, gender studies and George Floyd murals in Kabul,” as Victor Davis Hanson recently wrote, when common sense would have had the U.S. maintain Bagram Airfield until the last American, ally, and Afghani who had assisted allied forces had left Afghanistan. Did General Mark A. Milley show common sense when he made those Dr. Strangelove-like calls to General Li Zuocheng? Do calls for defunding the police, despite rising murder rates in inner cities, reflect common sense? What about the discrimination exhibited in schools and colleges in setting different standards for students based on race? Is not that sanctimonious discrimination? Does it make common sense to mandate masks and vaccinations for university students and business employees, yet let in tens of thousands of illegal immigrants, without requiring either masks or vaccines?
It is not as though the U.S. is not faced with real problems, which common sense would address. To name four: Debt and deficits: The ratio of federal debt to GDP is approaching what it was in World War II, and that does not include unfunded liabilities for Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. In 1960, mandatory spending (entitlements, like Social Security. Medicare and Medicaid, etc.) accounted for about 25% of the federal budget. Today, that number is close to 70%. Education: We spend more per student than most any other country. Yet, we are failing many, mostly in Democrat-controlled, inner cities. In the 2018 PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment), which tests 15-year-olds around the world, the United States ranks below the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) average. As well, college costs have become untethered from reality. Families: It is well understood that children raised in two-parent households fare better economically and emotionally. Yet, family formations have been in decline in the U.S. for sixty years. In 1960, according to a 2015 Pew Research Center study, 73% of children were raised in two-parent households. By 2014, that had declined to 46%. Culture: As a nation, we have descended into a morass of multiculturalism, political correctness and wokeism, which has left us bereft of a national moral compass.
Common sense is looking at the world through clear lenses. It sees the world as it is, as Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote, not as one would like it to be. Like classical liberalism, common sense is based on empiricism, experience and research.; it is skeptical of fashion. It recognizes differences in people, not in races. It acknowledges there are two biological genders, not the 57 that OpenLearn suggests. It adheres to the Golden Rule: do unto others as you would have done unto you; it is learning right from wrong and practicing the civilities once taught by parents, and in schools, Synagogues and Churches. Common sense allows us to focus on the individual, rather than the collective.
Horse sense is a synonym for common sense. The former was once defined by the comedian and actor W.C. Fields: “Horse sense is a thing a horse has which keeps it from betting on people.” Yet we, with people-sense and with government encouragement, bet on everything, from Lotteries to sports to horses – which common sense tells us is a loser’s game and regressive taxation. Common sense, where have you gone?
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