Learning From Labour's Loss

I don't follow British politics very closely. I know that the UK uses a parliamentarian system and over the years I have been familiar with some of the leading English politicians. I know something about the policy positions of the major parties. I am hardly a keen observer of the British political scene.

Despite that disclaimer, I have found it interesting that the electorate of the United States and the UK have followed somewhat similar cycles in their voting patterns over the last 40 years.

USA/UK Election Background

Ronald Reagan's election in 1980 in the United States ushered in a completely different era in American politics. Before Reagan, conservative views were at the fringes of the body politic. There was very little difference between a lot of Republicans and Democrats. In fact, many Democrats in the 1960's and 1970's from the South and West were more conservative than Republicans from the Northeast and Midwest.

The United Kingdom suffered economic malaise in the 1970's. The economy was struggling, inflation was high and labor union strikes were common occurrences. Many large industries (rail, airlines, public utilities) were owned by the British government.

By 1979, the Labour Party had been in control of the British government for 12 of the previous 15 years before Margaret Thatcher took control with the Conservative party. Thatcher set about privatizing most of the government-owned businesses and the British economy started to recover. Thatcher would serve for almost 12 years.

Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher
Credit: WikiCommons

A year later Ronald Reagan won in the United States. He served for 8 years and was followed by George H.W. Bush who some would describe as Reagan lite. Thatcher was succeeded similarly by Conservative John Major who was more mild-mannered and moderate than Thatcher and served 6 years. It is hard not to see the similarities between Reagan/Bush and Thatcher/Major.

Major was followed by Tony Blair of the Labour Party in 1997. Many at the time saw many similarities in the style of Blair to Bill Clinton who was elected in 1992. Clinton went on to serve 8 years and Blair led the UK for 10 years to be followed by Labour's Gordon Brown for 3 years.

In the meantime, George W. Bush returned the White House to the Republicans for two terms and the UK returned to Conservative rule in 2010 which they have held to this day with three different Prime Ministers--David Cameron, Theresa May and Boris Johnson. The only thing missing was a Barack Obama figure to rescue the Labour Party in Great Britain.

We now have Donald Trump and Boris Johnson who share a lot of the same similarities. They are brash and at uncouth at times . They are not always politically correct. However, they favor populism over elitism and nationalism over globalism. You could say both are imperfect. However, they both benefited by running against opponents who were even more flawed.

Boris Johnson and Donald Trump
Credit: BusinessInsider.com

There are a lot of parallels looking back over those 40 years. As I have said in these pages in the past, history may not repeat but it surely rhymes. You can say the same thing looking at the last 40 years of politics in the UK and USA.

Of course, the defining political moment in both the UK and USA recently were the events of 2015 and 2016.

In a national referendum in 2015, UK voters chose to leave the European Union (Brexit) shocking the political class and media elites. Similarly, Donald Trump did the same thing by winning the Presidency in the United States on a populist and nationalist agenda.

Both countries have been in various forms of political chaos since those votes, in large part due to the fact that the political and media elites seem to have not been able to process the fact that average working people do not share their elitist, globalist views.

2019 UK General Election

In the UK last week, the Conservatives gained 47 seats in Parliament giving them 365 total seats. Labour lost 59 seats. Labour had held some of those seats for over 100 years. It was the worst overall result in 84 years.

The extent of the blind eye that the elites have compared to election results reality is revealed when you compare the predictions of Conservative party gains in the 2019 election compared to the final tallies.

It seems that the "smarter" you are only means that you are the furthest removed from reality as this tweet I saw after the election on Twitter demonstrates.

The most interesting parallel between the two countries is the extent to which each party that was traditionally considered the representative of the working people (Labour in UK, Democrats in USA) have slowly abandoned that constituency in favor of a globalist and progressive agenda.

You can see it in these next few graphs that compare voting patterns in the two countries.

UK in 1997---Red (Labour), Blue (Conservative), Other Colors (Minor Parties)

UK in 2019---Red (Labour), Blue (Conservative), Other Colors (Minor Parties)

Labour member in the House of Commons continue to hold seat in a few isolated pockets in the country.

This is also what has happened in the United States between when Bill Clinton was re-elected in 1996 and the election of Donald Trump in 2016.

USA in 1996---Blue (Democrat), Red (Republican).

It is beyond me why the same colors cannot be used in both countries to signify liberals and conservatives. I guess it is why we also drive on opposite sides of the road!

USA in 2016---Blue (Democrat), Red (Republican).

Democrats have increasingly become a party that only represents coastal urban areas and counties along the border.

Do you see some similarities here?

You also see the same age-based division in the UK as in the United States. Young voters tend to be liberal. Older voters are more conservative. However, that age divide is much greater in the UK than in the USA.

Look at this distribution of the vote in the UK by age.

57% of 18-24 year olds voted for Labour. Only 18% of those age 65 and older did.

Do you think those chronologically advantaged voters might remember what it was like back in the 1960's and 1970's in Great Britain?

This is what the UK electoral map would look like if 18-24 year olds were the only votes that counted.

This is the age distribution in the 2016 election between Clinton and Trump. You see that same general trend by age (younger--Democrat, older-Republican) but it is not as pronounced in the UK)

Credit:Thoughtco.com

Implications for US Election in 2020

Are there any takeaways from the British general election that might give us a clue of where we are headed in the United States in 2020?

First and foremost, as I have stated many times in these pages, the voters are sovereign in the American political system. The same is true in the UK. The people ultimately determine the government that they want.

Politicians who disregard the will of the people do not survive in the long term.

The people spoke previously that they wanted Brexit. The Labour party didn't believe it. You would have to believe they understand it now.

The Labour party agenda also veered very far to the left. Much too far left for almost anyone but hard core socialists.

To make matters worse, the leader of the Labour party, Jeremy Corbyn, was considered "profoundly personally unpopular" by many (he had a -40 approval rating in recent polls) due to a mix of the radicalism of his views and increasing anti-Semitic sentiments in his party.

Countries that are as divided politically as the United States and Great Britain have been recently do not stay that way forever. One party eventually wrests control over the other as the voters tire of division and inaction and come down on one side or the other. When they do they want decisive action on those things that they deem most important.

That appears to be what occurred in the UK last week. There should be no mistaking what the people want regarding Brexit with their vote last week.

The losing party must adapt or die.

I see Trump following a very similar script to what Boris Johnson and the Conservatives have done in the UK.

Trump is going to continue to push populist issues and he is going to continue to be strong on sovereignty issues such as illegal immigration, trade policy and attacking identity politics. These are winning issues in this day and age. He is going to be moderate on social issues rather than radical. He is going to continue to protect Social Security and Medicare from cuts and is going to support private health care as opposed to a government takeover. He is going to extend social safety net issues selectively such as the recently passed paid family leave for federal employees indicates.

In the end, Trump will most likely be much closer to the center, and the heart of the average American voter, than any Democrat will be. From where the Democrats are now, it is a long way to get to the point that the American middle class worker believes they are on their side.

Trump, like Boris Johnson, is far from perfect.

However, political choices are binary most of the time. It is not necessarily the best man or woman that wins. Many times, especially with voters in the center, it is less a vote for someone you want than a vote for someone you do not want.

The UK election illustrates that.

I am sure Trump understands that better than anyone.

The UK election results should tell Democrats that ignoring the lesson learned by the Labour Party last week carries considerable risks to their future prospects.

The actions by Democrats this week involving impeaching President Trump on trumped up charges indicates that they are not paying much attention to what has transpired in the UK election last week.

My advice to Democrats---proceed at your own peril. The voters are watching and in the end they will have the final say. They always do.

A Drink, a Pizza and a Tree

It has been a tough week of news. We found that the top leadership of the FBI apparently was thoroughly corrupt in an investigation of a Presidential candidates campaign. We have seen House Democrats abuse their power in a rush to impeach a duly elected President without citing any crime. We are still awaiting the final results of the UK general election but early returns suggest that Boris Johnson and the Conservatives have gotten a boost and Brexit is closer to reality.

Quite a week.

I thought it best to end the week on a less serious side and highlight some interesting information that has nothing to do with politics. How about some data on booze, pizza and trees?

Alcohol Consumption

We often hear how bad things are around the world. However, alcohol consumption is generally declining almost everywhere. It does not appear that people are drinking their troubles away.

There has been no greater reduction in drinking than in Russia. Austrians, Irish and the French now drink more than Russians. In 2007  no one could put them down like the Russians. Alcohol consumption per adult has decreased almost 40% over the last decade in Russia. Is Putin doing something right?

Pizza

These charts show the locations of all the major pizza chains in the United States. It is still easier to find a Pizza Hut than any other pizza restaurant.

All the charts are from DataIsBeautiful/BoMcCready.

Domino's and Little Caesar's were both founded in the Detroit area.

I found it interesting that up and comers Marco's, Hungry Howie's and Jet's all have their biggest concentration of stores in the that area. They must really like their pizza in the Great Lake state.

Forest Cover by State

There are a lot of environmentalists running around saying that we are destroying the planet. However, when it comes to trees, there is actually more forest cover in the United States than there was one hundred years ago. This is despite the fact that the population has increased three-fold in that time to an estimated 330 million people.

The chart below shows the percent of each state covered in forests.

89% of Maine is covered in forest. Only 2% is covered by forest in North Dakota.

It is pretty startling to see how forest-covered the Northeast and Southeast are when considering the population in these regions (and the number of pizza restaurants)!

Credit: https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/anfpkn/percentage_forest_cover_in_each_us_state/

My suggestion for you this weekend is to forget the depressing news coming out of Washington, D.C. by grabbing yourself a drink, ordering a pizza and building a fire from the wood in all those trees.

Next week will come soon enough.

Is That All There Is?

Is that all there is, is that all there is


If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing


Let's break out the booze and have a ball


If that's all there is

Those are the lyrics of the chorus in a song by Peggy Lee from 1969.

Lee won a Grammy for the Best Female Pop Vocal Performance for the song that year.

Here is a video of Peggy Lee performing the song if you cannot open the embedded video in your browser.

I thought about the lyrics to that song as I saw the Articles of Impeachment against President Trump unveiled today by the House Democrats.

It was impossible not to think, "Is that all there is?"

After months and months (years and years?) of investigations of President Trump, in which he has been accused of almost anything you can think of, the House is going to formally charge him on just two counts...

1. Abuse of Power

2. Obstruction of Congress

What happened to the Whistleblower, Mueller, Russia Collusion, the quid pro quo, bribery, treason and obstruction of justice?

Obstruction of Congress? What is that?

The Constitution establishes three separate and co-equal branches of government. If Congress thinks they have been obstructed they are supposed to go to the Judiciary to sort it out. Did Congress do that in this case? NO.

Do the Democrats seriously believe that a President can be impeached because he didn't cooperate with them in trying to impeach him? Seriously?

I am at a loss on what the Democrats think will be accomplished from all of this.

Seeing this I wonder whether Nancy Pelosi just wants it to go away.

I called this the "Hail Mary Impeachment" several weeks ago and it has proven to be just that.

Pelosi had to satisfy the left wing base of her party by starting this and, as the impeachment inquiry looked worse and worse by the day, she has to feel trapped on how she can extricate herself from this mess.

I would be surprised if there is one Republican in the House that votes for either of these two counts. I am now also questioning how many Democrat defections there might also be. There have to be a lot of those 31 House members in districts that Trump won who don't want to cast this vote with others in their party.

Could the Impeachment vote actually fail to gain a majority in the House?

I still think that is extremely unlikely due to the lock step manner in which the Democrats usually stick together on important votes like this. However, with evidence as slim as it is, and these weak charges, I am beginning to doubt myself.

Adding to this is the statement today from the House Democrat leadership that they will not whip the votes on impeachment. Is Pelosi actually going to call for this vote and not know whether she has the votes on the floor? That seems impossible to comprehend.

I have seen some suggest that Pelosi may have determined the best way out of this is to take the vote, and if it fails, blame Schiff, Nadler or the immovable, cult-like Republicans, and tell the hard Left in her party that she tried.

She could then use this failure to motivate voters to throw Trump out in the 2020 election together with calls for an insurance policy of a Democrat House in case Trump cheats and wins again. That way the House can impeach him again in 2021.

At this point I don't know what the Democrats are thinking. We are beyond any rational thought or reason in what they are doing.

What I do know is that these House Democrats will forever be remembered as the group who totally abused their constitutional power by using impeachment as an act of political retribution and hatred. In the process they have disgraced their oath of office and attempted to undermine the foundational principles of our constitutional republic.

Forever remembered in History

They have also established a dangerous precedent for the future. What President in the future will not be considered to be involved in Abuse of Power or Obstruction of Congress if they are not of the same political party or have different policy ideas than a majority of the members of Congress?

It is truly sad.

If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing.

Let's break out the booze and have a ball.

That is all there is to it.

The Deeply Disturbing Deep State

The Inspector General Report on FBI's conduct during the FISA application process to investigate Trump campaign associates has been released.

As was the case with the IG Report involving the Hillary Clinton private email server, this report also finds significant deviation from FBI protocols but states it found no political bias from FBI personnel.

This is pretty much as expected coming from what is a Justice Department bureaucrat who is normally looking at internal errors who then makes recommendations to fix the problem in the future.

It is important to note that the IG found 17 significant errors in the FISA process. The report details numerous violations of procedures, omissions of exculpatory evidence and reliance on discredited evidence as they sought approval to spy on Trump campaign associates.

This is how the Associated Press described the report. They called those errors "performance failures".

First, consider of the 17 listed "performance failures" how many were to the benefit of those in Trump campaign who were being investigated? NONE. What are the odds that these were mere innocent mistakes?

Second, how did the IG determine there was no political bias? Here is what the report says.

"We did not find documentary or testimonial evidence that political bias or improper motivation influenced the decisions to open the four individual investigations."

In other words, no one wrote anything down on paper or they answered "No" when asked whether political bias entered into their decision to investigate and surveil Trump campaign associates.

Does any of this make any sense?

Why would high level FBI personnel open an investigation of Trump campaign associates and then lie and cheat to surveil people if there was no political bias? Why else would they do it considering the career risk they took in doing it?

You can ask the same question about the FBI activities in the Hillary Clinton investigation where they broke every rule on the books and ignored evidence in plan sight to conclude Clinton had no "intent" to break the law. Why would they do that unless there was political bias involved?

It was also no surprise to me that the IG concluded that the FBI had a reasonable predicate to begin the investigation of Trump and his campaign. This is something I predicted previously would occur.

The IG stated that the investigation was initiated after the FBI received a tip from a friendly foreign government that someone associated with the Trump campaign (George Papadopolous) had indicated that the Russians had informed the Trump team that they might be able to assist with information damaging to Hillary Clinton. The IG concluded that it was entirely reasonable for the FBI to follow up on this tip and begin an investigation.

The problem was that the FBI was  never able to confirm this "tip". However, they proceeded with the investigation anyway. In trying to get the goods on the Trump campaign they ended up relying on the Steele dossier for the FISA applications which they did not verify That was just one of many problems with their "investigation".

As the AP did in its headline, you could stop here and conclude that the IG Report is a nothing burger. Par for the course in Washington. A lot of misdeeds with no one being held accountable.

However, shortly after the release of the IG Report, US Attorney John Durham, who has the legal authority to actually prosecute people for wrongdoing rather than merely point out "internal mistakes",  released a statement that included this quote.

Based on the evidence collected to date, and while our investigation is ongoing, last month we advised the Inspector General that we do not agree with some of the report’s conclusions as to predication and how the FBI case was opened.” (emphasis added).

In my view, that statement from  Durham was the most significant disclosure of the day. It is much more important than anything in the IG Report for the simple reason that Durham has much broader investigative powers as well as the power to actually indict people and bring them into a court of law.

Durham's statement seemed designed to cut off at the pass those in the media and others who might want to use the IG Report to claim that everyone in the deep state had been exonerated. It seems to be a clear message that another shoe may yet drop. The story is not yet over.

Right about the same time Attorney General Barr released a similar statement including this quote.

The Inspector General’s report now makes clear that the FBI launched an intrusive investigation of a U.S. presidential campaign on the thinnest of suspicions that, in my view, were insufficient to justify the steps taken.  It is also clear that, from its inception, the evidence produced by the investigation was consistently exculpatory.  Nevertheless, the investigation and surveillance was pushed forward for the duration of the campaign and deep into President Trump’s administration.  In the rush to obtain and maintain FISA surveillance of Trump campaign associates, FBI officials misled the FISA court, omitted critical exculpatory facts from their filings, and suppressed or ignored information negating the reliability of their principal source. (emphasis added)

That is pretty strong stuff coming from the Attorney General and a U.S. Attorney specifically charged to investigate crimes related to this FISA abuse. It is hard to imagine that they would go out on a limb with these kinds of statements unless they feel pretty comfortable that this story is not over by a long shot.

What is most significant is that while the Justice Department IG had set boundaries for his investigation that did not go beyond his individual department, Barr and Durham are looking at other players in all of this that might include the State Department, CIA and Defense Department.

Where does this do from here?

You never know for sure but if I were former CIA Director or  FBI Director James Comey I might not be sleeping very well tonight.

These are the big questions that I still have.

What if that friendly foreign government source who fed the Russian story to the FBI about the Trump campaign actually was planted by the CIA with that ally?

What if Papadopolous was being entrapped by an operation that was initiated by the CIA or someone else in the Obama administration? He claims he was.

Could it be that the entire Trump/Russian collusion story was a CIA operation designed to entrap Trump and his campaign?

Did we have a current American Presidential administration conspiring and colluding to prevent a Presidential candidate from the opposite party from taking office?

These are questions that deserve answers.

In the meantime, anyone who takes joy in what came out in the IG Report today should seriously reconsider their priorities and patriotism.

At best, the FBI's reputation has been deeply tarnished. It will not be easy to rebuild trust in this institution that is supposed to be committed to truth and justice before anything else.

At worst, we have the biggest political and governmental scandal in the history of the United States.

Much more remains to be revealed.

However, I can't help but compare the Trump impeachment inquiry that is ongoing with what occurred in the Trump campaign investigation.

The case for Trump's impeachment appears to now be that Trump has ill intent even if they cannot produce any evidence of wrong doing. He may not be guilty of anything yet but if he is allowed to stay in office he will be guilty of something. As a result, he needs to be impeached and removed from office before he can serve another term.

On the other hand, The IG Report on FISA concluded that there was plenty of evidence of wrongdoing on the part of the FBI but somehow there was nothing to show they had any ill intent. Therefore, they are not guilty of anything.

What else do you need to know that something is deeply disturbing within the Deep State?

It now remains for John Durham and Bill Barr to get to the bottom of this and bring any guilty parties to justice.

We can only hope that justice will be served to those who deserve it.

A Heck of a Week Ahead

It looks like we are coming to the end of the year with one heck of a week of news in sight.

Impeachment

The impeachment inquiry of the Democrats seems destined to have Articles of Impeachment voted out of the House Judiciary Committee on a party line vote this week.

What the grounds will be is still uncertain. The Democrats seem to have a different idea about that every day.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler seemed to inadvertently reveal what is really behind this when he said this on CNN Sunday (as reported by Bloomberg.com.)

On NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Representative Jerrold Nadler, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said it was a “matter of urgency” to deal with the president’s pattern of behavior ahead of the next election. On CNN’s State of the Union, Nadler said Trump may try to “rig” the 2020 vote.

Trump is being impeached because he may try to rig the 2020 election?

Let me get this straight.

The Democrats are saying that a President can be impeached because of something they think he might do in the future?

Speaker Nancy Pelosi said something similar in her CNN Townhall appearance last week in which she said "Civilization itself is at stake in the next election."

What does the next election have to do with it? I thought this was about what Trump has done as President? Isn't Pelosi admitting this impeachment is all about the 2020 election rather than Ukraine, Russia or anything else? They are trying to prevent the voter from making their own choice in just over 10 months?

Isn't this getting a little ridiculous?

Inspector General Horowitz Report on Possible FISA Abuses

Of course, all of this impeachment talk might have been engineered specifically to keep the public's attention away from the second item of news that is breaking this week---the report of Justice Department Inspector General Horowitz on possible abuses of the FISA process by FBI and Justice Department officials in spying on the Trump campaign.

The use of surveillance tools against American citizens is supposed to be extremely limited and the process to get a FISA warrant to do so subject to strict rules to prevent abuse and the violation of civil liberties. A special FISA court must be used for these warrants and extraordinary measures are supposed to be used by the FBI to allow this surveillance.

Were those procedures followed in the case of FISA warrants against individuals in the Trump campaign?

Was there a reasonable predicate to even initiate the investigation or was this done principally to keep Donald Trump out of the White House?

Will anyone be held to account if rules were bent or broken to try to get Trump or entrap people in his campaign?

It will be interesting to see what is in the report which is scheduled to be released Monday. Horowitz is scheduled to testify before Congress on Wednesday.

What we do know is that a U.S. Attorney (John Durham) has opened a criminal investigation based on what we are told are some of the conclusions in that report.

Will there be criminal indictments following the release of the report?

There is a lot riding on this report. There have been few leaks and those that have come out from the mainstream appear to have been planted in order to get ahead of the story and suggest there is not much here. Others suggest that it reveals a coordinated effort within the Justice Department (and possibly including the CIA and others) to spy on Trump and prevent him from becoming President.

Whatever way it goes it will be big news for someone.

UK Election

If all of that US news is not enough, the UK also has its general election this Thursday in which it will elect members of Parliament that will result in the selection of the Prime Minister.

The Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson seems to be leading in the polls right now.

Credit: TheGuardian.com

The fate of Brexit may also be tied to this election as Boris Johnson wants to proceed with a deal to leave the EU that he negotiated.  Liberals generally want to remain in the EU, or at a minimum, have another vote.

We will know more at the end of the week.

In the meantime, I found this additional polling to be particularly interesting in how different age groups intend to vote by age group for the two the major political parties in the UK.

Would you say there is a generational divide in the UK?

Could it be that those young voters do not remember much of what a economic basket case the UK was in the days before Margaret Thatcher started dismantling the socialist economy and privatizing scores of government-owned businesses such as British Telecom, British Airways, British Steel and British Gas?

If you think the U.S. education is brainwashing the young with liberal ideology it appears that it is nothing compared to what is happening in the UK.


Democrat Primary

Of course, the Democrat candidates will still be out there campaigning.

Who knows what inane thing we will hear from Biden, Sanders, Warren or Buttigieg and other Democrats this week?

We may see someone else drop out of the race. Who knows, we may see someone else get in.

If anybody gets in at this point, they better have access to a lot of money.

Take a look at this interesting chart that shows how much each candidate for President has spent on tv advertising so far in the campaign.

Here is how the Democrats spending breaks down according to Nate Silver.

Tom Steyer                                     $47 million

Michael Bloomberg                       $39 million (in two weeks!)

All other Democrats combined   $15 million  

That is some news. Where else have you seen that?

Are we at the point that unless you are a billionaire you can't run for President?

Too early to tell.

Average of three polls released last week has Steyer at 1.3% and Bloomberg at 4.7%.

All the best to you this week whatever the news.

Born That Way?

Life used to be fairly simple.

It was generally acknowledged that there were men and there were women.

It was known that there were those who were gay (or possibly bi-sexual) but it was also known that this was a very small portion of the population.

This changed over the years due to movies and television shows from Hollywood that had gay characters and news media reports disproportionately focusing on gay rights, gay marriage and gay issues.

The result is that, even though most estimates still suggest that gays and bisexuals make up no more than 4% or the population, people believe that the number is much higher.

For example, a Gallup survey from 2015 found that when the American public was asked to estimate the number of gays and lesbians in the population, the average answer was 23%.

33% of people surveyed believed the number to be more than 25%. Only 9% correctly state that the number is less than 5%.

The whole issue has gotten more complicated in that we are not just talking about sexuality today. We have entered into an era where the science of two genders is also now being questioned every day.

This chart may help you keep up with all that is necessary to stay current on the topic.

I used to think that the holy grail for gay and other activists in this area was to have science once and for all determine that homosexuality was genetically determined. If people were "born that way" it makes it very difficult to question the lifestyle or behavior of any individual. It makes other people much more sympathetic than if the behavior is a choice.

I was surprised to learn not long ago in a sermon by my pastor that some in the gay community, transgenders and others, were no longer interested in proving they were "born that way". They increasingly look at that view as denigrating "their choice". People in these communities see themselves living their truth through their choice and who they choose to be.

USA Today did a story on the background behind this change a couple years ago.

Getting America to believe that people are born gay — that it’s not something that can be chosen or ever changed — has been central to the fight for gay rights. If someone can’t help being gay any more than they can help the color of their skin, the logic goes, denying them rights is wrong. But many members of the LGBTQ community reject this narrative, saying it only benefits people who feel their sexuality and gender are fixed rather than fluid, and questioning why the dignity of gay people should rest on the notion that they were gay from their very first breath. 

Not long after learning this I came across a story about doctors and scholars at Johns Hopkins University who recently published a 143-page report that concludes that there is insufficient scientific evidence to suggest that gay, bisexual or transgender people are born that way.

"Studies of the brains of homosexuals and heterosexuals have found some differences, but have not demonstrated that these differences are inborn rather than the result of environmental factors that influenced both psychological and neurobiological traits," the report reads." One environmental factor that appears to be correlated with non-heterosexuality is childhood sexual abuse victimization, which may also contribute to the higher rates."

An interesting part of the research was the study of 3,826 identical or same-sex fraternal twin pairs to see if any gene could be found that predetermined sexual orientation. Only about one in five sets of male and female identical twins that were studied resulted in both twins being same sex attracted. In sets of fraternal twins it was even lower.

"Summarizing the studies of twins, we can say that there is no reliable scientific evidence that sexual orientation is determined by a person's genes. But there is evidence that genes play a role in influencing sexual orientation," the report explains. "So the question 'Are gay people born that way?' requires clarification. There is virtually no evidence that anyone, gay or straight, is 'born that way' if that means their sexual orientation was genetically determined. But there is some evidence from the twin studies that certain genetic profiles probably increase the likelihood the person later identifies as gay or engages in same-sex sexual behavior."

In this way it appears that homosexual or transgender behaviors may not be much different than other things like drinking, drug use, gambling, adultery and other behaviors.

I think the research is clear that some people have a greater genetic predisposition to addictive behaviors than others. Some become addicted. Some don't. Some overcome it. Some never let the temptation get the best of them in the first place.

Donald Trump saw what alcohol did to his older brother when he was still a very young man. As a result, he made the decision early in his life that he would never drink. He did not want to take the chance that what he saw happen to his brother could happen to him. He did not want to take the chance that he might be genetically predisposed the same way his brother was who died from the effects of alcoholism at age 42.

We often hear alcoholism referred to as an illness. The same with other addictive behaviors. However, you do not hear anyone saying that these are "normal" behaviors.

I am not sure where the LGBTTQQIAPP activists are heading with their push back on "born that way".

I also don't know the answers to the following questions but it seems we should be seeking the answers.

If we are to believe any of this is "normal" doesn't it have to be shown they were born that way?

If they weren't born that way is it not some type of mental illness or abnormality?

How can behaviors exhibited by less than 5% of the population be considered normal if they were not born that way?

I have no doubt that much more research and study will be done to determine these answers.

I have no ill will against anyone. I also try not to judge anyone. The Lord Almighty will judge us all. We are all human beings with failures. What an adult does in the privacy of their home is their business.

We live in an age when people want us to respect their truth.

I am more interested in following and respecting the truth.

They may be the same. They may be quite different.

One thing that is true is that for thousands of years of human history the type of behaviors that are being promoted by the LGBTTQQIAPP activists have been considered sins by many religions around the world. At the very least, they have been considered abnormal behaviors. Is that a "truth" that we now find to have been wrong only within the last couple of decades? If so, where is the science that supports that new "truth"?

I am quite sympathetic to the argument that I have heard from gays and others who strongly believe this is who they are and have been since childhood. They persuasively argue that they would not choose that lifestyle and suffer the discrimination and disdain they encounter that goes with it. However, I am waiting for the science to back them up. This recent study pretty strongly puts their argument on the wrong side of science right now.

It will be an interesting subject to keep our eyes on in future years to see if we get better answers.

Those answers could also lead to much different views on this subject.

We may find that, indeed, there is a genetic reason for every LGBTTQQIAPP person to claim they were born that way.

We may find the opposite.

Is there a real truth?

Taking Down Trump?

We are two months away from the first votes being cast in the Democrat primaries for President and three months from Super Tuesday

The Iowa caucus is February 3 and Super Tuesday is March 3 when 13 states will have primary elections.

In 90 days we should have a much better idea of who the Democrat nominee for President will be.

The reality of Presidential primary politics is that the field narrows naturally over time as there is only so much money, organizational talent and voter support to go around.

We have already seen that occur in this race despite the fact that we are still two months away from the first votes. Which announced candidates have already dropped out? I count thirteen with Kamala Harris just announcing today that she is suspending her campaign.

Kamala Harris, Bill DeBlasio, Kirsten Gillibrand, Mike Gravel, Jay Inslee, John Hickenlooper, Wayne Messam, Seth Moulton, Beto O'Rourke, Tim Ryan, Eric Swalwell, Steve Bullock and Joe Sestak.

In the meantime, two candidates (Deval Patrick and Michael Bloomberg) have recently announced their candidacy, which is highly unusual at this late date. That alone must say something about how strong the remaining Democrats in the field are perceived right now.

By my count, that leaves 15 candidates still in the race.

The first tier of candidates clearly includes Biden, Sanders, Warren and Buttigieg. They are the only candidates polling in double digits.

I looked at the five polls (Economist/YouGov, CNN, SurveyUSA, Quinnipiac, Politico/Morning Consult) that were released last week on the Democrats and averaged them to show the relative strength they have with voters right now.

Biden       28%
Sanders    17%
Warren     15%
Buttigieg  12%

The second tier includes Yang and Bloomberg (and Harris before she dropped out).

Harris          4%
Yang             3%
Bloomberg  3%

The remainder of the candidates (Booker, Klobuchar, Steyer, Patrick, Gabbard, Castro, Bennet etc) are polling at 2% or below.

Let's assess the top tier of the Democrat field. It is readily apparent that each has major deficiencies they bring to the task of defeating Donald Trump.

I am not one to believe that Trump is poised to win in a landslide. Trump has clear vulnerabilities and the right Democrat could beat him in the divided political world we live in today.  However, all of these candidates also have vulnerabilities, not the least of which are their positions on a number of issues that seem to be outside the mainstream of most of the American voting public.

A few observations on each of the top candidates as I see them right now setting aside policy considerations.

Joe Biden
Biden is 77 years old and, if elected, would be the oldest President to ever be sworn in at age 78. He is gaffe-prone and you have to think that this alone will be his undoing at some point. He also has the entire specter of his son Hunter's behavior hanging over his head. Hunter earned millions by serving on the board of a Ukranian gas company while his father was VP but now claims he has little money to pay child support for a child born from his relationship with a DC stripper? Biden is the strongest candidate in the field? If he is, it is only because the rest of the field are so far left that good old Joe looks pretty good in comparison. That is hardly the stuff of a strong candidate to challenge Trump. An important question--will Biden implode before or after the Democrat convention? I have to think it is inevitable.


Bernie Sanders
Bernie is 78 years old and will be 79 next year. His age has become more of an issue since Sanders had a heart attack recently that briefly took him off the campaign trail. Sanders is not even officially a Democrat. He describes himself as a Democrat Socialist or Progressive. He was elected and has served in the U.S. Senate since 2007 as an Independent. Sanders honeymooned in the Soviet Union so he comes by his leftist leanings legitimately. Sanders has very strong core support among the far left wing of the Democrat party. Young voters were particularly drawn to his challenge to Hillary Clinton in 2016. However, he has never had much support from African American voters. Does Sanders also have what it takes to appeal to Middle America voters, particularly in the swing states that Democrats need to win to defeat Trump? I think Sanders might have been able to defeat Trump in 2016 if he had gotten the nomination. Much more is known about both candidates today. Trump looks better to the average voters, Sanders looks worse based on what the economy has done since then. The last three years have not been kind to Bernie Sanders.


Elizabeth Warren
I continue to be shocked that Warren has done as well as she has thus far. I had given her up as politically dead after the disclosure that a DNA test showed she was 1/1024 Indian after claiming for years she was an American Indian to further her career as a law professor. Warren does have the advantage of being polished on stage and is younger (age 70) than both Biden and Sanders. However, it remains to be seen how she believes she can become President while attacking three of the core components of the traditional fundraising base of the Democrat base---Wall Street, Silicon Valley and the uber-wealthy. Warren's poll numbers recently have been in free fall as many of her big spending plans for Medicare for All, forgiveness of student loans, etc have come under more scrutiny. The entry of Michael Bloomberg into the race appears to have been principally motivated to keep Warren out of the White House by Wall Street players. Will we see Warren slowly get squeezed out by Bernie, Bloomberg and Buttigieg?


Pete Buttigieg
There were many who thought Barack Obama did not have the experience to be President. What must they think of Buttigieg? It is interesting to consider that Buttigieg (37 years old) is less than half the age of both Biden and Sanders. His only public office experience is as Mayor of South Bend, Indiana which has a population of 100,000. He garnered only 37.5% of the vote when he ran as the Democrat candidate  for Indiana State Treasurer in 2010. Mayor Pete does have an impressive resume--Harvard degree, Rhodes scholar, service as an Naval Reserve intelligence officer with a tour in Afghanistan. His youth is an obvious advantage with a Democrat electorate that trends younger than the GOP. However, is the country ready for an openly gay President who would bring a "First Husband" to the White House before we have had a woman President? Buttigieg also seems to have lukewarm support among the African American community. Buttigeig may rise to the top as the older candidates fall by the wayside. Being the "fresh face" has generally been more important than experience and competence with Democrat Presidential primary voters in the past. Is Mayor Pete that guy in 2020?


Michael Bloomberg
I am going to add Michael Bloomberg to the top tier for the simple reason that you don't disregard anyone with a net worth of over $50 billion who has stated he is willing to spend a good portion of it in getting elected. Bloomberg is barely registering in the polls right now but he just got in and most voters are not very familiar with him. Bloomberg appears to me to be someone who would especially benefit if Biden falters. I can't see many Biden supporters embracing Warren or Sanders. Buttigieg's inexperience has to also give them pause. Bloomberg is a natural choice, especially with that bankroll behind him. Then again, Bloomberg has the same age problem that Warren and Sanders have. He will be 78 in February. Bloomberg was also twice elected Mayor or New York City as a Republican. Bloomberg is also Jewish (as is Sanders). Let it not be forgotten that to this day we still have had only one Catholic elected President not to mention no one of the Jewish faith ever being assuming the office. Bloomberg is also not the kind of guy who is going to get many people excited on the campaign trail. Can he counter the Trump rally effect with competence to counter the Trump's charisma? Does that motivate people to vote?


I am looking forward to the next several months to see how Democrat voters assess these candidates when it it their turn to vote in each state.

There would seem to be little doubt that the principal attribute that Democrat voters are looking for is that person that can beat Donald Trump. Everything else is a distant second. It was no different than it was for GOP voters in 2012 (Obama) or 2016 (Hillary Clinton). It seems right now that most Democrats think that is Joe Biden.

However, running against Trump is a unique experience that is difficult to prepare for. At this point four years ago there were not many who predicted Trump would be the nominee. I saw the appeal of Trump but did not think he could convince enough GOP voters that he could win in the general election. This is what I wrote almost exactly four years ago today.

Trump has energized the race. He says things that many voters think but would never say. There is a lot of bluster and some blarney in him as well. He's like the "bad boy" that a lot of girls would like to date. However, will they marry him? His poll numbers look good in the dating phase we are in right now but are GOP voters going to commit to him long-term in the voting booth? That is a commitment I am not ready to make and my bet is that will be true for a majority of GOP voters in the end.

I vastly underestimated the appeal that Trump had with voters. I also did not understand how truly indefatigable Trump is. He plays to win, he works tirelessly on achieving his goals and he never quits. He exceeded my expectations as a candidate. He has exceeded my expectations as President.

A friend and I were recently discussing the Democrat field and he asked me hypothetically who I thought would have won the GOP nomination in 2016 if Trump had not run.

That is a great question. It is difficult to answer because running against Trump is not like running against any other politician. You know how it is said that no battle plan survives the first contact with the enemy? How would Jeb Bush have fared if Trump had not kept referring to him as "Low Energy Jeb" or Marco Rubio as "Little Marco" or Ted Cruz as "Lyin' Ted"?

In other words, it is one thing to run in the Democrat primary. It will be something altogether different to run against Donald Trump. It will be a political war that I doubt any are truly prepared for.

Is any Democrat up to the task?

Democrat voters must decide who that is in the next several months.

I don't envy them.

Winners and Losers in the Dating Game

In my last blog post I highlighted this chart and raised the question of why?

In the meantime, I came across this interesting thesis on the current dating market written by a hedge fund manager (Dan McMurtrie, Tyro Partners LLC). That thesis looks at the dating market in analytical terms looking at market opportunities, market frictions and the outcomes that are produced by changes in technology affecting the market.

It also attempts to answer the question "why?" as this chart is also referenced in the thesis.

The core thesis is that the dating market has been fundamentally changed by the introduction of online dating. This has resulted in a massive power shift that has mostly advantaged women in prime reproductive ages.

 The cost of instantly searching for potential mates is now effectively zero. Click a button, download the app. Photos, etc. automatically populate your profile from Facebook, Twitter, etc. A user can be looking for matches within 2 minutes. Further, the number of available potential mates is now effectively infinite, thus materially changing marginal and opportunity costs for market participants.

Because costs (physical safety, social stigma) have been disproportionately impactful to women, their elimination has had the effect of flipping the power dynamic in the market to favor women in prime reproductive age, though the dynamic changes with age. 

You can see how big this change has been by looking at this graph that tracks how heterosexual couples met between 2009 and 2017.

Why has online dating given so much more power to women?

Physical safety has been an ever-present issue for women in meeting potential dates, not to mention after agreeing to be alone with them on a date. In the era of online dating, women are at significantly less risk simply by not being in the immediate proximity of their prospects, and rejecting a prospect has no downside risk.

Women globally also have more upside potential because they can draw from larger prospect pools than ever before. Due to the significantly higher biological risks associated with reproduction, women are intrinsically far more selective when evaluating potential mates than males. In an online dating context, this selectivity is more apparent than ever, with significant knock-on effects for the rest of the culture. There is less pressure to "settle" than at any other time in modern history because of the availability of alternatives and the speed of interactions. 

If you doubt that women are more selective than men in their evaluation of a mate take a look at these two charts from OkCupid.com data disclosures on how men and women view each other's attractiveness.

Men broadly rate women on something closely resembling a perfect distribution. A few 9's and 10's and 1's and 2's. A lot in the middle.

Credit:OKCupid.com

Compare that to how women rate men.

Credit: OKCupid.com

Yikes! There are a lot of guys walking around thinking they are an 8 or 9 when women see them as a 2 or 3. Women are clearly not from Lake Woebegon. They see almost all men as being below average.

Research in the past has suggested that the dominant risk for women has historically not been selecting a too low quality mate but the risk of not settling for an adequate mate and ending up alone. Looking at the chart above shows why that can be a substantial risk for women based on how they rate men. In their eyes, there don't seem to be many that measure up.

The thesis suggests online dating should make it easier for women to not have to settle. The pool of men is much bigger for them to explore. The author of the thesis also believes that is the reason why the males at the bottom of the 18-30 age range are not getting any action. In economic terms, these guys have effectively been disproportionately "priced out of the market". There are no takers for what they have to offer. Why would a woman take a chance on a lower tier guy when it is much easier to just keep looking online?

However, all is not lost for these guys on the bottom rung. Age will eventually work in their favor.

Women aged 18-25 are the effective “price setters” of the market and are able to select at will from the available inventory of males aged 18-60. Generally, women will only date older and men will only date younger. Thus, as women age from 20 to 30 years of age, 25% of the available inventory of potential mates evaporates. 

In addition to this, the rates of partnership for both genders is fastest between 20 and 35, going from 50% to 90%. This means that as female market participants move from age 20 to age 35 their available inventory to select from may shrink to a small minority of the original pool. Male market participants face a virtually unchanged opportunity set, if not an increasing pool of opportunities.

This generally means that between the ages 30-35 both men and women today have reached the point that it is time to place their long-term bets on a mate.

Between ages 30 and 35, both male and female cohorts are highly predisposed to forming long term partnerships due to visibly shrinking opportunity sets from the female perspective and general exhaustion and expectation rationalizations from the male perspective.

You can see these effects in this chart that shows the odds of being married at least once at various ages. This graphically shows how the ages of those marrying has been extended. You can also see that the gap between today and prior years narrows markedly between the ages of 30-35.

The good news in this is that dating market participants are making better informed and more thoroughly vetted choices versus historical norms. This should result in a reduction of the divorce rate in the long-term.

In fact, early indications are that divorce rates have been declining since the introduction of the iPhone and dating apps. This chart shows the one-year aggregate probability of divorce for newly married women since 2008.

When I posted the original chart and asked why, I posed several possibilities of why the share of those between 18-30 were getting no sex?

These are the possibilities I suggested.

Later marriages?

iPhone introduced in 2007?

Harder to do it when you are living in your parents' basement?

More women having sex than men. Are they only doing it with men over age 30?

It seems I was not far off if this hedge fund manager is correct in his thesis.

I asked you to ponder this yourself.

You have more to ponder now. That especially applies to any of you men reading this who believe that they are "better than average" in attractiveness to the opposite sex.

Leftovers After Thanksgiving

I come across a lot of interesting facts, figures and charts in my reading and research.

Many times it is not possible to write an entire blog post about them.

This blog post highlights several things that I found interesting but didn't think they would work in a full post. Think of them as BeeLine leftovers after Thanksgiving.

However, just because they are leftovers does not mean they will not nourish you in some way. If nothing else, one of these might prove to be a conversation starter at a holiday party over the next couple of weeks.

Hong Kong

1.47 million people in Hong Kong voted in local elections four years ago. This past week 2.94 million voters turned out. There is nothing that makes people angrier than trying to take something away from them---especially their freedom.

The pro-Chinese communists had a rather bad election night in Hong Kong. Democracy is on the upswing in Hong Kong.  More troubles for China.

Democracy

This graph might explain why the Hong Kongers were motivated to vote. A lot of people in the world still do not have that privilege. However, more people live under democratic rule than ever before. You can thank our Founders for starting that trend and the Greatest Generation for giving it a boost with their sacrifices in World War II.

Credit: The Visual Capitalist

Taxes

Speaking of freedom and democracy, how receptive are people to handing more of their hard-earned money to the federal government? Bernie Sanders said last week that he planned to raise taxes on everyone making more than $29,000 per year to pay for his socialist vision.

How do you think that will work out?

A recent Rasmussen poll asked likely voters how much they would be willing to spend in additional taxes per year to pay for Medicare for All.

32% of Democrats are unwilling to spend anything. 22% are willing to spend an extra $100 annually and 17% are willing to spend $300. In other words, 71% of Democrats are not willing to spend an extra $1 per day out of their pockets to pay for Medicare for All.

It does not look like a winning issue to me. There are an endless number of people who will vote for free stuff. There are not many who will vote to take money out of their own pocket to pay for it.

I am old enough to remember the last Presidential candidate who ran by telling voters he was going to raise their taxes.

It did not end well for Walter Mondale in 1984. He captured only 13 electoral votes. 3 from D.C. (where all the tax money goes) and his home state of Minnesota (although he carried it by a margin of only 3,700 votes).

Credit: 270toWin.com

Leftovers or Left out?

How do you explain it?

Later marriages?

iPhone introduced in 2007?

Harder to do it when you are living in your parents' basement?

More women having sex than men. Are they only doing it with men over age 30?

Are those 28% of men leftovers or left out?

I will leave it to you to ponder this one.

Elizabeth Warren: Meet the Pilgrims

The Democrat primary field for President this year is much further left than it has ever been. In fact, leading contenders like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren can no longer be described as liberals or progressives---they are actively promoting unapologetic socialist policies.

For example, in the last debate Bernie Sanders proposed criminally prosecuting and imprisoning corporate executives with coal, oil and gas companies for causing climate change. Warren suggested something similar earlier in the campaign.

The only problem is that the fossil fuel energy that Sanders and Warren rail against is what drives the economy. There is a direct correlation between energy consumption and GDP as I have written about in the past. 

They are going to jail the people (and effectively shut down the fossil fuel industry) who run the engine that drives the economy that supports everything in our society?

It makes you wonder how will we pay for all of their socialist proposals?

Thomas Edsall of the New York Times summarized Warren's policy proposals in a recent column.

The broad scope of the Warren agenda is partially reflected in proposals to provide universal health care; to increase Social Security benefits by $200 a month; to “end Washington corruption;” to achieve 100 percent clean energy; a “fair and welcoming immigration system;” free public college; the breakup of Facebook, Amazon, Google and Apple; cancellation of student debt; “guaranteed high-quality child care and early education for every child in America;” a 2 percent tax on every dollar of net worth above $50 million and a higher tax on every dollar of net worth above $1 billion; and a $1 trillion program of environmental justice for poor and minority communities.

In addition, Warren would decriminalize illegal border crossing — the “criminal provision is totally unnecessary for border security” — and her Medicare proposal would include coverage of undocumented immigrants.

Roll Call recently estimated what all of Warren's proposals would cost. It came up with almost $30 trillion in additional federal spending over the next 10 years. I have to think this is on the low side.

Let's put that $30 trillion in new spending in context. The federal government is projected to collect just $3.6 trillion in revenues this fiscal year. That means that Warren essentially would almost have to double the tax take to the federal government in order to pay for her new spending proposals.

Does there appear to be a slight disconnect here?

You would think that Elizabeth Warren would know better. After all, she is a Senator from Massachusetts, where the Pilgrims landed 399 years ago.

Senator Warren might want to be reacquainted with the story of those Pilgrims this Thanksgiving.

The Pilgrims also thought that socialism was the ideal answer for their community when they first arrived in America. It did not take long for them to discover the theoretical appeal of socialist ideals quickly falters when tested against the human condition.

I wrote the following blog post in 2013 about the Pilgrims and the origins of Thanksgiving Day. It is a useful story to have at hand at the dinner table should someone you love start to turn the conversation in a leftward direction.

Share as you might dare between the mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie.

For me, I am thankful for all of my readers this Thanksgiving. Thank you for being a part of the BeeLine family.

Pilgrims, Prosperity And Poverty
(originally posted November 28, 2013)

I am thankful for many things.  My family. My friends. My job. I could go on and on. The list is very long.

I am most thankful I was born in the United States of America.  A country founded on the concept of individual rights and freedom.  A country that has embraced the idea of economic freedom, property rights and capitalism since its founding.

Of course, I was born at a different time than where we seem to be today in our attitudes about some of these ideals. Will our young people be as thankful as I am about their country of birth? I certainly hope so. However, it amazes me how we fail to accept the reality of the failings and foibles of the human condition throughout history. As a result, the same mistakes and missteps plague us no matter how many times the history lesson is taught.

Look no further than Venezuela. What was once the one of the most prosperous South American countries now languishes under a socialist regime despite rich natural resources.  Communist North Korea can't feed its own people while South Korea is giving a tablet computer to every school child. Taiwan flourished in freedom while Red China floundered for decades before its leaders embraced capitalist-based economic reforms. The same was true for East and West Germany.  In all of these cases there was no difference in the people. They were literally blood brothers and sisters. It was the governmental system and philosophy that made the difference between prosperity and poverty for the people of these nations.

Speaking of history, let's revisit the story of the Pilgrims and the origins of Thanksgiving Day. The story as I learned it in school was about a group of rugged individuals who set sail on the Mayflower in 1620 seeking religious freedom in America. They encountered many hardships that first year but thanks to help from Indians and the Grace of God (I am sure this is no longer mentioned in the textbooks) they reaped a bountiful harvest in the following year and gave thanksgiving with a giant feast.

The First Thanksgiving At Plymouth, Jennie Augusta Brownscombe

The real story is much more enlightening.  It also shows that there is absolutely no question about which system works best to provide the most prosperity for the most people and limits poverty. There should be no debate. It has been shown to be true over and over again in human history. However, over and over there are those who persist in thinking there is a better, more humane way to best provide for people in a society.

The real story of the Pilgrims was written by William Bradford who was the leader of the Plymouth Colony from 1621-1657.  He wrote "Of Plymouth Plantation" to chronicle the story of the Pilgrims and it is recognized today as the most complete and authoritative source on the subject.

One of the best summaries I have seen about the Pilgrim story was written by Dr. Judd W. Patton, "The Pilgrim Story: Vital Insights And Lessons For Today".

Let's start at the beginning. When the Pilgrims decided to go to America they had a problem not uncommon to many of us. They did not have enough money. They lacked the funds to sail to America, equip and establish their colony. As a result, they got financial help from some investors who financed New World adventures in return for a share of what the colonists made through farming, fishing, trade and other working endeavors.

The contract between the Adventurers (Investors) and the Pilgrims consisted of ten points. The most critical of which stated, “That all such persons as are of this colony are to have their meat, drink, apparel, and all provisions out of the common stock and goods of the said colony.”

Today we would call this a socialist commune. In other words, the Pilgrims accepted the socialist principle, “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need.” Each person was to place his production into the common warehouse and receive back, through the Governor, only what he needed for himself or his family. The surplus after seven years was to be divided equally, along with the houses, lands, and chattels, “betwixt the Adventurers and Planters.”

The first year after they set sail for America was particularly difficult. The voyage itself took sixty-six days. They landed first on Cape Cod even though they had intended to reach the mouth of the Hudson River. They spent another month sailing the coast of Cape Cod until they finally decided to settle in Plymouth at the site of an old Indian village on December 21, 1620.

Within two months, half of their numbers died. Of the 24 families who had set sail, only four were untouched by death that first year.  Four other families were wiped out completely.  Those that made it to that first Thanksgiving were thankful.  However, it wasn't necessarily because of a bountiful harvest. They were just happy to have survived.

Contrary to legend, the harvests were extremely poor in 1621 and 1622. It was normal to be hungry. Governor Bradford referred to 1621 as the “the small harvest” year. Yet he notes that in “the summer there was no want.” Thankful for what God had given them, Governor Bradford declared a three-day feast for the purpose of prayer and celebration. We all know it as the first New England Thanksgiving – apparently observed in late summer.

Things were marginally better in 1622. The harvest was a little better but many Pilgrims held back and did not work as hard as others. There was stealing and hoarding. Bradford and the other Pilgrim leaders recognized that this would continue unless they changed the system.  What could they do to prevent another poor harvest?

This is how Governor Bradford tells it in "Of Plymouth Plantation".

“So they began to think how they might raise as much corn as they could, and obtain a better crop than they had done, that they might not still languish in misery. At length, after much debate of things, the Governor (with the advice of the chiefest amongst them) gave way that they should set corn every man for his own particular, and in that regard trust to themselves; in all other things to go on in the general way as before. And so assigned to every family a parcel of land…This had very good success, for it made all hands very industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise…The women now went willingly into the field, and took the little ones with them to set corn; which before would allege weakness and inability; whom to have compelled would have been thought great tyranny and oppression.”

The socialist system was discarded and replaced with a system that was built on individual property rights that put the trust in individual initiative to take care of the common good of the colony.

How did that work out?

In 1621, the Pilgrims planted only 26 acres. Sixty acres were planted in 1622. But in 1623, spurred on by individual enterprise, 184 acres were planted! Somehow those who alleged weakness and inability became healthy and strong. It’s amazing what incentive will do to improve bad attitudes!

However, the Pilgrims still had their challenges. The summer of 1623 was hot and dry. For almost two months there was no rain. Their crops were in jeopardy. Governor Bradford did not lose faith.

Governor Bradford then set a “solemn day of humiliation (fasting) to seek the Lord by humble and fervent prayer in this great distress.” Their prayers were answered. By evening it began to rain. It revived the corn and other fruits. Even the Indians were astonished. The soft showers continued along with beautiful fair weather. The result was a “fruitful and liberal harvest …for which mercy they also set apart a day of thanksgiving.”

By the fall of 1624, the colonists were able to export a full boat load of corn! And the Pilgrims settled with the Adventurers. They purchased the Adventurers stock in the colony and completed the transition to private property and free markets.

The rest is history. The experience of the Pilgrims went a long way to forming the values and principles upon which our Founding Fathers created a new nation unlike anything the world had ever seen before. It came to be the most prosperous and powerful country ever known to mankind. For that I am forever thankful to the Pilgrims and the others who endured trials and tribulations to give me the life I have today.

As we celebrate Thanksgiving it is useful to remember the Pilgrims and what their experience can teach us. I think Dr. Patton summarizes the lessons pretty well.

The Pilgrim experience dating from 1623 was and is yet a prototype for the United States of America. They learned the hard way that: (1) Socialism does not work; it diminishes individual initiative and enterprise; (2) Socialism is not a Godly economic system; and (3) Famine and drought can be used by God to humble a people and set them on a proper course. The Pilgrims responded. The real question today is: Can Americans learn these vital insights from the Pilgrims or must we too face famine and drought in the coming years?

Happy Thanksgiving!