Changing Minds and Hearts

On Glenn Beck Radio this morning, he was talking to ex-KGB agent Jack Barsky (author of Deep Undercover), who had been deep cover as a spy in the US back in the 80s. He defected shortly before the fall of the Berlin Wall, remaining in the US because of his daughter.

image from Amazon.com

In telling his story he mentioned that, when you’re indoctrinated with certain ideas, or ways of thinking, it’s very hard to let go of those ideas as an adult.

“Ideology as it’s fed to you from childhood on is a very very strong foundation.”

In their further conversation, they mentioned that Islamists, and North Koreans, who have been trained since childhood to believe we are the enemy, the Great Satan, and worthy of death for existing and not being “them,” can’t be expected to change just because we offer them freedom, prosperity, and civilization. Many former East Germans now support Putin, for example. In reference to North Korea, Barsky said,

“You cannot think that, once you free them from that dictator, that the country is going to change.”

A little later in the day I heard radio host Dennis Prager say that one of the purposes of his PragerU videos is to educate the young people who have been missing a lot of truth in their education. He believes that, if you can bring them facts, and show them truth in a logical way, you can get through to them.

This afternoon I read an email from Hillsdale College, advertising their free online American Heritage course, which I have taken. They mention some troubling statistics:

According to the National Assessment of Education, only 18% of American high schoolers are proficient in U.S. history. So it’s no surprise that, according to the Pew Research Center, only 32% of Millennials think America is the greatest country in the world.

They say this happened on purpose:

Progressives who opposed the ideas of limited government and individual rights began a concerted effort over a century ago to take over America’s schools and universities. Since the late 1960s, to the extent young Americans have learned anything about our country’s history, it is more likely than not to be about its faults.

Meanwhile, I’ve just finished a section in my Book of Mormon reading about the conversion of a rather large group of people who had previously been taught to hate the other people, to see them as thieves and liars that they had a right to murder and subjugate. The change was dramatic. They were so determined to keep their new promises to God and their fellow human beings, that they buried their swords as a sign of their promise never to kill again (Alma 24:16-18). For them that even included in self-defense, which caused some issues later, but that’s another part of the story.

Anti-Nephi-Lehies, burying their weapons
image from LDS.org

These people did remain faithful. The change was not only dramatic; it was permanent.

And the former spy, Jack Barsky—his change has been permanent as well. In the cases where these people changed permanently, there are a couple of similarities: they were taught about Christ in a way that changed their hearts, and they felt love for those who taught them and for those around them.

If we’re looking for a way to change the world—to change a generation from hating freedom and the rules that lead to civilization into a free and prosperous people—how do we do it? There’s a simple but not easy answer: teach truth while loving them as they are.

I’m hoping that Dennis Prager is right. I hope that teaching millennials (and all of us) with clear, short videos that explain the truths will contribute to some conversions.

Add in the free online courses by Hillsdale College—on American Heritage, the US Constitution, the classics, and more—and clear truths are made accessible. This may mean more conversions.

I’m adding my small efforts here, at the Spherical Model, to try to lay out truth, as logically as I can, as a path to freedom, prosperity, and civilization.

I’m hoping for enough conversions here in America and among freedom-loving people around the globe, that the next generation won’t be trapped by the regressive teachings of the progressives. If we can preserve and recover freedom here in America, there’s hope for the rest of the world, or at least much of it.

But we’re up against a lot. And calmly teaching truth is the easy part. The other part, the letting them feel loved by us, so the change of heart comes—that’s always going to be a challenge.

But this week we celebrate the impossible: Christ overcoming death and the fall. With the help of the One who made the ultimate sacrifice for us, we can be made capable enough to help in change-of-heart miracles.

Lower Taxes Lead to Greater Revenue

I’ve been leisurely going through Hillsdale College’s free online American Heritage course. The other day I was listening to lecture 4, “The American Founding,” when I made a connection I hadn’t before.

The lecture is a detailed tracing of the movement from being loyal British citizens, asserting their traditional rights, to being independent peoples with natural rights. But there’s a story along the way, about taxes and duties.

For about four decades, the Whigs had been in power in the British Parliament, and they had lived by the philosophy of, “let sleeping dogs lie,” don’t upset what’s basically working. And that meant they had left the colonies mostly to rule themselves. There were governors, but the governors only got paid when the colonial assemblies voted to pay them. And Britain was three months away. So the colonists were pretty used to being left alone. 

But then a new prime minister comes in and starts to be concerned about those colonists getting too independent, and devises ways to crack down on them. I’ll let Dr. Paul Rahe tell this part (starting at 19:00 minutes into the video):

One of the things he does in April 1764, George Grenville, is to supplant the Molasses Act, which was designed to sort of ban molasses from America, with the Sugar Act. And it reduces the duties—the old duties had been set so high that no one could buy anything—so they cut the duties. In cutting the duties they were aiming at a revenue. And so the discontent in America begins with a tax cut, objections to a tax cut.

Well, the original tax was never paid, because it was so high it couldn’t be paid. The cut means that the British are going to seek revenue from the Americans in their own land. And the Americans respond to this with “no taxation without representation,” and they’re not represented in Parliament.

They tighten up the activities of the vice admiralty courts. The Americans were very efficient smugglers. One of the reasons they didn’t object to the Molasses Act is they smuggled molasses in and just skipped past the act. They’re going to tighten the vice admiralty courts so they can hammer these people. Then the Stamp Acts follow in 1965. The colonists are caught flat-footed. For forty-one years they’ve been left to their own devices, and suddenly there’s interference, and suddenly taxes are being imposed upon them, and there have never been taxes on them before

So here is something that governments knew back in the 1700s: higher taxes don’t mean more revenue; you get more revenue when you lower the taxes.

That’s the Laffer Curve, described by economist Art Laffer just forty years ago.

The Laffer Curve
from "The Laffer Curve: Past, Present, and Future," 2004

In short, there’s a point at which you can maximize revenue (if that is your goal—and it is often the goal of governments), and if you raise taxes above that point, the revenue will decrease. Because people avoid paying the tax if it is perceived as confiscatory.

Apparently the early colonists had no qualms about ignoring ridiculously high taxes, or duties (there are differences, but we’ll deal with them as similar enough for our purposes) by smuggling instead of obeying the British-imposed laws. In our day there might be other methods—moving a business out of the country, giving money to children in a trust where it can’t be touched, investing in times and ways that avoid tax, maybe even avoiding earning income over a certain level.

When taxes fall back into the range that people feel is tolerable, they start putting their money to use again, risking the need to pay the tax, because it’s worth paying in order to accomplish various personal goals.

That’s what happened when Reagan lowered to upper tax rate from 70% to 28%, which led us out of the Carter malaise and into a couple of decades of growth.

So, you’d think that if government officials really had the goal of raising revenue, they would find that sweet spot and use it. But they don’t. So they must have some other goal in mind—like appearing to care about the poor by confiscating from the wealthy,so they can get votes to retain their power.

Confiscatory taxes aren't good for a country. (Note: God asks for a flat 10%, given willingly, and maybe some extra offerings for the poor. Does government deserve more than God?) People take it personally when someone forcibly takes the fruits of their labors to use it for some other purpose. As John Locke put it, back in the day, “For what property have I in that which another may by right take when it pleases himself?”

If we want prosperity and growth in the economy, the way to do that is to set people free in the market, to earn what they can, and keep what they earn. You won’t get equal outcomes, but you’ll get better outcomes for everybody who participates.