As Should Be Obvious

RALEIGH – I was tucking my sons in bed a few nights ago when MSNBC commentator Keith Olbermann named me as one of the worst people in the world.

When a left-wing friend later informed me of the honor, I admit to being a bit underwhelmed. Since Olbermann hands out the honorific frequently, and presumably doesn’t want to bore his audience by naming Dick Cheney every night, it was only a matter of time before he got to me. Plus, I’ve seen MSNBC’s ratings so I figured it was statistically unlikely that I’d meet very many people who had actually watched the show.

So I just went to bed.

But it turns out that being named one of the worst people in the world comes with responsibilities that aren’t easy to shirk. There are character flaws to be hidden, prejudices to be denied, and conspiracies to be explained away.

I’ve been around the political debate long enough to know the game people like Keith Olbermann like to play, and to refuse to play it with them. If an adversary seeks to provoke to discuss topic A, it’s best to discuss topic B. If he wants you to react with dismay or fury, it’s best to laugh at him.

You see, it is particularly silly to ascribe made-up beliefs and attitudes to individuals who write and speak for a living. In my case, there are literally tens of thousands of columns, blog posts, audio files, and TV snippets freely available on the web to anyone who might wonder what I think. It should be pretty obvious by now.

But I’ll offer the following as a handy time-saver:

I hold it to be self-evident all that persons are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; and that among these are life, liberty, the enjoyment of the fruits of their own labor, and the pursuit of happiness.

Sound familiar? It should. This is a direct quote of Article 1, Section 1 of the North Carolina Constitution. With a couple of small differences, of course, the passage also appears near the beginning of America’s founding document, the Declaration of Independence. That language was, in turn, lifted with just a few other alterations from a famous passage in Two Treatises of Government by, as it happens, an English chap named John Locke.

Many have heard these words so often that they’ve become a catechism. Rote recitation and repetition have drained the words of their original meaning. Let’s look at each phrase in more detail.

To say we are all created equal is not to say that we are indistinguishable. We differ widely in size, shape, hue, talents, culinary preferences, and the hand-eye coordination necessary to master the Wii. Left to our own devices, we won’t all develop the same interests, earn the same wages, rear identical children, or adopt the same beliefs.

What the phrase really means is that, whatever our differences of status or wealth, we all enjoy equal rights under the law. We are all equally entitled to the protection of those rights by the civil authorities.

And what are those rights? Well, as Locke wrote, in a hypothetical state of nature we enjoy unlimited rights to think, say, and act as we wish. In the real world of human societies, however, human beings give up or “alienate” some rights – in particular, the right to initiate physical force – in exchange for governmental protection.

Still, other rights are inalienable. We always possess them. They include the right to own ourselves and our decisions (life & liberty), to acquire property by mixing our labor with natural resources (the fruits of our labors), and to acquire property by voluntary exchange with other people (the pursuit of happiness).

Basically, then, every human being enjoys the right to do whatever he wants to do, on his own property, as long as his actions do not reduce other people’s rights to do the same. My right to swing my fist ends at your nose, and all that.

To say I have the right to pursue happiness is not, of course, to say that I have a right to force you to make me happy. I don’t have a right to force you to give me food, clothing, shelter, or health care. I can ask. I can offer something you value in exchange. When the Left tries to misuse the concept of rights to justify theft, I snort.

I take a dim view of politicians who think their job extends beyond carrying out the few, core, constitutional duties of government. I also take a dim view of people who won’t mind their own business, in all senses of the terms. And I take a dim view of anyone who thinks that personal freedom doesn’t come with personal responsibility, and that it is the job of government to force taxpayers to bail out profligate households or businesses.

If that makes me one of the worst people in the world in the eyes of a few deluded nincompoops, fine. I’ll just wish them a speedy recovery and go play with my kids.

Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation