Eric Stubben
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Eric Stubben is a mechanical engineering sophomore and Mustang News conservative columnist. These views do not necessarily reflect the opinion or editorial coverage of Mustang News.
For decades, Paul Harvey was the morning alarm for thousands of Americans. His thundering voice and right-wing opinions mixed with his nimble words to make him a staple of radio. He wasn’t flashy, but he told life how he saw it. To many Republicans, he was a prophet speaking out of the book of Reagan, even before Reagan became who popular.
To me, Harvey’s “If I Were the Devil” speech, first written in 1964 and expanded on through 1999, represents the epitome of conservative thought. His catchy phrases strive to depict the slow but critical advances of social progressivism in America. Harvey’s 50-year-old speech still resonates today, perhaps more than ever. I’ve picked out some of the most indicative lines to show just how real Harvey’s speech was, and how incredibly relevant it remains today.
At the beginning of the speech: “In the ears of the young married, I would whisper that work is debasing, that cocktail parties are good for you. I would caution them not to be ‘extreme’ in religion, in patriotism, in moral conduct.”
Look, I’m not here to say a cocktail party isn’t a good way to blow off steam. It may come as a shock to few, but conservatives aren’t that stuck up. One thing conservatives universally believe in is the power of hard work. Too often today we see hard workers or religious zealots dismissed as “extreme.” The first person that comes to my mind is Tim Tebow. On the field, his religious affection and nose-to-the-grindstone attitude allowed people to dismiss him as “extreme,” while passively ignoring his on- and off-the-field success.
Politically, Republicans are often portrayed as patriotic “extremists,” too. The media jumps on any chance they can to depict prominent Republicans such as John Boehner and Marco Rubio as extreme hawks or patriots, as if being a patriot is a bad thing. While extremism is consistently roped in with passion, they are far from the same. This country was born on shrewd, hard-working, passionate people whose call for independence would nowadays likely be passed off as “extreme.” What a different world this would be.
Toward the middle of the speech, Harvey says, “I’d infiltrate unions and urge more loafing, less work. Idle hands usually work for me.”
What’s more detrimental to a country than people who work less, yet get paid more? Outside of a nuclear disaster, very little is worse. To conservatives, unions are mere faces for feet stepping on the throats of the companies they work to dupe. For years, unions’ overblown pensions and incredible unwillingness to settle for anything less than their extreme demands has crippled companies and government. Companies such as Boeing face constant union work stoppages, affecting their productivity and forcing Boeing to consider moving some work elsewhere.
Paul Harvey ends with: “If I were the devil, I’d take from those who have and give to those who wanted until I had killed the incentive of the ambitious.”
If there is one sentence that sums up anti-conservative thought any better, please show it to me. Conservatives are all about “earning,” but hardly about “handing out.” Clearly President Barack Obama’s administration knows how to poke the nerves of conservatives. In 2011, spending on welfare jumped to more than $1 trillion, a big bruise to Republican’s budget-reducing philosophies.
Yet what hurts conservatives most is that this huge amount of money spent on welfare is simply full of “handouts.” Our welfare system does nothing to provide training for those who need it. Through technical skills and trained trades, we can replace apathy with ambition. There’s a big difference between training people for careers and giving them jobs. Jobs are just something that make money and take up 40 hours per week. Careers create incentive for success and allow for an opportunity to climb the career ladder.
Now, reading or listening to any of Harvey’s whole speeches (I highly recommend them) from 1964 to 1999, there are an incredible number of comparisons that can be made to today’s life. Some are religious convictions, but many are not. He chimed in on high taxes, big government and just about everything else. He had the mind of today’s conservative mouthpieces, but was almost universally well-liked (read: nothing like Rush Limbaugh).
What may be the most impressive — or concerning — part about Harvey is most of his predictions and intuitions have come to be correct. His typically optimistic and grounded view on life was refreshing, but his warnings continue to hold.
As a conservative and an American, I heed Harvey’s predictions. If they’ve been true for 50 years to date, there’s a good chance they’ll continue to stay true. Perhaps Harvey’s words say it best: “In other words, if I were the devil, I’d just keep right on doing what he’s doing.”