A special announcement (and endorsement)

It is my great honor to endorse Clark Durant, my father, for United States Senate.

More than 28 years ago, on the day before Thanksgiving in 1982, my father almost died.  My mother was a few months pregnant at the time, and had three kids under the age of 7.  After a long day of work (my dad has always taken on the work of ten), he came home feeling like he had the flu.  In the bathroom, he collapsed in a pool of blood.

My mother called an ambulance -- this was before the days of 911, when you actually had to know the phone number for the police.  The paramedics rushed to our home, struggling to reach him with the stretcher (our hallway was narrow and the bathroom was small), and raced him to the hospital.

Seeing that my mother was pregnant, the doctor didn't tell her that my dad was in critical condition.  He didn't want her to have a miscarriage.  I'm glad she didn't -- it was me.  (And despite the doctor's efforts, she knew exactly how serious it was.  She's a tough lady.)

Over the next few days, and a few more close calls, the doctor eventually determined that my dad had three bleeding ulcers.  Using a surgical procedure that is now obsolete, the doctor operated on my father, sewing up two of the ulcers and removing the third.

The conventional wisdom at the time held that ulcers were caused by stress.

(Readers of this blog might appreciate how the conventional medical wisdom was, if not wrong, then dangerously incomplete.  The 2005 Nobel Prize in Medicine was awarded for the discovery that bacteria is the proximate cause of most peptic ulcers.  Stress plays a role, but I'm sure that diet plays an even greater one.  How's that for hitting close to home?)

The doctor told him, "Clark, you've got to stop working so hard."

That was like telling bacon not to be so delicious.

My dad is the type of guy who doesn't know what to do with himself on vacation.  If we went to Florida for a week (a rare treat back then -- most of our vacations were road trips to visit different baseball stadiums or canoeing on the Pere Marquette or Au Sable rivers), he'd start to relax the day before we had to leave. 

He's the type of guy who will never retire.

Education: Letter Books, Dinner Table Debates, Cornerstone

Ideas have always been important to my father, and education has always been one of his Big Projects.

In many important respects -- and without diminishing the work of all the great teachers I have had -- I have often felt like I was home-schooled.  He and mother taught me and my siblings how to read before we learned it in school.  They worked with us on our "Letter Books" (A, B, C, D, etc.).

In the 3rd grade, I got looks for bringing in the book I was reading: a single volume edition of the Lord of Rings.  Other kids thought I was reading either the Bible or the dictionary -- the two "big books" that most kids knew.

One of my fondest memories of growing up is the debates my brother and I would have with my father.  They were epic.  They really were.  I wish we had tape-recorded some of them.

Should a 15-year old be able to attend a concert on a school night?  Should the youngest child have a later curfew than his older siblings did at that age? There was more at stake than my bedtime -- the appropriate curfew was a deep moral and philosophical question requiring my brother and me to marshal the great thinkers of history.  What did Jesus and Nietzsche have to say about my curfew?  A lot, apparently.

My father was always happy to hear counter-arguments -- as long as they were logical.  We had a very Socratic upbringing.  And yes, sometimes we won, purely on the basis of logic, and got to go to that weeknight concert.

In 1991, my father continued his passion for education when he helped found the Cornerstone Schools, a series of independent schools in the inner city of Detroit.  (Two of them are now charter schools.)  And for the past twenty years, he has devoted much of his life to creating opportunity for those who had little.  You can read about his efforts here: "Cornerstone opened the way for more city school options."

It would have been easy to criticize -- or ignore -- the Detroit Public Schools from the far-off (and white) suburbs.  But it wouldn't have solved anything.  Better to criticize by creating the alternative.  Show that it works, and let reality do the persuading.  And that's what he did.

Fundamentally, education in this country, and around the world, is still done in much the same way that it has been for the last 200 years.  It was a system originally designed to train farmers living in an agrarian society to be factory workers and office workers in an increasingly industrialized world.  And it's hardly changed with the times.

I actually find this to be a great cause for optimism in today's economy, because it is still an area where we should see dramatic improvements.  If -- and this is a big IF -- if we allow innovators to innovate.  If we allow entrepreneurs to develop new methods and technologies.  There will be failures -- innovation always entails false starts -- but it's the right process to eventually succeed.

I'll make a small suggestion: it might be good to have a few Republican in office who have a background in traditionally Democratic issues like education and healthcare.  Similarly, it might be good to have a few Democrats in office who have a background in entrepreneurship and running a business.

Radical, I know.

The Economy: Jobs, Debt, and Free Enterprise

The issue of the day, of course, isn't education -- though education is part of a comprehensive solution.  The issue of the day is this shit can of an economy.  Apologies for language.  I'm going to go on a little rant here.

I'm trying to start a business right now, and it'd be nice if our potentates in Washington -- all of them -- would keep their eye on the ball.  There's plenty of blame to go around.

The housing bubble can be traced back, at a minimum, to actions taken in both the Clinton and Bush administrations -- and the inability to properly reform Fannie and Freddie, for one, lies squarely on the Obama administration.

Deficits too.  The Republicans racked up deficits when they were in power, creating a culture where deficits don't matter -- deficits that only look small in retrospect, when compared to astronomical Democratic deficits.  Republicans seem happy to run deficits in times of war, Democrats seem happy to run deficits in times of peace -- and we'll just have to see who is left holding the bag.  Unfortunately, that probably means the taxpayers in my generation.

The Democrats, at their worst, veer off into class warfare and socialism.  The Republicans, at their worst, veer off into defending big business and crony capitalism.

What would be nice is if a group of elected officials would actually stand for a very simple idea that is older than either party, and will outlast both.  It's called the free enterprise system.

• Free enterprise means simple and fair rules that apply equally to all people: rich and poor, male and female, black and white, young and old.  (Complex rules favor Ivy League graduates, who are smart enough and well-connected enough to game the system.  Complex rules encourage rent-seeking, graft, and free-riding.)
• Free enterprise means a clear and predictable legal and regulatory framework.  (Complex regulation favors big corporations at the expense of small businesses and start-ups.)
• Free enterprise does not mean dog eat dog, and our social safety nets should be designed to get people back on their feet and become independent, upwardly-mobile, and contributing members of our society as quickly as possible.  But these safety nets have to be sustainable, otherwise we will all go down with the ship.

KISS.  Keep It Simple Stupid.  Now that's a winning platform.

What is so damn hard about that?  I'll tell you what's hard:

• Short letters are harder to write than long ones
• Simple computer code is harder to write than complicated computer code
• Short speeches are harder to write than long speeches

But there is great virtue in simplicity.

Think of a nation's laws and institutions as its "operating system".  Our nation's Declaration and Constitution -- remarkably short documents -- are like Apple: simple, elegant, user friendly, and provides a platform for creators to do what they do best: create, innovate, and invent.  It may need a major upgrade once in awhile (slavery was the original sin embedded in our founding documents that had to be so painfully rooted out), but mostly it just needs minor upgrades.  It works pretty well -- particularly relative to all the alternatives.

Our current government is more like Microsoft: complex, klugey, slow, and precariously balanced on top of a legacy code base.

I'm sure there are lots of problems with this metaphor.

But remember, our national operating system wasn't set up exactly as it was because our founders had some kind of god-like foresight into the type of rules that would enable the astonishing economic growth that would result.  They set up the system they did, in large part, because it SEEMED FAIR TO THEM.  They were tired of getting abused by a distant imperial power in cahoots with crony mercantile business interests.  As it turned out, a fair, simple set of rules and institutions turned out to be just the thing that fosters long term growth.

One more thing: free enterprise is not socialism, plainly -- but it is definitely NOT crony capitalism.

In fact, in many ways, crony capitalism is a greater threat to the free enterprise system than socialism ever will be.  Because to the extent conservatives are correct about socialism, then reality will deliver the final verdict on socialism.  But crony capitalism is a much more insidious force that erodes the moral authority of the free enterprise system, and the liberty and prosperity of a free and fair people.

End rant.

You can ask my dad about his own views.  As for motivation, he isn't running to build a career in Washington.  He is running against two long-standing politicians, one from each party.  I am not going to say anything about them.  I am only here to talk about my dad.

And I endorse him, not because he is my father -- I would still endorse him even if he weren't -- but because he a man of character, a man of principle, and a man who is focused like a laser on solving the economic problems of today.

(And I'll add this: if there is an issue that is personally important to him that he will also focus on while in office, it will be reforming and improving our nation's education system.)

Clark Durant will be a terrific Senator.

Anyhow, I'm not going to be using this blog to promote his campaign, but I'll provide some information this once.

• His website is at ClarkDurant.com, and his bio is here.
• Like Clark on facebook
• Follow Clark on Twitter
• And if you'd like to donate, then today (Friday) is the day, because it's the end of the fundraising quarter.  You can donate here.  There is no donation too small.  There is no donation too large.  (Oh wait, actually, there is: $5k is the max for the election cycle.)

Thanks, everyone.

Now back to your regularly scheduled programming -- rants against the underlying sources of our national decline: tofu, gourmet cupcakes, and gluten.