Honest Leftists

Some folks say leftists are serially dishonest.

And it’s true that they openly assert that nations can tax and spend their way to prosperity. But we know that’s false.

And it’s true that they also claim the economy is a fixed pie and successful people only become rich by making others poor. Yet we know that’s a big fat lie as well.

Heck, it’s even true that they will argue that more government control of a big segment of the economy will lower costs and improve efficiency. And that’s obviously a whopper

But that doesn’t mean honest leftists are mythical, like Bigfoot and unicorns. Every so often a statist actually says something very honest. This deserves special attention, so this page has been created to commemorate those rare occasions.

But we also want to distinguish between types of honesty.

Our first category is for those who admit that leftist policy is somehow wrong. Or they at least acknowledge that there are negative side effects.

• Nicholas Kristof writes on the problem of government-caused dependency.
• Hillary Clinton confessed that Obamacare was undermining full-time work.

And we have several who have had epiphanies about gun control.

• Jeffrey Goldberg admits gun ownership reduces crime.
• Justin Cronin explains how he became a left-wing supporter of gun rights.
• Jamelle Bouie pours cold water on Obama’s gun control agenda.
• Leah Libresco confesses that gun control simply doesn’t work.

Our second category is for those statists who inadvertently reveal the degree to which they harbor depraved thoughts.

• An English leftist named Richard Murphy actually argues that private income is the “rightful property” of government.
• An American statist named Matt Yglesias openly expressed a desire for ultra-high tax rates solely for reasons of spite rather than to finance bigger government.
• A California statist (sorry for being redundant) who happens to be Governor, Jerry Brown, celebrated the role of government coercion.

Our third category is for statists who admit they want higher taxes on the middle class.

• The editors at the New York Times endorsed higher taxes on the middle class in 2010.
• The then-House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer also gave a green light that year to higher taxes on the middle class.
• In 2012, MIT professor and former IMF official Simon Johnson argued that the middle class should pay more tax.
• The Washington Post also called for higher taxes on the middle class a few years ago, as did Vice President Joe Biden’s former economist.
• A New York Times columnist also called for broad-based tax hikes on the middle class in 2012.
• A Senior Fellow from Demos also argued for higher taxes on all Americans that year, specifically targeting the middle class.
• In 2013, the New York Times again (!) editorialized in favor of higher tax burdens on the middle class.
• In 2017, two UCLA law professors endorsed big tax increases on ordinary people.
• Also that year, a columnist for US News & World Report urged higher taxes on middle-income people.
• In 2019, an out-of-the-closet socialist admitted a big welfare state requires big tax hikes on lower-income and middle-class people.
• In 2020, two leftists opined in the Washington Post that ordinary people need to pay much higher taxes to finance bigger government.
• In 2021, a Washington Post columnist embraced big tax hikes on people with modest incomes.

Congratulation to all these people for their accidental honesty!