George Will praises dynamic Florida as he boos the state of national politics

George Will. Photo via Florida TaxWatch

Conservative pundit George Will, a self-described Ronald Reagan Republican, has little good to say about the Presidential Election. But at a Florida TaxWatch event, he offered words of praise for Florida’s governing philosophy.

From a lack of state income tax to a move away from diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, Will told attendees that Florida remained a “laboratory of liberty.” And he credited Florida TaxWatch for much of that.

“If we had 49 of these — and one in Washington — we’d get a lot better off,” he said. “State-based organizations like this are going to save us.”

But the conservative stalwart made clear he had little use for Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

“Mass deportations are not going to happen,” Will said. “There are 11 million illegal immigrants in this country, most of whom got here before 2010, which is more than a decade ago now. Half the population, in their native decency, would not put up with the police measures that would be necessary to extract from our communities the people who are here for whom this is home.”

He said neither presidential candidate fits his own worldview. While he said nothing specific about Harris, he slammed rhetoric from President Joe Biden, especially claims that every important idea from the last two centuries was born from government.

“That idea is refuted by every page of American history,” he said.

From Eli Whitney’s invention of the cotton gin to Jeff Bezos turning an online bookstore to a business bigger than the British economy, he said the business sector was responsible for more American greatness than the political system.

On the subject of the federal government, Will at points turned downright gloomy. Besides bashing Trump’s immigration policies and the administration’s love of regulation, he said no political candidates today seem willing to address the greatest challenges facing America.

First among those, he said, are the entitlements promised to an aging population now driving up the debt.

“The real problem, ladies and gentleman, is a modern blessing: modern medicine,” he said.

The conceivers of Social Security, he said, could not imagine so many Americans living far beyond the age of 65.

“People worked until they could work no longer and died shortly,” he said.

But beyond Americans living far longer, it costs far more for them to stay alive. He noted that in most major metropolitan areas, health care now serves as the greatest employer, and in most state budgets, Medicaid payments remain the single costliest part.

The solution to Social Security, he said, is obvious. Raise the retirement age at a faster pace. “Simple conceptually. Politically impossible, of course,” he acknowledged.

The costs of entitlements, he said, mean a national debt now exceeding $35 billion and debt services payments that exceed national defense costs.

But for the naysaying about politics and regulation, Will said he remains optimistic about America and said there’s no greater time to live in the country than now. The poorest person in the poorest state, Mississippi, still has a higher income than the average Canadian worker, he said. The seven largest tech firms in the U.S. are more valuable than the entire stock markets of the U.K., Canada, Germany and Japan combined.

Americans, he said, should abandon class warfare driven by envy and embrace the ups and downs of a constantly changing economy. The rich tech titans have no more guarantee on future success than anyone else, he said, reminding that companies like Sears and Yahoo were once among the nation’s biggest. He expressed as much distaste for Federal Trade Commission attacks on so-called monopolies as he did on nativist attacks on legal immigration.

“They just say big is bad,” he said. “Monopolies are dangerous because monopolies are immortal things. The Roman Empire is gone. The Carolingian Empire is gone. The Ottoman Empire, Spanish, French, British, Soviet, Portuguese empire. It’s all gone, but Microsoft is forever?”