Should Unintended Consequences of a Policy Excuse its Proponents from Not Anticipating the Results?

 

Too often the answer is no.

All of us do things with good intentions that don’t work out as hoped.  And, ok, we make mistakes and misjudge what’s the best thing to do.  But we should learn from the experience (and those of others) and try to do better next time.  If we don’t, we are fools.  As the adage goes, to do something again which failed the first time and expect a different outcome is a definition of insanity.

To ignore human nature, as those on the left are wont to do, generates untold misery and worse.  Of course, one can deny that humankind has flawed, ingrained dispositions or that evil people exist, for instance.

But common sense and history prove otherwise.  Does the fate of utopian projects come to find?

Hope should not supersede reality.  [That, to me, is a summary statement of the Conservative’s political perspective.]

Consider recent examples of what happens when hope determines policy.

 

Defund the police:

          I am confident that the woke Left neither desired nor expected that a jump in crime rates would ensue in the wake of its demands (anarchists excluded).  But they were fools not to have anticipated such results.

 

End hostility to illegal border crossings:

          Did President Biden truly believe that his words opposing Trump’s strict enforcement would not encourage increased efforts to enter the U.S.?

                   Yes.  I don’t think he wished to invite tens of thousands of illegals to storm north.  (There is no evidence that he has joined those of the Left who want open borders.)  So what happened was unintended.  But was it unanticipated as well?  Only a fool would think so.

 

Give out free money: 

          The economy is recovering rapidly but progress is being hampered by the apparent reluctance of many currently unemployed people to work.  Why get a job when a person formerly employed in low-paying service jobs (in restaurants, in particular) gets more money sitting on the sidelines?

          Did the President and Congress intend to slow the economic recovery?  No.  But again, given human nature, was the consequence unanticipated?