I’d like to help reduce the frustration of folks who care about national politics and public policy. It’s my observation that a simple truth drives the major political parties. Here it is.

When a national government goes beyond its most fundamental functions, e.g., enforcing the rule of law and providing national defense, it becomes a bureaucratic engine plundering resources from one group to give them to another. The flow is usually from the poorly organized to the well off and well organized.

The best governments create institutions that encourage creativity and foster social well-being. This is measured annually by the Heritage Foundation/Wall Street Journal’s Index of Economic Freedom. There is a clear association between economic freedom and prosperity: those governments that plunder least produce the wealthiest people.

But political incentives often run to the contrary. Consider Republicans, formerly the party of “limited government, fiscal responsibility, and free enterprise.” Clearly, they’re over it. As David Brooks, a conservative New York Times columnist, observed recently: “Republicans used the powers of government to entrench their own dominance. They used their control of the federal budget to create a new entitlement, to woo new allies and service a key constituency group, the elderly.” Simply put, they use the budget process to buy votes.

I’ve just returned from several weeks with some of the nation’s leading economists and policy analysts at think tanks and universities in the East. I noted serious squabbles between them and Republican operatives working with K Street lobbyists.

But it’s not only conservative and libertarian intellectuals who discern the Republican hypocrisy. Last weekend the Financial Times lead editorial was titled, “Pork feast cooked up by Congress.” Our legislative body “has been transforming itself into a vending machine,” the FT wrote. “Into the vending machine go the campaign contributions and out come neatly packaged pieces of legislation to repay those generous benefactors.”

In the Washington Post David Broder recently noted: “In bending the rules and fudging reality, Republicans showed just how much they value these victories.” And we know why: that’s how a party wins the power to plunder.

Traditionally, Democrats claimed to be progressives, representing the downtrodden and those of modest means. But their behavior clearly demonstrates Republicans have no lock on hypocrisy and mendacity. It’s just that the Ds respond to different constituencies.

The two clearest examples are the class-action trial lawyers (who have done incalculable damage to both poor and rich) and the teachers’ unions.

Despite the devastatingly consistent failure of inner-city schools, and the overwhelming support of minority parents for reforms ranging from vouchers to charter schools, the Democratic party acts as a subsidiary of the AFT and the NEA. These unions fanatically oppose merit pay for teachers who exceed performance expectations. This pushes teachers with high-demand skills (e.g., science, math, and computers) into the private sector, where they can be paid what they’re worth.

Both parties behave consistently across time, i.e., contributions trump alleged commitments to principle. The vending machine model of national politics explains far more than does the traditional civics text.

Yet, America remains by far the most successful large-scale social experiment in history. We are also the most likely to survive these political Ponzi schemes that have entrapped all highly developed western nations.

We may be saved by three forces: a relatively favorable demography, a constitution that fosters high innovation and adaptability, and by far the world’s most sophisticated professional policy analysts.

Analysts expose silliness, wickedness, and long-term consequences of self-serving policies. Fortunately, many are in institutes well insulated from political pressures. Further, all have access to a genuinely free press, even if “only” a blog site. As a result, opportunistic politicians find it ever harder to hide.

And this has consequences. As more folks learn that parties are unconstrained by philosophical positions, e.g., George Bush’s support of the steel tariff, party loyalty erodes.

At one time party labels carried information, e.g., Republicans stood for limited government, fiscal prudence, and conservation. Democrats favored expanding the welfare state with higher taxes. Today the responsible citizen ignores party identification, instead examining candidates’ platforms and monitoring winners’ voting behavior.

Fortunately, this is ever easier. With today’s information technology, there’s no place for the hypocrite to hide.