I think it’s important to establish first that I am a Conservative Christian Republican although some of my views here are contrary to my party’s ideology. I do although support true capitalism, but true capitalism in America does not exist and we need to take drastic measures to realign the country with the dream our founding fathers had.
I grew up with a great respect for free markets and this notion of Laissez-Faire economics. I was a product of Corporate America and truly believed that we are the America we are because of these principles. Oh how sadly I have been misled. First lets address the context to which Adam Smith described “the invisible hand” and Laissez-Faire Economics. If you do not know the term Laissez-Faire its literal translation is “let the business alone,” a philosophy that free markets will always regulate themselves. While this is a brilliant concept it has been grossly distorted through the eyes of Corporate America. Regan’s trickle down economics started a landslide of Corporate Power and I would have to argue that Corporate America has become a Monarch, reigning over all the power and all the money, making it harder and harder for middle class Americans to voice their hopes and dreams.
When Smith coined this concept it was in direct relationship to local business, that a localized community would regulate supply and demand. Unfortunately it has been the catalyst of income concentration to a minute percentage of the US population, and many middle class Americans do not understand the concepts they so rigidly fight to uphold, myself formally one of them. Bruce Judson does a phenomenal job at walking you through history in his book titled “It can happen here, America on the Brink.” A society can not sustain without a middle class, and we have allowed the weakening of Unions, and the creation of a greed machine called Wall St. to erode this middle class.
Wall St. operates on one factor, profit at all costs, CEO’s being rewarded for layoffs and cost cutting as long as profit was achieved. An obscene example of this was something that I previously supported. I, as did many, said that the AIG bonuses were guaranteed to the AIG executives, and that in the name of capitalism and free markets the government should not take away their bonuses. What a naïve thought! Had the government not bailed out these banks would they have still received their bonuses? Possibly from the bankruptcy judge but even that is debatable. Wall St. has been rewarded for helping destroy the economy of our country. I helped and so did you, were we rewarded? While I do now support the stimulus ( I didn’t prior to understanding our history and where we are as a country), I think that we need heavy government regulation on the banking sector. We need to ensure that people, not profit, are considered when making crucial decisions concerning corporations.
I believe that federal government involvement should be minimal in a healthy society, with laws set up to protect its people and not their bank accounts.
The key word is healthy, America is by no means healthy, we have four out of five factors present prior to every major revolution in history (Judson 2009). The free markets have failed and now if we do not realize the necessity of government intervention, we set our president up to fail and in turn our country. A month ago I would have debated FDR’s role in history, but after hours of reading and research I think he was one of the greatest leaders we have had. He was a true leader, not afraid to say he didn’t have all the answers.
Americans are looking for a quick fix and that does not exist. If anyone tells you they have the answer they are either lying or mis-informed. I wish our president would step up to the plate and let everyone know that its going to be a rough road ahead. Stop telling us jobs will improve in 3-6 months when all economic indicators point the other way, and tell us he doesn’t have all the answers. Tell us he will work to restore the middle class at the expense of corporate America and I will stand up and support his decisions.
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I agree, in fact your critiques mirror progressive criticisms of Obama. Now there are some ( not many) christian progressives. I'm not sure how many would qualify as fundamentalist but you may want to read some Jim Wallis. The simple facts are that we need more, not less government involvement in regulating big business. The balance just isn't there after 40 years of mostly conservative leadership. Government intervention in the name of the people is not socialism it's just government struggling to do the right thing in the face of massive opposition from corporate american that has grown far too used to getting its' way.
something's wrong here. this doesn't sound like the glen i was arguing with a week or two ago.
glen, if you're reading this, i have launched an full-scale search for your kidnappers.
but seriously and in all sincerity, this is a great post. I'll make sure to bookmark and read more.
also, i had no idea you were the guy on "giant pool of money". that was one of the best articles TAL ever did.
One more comment on your post. The part about Obama promising a "quick fix". I think it is important to not misrepresent what Obama has said. To my knowledge he has never promised some sort of miracle recovery and I'm quite certain he has never promised a bull market or a booming economy anytime on the near horizon. However while Americans need straight talk on where we as a nation are at the markets and the economic mood are not simple things to control. Economics have never been considered a "hard science". This is because things like optimism and fear both play a key roll in the up and down ride that markets are always on. If Obama got on TV and said we are on the cusp of falling apart and into a revolution then the media would seize on that statement and create a panic. Right or wrong this would likely be the result. That is why when Obama says things referencing the situation he stepped into when he assumed office he is being very real. I think he's trying his best and I think he loves this country. The situation is fairly unique and while you can look back in history for reference there is no easy path out of this. Every move he makes will likely have both negative and positive consequences. Compounding the problem is that if he believes in what he is doing ( I'm quite sure he does). It has to work within about 3 years. If the economy is still teetering in spring of 2012 he is likely out come November. A massive change in leadership could make things worse or create a short term bubble that blows up and creates another far worse crisis down the road. Lots on the line here and that is why when the right-wing uses dishonest fearful tactics to try and derail him they are putting a lot on the line. The country is on edge enough. When the left opposed the War in Iraq it was not because we just wanted to oppose Bush. It definitely was not because we wanted to compromise national security. It was because the left truly believed that it was a terrible strategic decision for the nation. Eight years later it is hard to argue that it was not a poorly conceived war and the country may have been better without it. The left is also coming down on Obama pretty hard on Afghanistan so let's not think it is all politics. I don't doubt that some on the right sincerely believe that what Obama is doing is bad for the country. However some very vocal voices such as Rush Limbaugh and Jim DeMint have said they just want to make sure that Obama fails. That is not good for the country and it is ideologically narrow-minded and selfish.
yeah brendan, same glen, both last week and TAL.:-0 TAL really messed up the first time, we just did a follow up that will be on TAL this weekend that should be great. I also wrote a piece for NPR's "planet money blog" that will be out this weekend as well.
Honestly Bruce Judsons book really opened my eyes to the lie i have been feed about capitalism. Im gonna be posting some more thoughts soon, so add me here.
Shapper, Rush is crazy and saying he wants Obama to fail shows his stupidity. You make some good points, but let’s not equate all anti Obama rhetoric as "scare tactics" such as the initial bill paying for illegal aliens. I think it should pay for them, we need severe immigration reform and end up paying anyway, BUT he misled the public. The hard facts are this (and I’m just using this issue as an illustration that not all the "scare tactics" are untrue)HR 3200 which the president said would not pay for illegal immigrants is a tax bill, not an immigration bill. US Tax code does not discern between illegal and legal immigration status, it only discerns if you are legal to pay taxes or not. An illegal alien can get an ITIN (individual taxpayer identification number) after proving that they have lived in the US for 183 days in the previous 2 calendar years and 31 days in the current calendar year. Now that being said the tax bill specifically says you must be legal but it is in regards to paying taxes and not immigration status. I don’t even know if the president knows these nuances, but it’s important we get all this stuff out without being labeled.
I wasn't lumping everyone together. I even said that I thought some on the right genuinely objected to Obama's policies and ideology. I do think that the right has employed a lot of silly tactics in opposition to Obama. He's not a socialist, there are no "death panels" and he was born in this nation. If the right wants to argue about policy then that's fine. If they want to try and scare people into believing that Obama is some sort of fascist or an illegitimate president then that's just silly and counter-productive. Take the "tea parties" the original tea party was not a pure tax protest it was about no taxation without representation. The colonies were paying the king of enlgand taxes and receiving nothing in return. He was after all a "king". These tea parties are rooted in a lot of false fears. Unless they are made up exclusively of multi-millionaires it would be fair to say that many of the people protesting are now paying lower taxes then they were under Bush a few years ago. So what exactly are they protesting? An attempt to improve health care? Lower middle class taxes? An increase in domestic spending on programs like education and infrastructure? Even if they are protesting a very large federal deficit where the was this outrage a few years ago when Bush was blowing up the deficit and putting zero dollars back into things like education? Are some of Obama's policies unprecedented ? Yes. Then again lowering taxes on anyone during a war was also unprecedented and that didn't stop Bush from doing so. I understand that people are fearful, change is always difficult and economic times are very tough. Do we really need people exaggerating and distorting facts in an attempt to drum up opposition thus increasing the level of fear?
No we do not, left or right, it’s completely counterproductive for all of us! We need the president to come out and defend these concerns without brushing them off, I don’t think he has done a very good job at this, and choosing not to voice his views on fox for whatever reason was in my opinion a slap in the face to anyone who opposes him. We have to figure out a rational way to add 30-50 million people to a system that is already becoming over burdened without destroying the quality of care. I personally need to hear how this will be handled. I just want clarity, as do I think most Americans.
I too questioned the judgement of him brushing off Fox. However it must be extremely difficult for him to have any faith in any sort of civil discussion on a network that showcases guys like Beck and gets caught mere days before Obama's Sunday morning blitz drumming up faux rage at the 9-12 rally the previous week. Then Chris Wallace calls the White House a bunch of "crybabies". This following eight years of a Bush white house that routinely selected their crowds at public speeches, shut out controversial white house press pool reporters like Helen Thomas, and all too often went ONLY to Fox for any sort of decent interview. On the one hand Obama does need as many Americans standing with him and not against him, on the other hand if Fox really wants to be a news organization then they need to be a bit less transparent in their right-wing reporting tactics. Is MSNBC liberal? Absolutely. Yet Rachel Maddow has spent weeks ripping Obama and many democrats both left, center, and right for bailing on healthcare. Further Maddow and Olbermann are left wing but when they reported on Bush they did so using real information. That just doesn't equate to Beck interviewing Birthers and Hannity talking about Death Panels. If Bill O'Reilly is the "moderate" voice on your network then your network is not fair or balanced. I think Obama probably saw a Fox interview being 10-15 minutes of him having to debunk a ton of right-wing nonsense that has no real place in the debate. It would have been all about death panels, racism ( the other networks asked him about that too) socialism and probably questions about guys like Beck and Hannity. Would that have been productive? Would that have served to win over any of the dedicated Fox News viewers? I'm not sure.
The position of liberal Christians is well articulated in Marilynne Robinson's essay, "Onward, Christian Liberals," which can be found in _The Best American Essays 2007_.
Great post, by the way, Glen.
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