Obamacons Unite!
(posted by FreeDem)
So the new economic gospel of “Obamanomics” was rolled out today; “A Mashup of Freakonomics and Robert Rubin” according to liberal blogger Matt Stoller. The best news to a left-libertarian like myself comes from Stoller’s sour grapes proclamation “You’re not going to see the Naomi Klein critique of disaster capitalism in his policy team.”
There is a lot to learn about the economic policy of a President Barack Obama from not just his speech today, but his advisers. Marc Ambinder on Jason Furman:
He is the author of a well-regarded and much-debate piece for the Center for American Progress arguing that some efforts to pressure Wal-Mart into changing its business practices wind up hurting low-income consumers. He was writing in response to a report by Wal-Mart Watch which noted that Wal-Mart employees are disportionately on the dole; Furman wrote that Wal-Mart’s low prices + entitlement programs = a decent standard of living for most low-income Americans, although he concedes that Wal-Mart can and should do much more to help its own workers. In general, Furman appears to be a Keynesian, but as director of the Hamilton Project, he’s joined a group that advocates for a balanced budget….over the long term. So Furman might well countenance an expansion of the deficit during a recession. On trade, Furman’s positions are well within the Democratic mainstream. (Globalization and trade = good, generally, but American workers have legitimate complaints and the system needs to be configured to deal with and temper the enormous dynamism of a world economy.) He has advocated for a cut in the corporate income tax that would be financed by increasing the number of companies subject to the tax. Sensitive to the campaign’s intent to bring in a diverse array of voices on the economy, Furman lists several liberals as co-advisers.
This sounds like good news for the libertarian and conservative Obamacons. More here.
June 9th, 2008 at 9:43 pm
Yeah, but then he had to advocate another $50 billion “stimulus” including a second round of “rebate” checks. For some reason I don’t think he listened to his advisors on that. Not that the Republicans are any better on that sort of thing these days…but it did destroy my hopes that Obama would pander less now that Hillary’s out of the way. (FWIW- I don’t have much objection to the unemployment extension part of the package - just the really bad second round of rebate checks part).
June 9th, 2008 at 11:22 pm
While I’ve been optimistic in the past about Obama’s comparative market-friendliness, the optimism has been tempered by the fear that he’ll adopt the neoliberal version of the market: IOW that he’ll be just another DLC Democrat.
If Furman equates “globalization” to “trade,” as does most of the so-called “free market” commentariat, it just confirms my fears. Hell, I’d like nothing better than to see a critique of Klein’s disaster capitalism coming from his administration. Klein is entirely correct to hate disaster capitalism, corporate globalization, and the Washington Consensus; she’s just wrong to equate them to “free markets.” I’ve just about had my fill of politicians, of either party, using “free trade” rhetoric to defend corporate globalization.
June 10th, 2008 at 8:35 pm
to a left-libertarian like myself
I don’t think that phrase means what you think it means.
June 10th, 2008 at 9:11 pm
I’m surprised Carson didn’t mention his rather positive review of Klein’s book. I discuss it here.
Larison grouses about “Obamacons” here.
June 10th, 2008 at 9:43 pm
There was a book released last year called Freedom From Want published by Soft Skull Press. It criticized the growing fondness for protectionism and economic “isolationism” (I suppose) on the part of the left, from a leftist. He notes that protectionism and nationalistic economic rhetoric is historically an element of the xenophobic right, not the left. He cites Hoover as an example of this, ironically as we’re told that he was all about laissez faire.
On the one hand I’m impressed and uplifted by Obomacon types who can help stifle some of the most populist elements of illiberalism on the left, but on the other hand, as Carson is apt to point out, these folks get things wrong concerning what free markets really are. They really do take their economic rhetoric from the mainstream Neo-classical/Keynesian fusionism.
I’m more and more convinced that what people most dislike about “free markets” would not be diminished by the real thing, because free markets really do mean a relative lack of security (as in a knowledge of what the future may hold), openness to foreigners, an appreciation of “spontaneous order” and tolerance for the intuitively “irrational” choices of countless strangers. These things don’t mesh well with our psychology.
June 10th, 2008 at 9:53 pm
Here is a critique of Klein from Johan Norberg:
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=9384
A few weeks back I read both Carson’s critique and Norberg’s simultaneously (flipping back and forth).
One notable thing is that Carson is comparing the actions of neo-liberal/state collusion to an ideal free market and basic human decency. Norberg compares it to other nations during the same time period, to assess Klein’s implicit (explicit?) idea of the necessity of screwing people and engaging in violence to implement market reforms. This is important, because it means that the critiques are not necessarily mutually exclusive.
I can’t remember what all is in the Norberg piece, but I do recall that it had no mention of Operation Condor, a rather important oversight on his part!
June 10th, 2008 at 11:23 pm
Some people might also be interested in a critique of the Shock Doctrine from the left.