Over at Oxblog, David Adesnik actually goes back to Kerry and Edwards’ speeches and makes a good point. Riffing off a Josh Benson criticism of Schwarzenegger’s 8th grade civics class motif, Adesnik writes:
As OxBlog said, the [Schwarzenegger] speech was shopworn and predictable. However, all of Arnold’s talk about free enterprise made me ask, “Did Kerry or Edwards say anything good about free markets in their speeches?” Well, sort of…. Again and again, Kerry emphasizes the plight of the worker and the dangers of the marketplace, not the ingenuity of the entrepreneur and the opportunities inherent in a free market. I don’t think Kerry’s emphasis is wrong. My natural sympathies lie with those whom the market has left behind. But is it any wonder that all those millions of Americans who are enchanted by the free markets and unprecendented opportunities vote Republican?
There is a difference in emphasis - with broad brushstrokes, Democrats believe that market failures exist and that it’s government’s job to do the best it can to mitigate or correct these failures; when and how often you see if failing perhaps best identifies where in the Democratic party one lies. Republicans either have a dogmatic belief that markets always work or at least a feeling that government’s not very good at addressing market failures. (Or, some might feel that while market failures occur, they’re rare and that Democrats are too eager to diagnose them - I don’t encounter too many Republicans of this vein, however.)
But let me complicate this dichotomy (Dems anti-market/ GOP pro-market) just a little.
For one thing, one can’t deduce from Kerry’s speech that he doesn’t see free markets or entrepreneurship working. After all, if one is going to be (Adam) Smithian about it, wouldn’t you say that the invisible hand works on its own, that entrepreneurs work out of self-interest not because someone in the political sphere congratulates what they’re doing? Yes, the free marketeer might say, but there are currently too many hurdles for working in self-interest. But the issue is more than that: Republicans want a political discourse that valorizes the entrepreneur as a social class, not merely an economic actor. Dems might be smart to figure out a way to do this as well - but on some level it’s an issue of performing class identity rather than making policy. In fact, that’s the level Adesnik’s discussing it.
A second point is more important: one can believe in free markets and entrepreneurship and still believe in macroeconomic management. Yet one of the most exasperating trends of recent years is for Republicans to act as if it’s not the government’s job to insure aggregate demand. Yes, monetary policy and Alan Greenspan’s actions should be our first offense. Yes, we’ve learned humility since the Keynesian heyday of the postwar years. Yes, the President can’t magically control the economy. But he can do more than pretend supply-side measures are stimulus packages. He can do more than host bogus economic summits that are meant to sell rather than to diagnose and treat an ailing economy. He can stop shelling out Chamber of Commerce boosterism as fiscal policy.
By the way, have any of the speeches said anything good about professors and grad students? Fund editors or market analysts? Magazine editors or film producers?
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