Is The Left Right?
This may be one of the more shocking columns I've read. It's shocking not so much because of its argument but its provenance. The author is Charles Moore, biographer of Margaret Thatcher and former editor of the Telegraph:
It has taken me more than 30 years as a journalist to ask myself this question, but this week I find that I must: is the Left right after all? You see, one of the great arguments of the Left is that what the Right calls “the free market” is actually a set-up.
I wrote several paragraphs in response to this and then lost them. It's for the best. They were overwrought.
Of course the Left isn't right. But anyone on the Right who is honest has got to be asking the question: What went wrong? Because yes, what we're seeing does conform to the theoretical models offered by the Left.
We're looking at a state of affairs in the West that should not have happened, according to the center-right, given initial conditions of basically free elections, basically free economies and a basically free press. I do not mean the "theoretical right," I mean the real politicians of the right. (The theorists of the right, including me, are either now feeling mighty uncomfortable thinking about Marxist theorists who still believe that communism's a terrific idea that was never properly applied or they're dangerously incapable of self-doubt.)
If your response is, "Yes, but these institutions became invisibly unfree while we were sleeping," you need to ask why it was invisible to so many--to the point that by the time it became visible, it was too late. That is not, you must admit, a system that works. That's not one you can defend with a straight face to the developing world as "the best the human race has ever come up with"--at least, no more enthusiastically than you can defend the idea that heroin is the best high we've ever come up with, so be a lamb and show us your veins, we've got the needle right here for you. There was insufficient self-correction at every juncture to prevent catastrophe--about which we're all now very realistically worried. Why?
Why is it is assumed--part of our collective common knowledge, now--that our politicians are not able to cooperate or subordinate their own short-term political interests to our long-term interests? How did this level of cynicism take hold in the West? Weren't the structures and institutions of democracy supposed to militate against this?
I don't agree with Moore that Murdoch is a key symptom. But I am certainly asking myself how it came to be that in a society with so many guarantees of press freedom, our key press organs now churn out coverage of the news to which I react much as Soviet citizens did to Pravda--by laughing darkly, endeavoring to read between the lines, and then trying to figure out what's really happening by word-of-mouth.
Who predicted that? Chomsky. Uncomfortable, but there we are. What kind of world does Chomsky suggest instead? A proven hell. So where does that leave us?
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Re: Is The Left Right?
I broadly agree with everyone who is saying "the problem is not capitalism, but crony capitalism."
My first question is whether the devolution into crony capitalism is ever preventable, or whether it really is inbuilt into systems we thought relatively well-proofed against it by a system of checks and balances, among them safeguards on speech.
My second question: Suppose these safeguards do work, albeit slowly and painfully. Will they work fast enough this time to forestall a real age of darkness? Because while the West is "slowly correcting itself," the rest of the world is on a very different schedule.
Sep '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
I think that is the argument the left makes for not allowing the free market to remain free. The statement is accurate, but what is not considered is the "relative few", top 10% lets say is not a static group. People are constantly moving in and out of this group. People become rich in a free market society and they also lose their money. That is a good thing. Note your solution is to expand government power not constrain it. If you think a powerful government will favor the little guy, who cannot buy influence, over the rich a powerful who can you are truly a man of the left.
Dec '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
"... We're looking at a state of affairs in the West that should not have happened, according to the center-right..."
Like a lot of people on this thread, I'm confused by this part of the article. I've never heard any proponent of the free market suggest that it couldn't be corrupted. And in retrospect, it's not hard to see how the forces of the global left, combined with inattention from the electorate, has sickened the free markets in the West.
But just because the left has been so successful at corrupting and marginalizing the free market does not in itself argue against the free market. It's a little like the death penalty; for years, the left set up every roadblock to the death penalty they could think of, making it more and more expensive and time-consuming to execute people. Lately, their primary argument against the death penalty is that it's so expensive and time-consuming.
Does the free market work after it's been completely corrupted by the left? Well... no, it doesn't, but that's a pretty thin argument for the left to use against free-market capitalism.
Nov '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
Capitalism gives consumers what they want. But it does not ensure that what they want is good, or that what they want is what they need.
Socialism gives consumers what other people think they need. But it does not ensure that they need it, or that they want it, or that it is good.
The question is not which system is perfect, but which is less flawed than the other.
On balance, capitalism is much better. Both logic and experience prove this. Even bastardized versions of capitalism work better than pure-bred versions of socialism.
Capitalism beats socialism because it is the only scheme that, bending with human nature, incentivizes everyone to work on behalf of everyone else, thereby making everyone wealthy.
But both capitalism and socialism get corrupted by the state. Instead of voluntary trade and private charity, one instead gets coercive monopoly and public redistribution: corporatism or communism, both wasting wealth, both disadvantaging the consumer.
The evils of both capitalism and socialism are best alleviated by minimizing the state. Democracy will only ever be as good as the state whose politicians use it to bribe beneificaries to re-elect them. The smaller the state, the better the outcome.
Re: Is The Left Right?
This cynicism goes at least as far back as Madison's observation that if governments were composed of angels, they wouldn't need a constitution to rein them in. The rate of our decline is commensurate with the rate of our abandonment of the Constitution itself.
To blame the founding principles of individual liberty and limited government for the current government-induced chaos is on the order of blaming the Ten Commandments for the prevalence of venereal disease. If you ignore the first, you are more likely to end up with the second.
May '11
Re: Is The Left Right?
Claire Berlinski, Ed.: I broadly agree with everyone who is saying "the problem is not capitalism, but crony capitalism."
My first question is whether the devolution into crony capitalism is ever preventable, or whether it really is inbuilt into systems we thought relatively well-proofed against it by a system of checks and balances, among them safeguards on speech.
My second question: Suppose these safeguards do work, albeit slowly and painfully. Will they work fast enough this time to forestall a real age of darkness? Because while the West is "slowly correcting itself," the rest of the world is on a very different schedule. · Jul 24 at 10:17am
To the first question; I would say Yes, the common good is difficult to define but not impossible. To the second question; I fear it is indeed too late.
Oct '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
Claire Berlinski, Ed.:
We're looking at a state of affairs in the West that should not have happened, according to the center-right, given initial conditions of basically free elections, basically free economies and a basically free press.
The qualifier basically means that there are aspects of each of these that are not free. And as in most cases where an inch is given, a mile is taken. The function of each of these is dependent on engaged and informed participants be they journalists, entrepreneurs, or voters. It would seem the real shortfalls are in education and accountability. Just think about the fact that almost every college graduate is subsidized by the state. If the goal is >50% population with college degree, you have your state dependent voting majority before they are tested by reality or gain experience. The efficiency free markets stems from the fact that there are winners and losers and the losers are a good thing because limited resources are diverted to more productive ends and inefficiencies are eradicated by competition. When we are taught everyone are winners or equal in their own way, you have a generation that cannot confront the contrary, divergent reality.
Aug '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
"A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest..."
The thief has come. And as katievs and others have pointed out, our founders knew well he would. Leftist philosophies believe in the inevitable unfolding of History, the progress of the Concept through time, etc. One could say the right agrees. But for the left it is a metaphysical thesis; for the right, it is the common sense expressed in the Proverb above. Human nature is as Aaron Miller has discussed, and worse. Thieves will take advantage of idleness. The difference for the right is that redemption is always available; we recognize the ability people have to wake up and chase the thief off.
I believe it was Jefferson who, when asked pointedly what he'd given us, quipped "A republic, if you can keep it." He didn't attribute the preservation to any check built into the system, but to the individual farm woman (if I remember the story correctly).
Will we correct in time? We'll see soon enough. I, like many others, am given hope by the Tea Party.
But the hour does seem awfully late.
Sep '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
The Founding Fathers knew that what they constructed was a divided government designed to prevent many of the evils to which the West has succumbed. But they also knew that the Republic's long term success depended upon a virtuous and educated citizenry.
When the state took control of universal K-12 and co-opted teachers through the teacher's unions with ginned up defined benefit pension plans, the fix was in. Its been a slow burning fuse, but its burnt down awfully close to ignition. Allan Bloom's The Closing of the American Mind documented that Germany had lost World War II, but German philosophy was the undisputed victor on campuses in the UK and the United States.
The Master Slave dialectic is alive and well and operating exactly as its supposed to. And, yes, I ended a sentence with a preposition.
Edited on July 24, 2011 at 8:32pmRe: Is The Left Right?
Well, I guess we'll see.
If it doesn't work before it's too late, it doesn't work in the most important sense. A plane that can take off is an amazing proof of many theories in physics, but if it can't land without crashing, it's not a great argument for air travel.
May '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
Checks and balances only work if the courts are committed to them. If the judiciary sets aside broad swaths of the Constitution in the belief that the "living Constitution" requires a reinterpretation to achieve "fairness," then you're screwed.
In the Anglo-American tradition, equality is viewed as equality before the law. In the Marxist-Socialist one equality is viewed in terms of outcome. "Fairness" requires group rights to supersede individual ones.
May '11
Re: Is The Left Right?
Claire Berlinski, Ed.
Well, I guess we'll see.
If it doesn't work before it's too late, it doesn't work in the most important sense. A plane that can take off is an amazing proof of many theories in physics, but if it can't land without crashing, it's not a great argument for air travel. · Jul 24 at 11:20am
Yes, we will see. I fear we are indeed entering "the real age of darkness", but if we are to have hope, we hope in the Lord.
Jul '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
In the old Star Trek series there was an episode in which a Mineral Life form had brought Kirk and Spok down to the planet’s surface to run a scenario in order for it to understand the concepts of Good vs. Evil.
It gave them the setup and then told them to respond.
Kirk and Spok decided not to cooperate with this as it wasn’t within the realm of activities they should partake.
The thing then provided an Incentive. It made the survival of the Ship contingent on the outcome of the Scenario.
When the Scenario was ended and Good triumphed, the being was confused. While Good did defeat Evil, the methods seemed to be indiscernible.
What the Being had failed to note was that The Difference Between Good and Evil had been presented to it in the very beginning. But it was so interested in running its Scenario to observe that It had interfered and altered the equation. By pushing the members, and therefore removing the freedom of action, it had literally forced the very outcome that confused it.
Leftist interference in free markets is no different.
Oct '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
I'm not sure why this is surprising. We've been living off the accumulated savings of other nations for decades; there is no more powerful market distortion than that. We're also experiencing a period of extreme political volatility, and until the public (and the elite) learn that a race to the bottom in political competition isn't in anyones best interest it will continue.
Plus, the federal government is too big, but most of the elite is too scared to let states take on the load.
Anyway, there's a lot of different issues.
Oct '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
Claire Berlinski, Ed.: I broadly agree with everyone who is saying "the problem is not capitalism, but crony capitalism."
... well-proofed against it by a system of checks and balances, among them safeguards on speech...
Except we don't have checks and balances. The states were always meant to be the responsive, policy-making arm of government, with the federal government deadlocked. But our national problems have always been too big for this. Whether the Civil War, the Great Depression, or Jim Crow, for most of our history our Constitution didn't work.
It's only in the past thirty or forty years that the small-c constitutional society the Founders envisioned has taken form. But our politicians are all old enough to remember how bad things were in the past, and they're terrified to give the Constitution a try.
Nov '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
The last paragraph of this piece rehabilitates Moore:
One must always pray that conservatism will be saved, as has so often been the case in the past, by the stupidity of the Left. The Left’s blind faith in the state makes its remedies worse than useless. But the first step is to realise how much ground we have lost, and that there may not be much time left to make it up.
May '11
Re: Is The Left Right?
I guess I should qualify that. We put our hope in the Lord but we pray to Paul Ryan. Claire, you are right that America is a jumbo jet with no landing gear. I would bail out but I have no parachute and don't know where to land. Penguins cannot fly.
Edited on July 24, 2011 at 9:31pmMay '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
Claire Berlinski, Ed.
If it doesn't work before it's too late, it doesn't work in the most important sense. A plane that can take off is an amazing proof of many theories in physics, but if it can't land without crashing, it's not a great argument for air travel.
The Founders gave us the Amendment process so we could adjust to events and changes which they could not specifically foresee. That process was always our best hope for peaceful transition. But any government is as sure to die as a machine; it is simply impossible to predict where and how it will end.
What government was ever designed in a way that ensured a peaceful end and rebirth?
Claire Berlinski, Ed.: I broadly agree with everyone who is saying "the problem is not capitalism, but crony capitalism."
My first question is whether the devolution into crony capitalism is ever preventable....
No, it's not. It's in the financial best interests of most companies to impede and eliminate competition. Monopolies are a natural conclusion of free markets. With or without big government, businesses conspire for profit and control.
Look at medieval trade guilds.
May '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
By the way, the Amendment process no longer offers hope of peaceful transition. It is a difficult process, so the Left has bypassed it by ignoring or denying the Constitution's original meaning and authority outright. Amendments are a system of negotiation. The Left is no longer willing to negotiate. They seek to impose changes unilaterally.
Dec '10
Re: Is The Left Right?
Virtue begets prosperity begets power begets corruption begets collapse.
Our New World developed with the opportunity for virtue. It matured into a world of opportunity for power, because of its prosperity, leading to corruption, and now collapse.
The New World’s dependence on the virtuous individual enjoined resistance to the impediments of centralized power and weight of a superfluously meddling administration, resulting in prosperity shared by a greater number than shared anywhere before. Then, more and more than ever before from anywhere came to share in it.
This vast community of shared Judeo-Christian, Western traditions, from the prosperity they produced, fell into the entanglements of the hydra of grievances and discontents. The rules and regulations, the diktats of decrees, and the usurpations of the courts intrude into our way of life with their lust for power no popular legislative election will ever again rescind. There can only be a new Repbulic.
These blighted fields of administrative anonymity has culminated in its logical progeny: our historic first Islamic apostate president—whose only worries are the elevation of cultures other than our own such as how markets in Asia Sunday evening would react to the negotiated immiseration American taxpayers Monday morning.