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We're All FDR Liberals

(Guest Post from Big Tent Democrat)

All of us, Democrats and Independents, and Republicans for that matter, we're all FDR liberals. I have written it here before, liberals won the battle of ideas during the New Deal. Some extremist Republicans want to refight that fight, but no Republican who wants to get elected will fight that fight.

I write this because Harold Meyerson writes an incisive reaction to Markos Moulitsas's theory of Democratic Libertarianism:

Writing from the perspectives of a more New Dealish American liberal and an avowed social democrat (the latter tendency, I need not be reminded, being one that has fewer avowed adherents in America than libertarianism, though more than Trotskyism), I want to make a couple of points that Markos doesn't touch on. First, I want to point out the areas of overlap between libertarianism--or, at least, the preservation of personal liberties--and New Deal democracy, and even social democracy. Second, I want to look again at some of the new libertarianism Markos documents within the Democratic Party--not just where it extends, but where it can't extend, and why it can't.

On the other side, I'll talk more about Meyerson's cans and can'ts, but if I may, it seems to me that what Markos is attempting is a packaging of New Deal policies in attractive garb for those who consider themselves libertarian in outlook. In that sense, I think Markos' exercise is a valuable one. And to consider it an academic discussion of libertarianism is to miss the point.

First, what spurs Markos to discuss Democratic Libertarianism? I think Meyerson puts his finger on it:

In the real world, and more particularly in 21st-century America, encroachments on privacy, personal security, and the environment are as likely, if not more likely, to come from business as they are from the state, and these are threats that require state regulation if they're to be mitigated or dispelled. . . . [I]n the real world, the Republican Party has become a dangerous advocate, and enforcer, of executive branch autocracy, as promulgated by George Bush and Dick Cheney, defended by John Yoo, and likely to be upheld by such ostensibly conservative jurists as Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, John Roberts, and Samuel Alito.. . . Classic libertarians are as appalled by this last development as any Democratic congressman is.

But Meyerson further points out that Democrats can not be and should not be classic libertarians:

But there are some basic Democratic principles that are not libertarian, and that even Markos' Mountain State mavericks still affirm. None of them have called for privatizing Social Security. None of them have called for abolishing Medicare. They may be civil libertarians and to some degree social libertarians, but they're not economic libertarians. And for good reason: Economic libertarianism has never been more preposterous.

Let me say that I think Meyerson's last line is overstating a great deal. And he misses what was, indeed IS, at the heart of liberalism - pragmatism. Yes, pragmatism. For what defines a liberal is not the program or policy that is implemented, but rather the result reached. Indeed, it becomes, in some cases, a fatal flaw. Consider the romance with left wing totalitarian regimes like the former Soviet Union prior to 1950 and the continuing romance with Castro's Cuba. We lliberal love our goals - equality, egalitarianism, economic and racial justice and where our goals our mouthed by an ideology, we are more tolerant. We should not be.

To me liberalism can and does embrace economic libertararianism where it meets the goals of liberalism. We are pragmatic. If social justice and economic equality could be reached be cuts in the estate tax, we liberals would support it. We oppose it because it does exactly the opposite.

Thus when Meyerson writes:

[T]he need for a state that takes the burden of economic and health security off employers who won't pick it up and employees who can't pick it up is increasingly urgent. It's hard to predict what exactly the tipping point will be as our private-sector welfare state continues to contract. But at some point, the Democrats will embrace a decisively larger role for the state in these matters because the public will demand it--not because the public will suddenly identify itself as liberal, but because there will be nowhere else to turn.

I can agree with him because I believe that, pragmatically speaking, the best policy to achieve the liberal result will likely embrace what he describes. But that does not mean that the state will or should intervene in a sweeping fashion in our economy. There are lessons history has taught us, and one of them is the less government intervention in the economy, the better the economic performance. Liberals seek to strike a balance between the efficiency of the market and the important objectives of social and economic justice - not just because these goals are "good," but because they are essential to the well being of the country.

And in the end, Meyerson understands the important role of pragmatism for liberals:

Ultimately, the Democrats aren't going to proceed very far down the libertarian road, for one simple reason that's far more pragmatic than philosophic: It doesn't lead anywhere.

And it will be this pragmatism that leads liberals to not seek a statist solution to all of our ills. Because the statist road also does not lead anywhere.

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    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#1)
    by Domino on Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 02:46:50 PM EST
    FDR was a regulator, which is incompatible with modern libertarian thought.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#2)
    by Dadler on Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 02:46:50 PM EST
    Tent, Nice post. However, there are times, such as the Depression, when serious government intervention into the economy is necessary. And if we are truly a free and democratic nation, the government merely means we the people. If it is not, or to whatever degree it is not, is an entirely separate issue. Second, using your Castro example, I don't think it useful to suggest that liberals in a significant mass have a love affair of some sort with regimes like Cuba's. A genuine liberal, a free person, can both appreciate the acheivements of the people, the ironies of those acheivements, fully taking into objective account the regime they emanated from. You're making the old black/white argument again. You either hate this or love it, you're either with us or against us. Cuba is Cuba and no place else. Any liberal worth a brain cell must be able to look at Cuba, Castro, the entire reality, in its whole, conflicted, irony-laden state. I think most can and do. That the opposition would still label this as Castro-loving is out of our hands.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#3)
    by jarober on Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 02:46:50 PM EST
    The social welfare policies enacted by FDR, and expanded by every President since (including the present one, with the prescription drug policy) are not sustainable in the long term. They worked fine so long as (most) people died before the benefits kicked in; they are growing less and less affordable all the time. Over the next few decades, mandated federal spending (medicare, social security, etc) will expand so as to crowd out all discretionary spending. One of two choices will be required - drastic cutbacks in these policies, or taxation that is positively ruinous. By ruinous, I don't mean the relatively small differences between the Bush cuts and the Clinton levels, either. You can deny this, but that only means that you are innumerate. It's a simple arithmetic problem. Right now, politicians (of both parties) are whistling past the graveyard on this one.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#4)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 03:54:32 PM EST
    I don't know if I'd agree that we're all FDR liberals. Newt Gingrich said in 1994, I think, that the goals of the Contract with America was to roll back the New deal reforms and return the country to 1903 regulationwise. I assume anyone who voted republican bought into that line whether they udnerstood it or not. I do agree that pragmatism is at the heart of liberalism. The problem with libertaaianism, at least in its accross the board "doctrinaire" approach to government, is that fails to discriminate between human beings and corporations or the regulation of property and property rights. For example, our economy is dominated by corporations, which are not human beings but are legal persons in the sight of the law. Most of the complexity of laws and taxation comes from trying to balance corporate power representing aggregations of capital often represented by corporate officers and executives who are otherwise unaccountable to anyone, against the individual human being. Galbraith talked about this as the countervailing power of government as did Berle and Means. A doctrinaire libertarian approach I suppose would hold that there should be no regulation of corporations or that corporations should be abolished entirely as creatures of government and all business should be run on sole prorietorship or partnership basis. Either of these approaches is absurd in today's world. Thirty years ago, the presumption was that markets were inherently flawed and imperfect and unable to control corporate excess. Taxes were part of the corporate regulatory scheme. Today, that presumption is reversed. Nothing has changed to warrant that except right wing propaganda. But while even many of the regulatory agencies that were created over the 20th century to countervail against corporate power are still in existence, they are headed by people who do not believe in their mission or their raison d'etre. We have laws that are not enforced and taxes that are not collected or are undone by other laws that make them inapplicable. I am sorry to say that Democrats have joined Republicans in approving many of these policy changes. This one reason I think we see the decline of unions and the rise of outsourcing and the export of jobs overseas. We have deregulated corporations so that they are primarily engines of wealth maximization for a privileged few rater than an engine of job and opportunity creation for the economy and the many. I think the Democratic party at its core is united in social libertarianism in areas like abortion and personal rights because they deal less with freedom of contract than health, family and individual privacy rather than corporate rights or privacy. So I think Democrats need to return to their New Deal roots in terms of regulating corporations and wealth creation to ensure that the profits and rent seeking does not become an end in itself but are means to the common good.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#5)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 04:45:32 PM EST
    No, we're not ALL FDR liberals; I have been working for the past 50 years toward the demise of the New Deal. I finally gave up on the GOP and became a Libertarian. And why do I feel this way? Because "big government" politics eliminates individual choice, and because the tax burden necessary to finance all this is contrary to financial freedom. All our so-called "leaders" of both parties have forgotten Thomas Jefferson's advice: "That government governs best which governs least".

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#6)
    by Sailor on Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 05:11:51 PM EST
    The social welfare policies enacted by FDR, and expanded by every President since (including the present one, with the prescription drug policy) are not sustainable in the long term.
    Coming from a guy how is willing to spend billions every month on an illegal war but can't stand to see the money spent on Americans. Next!

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#7)
    by Che's Lounge on Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 05:45:03 PM EST
    Gotta get the aristocracy out first. Go where the money is. Once you eliminate the multibillion dollar global grifters, then you can effect some change. So called "free market" principles like privatization of water and electricity are destructive in the hands of greedy execs (is there another kind?). It's all public property. Good luck.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#8)
    by Dadler on Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 06:36:47 PM EST
    J.R., What is worse: those of us with more than enough aleady paying a few precent more in the service of the greater good OR large numbers of struggling, often desperate people cut off from basic services? You seem to see the value of money as beyond our control. And you seem to underestimate the power of the market to respond to genuine long-term civic investments. After all, the market is just people. And people tend to respond positively to the idea of a secure and positive future. It appeals to our survival instinct, on a very basic level. Then again, the government is satan, all big government programs besides defense are socialist and communist in a way, and it's probably better if we just let the market respond to the least among us begging for help.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#10)
    by Che's Lounge on Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 08:19:59 PM EST
    Dadler, You seem to see the value of money as beyond our control. The global community has now grown to the point where money should not even be a factor, other than for those who truly love to wallow in excess. You need homes somewhere? You build them. People starving? Send food. Why in heavens's name should it be necessary to first raise a bunch of money to help a drought stricken area anywhere in the world. If the resources exist and the labor exists, and the technology exists, those situations should NOT exist. They should be the topics of stories that we tell our grandchildren.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#9)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 09:16:29 PM EST
    I expect that those who are perfectly willing to pay a "few percent more" to help the needy will, until taxes are raised, donate that money to a charitable foundation which already helps the needy.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#11)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 09:16:29 PM EST
    When I was in my early 20s and already a history lover, I came across a great book at a resale shop by William Manchester covering the years of the new deal to watergate. After that I became a huge fan of FDR. I always concidered myself a new deal dem. I found FDR to be what a democrat is. He totally reshaped not just his party but, politics and the social fabric of America for the better. Anyone who says they want to privatize social security and dismantle the new deal programs is a liar. Just puffing smoke. Most of them have a family member who has been helped by a new deal program. And who wants to see hordes of seniors homeless and begging on the streets? Aside from this administration, of course.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#12)
    by jarober on Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 09:58:36 AM EST
    Sailor: "Coming from a guy how is willing to spend billions every month on an illegal war but can't stand to see the money spent on Americans." The war is discretionary spending. Meaning, Congress actively voted on it, and can end it any time they choose. Nice non-sequitor though. Dadler: "What is worse: those of us with more than enough aleady paying a few precent more in the service of the greater good OR large numbers of struggling, often desperate people cut off from basic services?" It's not a matter of "a few percent more". Here's the problem:
    Most observers agree that a potential fiscal crisis looms with Social Security. "You've got this massive demographic overhang," says Jeff Gates, president of Shared Capitalism Institute, a nonprofit group in Laguna Beach, California. Gates refers to these familiar yet startling statistics: In 1945, there were 41.9 workers per Social Security retirement recipient; in 2000, a mere 3.4 workers supported each recipient; by 2030, that financial burden is projected to fall on the shoulders of just 2.1 workers.
    Demographics tell the story, and it's not a pretty one. We can't jump back 30 years and mandate more people (either via immigration or birth rates), and we can't jump forward and insist that death rates return to 1945 levels. We have the demographics we have, period. At the moment, the social security system (which is pay as you go - there's no "trust fund") brings in more money than it pushes out. That's not going to stay true as the baby boom generation moves into retirement. It's not just spending that the left doesn't like that will be affected, either - the entire budget will get impacted by this. It's a freight train headed our way, and living in denial about it is silly.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#13)
    by Slado on Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 10:35:13 AM EST
    Why do liberals never understand simple economics? Take a look around. The economy is booming. Why? Tax cuts. Simple as that. Bush has pulled us out of the Clinton recession and all anyone can do is complain. Why? Because if they don't they would have to recognize reality. It's a fine line between taxing too much and not taxing enough. For liberals it's never enough for libertarians it's always too much. Right now it's probably a little high but put democrats back in control and kiss this good economy bye bye.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#14)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 12:39:14 PM EST
    Most observers agree that a potential fiscal crisis looms with Social Security. "You've got this massive demographic overhang," says Jeff Gates, president of Shared Capitalism Institute, a nonprofit group in Laguna Beach, California. Gates refers to these familiar yet startling statistics: In 1945, there were 41.9 workers per Social Security retirement recipient; in 2000, a mere 3.4 workers supported each recipient; by 2030, that financial burden is projected to fall on the shoulders of just 2.1 workers. This is a good qoute, but it seems to ignore something that I feel is pretty basic. As the means to produce a good or service becomes more mature technologically, they should, in theory, become cheaper to provide. This has not been the case, particularly in the healthcare industry. Healthcare costs have skyrocketed - not decreased. Why? Because private, for profit, corporations have aggresivly moved into providing basic health care services. This "forces" them to maximize profits by artificially inflating prices. Drug manufactures spend pennies to make a pill that they then wholesale to pharmacies for tens of dollars, those pharmacies turn around and retail the drug to the consumer for triple the wholesale cost. These drugs are often basic human needs, you'd die without them (what's life worth? - everything you've got) so market forces are not a factor. If the drug is patented then there is no competitive pressure to keep costs low and the producer is free to gouge the consumer. Monopolies or near monopolies must be controlled by some authority. The libertarian (and republican) schtick that uses the kinds of numbers quoted above do so because they hold the "free" market sacred - there is no debate over what sort of economic system may better serve the human beings that comprise our society. IF things keep going the way the are with a growing, perpetually entrenched aristocracy and hyper powerful business interests our current society will not last another 50 years. You make a majority of Americans dirt poor in living memory of the "good 'ol days" you're gonna get a revolution. We have to find a decent balance.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#15)
    by kdog on Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 01:32:55 PM EST
    You make a majority of Americans dirt poor in living memory of the "good 'ol days" you're gonna get a revolution. We have to find a decent balance.
    Good point...I think is we had a "New Deal" in the first place. So many people were dirt poor, and unregulated business was running amok grinding human beings down like erasers. Without the New Deal, I think this country would have had a revolution back then. The New Deal literally saved America. Looking forward, we will have to find a way to tweak it to keep it working, but dropping SS and Medicare isn't an option. Start with a couple billion dollar cut to "discretionary" war/defense spending if necessary.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#16)
    by Peaches on Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 02:54:48 PM EST
    Slado, Was that a lesson in basic economics? Stick to engineering. You can do the math. How much did the economy grow during the last democratic administration. How about the National debt? Deficit? Okay, now compare those numbers with the current administration since 2000. The economy is not booming. It has barely moved. And we have mortgaged our future to keep it holding still.

    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#18)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 03:05:21 PM EST
    Another quote from Jeff Gates, president of Shared Capitalism Institute:
    Why is Shared Capitalism Needed? The trouble with capitalism," author and attorney Jeff Gates told 300 participants at the 1999 Ohio Employee Ownership Conference, "is that it doesn't create enough capitalists." The gap between the haves and the have-nots is widening, resulting in what Gates calls a "disconnected capitalism" that has already created a virtual two-tier society. In his address to the Conference, Gates used statistics and political cartoons to bolster his contention that "current trends in economic inequality, both domestically and abroad, pose dangers to human dignity, democracy, political stability, fiscal sustainability, social justice, freedom, civil society, physical/mental health and environmental sustainability."


    Re: We're All FDR Liberals (none / 0) (#17)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 03:50:11 PM EST
    Kdog, I agree that the New Deal saved this country - either from a Communist revolution or a Fascist pustch. Could you imagine a civil war in the US in the 1930's. Think Spain times 10 with our own homegrown internal alien enemies. African Americans treated to Jim Crow wearing a swastika with government backing. Nightmare. Lets not get so close again.