Fixing capitalism?
“In a few short weeks, America’s political economy has been stunningly transformed. The Bush administration, the Republican Party and three decades of conservative ideology are facing a potential rout. Yesterday’s conservative clichés are today’s political embarrassments. Americans are getting a vivid if painful education about the limits of the marketplace and the salutary role of government. It will be a very long time before anyone can say with a straight face that markets always work better than governments. But market fundamentalism has been so ascendant for so long — politically, culturally, financially — that this is only the very beginning of an ideological sea change. It remains to be seen whether liberals will manage to save capitalism from itself, for the second time in the past 70 years.”
This excellent essay does a good job of summing up the current problems faced by the Bush administration (and the challenges faced by the Democrats) now that the rose-colored glasses have been knocked off the faces of Americans when it comes the the wonders of the free market. It also takes a look back at the parallels to the 1930s. It’s rather long, but well worth the read.
Read the article here.
