Do Republicans Believe In Free Markets?
A news story on Monday, McCain urges free-market principles to reduce global warming. Which"free-market principles" does McCain mean?
McCain's major solution is to implement a cap-and-trade program on carbon-fuel emissions, like a similar program in the Clean Air Act that was used to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions that triggered acid rain.Summary: the government sets a limit on how much CO2 companies will be allowed to emit. The government sets a fee for any emissions above that level. The government allows companies with emissions below that limit to sell "credits" to companies above the limit.
McCain describes this as a "free market" approach.
Conservatives always come up with nice-sounding ways to describe their ideas. They talk about "free markets." "Free" sounds so good. Has a nice ring to it. But is there really such a thing?
In McCain's example every single component of this market is defined, set up and regulated by government. But conservatives always say that government is the enemy of freedom and of markets. Do they not see the contradiction?
In fact, is there a market that is not defined, set up and regulated by government? Would markets even exist if there were no government? First, there is the money that is exchanged in a market. Unless we revert to a pure barter system where goods are exchanged money is entirely a creation of government. And it is entirely regulated by government. Next are the laws that, excuse the word, "govern" the market system. These laws are entirely a creation of government and it is government that enforces them and government that runs the courts that resolve disputes. And yes, these laws are "regulations."
So when conservatives complain about "government" and "regulation" and advocate "free markets" what is it they are really saying? The best way to understand what they want is to look at what they do, not what they say. If we look closely at the results of those times when conservatives gain power we can see that they really seem to mean they will use the power of government to protect the wealthiest people and biggest corporations.
For example, conservatives in government have always defended the big energy companies against threats to use of their products. They oppose mass transit, alternative energy research, even requiring cars to get better gas mileage.
A closer look reveals that what they really stand for is a protection of the status quo, defending the rich and powerful against the rest of us.
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America has not had a 'free market' since at least the time of Alexander Hamilton. The fact is, as long as there is a government like ours with a Federal Reserve, a Commerce Department et al, a 'free market' is just fairy dust.
Gabriel Kolko's book, "Triumph of Conservatism" shows how big business sought government regulation in order to protect themselves from competition.
"In fact, is there a market that is not defined, set up and regulated by government?"
Of course - any so-called 'black market' operates outside government regulation, and they thrive in every country in the world. Sex and drug trades in the US are hugely lucrative, mature, and "free" markets, by the definition you and other posters here provide. I'm not sure why you and others ignore it, given the economic scale.
Do Republicans wave the flag and tout these American free-market success stories, or the thousands of hard working entrepreneurs struggling their way (literally) up from the streets? No, but if they were true to their ideology, they should. "Free market" rhetoric is used to whitewash a host of illicit white collar commerce.
As others have noted here, "free-market" is Republican code for a government sponsored (and often subsidized) market which is exploited with minimal government interference by a minority of players in a position to do so. Archer Daniels Midland and other mega-agriculture corporations are the prime multi-billion tax dollar beneficiaries of the recent Farm Bill, for example, although from the rhetoric (and it's bipartisan) you'd think we were saving America's dwindling small farms. Pah.
I swear, next time I hear the phrase "free market solution" from a politician or cable TV talking head I am going to vomit
"McCain urges free market principles to reduce global warming". America pretends to be a Christian nation but is actually in the service of Mammon. If we were a Christian nation the sentence would read; "McCain invokes the Father the Son and The Holy Spirit to reduce global warming". The meaning is the same.
The discussion of where McCain’s cap-and-trade(C&T) proposal falls on the political spectrum is interesting.
But, why are the McCain C&T programs being accepted across that spectrum of interest players from the trans-national corporations to the Robert Kennedy’s of global environmentalism.
Such a strange one-size-fits-all solution to climate change is in merit of serious questioning.
The Congressional Budget Office(CBO) analyzed the several different C&T proposals under consideration against the more direct implementation of a carbon tax for meeting our climate change goals, and found the carbon tax is the best way to go, getting to the goals both more quickly and more cheaply.
The impending implosion of the global financial markets based on leveraged speculation is poised to fall on the greater American populous.
If you like the combinations of the falling dollar, $4 per gallon gasoline, and an economic depression, then C&T is definitely the way to for solving climate change.
The C&T is a tax, just like the carbon tax.
The difference is that with a carbon tax you know how much you’re going to pay.
With a C&T you get sliced, diced, leveraged and futured, with no way of knowing or controlling how much you’re going to pay.
I understand why the multi-nationals would want access to the taxpayer’s pocketbooks for the most expensive solutions, but the enviros?
Free markets! What a joke! There are requirements for a free market such as absolute access to the marketplace and absolute knowledge of costs - our system has niether of these. What we do have is a market place that is always moving to monopoly so the fewest of us control the most of everything. Having such control monopolists can jack prices up.
Additionally companies like Wal-Mart have access to child and slave labor markets - the one market the American Capitalist really wants to be a free market is the labor market!
McCain is not a conservative, and many in the Republican party are not conservative, well, at least the ones in Congress.
Apologist.
Appeaser
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This is ridiculous. When conservative policies screw up it's always because the people who put them in place aren't really conservatives.
And Goldwater was a liberal. And Reagan was a liberal. And Bush is a liberal. And McCain with his 99% conservative voting record is a liberal, too.
Right.
Thank you Dave!!
Of course they are conservative; American conservative. Outside of our little empire the word conservative stands for something besides corporate welfare.
In America however, conservative means those who believe in sucking at the public tit and giving nothing back.
Free markets is the LAST thing they want.
"Free Markets" can be useful, but they are not a panacea for every problem, despite what hardcore "Conservatives" may have been led to believe. The elevation of Free Markets to almost religious worship has been one of the worst things ever to befall this ocuntry.
Free Markets are still better than any other form out there. Managed economies fail everytime.
In all seriousness--name for me one "free market" that has existed in any modern, industrialized western nation. One with absolutely no government intervention-either regulation or subsidies. Truly free, level playing field, market. Just one...
All markets are "controlled, managed, or influenced" by economic forces, including so-called capitalistic based "free markets". As such, they are prone to business cycles. As the empiricist Marx theorized, economies based on capitalism are prone to the business cycle and therefore potential collapse.
The illusion or connotation that "free markets" aren't managed is patently false . Apparently you are not familiar with such economic concepts as "labor arbitrage", "absolute advantage", and "means of production". If you were, then you would comprehend the active management, or rather manipulation, of our current FTA and MFN system of "free market" trade.
First, there is no such thing as a free market, there never has been and there never will be, get over it!
Second, let's look at that, shall we? China: Largest growing large economy in the world, also the tightest management in the world. Europe: largest growing multinational economy in the world, also very tightly managed, though not as much as China.
Yeah, those damn liberal "facts"...
Photofarm - I hate to tell you but America has a managed economy. The Federal Reserve sets interest rates and the Commerce Department helps with trade agreements. Big mummy gubmit helps big business.
That's because, Cathexis, just like with the Clean Skies Initiative, and Operation Enduring Freedom, and the No Child Left Behind act (and boy what an act...) calling a thing a free market doesn't make it one. It's not a free market when the Corporate Oligarchs gamble with our money and lose, and it sure as hell isn't a free market when the Fed bails them out, with our money again.
What the morons promoting this mis-named economic bs don't want to admit is that the game is rigged for the wealthy, and it always has been. There are more rules and regulations in place to cover the collective asses of the real power behind Bush's throne than any Democrat could hope to conceive. These are the sorts of guys who'd complain that laws against murder are just simply too much central planning! But the fact is that in our society there are the weak and the strong and the ideal notion of government is to enact laws that protect and defend the rights of us all. Sometimes that means recognizing the worst instincts in man and stopping them before innocents are hurt. Gee, i guess those laws against murder and rape and assault are pretty good ideas after all...
Some do, some don't. What's ironic is that when one finally identifies one who does actually believe in real free markets, they are usually tagged as a radical libertarian and discounted by the very same freedom loving progressives who you'd think would embrace 'em, all over some silly issue like "evolution" or "global warming". In many ways it reflects the inherently misleading view we have regarding the political process by having it reduced to a two party, right versus left, paradigm which is a mere shadow of the complex 3 dimensional landscape that we all inhabit. Perhaps if we took of the blindera and looked at what was going on "outside the cave" instead of staring like slack jawed knuckle dragging mouth breathers at the amusing shadows on the cave's walls.
In the USA Corporation mean Free Trade for them and no one else. They have gotten so many BARRIER TO ENTRY laws passed to protect themsleves from Competition the anyone entering a market for any item will have to jump thru expensive hoops just to open the doors while the Old Corporations are grandfathered laws they wrote for their Republican LACKEYS!
Heck just to open a CAB company in most cities requires an act of God even if the old companys are terrible. Paying for a NEEDS STUDY will surely put a dent in any new competitions cash flow.
1. The neocon Republicans do not believe in free markets. They are merchantilists. They believe in a few selected large businesses to do their bidding around the globe.
2. Democrats believe in free trade, but say no trade agreements, but then back door wink wink. At the end of the day, they implement free trade and know it works.
3. The wealthiest, the uber wealthy, are Democrats. Why, the uber wealthy are about power and control.
4. The Democrats and Republicans work to defend the interests of a few at the expense of the many. They watch out for lobbyist and special interests. The masses pay.
5. You misrepresent the workable definition of a free market and use the extreme. A free market is going to Wal-Mart to buy what you want, when you want it at a fair price. Use your own money to buy what you want. A government market is one where Fed-Mart requires you to purchase item A from their company at 100X the price with half the quality.
read "The Shock Doctine" by Naomi Klein for an eyeopener.
You Democrats will never vote Republican/Clinton again.
"Do they not see the contradiction?"
Absolutely. There is very little support for McCain within Conservatives. Most call him a "Democrat.
But to say that there is no market without Government is ignorance. For centuries Gold was the currency of choice, it was completely unregulated, and accepted everywhere.
More hard core Free Market advocates would love to see a return to the Gold Standard.
Of course, when you say gold you mean gold coins, minted by governments. The reason only government coins were accepted is that they garunteed the gold content. Otherwise you didn't know if you had a gold coin or a lead coin with gold coating.
Later governments introduced paper certificates worth a certain amount of gold, and finally they dropped the gold standard entirely (at one point you could take US dollars to any bank and withdraw gold coins or bars).
So what gold standard are you talking about, the government one?
"when you say gold you mean gold coins"
No.
If I meant gold coins, I would have said gold coins. IOn Ancient times, he purity of gold could be checked by measuring it's density. (Remember the story of. Archimedes?) As metallurgists became more clever there became a need for more insurance, so the Assayer profession was created. (Some Assayers even minted their own coins.) Remember, Deadwood was settled without Government, and the nugget was the currency of choice.
For centuries fleas were completely unregulated and "accepted" everywhere.
What is your point?
A return to the gold standard, which was another system with artificial controls and regulations that also favored the rich. Or have you forgotten about the great depression.
read your history books.
The Depression happened because the Federal Reserve was allowed to print money which had no value. Before that, money had to be backed by actual gold deposits.
The Depression wasn't caused so much by the gold standard, but by the fact the Reserve had more money outstanding, than gold on deposit.
The Depression was caused by Government "created' money; which is (according to Dave Johnson) the only place money comes from.
McCain is NOT a free-market conservative - he is a neocon RINO. You want real free-market ideas, listen to Ron Paul - I'm not saying you have to agree with him, but that is true and honest free market principles, not McCain's pandering BS. So your criticism of McCain as a hypocrite is spot on
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Ron Paul is ALL ABOUT letting the corporations run everything. Who do you think funds all these libertarian ideas, anyway?
Domestically Mr. Paul is a disaster in the epic Bush sense of the word. Now his foreign policy seems sound however.
He actually advocates TALKING. WTF? Are we sure he is part of the Repub party.
It has become "us against them--the wealthy class emboldened by the Repug policies that treat employees as servants fortunate to have work. The pedulum has swung way too far away from the realization that the middle class keeps the machinery of the workplace running AND spends hard-earned money on goods produced..
.....then why is the U.S. importing more than a million people per year--NOT including ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS? Their presence in the U.S. amplifies many times their effect on resource consumption as well as ENCOURAGING ever greater levels of IMMIGRATION (both legal and illegal!!!) REMEMBER: As the supply of labour rises, it relative and ABSOLUTE value will inevitably FALL--as it is NOW!!!
Since 1965 most of the population growth of the U.S. has come from immigrants--both legal and ILLEGAL--and their decendants. Only PC twits do not recognize this historical FACT because it would gall their aim to remake--in a generation or two--the ethnic composition of the West!
A curious mix of SELF-HATRED and HUBRIS!
Um....
What?
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