Looking Forward: What Comes After the New Deal and the Raw Deal?

After a sweeping electoral victory, Democrats today have much to rejoice. So do middle class Americans, who made clear with their votes that they could not afford another four years of a government asleep at the wheel that cost them a fifth of the equity in their homes and a third of their retirement savings and their children's college funds.

More than anything right now, voters want a pragmatic, solution-focused government. They want leaders who will put policies into place that restore confidence in our financial institutions and address the host of problems facing the struggling middle class--stagnating wages coupled with skyrocketing prices, health insurance that seems to evaporate when you need it, pension plans written in disappearing ink, and a global race to the bottom for jobs in which the most highly sought worker is the most poorly paid worker with least benefits and workplace protections.

But at another level, the task facing the new president is to redefine the role of government itself. In 60 years we've gone from the New Deal to the Raw Deal, and the question is what kind of deal the new president is going to offer the country. In many respects, as a nation, we have just re-learned the lessons our grandparents learned during the Great Depression: that unfettered greed is not good public policy. Nothing in the nature of the market guarantees that businesses that write their own rules will build the protection of homeowners, consumers, or taxpayers into the rulebook. Nothing in the nature of the market guarantees that the people who go to work every day to produce the nation's wealth will share fairly in it. In the last few weeks of the election John McCain described Barack Obama as a socialist who would "redistribute the wealth," but what voters understood was that in the last eight years the wealth had already been redistributed--from middle class Americans to CEOs, oil companies, and companies that outsourced their jobs.

In the 1930s, Roosevelt carved out a sweeping new role for government. If the market couldn't find jobs for people who wanted to work, government would put them to work building our infrastructure. (That's why we have the system of highways we have today.) If the market couldn't protect people's assets, government would insure their savings and regulate banking and financial markets. If the market couldn't guarantee retirement with dignity, government would create a pooled savings plan to make sure our seniors had security in their twilight years.

The New Deal was the right deal for its time, but by the time of the Reagan Revolution, voters resonated with the idea that "government is the problem, not the solution." Part of the selling of that sentiment played on people's prejudices: An essential component of the language of the right was that it pitted "us"--hard-working (white) Americans--against "them"--able-bodied (black) welfare loafers. But part of the Reagan critique of the vestiges of the New Deal spoke to voters' legitimate frustrations with programs that never seemed to disappear even after they had outlived their usefulness as well as the inevitable limits of bureaucracy (whether public or private).

The Bush years have demonstrated the bankruptcy of radical free-market economic ideology that denies any legitimate role for government. In this election, voters made clear that they were tired of ideological bankruptcy leading to financial bankruptcy. Americans were rightly afraid of a McCain health care plan that would have done to our health what radical deregulation had just done to our housing and financial markets.

The task facing President-elect Obama is to articulate the role of government in the 21st century just as FDR articulated its role in the 20th. How do we steer a path between expanding our markets in a global world while protecting the wages and benefits of American workers? How can government and business partner to invest in energy solutions that rebuild our economy, create jobs, and eliminate our dangerous dependence on foreign oil?

If the new president can not only offer Americans practical solutions but a new understanding of what government and business can and cannot do--and how they can best work together to insure the twin goals of prosperity and fairness--he may be able to achieve the kind of political realignment that Roosevelt and Reagan both achieved. In the Electoral College, Obama broke through barriers in the South and the West, while, remarkably, breaking through boundaries of race, winning percentages of the white vote Democrats have not typically won over the last 40 years. He also turned young voters onto politics in large numbers--something characteristic not only of only charismatic leaders but also of political realignments, as political affiliations developed during the late teens and early 20s tend to last a lifetime. We can only hope that one of the most thoughtful and inspiring leaders we have seen in decades can put together a vision for the future and a way of talking with the American people about it that captures both the moment and the imagination.

Read more reaction from HuffPost bloggers to Barack Obama's victory in the 2008 presidential election

Drew Westen, Ph.D., is Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry at Emory University, founder of Westen Strategies, and author of "The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation."

Comments

[Trejo12]

I disagree totally.

Today’s economic crisis is a failure of the regulated market (including the New Deal version of it). But today’s financial crisis goes deeper than economics, which explains Obama’s victory and its frightening moral consequence for America.

Capitalism and free markets are fundamentally selfish. One either has a right to one’s life, liberty, property and pursuit of happiness—or not. This means the “self,” one’s own life is good—and that one’s judgment and effort (in the market) is a virtue. This was the Founding Fathers’ political achievement. While the American people identify emotionally with the Founding Fathers’ view, the election shows that they act by an opposite philosophy. Instead of the “pursuit of happiness,” the American people have endorsed Obama’s Christian morality of self-sacrifice and its attack on “the virtue of selfishness.” They have endorsed “giving back” and “service,” of regulated markets—and of potential interventions with no principled, rational limit. When Obama places religious faith at the center of his moral program and sacrifice is the highest virtue, how could it be otherwise?

America’s election of Obama—and the pending implementation of his vision through government, faith-justified force—is a victory no religious Bush conservative could have achieved today. Our intellectuals and pundits would have exposed and denounced it. However, a bible quoting, articulate leftist can and did achieve it—with no significant protest from today’s intellectuals and pundits, who predominately endorsed him.

That is the frightening moral consequence for America today.

.

[albanaeon]

Really? So the Grahm-Leahy Act which effectively created a shadow banking system with no oversight at all was still over-regulation? Wow. What would you have put in place, I shudder to ask?

[Vickster]

During most of the nineteenth century, legislatures would charter corporations to do a certain job that was deemed to be in the public interest. Once the job was done, the assets were distributed among shareholders and the corporation ceased to exist. Likewise, profits were often limited by the charter. This continued until 1886, when the Supreme Court ruled that corporations had the same rights as citizens. Ironically, the Supreme Court used the Fourteenth Amendment (protecting the rights of freed slaves) to rationalize this decision.

The things we can learn by reading history, huh?

[Mason]

Few people realize that the Supreme Court decision you reference did not cite any authority for the principle that a corporation is a person. Of course, there was no authority to cite because the legal principle did not exist.

I wonder what our nation would be like today if the Supreme Court had not stepped outside its constitutional role of resolving disputes by applying existing law by, in effect, legislating corporations into person-hood.

I suppose it's unrealistic to consider, let alone attempt, to turn back the clock and, as Robert Frost wrote in his famous poem about coming to a fork in a path, "take the path less travelled," but corporation person-hood does not appear to have been a wise path to take.

[BillZBubb]

"Capitalism and free markets are fundamentally selfish. One either has a right to one"s life, liberty, property and pursuit of happiness"or not."

Aside from your addition of "property" which the founders PURPOSELY LEFT OUT of their list, yours is typical right wing black/white thinking. The founders understood the necessity of taxation and eminent domain for effective governance. So, unlike you they understood one's right to property was a limited right.

Because capitalism is selfish, it is unable to control itself from excesses. Because those excesses often lead to widespread financial and economic distress, the government must step in to regulate those excesseses.

It was precisely the foolish Republican Laissez Faire attitude that has led to the present calamity, not as you so erroneously state to regulation.

[Javani]

What comes first? Obama brings big hopes for change so we must look at how he makes his first signals.

His first signal for a substantive post is RFK Jr. at EPA. This is a signal of change and priority to his supporters in Wall Street Finance and interests connected to the Chicago Carbon Exchange that CO2 Cap and Trade will be instituted. This is the change that Obama is brave enough to embrace, even admitting on camera to the drastic increased costs to electricity consumers, cap and trade of ephemeral CO2 molecules.

Obama here shows he is a pro, a player. The low information voters will think this appointment of RFK Jr. is motivated by a policy of cleaner water. Same voters don't realize Caroline K. is a big cap and trader too. Converted her husband on the issue. Obama will reach across the aisle to Paulson on the issue and establish his bona fides as a uniter.

[WritusMaximus]

Obama can have a great start by demanding accountability from both repubs AND dems. The millions of newly-minted dem voters are Obama voters, NOT Barney, Pelosi, or Reid voters. Obama, unlike Bush, can bring down a very, very heavy hammer on those that try to have biz as usual. Time for Barney, Pelosi, and Reid and other tax-and-spend, leave-it-t­o-our-chil­dren-to-pa­y folks to toe the Obama line, otherwise expect a considerable portion of their constituents to demand answers as to why they are not supporting our prez.

The age of the ideologue---repub AND dem--- is over. Reality is here to stay.

[BillZBubb]

LOL, boy you sure missed the message the voters sent. Obama said he will raise taxes on the wealthy and he's going to spend a ton of money to get the economy out of the mess the Republicans put it in.

[certainot]

the disaster that followed reagan would not have been possible if reagan did not kill the Fairness Doctrine. it gave the right wing of the GOP the biggest soapbox in the country and as a monopoly and with call screeners no one could get in their face. that coordinated uncontested repetition has been used to take lee attwater's techniques national and has turned the Party of Lincoln into the Party of Limbaugh. as long as that monopoly remains largely unnoticed and unchallenged by the Obama administration real bipartisanship and democracy will continue to be nearly impossible and progressives will continue to play politics without a front line. i hope progressive analysts and strategists and politicians will soon begin to give the talk radio monopoly the attention it deserves.

[TomR]

----
...by the time of the Reagan Revolution, voters resonated with the idea that "government is the problem, not the solution."
----

Believe it or not, Ronald Reagan was once in his right mind:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFhoM6xZpEQ

- Tom

[NASAcrew]

Obama cares nothing about the 3rd party voters, he said nothing in his speech to include us. My guess by his lack of inclusion tells me that he will do everything to snuff us out, or find a way to filter our blogs, or concerns. He will do what they did at his convention, jail reporters who report the concerns of the other "WE THE PEOPLE". As a reminder Mr. Obama, we are also part of America, you can choose to exclude us, but we will continue to raise our voice, because this is America, and it is our right. You can try to hush us, jail us, pass laws that will not allow us to speak, but in the end, we will not stop. You can put us on your watch lists, make our life a living hell, but we are still "WE THE PEOPLE" and we still have the right to be heard. You are to represent us, hear from us, acknowledge us, and treat us with respect as Americans with a different point of view. You have so far, refused to extend the olive branch, you want change... but only with your people, not with the 3rd party voters that are still part of "WE THE PEOPLE". Thanks, but now I see, you are not willing to be my President.

Faith McGary,

Bethlehem, PA

[VentingVietVet]

What Barack Obama have YOU been watching? The man has reached out to everyone numerous times and all you need to do is lift your hand and reach back. If you want to.

[drkazmd65]

Hmm,... as a person who has previously voted 3rd Party in Presidential elections (Perot, 1992; Nader, 2000), and for local-level Green Party candidtes - you must have been listening to a different speach than I did NASAcrew,...

He may not have mentioned Libertarians, Greens, Constitution Party, or Socialists by name in his speach,... but last I checked,... you all (and myself) were all included in America. If President Obama choses to shut you out,... you have the same rights to free speach and represenation as the rest of us.

Relax for a few moments,... give the guy a chance to do something, or to disappoint before you get all snippy. He just got there.

[princessofnowt]

I'm just looking at the slideshow of the world's reaction and it seems like he personifies One World and all the hope of what can be to nearly everyone everywhere.

Imagine all the people..... wow..

[Airmonger]

New Deal, Raw Deal..

Time for the "Real Deal".

Obama mapped it out last night. Hard work, collaboration, practical progress.

Throughout the campaign Obama has stressed personal responsibility and service. These may be the hallmarks of the Real Deal.

[GrainOSand]

I have been up all night. I have to get some rest. But I had to comment on the title of this peice. I cannot read another story for my eyes are starting to hurt. I will read the article later. The title says it all though and without having read the article I can imagine the content. It made me laugh as I considered FDR and Bush. One told the nation to stand up (New Deal) and the other told the nation to bend over (Raw Deal).

That is a perfect thought to leave the conversation on and contemplate in solitude. It also made me laugh.

Congratulations to America. Movement towards a more perfect union has begun again.