John McCain decries middle class tax cuts as "socialism" because they "spread the wealth around." What are tax cuts for corporate America and the wealthy then? There indeed has been an increase in "socialism" in the U.S. but a smokescreen of conservative ideological rhetoric has hidden it for decades.
In order to stimulate growth in the short term, public works projects, national goals like carbon reductions and even perhaps a national specialization, like India has focused on computer technology, are possibilities. At this point it is quite certain that finance is not a specialty about which we can claim preeminence.