Capitalism by Any Other Name

[marmar]

from the American Prospect:



Capitalism by Any Other Name

John Stoehr
December 16, 2011
Republicans are fighting to rebrand capitalism as economic opportunity but their agenda remains the same.


I've been thinking about the term "capitalism" since Frank Luntz, the renowned pollster, told Republicans to quit saying it. The Occupy Wall Street movement has turned "capitalism" into a dirty word, he said. If Republicans want to win in 2012, they'd better stop worrying and learn to love "economic freedom" instead.

It's a stunning turning of the tide. No matter the kind of conservative—Southern, evangelical, libertarian, Tea Party, or old-school Rockefeller patrician—conservatives have never hidden their allegiance to the moneyed class and power elite. I have never in my lifetime seen a conservative counsel against expressing one of the major tenets of conservative ideology. You might as well advise the GOP to stop trying to repeal the New Deal and start defending labor rights.

I've been thinking about this rhetorical shift while riding the bus in New Haven every day. The passengers are typically at the bottom of the 99 percent. Some are destitute; some are unemployable. Most are working poor, people with full-time minimum-wage jobs who cannot rise above poverty. I wonder what they'd think of John Mackey's definition of "economic freedom." The CEO of Whole Foods wrote in The Wall Street Journal in November that the phrase means "property rights, freedom to trade internationally, minimal governmental regulation ... sound money, relatively low taxes, the rule of law, entrepreneurship, freedom to fail, and voluntary exchange." My guess is they'd think very little of it.

Mackey's definition is meaningful only if you already have money. Real money. Money you don't have to spend right away, money that can sit around for a while. But when you don't have real money, it has nothing to do with "economic freedom." If Mackey were defining "capitalism," that would be one thing. The working person might have nothing to say to that. The abstract nature of "economic freedom," though, invites interpretation, and, for the working person, it has everything to do with making a living. ................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://prospect.org/article/capitalism-any-other-name

[DJ13]

1. John Mackey's definition of "economic freedom."

Why do many liberals see that guy as some sort of liberal icon when he's a rightwing whackjob?