Monday, January 17, 2011
A Tale of Two Moralities
Paul Krugman: "One side of American politics considers the modern welfare state — a private-enterprise economy, but one in which society’s winners are taxed to pay for a social safety net — morally superior to the capitalism red in tooth and claw we had before the New Deal. It’s only right, this side believes, for the affluent to help the less fortunate. The other side believes that people have a right to keep what they earn, and that taxing them to support others, no matter how needy, amounts to theft. That’s what lies behind the modern right’s fondness for violent rhetoric: many activists on the right really do see taxes and regulation as tyrannical impositions on their liberty. There’s no middle ground between these views. One side saw health reform, with its subsidized extension of coverage to the uninsured, as fulfilling a moral imperative: wealthy nations, it believed, have an obligation to provide all their citizens with essential care. The other side saw the same reform as a moral outrage, an assault on the right of Americans to spend their money as they choose.”
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I think the description of the two sides is fair for the most part, but am uncomfortable saying that the different economic and moral philosophies is the reason for the "violent rhetoric"on the right - which is not even close to being anything new in American politics. Violent rhetoric seems to me to be rooted, whether it comes from either side, in a gross lack of maturity and intelligence, as well as impatience. That may have nothing to do with different economic standpoints.
This quote obviously gives the left the moral high-ground, as well..but it's just not that easy in my opinion. Not everyone on the right is a free-market fundamentalist or libertarian. Yes, we have different beliefs about the value and size of a "social safety net," but we are not compassionless and violent. We like to think we're trying to do the right thing in the right way. If I really thought my tax dollars were actually helping those in need I don't think I'd be so opposed to higher taxes. But all we've seen for decades is the government's overwhelming capacity to waste money and direct it to political and not benevolent ends. That's not a reason to just abandon social programs and legislation, but it should cause us to hesitate.
I can't say that the conservative movement, and those in charge of it, aren't displaying some reprehensible and compassionless behavior - but the social Darwinism, violent rhetoric, and Capitalistic Idealism is not the inevitable consequence of Conservatism.
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