Fire up the Barby

Put some shrimp on the barby, mate; Charlie's here. Darwin, capital of North Australia, really was named for that passenger on "The Beagle". As I have mused in the past (most recently) and earliest, the Tea Baggers are misanthropic, myiopic Social Darwinists. Today's NY Times, in the Business Section no less, carries an article by Robert Frank (derived from his book) which denies the notion that either Darwin or Adam Smith was a Social Darwinist. Give it a read, and buy his book. I'd ask for percentage, but I'm hardly the only one who's made the case.

A quote from Frank:
Close reading of Smith's work shows that his position was very similar to the modern liberal's.

A quote of Smith by Frank:
In "The Wealth of Nations," he wrote, "People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices."

But, since the Tea Baggers take Cheney's point of view, that only the left engages in reality based policy, I suppose they'll not be fazed. Frank's solution is not so far fetched, but fails, I think, to provide a mechanism in either fiscal or monetary policy when things go bad (or, less often, good). On the other hand, he's saying what I've quoted My Mother (and yours, if she were smart) as saying: "what would be world be like if everybody acted like you?" He touches on the sore spot of Right Wingnut capitalism, which is that it is inherently wasteful. Or put another way, that there is an infinite supply of natural resources. Why an infinite supply? Because of the notion of creative destruction of capital and multiple capitalists consuming capital to produce a Certain Widget. In time, capitalists conspire to choose a monopolist, but not necessarily the one who's most efficient in the production of the Certain Widget. And even if it is, there's no reason that there'll be enough resources left.

Never forget: there are *twice* as many Americans today as 1950. While there were enough resources to support a middle class which really was most of the middle when there were 150 million of us, that's not true today. The shrinking of the Western middle class (and the dramatic slowing of its birth in the East) as a proportion of the population can't be avoided. Sorry.