Ideas and Motives
I don’t think that the defence of the free market I hear from Jeff comes from the same place as the (nominally identical) version coming from the insurance executives testifying on Capitol Hill.
This is certainly right. There are a lot of people who speak about freedom and markets and liberty, but actually seek to game the system to enrich themselves. Many businessmen talk a nice capitalist game, but then hire lobbyists to get them special favors, or lobby for regulations that impose barriers to entry for their competition. It’s easy to disguise an ulterior motive in the vocabulary of an ideology.
This is true of progressive ideas as well. Many people have called for new government programs or regulations that would-surprise!-just coincidentally deliver enormous financial windfalls to them.
I know that Southpol is sincere in his arguments; I know that Robot-Heart is sincere in hers; and they know I’m sincere in mine. The debate on Tumblr, and most blogs, is generally pure, and from the heart. But the debate in Washington is not. All of the players in the debate have huge financial interests in what happens. All of the politicians owe favors to constituencies and donors. Whatever emerges from Congress will be disguised with the rhetoric of ideas, but underneath, it will be all corruption and kickbacks.
