I try to plan out my life. I write down goals and seek to make them happen. Perhaps you do something similar. Try as we might, we can't always determine the desired outcomes in our lives. Imagine, then, the hubris it takes for someone to believe that they can plan somebody else's life, or, the lives of entire nations of people. This is what most politicians do. Certainly both major presidential candidates boast of ambitious plans. Officeholders with grand schemes may wear the label Democrat or Republican, but, in many instances, they're really just socialists.

"The problem is that government is not supposed to plan our lives or run the country; we are supposed to be free," writes Ron Paul, one politician who rejects the ethos of planning. "Those who believe in limited constitutional government should worry every time a politician says, 'I have a plan.'"

Conservatism, as the writings of Russell Kirk and others remind us, is the rejection of ideology. This is why free-market economics is embraced by conservatives. It's the anti-system system.

Congressman Paul writes: "Capitalism is not a system, but rather the result of free individuals taking economic actions without interference by government. A true capitalist economy is neither planned by bureaucrats nor steered by regulators. This is why it’s so important that we resist the idea that any president should plan our economy. If we accept that government 'runs' the economy, we accept a fundamental tenet of socialism. We must understand that economic liberty is every bit as important as political and civil liberties."

Neither John Kerry nor George W. Bush understands this. The victor of the election is in doubt but not the outcome: big government.

As far as economics go, the government's ONLY job (other than to manufacture currency) is make sure everyone "plays ball on an even field" (everyone has an equal chance of success, regardless of race or ethnicity, sex, religion (or lack thereof), disability, or sexual preference). Beyond that, the government should stay out of business. If I open a shoe store and I don't sell enough shoes to make a profit, the government should NOT help me out.

Right you are – Government should endeavor to keep the playing field level. Unfortunately due to lobbyists, campaign contributions and the like the government refuses to do this. Both parties are guilty, Republicans more than Dems but both. As a liberal I would gladly end all handouts such as pork barrel spending, corporate tax breaks, special interest legislation and welfare. But it will never happen

I was glad to see that the Constitution party made it on the ballot here in Kentucky, now I have a place for my vote.

As a federalist I believe that the federal government needs to stick to the founding documents, but State governments have more leeway. I happen to agree with Friedman about the governments role in the economy, ensure the money supply, and that is about it.

One thing people need to realize that economies are in nature, cyclical. When a government tries to keep things more even is when the feces hit the fan.

Be well,

Sponge

But Russell Kirk didn't embrace free market economics did he?

"So America's contribution to universal 'democratic capitalism' of the future will be just this: cheapness, the cheapest music, and the cheapest comic-books and the cheapest morality that can be provided." - Kirk

Kirk was definitely critical of aspects of capitalism. I think Kirk believed, unlike many libertarians, that the free market is not enough.

Having said this, look at his fourth principle of conservatism in The Conservative Mind. It reads: "Persuasion that freedom and property are closely linked: separate property from private possession, and Leviathan becomes master of all. Economic levelling, they maintain, is not economic progress."

We should make a distinction between capitalism as an ideology and capitalism as simply a free, unplanned market. Capitalism as an ideology amounts to a universal claim that lack of government economic 'meddling' always necessarily maximizing the good; it also holds that absolute properties rights are unlimitable human rights. But Kirk never would have committed himself to either of these two ideological claims. Capitalism as simply a free market, as opposed to a planned economy, is something different. The free market is the affirmation of economic liberty and self-responsiblity. These lead us to a prudential rejection of planned economies and welfarism etc., but it also rejects ideological dedication to a libertarian version of the market.

So where do corporations fit in? Since they are entirely a creation of government are they inherently anti-capitalistic?

In order for there to be a "level playing field," some degree of government interference is necessary. For example, laws are in place to ensure publically held corporations are accountable to their shareholders... all their shareholders. Laws are in place to ensure no one can be denied a job or fired strictly on the basis of race/ethnicity, sex, or religion. However, the government should not pass laws that make it difficul for any corporation to do business, regardless of what it manufactures, grows, or sells, or what service it performs.

The issue of corporations is a real sticking point for me as far as figuring out what my economic views consist in. I have come to no firm conclusions even about the virtue of McCulloch vs. Maryland.

It seems to me that conservatism understood classically has always desired smaller scale business, family owned, etc. This is why even Marx had a real traditionalist conservative streak in his very Christian sounding critiques of corporations, usury, and capital accumulation as greed. Remember that even Adam Smith who is celebrated as a free marketer was a moral philosopher harshly critical of the disruptions caused by industrialization and, more important, he was writing before the real full-scale industrial and corporate boom and revolution.

If you look at the older agrarian and Jeffersonian conservatives in our own political tradition (in some ways still alive in the Buchananites) who I believe were very influential on Kirk, then the defense of "corporate capitalism" and "free-market" capitalism becomes very problematic.

I throw these thoughts out not to draw any conclusions (particularly with regard to what the government's role, if any, should be in this) but to simply say that I am respectfully withholding assent to Congressman Paul's description of capitalism and Dan's conservative defense of the so-called free market.