Environmental Idealism vs. Hard Reality

Idealism: President Obama's Green Jobs Czar, one-time 'truther' (or maybe not)* and former black nationalist Van Jones, has big plans for changing America. He believes he can help incrementally move America and the world from "suicidal grey capitalism" to "some kind of ecocapitalism".

. . . We want to go beyond the systems of exploitation and oppression altogether . . . the green economy will start off as a small subset, and we're gonna push it and push it and push it until it becomes the engine for transforming the whole society.

Wow. Hope and Change big time.

Hard reality: Concerning "systems of exploitation and oppression", giant corporations like GE and rich investors like Warren Buffett (a big holder of stock in GE) have the most to gain from government subsidies for "green technology". As a general rule, the more closely an industry is regulated, the greater the advantage to the largest corporations. Unless they have good connections in government, smaller firms do not have the resources to deal with regulations, or lobbyists to promote their interests in Washington. The hope for smaller, well-connected start-ups is to make their "profits" from government subsidies rather than from their primary business. "Crony Capitalism" has all sorts of bad, unintended consequences.

So far, not much luck with dismantling "corporatism" with plans for "green jobs". However, the government has apparently been successful in limiting jobs for other oppressive segments of society, skilled professionals and white male construction workers. Is this because Americans want all that rebuilding of infrastructure promised during promotion of the stimulus package - bridges, roads, government buildings, etc. to be done by the long-term unemployed rather than by skilled professionals and experienced construction workers? What sorts of controls would be needed to make sure that "green-collar jobs" went to low-income people?

Green subsidies do not always work as intended. Or stimulate the U.S. economy. There are even environmental costs, such as depletion of natural resources, accompanied by toxic mine tailings.

Lots of Mr. Jones' ideas sound great - lifting people out of poverty, fairness, a strong green economy, etc. And he tells us that the "moral challenge of the new century is to connect the people who most need work with the work that most needs to be done", thus fighting "poverty and pollution at the same time". Not everyone would agree with him about what the greatest moral challenge of the new century is. And not everyone outside places like Berkeley and Hyde Park would be comfortable with the way he uses language when talking with a liberal audience. But nobody wants poverty or pollution. And what could possibly go wrong when the government has such good intentions: providing work to people who need work while reducing pollution?

Some of his plans and his admonitions to the "business community" and world governments sound downright religious. They're spoken in the jargon typical of the utopian Left, complete with a list of bad guys to overcome. A very general list in Jones' case. But lofty goals don't always work out as planned. And the worst tyrannies of the 20th century were built on beautiful, idealistic goals (excepting the antisemitism, etc. which were an integral part of the Nazi utopian dream). Even if the current administration's actions were completely benign, what about the power they would leave in the hands of unknown future administrations (or some international organization) with heavy environmental regulations which were also expected to redistribute wealth?

Ed Morrissey:

A truly economic argument for “green jobs” would show how the transfer to a so-called green economy would outperform what we have at the moment. Since experience proves that argument a loser, Jones and his allies want to cast the effort as a new revolution. It sounds a lot like old revolutions, and one that won’t free people like the civil-rights movement, but one that will put people in thrall to an autocracy that dictates economic activity and strips property rights from its citizens. We saw that often enough in the 20th century to know how it turns out — badly.

University of Chicago law professor Richard Epstein on President Obama:

The fundamental mistake of his entire world view is that he treats contracts as devices for exploitation. He doesn't treat them as devices for mutual gain. And he assumes that redistribution can take place without any negative impact upon production. And if you live in that kind of fairyland, which I think he does, every one of your major social and economic initiatives is going to (A) misfire and if they succeed, God forbid, in getting through, they're going to lead to an intensification of the downturn that we've already experienced.

Obama's Backward Progressivism:

In yesterday’s book review in the Wall Street Journal (the book under review was 1688: The First Modern Revolution by Steve Pincus), William Anthony Hay writes that King James II “sought to extend state power at the expense of Parliament and the privileges of local communities. James’s adversaries preferred the dynamism of commerce; they believed that wealth sprang from the limitless striving of human endeavor rather than the finite availability of land.

King James II (reigned 1685-1688) attempted to emulate Louis XIV’s absolutist, dirigiste France rather than the live-and-let-live, commercial-minded, and very wealthy Dutch Republic. The ever more commercial-minded British gave James II the boot in the so-called “Glorious Revolution,” replacing him with his elder daughter and son-in-law (as well as nephew) William of Orange, the Stadtholder of the Netherlands. Britain rapidly became the richest and most powerful state in Europe, while France languished under its top-down, autocratic government until the explosion of the French Revolution a century later produced, in Margaret Thatcher’s memorable phrase, “a pile of corpses and a tyrant. . . .

. . . Obama’s idea of how the country should be run is really a throwback to an earlier world view. But in the greatest triumph of public relations in the history of politics, the Left succeeded some one hundred years ago in labeling its ideas as “progressive” — i.e., new and innovative. In fact they are deeply regressive. . .

Is there much difference between Barack Obama’s vision for America and Clement Atlee’s vision for Britain sixty-four years ago. Not really.

Going back to an idea that failed more than two generations ago may be “progressive” but it’s not progress.

* Three Possibilities:

One: The Truthers are lying and simply added names of activists like Jones who, um, no one had ever heard of when the petition was circulated in 2004. If that’s true, it’s curious that people like Ed Asner and Janeane Garofalo, whose names are also on there, apparently haven’t objected in the five years since. Two: As I said in the Beck post, maybe Jones doesn’t actually believe the theory but signed on for the sheer romantic rebel pseudo-intellectual glory of it. In that case, we’re in the same situation as we were with Ron Paul when he denied having written the racist crap in those old Ron Paul newsletters: Even if he’s telling the truth, the fact that he approved it proves he’s either too stupid or careless to be trusted with power. Or three: Jones is lying. Unless the correct answer is number one — and it’s mighty curious that Jones isn’t saying it is — then he’s got to go. . . .

Or maybe we need to get ready for Free Mumia rallies at the White House.