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WEBB THE POPULIST. So long as we're extolling the virtues of Senator James Webb, it's worth noting that he delivered the keynote at the kickoff for the Economic Policy Institute's kickoff new "Shared Prosperity Agenda" yesterday. His speech was a generally interesting address -- much moreso than you generally here at these gatherings -- but I was particularly struck by an extended historical analysis he offered of Teddy Roosevelt's "Square Deal" speech, and particularly, this bit:
Side by side with this increase in the prosperity of the wage-worker and the tiller of the soil has gone on a great increase in prosperity among the business men and among certain classes of professional men; and the prosperity of these men has been partly the cause and partly the consequence of the prosperity of farmer and wage-worker. It cannot be too often repeated that in this country, in the long run, we all of us tend to go up or go down together. If the average of well-being is high, it means that the average wage-worker, the average farmer, and the average business man are all alike well-off. If the average shrinks, there is not one of these classes which will not feel the shrinkage. Of course, there are always some men who are not affected by good times, just as there are some men who are not affected by bad times. But speaking broadly, it is true that if prosperity comes, all of us tend to share more or less therein, and that if adversity comes each of us, to a greater or less extent, feels the tension.Responding to this, Webb said:
There was a perception, then as now, that the country was concentrated in the hands of a few...[Roosevelt] talked about the notion that the welfare of each of us is fundamentally dependent on the welfare of all of us...the time period when Teddy Roosevelt was talking about these issues was, frankly, less complicated in terms of these issues than today. Roosevelt believe we were all in this together, the people at the top, the people at the bottom...but we all know now that in the age of globalization, in the age of internationalization of corporate America, it's a little bit different because we're not all in the same boat, there are options at the top that weren't there before in terms of how you define the national good. The alternatives of corporate America in many cases are now to send jobs overseas, to send industries overseas and the only way for us to bring everybody back into the same room is to return to notions of fairness when it comes to the equation of protecting the American workforce.It's unclear how far Webb will take that insight. He revealed that, along with Byron Dorgan, Jon Tester, and Sherrod Brown, he'd created a sort of Populist's Caucus in the Senate, which would seek to restore intellectual vibrancy and legislative energy to the economic left. We'll see what sort of policies they eventually emerge with, but for now, it's good to have voices widening the spectrum of debate in that direction. On both national security and economic fairness, Webb is doggedly pursuing positions long out of favor, but desperately needed, in American life. He's exciting to watch.--Ezra Klein
