The Tea Party and Laissez-faire

Published in El Comercio
(Ecuador) on 5 November 2010
by Juan Esteban Guarderas (link to originallink to original)
Translated from by Norma L. Colyer. Edited by Julia Uyttewaal.
The new U.S. movement was not incited by the defeat of Obama; it has been promulgating its rage for months. Obama’s active and progressive stance, contrasted with the lukewarm moderation to which politicians had us accustomed, has awoken a new beast.

The tea party movement, which has been largely responsible for the blow just suffered by the Democrats, is a monster with many limbs. Not having an official affiliation and being managed by multiple groups, it does not have a clearly defined ideology.

Throughout the profuse demonstrations, countless colorful ideals have been expounded, which, although not related, are all weighed down by a strong, stale smell. So many racist as well as anti-immigrant causes have crept in, along with other ideas as disparate as skepticism regarding climate change and the ecological crisis.

But faced with the advance of the Obama government and its corresponding interventionism, the whole movement is consistent with the idea of classical liberalism and public sector downsizing.

Flaunting an astonishing lack of historical memory, a proto-nineteenth-century spirit has been recaptured. Basically, the libertarian revolution ideology itself was revived, calling for the abolition of taxes, the elimination of all fees and slashing public spending. In that sense, it is necessary to refresh one’s memory and remember what happened to the nineteenth-century liberal state. It played out that the private power turned out to be much more cruel and merciless than the public institutions. Without labor laws, a low wage competition that decimated the well-being of workers was put into effect. Workers volunteered to work for less and less, to the point of accepting salaries and conditions that did not meet their basic needs.

The existence of Marx was a historical product of that context; his was the voice that had to occur because the situation of the working classes inevitably had to be denounced.

But their Alzheimer’s forgot not only the long term but the short term as well.

The financial crisis of 2008 was caused by the private sector which, without controls, fanned risk until it contaminated the entire system.

And it was, as a matter of fact, highly interventionist actions like the mammoth rescue following the financial crisis that saved the world from a new 1929.

It would be possible to continue endlessly enumerating arguments, starting with the economic policies of Keynes.

There are reasons why the death of the old liberalism was celebrated by veritable rivers of ink, because if successful, the U.S. will be on a real roller coaster.



La nueva movida estadounidense no se encendió con la derrota de Obama, viene pregonando su furor desde hace meses. El posicionamiento activo y avanzado de Obama, contrastado con la tibia moderación a la que nos tenían acostumbrados los políticos “estándares”, ha despertado una nueva bestia.

El movimiento Tea Party, que ha sido en gran medida culpable del batacazo que acaban de sufrir los demócratas, es un monstruo con numerosas extremidades. Al no tener una afiliación oficial y estar manejado por múltiples colectivos, no cuenta con una ideología claramente delimitada.

A lo largo de las profusas manifestaciones se han declarado un sinnúmero de ideales colorinches, que a pesar de no estar emparentados, sobre todos pesa un fuerte olor a rancio. Tanto motivos racistas, como antiemigrante se han colado con otros tan dispares como el escepticismo respecto al cambio climático y la crisis ecológica.

Pero ante el avance del estado obamista y su correspondiente intervencionismo, todo el movimiento concuerda con la idea del liberalismo clásico y la reducción del sector público.

Haciendo gala de una pasmosa falta de memoria histórica, se ha retomado un espíritu proto-decimonónico. Básicamente se revivió el discurso propio de la revolución libertaria, pidiendo la abolición de los impuestos, la eliminación de toda tarifa, y el corte a mate del gasto público. En ese sentido, es necesario refrescar la memoria y recordar qué pasó con el Estado liberal del siglo XIX. Ocurrió, que el poder privado probó ser mucho más cruel y despiadado que las instituciones públicas. Sin un derecho laboral, se inició una competencia por salarios bajos que diezmaron el bienestar de los trabajadores. Los obreros se ofrecieron a laborar por menos y menos, al punto de aceptar salarios y condiciones que no cubrir sus necesidades básicas.

La existencia de Marx fue un producto histórico que ese contexto; fue la voz que tenía que aparecer, porque forzosamente era la situación de las clases obreras debía denunciarse.

Pero su Alzheimer no solo olvidó el largo plazo, sino también el inmediato.

La crisis financiera del 2008 se dio debido a las acciones de la empresa privada, que sin ser controladas transmitieron los riesgos con ventilador hasta contaminar todo el sistema.

Y fueron precisamente acciones profundamente intervencionistas, tales como los rescates mastodonte, que salvaron al mundo de un nuevo 1929.

Sería posible seguir enumerando argumentos interminablemente, empezando por las políticas de Keynes.

No por algo verdaderos ríos de tinta han celebrado la muerte del viejo liberalismo; puesto que de lograrlo, se meterán en una verdadera montaña rusa.

This post appeared on the front page as a direct link to the original article with the above link .

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