Michael Hiltzik: Wisdom from the not-so-distant past

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Wyoming-born Thurman Arnold, whose wisdom is referenced in my Sunday column, was a trust-busting antitrust chief in the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration, a federal judge and a penetrating legal and social critic of his era. Sadly, he’s largely unremembered, except on the nameplate of the big Washington law firm he co-founded, Arnold & Porter.

His 1937 book ‘The Folklore of Capitalism’ is still in print. That’s a boon, because of its startling modernity. Read these nuggets and tell me they don’t sound like he foresaw the Sarah Palin/’tea party’ idiocies of today, and the flailings of progressives:

--The ‘belief in the inherent malevolence of government’ results in the following ‘absurd’ propositions: ‘If government conserves our soil from floods and erosion in order to bequeath to posterity a more productive country, our children will be impoverished thereby ... If government builds a large number of productive public works which can be used by posterity, posterity will be worse off. Therefore, we do not improve our country or utilize its labor -- out of consideration for our grandchildren.’

--’Men do not actually search history to avoid the mistakes of the past. They seek convenient analogies to show the dangers in failing to adopt the creed which they advocate.’

--’Liberals and intellectuals usually fail as political organizers because they desire their slogans to be accurate and logical, rather than political. When they become politicians, a feeling that they are betraying ... intellectual integrity makes them confused and ineffective.’

So that’s the problem! Arnold’s book can be found at used-book sellers and your local library.

The column begins below:

Get mean, already.

That was the unsolicited advice I offered to President Obama last year. The administration was reeling under a relentlessly anti-intellectual right-wing assault on healthcare reform. The program finally got passed, but the Democrats looked hopelessly feckless in the attempt.

Today the Democratic agenda, like the party’s weight in Congress, has dramatically shrunk. Hard-fought reforms on healthcare and consumer finance could be nullified by legislative meddling. Social Security, which keeps millions of older Americans out of the poorhouse, is under fresh assault.

Read the whole column.

-- Michael Hiltzik