PBS Lobbies for 'Aardvark Liberalism'

March 1st, 2011 8:59 AM

In The Weekly Standard, Matthew Continetti addressed the latest pairing of politician and six-foot PBS cartoon character/lobbyist. A man in a full-body Arthur the Aardvark suit was standing next to liberal Congressman Ed Markey. “Arthur,” Markey said glumly, “your silence is eloquent.” But "aardvark liberalism" isn't a natural fit for our high-deficit, high-unemployment era:

Now, for all we know, Arthur’s silence may well have been a protest against big government policies that rob Big Bird to pay Elmo. Or perhaps Arthur, being a reasonable aardvark, understood that cuts to public broadcasting most likely won’t result in the end of Sesame Street or Arthur. To the contrary: These million-dollar edutainment juggernauts are more than capable of thriving without government support. What’s more important is that, at a time when most of the adult world is engaged in the great task of disciplining government before the bond markets do it for us, representatives of one of America’s two major political parties seem less concerned with debt than with an oversized, nocturnal insect-eater of the order Tubulidentata.

Indeed, the Democrats’ unseriousness about the challenges facing America in the 21st century is revealing. Somewhere along the line, American liberalism became a reactionary force: more interested in preserving its hard-won constellation of benefits and subsidies than in facing a potentially catastrophic problem head-on and boldly embracing the change necessary for growth and excellence. From health care to Wall Street to pensions, liberals support policies that consolidate dysfunctional systems already in place rather than rethinking​—​progressing from?​—​outdated assumptions of what government can and cannot provide the citizenry. Where liberals once proclaimed their willingness to sacrifice for a world where a prosperous America stood as the champion of freedom, it has been left to the Tea Party and conservatives to confront a debt problem that even Obama’s Treasury secretary concedes is “unsustainable.”

More than budget-cutting will be required to ensure that the next 100 years be remembered as the second American century. It will take a willingness to entertain and debate bold public policies, as conservatives are now doing, to cite just one example, with the state bankruptcy proposal put forward by law professor David Skeel in these pages last year. It will mean questioning the conventional wisdom that has governed fiscal and monetary policy for decades. It will demand a strong defense of American exceptionalism and the maintenance of America’s global commitments. It will depend upon leaders who pugnaciously assert the hard truths in pursuit of genuine reform.

It won’t be easy. But Americans, we trust, will prefer a lion conservatism to an aardvark liberalism.