Not Quite Right

The other day, Paul Krugman argued that pragmatism isn't really pragmatic because

But I’d also like to register a philosophical protest. There’s an old joke to the effect that you’re an ideologue; I’m just being sensible. The point is that everyone has an ideology — which is another way of saying that everyone has (a) values and (b) some view about how the world works. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

Ideology isn't what he thinks it is. Knowing something about the way the world works is entirely different than constructing a totalizing narrative of how the world works that ignores reality. In the first case, if I push something hard enough it will fall down. In the second case, free markets' efficiency increases as onerous regulations decline. In this case, efficiency means buyer beware and allows the seller to lie, pollute, and etc. Ideology is a means of masking reality while a pragmatic commitment to what works allows me or you to work for solutions to problems that work

In a similar fashion, values have little if anything to do with ideology. Values might shape desired outcomes but ideological commitments determine policy preferences. Neoliberals all claim to value human equality but their ideologically driven policy preferences ensure radical inequality.

And, while we're on the subject, his point that as he

 recall[s], the last president we had who viewed himself primarily as a manager was … Jimmy Carter.

The point here, it seems, is that Carter was failed president because he eschewed ideology in favor of working on policies that worked. As I recall at least part of the reason Carter lost the presidency is because Reagan et alia were willing to make odious deals with America's enemies in the service of a partisan political victory.

My point here is not that Obama is right because he is being pragmatic but rather that if he were pragmatic it would be better for all. Instead his is a center right Neoliberal or, in any event, he governs as if he were a center right Neoliberal.