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The Free-Market Populism of Javier Milei

Javier Milei is a rock star. The president of Argentina was, in fact, in a Rolling Stones cover band as a teen. But now he plays stadiums — like Buenos Aires’ 8,400-capacity Luna Park — as a political phenomenon, a charismatic cross between Donald Trump and Milton Friedman. Except that Milei, a former economics professor himself, is more free-market than Friedman, in theory at least. He’s a devotee of the most notoriously “intransigent” free-market thinker of them all, the great Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises. As Mises’ masterwork, the nearly 900-page opus “Human Action,” turns 75 this year, Milei has made a cover version of sorts: his own new book, “Capitalism, Socialism, and the Neoclassical Trap.” He took to the stage at Luna Park to promote it after the Buenos Aires International Book Fair canceled him in retaliation for cuts he’s made to government arts funding. Clad in a long leather jacket yet wearing a tie, his collared shirt untucked, Milei was a nerd gone wild, belting out a hard-rock number called “Panic Show” by a band named La Renga before launching into an econ lecture. That might sound like a buzzkill, but Milei’s brand of political economy is full-on “anarcho-capitalism,” and it’s finding fans even among Argentines who’ve long benefited from their government’s many subsidies. Reporters for The Guardian spoke to one businessman at Milei’s May 23 rock concert/book launch/political rally who called the president’s slashing of transportation subsidies “directly detrimental to my personal activity” yet who still believed “we must finish the economic cleanup — we can’t keep living a lie.” Milei’s election last year scrambled the conventional wisdom of North American pundits, who assumed populism had to be hostile to free-market principles. Yet here was an ardent capitalist ascending to power in the land of Juan and Evita Peron, a duo whose big-government economic nationalism was assumed to be a blueprint for the populist right. For his part, Milei makes no secret of his admiration for Donald Trump — for what he calls Trump’s “fight against socialism” — and posed with him for a photo op at CPAC last February. Milei’s not the only evidence that populism and libertarianism can be allies instead of enemies, however: The Libertarian Party recently shocked many anti-populist libertarians in this country by inviting Trump to speak at the LP national convention. Is this simply a case of outcasts banding together? Milei and Trump do represent a repudiation of the old leadership class in their countries. Those leaders were Peronist in Argentina; here, they were Clinton Democrats and Bush Republicans. Outsiders attacking the political establishment might be expected to have a similar attitude — a rock ‘n’ roll attitude of defiance, ready to shock and offend. But there are deeper connections between free markets and anti-establishment politics. The anti-tax movement that kicked off with California’s Proposition 13 in 1978 was a popular revolt that presaged the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980. The Reagan revolution was born of free-market populism. Although many intellectuals who now attach themselves to populist causes find economics to be a “dismal science” — one that casts doubt on their power to save the country through policy brainpower — free-market economics suggests many good reasons why voters turn populist. Inflation, for example, brings free-market theorists and populist voters’ instincts together. As Milei said in a recent Time interview, inflation “means you lose the purchasing power of the money you have in your pocket, which is theft. In other words, printing money and putting it on the market is theft; it’s counterfeiting; it’s fraud.” And just as some businessmen who’ve lost their subsidies still back Milei, populist voters in the United States aren’t necessarily looking for handouts. They want a fair shake, not a New Deal. “No taxation without representation” is a perfect expression of the populist side of libertarianism and the libertarian side of populism. The American Revolution wasn’t just about high taxes — which weren’t steep by today’s standards. It was about the fact that the taxing authority belonged to an elite that wasn’t accountable to the people. The American colonists didn’t hate King George III, not at first. But they demanded control over their own economic destiny, for better or worse. That’s what populists are calling for today — including free-market populists like Javier Milei. Daniel McCarthy is the editor of Modern Age: A Conservative Review. To read more by Daniel McCarthy, visit www.creators.com

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Trump's Sun Belt Hopes and Rust Belt Needs

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Trump’s Sun Belt Hopes and Rust Belt Needs

Donald Trump’s first election redrew the map of American politics; suddenly Pennsylvania and Michigan were in the Republican column for the first time since the 1980s. But they didn’t stay there: The Rust Belt states that made Trump president in 2016 sent Joe Biden to the White House in 2020. That second Trump election also redrew the map, this time forfeiting two Sun Belt states that had been Republican for decades, Arizona and Georgia, to the Democrats. Which map will Trump draw this time? Polls show him ahead in the Sun Belt and Rust Belt alike, and indications that Black and Hispanic voters are trending Trump’s way have Republicans giddy. Will this election upend political demographics the way the last two shook up electoral geography? The prospect is real — but Trump’s experience in 2020 contains a warning. He can’t afford to be complacent about the Rust Belt no matter how dazzling the Sun Belt and its demographics seem today. Yet it’s hard not to look on the bright side. Trump is up five points in Arizona according to a CBS News poll released Sunday. That fits with the six-point lead the latest New York Times/Siena poll found a week before. Even more encouraging, the same NYT/Siena survey showed Trump up 13 points over Biden in Nevada, a state Republicans haven’t won in a presidential contest since 2004. Georgia, too, is going red; no poll has shown a lead for the Democrat there since the Trump-Biden rematch got booked. After four dour years of continual crises abroad and inflation at home, does sunshine now remind voters of Trump? Two of Biden’s weaknesses are a special source of the Republican’s Sun Belt strength. First, the incumbent can’t evade the blame for the mess on the southern border and his administration’s inability, or brazen unwillingness, to control immigration. Arizona’s electorate is acutely conscious of the border situation, of course, but immigration is an urgent issue in Nevada and Georgia as well. Georgia even recently passed legislation to crack down on local officials who shirk their duty to enforce immigration law. Second, contrary to progressives’ expectations, the ethnic diversity of these Sun Belt states is starting to work to Trump’s advantage. Black and Latino voters are defecting from Biden in droves, according to repeated rounds of NYT/Siena polling, which most recently found Trump virtually even with the Democrat among Hispanics. Trump has a long way to go before he can equal Biden with Black voters, but for the incumbent to lose any support with a constituency that voted 92% for him in 2020 is a fire alarm. Biden’s worried enough that he’s made recent appearances before Black audiences — including a commencement address at the historically Black Morehouse College on Sunday — occasions to sell himself hard to voters he would normally count on. Even at Morehouse, the president is dogged by divisions his policies toward Israel cause in his own coalition. Before Biden spoke, the graduating class’s valedictorian, DeAngelo Fletcher, drew applause for demanding "an immediate and permanent ceasefire in the Gaza Strip." When Biden took the stage, some of the class turned their backs or walked out. The crackup of the Democratic coalition doesn’t automatically put Trump back in the White House, however. If he sweeps Arizona, Nevada and Georgia, the Republican still won’t have the Electoral College votes he needs unless he flips at least one more state. The Rust Belt battlegrounds of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are his best prospects. In these states, the white vote will likely decide the outcome. Trump lost ground with whites nationwide in 2020, a fact that’s drawn less attention than Biden’s troubles with Blacks and Latinos. According to a June 2021 Pew analysis, in 2020 Biden drastically cut into Trump’s support among suburban white voters compared to 2016, narrowing the Republican’s lead with them from a commanding 16% margin down to just 4%. Even among whites without college degrees — a core component of Trump’s base — Biden made gains relative to Hillary Clinton’s performance in 2016, raising the Democrat share of non-college whites from 28% to 33%. Because white voters nationally are still a majority, these declines in his 2020 white support were fatal to Trump’s reelection, more than counterbalancing gains with Hispanics. And whites make up a larger majority in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin than they do in the country at large. Trump should do everything he can to win the Sun Belt, and Black and Hispanic voters, away from Biden. But his priority must be to win back the Rust Belt states and white voters he lost in 2020. The Rust Belt map Trump drew in 2016 is still the one that leads to victory. Daniel McCarthy is the editor of Modern Age: A Conservative Review. To read more by Daniel McCarthy, visit www.creators.com

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What Trump Sees in Doug Burgum

Donald Trump knows how to run a talent show. He’s built a career out of them — in addition to careers as real estate mogul and president of the United States. What he learned from Miss Universe beauty pageants and the breakout success of “The Apprentice” he’s now applying to the tryouts for vice president. No one watches if competition isn’t tense: Contestants all need a moment to shine, even if their chances are dim. Dark horses make a good storyline — underdogs an even better one. So now the spotlight turns to a contender nobody would have guessed would be under serious consideration: the governor of North Dakota. Who? Is that the one who shot the dog? No, that’s Kristi Noem, governor of the other Dakota. And her hopes are as dead as that poor pooch. The governor on the rise is Doug Burgum. Who — or rather, why? Burgum ran for president last year and participated in the Trumpless Republican debates nobody watched. He had so little support he offered $20 gift cards for $1 donations just to keep up his donor numbers to qualify for the debates. He dropped out when even that wouldn’t cut it anymore. Burgum’s unknown to anyone but nerds and North Dakotans, and his state isn’t in danger of defecting to Joe Biden. If Tim Scott or Marco Rubio might just help Trump with Black or Latino voters, or a woman might get more women to vote Republican, what does Burgum bring? Ohio is safely red, but Sen. J.D. Vance reinforces Trump’s populist rhetoric and could boost him in rust-belt battlegrounds like Pennsylvania and Michigan. But Doug Burgum? Yet he’s getting an audition — even a push, appearing alongside Trump at a huge New Jersey rally last Saturday. Trump sees personal, ideological and financial angles to the North Dakota governor. The last is most obvious: Burgum is rich in his own right and does more for the ticket’s bottom line than any other VP contender. It’s hard to know just how rich the governor is, but the most modest estimates put him above $100 million, and he could easily be worth many times that. Trump was outspent in 2016 and 2020, and Biden’s fundraising has far outpaced his this cycle. The endless civil suits and criminal cases lodged against Trump haven’t torpedoed his polling, but they’ve drained him of dollars his election effort can’t spare. Burgum wouldn’t be the first running mate added to a ticket for the millions he can personally contribute: The Libertarian Party nominated the billionaire David Koch for vice president in 1980, hoping his money would propel presidential nominee Ed Clark to victory, or at least a respectable showing. That hope was in vain: neither Ronald Reagan nor Jimmy Carter, nor the electorate, took notice of the Clark-Koch ticket, which won about 1% of the popular vote. This year another contender outside the two-party system, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is pursuing a similar strategy. His running mate, Nicole Shanahan, the ex-wife of Google co-founder Sergey Brin, is estimated to be worth several hundred million dollars — not enough to buy the election but plenty to help an independent like RFK over the costly hurdles involved in getting ballot access. Do Burgum’s bucks bring enough bang for Trump? The ideological rationale for considering the governor is simply that he reassures the GOP’s capitalist wing, which is troubled by Trump’s populist tendencies and extravagant personality. Eight years ago, Trump picked Mike Pence to cement the loyalty of evangelicals and old-guard conservatives who’d had reservations about the New York tycoon throughout the primaries — Republicans more excited by Ted Cruz than Trump. Today Trump expects enthusiastic evangelical turnout. So he might look to secure his flank on the other side of the party, with libertarian-minded and business-oriented Republicans. And on a personal level, Trump likes old-fashioned archetypes of executive authority — military men and corporate leaders, like his ill-fated first secretary of state, the ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson. Trump’s an impresario, but when the cameras are off, he wants to be surrounded by suits and uniforms, not wannabe celebrities. Burgum’s a vice president for corporate America; Trump’s the only star his administration needs, as far as the man at the top is concerned. Even so, Burgum probably won’t be Trump’s pick. Yet he’s plausible enough to extend the season an episode or two. The contest isn’t really about the contestants anyway; it’s about investing the audience in the drama of choosing and the man making the choice. Every hopeful gets his or her moment, but the hour belongs to Trump. Daniel McCarthy is the editor of Modern Age: A Conservative Review. To read more by Daniel McCarthy, visit www.creators.com