America needs liberal nationalism back

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Back when I started blogging in 2011, I saw my main function as technocratic — I would discuss policy ideas with other intellectual econ types, and wise policymakers at the Fed, in Congress, or in the Obama administration might put those ideas into practice. Since 2016, however, technocracy has felt less and less important, and policymaking has felt more ideological. In the second Trump term, concern for costs, benefits, and the public good seems to have entirely gone out the window — policy is now driven either by the whims of an aging egomaniac and his personality cult or the echo chamber of the online right. Tariffs and immigration raids make no sense as economic policy; they are intended as part of a nativist, isolationist ideological project. The Democratic alternative is less bad, but is still increasingly ideological, centered around the idea that corporate profits are inherently bad.This changes the nature of my job, and in fact makes it much harder. Whereas in the past I could just recommend policies, now I have to make arguments about what kind of country we should want to have in the first place. In order to get anyone to listen to my advice, I have to be a bit less technocratic and a bit more ideological. And I have to do that at a time when the main ideologies being offered to the American public are becoming more extreme. And yet this is the job now, so I should stop complaining and just do it. Because I do have a pretty clear picture of what kind of country I think America should be. I believe that in the 20th century, under the leadership of Franklin D. Roos…