Why Not McCain?- 2

When John McCain was asked by Rick Warren at the recent forum at Saddleback Church to name the "three wisest people" he "would rely on heavily in an administration," he named General David Petraeus, whom the Senator appears to idolize; Representative John Lewis, a hero of the civil rights movement, who found the plug puzzling; and Meg Whitman, the former
CEO of eBay and one of his economic advisers. McCain gushed

Meg Whitman, Meg Whitman, the CEO of eBay. Meg Whitman, 12 years ago, there were five employees. Today, they're 1.5 million people that make a living off eBay in America, in the world. It's one of these great American success stories. And in these economic challenges times, we need to call on the wisdom and knowledge, the background of people like Meg Whitman, who have been able to make such a great success such as eBay part as the American folklore.

This is not the first time McCain has canonized eBay, which has transformed an "incredibly inefficient market for junk and turned it into a very efficient market for junk," according to Lehman Brothers' Ethan Harris, quoted in perrspectives.com. But as Betsey Stevenson of the Wharton School of Economics at the University of Pennsylvania has explained, "in terms of jobs, there's no net increase in GDP that comes from trading stuff that's already made. New people selling stuff out of their closet on EBay isn't growing the economy."

That explanation, however, did not suit Mr. McCain, who is a very slow study when it does not benefit his political prospects. We now can better understand the comment McCain made while he was campaigning in January in Livonia, Michigan for that state's primary, when he claimed it

wasn't government's job to protect buggy factories and haberdashers when cars replaced carriages and men stopped wearing hats..... (and we should avoid raising) false hopes that somehow we can bring back lost jobs.

Primary voters in Michigan rejected McCain, recognizing him as callous, indifferent to middle-class jobs with benefits. Stevenson notes

In terms of jobs, there's no net increase in GDP that comes from trading stuff that's already made. To trade things that are produced in other countries just to swap them.....(conveys a message) that America can't produce anything and that's a very dismal view of the U.S. economy.

But John McCain, oblivious to the importance of Americans producing things, for ourselves and for others, is a true believer in the restorative effects of free trade: n of buying as much as possible from other countries, with the Midwest- and ultimately much of the rest of the country- drowing in the abyss of a dangerous trade deficit. The workers themselves, however, have an option- they can always buy and sell on eBay and forget about their pensions, health care, and the economic security of their families.