If Obama is a socialist, so was Adam Smith

James Otteson, professor of philosophy and economics and author of learned books on Adam Smith and other weighty subjects recently wrote a short paean to capitalism - An Audacious Promise: The Moral Case for Capitalism. He begins by noting that "President Obama has oddly claimed that we’ve tried free-market capitalism, and it 'has never worked'." Yet by the criterion Otteson is using - criticising the sufficiency of free markets in any way - Otteson's own libertarian hero, Adam Smith, must also have been against capitalism.

‘I bring good news about our bourgeois lives’: Why business is good for your soul

Deirdre McCloskey's Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for an Age of Commerce is a bold attempt to rehabilitate the much maligned bourgeoisie as the focus of a positive inter-twining of capitalism and ethics. Who are the bourgeoisie? People with middle-class values, temperament, and position.  People like us.  McCloskey argues, building on her extensive reading in economics, history, philosophy, religion and ethics, that we should recognise and embrace our bourgeois identity. For it is an ethical way of life that is not only instrumentally successful (showing up in our ever increasing wealth and freedom), but intrinsically valuable (showing up in the meaningfulness and richness of our middle-class lives).