Jim Webb in the WSJ

I'm kinda surprised they printed this. In the Wall Street Journal, Senator-elect Jim Webb (you know, one of the 'conservative' ones we're hearing about) lays down a compelling argument for a dramatic economic realignment in this country, with a smackdown on the status quo:

In the age of globalization and outsourcing, and with a vast underground labor pool from illegal immigration, the average American worker is seeing a different life and a troubling future. Trickle-down economics didn't happen. Despite the vaunted all-time highs of the stock market, wages and salaries are at all-time lows as a percentage of the national wealth. At the same time, medical costs have risen 73% in the last six years alone. Half of that increase comes from wage-earners' pockets rather than from insurance, and 47 million Americans have no medical insurance at all...

This ever-widening divide is too often ignored or downplayed by its beneficiaries. A sense of entitlement has set in among elites, bordering on hubris. When I raised this issue with corporate leaders during the recent political campaign, I was met repeatedly with denials, and, from some, an overt lack of concern for those who are falling behind. A troubling arrogance is in the air among the nation's most fortunate. Some shrug off large-scale economic and social dislocations as the inevitable byproducts of the "rough road of capitalism." Others claim that it's the fault of the worker or the public education system, that the average American is simply not up to the international challenge, that our education system fails us, or that our workers have become spoiled by old notions of corporate paternalism.

It's a great op-ed piece, especially because it's a laundry-list of things that run counter to the philosophy of what I imagine would be the majority of the Wall Street Journal's readers. Is Webb blowing smoke up our asses or is there going to be a genuine attempt to return to the economic populism of the Democratic party of long ago? We'll see in January, I guess.