I've lived in post-communist countries for over a decade and I can say from first-hand experience and without fear of hyperbole that Communism was one of the worst things that has happened in history. It failed in every way possible, was responsible for the death of millions and endangered the well-being of the billions of others. It was so brutal and so corrupt and so difficult for most Americans to believe that it almost cries out for apologists. Such failure on such a mass scale is simply beyond the comprehension of most Americans.
I'm a big supporter of Obama, hated Bush and loved Clinton. So it is common for friends and family back home to ask me "if you've seen first hand how that system has failed, how can you favor those policies?" Michelle Bachmann hurls the epitets "Liberal" and "Leftist" as proof of "Anti-Americanism."
I think on-balance, most Americans know that Bachmann's view is wrongheaded, but she wouldn't repeat it if it didn't have resonance. Most Americans are also are uneasy about Socialism and it is true that we are a "center-right" nation. So I think that a lttle more thought needs to be put into a rebuttal than simply calling her a lunatic (even though she probably is).
Let's go through the Conservative arguments against a more activist and intrusive government one by one:
The Founders'('s) Vision: It's amazing what a difference an apostophe can make. For when conservatives invoke the "Founders' Vision, the often mean the "Founder's Vision." For them, the singular Founder is Jefferson, who was adamantly for States' rights and in opposition to the Federalists (it's amazing how a term's meaning can change over time). Jefferson wasn't involved in the Constitution's development. He was in France during the entire process, didn't see first-hand the failures of the Articles of Confederation and was generally skeptical of both Federal power and the Constitution itself. His only tangential contributions were wholly through his correspondence with James Madison.
Of course, unlike his Republican descendants, Jefferson's epithet of choice wasn't "Anti-American," but "Anti-Revolution." However, his tactics and outlook were very similar and he vilified anybody who disagreed with him, regardless of their heroism in the Revolutionary war (Jefferson was a famous coward). He, like Rouseau, felt that cities were corrupt and favored an agrarian society. He probabaly would have favored Palin, if only she read a bit more.
There is some delicious irony here. Jefferson was the most francophile of all of the founders (he was an extremist on this issue, actually) and was notoriously and proudly incompetent on financial issues. He died bankrupt. Of course, his Vice President also shot somebody.
10th Amendment: Conservatives love to invoke the 10th Amendment, which states:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
They point out that it clearly argues against an activist Federal Government and say that the matter should end there. Alas, these Constitutional scholars don't seem to read the very first Article, which states just as clearly that Congress has the right:
To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.
So the Founders obviously intended an activist government to be possible, but difficult. The Founders knew what they didn't know and wanted Congress to have the power to do what was needed to run the country. They gave the Legislative branch the right to make any law they saw fit, subject to Presidential veto and Judicial review. This clause was first invoked by Washington, so there is really no ambiguity here.
Center-Right Government: As John Meacham writes in Newsweek, we are a "Center Right Nation." We generally value the individual and are suspicious of state power. If given a choice between prosperity and social equity, America - more than any other developed nation, generally chooses prosperity. However, it's not an absolute. We value both and are wary of extremes. The argument for a center-right nation is also an argument against a far-right nation. I think it's safe to say we are in no present danger of being to the left of anybody.
The Market System has been proven best: There is certainly some truth to this statement and America has been on the forefront of the market revoltuion. Americans won such as Friedman, Modigliani, Coase and others dominated the Nobel Prize for Economics in for the first 20 years it was given; mainly forwork on the efficiency of markets. However, three out of the last ten Nobels have been given for work related to the limitations of markets (2001, 2002, 2007).
Government restricts freedom: This is true. Government does restrict freedom, but so do a lot of other things. Corporations, family, poverty, disease and many other things get in the way of us doing whatever we want to do. Every society needs to find a balance between freedom and order and, to be successful, must make those decisions wisely.
The conservatives are right, we are becoming a more Socialist society, but we are also more Capitalist. Multinational corporations and financial markets have power that couldn't be dreamed of even fifty years ago. We move much faster and produce much more. We need stronger schools, heath care and infrastructure in order to remain a modern and stable society. A more activist government is needed because other forces in our society have become so much stronger. Those types of checks and balances are what our country was built on and nothing could me more American.