Among other things, this trend suggests that some older, more established free market defenders have either (1) been asleep at the wheel, content to rest on the laurels of the Reagan and Thatcher Revolutions; (2) assumed that the conservative case for free markets doesn’t need significant recalibrating for the twenty-first century; or (3) imagined that the best response to cultural, political, and theological criticisms of free markets is an economic argument. Novak, for one, didn’t make these mistakes.

Capitalism isn’t and shouldn’t be beyond criticism. For conservatives in particular, there’s no such thing as a perfect economic system. That said, I find McManus’s critique of my arguments unconvincing. Here’s why.