Watch: Arthur Brooks' Ted Talk Makes the Moral Case for Capitalism

Guy Benson | March 18, 2016 4:31 PM

The American Enterprise Institute's Arthur Brooks is one of conservatism's smartest and most effective ambassadors. Hailing from a progressive enclave and neither looking or sounding "the part," Brooks has devoted years to the passionate pursuit of conveying liberty-minded arguments to left-leaning audiences -- speaking their language, while advancing our ideas. In his

newly-released Ted Talk, Brooks discusses the miraculous impact of the free enterprise system on global poverty, arguing that economic freedom is not just morally defensible, but morally imperative. His tone and lexicon differs from the standard Righty fare so often served up on television and in stump speeches, and that's by design. His aim is persuasion. He's an ideological missionary, proselytizing to the hostile and the skeptical, not offering agreed-upon tropes to the converted. As you watch, be on the lookout for an insightful quote from a surprising source:

Brooks mentions Jonathan Haidt's work, which I'd recommend looking into. His findings about how liberals and conservatives think and process moral questions proved...inconvenient to many of his fellow liberals. Brooks also echoes a theme Mary Katharine Ham and I emphasized in End of Discussion: The toxicity of reflexive motive-impugning in today's hyper-polarized political climate.