POLITICS AND NATURE

"There was a door to which I found no key: There was a veil past which I could not see: Some little talk awhile of Me and Thee there seemed--and then no more of Thee and Me"                                                                                      Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

The Free Market of Ideas

Today C-Span showed a gathering of five or six economists debating the day's challenges. The eye catching facet of the whole ordeal elevated to a war between disparate ideas forming the basis of the political challenges facing the country. On one side are the free marketeers. Those advocating privacy of everything at all costs. They want to reduce the size of the federal government and eliminate regulation. On the other side issues surround around efficient use of government money and the chasm between what the nation needs and how to utilize the resources to get things done.

Contraction of governmental resources may be a wonderful plan. But look at how it worked the last time there was a long period of anti government folks in power. The government grew because the ideologically led governance does not work and in the early twentieth century free market ideas with no rules led to the Great Depression which subsequently prompted the election of Franklin Roosevelt, the New Deal, and a new path for America.

In today's world, a totally free market leads to Enron and WorlComm type abuse, people lose their life savings in bad choices in stocks and at least they have Social Security. National Parks are there today instead of mines or houses because of foresight on the part of ideas to hold them for future generations, which is today.

The government is evil ideology leads to abusive governmental powers. The anti-regulation folks want to be left alone. Dire warnings emerged from a panelist arguing legislation holding financial institutions responsible for fraudulent loan practices inevitably will produce a fearful and timid industry with disincentives to take risks. People have made mistakes and will continue to make mistakes.

The True Race

This race involves serious questions of the role of government and the methods by which politics affect individual lives. Very powerful people out there believe strongly in the power of corporatism and who emphasize the need to get business up and running. The question really becomes what the pervayors of this ideal did with the government when they controlled it all. They used the power of government to support big industry through no bid contracts, borrow and spend tactics, and ugly no-holds-barred, corruption. And then they blamed the Democratic Party for everything.

This is real and it is what creates a vast difference between Democrats and Republicans. Republican pundits exhaust the senses by supporting business and wealth unless someone of alternative ideas is wealthy, then they attack mercilessly the leftist elites. So Rupert Murdoch, an Australian immigrant, becomes a scion of American ideals while George Soros, who's from Europe somewhere, is anti-American. And Bill Gates and Warren Buffet just don't know what they're doing.

Privacy advocates seeking power will destroy achievements created by thoughtful leaders if given the chance. The Bush administration has advocated selling off public lands. In Texas, Florida and Michigan efforts have been taken to sell off lands owned by citizens for short term gain. Those lands will be lost forever if this ideology sustains itself. For short term profit and this is a benefit according to certain powerful agents in the nation. And these agents live within the fabric of the Republican Party.

Even Bill O'Reilly, in his self promoted looking out for you, recently pointed out airline deregulation failure by Carter as the reason for the mess of unfriendly skies now. Corporate power harms this nation. Who will stand up to corporate abuse and bad decisions? That is a question involved in this political contest. Americans do not want big brother but useful, thoughtful, and effective utilization of tax dollars in an effort to assure the creation of a more just and positive social order.

Feds are here to stay. Being the bearer of bad news is never something people look forward to. How federal authority is used determines the strength and freedom of society. Reducing the size and scope of governmental power requires a serious examination of what it does, how it works, and why it needs to be changed. Instead, you get an ideologically charged party boasting its desire to eliminate something which can't be eliminted and, in the end, using it for their own means instead of taking courageous steps to actively take part in solutions.