Straw Dog

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/16/opinion/brooks-the-planning-fallacy.html

Brooks writes: "Over the past decades, Americans have developed an absurd view of the power of government. Many voters seem to think that government has the power to protect them from the consequences of their sins. Then they get angry and cynical when it turns out that it can’t."

Says Who?

Oldest trick in the book: Set up a straw dog, and tear it down. What evidence does he have that ANYONE feels the government should solve all their problems?

The problem is just the opposite: Over the decades, the government, a powerful referee when it wants to be, has withdrawn from the arena and let the powerful interests run amok. That's how we got this latest financial crisis, by eliminating regulations, distinctions and protections. That's not creating free markets; that's picking winners and losers.

Loser!

Ultimately, the loser is capitalism, because when the government withdraws as the ref, powerful interests combine and distort the market, and consumers get run over.

The whole argument over lots of government vs. minimal government -- Rick Perry's notion of making the FEDERAL government "inconsequential" in people's lives (never the state gov, of course) -- isn't about left or right or free markets or socialism. It's about protecting capitalism in the long term by softening its roughest edges.

Thrown Under the Wheel

Capitalism has always been recognized as a rough system; it's great if you're among its winners, but it's brutal on the losers, and there will always be losers. No one wants go get rid of it; we just want to make sure that someone is there to help those who would otherwise get crushed under its wheels.

That's what will protect capitalism in the long run by ensuring people don't turn against it.

Brooks, you fool!