(June 4, 2013 at 1:04 pm)Rhythm Wrote:(June 4, 2013 at 4:55 am)little_monkey Wrote: Unfettered free capitalism was tried in the 19th century, and it led to massive monopolies,-and much, much more....good and bad, absolutely.
Agenda, while I agree with you in the broad strokes, this whole "crony capitalism/soft fascism" thing, to me, seems to be little more than trying to distances one's self from the weaknesses of a particular system. It's okay if capitalism leads to land barons - mine labor history etc..no tool is perfect. You clearly understand what went wrong and why we need to make sure that doesn't go wrong again. That doesn't mean that capitalism is -bad mmkay-.. just that it can be used for whatever purpose the operators ingenuity can devise. If you think that leveraging your capital to capture a government is anything -other- than one of the most powerful examples of free market capitalism (why isn't the government for sale..as a product..bud?)...then you're giving the free market a short shrift. That is one hell of a business transaction. To be completely honest, sometimes, when government is bought, it isn't so much that it -can be- bought that bothers me....as the bargain basement price it went for, you know?
Should we really be surprised when some otherwise successful system breaks down or grinds against itself when taken to extremes?
You make some good points. Frankly, all I ask of people who want to impose limits on capitalism is that they think it through. There's no law that says maximum market efiiciency is the ultimate good. We're certainly allowed to value other things, but we should be careful not to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs in pursuit of them, else we wind up with no goose and no eggs. Keeping a close eye on the goose and making sure no one abuses it or feeds it too many things that are bad for it is good for all concerned except thieves. And you don't want it eating things that are valuable, making you pay too high a price for those eggs. There's a just right zone, a balance where you get the most eggs at the lowest price without hurting the goose, but it's a moving target because things change, and you can't be trusted to keep the goose there if you hate the goose...and you can't be trusted to keep the goose there if you love it for it's own sake too much.
