Yep, the next chapter in the most blatant story of economic ignorance in history gets under way. Anti-trust, the American hallmark of self-destructive and senseless tyranny, is rearing its obnoxious head again - this time to aggravate Apple and AT&T.

The Department of Justice has started an informal review of the exclusive arrangements that limit handsets such as Apple’s iPhone to particular wireless communications companies, according to people familiar with the matter.

The inquiry follows consolidation in the US wireless industry that has left four operators accounting for more than 90 per cent of the country’s wireless subscribers. This has left them with the market power to carve out exclusive deals with makers of the most popular handsets, making it hard for smaller rivals to compete and leading to higher prices for mobile services, according to rivals. [emphasis added]

Hmmm, so the resources and market position that AT&T and Apple have earned should be sacrificed to the needs of smaller rivals? Only in altruist-collectivist-statist-wonderland.

Apple, as the creator and producer of the iPhone, has the right to sell it to whomever under whatever terms they choose. Likewise, AT&T has the right to distribute and market products of their choosing; also according to whatever terms they choose. In sum, Apple and AT&T have the right to work together under whatever terms they agree upon. Any law that trumps their right to do so is unjust, irrational, subjective law.

So long as a market is left free from Government intervention, new competitors will step in if prices are set higher than the market will tolerate. If AT&T’s exclusive contract to sell the iPhone is leveraged to charge more than the market will bear, other competitors like Google and Blackberry will have an opportunity to seize a share of the market. Apple’s rightful purpose in business is to make money, not to provide phones as a charitable cause. Likewise, AT&T’s purpose is to make money, not to dole out phone service to the needy. If any relationship between these two companies results in prices that are higher than what the market will bear, consumers will spend their money elsewhere.

Thanks you meddling idiots, but we can take care of ourselves - no brilliant Government intervention is necessary.

Our country is the final stages of a tremendous mistake - one that will have adverse effects on every person you know. Acting as if human lives are disposable and that economic laws are pliable, so many are willing to give in to consensus and experiment with Government run health care. It can’t hurt to try right?

This is a deadly pragmatic notion that must be rejected. Not even a single right or life is properly available for sacrificial experimentation. Even if dissecting one human being would save the lives of billions, doing so is immoral. If one man’s rights are violated, so all men have suffered injustice.

For America to endure we must return to nothing less than a free-market in health care.

Politicians are masters at muddying the water in order to aid their efforts. The more they obfuscate and complicate the issue, the more likely citizens are to give-up and give in to what appears to be the superior insights and motives of our leaders. Throw in some hollow rhetoric and spike the potion with the moral tint of altruism and consensus will stomp over an endless sea of corpses. However, If one peers through all the emotional fog, the entire conversation is revealed to be senseless. To make the case much clearer, I’ll frame the principles in an analogous market less prone to emotional fraying.

This not-so-hypothetical market is comprised of a fictitious entity called “Technicare” - a taxpayer funded program to assist a segment of the population with their electrical appliance needs - and a retailer, in this example I chose Wal-Mart, arguably the most highly qualified bastion of efficiency and value.

Like all cases of market dysfunction throughout history, the cause is unnatural economic forces. Essentially, the only force capable of wide scale economic influence is Government. Economics is an elegantly simple system governed by principles that endure time and scale. Producers produce goods that consumers consume according to the standards and prices that both parties agree on voluntarily. That’s it. These fundamentals are absolute and unforgiving, and when any component of the preceding summary is acted against, the market becomes dysfunctional. If producers ability to produce is either enhanced or hampered, if consumers ability to consume is enhanced or hampered, or if the voluntary prerogatives of either are restricted to any extent, the result is some degree of market dysfunction.

Our Heath Care market is one that’s clobbered with regulatory assault from every angle. Each of the components prescribed above are unnaturally manipulated by Government. Government meddling inevitably serves to reduce competition, and decrease purchasing power, the two elements that form the lifeblood of a growing and prosperous economic system.

There are far too many instances to cover exhaustively, but fortunately a principled examination of only a few will clearly illustrate the negative impact that is universally achieved by market intervention. We’ll start by considering an element that achieves tremendous competitive detriment and has no logical justification - The Certificate of Need.

From the NCSL site:

Certificate of Need (C.O.N.) programs are aimed at restraining health care facility costs and allowing coordinated planning of new services and construction. Laws authorizing such programs are one mechanism by which state governments seek to reduce overall health and medical costs.

The basic assumption underlying CON regulation is that excess capacity (in the form of facility overbuilding) directly results in health care price inflation. When a hospital cannot fill its beds, fixed costs must be met through higher charges for the beds that are used. Bigger institutions have bigger costs, so CON supporters say it makes sense to limit facilities to building only enough capacity to meet actual needs.

Profit is determined by the difference in revenue from a unit of work in relation to the unit’s associated costs. Profit increases by either charging a higher price per unit to consumers or establishing a lower cost per unit for producers - by higher prices or by lower costs. Competition amongst market players urges them to offer services at the lowest possible price, thus their opportunity to increase profit will be naturally determined by their ability to operate at the lowest possible cost, as opposed to selling at a higher, less competitive price. Competition is a necessity.

By hindering the competitive aspect of the market, the CON hurdle is actually prone to a rise in costs precisely because mitigates (or eliminates) external pressure to compete on price. Additionally, the process is tedious, timely and expensive. For productive endeavors, time is money, and this process equates to an atrociously misdirected waste of capital.

The other fallacy used to justify this process is that investors would risk such vast amounts of money as typically involved without doing the proper market research to justify the expense. Like in so many other cases, and for obvious reasons, bureaucrats just can’t grasp the concept of personal responsibility. Unlike moochers wasting handout money, when an individual is spending his own earned resources, he’d best be, and typically is, mindful of how he does so. Successful investors seeking a profitable avenue for their capital do not need parental guidance.

Let’s consider this absurdity in our fictitious market:

• How would the “Certificate of Need” process and burden, including all the inherent political wrangling, affect an aspiring Wal-Mart store?
• Would the associated cost cause their prices to increase or decrease?
• Would that money be more appropriately invested in real estate, infrastructure and inventory, or as the cost of asking permission to do business when and where they see fit?
• On what logical grounds should they have to ask permission?
• By what right could some authoritative body decline their request?
• By what right does anyone or any entity have such authority in a country founded on individual rights?
• Whose right to what would be in jeopardy of encroachment by a lack of oversight for this new entity?

Consider Technicare’s impact throughout the rest of Wal-mart’s business model:

• Once the tedious CON process is complete and business is booming, how would Wal-Mart compensate for selling televisions to Technicare customers for an amount that’s significantly reduced - possibly below cost?
• Would these customers tend to spend more or less if given a Technicare credit card for which they have no financial responsibility?
• How would this consumption impact the individuals who are liable for the Technicare expenditures?
• How about if Technicare was granted the authority to determine what Wal-Mart could charge non-Technicare customers for televisions, how would this affect these customers if the pricing was at or below cost?
• By what right should Technicare posses such authority?

If Technicare was expanded to include storage media:

• Would this amplify or negate the existing affects of the program on Wal-Mart?
• How about if the storage media market was regulated by Technicare’s parent company GovCo. so that the media could be adequately tested, which led to drastically increased research manufacturing and legal costs and the time to market for a new product was a number of years. Would this impact the cost of storage media for all consumers?
• What if Wal-Mart was also regulated on how much they could charge Technicare customers for storage media?
• What if they had to sell below cost? What would this do to the costs of storage media for non-Technicare customers?

If Wal-Mart were forced by law to give away products at no charge:

• How would the rest of their business model be impacted?
• Would they continue operating at a loss?
• Would this raise or lower costs to the remainder of their customer base?

If Wal-Mart’s prices increased drastically over time due to the mandates of Technicare:

• How would the “Certificate of Need” process and burden, including all the inherent political wrangling, affect an aspiring competitor?
• Would it make market entry easier or more difficult?
• Would this affect lead Wal-Mart to be more or less responsive to its customers?
• Would such market-entry overhead inspire entrepreneurial interest?

Given the above scenario and the obvious answers and established patterns:

• On why logical grounds would some suggest granting Technicare/GovCo drastically increased, if not exhaustive, control of Wal-Mart operations, accounting and pricing?
• What would the expected results entail?
• As non-Technicare customers lose purchasing power as a result from both having to fund Technicare and having to endure higher prices as a result of Technicare, what changes would be more likely to repair the situation?
• What if Technicare decides to restrict all customers from shopping anywhere besides this new WalTech-GovCo?
• By what right could they?
• Wouldn’t this be a coercive monopoly?
• What would that mean?

With “solutions” like these, who needs problems? Is this issue really as complex as so portrayed by the media and politicians?

Socialization proponents consistently offer supposed aspects of the health care market that exempt it from economic laws due to some disadvantage faced by consumers. Regardless of the specifics, for each such claim we should ask “Why is this, and what are the repercussions?”

My point in general is that the “whys” are far more important than their corresponding repercussions. If a patient has a rash it could be a sign of a number of things, such as poison ivy, a food allergy, an infectious disease like measles, or a skin infection. Treating the symptoms without accurately identifying the cause could leave the patient worse off. Making assumptions on faulty or unrefined premises is a recipe for failure.

I’ve yet to hear a valid claim of “market-dysfunction” (if you will) that is actually more in substance than an acknowledgment of reality, e.g., individuals have varying financial means, or an example of a symptom caused by an existing economically unnatural force in the system, e.g., how Medicare rates affect private insurance premiums.

The former family of claims, in the context of “what should be done?” should properly be answered “whatever motivated individuals choose to do with their own resources.” The charge of “not providing unlimited free service to all who’d consume it” is no more valid a charge of dysfunction than criticizing a rock for not spurting pop-tarts on whim. Demanding a breach of reality in the form of non-causal action is irrational.

If the same question is posed in the context of the second category above, the answer should be “identify and remove the source of the issue.” - which arguably is in all cases, Government intervention.

Despite all the attempts to complicate this issue, it really is as simple as the answers above. Unless and until that is, as I mentioned previously, ulterior motives come into consideration. As soon as the rights of producers and consumers to contract freely are inhibited to any extent, the only possible result is a distortion in the market that will exponentially correlate to the extent of the inhibition.

Individuals thrive under, and have a right to, freedom. Innovation, value and efficiency are the result of freedom. Regulations, on the other hand, reduce freedom - which results in inefficiency, shortages, escalating prices and general stagnation. History illustrates this condition quite well.

Patients have the right to choose from whom, for what, and at what price they consume medical services. Likewise, providers have the right to choose from whom, for what, and at what price they provide their expertise.

This is the only moral and practical relationship between patients and providers.

A diligent consideration of any elements of the market that affect these mutual rights, including their cause, will very accurately highlight what needs to change for the market to operate normally. Increase freedom and all the positive dynamics of this and any other market will prevail.

Again, history unequivocally supports this fact.

To concretize - a free-market in health care, just like every other field throughout history - would result in the best service at the lowest price, according to the discretion of the consumers and producers involved.

There’s nothing unique about the health care market that should exempt it from basic economics. Providers gain expertise in medical services that individuals would consume based on supply and demand.

Only third-party involvement by force can disrupt economic laws and patterns. If one detects a flaw or undesirable pattern, prudence suggests one identify any source of unnatural tampering. Any market traits, e.g., “Forty-plus million uninsured”, could either be symptoms of an illegitimate disruption, or merely factual attributes representing reality. If one were to consider the statistic in slightly different terms, say “Forty-plus million individuals can’t own a 42 inch widescreen television”, then the issue becomes less clouded by by emotion. The facts illustrate that five years ago, indeed a large percentage of individuals couldn’t afford a 42″ television. However, the market (a relatively free one) has responded to demand and now a 42″ television is much more affordable. These principles work regardless if the market is for widgets, televisions, mobile phone service, wellness physicals or CT scans. Where the conversation veers drastically off course is when egalitarian politics come into play. If authentic rights are to be subsumed by artificial privileges, some external force must attempt to usurp economic reality. For every ‘yin’ of Government intervention, there’s a corresponding ‘yang’ of market disturbance. These ‘yangs’ reverberate through the system and their effects continue to amplify until very serious results surface. The system we have now is a result of 50+ years of intense ‘yin’ing. What, other than a tremendously distorted market, could we expect? And, exactly why would we propose more intervention as the solution?

So long as consumers are left free to consume (by their own means) and producers are left free to offer services (as they see fit), the market will perform and innovate like any other.

The government depriving people of opportunities and choice regarding their livelihood is not the solution to the problem of the government stifling competition with distorted economic forces. The solution is to get the government out of health care altogether.

Supplemental Ammunition:
I highly recommend Paul Hsieh’s work demolishing the case for socialized medicine:

FAQ On Free Market Health Insurance

Health Care Reform vs. Universal Health Care

Moral Health Care vs. Universal Health Care

Mandatory Health Insurance: Wrong for Massachusetts, Wrong for America

Tack one more nail in the American coffin. The rights-trampling frenzy continues with restaurant and bar owners being the latest victim burnt on the collectivist mob-rule stake as The People’s Republic of North Carolina has finally passed their precious smoking ban.

A similar attempt failed a few years back, but the statist yearning to rule by force is insatiable. This debate emphasizes the typical degree of concrete-bound, irrational thinking that consumes most of our population. If we were to extract the essentials from the average opinion supporting this law, we’d discover a criteria template that could justify any law imaginable. However, when the facts are considered, the silly, evil, and obtuse nature of this law is abundantly clear.

Relevant Facts:

1. Freedom: In a rational, civilized society, individuals are free to choose which establishments they patronize. Virtually all supposed justifications for this pathetic abuse of power evade or ignore this fact completely.

2. Property Rights: In a rational, civilized society, property owners are free to determine their own smoking policies. This is the core issue at hand.

3. Role of Government: In a rational, civilized society, the proper role of Government is to protect individual rights from forceful encroachment. Instead, this law relies on initiation of force by Government.

4. Objective Law: In a rational, civilized society, laws and legal enforcement thereof should be based on rights. If an action doesn’t forcefully encroach on an individual’s right to life, liberty or property, or doesn’t objectively convey intent to do so, it shouldn’t be illegal. Whenever considering any law or regulation, justice demands we ask “whose right to what is being forcefully violated?”, and if there is no clear and objective answer, then justice is not the motive at hand. In this context, where smoking is permitted by the owner and other individuals are free to leave, no one’s rights are forcefully violated.

Irrelevant Misconceptions:

“The issue is smokers vs. non-smokers…”

This issue is about the rights of property owners. The owner of a restaurant or bar has the right to determine his own policies regarding smoking. This law imposes on the property owner, not the customers. See #2.

“When you serve the public you forfeit your property rights.”


Perhaps in a collectivized, mob-rule nation ignorant of the concept of rights, but not in a free country. Individuals conducting commerce are traders - not servants. They are offering a value in the form of a product or service that other traders can choose to consume or not, depending on whether they find the value offered as beneficial in proportion to the cost. These two individuals, the traders, are the only two who should rightly decide on the details pertaining to their barter. If a consumer is unhappy with the product or service offered they are free to seek consumption elsewhere, and the seller must adjust his offering to remain in business. The only proper function of Government in the barter is to enforce contractual obligations breached by force or fraud. Any other Government intervention in this voluntary transaction is illegitimate and a violation of one or both of the trader’s rights. Only the competition of a free-market can rightly and justly promote change in the seller’s offering. In a rational and just society, this rule applies to any and every aspect of the business and barter. The fact that we’ve set precedent for such encroachment with OSHA, FDA, zoning, wage and countless other regulations does not justify yet another blatant disregard for the sanctity of property rights. See #1-4.


“Smokers don’t have the right to smoke anywhere they choose.”

This is correct, but the decision to allow or prohibit smoking is up to the property owner and no one else. See #2.

“Do you smokers have the RIGHT to harm other people just because you think it’s ok to smoke around them?”

Of course not, there is no such thing as a right to harm others, but this question evades the fact that the “victim” is free to leave an environment where conditions (including second-hand smoke, noise, temperature, food quality etc.) aren’t suitable. See #1.

“This ban is guarding the public safety.”

See #1 and #4.

“It’s a darn shame that a law had to be passed to prevent the inconsiderate nicotine addicts from spreading their disease and stench while ruining ones meal.”

If their lack of consideration offends you, you’re free to leave. See #1 and #4.




“Studies show that {insert any fact supporting the negative impacts of second-hand smoke} is harmful.”


See #1.

“An owner that accepts non-smokers does not reserve the right or choice to put the life of the non-smokers family in danger of death due to lung cancer to satisfy the addiction of a smoker.”

Their lives are only in danger if they choose to be present in such conditions. See #1.

These are only a handful of the common justifications used by advocates. As I hear new ones I’ll add them to the list along with a proper debunking.

Conclusions:

There is no just basis to support a smoking ban on private property - only emotion-driven rationalizations that undermine the rule of law, and scoff at the American essence. Objective law requires for an individual’s rights to be forcefully violated. So long as one’s presence in such establishment is voluntary, force is absent, and any legal intervention represents an injustice.

If all private restaurants and bars closed their doors (the appropriate response to this and any other meddling in business), how many days before this fascist tripe would be repealed? The first day they’d call their bluff. The second day they’d call an emergency session with expedited Governor sign-off so all the statist thugs in Raleigh would have a place to grab lunch, and this wretched idea would never be brought up again.

Do I look forward to the first Sunday morning I enjoy a completely smoke-free breakfast at Cracker Barrel? You bet I do. But, for that reality to come into fruition through an anti-American, rights-stomping, emotion-driven law is hideous. I’d rather endure smoky meals for the rest of my life to hang on to the smell of freedom than condone such a contemptible mob-rule measure. Precisely because this is happening in America, the first nation founded on justice and freedom, we truly are in the golden age of injustice.

My current job lends itself to substantial visibility into any congressional activity pertaining to health care. I see weekly summaries listing all medically related bills. The irrational nonsense they try to pull off is remarkable.

This one is especially evil - Section 3 (a-b):
S. 623

SEC. 3. ELIMINATION OF PRE-EXISTING CONDITION EXCLUSIONS UNDER GROUP HEALTH PLANS.

(a) Application Under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974-

(1) ELIMINATION OF PRE-EXISTING CONDITION EXCLUSIONS- Section 701 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (29 U.S.C. 1181) is amended–

(A) by amending the heading to read as follows: ‘elimination of pre-existing condition exclusions’;

(B) by amending subsection (a) to read as follows:

(a) In General- A group health plan, and a health insurance issuer offering group health insurance coverage, with respect to a participant or beneficiary–

‘(1) may not impose any pre-existing condition exclusion; and

‘(2) in the case of a group health plan that offers medical care through health insurance coverage offered by a health maintenance organization, may not provide for an affiliation period with respect to coverage through the organization.’;

(C) in subsection (b), by striking paragraph (3) and inserting the following:

‘(3) AFFILIATION PERIOD- The term ‘affiliation period’ means a period which, under the terms of the health insurance coverage offered by the health maintenance organization, must expire before the health insurance coverage becomes effective.’;

(D) by striking subsections (c), (d), (e), and (g); and

(E) by redesignating subsection (f) (relating to special enrollment periods) as subsection (c).

(2) CLERICAL AMENDMENT- The item in the table of contents of such Act relating to section 701 is amended to read as follows:

‘Sec. 701. Elimination of pre-existing condition exclusions.’.

How compassionate! They want to to remove pre-existing condition exclusions for group insurance policies. Essentially, insurance companies will be required to cover you regardless of your health. If an insurer is required by force to cover any patient, they are essentially required to provide coverage that might be a guaranteed loss. Of course, they can’t operate at a loss, so they have to recoup the losses from some other avenue. That avenue is the other policy holders.

Just as the result of mandatory ER coverage increases costs, our insurance premiums will skyrocket if this repulsive bill passes. Of course the rise in costs will be attributed to “greedy” insurance companies and used to justify more regulation - typical regulatory recursion, i.e., controls breed controls.

Statists never quit and they’re attacking from every possible angle - a relentless army of irrationality. The attack in the field of medicine is especially deadly. FIRM is the organization offering the only rational mindset that will save American medicine from stagnant rot.

UPDATE: Apparently Insurance companies have see this mandate as inevitable and opted to leverage the statist force as an opportunity to cash-in. Such is the tactic of our valiant mixed-economy barons.

• Insurers offer to start charging healthy people more
• Health Insurance Industry Sells Its Soul to the Devil

Government that is…

Congress is working really hard to take government meddling in the economy to the next level.

The bill, which passed on a 247-171 vote, would give the U.S. Treasury broad powers to prohibit “unreasonable and excessive” compensation and bonuses that are not based on performance standards.

The “Pay for Performance Act of 2009″ is among a number of efforts by Congress to claw back bonuses and curb pay in the wake of public anger over recent executive bonuses at insurer American International Group, which has received a bailout worth up to $180 billion.

“The Pay for Performance Act is based on two simple concepts. One, no one has the right to get rich off taxpayer money, and two, no one should get rich off abject failure,” said one of the bill’s authors, Representative Alan Grayson, a Florida Democrat who co-authored the measure. “We should not pay an arsonist to put out his own fire, and we should not be paying an executive to ruin his own bank.”

Congress represents the pure embodiment of that which of both stipulations aim to curb! Why should politicians be exempt from these standards? Don’t worry though, the free-market republicans will stop this madness right?

“There’s no question we need more performance-based pay decisions, but the government deciding and judging the performance of employees in private companies, the secretary of the Treasury deciding whether an employee is performing? I think not,” said Representative Spencer Bachus, an Alabama Republican. “The answer is not a dramatic expansion of government control.“

In other words, “we need more government controls, but only so many new government controls.”

Just another nail in America’s coffin…

In yet another inevitable attempt to regulate existence, thermal imaging cameras can now be used to detect any citizens who insist on using more energy than nanny-state environmentalist deem appropriate.

Thermal imaging cameras are being used to create colour-coded maps which will enable council officers to identify offenders and pay them a visit to educate them about the harm to the environment and measures they can take.

Perhaps council officers could benefit from certain education as well - namely the concepts of man’s rights to life, liberty and property, private property.

‘We do a lot on domestic energy conservation already and realised it would be useful to see if any of the homes which were particularly hot were properties where people had not insulated their lofts.

‘We were also able to look at very cold properties and think we might have picked up people on low incomes who are not heating their homes because they cannot afford to.’

This new statist weapon is not only useful in cracking down on subjective-law criminals, but also for identifying wealth redistribution targets - an egalitarian swiss-army knife, if you will.

Lib Dem group leader Stuart Beadle added: ‘Cameras are in place all over today and we have to accept them. So long as the right guidelines are in place and it will bring benefits, I think the scheme is a good thing.’

Of course, we must remind ourselves that these planes, cameras and all the logistics involved are metaphysical facts and must be conformed to as such. And, according to Beadle this is a good scheme, although he neglects to mention whose standard of value his assessment is based on. I doubt the individual who rightfully produced the wealth to pay for such technical luxuries as heat and electricity will appreciate the pestilence of government enviro-thugs offering their “friendly advice”.

Altruist-collectivist-environmentalist-nanny-statism - such is the manner by which a society implodes into stagnant misery. Hatred of life, hatred of man, hatred of wealth, and hatred of reality is the moral of this story.

This read is astonishing.

This raises a truly alarming question: can capitalism and democracy survive side by side?
[edited for relevant concision]

His conclusive question is valid, but not for the misguided notions he presents.

The answer is clearly no, Democracy and Capitalism are not compatible.

Capitalism is a system based on individual rights where Government acts to protect such rights as the sole agent of retaliatory force.

Democracy is mob-rule. Whether the gangs involved are political parties, lobby groups or grassroots organizations - they are all competing to condone and prescribe illegitimate government force to achieve their ends. Such goals can only be achieved by encroaching on other individuals right to life, liberty or property and cannot be accomplished under a system where said rights are sovereign.

The author seems to resort to the tired old false dichotomy of Keynesian meddling vs. full Statism, i.e., Socialism/Fascism vs. Communism - neither is the path to Capitalism and the prosperity that results.

America is not and was not constructed as a Democracy but rather a Constitutional Republic. To borrow Ayn Rand’s words -

The American system is a constitutionally limited republic, restricted to the protection of individual rights. In such a system, majority rule is applicable only to lesser details, such as the selection of certain personnel. But the majority has no say over the basic principles governing the government. It has no power to ask for or gain the infringement of individual rights.

Also, contrary to his apparent penchant for central planning, Keynesian madness is precisely the tactic (facilitated by a phony currency) responsible for all previous, current and our impending economic turmoil because it involves wholesale trumping of individual values, choices and accountability and the attempt to evade reality in a economic context.

I’ll end with the thoughts of Myrhaf:

The only solution to the entire crisis is the one thing our statist politicians cannot tolerate: individual rights. Get the state out of the economy and let free individuals dispose of their property according to their best judgment. No, Obama and his buddies want no talk of individual rights; they want the people to think of themselves as part of a collective controlled by the state.

Mob violence is a perfect manifestation of Obama’s collectivist vision of man’s nature. His altruist-collectivist-statist premises have no room for free, rational individuals trading peacefully with one another without interference from their masters in Washington, D.C.

This story highlights the type of mind that result from and thrive in an economy rife with Government meddling - Faux Capitalists.

[Ford CEO Alan Mulally] was a guest recently at this newspaper’s ECO:nomics conference in Santa Barbara, where he outlined his efforts to revamp the struggling car maker. He said one problem is that America didn’t have an “integrated energy policy.” On the one hand, the government “regulated” smaller cars by “mandating average fuel mileage improvements,” but on the other hand “with low fuel prices and low interest rates over the years, the U.S. consumers have chosen generally larger vehicles.”

Mr. Mulally offered his own solution to the mismatch, artfully explaining that we needed to “involve the consumer in our energy policy.” In case anyone missed his point, Michael Jackson, CEO of AutoNation, the largest auto dealer in the country, was more explicit: “Mr. Mulally said it very elegantly last night and I will say it more straightforward. We need more expensive gasoline.”

In other words, they want to leverage illegitimate government force to compensate for the mediocrity (lack of market share) that results from previous illegitimate government force. Yet another example of the recursive nature of statist regulation, i.e., controls breeding controls.

So: The U.S. government mandates fuel-economy standards that force Detroit to make cars Americans don’t want to drive. When Detroit loses money on those cars, Washington throws taxpayer dollars at its mistake, and the car makers demand a tax increase that would prod Americans to buy the unpopular cars that Washington mandates. As for what the American consumer or taxpayer wants — or can afford in today’s economy — who cares? Welcome to government-run energy policy.

I would correct the last sentence… welcome to government run anything. The mindset of these mixed-economy barons inevitably serves to further blur the line between economic and political power that so many fail to see. When most American’s hear successful supposed Capitalists calling for such measures it only reinforces their confusion of the proper role of Government in a free nation’s economy.

I’ve been re-listening to Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal in audiobook format just this week, and to read this piece after having just heard Greenspan’s chapters is mind-boggling. The style, wording and clarity are the same, but it’s all non-essential tangents!

How could he be at once so eloquent and passionate an advocate for Capitalism and turn into this? Smeagol says not to “bridle with heavy regulation”, Gollum calls for a new “regulatory regime” - which is it Mr. Greenspan?