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Yes, it makes about as much sense as the fox protecting the hen house. It is quite obvious that
government "oversight" had much to do with the makings of this latest economic catastrophe. The
fallacy in reasoning for reliance on government goes something like this. Syllogism #1: People can
be very corrupt and greedy. The financial markets are controlled by people. Therefore, financial
markets need to be controlled by the government to prevent this greed and corruption. Then look at
Syllogism #2: People can be very corrupt and greedy. The government is made of people. Therefore,
the government needs to be controlled by the government to prevent greed and corruption. Well, this
just doesn't make sense, it is illogical. How can we trust the government or government regulators
or those who regulate the regulators when the same argument for corruption of the financial markets
applies to any organization made up of human beings. There is no evidence, to my knowledge, that
those in government have any higher degree of morality in these areas than other members of society.
In fact, history seems to indicate that those in power are the most corrupt of all. |
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I disagree with the main heading but yet agree with the subheading.
It's not "idiocy" to want the government to regulate the financial markets, they clearly can't be
trusted to regulate themselves, and lax or nonexistent regulations have been clearly shown to fail
completely too. The devil is in the details of course (what are the regulations, who enforces them,
what are the penalties), but failure of the government to do it in one set of circumstances doesn't
mean there isn't another set of details in which it would work.
Yet I agree with you that the government itself has amassed enormous debts on behalf of every
citizen and has terribly squandered much of the money it does have. But I don't take the
government's own misspending as proof they can't regulate others. It could make them hypocrites,
but it doesn't prove it can't be done. Many hypocrites succeed in getting performance out of others
that they can't get out of themselves. |
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30 Jun 2009 18:53
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