[TheForge] Slack tank...POL OT

[Andrew Vida]

peter fels & phoebe palmer wrote:
> 
>> Just leave the market alone and we'll run out and switch
>> to something else.
> If the US waits that long we will be very broke and in a really nasty pinch.

	Under the current system, yeah.  I don't think any rational person 
argues for that.

> Look how well the magic of the market worked  on the last 2 market crashes.

	Not a free market so your implication of causality fails.

> Look how well it did during the last energy crunch and the one before that.
> Look how well it did  consequent to  bush's deregulation.

	Regulation has CAUSED plenty of the problems and is in fact the root of 
nearly all of them.  State-granted monopolies and oligopolies are NOT 
elements of free market economies.  I will add that "free market" does 
not mean a free-for-all in the sense of anything goes.  One must still 
work within the boundaries of the correct principles, which provide for 
expansive opportunity and avenues of choice while imposing vanishingly 
small restrictions.  It's not that difficult to comprehend or even put 
into practice.  Those in power don't want it because it removes the 
guarantees that absence of real competition provides.