The last myth of the right crumbles

[npk]

The myth that the private sector does a better job than the public sector at just about everything. Except that it doesn't. And if anybody needs yet another example that this myth is a falsehood, just look at the Gulf Oil Spill disaster. It was caused by lax private/ownership oversight. It was caused by putting profit over the environment and the general welfare of the people who live along the gulf. And it will ultimately fall on the responsibility of the government to clean up and stop the spill. Because it was very apparent, that after 30 days of the private sector trying to fix the problem that they caused, it will ultimately rest on the public sector to fix the problem and clean up the mess.

Oh wait, this just in, the private sector says they should have the leak capped by August, or maybe early fall.

[WeDidIt]

1. Spot on

The magic hand of the free market does nothing but jack off.

[rucky]

2. I don't think the gubmt would hold back on any solutions

just to prove a point.

Would they?

[npk]

10. But BP told them that they would have the leak capped in short order

But alas that was just BS spin. Either way the public sector is now involved. And in the end it will be the public sector that will be stuck with the ultimate clean up.

[applegrove]

3. Yup. Deregulating everything has been tragic.

[stevedeshazer]

4. True dat.

Recommended.

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. As to the timeline for caping\relief well

I am not surprised. I mean PEMEX, a government run entity, took nine months to deal with Ixtoc 1...

Not that you are wrong in thinking that private entities do these things badly... but I needed to point that for completeness.

By the way the Ixtoc 1 was the worst spill until now. That one was bad. This one is making that one look like a walk in the damn park.

[secondwind]

6. what? are you serious? FALL? Pls. tell me that is a joke!

[MadMaddie]

8. I actually thought I heard something similar..

[npk]

11. That's what was reported earlier in another thread

I will see if i can find a link.

[npk]

15. Here is a story talking about the August timetable

BP began drilling a relief well on May 2 that could divert the flow until the well is permanently sealed, but this may not be ready until August. While official investigations continue into the disaster, House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman Henry Waxman, at hearings Wednesday, zeroed in on a valve intended to serve as a rig safety mechanism.

link: http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/wilderness-resources/stories/bp-tries-new-fix-to-cap-oil-spill

[Enthusiast]

57. It will stop naturally once

the oil runs out. Nature will take care of it.




















:hide: :sarcasm:

[athenasatanjesus]

7. I thought that myth crumbled during Teddy Roosevelt's presidency.

Didn't we learn the importance of regulation way back then?

[csziggy]

18. Yes, but the business has been re-writing history ever since

So the right winger nuts who don't believe in elitist book learning never knew that history.

[caledesi]

24. Uh, no. nt

[GreenStormCloud]

9. Do you think that government bureaucrats would do a better job of drilling for oil? N/T

BP screwed up, but if the government were drilling the wells they would screw up worse.

I am a cynic of sorts. It is human nature to screw up.

[laughingliberal]

14. I don't think we have any evidence of that

Case in point: I believe our military was able to construct and maintain the quarters for our troops for a number of years without electrocuting the soldiers in the shower as KBR has. And they did it a hell of a lot cheaper, too. Just what are we paying KBR to kill our kids in the shower?

[GreenStormCloud]

17. Governments are not free from screw-ups.

I believe that it would be rather easy to find cases where governments have screwed up on massive scales. Private sector will have screw-ups too. Screwing up is what humans do very well.

[laughingliberal]

19. Government doesn't have to protect their profits and fiduciary responsibilities ...

while getting the job done.

[GreenStormCloud]

30. Unless the government is a dictatorship, it has to protect votes.

Tell me. How well did the government do on the levees around New Orleans? Decades before Katrina everybody knew there was a problem. I specifically remember attending a lecture on the danger that a project storm would pose to New Orleans. That lecture was in the late 1980s.

If the government is a dictatorship, then they screw up even worse.

Just because something is a government project does NOT mean it will be done well.

[laughingliberal]

35. The past 3 decades are the problem

Reaganism, which convinced everyone government couldn't do anything and then proceeded to defund programs to make sure it couldn't do anything, is the reason for that. Government was doing pretty well after Roosevelt until the deregulating defunding binge, started by Regan, took hold.

I know of no program which was once a government service which did not get more expensive and less responsive to the needs of people once it was privatized.

Having to be worried about votes is a good part of government services. It means they must be responsive to the people they serve. Unfortunately, our system is contaminated with money and lobbyists who make sure they are served instead of the people. When the Reagan Democrats came home, they should have left St. Ronnie where they found him. A whole generation or so here does not even remmeber it was not always this way.

[GreenStormCloud]

59. I am not arguing for privatization of everything.

I am saying that having the government run everything won't be an improvement. Government, even by Democrats, is not immune to massive screw-ups. That is simply human nature, and no amount of legislation will undo it.

[TheKentuckian]

43. You deny that electing Republicans who assert government IS the problem

adds mightily to such problems? Sure, government is going to be inept and ineffective when enforcement and oversight is gutted or when horse trainer are put in charge of FEMA or a coal Barron in charge of the EPA.

How about complete refusal to maintain, much less upgrade and modernize infrastructure?

For anything to work it almost always takes a legitimate effort or at least willful sabotage must be avoided.

No doubt that even the best plans go wrong and the greatest efforts can be fruitless but conservative gremlins in the works particularly over the last generation or two has severely hamstrung any effective action from government.

[GreenStormCloud]

62. Even Democrats are not all-wise and all virtuous.

To maintain that the spill would not have happened if government were doing the drilling is not defensible.

[quakerboy]

87. I maintain that if the government had said no to

drilling there, the spill would not have happened. You present a false dichotomy. Either The private sector will drill there or the government will drill there. It seems obvious at this point that it is entirely questionable as to whether anyone should have drilled there.

[socialist_n_TN]

95. And WHO was the government during the late 80s?

Reagan and his merry band of "government can't do anything" deregulators. If you don't BELIEVE in government, how can you be expected to actually GOVERN, much less govern well?

[datasuspect]

51. government ultimately should have as its basis a reverence for the common weal

[GreenStormCloud]

65. And you think those three are good examples?

Sorry, but Soviet Russia was one of the worst totalitarian governments ever.

[Enthusiast]

58. We outsourced what was traditionally military

work to KBR, Blackwater and Halliburton. They have robbed us blind and done a terrible job of it.

Why are you so quick to propagate RW talking points on DU?

[GreenStormCloud]

63. I am saying that government is NOT infallible.

Do you maintain that any political party is safe from ever screwing up?

[Enthusiast]

71. Damn, you sound exactly like

a Fox News watching Republican, your every word. Do I maintain? I am nearly constantly complaining about my party. But my basic philosophy isn't Limbaugh inspired. If you are a Democrat just go ahead and switch to Republican because they are more in line with your thinking.

[socialist_n_TN]

97. No you are saying that the private sector

does anything better than government, and that's patently NOT true.

And even if there was a doubt in my mind about that, I'd STILL want the government to give it a shot. The private sector has screwed things up SO bad that I want another entity to give it a shot. I'm willing to bet that government has a better shot at fixing this clusterfuck that the USA has become under deregulation than the private sector.

Profit is NOT God unlike what we've been told over the last 3 decades.

[defendandprotect]

107. .... and certainly corporations are far from "infallible." Not even the Pope is infallible --

despite Papal claims!!

[John Q. Citizen]

85. The difference is you can vote out an incompetent government. An incompent

corporation that escapes liability is forever.

[npk]

21. The problem I have with some corporations

Is that the feel they are immune from government regulations. They feel that government regulations only hamper their efforts. So they have for over the past 30 plus years done everything they could to eliminate as many regulations as they could. My point is not the government doesn't fuck up, because it does, but the government at least, in a pure essence, understand that regulations are important because they make people, or humans adhere to strict standards and oversight, which help prevent these kinds of fuck up from hasping. It doesn't mean that you can completely eliminate fuck ups, but you can sure as hell decrease them. I am for no drilling in the gulf. But this is more than the just the oil spill in the gulf. It is a complete disconnect on the part of the private sector to understand that there could be sever accidents and that trying to bypass or eliminate regulations to save money is just what got us into this mess. Did BP have a contingency plan in case something like this happened. No. They didn't have one because there was no regulation there telling them that they needed one. When I talk about government, I am talking about an entity put in place to govern, not the people that always make up that body. In this case it was the people in the government that failed the government. It was years and years of bypassing and destroying as many of them as they could. It was years of private business having their hands and money in bed with government officials.

We have a separation of church and state. What we really need is a separation of the private sector and the government sector.

[GreenStormCloud]

31. Many things are great in theory and lousy in practice.

Regulations can often be incredibly stupid because they were put in place by ideologues who didn't understand the subject, or because the law of unintended consequences often bites everybody in the butt.

As soon as real live humans get into the mix, screw ups will occur.

[Enthusiast]

60. Is your name Newt Gingrich?

You repeat his words perfectly.

[GreenStormCloud]

67. Do you maintain that some humans are infallible?

Having a project done by government is NOT a guarantee of perfection. When humans are involved, screw-ups, including massive ones, WILL happen. That is a guarantee, regardless of party label or whether the project is private or government or some mix. People screw up.

[Enthusiast]

72. Get your smoke screen

pumped up. I see you for what you are.

[GreenStormCloud]

80. Is that your discussion technique?

Call those you dislike names, accuse them of being RW? Do you insist that everyone walk in rigid lockstep with you?

Notice that I have agreed with some of the more thoughtful posts in this thread.

Neither government running a project directly nor private business running a project directly, nor any mix will give a guarantee against screw-ups. Fallibility is part of human nature. Now how is that bolded statement RW?

[socialist_n_TN]

98. You ARE right wing...........

that's pretty obvious from your posts extolling the private sector and downing government. We don't have to call you anything.

And that's OK. You can believe anything you want, but WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING ON THIS BOARD?????

Fallibility is a part of human nature, but add unregulated profit motive and human nature becomes a GUARANTEED screw up. Because they don't think about the future. They're thinking about immediate profit and NOTHING ELSE.

[ThomThom]

29. There are things the government should do and things that

business can do. The mail gets delivered every day, maybe not in the right mail box but it gets delivered day. Social Security checks arrive and our military can blow almost anything up. We went to the moon but some shuttles have had problems. Monopolies are good in some situations but unfair in others. Profit is ok in most situations but excessive profits are unfair. The commons need to be protected and regulations are needed to keep things reasonable and above board. Government is not the enemy and business shouldn't be relied on to do what is in the people's best interest. Profits are their bottom line and that should always be remembered. That is why government must step in and make sure the people are protected. We were not well served by the oil companies deciding what protections they would have standing by in case of problems. Business that is self regulated will by it's nature avoid expenses and in the case of this oil disaster pay the price of their mistake. Hopefully anyway. Government should not have let them decide, they should have had guild lines to follow that protected everyone. If our government wasn't in their pockets this disaster could have been prevented. The question now should be how do we best clean-up this mess.

[GreenStormCloud]

32. You have well stated the middle ground. I agree in principle.

In principle, a well regulated private sector works best. Unfortunately, all regulatory agencies tend to be taken over by the industry that they are regulating. The tail begins to wag the dog. There is a reason why this occurs. One would assume that you would want the oil industry regulators to be extremely knowledgeable about the industry that they regulate. The place to find such knowledgeable people in in that subject industry. So the commissioner of insurance will happen to have been an insurance industry insider. But any insider will have too many active connections to other insiders. And the regulatory agency becomes taken over.

The alternative is to put amateurs in as regulators, but that WILL cause major screw ups.

[ThomThom]

47. You are correct, it would be nice if we all acted out of an ethical

conviction instead of a personal financial biased.

[Enthusiast]

61. So you are anti-government and anti-regulation.

And you claim to be a Democrat. You sound exactly like the Republicans I hate so much.

[GreenStormCloud]

70. You are over-reacting.

I am stating the government control is NOT a guarantee against screw-ups. That is not an anti-government position, it is simple reality. People screw up, including people in government, and in private business.

[Enthusiast]

74. No one claimed the government is a

guarantee against screw-ups. But, like a good little Limbaugh soldier, you had to point out that private enterprise can do better and government often screws up. Hey, we hear that shit 24/7 on the damned RW media, we don't need to hear it from (supposed) Democrats on the DU.

[GreenStormCloud]

81. I did not say that private enterprise does better.

I did point out that government screw up too. And you got very angy and started calling me names over that.

[Enthusiast]

83. We hear that government can't

do anything right 24/7 on every TV channel from every Republican talking head. It is the RW mantra. But you feel the need to repeat it. Why? Admit you are a troll. Go ahead, admit it.

[patrice]

100. The difference is that "WE" have more recourse when it comes to fucked up government.

At least in theory anyway, in practice, the corruption of our political process by money and media, and the corruption of the vote by the political processes, e.g. gerrymandering, and by machines have mitigated the will of the electorate.

[donco6]

39. Maybe. Maybe not. We have no evidence.

Although it'd be pretty hard to top this screw up, no?

I think government's role in this case is not to do the drilling, but to protect the interests of the country (i.e., shoreline, fishing areas, wildlife protection, pollution).

The government should be able to confidently expect (re: not have to beg) that the latest safety apparatus and techniques be demonstrated and used at the sites. That businesses be open to spot inspections at any time. The government should have the unquestioned authority to regulate processes that, if misused, could damage the above mentioned national interests.

I don't think that's too much to ask.

[GreenStormCloud]

73. Your position I agree with.

I am arguing against those who think that having the government directly run the project would be a guarantee against disasters.

The government didn't improve the levees around New Orleans despite decades of warnings, both Democrat and Republican administrations.

[Obamaknowzz]

49. If the public/government controlled our energy policy, we wouldn't

be drilling for this shit. We would have switched to renewable alternatives after the public cost of fossil fuels was factored in.

[GreenStormCloud]

76. Isn't energy policy set by government?

We do have a screwed-up energy policy. We should be switching off of oil, and should have been for decades. But government policy has stayed in the 1950s. World War II, which was in large measure about oil, should have taught us something.

[Enthusiast]

110. In this day and age the government

hardly does as the electorate wants in regard to energy policy. Corporations dictate the country's energy policy and that is why we have been on the wrong course for these many years.

But you right wing creeps fight every attempt at campaign finance reform, at reining in corporate influence, resulting in a terrible energy policy that gives huge tax breaks to an oil industry that is making record profits.

[amborin]

78. yes, i do; PdeVSA in Venezuela was a great gov't bureaucracy

a true bureaucracy in the Weberian sense: technocrats and no cronyism

under gov't control

[amborin]

79. yes. Venezuela was a great example

[Orrex]

93. Only two institutions are guaranteed to be more corrupt and incompetent than government

One is organized religion, and the other is corporations.

Privatization has never--not once, not ever--delivered on any promise except to funnel profits to the shareholders. Any benefit to society or the environment or the world at large has been incidental and of secondary importance at best.

[socialist_n_TN]

94. Sorry I don't believe that

One of the problem with unregulated capitalism is that they don't even know HOW to regulate themselves. Left alone they INEVITABLY make decisions based on immediate profit. They won't put off immediate profit for ANYTHING, not even for better profits 5 years later. They WILL make decisions that will destroy even THEMSELVES, not to mention anything else in the way of immediate profit like the environment or worker's lives and standards of living.

[Alcibiades]

101. Do corporate bureaucrats do better?

By the way, I support government workers, and prefer not to call them bureaucrats. You are alive to call them bureaucrats because they inspected your food, made sure your medicine and your car are safe, and because they defend your country.

[defendandprotect]

106. Legitimate "people's" government would do a better job. . . but, had we not had private control

and profit motivation over our natural resources, I think that we would have had

a better chance of listening to 1957 era models of Global Warming and

Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring" re the toxic soup of chemicals we were creating.

JFK was certainly someone who listened -- he wasn't suicidal.

The 1960 Democratic Platform he ran on called for NATIONALIZING the oil industry.

JFK was ending the oil depletion allowance, as well.

Further, as we see currently, only government can finally be responsible . . . it is

government who gave approval for this insanithy -- 600 rigs in the Gulf alone -- and

another rig -- 10X bigger -- having serious problems!!


We shouldn't be doing off-shore drilling for many reasons -- BP being one of those

reasons. And, the lack of any ability to pick up oil from oceans before it destroys

animal life and damages nature, often long term.


We would, I think, have been more likely to move to solar and wind as renewable sources

of energy. With government investing heavily in alternate energy.


Not only is oil polluting our planet in 100's of different ways -- oil may actually be

our earth's ballast.

[bobbolink]

12. And yet......... there are so many DUers agreeing with "privatizing" public housing.

If you want to get dizzy from your head spinning, look at some of these replies:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x8384856

Yup, when it comes to poor folk, having housing all be profit-oriented is a GREAT idea!

[laughingliberal]

20. Yes, Reagan lives on! Disgustingly, he now lives in our party. nt

[glitch]

23. I don't recall asking the Reagan Democrats to return, do you?

Damn leeches.

[bobbolink]

25. They don't need an invitation. They think they are entitled to run everything into the ground.

:nuke:

[glitch]

36. We need to disabuse them of that conceit. :( nt

[defendandprotect]

108. IMO, the same kind of "entitlement" the Mafia feels . . . . !!

[CrispyQ]

38. Ture, but as the batshit crazies take over their own party, where else is there for them to go?

And since the dems have drifted further & further to the right, the dem party looks more & more like the old repub party, so it's a good fit for the more reasonable repubs. Sadly, it's the true liberals that are left out in the cold.

[glitch]

41. Too bad they didn't have the guts/smarts to take back their party from the crazies

And likewise for us to allow them to run amuck in ours.

[CrispyQ]

44. I wonder if they now regret getting into bed with that group?

At first, it seemed like a good way to get votes - claim to be the party of God to get the zealot vote. I suspect it didn't quite work out like they thought it would. I would be grinning ear to ear if it weren't for the fact that they are now infiltrating our party - & with the blessing of too many dems!

[glitch]

45. That would require self-reflection, looking back to evaluate your mistakes and correcting them.

Pretty sure they're solely focused forward.

[caledesi]

26. Yuk! nt

[tonysam]

54. +1,000 n/t

[djp2]

56. I'm beginning to think that the majority of DUers are TROLLS

Against Public Housing, Against Public Schools, Against Unions

The MSM has done their job in their mind-washing campaign of the American public
when even those who CALL themselves Dems go along with these Right-wing views.


Whatever happened to good old Democratic VALUES.
FDR was the ultimate Democrat in my opinion....We need to go back to his VALUES...
anyone against HIS values shouldn't be allowed to be called a Democrat

[Enthusiast]

64. Many are trolls.

They are on the DU to sew confusion and discontent. You will know them by their words. If they are anti-government and anti-regulation they are Teabaggers.

[bobbolink]

102. Those traditional Dem values of which you speak were sold out to the highest DLC bidder.

Yeah, Bill....that means YOU!

That's precisely why all the talk about "hope" during the campaign didn't affect me..... I lost hope a long time ago, seeing just how ignored poor people are here and in the party at large.

:cry: :nuke: :cry:

Its only the deaths from war that affect "progressives". The deaths caused by their neglect don't seem to matter much. When it is YOUR death that starts coming into view, it is traumatic.

[msongs]

13. give dr. rand paul a giant straw and tell him to suck nt

[glitch]

16. You mean Reagan was wrong? Again?

Perhaps it would be easier if we found something he was right about, and I don't mean far right.

[npk]

22. Yep. Reagan sold America down the river

So that he could in rich his buddies.

[AnArmyVeteran]

27. Perfect npk... can you imagine the right wing rage if the government ran that rig?

I don't know how far infinite is, but I do know wherever it ends conservative hypocrisy will still be going strong. And I believe I'm being kind...


The Myth of the Right
by npk of DU

"The myth that the private sector does a better job than the public sector at just about everything. Except that it doesn't. And if anybody needs yet another example that this myth is a falsehood, just look at the Gulf Oil Spill disaster. It was caused by lax private/ownership oversight. It was caused by putting profit over the environment and the general welfare of the people who live along the gulf. And it will ultimately fall on the responsibility of the government to clean up and stop the spill. Because it was very apparent, that after 30 days of the private sector trying to fix the problem that they caused, it will ultimately rest on the public sector to fix the problem and clean up the mess.

Oh wait, this just in, the private sector says they should have the leak capped by August, or maybe early fall."

[npk]

75. Yes the tea baggers would be calling for impeachment

Of President Obama. We would never hear the end of it.

[AnArmyVeteran]

82. Just how high can hypocrisy be piled?

I guess that's a question to be asked by some of the world's greatest philosophers. But even they would probably have a hard time trying to figure out a tea bagger.

Of course, you're right. Right wingers would have already been served notice he was going to face impeachment hearings. But since it was a godly corporation right wingers are not asking for the BP CEO's head. What hypocrites!

Have a great weekend!

[mulsh]

28. I wonder why it is that the folks I know who believe that myth

all have spent their entire professional lives working in government jobs. Not one of my family, friends, or even acquaintances who espouse and argue in favor of that myth has spent any significant time time working in the private sector. these tend to be the same folk who say that "government should be run like a business." weird, huh?

[glitch]

37. And people like me who've spent their entire careers in business think the government is run better

except for where they've been corrupted by business.

Incompetence is everywhere but at least government used to be somewhat accountable.

[Kablooie]

33. The conservative response is, "Accidents happen but the private sector is still better."

The least effective argument to make with a conservative is to use reality as an example. Reality is the one thing they refuse to consider.

[datasuspect]

52. the mantra "personal responsibility" dissolves in the right wing reactionary

"thought" process whenever it is a for profit corporation on the hot plate.

[Enthusiast]

66. You noticed that too?

There is no personal responsibility for corporations even though they are persons. Makes good sense to me.

[Name removed]

34. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[donco6]

42. Golly - gone already. Oh well. n/t

[CrispyQ]

40. Both private & public have some good organizations & bad, but the key difference between

private & public is when it's public, you can vote the fuckers out. Unless you're a shareholder, & a significant one at that, you have no say in how the private sector runs things. That's what the repubs (& too many dems!) want - for the People to have no say.

[glitch]

46. Yes - you can only wait for bad corporations to self-destruct, and quite often they take innocents

with them. But, a few people don't have to pay for that, in fact they make a lot of money when bad corporations fail, so they fight government and regulation for that reason.

They define sociopathic, if we had a healthy culture we would not allow them the power to harm us.

[tomp]

48. and it was all done in cahoots with the government....

...i.e, both business and gov't suck. another way of putting it is: business is gov't.

[npk]

55. I agree. Government has become too cozy with the private sector

There job is to regulate commerce, not become it's willing and enabling partner.

But more to the point, government wouldn't suck half as much if we could get to start representing us, the people, again. You know like what's written in that really old document.

[tblue37]

50. The same idiots who say to privatize everything and that the private sector

can be trusted to regulate itself are now squawking that Obama needs to take over and not let BP try to fix the disaster. They do not know the meaning of the word "consistency."

[tonysam]

53. It may be crumbling, but don't expect the "right" and the neoliberals give up their ideology

It's an ideology, a religion, a cult, in fact. This cult is rampant in BOTH political parties.

[backtomn]

68. Are you kidding??? What a JOKE !!!

1) Where is our government doing a better, safer job of oil drilling??
2) What solutions does the government have for solving the problem??
3) The government regulates the oil industry.....how is that working for us???

The myth is that the oil industry and government are in any way separated.

Try again.

[npk]

86. You are making a false equivalence

1) False Equivalence.
2) It was BP that failed to put in place any kind of contingency plan to deal with the likelihood of an oil spill. Not exactly a far fetched likelihood considering the dangers of off shore drilling.
3) BP used it's influence to circumvent regulations. Well at least the ones that big oil didn't destroy.

I would agree with your last statement. The private sector has become to cozy with government regulatory bodies. The difference is that the some people like to pretend that it's the government that screw up the private sector, that if they would just get out of the picture everything in the private sector would go perfectly. It's actually the other way around. If the government completely got out of the way, which is what many corporations want, it would lead to massive safety short cuts, and massive circumventing of any laws in place to protect people from corporations.

[Lorien]

69. And yet some DUers have fallen for Reagan's ideology hook, line, and sinker

because Obama is supporting it. It's unreal, watching how easy it was for a charismatic leader to lure onetime liberal progressives into the Ayn Rand/ Milton Friedman/ St. Ronnie fold. They honestly believe that no government agency can do a better job than the criminals to caused the problem in the first place-and who, by law, CANNOT take any action which does not benefit their bottom line. Unfreakingbelievable!

[amborin]

77. But: our gov't is effectively countenancing that right-wing meme, by allowing BP to remain in charge

and after essentially giving BP carte blanche

which is why i hate the dichotomous right versus left thinking

[mainer]

84. Yet the right is now mad that the gubmint isn't fixing things

The private sector is always so much better at things. Except when they aren't.

[drlindaphd]

88. Call me crazy, but...

I always believed that the purpose of government was to serve the needs of the people. Isn't that why we give them the power in the first place? Isn't that why we pay their salaries? I thought, silly me, that they worked for us. People, voters.

Call me crazy, but corporations don't vote, not yet anyway. The government is supposed to be looking out for the interest of the people. That means regulation monster corporations like BP who are looking out for their own self interest and profit, not ours.

Call me crazy, but the people in government, who are in fact our employees, are supposed to be protecting our resources, our interests, and our welfare as a nation. I think that many of these people, especially the Republican corporate puppets have forgotten who they work for. I think many of our government officials have been in office for so long that they have lost their way.

Call me crazy, but I thought this was the people's government and that power derived from the people. That is why the government must regulate private enterprise so that the interests,welfare, and assets of the true owners of this country are protected by the people who have been given the responsibility to do so. That is why it is call public service.

[Francisco]

89. Sadly you are right..

private businesses keep making mistakes and everyone else has to pay for them. If its not by financially bailing them out its by letting them destroy our environment without any consequences. I'm tired of it!!

Was that Un-American to say? oops sorry!

[Overseas]

90. With Privatization, quarterly profits trump common sense, public safety and compassion.

edited to add--

Privatization and transparency don't seem to fit.

Privatization and accountability also seem to be at odds. We are still doing business with Blackwater/Xe, and Halliburton, and others with overt failures.

[Dr Morbius]

91. I disagree.

This isn't anywhere near the last myth of the right.

They have dozens, if not hundreds, of myths besides this one!

In truth it is a myth that private sector can do X better than government, and it is also a myth that the public sector can do X better than the private sector. Depends on what X is, in my view. Government should do the things that the people can't do well for themselves, said Mr. Lincoln, and it may have been the last time a Republican was absolutely right about the role of government.

[Duer 157099]

92. You say that as though busting myths is meaningful to them

They LOVE myths and mythology and proving something is a myth probably just makes it that much *more* appealing to them.

[Swamp Rat]

96. k&r

[Stuart G]

99. Right On.

[rasputin1952]

103. The RW is an aspect of society that loves to gamble...

usually with other peoples money, time and welfare. It's a system that says, "private industry must never be tethered", and as soon as regulations are slimmed down, or not adhered to, it's all about the crossing of fingers...inevitably, there is a disaster, and all of the hope and praying in the world will never stop the inevitable.

The incredible stupidity of some of these people is truly astounding...save a few bucks up front, on the hope nothing bad will happen, then spend tens of million, to billions on the back end when disaster strikes because they were too cheap to realize that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound in cure.

No one should ever listen to these jugheads...:grr:

[Aleric]

104. Last? Crumbles?

You must have your own myths you live by if you believe that the right has no more myths to promulgate or that they'll accept your logic on the matter.

[rhett o rick]

105. It doesnt matter. The gullibles dont want to know the truth. They cant handle the truth. Unless we

figure out a way to get them on our side, we are screwed. The worse things get the more people join their side. It is fascism. They hate the intelligent and the intellectuals. They resent them and therefore chose to follow idiots like Beck and Palin. Unless we figure out how to combat that, we are screwed. The Corporate state will lead them to our destruction. Remember the Killing Fields in Cambodia. Doctors, lawyers, teachers, scientists were slaughtered.

[Technodaoist]

109. That myth has been dispelled...

...plenty of times over the history of this country.

But then it never seems to actually get dispelled plenty of times over the history of this country...

Funny that.