Response to an Email from a Friend

Our government exists on this basic premise: ".. in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity..."

Inherent in this ideal is the expectation that people will be reasonably free to conduct commerce, business and trade to enrich themselves in order to participate in and benefit from the framework of government created under the Constitution.

Certainly much has changed with respect to commerce and government in the intervening centuries, but one thing has not changed. That constant is the nature of Man.

While Man is capable of noble thoughts and deeds, our basic nature is inherently sinful, selfish, and greedy. Else why do we need laws to regulate and punish errant behavior and protect us from each other?  Laws are necessary to control the limits of greed and other destructive behaviors carried to extremes by some.
As long as we expect men and women to provide for their personal and family well-being and to create wages and wealth to be taxed for the 'general welfare and 'common defense,' the inherent traits of 'selfishness and greed' are a far more effective stimulus for individuals than any government decree or general prohibition.

I don't want my government prescribing how I should earn my living, regulating how much money I should earn, how much or how little wealth I can own or what business I can engage in. A framework of laws and sensible regulation for the common good, yes, but our Founders wisely recognized the inherent nature of man and intended that it flourish within a system of necessary  laws and common sense. This is the essence of freedom and an appeal to, but no guarantee of, nobler motives.

Yet because the interconnected systems of banking, finance and commerce have become so entwined and interconnected in this digital age, we are in uncharted territory. This calamitous complexity certainly could not have been envisioned by our Founders, perhaps not even by Mr. Friedman.

To avoid collapse, intervention by government is necessary, but we should recognize they are only human, too, and none of them have been down this road before. To some degree, they are winging it.

I'm not particularly an Obama fan, primarily because of his inexperience and understandable lack of wisdom. Perhaps he will mature in office. I am deeply concerned that 'team Obama' intends to implant an ideological agenda in our country disguised as an economic recovery plan and likely to spend ourselves into servitude to crushing debt and rampant inflation resulting in the country's rapid economic demise.