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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: combjelly who wrote (685467)	11/19/2012 12:29:00 PM
From: i-node	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1577985

>> That is your best argument? It is all that's necessary and crystal clear. >> Sorry, Friedman should have been discredited with the global meltdown in 2009. To the contrary, I think Friedman would properly state that government caused the problem in the first place. And I don't think he would have had a problem with the notion that derivative transactions needed to be at least minimally regulated in light of Brooksley Born's testimony during the Clinton years (before she was summarily fired). While you might argue that government doesn't produce anything, and that isn't always true, what it does do is provide a framework so that things can be produced. That's not the argument. The argument is that it can never produce more than the money would in taxpayers' hands, and usually produces far less; so, all things equal, you'd rather have the money in taxpayers' hands. Everyone (including Friedman) acknowledges that there are certain things that government should and must do -- such as national defense -- essential functions of government. We accept the inefficiency and do it because it is necessary that government do these things. OTOH, those functions that are not essential -- like the Department of Education -- should not be federally funded because the money is largely nonproductive and wasted, whereas, in the hands of taxpayers, or closer to them in local government, it would create productivity and therefore produce economic growth. It provides protection, both police and military, a court system and regulations to protect citizens from excess and should provide a level playing field. And these are all legitimate functions of government but have become terribly excessive which not only is a poor use of the money but excess is counterproductive. Medicare and Social Security are the big examples of this federal incompetence; broken programs that can't be fixed. But I think there is no better example of lesser federal programs gone awry than the so-called "War on Drugs", which wastes perhaps 100 Billion a year and destroys countless lives, yet the federal bureaucracy wants to retain control even after some states have said, "No thanks, we can handle this on our own." Democrats and Republicans, alike, are hamstrung by confused beliefs over what is politically popular and so it just rolls on.