The Demise of Reason

That is what we are witnessing in Washington at this moment.

A widely held definition of a Democracy is a system of government and control whose purpose is to assure the greatest good for the greatest number with the fewest
blatant inequities. Government will not choose winners and losers: it will make available to everyone the opportunity and tools to make themselves a winner.

Over time the winners buy/or gain control of the apparatus of government and exploit it for selfish interest. To prevent this perversion of purpose, regulations must be emplaced to control predatory or dishonest practices. Without due diligence even
regulations can be diluted or evaded, as occurred in our current breakdown in the
financial system and resulting recession-depression. Even in our present state
some winners, including those who caused the problem, still profit. Their control of media even makes the people most injured by the collapse of the economy into supporters who then oppose any real reform for their benefit.

In recent days measures to control risky investment practices such as derivitives,
sub-prime mortgages, etc have been, with Democratic connivance, weakened to impotency. Banks have used bail out public funds to acquire other financial institutions instead of issuing business credit essential for recovery. The obscene
compensation for the malefactors have even increased. All that without any sanction
by the agencies responsible for protecting the public interest.

The health care "reform" process is a massive offense against the public. Private,
for-profit health care insurers are middlemen. They provide no health care, fund no
research, serve no public purpose. They collect premiums, skim off a large share, and
pay claims. In order to protect their share they limit who will be insured, what
treatment can be covered and how much they will pay for that, and even who lives or dies by their fiat. No other developed country permits such a wasteful, anti public
system to exist. Most of them are not Socialist governments, just reasonable.