Liberal Talk Radio

As longtime readers will note, Matski believes there are only two proper reasons for the existence of government — to correct market failure, and to enforce contracts, including the social contract.

For us in the U.S., part of our social contract is that all of us should have an equal opportunity to accomplish our goals in life. It’s a great tragedy that all three branches of our government are controlled by people who want to bar the gates to the palace — Bush and the rest of the Radicals want to protect their privileged status and keep others from joining them in the green meadows of wealth and opportunity. Bush slaps our national traditions in the face, and spits on our character as a people while he flips each and every American the bird.

Bush has decided to support his friends on Wall Street with his shameful proposals for Social Security reform. The purpose of Social Security is not to make a few who bet correctly — and traders — rich, it’s to keep the unfortunate from absolute destitution. By denying the essential, democratizing character of the institution of Social Security, Bush again shows his willingness to throw 230 years of American tradition out the window.

Now comes word that the President and Congress are unable to provide leadership on another critical issue — healthcare. As this story in the New York Times details, a coalition of major American businesses are so fed up with the government’s inability to provide health care, that they’ve decided to take action on their own.

Healthcare is a public good. Economic theory predicts that, as such, it will be underprovided by the marketplace — i.e., it’s an example of market failure, and thus it’s a service properly provided by the government. The fact that our government is failing so badly on this issue that private companies are now experiencing high enough costs to motivate them to address it on their own should give us all pause. This thing is running off the rails, people!

I hate to say it, but I’m almost glad that Radical Republicans control all three branches. Eventually, they’ll have to look in the mirror. What they’ll see will not be pretty.