Thanks for linking this, apo! It was a great article.

I'm reading Krugman's latest right now, and he makes similar arguments. It's just really hard for me to put the memory of 2004 out of my mind. So many reasons to not vote Republican, and so many people did so. 2006 was encouraging, but this horrible horrible congress is legislating as if the President's approval rating is in the 90's, their growing disapproval rating because of this (and furthermore, their stubborn indifference to this fact) is concerning.

Article seems wildly alarmist. The subprime market just isn't all *that* big, all things considered. Even assuming defaults in a unrealistically large portion of those, there's an absolute cap on total losses, and it's not catastrophic. Painful sure, but we'll get through.

The shit may hit the fan, apo, but the reason why Steve Fraser is wrong is that Dems refuse to take power away from fat cats but instead long to cater to them the way Republicans have.

That's why, while the Republicans richly deserve to be in the doghouse and voters keep trying to put them there, the Democratic politicians don't act to show how rotten things really are.

So when the Dems get power, the Republicans will get back in the game by enticing voters with empty promises of what voters really want - better. slimmer and less corrupt government.

what voters really want

Cite? Particularly for the "slimmer" part? All the polls I've seen show broad majority support for the government doing more in areas like health care, consumer protection, environmental protection, security, etc.

4: Good BS call, m/m, and wishful thinking on my part.

One of the sicknesses of the system is that people are always happy to get more than their fair share of what others pay for, and somehow think that they end up getting a good deal rather than a pig in a poke that is eating them out of house and home. Our multi-trillion war on terror is really a war on our budget and our children, who wil have to pay it. It was precisely this ability of the wealthy to pick the pocket of the nation by borrowing to pay for wars, etc. that led Jefferson to urge frequent revolution, so future generations would not have to inherit the national debt.

Clearly better and less corrupt government are hard to reconcile with a fatter, pork-laden one. On areas like health care, consumer protection, environmental protection, and security, I think good arguments can be made that more is actually less, especially on the last three. "Security" is a farce, our environment is much improved and most environmental scholars believe that we could do much better by increasing flexibility by moving back to state regulation and private litigation.

our environment is much improved

And how do you think that was achieved?

and most environmental scholars believe . . .

I don't think this is a true statement, TT. Cite?

And how do you think that was achieved?

DEREGULATION!

6 & 7:

My view is that federal environmental regulation was needed, but it's been clear for a long time that it has been unnecessarily costly, rigid and beneficial to larger firms at the expense of more nimble market entrants, which is the chief reason that it continues in the form it does.

I've put together some links that address these issues in depth, to the extent you're really interested.

I'm an environmentalist, FWIW, as you can tell if you let your fingers walk through my blog. I take considerable heat for my "lefty" "enviro" views on libertarian sites.

My primary quibble is with your consistent habit of making sweeping statements ("the American people want", "most experts agree", etc.) that are either false or unsubstantiated.

For example:

it's been clear for a long time . . .

Clear to who? And how?

For that matter, the statement that Federal environmental regulation "has been unnecessarily costly, rigid and beneficial to larger firms at the expense of more nimble market entrants" is so ridiculously overbroad as to be basically meaningless.

10: Clear to anybody paying attention, willing to do any investigation and to question their own assumptions, M/tch.

Maybe it seems more obvious to me, as I studied on this stuff when I was in law school back in the early 80s and edited law journal paers on Clean Air Act reforms. The first item on the list, now Justice Steven Breyer's 1994 "Breaking the Vicious Circle" is a decent start. The work by Stewart, who with Breyer was one of the two gurus on administrative law and head of the Environmental Defense Fund, is also Because of the financial muscle of existing firms, regulations very frequently serve to raise barriers to entry. The Clean Air Act was a great gift to dirty Appalachian coal and grandfathered existing Midwestern smokestacks while requiring expensive technology for new plants, instead of setting performance standards and allowing firms to find the least cost means of reaching them. The other pieces I cite are a litany of how regulation goes wrong, and that less expensive and more flexible means are often available.

As for sweeping statements, it seems that you prefer the sound of silence over succinctness, given your presumption of the great good that government does - for the American people, as opposed to regulated firms.

The enduring problem is that corporations, with deep pockets, unlimited lives, purposes and now "Constitutional" rights to free speech etc., have huge advantages over us in influencing our "limited government". It takes enormous, focussed effort - like that the Greenwald and Dodd have led on FISA immunity - even to win a brief delay in gifts that Presidents and Congresscritters want to give those who bankroll them.

Clear to anybody paying attention, willing to do any investigation and to question their own assumptions, M/tch.

So anyone who disagrees with your conclusion or feels that it actually isn't quite so clear as you attest just isn't paying attention, hasn't done any investigation, and isn't willing to question their assumptions. Got it.

I was pretty sure that's what you were trying to say, but thanks for spelling it out. Most informative.

The Clean Air Act was a great gift to dirty Appalachian coal and grandfathered existing Midwestern smokestacks while requiring expensive technology for new plants, instead of setting performance standards and allowing firms to find the least cost means of reaching them.

So it seems to me the best response is better federal regulation, as opposed to just throwing in the towel and hoping the states or private individuals pick up the slack somehow, which seems to be your reflexive solution to any instance of federal regulation not working optimally.

As for sweeping statements, it seems that you prefer the sound of silence over succinctness, given your presumption of the great good that government does - for the American people, as opposed to regulated firms.

I'm not asking you to shut up, Tom, I'm asking you to put up, or at least not to whine when someone questions whether your sweeping claims are actually true or supportable.

given your presumption of the great good that government does - for the American people, as opposed to regulated firms.

I don't presume that government does good. Far from it. I just don't presume that government is incapable of doing good.

The enduring problem is that corporations, with deep pockets, unlimited lives, purposes and now "Constitutional" rights to free speech etc., have huge advantages over us in influencing our "limited government". It takes enormous, focussed effort - like that the Greenwald and Dodd have led on FISA immunity - even to win a brief delay in gifts that Presidents and Congresscritters want to give those who bankroll them.

I'm genuinely curious as to why you think State and local governments are better situated to resist such pernicious influences.