Government Must Serve the Common Good and Empower People
One often hears from right-leaning political pundits that most Americans would find repugnant the idea of living in a social order patterned after the West European social democracies. According to this view, typical Americans have instead a deep value-based attachment to opposing free-market principles. These include limited government, low taxes, entrepreneurship, corporate deregulation and growth, capital expansion, and the make-or-break imperatives of unfettered competition in the labor and capital markets, and the consumer marketplace.
In light of the 2010 mid-term election results and the current cultural “noise” – talk radio, cable talk and news, Tea Party gatherings, web postings, polls, etc. – it would seem that the pundits have at least one thing right. It is clear that a very large body of Americans, whether or not they understand the functioning of free markets, or even believe in their efficacy, opposes any meaningful role for the federal government in shaping their outcomes. They roundly condemn the near-trillion-dollar bank bailouts of 2008, to which the current administration is heir,
