Reply #22: I'm not against corporate regulation

[Selatius]

I'm all for it. If we are going to continue to live the way we have lived, then we need common sense regulation of the markets to protect them from their own excesses and abuses due to greed.

Personally, even if we got what we wanted as far as regulations and services are concerned, there will always be the danger that they will be undone by some corporatist (aka fascist) thug winning power and then using it to undo everything we have fought for. That's what you get when you concentrate power into the relative hands of a few.

That power, in the hands of the right people, can be used for tremendous good (FDR), but if it falls into the wrong hands (GWB), it can do as much harm if not more so. By diffusing that power and giving people as much direct control as possible over the affairs of the community, it would become that much harder to usurp power and destroy all that has been created.

Hypothetically, if a community followed a direct democracy model or something approaching that model where citizens themselves essentially act as the assembly appointing people to keep up the local utilities and the sanitation and permits and such and met, say, just once a week to discuss issues (like a townhall meeting format), it would be much more difficult to buy-out and corrupt than if there was only a city council of, say, 9 people who are in charge of appointing people and issuing building permits and such.

Personally, I am beginning to fear the idea of a corporation. It was designed to minimize risk and maximize profit. Too often the temptation is to reduce people down to simple numbers, statistics, assets, and liabilities, not look at them as human beings.

I guess the argument is not over the size of the government but over the fundamental issue of how we run our affairs to begin with.