Tuesday, November 29, 2005

Hey Republican Friends! Here's an idea

So, from the department of Just One More Clever Idea:

Ya know how the Repubs are so certain that the power of the free market is so potent that it can solve darn near any problem? From incenting poor people not to be so poor to getting low-grade earning students off their lazy butts, there's no problem for which a good Republican can't figure out a market solution for. Damn clever of them.

So, let's look at the way the Repubs have built a market-solution to war. Why, virtually every aspect of modern warfare has been turned over to the private sector.

So doesn't this mean that we've created a market for war? That there are market participants whose livelihood depends on a fairly steady stream of people and things getting blown up, burnt and shot? Won't they be expected to maximize their self-interest by ensuring that we're always at war somewhere, with someone?

So here's the thought: this seems like a very, very bad policy. How about we decide that war is a bad thing, one that ought to be avoided except in the most compelling cases. Which would mean that we should end these market forces, like we have whenever we've had a real war. Anyone remember the War Board telling Ford Motor Company exactly what it would do with its assembly lines, and exactly how much the tax payers would pay, on pain of having the government take it over if need be?

Pretty far cry from the head of Haliburton also being the head of the government and telling the government what it will pay when Haliburton decides we need to invade, say, Venezuela.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hi

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