patrick.net

I'll suggest a start-up: a web site "Lobbyist.com" where citizens can debate political topics, and form groups on specific public interests topics, and make donations.
- For groups big enough, the donations would be used to hire lobbyists in Washington to bribe politicians and push in the direction promoted by the group.
- Otherwise donations would simply be used to run campaigns to promote the group.

If a few million people made even small donations to buy laws on privacy or other topic, I'm pretty sure you would see rapid changes.

At the very least it would raise the costs of buying politicians.

If you can't beat them, join them!

Government can never make intelligent choices in regards to free enterprise for the simple reason that virtually no politicians have participated in free enterprise.

Non-business people telling business people how to run their businesses makes zero sense.

Government mentality: if it ain't broke, keep fixin' it till it is. You know, overregulate it to death. Kill the goose that lays golden eggs. Make things so bad that successful people and successful businesses leave the (pick one) City, State or Country.

Honest Abe says

Rich people are willing to take on big responsibilities - which is why they get paid the big bucks.

Like Paris Hilton? The Kardashians?

sbh says

Free-market cheerleaders never have to admit that bad things arise in a free-market because they have a codified set of tenets that points the finger at government. I agree with most of them. The problem is you have to agree with all of them to be one of them.

Yep: no enemies on the right.

You can never be too conservative.

It's funny how much the doctrinaire right resembles the Bolshevik Party of the 1920s: always on the alert for ideological errors and heterodoxy.

Many of you seem strikingly ignorant that your lightly-regulated capitalist utopia has already been tried, and it was miserable for the working person. Read a little history on the USA in the late-19th century and see if that is really what you want to return to.

finehoe says

Many of you seem strikingly ignorant that your lightly-regulated capitalist utopia has already been tried, and it was miserable for the working person. Read a little history on the USA in the late-19th century and see if that is really what you want to return to.

the average person through history has got a bad deal with low average life expectancy, starvation, poverty etc.

The commercial advances of the late 19th century, however brought more material wealth and well being to larger numbers of people than ever in history.
The average 'poor" person may be obese -meaning food is plentiful, watch tv, drive a car, use electricity and the internet and travel hundreds if not thousands of miles from his home.

In the 17th 18th and 19th century no one did that.
In the early 20th century few but the extreme wealthy traveled or had running water or electricity.

The advances of commerce have made it possible for more people to enjoy more wealth and well being than ever before-its not because of government regulation that we have achieved this.