Saving Capitalism

When we see rapacious “financiers” take over companies, steal their assets, and then sell them off with no care for workers or communities, claiming that the companies weren't run well---when we all know it's really a selfish fight over who gets the cash---it is then that we at first might think of trashing capitalism and the free enterprise system. But our better Burkian selves usually realize that no system is perfect and we need to reform the capitalism which once brought us the highest standard of living in human history.

Rana Foroohar of Time magazine rightly suggests that we need not only corporate pay and tax reform but a more German-style stakeholder capitalism that spreads the benefits of a company's growth more evenly among labor, management and shareholders. But I believe we need much deeper changes and a return to basics.

The people at “Economy In Crisis”remind us that we cannot manage our nation for our own benefit as long as we are committed to disastrous “free trade” agreements which allow foreign countries to decide our economy and our lives. These so-called “free trade” agreements have brought our country from a productive, independent, debt-free country to one that is unproductive and heavily indebted. Floods of imports have destroyed our domestic manufacturing base, and our jobs have been shipped overseas, and only the same rapacious financiers benefit from this destruction.  Is this not criminal?

World trade agreements have usurped our Constitution and we need to get out of these agreements sooner then later so that we can restore America's economic strength. No strong political leaders or statesman are in sight who advocate this kind of life-saving economic nationalism, but we hope they will soon rise.