The One's Direction of the Mob

Peter Schwartz tallies some recent indicators of political mood:

The essence of mob rule is arbitrary and unchecked force, in disregard of all rights. If so, then when the government spends our money with virtually no limits — then trillions of dollars are gleefully disbursed through unrestrained horse-trading and arm-twisting among members of Congress — when trillions more are poured down the rat holes of failing companies at the uncontrolled discretion of bureaucrats — when government "czars" can select a company's CEO and dictate its product line — then what we have is government by mob rule. That is, we have government with arbitrary, unchecked power to do as it wishes — which means: government unconstrained by the principle of individual freedom.

As he goes on to explain, freedom is unjustifiably being made a scapegoat:

Like any mob, Washington desires a scapegoat. It blames capitalism for the mortgage and credit crisis, in order to divert attention from the real culprit, government intervention. Every housing-related measure taken by Washington has made the standards for homeownership looser than they would be in a free market. Government has stepped in to override private companies' aversion to undue risk. Regulators criticized banks for turning down too many mortgage applications. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were created to encourage the issuance of mortgages that would not be prudent in a free market. The FDIC anesthetizes depositors against risks taken with their funds. And the entire Federal Reserve exists to pump paper money into the economy, and to keep interest rates artificially low — often below the rate of inflation — so that more lending occurs. Yet when this house of cards collapsed, it is capitalism that was denounced and more government power that was demanded.