"Americans unbalanced these days almost as a matter of policy"

[Brett Knowlton]

>I've been reading way too much about the roots of neoclassical
>economics lately for my own good, but this notion of the merit of a
>constant craving for material wealth goes back through the ages to
>Smith and beyond.  The whole edifice of this ridiculous "science" is
>rotten to the core.

Hey Bill, don't leave us hangin' - how about a brief explanation?  Or at
least a reference or two.

>>>Who came up with
>>>this idiotic notion that there is something wrong with economic
>>>security?
>>
>>Friedrich Hayek, an Austrian. Not all by himself, of course, but he 
>>was no small part of it.

Funny Hayek should come up.  I just finished reading The Road to Serfdom,
Hayek's 1944 book which claims to deomonstrate the totalitarian nature of
socialism.  It is actually better than I thought when it comes to
criticizing centrally planned economies and organization.  He sees the
faults of the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany clearly enough.

But at the same time it is amazing how blind he is when it comes to the
capitalist democracies.  Some of the exact arguments he uses against
communist centralization could be used against concentrated business power
in the West, but he's too committed to the idea that free markets = freedom
to notice.

Glad I read it though.  Know your enemy and all that.

Brett