Quote:
Originally Posted by I B Hankering
@ Truly Passion*
fetishfreak's OP was obviously a joke, but his point about providers being forced to accept customers or face litigation for discrimination probably isn't as farfetched as you seem to think.
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Just to clarify my original post was indeed meant to be satire. However, Little Stevie, has made some points that seem to be off the mark. Libertarians would not need to force BP to apologize, the expectation would be that they would do so voluntarily (a forced apology can never be genuine).
The regulations that you are so high on are more often than not written by the industry being regulated and used as a way to make entry into the marketplace by new competitors more difficult. Often times pro government types will site how a regulation has helped society and then state that libertarians do not favor any regulations. This is not true. I support regulation in as much as it is allowed by the constitution. The power to regulate trade amongst states was to prevent a state or group of states from withholding a product unique to them from the other states without them supporting some type of legislation or other similar unfair practice. It was not meant to enforce prices require warning labels etc. Your example of the mercury while an important issue could have easily been handled by simply informing the public of the risk and allowing them to decide for themselves if that risk is worth it to them.
The irony of the pro-government types is that they do not understand how a free market truly works. The government protected BP in the oil spill. BP did have to pay some money, did have to pay for the cleanup, but was able to settle lawsuits such that the small business affected by the spill received practically nothing. Had free market principles been applied, BP would likely have paid a fortune. They may even had gone out of buisness having expended all their capital and been forced to sell off assets to meet the burden they would be forced to pay. Competitors or upstarts would have been able to aquire these assets at low costs and been able to improve upon what BP had failed to do.
Government regulation also serves as a shield to the business because they can take risks within the confines of the regulation and if they fail can be held to limited liability by those same regulations and not be required to pay full restitution to those harmed by their failures.
I understand that since you have never lived in a free market you would be unable to grasp how it may work. A truly free market coupled with truly free citizens is the best and most prosperous form of government available. It worked very well in this country's beginning but is now failing do to the slow takeover of our liberties by people who "just want to look out for us"
