November 19, 2003

All Wet on Economics

Democrats may claim President Bush has had the worst economic record since Hoover, but Howard Dean, M.D. sounds like he wants to recreate FDR's massive New Deal regulation. That means "re-regulating" (to use Duck, M.D.'s term) "utilities, large media companies and any business that offers stock options." His two prime examples are Enron and the California energy crisis. On Enron, Dean said in a speech, "those at the top enriched themselves by deceiving everyone else and robbing ordinary people of the future they'd earned." The result was the company going into bankruptcy and its executives undergoing criminal investigations. The Enron scam was going on way before Bush came into office. Unless we want a government regulator watching over every action done by a private company (maybe that's what Duck, M.D. wants) fraud will take place.

On the Golden State's energy crisis, I'll steal Steve Verdon's words:

Great, just great. I figured this would be the possible reaction to the California Energy crisis. Never mind that the roots of the crisis are to be found in the blundering and ineptitude of government.

"Dean Calls For New Controls on Business"