[Mr. Jeeves]

"In a great nation like ours, you can't let people do what they want. It has to be coordinated," says Hasan Ikhrata, the executive director of the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG).

Does this guy ever have the Obama talking points down! :)

[Sherman Logan]

"In a great nation like ours, you can't let people do what they want. It has to be coordinated,"

Actually, this POV goes all the way back to the Progressives of the late 19th century. It's based on the idea that simple pre-industrial economies can function based on the free market, but more complex economies and societies require management by experts.

The problem, of course, is that the reverse is true. A feudal lord can run a manorial economy, or a planter a slave plantation, on a command basis with some efficiency. Stalin did indeed produce great economic advance, although with even greater suffering.

But an economy beyond the relatively simple heavy industry level simply cannot be managed on a command basis. The more complex it gets the less possible it becomes.

This is why recent financial meltdowns and bubbles are caused primarily not be failures of the market but by failures of regulation. If the government weren't in it, the market would be self-regulating. Pit the smart guys against each other.

Put the government into the mix and it's the brilliant private sector manipulators against underpaid government salaried guys. Who do you think will win such a battle of wits?