"Nothing to see here, just move along folks"
Sorry...but there is something to see here. This is another step down the crazy path that Ronald Reagan so wisely saw and warned of way back in 1964 in his speech, "A Time For Choosing"
Here is a relevant snippet from
http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/ronaldreaganatimeforchoosing.htm
"Well, I, for one, resent it when a representative of the people refers to you and me, the free men and women of this country, as "the masses." This is a term we haven't applied to ourselves in America. But beyond that, "the full power of centralized government" -- this was the very thing the Founding Fathers sought to minimize. They knew that governments don't control things. A government can't control the economy without controlling people. And they know when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. They also knew, those Founding Fathers, that outside of its legitimate functions, government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector of the economy."
"We have so many people who can't see a fat man standing beside a thin one without coming to the conclusion the fat man got that way by taking advantage of the thin one. So they're going to solve all the problems of human misery through government and government planning. Well, now, if government planning and welfare had the answer -- and they've had almost 30 years of it -- shouldn't we expect government to read the score to us once in a while? Shouldn't they be telling us about the decline each year in the number of people needing help? The reduction in the need for public housing?"
I assumed there was enough sarcasm dripping that </s> wasn't necessary.
I do, of course, share your alarm.
To the degree that we'll end up with cw², truth be told.