Then what is a government for?

[kentuck]

Average people are getting hammered by the recent surge in gas prices. They can't handle it. It's difficult for many to keep their heads above water. What can we do about it? Nothing?

What do we have a government for if not to protect us against such corporate tyranny. Make no mistake. This is not about supply and demand. There are no shortages. There are no gas lines. It is nothing more than traders bidding up the price on Wall Street, just as Enron did with the electricity prices in California. They are screwing America and our government is doing nothing. What is a government for if not to protect our people?

[raccoon]

1. I totally agree. There is no oil shortage.

As you said,

It is nothing more than traders bidding up the price on Wall Street, just as Enron did with the electricity prices in California.

What is the government for? I guess ours is to preserve, protect, and defend the big corporations.

:sarcasm:

[ixion]

2. ..."just as Enron did with the electricity prices in California"

that is exactly what is going on. CA was only the proving ground for what they've now taken global.

[deminks]

9. The Enron Loophole. McBush is going to put the author of that in as Treasurey Secretary.

Gramm. Bush's third term ought to do the trick on us.

[jojo54]

3. Corporate and governmental greed is at a new level

and the poor and middle class are paying for it.

[Frances]

4. And yet I heard a pundit say that the first thing the next

president should do is say that the U.S. can't afford medicare or social security for the middle class. They should just be for the poorest people.

I say if we can afford a billion dollars an hour/day/week/or whatever it is, we can afford medicare and social security.

If we can afford to have the CEO's make multi-million dollars a year and pay very little tax, we can afford medicare and social security.

Repubs believe in taking from the poor and middle class and giving to the richest.

Gore tried to warn us back in 2000, but all the MSM reported was his sighing and the color of the clothes he wore and his "lies" (he invented the internet).

[Jackpine Radical]

6. That is always their first step in eleminating a benefit--

take it away from the middle class & the wealthy. Means test it. Then, having lost it, the middle class & wealthy have no stake in seeing that the poor keep it. Just another version of Divide & Conquer.

[HereSince1628]

5. I've got this idea for patenting a taser-wallet

Everytime a robber baron or retail bandit reaches in to pick my pocket I have the option to amp them.

Unfortunately, the robber barons and the gun-slinging speculators will continue to concentrate wealth until well after regulation is restored. We need something akin to conceal carry so that we can defend ourselves.

[bluerum]

7. The "average people" you speak of are often referred to as the "workforce"

or even "consumers". They are a commodity. They will always be there. They are expendable. The current government is simply siphoning assets from the "workforce" and transferring those assets to their constituents - the republic corpos and the rich have and have mores.

The current administration is in power to enrich the rich. They have come out and said this.

They permit the plundering of natural resources and allow the corpo bosses to extort money from "the workforce". They encourage the banking corpos to create bad business policy and generate billions of dollars worth of debt and loss to be passed back onto the "workforce". They start needless wars to enrich military contractors. The "workforce" must pay for these wars with blood and treasure.

I think everything you said in your OP is quite true - except the bit about government being there to protect our people. That is a worthy aspiration, but the current ship of fools has absolutely no conception of this.

[Bluerthanblue]

8. protecting laisse-faire capitalism-

that is what I've come to realize.

The rich become richer- the poor poorer. The government encourages people to aspire to become rich and to shun the poor.

peace~

[Xenotime]

10. Agreed. Govt should also do more by protecting those who are losing their homes.

[annabanana]

11. "to promote the common wellfare"

not to fatten the wealthy

[FarCenter]

12. The function of the United States government is to be "the leader of the free world"

In other words -- to dominate the planet with its armed forces with the objective of imposing its economic and political systems everywhere in order to plunder the world on behalf of the powerful and wealthy.