JANUARY 19, 2008 --

Mid-January brought reports that U.S. voters are now more concerned about the economy than about the war in Iraq.  For this observer, disheartening economic news is a function of predatory free enterprise.

The answer to predatory free enterprise is, for LPR, cooperative free enterprise,just as, in the film "It's a Wonderful Life," the antidote to the predatory banker Henry F. Potter was George Bailey, the businessman who urged people to stick together.

In our day, we have too many examples of predatory free enterprise -- lenders who persuade people to take on debt they cannot bear; credit card companies that charge crushing interest rates.   What is the purpose of predatory-free enterprise if not to turn the economy into a vast wasteland?  

LPR does not disagree with commentators who say the economy is  better served by lower rates of taxation. LPR believes, however, that this argument also applies to market prices.

Recently, LPR learned of a study by Demos and the Brandeis University Institute on Assets and Social Policy (IASP) that two thirds of the people in the middle class are financially at risk.  According to the study, "By a Thread: The New Experience of America's Middle Class," only one of three persons in the middle class is financially secure.   LPR can identify with that appraisal, looking ahead to financial flatline by April.

Asking for nickels or dimes in Cleveland

LPR would also ask this question of the predatory capitalists:  all right, you got your way, you wiped me out -- now what: a program of work relief constructing debtors' prisons?

LPR here appeals to clicksters to take up the cause of cooperative free enterprise -- before the predators succeed going wild and destroying our free enterprise system.