In his criticism of Republicans and “free marketeers”, Joseph Petrowski (“A Bipartisan Fix for the Oil Crisis”, July 10) neatly and succinctly expressed why many people don’t want government intervention with our energy situation. If the government, in fact, really was “engaged, effective and focused”, I think more people would be less concerned with its involvement. But unfortunately, that isn’t the case. First of all, with an approval rating in the low teens, it’s a wonder ANYONE wants Congress to do ANYTHING for fear of messing it up somehow. Secondly, our government isn’t structured in a way that will ever make it “focused” on much else that the re-election of its members or the perpetuation of its bureaucracy. And lastly, even if we were able to find a way to elect the most selfless politicians into office (and somehow keep them that way), they would run into what F.A. Hayek referred to as the “fatal conceit” when we charge them with picking the right technologies to subsidize or standards to mandate. Ironically, it’s the market mechanism Mr. Petrowski lauded in his appeal to Democrats, the amalgamation of the knowledge of millions of buyers and sellers manifested in prices, not the special interest-influenced selection by a small group of experts, bureaucrats, and politicians, that is best suited to address these kinds of problems.
Matt Hutchison
Atlanta, Georgia
I was a little confused by something Petrowski wrote in his article, so I added the following question for the editorial board at the end of my letter. We'll see if they respond.
By the way, was Mr. Petrowski saying that “the latest farm bill, ethanol and sugar tariffs, the cost of the Iraq war and Bear Stearns” are examples of free markets run amok? That’s the only reason I can think of why he would call criticism of biofuel subsidies and fleet mandates and the like naïve or hypocritical.
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