I may not be quite on your wavelength here, but I think there does need to be a mixture of the "free market" and socialism--or something close to that--if western culture is to survive.

I am not anti-capitalism. There are obviously many good things about the incentives, dexterity (in the sense of adjusting to new trends or technologies), and innovations that such a system encourages.

But it is not a God, and that's what most right-wing "free market" loons consider it to be. It is not inherently benevolent, and often times, when left to its own set of special rules, we will see the system manipulated from within to benefit the wealthy at the expense of the poor.

Socialism is similar in ways, because sooner or later that system is gamed too, but it is not the work of Satan to get together, as a large community on a national level, and set down some centralized plans that will benefit the population as a whole, and not just the handful of people at the top of the economic ladder.

I think a sensible balance between the two philosophies or methodologies is essential, and as it stands right now, in order for our country--if not the world as a whole--to regain its balance, it needs a common-sense approach to introducing more "socialized" methods of achieving common goals.

When I was in university there was a inherent problem how different takes on economy policy between professors would shape the assumptions students held as a whole. I took a mixture of classes that had both free market advocates and those who thought socialism was important. Now this is a fair variety of economic thought, there are some institutions that fall on either side of the issue as a whole.

This is where I think the problem develops, those who followed free market beliefs cocoon their though process into believing that the free market can and does self regulate in the long term, without really address the effect of such policy on sectors not adequately covered such as infrastructure, health care, defense, and so on.

As I see it, free market economics epitomize efficiency but need to occasionally be adjusted and regulated to create the right incentives in cases of market failure. I'm doing economics at the moment in Brisbane, and I have to say elements of collusion, negative externalities and monopoly power under provision and extra normal profit extraction get tossed into virtually every unit we do.