Greed is fact, not vice

I read this article, and I cringed. Friedrich Merz published a new book entitled ‘Mehr Kapitalismus wagen’ — that is: Courage for more capitalism. I thought, Wow! How surprisingly fresh. And — great timing! Surprising, because capitalism in Germany is given a rather nasty connotation: Capitalism = greed = bad. Great timing, because in times of noticable change, in times of today's credit crisis, more minds might want to break free from cattle mentality, to aquire more understanding.

What does Spiegel do with the news?

They talk down on it. With mockery, arrogance, and pretense, the book is presented as something that contradicts the Zeitgeist. Thinking like a journalist for Spiegel, the unquestioned assumption seems to be that failing banks are the result of capitalism. Therefore capitalism must be bad, and a book like this is rather scratchy.

In line with Spiegel's implicit reproach of Merz's book, one would ask: How could someone dare to argue in favor of capitalism, in times like this?! How could someone argue in favor of self-regulating markets, at a time when governments need to step in to clean up the mess? "The holy ghost of unsullied capital" cannot be permitted to undermine our moral duty. At least Friedrich Merz is not a "blind fanatic", according to Spiegel.

WTF! This reasoning is just too plausible, just too upside down - and the reason I can't stand Germany's hypocrisy - the nation of do-gooders. Ha! Greed is to blame, and government is our only hope?! Of course all this is lame and wicked reasoning.