http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/id.11202/pub_detail.asp
If there is one obvious condition associated with the last century, it is the lack of government humility. Among the century’s leadership there was the self confident belief that “good ideas” will trump tradition, customs, history, even instinct. There were scarcely limits to political ingenuity. Here was the triumph of positivism, the assumption that rationality can subdue emotion. The engineers were in history’s driver’s seat and the lights appeared to be synchronized in green. Somewhere along the way things went wrong and the lights turned crimson.
For public policy sophisticates, the imperfections in the free market suggested a reliance on planned capitalism. Former President Clinton embodied this view when he said “we can pick the winners in the economy and encourage them with appropriate incentives.” Erstwhile President George W. Bush referred to his domestic policy as “compassionate conservatism,” a belief predicated on government acting as a charity. And President Obama outdid his predecessors by actually inserting government as a partial owner of private enterprises, e.g. AIG, General Motors.