I think almost everyone falls on the side of not believing that the government has demonstrated very much capability of regulating anything. Me included.

Having said that, it's pretty clear that the dramatic disassembling of the regulations and the regulatory agencies, particularly over the last fifteen years or so, has left us all with a twisted impression of how regulation works. I was amazed when all those lead-painted toys came into the country from China to find out that all the inspectors in the Consumer Safety Commission had been fired except one. There was--and maybe still is--only one "regulator" standing between 300 million people and dangerous consumer products. The same may have been true of the peanuts, I don't know. We've all read of the meager staffing and inspections of meat and processed meat in the country. And the complete absence of any regulators with the responsibility for inspecting meat or food imported from other countries. I'm sure there are many more examples.

Then there's either the changing of the laws resulting in diminished or diluted regulations such as the repeal of Glass-Steagall and the exemption of financial derivatives from any regulation. And the selective interpretation of other regulations such as the EPA approving the dumping of mercury from a steel mill into Lake Michigan within 20 miles of a water intake for the Chicago water system, or the interpretation of a regulation concluding that land within sight of some of our most treasured national parks in Utah could be sold to oil exploration companies.

What I'm saying is maybe we haven't seen government regulation at its finest hour in the last 15-20 years. Fortunately, some regulatory agencies still work so long as the regulations that they enforce haven't been diluted. The FAA, NHTSA, and a few others come to mind.

However the problem gets fixed--whether by new or additional regulation or some other way--it's pretty obvious that the way we've been doing it for the last 15 years didn't work.