Socialism seems to be alive and well in America, despite rhetoric to the contrary. The government bailed out Bear Stearns with a very large subsidy, while Congress has passed a law to support homeowners that are in danger of foreclosures. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing, but there’s a slight cognitive dissonance in that a lot of people in power extol the virtue of a pure free market with minimum regulation.
Of course, the severe economic downturn is in large part due to the deregulation frenzy the current administration has been on (there probably still would have been a downturn, but it wouldn’t have been as severe without the administration’s policies). So it’s a little funny to see them trying to fix problems caused by a free market agenda with socialist solutions. The White House seems to only support corporate socialism, though, since there was nary a peep from them concerning the Bear Stearns bailout, while they threatened a veto of the homeowner relief bill.
For the record, I’m neither a pure capitalist nor a pure socialist. I prefer a mix and match of whatever works.