The Pope fights against the dark side of the For…invisible hand (irony inside)

The Pope came up with his latest ‘Apostolic Exhortation’ which rightly criticises those very evil free-markets. A few quotes:

The current financial crisis can make us overlook the fact that it originated in a profound human crisis: the denial of the primacy of the human person!

Really? I thought it originated in an unfortunate combination of too low interest rates and ill-defined regulation. I must have got it plain wrong.

While the earnings of a minority are growing exponentially, so too is the gap separating the majority from the prosperity enjoyed by those happy few. This imbalance is the result of ideologies which defend the absolute autonomy of the marketplace and financial speculation. Consequently, they reject the right of states, charged with vigilance for the common good, to exercise any form of control. A new tyranny is thus born, invisible and often virtual, which unilaterally and relentlessly imposes its own laws and rules.

States and politicians have always sought power for the common good, that’s for sure. I thought the Vatican was in Rome, where Berlusconi, a truly disinterested politician who sacrificed himself for the common good, ruled for many years. News reports don’t seem to be reliable around there. The Pope is right: for the greater good, we should all be governed and controlled by a handful of individuals whose only wish is to improve our way of life (rather than by a multitude of selfish individuals who have opposite interests and very limited control on anything).

Debt and the accumulation of interest also make it difficult for countries to realize the potential of their own economies and keep citizens from enjoying their real purchasing power. To all this we can add widespread corruption and self-serving tax evasion, which have taken on worldwide dimensions.

The Pope is right again: all those highly indebted countries have become so because of free markets’ greed. Certainly not because of the disinterested politicians who rule them. But, wait… Corrupted politicians? What do you mean? I thought they were “charged with vigilance for the common good”!

We can no longer trust in the unseen forces and the invisible hand of the market.

True. We have lived in free-markets for too long. We now have to rein them in and replace the invisible hand with Berlusconi’s hand.

Right. So I guess I, and my blog, are unlikely going to end in Heaven. I should have thought about that before opening it

Actually, I’m pretty sure that God’s knowledge is beyond comparison with our current Pope’s. I can sleep well tonight.

Let’s finish with Frederic Bastiat (The Law):

If the natural tendencies of mankind are so bad that it is not safe to permit people to be free, how is it that the tendencies of these organizers are always good? Do not the legislators and their appointed agents also belong to the human race? Or do they believe that they themselves are made of a finer clay than the rest of mankind?