The Constitution is a fairly open ended document, there really isn't much the government is restricted from doing. "Intent of the founders" is often quoted, but actually has no force, and really very little meaning, the founders were a very dissimilar group ranging from Hamilton to Jefferson. The "freedom of speech" mentioned in the first amendment, for example, going by the founders discussions was directed at political speech only, the city of Boston felt perfectly able to ban thousands of books because they didn't like the speech they represented as being too racy. Not that many of the early Americans didn't consider such as terribly prudish:
http://web.campbell.edu/faculty/vanderg ... onial.html
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A major issue that Puritan leaders struggled against was the commonly-accepted view that legitimate sexual relations could begin at the time of engagement, rather than waiting for the wedding. "Puritan orthodoxy had to contend with alternate beliefs and standards even among those who considered themselves respectable, God-fearing men and women: the covenanted community itself proved to be a hybrid culture" (Godbeer 22; see also, 7, 9). Many New Englanders followed a view common in England that "the boundary between illicit and licit sex was crossed once a couple became committed to each other," even though church leaders argued strongly against this (Godbeer 3).
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Cohabitation: cohabitation was also prevalent in the 17th century. John Miller, a minister who traveled through New York in 1695, �was appalled to observe that �many couples live[d] together without ever being married in any manner of way.� It was not uncommon, he reported, for such couples to separate after several years of living together, whereupon both would �take unto themselves, either in New York or some other province, new companions.� Those who did �intend to be married together� often engaged in �ante-nuptial fornication,� which was �not looked upon as any scandal or sin�� (Godbeer 8).
Godbeer adds that it was not unusual for early Americans to pass from one cohabitational relationship to the next with scant regard for the formalities of divorce and remarriage� (41).
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It would be easy to provide a number of such references, largely unknown outside the academic community. Myth overtakes reality in any history of more than a century past, and the "purity" of our ancestors is always a large part of such myths - and you can find quotes from historians regretting the "degenerancy" of the "modern" age all the way back to the early Greeks.
The occupy movement is a natural reaction to something that's been going on for quite a few years now, the use of public funds to prop up the wealthiest one tenth of one percent of the US population. A list that only gives the high points of that over the last few decades is pretty impressive, S&L crisis, LTCM crisis, dot com bubble, subprime mortgage crisis and bubble and these are only the major ones inside the USA, ignoring minor things like the salvation of the Hunt brothers. Even discounting the actions by the Fed, there were trillions of dollars poured into various risky ratholes where the top .1% had stashed large sums they were in fear of losing. Don't forget our support for a number of other countries which had their own various failures ongoing during that period. It is not an exaggeration to believe that without this government support, there would be far fewer wealthy persons in the world today, certainly there would be many fewer in the USA. While people tend to ignore such issues in "normal" economic times, in hard times the question of "what did my tax dollars go for" becomes uppermost in peoples minds.
The reactions on both the left and right were inevitable, so we have both the tea party and the occupy movements (and I'll wager you can easily find people who've turned out for both) which essentially are yelling for the same thing, for the government to quit propping up the .1% and to let them assume their own risks. I've yet to hear a single person interviewed in either movement who thought the bailouts were just perfect.
Koo is correct or somewhat correct, though it may be better to just focus on infrastructure improvement and let business rebuild itself. This recent penchant for the government to "let business do it all" and not get their hands dirty is costing a ton of money in added costs.
Semantic confusion abounds when reading any articles about banks or corporations or business in general. Both banks and corporations, not to mention businesses in general, are organizations of people. Actions by the "banks" are actions taken by people. There is no such thing in reality as a bank or corporation, both terms are used to describe legal fictions that grant certain rights to organizations of people to take certain actions and (hopefully) turn a profit without causing social disunity. This seems to be very easily forgotten by the various business writers.
Middle of the night and I'm rambling a bit. Oh well, let it stand.