For counterpoint, let's see a video of day-to-day life in a completely unregulated free-market paradise like Somalia.

Boy, I sure enjoy brushing my teeth more now that the gubment no longer forces Proctor and Gamble to keep the lead out.

@1 WIN

I was just going to suggest they move to Somalia. You beat me to it.

I'd much rather read the Q & A of the leader of Tea Party Nation on the Washington Post.

That shows them for who they are far more than just a video would.

Um,

Note to conservative assholes:

George Orwell was a proud Socialist. He believed in Socialism so much that he was willing to risk his life fighting for the Socialists in Spain against the pro-corporation and Falangist Franco.

Please stop using Orwell's words. He is not one of you. If he were alive today he would be far to the left of most Democrats and Labor Party members.

Damn, conservatives are stupid!

How I want the people to support this to die in a car crash due to Toyota cutting costs on safety measures or fall over dead due to cancer caused by a corporate chemical spill that was never cleaned up.

Just change the tone of the background music, and the snarky questions at the bottom, and this exact same video would be a pretty good advertisement for your federal tax dollars at work for you. Starting with, when you turn on your radio, and hear only one station at each frequency, instead of an unintelligible jumble of stations trying to drown each other out, yep, that's the FCC, just as the arrowed caption says. And so on through the video.

@7 - spot on. The ominous music is the funniest part of this. Ooooh... so scary that there's someone making sure your toothpaste and food doesn't contain harmful contaminants!

Streets, food, the hours you work are not dictated by YOU the citizen, they are dictated by the corporations that make them or that you work for. It's call living in a capitalist society and an interdependent community. The "regulatory state" is the govt protecting its citizens by ensuring that those corporations aren't taking advantage of the consumer, not the govt dictating your own personal life. If you want free will, live on a fucking farm and make your own food and clothing.

I got the impression that this video was sarcastic.

Seriously, is this a joke?

The general consensus of @1 through 10 pretty well sums up my feelings about the whole teabagger/fakey-libertarian axis of thought.

To wit: whereas the video sees consumer safety regulations as intrusive and sinister - 'do you need the government's permission to wake up?,' I welcome the gov'ts mandate to ensure that mattress manufacturers don't produce mattresses that outgas dangerous amounts of industrial solvents.

It's the same with the healthcare bill. Rather than this nonsense about death panels and government rationing, I welcome a regulatory apparatus that will help me and my loved ones better afford health insurance, while simultaneously protecting us from price-gouging, rescission-happy insurance companies. If it works well, in any case (here's hoping).

Can someone tell "these people" that there in fact can be a difference betwixt regulation and shitty regulation, that they don't neceassarily have to be one in the same? If you want BETTER regulation (which may very well be in some cases LESS regulation) then you need a smarter government, run on evidence-based politics.

I wonder how different this would be if the woman with an unplanned pregnancy was the protagonist.

At least one of the logos (the third--CSREES of the USDA) is a research and granting agency. It regulates nothing. Scary!

Eric @ 7 FTW.

Reminds me a bit of this brilliant post.