I do agree. In many places, governments are weak, captured, or
corrupt. But those are mixed economies, in which state and corporate
power fuse into one corrupt swamp: corporations lobby for regulations
to crush rivals, officials sell favors. That's not evidence that
economic power equals political power, it's evidence that abandoning
the principle of a government limited to retaliatory force produces a
cold civil war of pressure groups. The solution isn't more regulation,
it's total separation of state and economics.
> your second paragraph is at odds with your third
No. The government acting as plaintiff is still retaliatory force:
harm occurred, the state helps identify the perpetrator. That's not
"public interest" overriding private rights, it's the government
protecting individual rights by standing in for many individuals who
share a common injury.
And yes, corporate leaders want political power. That's cronyism. They
want to use force because they can't win in a free market. It's a road
to dictatorship, but the road is laid by the principle of "public
interest," not unlimited profit motives.
There's no such thing as "the public," only individuals. When one
treats "the public" as a blank check to override private rights, one
is really saying: some people get sacrificed to others. The taxi
industry lobbying to ban Uber isn't about safety or competition.
"Affordable housing" mandates that force landlords to subsidize
strangers aren't compassion. This institutionalized cold civil war
won't end until the state stops pickign winners.