New rules in an old tug-of-war

In the messiest way possible—quite literally—America is rethinking and remaking the relationship between government and business. Only the latest example is unfolding in Louisiana. Even as oil laps ashore there after leaking from BP PLC's well, souls are being searched in Washington about why regulators didn't prevent the disaster or have a good answer for coping once it hit.


How about a contingency plan? Both the government and the industry (including BP) should have had contingency plans.

President Barack Obama's announcement Thursday of an extended moratorium on new deep-water drilling and suspension of exploration and lease sales elsewhere is only the beginning of a government re-evaluation of its relationship with the offshore oil industry. A presidential commission soon will put the relationship in full therapy.

I highly doubt that the re-evaluation will be comprehensive; lobbying will see to that.

Mr. Obama declared that the whole relationship has been marred by a "cozy and sometimes corrupt relationship" between the oil industry and government regulators, and there's bound to be much discussion of whether there was too little regulation. The better question, though, isn't about quantity but quality: Were regulations and regulators smart and up to date?

Cozy relationships and rotating-door movements between industry and government os the norm, not the exception, and it is pervasive.

Regulators up to date? C'mon. Between calls of socialism when the government tries to make strong rules that work, and underfunding of governmental agencies accompanied by shouts of fiscal prudency and limited government, how the hell can government agnecies be up to date?

The broader point is that the oil spill is just the latest in a series of traumatic events forcing a rethink of government's relationship with business. Bank bailouts, energy plans, auto-maker rescues, Toyota accelerator problems: All have forced both politicians and average Americans to rethink the proper role of government in a private economy.

Rethink? As in calls of socialism, communism, fiscal irresponsibility from the right?