"Wall St. broke the social contract that exists in Capitalism."
This was John McCain's claim this morning on Morning Joe, this is a huge indicator of just how much John McCain is out of his depth when it comes to the economy, which is that he does not even understand what Capitalism means. Any student of Poli. Sci 101 will tell you that there is no inherent 'Social Contract' in Capitalism, the whole idea of Capitalism is to do away with the concept of Social Contract where there is any sort of an obligation on part of one section of society to another. Here is a definition of Capitalism from Wikipedia:
Capitalism is the economic system in which the means of production are owned by private persons, and operated for profit[1] and where investments, distribution, income, production and pricing of goods and services are predominantly determined through the operation of a free market.[2] Capitalism is usually considered to involve the right of individuals and corporations to trade, incorporate, employ workers, and use money, in goods, services (including finance), labor and land.[2] By definition, production and distribution in a capitalist system are governed by the free market rather than state regulation,[3] though this does not exclude the state defining and enforcing the basic rules of the market[4] and may include the provision of a few basic public goods and infrastructure.[5] Classic unrestrained capitalism is currently confined to theory, as "all of the capitalistic societies of the West have mixed economies that temper capitalism" with interventionist government regulation and social programs.[6]
This makes it clear that any sort of Social Contract imposed on Capitalism comes from 'Interventionist' governments, and is not an inherent part of it. This is the very sort of 'regulation' that McCain is so vehemently against. I know that this quote will probably be too high brow to put in a TV ad, but this needs to be pounded by Obama surrogates as well as Obama when they point out McCain's cluelessness about Economic issues.