I agree from a macro and idealistic standpoint. Why? Other than for the purpose of creating secure, lifetime jobs for career bureaucrats, the government does a poor job at just about everything that it sinks its teeth into--with the exception of WAR IN SELF-DEFENSE versus WAR OF CHOICE --although, at the onset, it always begins with the best of intentions.

However, from a realistic standpoint, I disagree. Why? That's because you'd wind up playing a shell game with the American people. Now you see it, now you don't. Politicians just can't help it - it's in their DNA to create huge and bloated bureaucracies as the answer to every problem. Once you create one of these bureaucracies, they tend to take a life of their own, become completely unrestrained, and just BLOAT and BLOAT until they implode under their own weight. The minute you get rid of one bureaucracy, 1-5 more would pop up in its place. The net savings is $0 or a negative $1 trillion dollars.

Douglas Rushkoff is right on the money with his assessment of Facebook. In fact, I predicted back in 2008 in the article "Evolution of Social Networks into Virtual Organizations" at http://www.virtualorganization.net/2008/07/evolution-of-social-networks-into.html that these social networks will eventually evolve into virtual organizations within the next 5 years. All the hype going on around Facebook's "valuation" is a sure indicator that we're getting very close to the end of Facebook's dominance of the social network era. As well, it's a perfect time to begin to prepare to cash out even before you begin to invest. The cashing out window period is 12-18 months following any upcoming IPO because I predict that the next 2 years portend to be the "supernova" stage for Facebook, that point at which it will shine its brightest before it begins to completely collapse. As an investor, you definitely don't want to wait for the full 2 years because it will definitely be too late by then. My advice is to SELL, SELL, SELL by no later than 18 months following their IPO, regardless of the selling price of the stock. I did also write an update on that article back in April 2010 titled "An Update on the Evolution of Social Networks" at http://www.virtualorganization.net/2010/04/update-on-evolution-of-social-networks.html which sorts of validates my 2008 prediction and the 5-year timetable. Without getting too technical and philosophical, there is a very good and fundamental reason why Facebook or any other successful newcomer is unable to escape their fate. That reason is based on the current One-Sided Coin strategy that is so much the central component of the business model of these social networks. I have written about that in great detail in an article titled "Content Monetization Strategy for Social Networks" at http://www.virtualorganization.net/2009/03/content-monetization-strategy-for.html ::