Music blogmeister Bob Lefsetz has rarely been short of opinions, distributed in daily bursts on everything from what’s wrong with the music business to which Elton John album is most essential. Today he surpised me with a powerful socio-political column – in fitting with his politics – put with a rare sustained accuracy point after point.

Read it now: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2014/08/19/hate-america/

I responded, after compliments and pleasantries, thus: 

From conformity to Ferguson, the breakdown of actual community has allowed 80% of the issues plaguing society to flourish. Community in America did not breakdown simply because of demographics and the ravages of emerging technologies. Community and capitalism had co-existed for decades.

Rather the deregulation largely associated with Reagan, but continued enthusiastically under Clinton, especially with NAFTA, removed a series of protections. Those prophylactics kept local economies functioning and geographic communities relatively staple, while placing a governor on capitalism’s engine. The effect proved similar…