Is having a free market like playing football without refs? Isn't man's natural instinct to cheat to win?

I'm a liberal democrat who generally supports free markets. After all, they are the basis of our economy and our American way of life.





But we have got to have at least a little more regulation over the market than we had the last 8 years - look what George W. Bush's ';hands-off, no government regulation'; policy has gotten us.Is having a free market like playing football without refs? Isn't man's natural instinct to cheat to win?
who defines what is ';fair play'; and what isn't?





any refs, of any stripe, flavour, or colour, from any government organized by any people will inherently have different interpretations of what is ';fair'; from any other set of refs.





When pretty much equal in power parties come together to do deals, the free market they create works quite well.





The devil seems to get involved when one party has little or no power relative to the other -- then we claim ';unfair'; and create rules and regulations through the power of government.








So which deals that you and yours were in were ';unfair'; to you and ';need'; regulation?Is having a free market like playing football without refs? Isn't man's natural instinct to cheat to win?
No, it's playing football with refs who don't have money on the game.





Govt should be the referee.





It just shouldn't be the owner or the coach.