Rod - As for your Princeton reader's point, that's quite a dodge. It is not merely "somewhat strange" to attribute conservative reluctance to challenge promiscuity to corporate greed, it's absurd. For the sake of argument, let's stipulate that conservatives don't challenge promiscuity (a charge I dispute below). Ascribing the motives of conservatives to "greed" (a constant trope in your book, by the way) when greed isn't the motive is a serious analytical blunder. Ascribing it to some conspiracy of corporate vassels and string-pullers is an even more extreme exaggeration of that blunder. If you get the causes of a problem wrong, your solution will undoubtedly be wrong too. If you get the causes of a problem disastrously wrong, your solutions will likely follow suit. As this is a point you've already conceded, at least regarding that passage, I don't see the reason to belabor it.
