Hey, I have no problem with that point of view at all. I, and I believe most reasonable liberals, also are suspicious of authority, and very aware of its abuses.

What I find very dangerous is the kind of reasoning that goes something like this: Government is very capable of abuse, therefore, the private sector must therefore be just the opposite, and incapable of abuse.

In fact, there is a sort of idealization, a lionization of private enterprise (the noble hard-working entrepreneur), and a concomitant demonization of the public sector (the evil power-hungry bureaucrat) which if not immediately accepted and agreed with is seized on as evidence of being totally socialistic, if not downright treasonous. And when you protest at this totally unfair characterization, you are accused of being pro-government and anti-business: I think the current slur is "statist". Yeah, I know, extreme leftists do the same thing.

I think most people, in both government and business, try to do a good job. I'm not being a pollyanna about this, I do believe most people believe doing the right thing is not only morally preferable, but in the long run, is good for business and their careers. They also realize that the market, (in business), and the voter, (in government), as well as the law, (in both), works to enforce this paradigm.

But there are also blind, impersonal market and power forces at work that tend to undermine these principles, both evil ones from unscrupulous people, as well as perfectly natural ones from normal, decent folks (after all, we all generally believe what is best for us is best for everyone). And of course, honest people will often disagree.

Since there are no principles or laws of nature that will tell us ahead of time what is good or bad, we just have to muddle through as best we can, and hammer out the best compromise we can. In fact, I think liberals in particular tend to be very leery of all-encompassing principles and laws. They tend to be invoked in a very one-sided and self-serving manner by abusers, whether they be on the right or left.