... and speaking of regs

The Bush era has been for businesses of all kinds sort of like a rebirth of the "free love" movement of the 1960s. Anything goes. Leave us alone. Let us prosper any way we can. Regulation? Oppressive and inhibiting. Oversight by government? Aw ... why do you guys always want to spoil the party?

But just as some of those flower children of days gone by now have regrets about their era, and adopt a considerably more strict attitude toward their own children, so it appears that even some traditionally pro-business advocates are having second thoughts about the nation's free-wheeling economy.

For one thing, some of the wheels have come off. The hazards in some imports from China. Contaminated food.

All these things may not be the result of a lack of regulation, or an easy-going attitude about enforcing the regulations that do exist, but as The Wall Street Journal reports, various business interests are a little worried that if the White House changes parties -- and perhaps even if it doesn't -- they're in for a round of tougher regulation. And in fact, some industries that might have resisted more rules in the past, grocery stores and toy stores to name two, are now thinking that better controls maybe wouldn't be all that bad. They may even be thinking of liability in the courts.

Federal regulation, and state regulation as well, doesn't have to be onerous, as industries typically claim it is, for those operating in good faith. The idea behind regulations is prevention -- finding that airline safety glitch before there is a catastrophe, rooting out bad spinach before someone gets sick.

Problems on a variety of fronts signal it's time that the pendulum was put in motion again -- and yes, for a time, it may have to stay on the side of tougher and better rules.