Nothing keeps a company honest and efficient like the threat of other companies coming along and taking its business away.

The lawyer's sophistry continues as he blames corporations for "making the dreams of millions of Americans 'disappear' in the form of home foreclosures and job losses."

This is more nonsense. Yes, some Americans (2 percent of those who had mortgages) suffered foreclosures, and some jobs disappeared (80,000 last month). But the lawyer and other anti-business hysterics in politics and the media never acknowledge that corporate America built those homes in the first place. It was corporate America that made homeowners' dreams possible by giving mortgages to the 98 percent of homeowners who haven't defaulted. It was also corporate America that created 25 million jobs over the past 15 years.

If the lawyers and eager regulators have their way, they might eliminate some of those bad mortgages. They also might prevent companies from firing 80,000 workers. But it's not worth it. Their freedom-killing "consumer-protection" rules and lawsuits crush innovation in a thousand ways. They stifle business creation and deter homebuilding. For every person they help, they hurt a thousand. If they got their way 15 years ago, most of those 25 million jobs would never have been created.

Yes, America now may face a recession. Maybe. But when people are free and capitalism is allowed, there will be "over-exuberance," followed by contractions. That's why it's called a business "cycle."

That creative destruction is what creates American dreams while, yes, allowing some to disappear.

Americans achieved a living standard that is the envy of the world. It is the direct result of the large degree of economic freedom we have enjoyed. Unleashing the lawyers to "protect" us will kill many, many dreams.