Edward Welsch is the executive editor at Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture.

Early in the article Bezos is described as a libertarian and then shortly as a neoliberal. Those 2 things are anywhere near the same thing. Bezos true colors have been shown to be more of a neoliberal, a part of the US private/public regime. That isn’t libertarian in any way.

Many of the criticisms are simply a company out competing its competition. That is a good thing, even if it means other retail businesses suffer. That is what markets do, reward efficiency. If other retailers see that partnering with Amazon isn’t a good deal for them, then they would be wise to avoid working with them. Find another way to improve their business.

However the government assistance and cronyism is a real problem. Preferential treatment isn’t honest competition. It is very common for large corporations today, so I am more interested to hear ways to break corporate-government bonds than to entertainment anti trust activity, which have really done little to increase competition in the past.

The other real problem is the injury rate in their facilities. If they are covering those up or somehow using government ties to get a pass on these things, then they need to be hit very hard.

Standard Oil and Bell are examples of what NOT to do. Rockefeller himself said that he made a fortune on the breakup—it diversified his portfolio. Breaking Bell into regional monopolies didn’t bring my landlines costs down to even notice. A regional monopoly is not competition. I don’t get how punishing efficiency is an incentive for entrepreneurs. What I’m in favor of is requiring Amazon to be treated as a place of public accommodation and requiring that they comply to established case law. How about curtailing their censorship and cherry picking merchants. Let’s make public their algorithms and rules. There is so much that can be done to save the baby without throwing it out with the bath water. I have no connection to Amazon except as a very satisfied consumer. I’ve actually found myself using eBay more as they have shored-up their supplier base recently.

I appreciated your article. I’ve read several others detailing his sharp practices, predatory attitude, and reneging behavior. I avoid Amazon purchases and encourage others to do the same.

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