Leaks and whispers are a daily routine of news-gathering in Washington.

Maybe the reason some folks lag behind in our free enterprise system is because they depend too much on the free part and not enough on their own enterprise.

The burnt odor in Washington is from the disintegrating authority of the governing classes.

Our values are defined by what we will tolerate when it is done to others. Everyone's sense of virtue is degraded by the present reality. A revolutionary principle is embedded in the global economic system, awaiting broader recognition: Human dignity is indivisible. Across the distances of culture and nations, across vast gulfs of wealth and poverty, even the least among us are entitled to dignity, and no justification exists or brutalizing them in the pursuit of commerce.

A profound political question is suddenly on the table: Must the country continue to give precedence to private financial gain and market determinism over human lives and broad public values?

Obviously, people with low or even moderate incomes could not afford such savings rates, and even diligent savings from their low wages would not be enough to pay for either retirement or healthcare.

The great multinationals are unwilling to face the moral and economic contradictions of their own behavior - producing in low-wage dictatorships and selling to high-wage democracies. Indeed, the striking quality about global enterprises is how easily free-market capitalism puts aside its supposed values in order to do business. The conditions of human freedom do not matter to them so long as the market demand is robust. The absence of freedom, if anything, lends order and efficiency to their operations.