Which leads us to the root of the problem...
Publicly owned companies are run by the proxy of dollar votes and confidence in the value of a stock that may not neccessarily be tied to the quality of the company's performance...
That said, corporations are no longer led by individuals interested in the longevity of the corporation, however by the perceived value intrinsic to that corporation.
If the corporation is run without sustainability in mind it will fail... If this is widespread... and we do live in a capitalist society then the country fails...
The beauty of the American system is that we are not democracy, we are not socialist, we are a hybrid, that is able to shift in order to sustain the life of the union...
Do I know if any of this right?? NO, but its trying something that hasn't been done before... We allowed a president to tinker with pre-emptive war and now we will have to see how this all plays out...
As for the buying stock or not... I think in this case the govn't has the right to meddle as there would never be any one person silly enough to just throw in a bunch of money w/o a vote...