Don't you dare compare me
Cuz there ain't nobody near me
They don't see me, but they hear me
They don't feel me, but they fear me
I'm illy
-Lil' Wayne (or Henry Paulson)
This week's "proposal" (which was a "proposal" in the sense that Hitler "proposed" to his army that it invade Poland) for you and I to bail out private banks to the tune of one trillion dollars is difficult to blow out of proportion, even for obsequious blowhards such as myself.
Here's one way to frame it: this is the biggest theft in the history of the world, perpetrated upon a prone and prostrate public under color of legality, a "color" so pallid that it would embarrass a serf on a feudal manner. How it can be foisted upon a supposedly free and fiercely independent people for whom property rights are religious in nature is beyond my capacity to comprehend.
Here's another way to frame it: this is the biggest power-grab in the history of the world, perpetrated not by Kubla Khan or Saddam Hussein, but by the unelected, unimpressive, and unbelievably unconstitutionally-minded Henry Paulson.
Last night, in a piece of hard-hitting journalism, I learned on NBC nightly news that Mr. Paulson is a down-to-earth outdoorsman. Thank God! If only Saddam Hussein had been an avid fly-fisherman, perhaps we could have come to some peaceable arrangement with his crimes.
Here, in the plainest English is what has happened:
First, several private businesses operating in the "free market" failed.
Second, members of the federal government decided (on what authority, pray tell?) that these businesses could NOT be allowed to fail. Tens of thousands of American families could fail due to health care costs and mortgage woes, of course, but these businesses simply could NOT.
Third, an unelected member of that government, Mr. Paulson, proposed taking one trillion dollars of your money and my money and everyone else's money to GIVE to the failed private companies.
Fourth, the Congress, the only body legally allowed to spend our money, gets in line to dress this crime with ex-post-facto legitimacy, much as the UN did after the US invaded Iraq.
Much like Madame Clinton's health care proposal, what we are seeing now is a synthesizing of the worst of both worlds, of the risks of capitalism and the tyranny of socialism. We see profit being privatized and failure being socialized.
When private companies operate on the free market, whether it's a cocaine dealer or a Dunkin' Donuts or Bank of America, it's largely on its own. The upside of this arrangement is that entrepreneurial risk-takers can conceivably generate huge profits, which they then keep for themselves since they took all the risk. The downside is that such risk can, and usually does, end in failure, in which the risk-takers and investors lose their money.
When socialized entities operate, whether its a fire department or an army or a library, it's protected by the collective faith and credit of the society. The upside of this arrangement is that these institutions cannot "fail" in the sense that a private bank can. The downside is that they are seldom efficient, their investors are coerced, and even less seldom are they "profitable" in the purely capitalist sense.
What we have here is the worst of both worlds. We have private institutions which have failed, but not before they have reaped huge profits which have gone directly into the pockets of individuals. Now, after those institutions have failed, we are informed by our government that our society cannot "afford" such failure, with the implication being that they should have been socialized in the first place.
All indispensable institutions should be socialized, e.g. police and firefighters. If the failed banks were indispensable institutions, why were they left to the vagaries of the free market, and why were their executives allowed to pocket millions in profit?
The ex-post-facto labeling of the failed institutions as indispensable is the problem, for it creates a situation in which you and I must bail it out, but only after all the profits have been spirited away. So it was private until it failed. And now it's ours. Profits were privatized. And now, failure is socialized.
I understand that these things happen. I understand that they have happened before. But what we must ALL understand is that, when they did happen before, FDR took a vastly different approach.
When private businesses folded 80 years ago, FDR did indeed expropriate vast sums of wealth from the American people, but the whats and hows of his actions illuminate how far we have fallen as a society.
FDR did two things. Firstly, he had Congress expropriate the money, which seems rather...quaint? cute? Constitutional? Whatever it was, I'll take Congress over Henry Paulson any day. Secondly, he used the people's money on....THE PEOPLE.
FDR took money from the people, citing an emergency, and used that money to put the people to work. They built roads. They built sidewalks. They preserved national parks. They painted murals. They wrote books. They performed plays. They regained their dignity.
Bush (in the guise of good ol' Hank) took money from the people, citing an emergency and....gave it right back to the private businesses which had just failed. Nobody will get a job from this trillion dollars. Nobody will get their house back from this trillion dollars.
No, what we get is the peace of mind that we will wake up in a world tomorrow made safe for insurance companies, if not for homeowners or breadwinners. And what use is winning bread if the government can steal it from you with the excuse that you and your children come second to the health of a private bank?
It used to be that the government would rob you to feed you and give you a job. Now, the government robs you to feed the bank that just kicked you out of your house.
Cuz there ain't nobody near me
They don't see me, but they hear me
They don't feel me, but they fear me
I'm illy
-Lil' Wayne (or Henry Paulson)
This week's "proposal" (which was a "proposal" in the sense that Hitler "proposed" to his army that it invade Poland) for you and I to bail out private banks to the tune of one trillion dollars is difficult to blow out of proportion, even for obsequious blowhards such as myself.
Here's one way to frame it: this is the biggest theft in the history of the world, perpetrated upon a prone and prostrate public under color of legality, a "color" so pallid that it would embarrass a serf on a feudal manner. How it can be foisted upon a supposedly free and fiercely independent people for whom property rights are religious in nature is beyond my capacity to comprehend.
Here's another way to frame it: this is the biggest power-grab in the history of the world, perpetrated not by Kubla Khan or Saddam Hussein, but by the unelected, unimpressive, and unbelievably unconstitutionally-minded Henry Paulson.
Last night, in a piece of hard-hitting journalism, I learned on NBC nightly news that Mr. Paulson is a down-to-earth outdoorsman. Thank God! If only Saddam Hussein had been an avid fly-fisherman, perhaps we could have come to some peaceable arrangement with his crimes.
Here, in the plainest English is what has happened:
First, several private businesses operating in the "free market" failed.
Second, members of the federal government decided (on what authority, pray tell?) that these businesses could NOT be allowed to fail. Tens of thousands of American families could fail due to health care costs and mortgage woes, of course, but these businesses simply could NOT.
Third, an unelected member of that government, Mr. Paulson, proposed taking one trillion dollars of your money and my money and everyone else's money to GIVE to the failed private companies.
Fourth, the Congress, the only body legally allowed to spend our money, gets in line to dress this crime with ex-post-facto legitimacy, much as the UN did after the US invaded Iraq.
Much like Madame Clinton's health care proposal, what we are seeing now is a synthesizing of the worst of both worlds, of the risks of capitalism and the tyranny of socialism. We see profit being privatized and failure being socialized.
When private companies operate on the free market, whether it's a cocaine dealer or a Dunkin' Donuts or Bank of America, it's largely on its own. The upside of this arrangement is that entrepreneurial risk-takers can conceivably generate huge profits, which they then keep for themselves since they took all the risk. The downside is that such risk can, and usually does, end in failure, in which the risk-takers and investors lose their money.
When socialized entities operate, whether its a fire department or an army or a library, it's protected by the collective faith and credit of the society. The upside of this arrangement is that these institutions cannot "fail" in the sense that a private bank can. The downside is that they are seldom efficient, their investors are coerced, and even less seldom are they "profitable" in the purely capitalist sense.
What we have here is the worst of both worlds. We have private institutions which have failed, but not before they have reaped huge profits which have gone directly into the pockets of individuals. Now, after those institutions have failed, we are informed by our government that our society cannot "afford" such failure, with the implication being that they should have been socialized in the first place.
All indispensable institutions should be socialized, e.g. police and firefighters. If the failed banks were indispensable institutions, why were they left to the vagaries of the free market, and why were their executives allowed to pocket millions in profit?
The ex-post-facto labeling of the failed institutions as indispensable is the problem, for it creates a situation in which you and I must bail it out, but only after all the profits have been spirited away. So it was private until it failed. And now it's ours. Profits were privatized. And now, failure is socialized.
I understand that these things happen. I understand that they have happened before. But what we must ALL understand is that, when they did happen before, FDR took a vastly different approach.
When private businesses folded 80 years ago, FDR did indeed expropriate vast sums of wealth from the American people, but the whats and hows of his actions illuminate how far we have fallen as a society.
FDR did two things. Firstly, he had Congress expropriate the money, which seems rather...quaint? cute? Constitutional? Whatever it was, I'll take Congress over Henry Paulson any day. Secondly, he used the people's money on....THE PEOPLE.
FDR took money from the people, citing an emergency, and used that money to put the people to work. They built roads. They built sidewalks. They preserved national parks. They painted murals. They wrote books. They performed plays. They regained their dignity.
Bush (in the guise of good ol' Hank) took money from the people, citing an emergency and....gave it right back to the private businesses which had just failed. Nobody will get a job from this trillion dollars. Nobody will get their house back from this trillion dollars.
No, what we get is the peace of mind that we will wake up in a world tomorrow made safe for insurance companies, if not for homeowners or breadwinners. And what use is winning bread if the government can steal it from you with the excuse that you and your children come second to the health of a private bank?
It used to be that the government would rob you to feed you and give you a job. Now, the government robs you to feed the bank that just kicked you out of your house.
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