The scraps of a dead car company are being pulled apart by statist bullies and anxious creditors with legal standing.
In the end, it seems like there was more of an urge to save union jobs than to save a struggling company.
Quin Hillyer on today’s seeming trend towards greater authoritarianism.
This is scary stuff. It is not just a diminution of freedom, but a frontal assault. And it’s only part of the story, the whole of which is even worse. We now have the government refusing to accept repayment of loans it made to various banks — preferring to keep control of the banks to regaining the taxpayers’ money quickly. Moving from economics to coercion and the use of the state to target political enemies, we have a Homeland Security Department targeting veterans and anti-abortionists as potential terrorists, and a White House leaving open the option of prosecuting its predecessors over honest policy choices made in a time of war and without identifying any specific domestic law supposedly broken. We see selective release of previously classified information for political purposes. We have the advancement of “hate crimes” legislation that makes it a prosecutable offense to think unapproved thoughts. (House Republican Leader John Boehner was right to say the bill makes him “want to throw up.”)
These moves might seem like insignificant outcomes to unrelated situations, but they mean something.
Jon Stewart is a schmuck.
Jonah Goldberg smashes some left-wing “wisdom”:
Meme – “These (tax) protests are unpatriotic astroturfing by plutocrats.”
So much for “dissent is the highest form of patriotism”!
I find it sort of amazing that when groups like ANSWER, a Mos Eisley cantina of America-hating nut cases, take to the streets it’s a full-flowering of democracy in action. When ACORN pays their ragamuffins to protest, or when Rainbow/PUSH shakes down businesses through racial extortion, it’s the sort of direct democratic action Thomas Paine dreamed of. And when labor unions pay people to protest, it’s populist. But when a bunch of independent Americans, talk-show hosts, and email campaigners organize hundreds of protests around the country, it’s astroturfing.
But more importantly, he attempts to set the record straight on what statist fascism isn’t, not that anyone hurling these ignorant epithets would listen or understand anyway:
Meme- “The populist anger out there is the real face of America’s homegrown fascism.”
How do I say this so people will understand? Fascism isn’t a libertarian doctrine! It just isn’t, never will be, and it can’t be cast as one. Anarchism, secessionism, extreme localism, or rampant individualism may be bad, evil, wrong, stupid, selfish, and all sorts of other things (though not by my lights). But they have nothing to do with a totalitarian vision of the state where individuals and institutions alike must march in step and take orders from the government.
If you think shrinking government and getting it less involved in your life is a hallmark of tyranny it is only because you are either grotesquely ignorant or because you subscribe to a statist ideology that believes the expansion of the state is the expansion of liberty.
Emphasis his.
Out of all of the major issues facing America on April 15th, it just so happened to be the perfect time, naturally, for the DHS to warn against right-wing militias!
The foot stomping and window smashing didn’t help either.
Correction: make that grassroots foot stomping and window smashing. This was supposedly a spontaneous demonstration against racist thought.
Jennifer Rudinger, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union in North Carolina, said the protesters’ actions amounted to “de facto censorship.” She had seen video of Tancredo’s appearance on YouTube.
“This is disturbing,” she said. “That video is chilling.”
Rudinger said Tancredo has the right to express his views against mass immigration, just as students at N.C. State had the right to paint racist remarks against President Barack Obama on the campus Free Expression Tunnel on Election Day last fall.
She was doing so well, until the mandatory mention of N.C State’s racist graffiti on Election Day! If we must remember that–as we well should–we should also remember what became of those student actions. There were mass protests against the graffiti. There were student apologies. There were “smart people” in the university system proposing hate crime advisory panels and additional diversity training for students. Will they propose the same here?
Let me think for a long minute. . . hmm. Nope.
A random, spontaneous act of racist graffiti by four students in a room specifically appropriated for, um, graffiti requires a top-down public soul cleansing with everyone having to take some bitter panaceas.
A coordinated, physically violent attack on free expression by a former politician invited to speak is just an anomaly for which no one will ever have to apologize.
And by Rightwing I mean Leftwing immigration activists.
But I’m sure none of these protestors have any allegiences to any ideological movements.
And this on the very day the Obama administration cautioned Americans to be on the lookout for so-called rightwing extremism.
Christopher Hitchens remarks on the stark differences between two recent, large public gatherings in Lebanon–the free and open-minded annual commemoration of Raif Hariri’s assassination in Beruit proper and the grim, fascist death seance at a Hezbollah rally:
The contrast between the two rallies could not have been greater. Try picturing a Shiite-Muslim mega-church in a huge downtown tent, with separate entrances for men and women and separate seating (with the women all covered in black). A huge poster of a nuclear mushroom cloud surmounts the scene, with the inscription oh zionists, if you want this type of war then so be it! During the warm-up, an onstage Muslim Milli Vanilli orchestra and choir lip-synchs badly to a repetitive, robotic music video that shows lurid scenes of martyrdom and warfare. There is keening and wailing, while the aisles are patrolled by gray-uniformed male stewards and black-chador’d crones. Key words keep repeating themselves with thumping effect: shahid (martyr), jihad (holy war), yehud (Jew). In the special section for guests there sits a group of uniformed and be-medaled officials representing the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Hitchens also alludes to the next (inevitable) war in the region, between Israel and the Iran / Hezbollah / Hamas / Syria / Venezuela / Cuba / Russian axis. You know it’s coming.
CBC members shower Fidel Castro with praise after visiting his “modest house” and are calling for enhanced dialog with the (retired) Cuban leader.
“It was almost like listening to an old friend,” said Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Il.), adding that he found Castro’s home to be modest and Castro’s wife to be particularly hospitable.
Awww. You see? He’s just like one of us. We can dialog with this man–after all, don’t we share interests? He’s eighty-two. Isn’t it about time we reassessed the situation?
Kaus isn’t falling for any of this silliness and is warning about the next escalation of Cuban intrigue.
Vodkapundit remarks on the curious, um, remarks from the New York Times regarding the massive economic stimulus in early 1930′s Germany, otherwise known as GigantArschficker.*
(The NYT link requires a user name and password, which I will most certainly not provide).
* best available German translation
Shy, reclusive billionaire George Soros denies any wrongdoing after his pet project is fined after crashing Hungarian financial markets:
In a statement Friday, Hungarian-born Soros responded he had been informed of the fine but insisted that he was not involved in the transactions.
“I no longer control the Soros Fund Management’s operations, I retired last year and now only oversee the transactions to do with my private account,” he said in the statement, published by Hungarian news agency MTI.
He’s just a peaceful, content old man tending to his tomato plants. And by tomato plants I mean strategic financial and propaganda campaigns purposed with enshrining the international left.
Soros has expressed regret, but what was done was done. It’s in the past now. Shall we move on?
Although, he just “ran” GM by running its CEO out of office, the President . . is . . .just. . not . . that. . . into. . . running car companies. But that doesn’t mean he discards the idea of using the production of automobiles to remake America. The ground work is getting laid here for something big. . .
Also from today’s speech:
Obama addressed industry workers, a crucial constituency, saying that while there may be more pain to come, “I will fight for you. You are the reason I am here today. I will fight to bring the methods and resources of production under your control and, together, we will produce something so essential to our being it will elevate us.”
I might have added the last sentence but what I think he’s getting at is this is the time to rally around remaking a once great company (which, for all of its warts, would have been a sustainable organization if not for the worldwide credit crisis) into a visionary enterprise destined to lift unionized American workers out of their grim situation. It’s about the next ‘peoples car’, and who will control its production, consumption, and usage.
"Nice little Chevy Volt"
America will make the Chevy Volt in its own image, with its own sweat and blood.
A sign of things to come: government-backed car warranties for GM, Chrysler.
Because it’s the “change we so desperately need” (from the comments).
Some Kausian perspective:
After visibly defenstrating GM CEO RIck Wagoner, and moving to replace the board of directors, won’t Obama now “own” the GM problem? If the company shuts down in the near future, costing tens of thousands of blue collar jobs, it will be under executives implicitly or explicitly chosen by Obama. It will be Obama’s failure, not simply GM’s failure, no? A public sector failure, not just a business failure. Doesn’t that make it harder, not easier, for the administration to walk away and force the company into bankruptcy (if, for example, the company’s plans for “viability” continue to fall short after the new 60-day deadline)? And doesn’t that, in turn, make extracting the necessary concessions (by threatening bankruptcy) more difficult as well? … This wouldn’t be the first time that financier-turned-autoczar Steven Rattner’s tendency to talk to the press–and maybe emphasize his own role–proved counterproductive.
There will be so, so much more to this.
Media Matters calls out Sean Hannity:
Sean Hannity claimed that President Obama has proposed “nationalized health care,” similar to programs in Great Britain and Canada. In fact, earlier that day, Obama explicitly rejected scrapping the U.S. health-care system in favor of the British or Canadian model.
Now, although the President may have said he wants universal health coverage:
OBAMA: Now, the question is, if you’re going to fix it, why not do a universal health-care system like the European countries? I actually want a universal health-care system. That is our goal. I think we should be able to provide health insurance to every American that they can afford and that provides them high quality.
So I think we can accomplish it. Now, whether we do it exactly the way European countries do or Canada does is a different question, because there are a variety of ways to get to universal health-care coverage.
. . do you think for one minute that he could accomplish this without pairing it with some massively expanded, government-administered program? And wow, look that this–Nancy Pelosi just happens to be talking about providing a government-run program. Wow, what timing!
Hannity is guilty only of being slightly unspecific.
How much farther are we going to let statist politicians grow their public sector fiefdoms at the expense of private enterprise? One British MP has had enough, and let his “master” have it.
And this is after we learn that your government knew about these AIG bonuses for months.
It’s almost as if this is an orchestrated attack intended to inflame class tensions. Naw, can’t believe I said that. Why would anybody want to do that?
Well, I might have got a name wrong here or there, but what is it with socialists wearing red? And the power grabs? Seems prevalent these days. . .
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano wants to start calling acts of terrorism “man-caused disasters” in order to move away from the “politics of fear”, or whatever the fuck that is.
Janet, honey, the terrorists don’t SPEAK english and likely wouldn’t understand such PC nuance anyway. In fact, if they whiff anything from such a vacuous shift it is likely dithering resolve.
But as long as you feel better.
What a difference a couple of months make. Who really controls the language anymore?
Reading Matthew Dallek I wonder if he really thinks that ‘socialist’ is simply a outdated label foisted on innocent progressives by out of touch conservatives recklessly grasping for any semblance of relevance:
Earlier this week, President Barack Obama decided to follow up on an interview with The New York Times and assure a reporter that he wasn’t, in fact, a socialist. “It was hard for me to believe that you were entirely serious about that socialist question,” Obama said.
The question arose because, at the Conservative Political Action Conference in late February, a raft of conservative leaders declared that Obama’s stimulus and budget plans would bring socialism to the United States.
No, the question arose because. . . pssss (a hint to help you out here) . . . . Obama ran as a socialist New Party candidate in 1996. Now go tell all your liberal friends.
But here’s why the socialist label won’t stick: It’s highly anachronistic. And meaningless.
I mostly agree here. The label is too broad and maybe it’s being used disparagingly. But enough with the Big “S” Socialist strawmen. Today’s leading liberals and progressives may not exactly be card carrying Chavistas (well, some actually are) but they are certainly making things fuzzy.
Contemporary liberals and progressives, whether they realize it or not, exhibit affinity for class parity, ‘long march’ social change from within, and increased central command of economic resources–all tenets of old school socialism.
Mr. Dallek cannot understand why someone who is openly calling for the explicit and forceful redistribution of wealth, nationalized healthcare, and increased central control of the economy would be called a socialist. Simply not understanding is forgiveable–saying that such correlations are incorrect (or “anachronistic”) is noxious.
Just because a christian might not regularly attend services, tithe his income, volunteer, or proselytize to the masses doesn’t mean he’s not a christian in the broad sense. He identifies with a set of values associated with Christianity. He’s the protypical, small “c” christian.
Obama’s predecessor, President George W. Bush, was the first to use taxpayers’ money to help prop up ailing banks and avoid a collapse of the nation’s financial system.
Like. There. Was. No. Consulting. With. The Opposition. Including. The. Incoming. Administration.
More important, the debate about whether liberals are turning America into a socialist government actually ended four decades ago.
It did? Because the debate seems to be going pretty strong right now, and you’re fueling it.
. . . the image of Obama as a socialist is also patently absurd in the eyes of the American people. Socialism is no longer perceived as a threat to the United States; charges about liberals-as-socialists, then, have more than a whiff of unreality about them.
Socialism is not a type of government that is voted in or out, or is worn proudly as a badge by some apparachik. It is an approach to economic control that happens to be entirely contrary to America’s founding principles of individual liberty and economic freedom. This isn’t some conservative talking point–it’s a fact. And just because our current system depends on certain quasi-socialist safety nets doesn’t mean America is already socialist.
Worldwide, after all, there are hardly any socialists who hold powerful positions in the major nations and want to abandon capitalism altogether. France’s former president Francois Mitterrand was a socialist, but he began to privatize state-owned concerns in the ’80s, and Europe’s socialist leaders today tend to support some free-market economic policies. The onetime socialist hero Fidel Castro is ailing and has ceded control of Cuba to his brother Raul. And Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez has become more a symbol of anti-American sentiment in Latin America than a leader of a struggle to liberate the proletariat from capitalist oppression. But that’s pretty much it.
You’re either a full-blown Socialist Lion or you’re a nobody. My guess is that the thousands of social democrats and democratic socialists operating most of the democratic governments of the world would take offense to this. Their impact is undeniably powerful, and their influence can be felt in all major cultural and scientific movements, from environmentalism to international wage agreements.
I’m sure it was just lucky coincidence that Fox, mostly out of the spotlight since the great stem cell debate of the early ‘naughties, has a press release about his personal outlook on science and health the same exact day Obama magically parts the waters of politics and science.
I, for one, could NEVER have seen this coming.
I just can’t put my finger on it, but. . . . .it’s almost as if the President and popular media are, like, joined at the hip . . . .or something. Weird, huh?
Obama making “clarifications”. Obama blames former President Bush—not for setting him up with a huge “socialist” deficit–but for making it necessary to enact much larger “socialist” deficit.
Does Gore use these moderated panels as proof that he’s operating on the premise of having an open mind? Because he sounds more like a corporate fatcat unwilling to concede any nit at any cost. As if he’s got. . . . some ulterior motive to keep towing the line.
Where does he get off claiming the chapter of scientific debate on climate change was closed long ago? The only thing that’s been settled is that there isn’t any firm conclusion. The man has been showing signs of hockey-stick psychosis for nearly a decade but yet remains undebatable. Score one for enlightened discourse, Al.
The White House happily admits of a coordinated campaign to discredit their critics. Not on the merits of any particular argument, mind you, but on polling. In any other time, with any other President and circumstance, this would amount to a shocking revelation with dangerous consequences to civil liberties.
Remember all that talk from Democrats about the “politics of personal destruction”? It was all bullshit.
What sort of arrogant fascism is going on here? We’ve long expected organized whisper campaigns were afoot, but for one to be actually celebrated in a major media outlet like Politico is more than unsettling. They would not pursue this kind of “clear the decks” tactic unless their shock polls didn’t suggest some problems with their big picture. I’m not suggesting that the White House can’t exploit the weaknesses of its ideological enemies, but when has a President ever unashamedly unleashed the state and its affiliated media on a single private citizen who’s only crimes are 1) he has a different opinion than liberals and 2) he polls unfavorably with liberals?
When did the Bush administration launch a five prong attack to silence Michael Moore?
So here is a list of sniveling fascists that start every morning with a conference call with the White House to coordinate their daily attacks:
Are they going to try to smear you too?
