NYT:
President Obama’s top economic advisers have determined that they can shore up the nation’s banking system without having to ask Congress for more money any time soon, according to administration officials.
In a significant shift, White House and Treasury Department officials now say they can stretch what is left of the $700 billion financial bailout fund further than they had expected a few months ago, simply by converting the government’s existing loans to the nation’s 19 biggest banks into common stock.
Converting those loans to common shares would turn the federal aid into available capital for a bank — and give the government a large ownership stake in return.
While the option appears to be a quick and easy way to avoid a confrontation with Congressional leaders wary of putting more money into the banks, some critics would consider it a back door to nationalization, since the government could become the largest shareholder in several banks.
Two questions: first, how is this a “back door to nationalization” rather than a de facto nationalization, given that the government is the majority shareholder? And second, is it okay yet to use the word “fascism” to describe a government that wishes to completely control the private sector, and is has already asserted that desire?
Bonus third question: does Charles Johnson have the power to ban me from my own website for raising questions 1 and 2?
(h/t Pablo)
Serious question: Is Charles Johnson going through the same transformation John Cole went through approx four years ago? If so, WTF?
Bonus question, on topic: If the Government is majority owner, do they have to comply with Sarbanes-Oxley?
Moebius regulation!
Regards,
Ric
You can’t be banned, so they do the next best thing: misinterpretation, derision, and attribution of bad faith.
It’s really scary when you look at the lengths the Left has gone to in the past four decades to redefine terms. Diversity means conformity with a coat of paint; tolerance means shouting down unwelcome arguments; fascism means defending one’s national interests; racism means judging someone on the content of his character over the color of his skin. All one needs to do is look at the other terms they’re redefining, and it’s pretty simple to figure out their game plan for the coming years.
What harm could a bunch of progressives do with the modern fractional reserve banking system?
Oh yeah, wow. We’re fucked.
Unless you are Glen Reynolds and maybe MM, all the money is on that side.
Now, imagine if you have years of cred as a “wingnut” to trade on! Hey, it worked for Cole.
The miserable sad sack.
Jen Rubin at Contentions:
Add to this the possibility Geithner converts warrants held in the banks that Paulson (where is he these days by the way, anyone heard his take on these events? NO?) forced to take Gov. funds whether they needed them or no. Now ain’t that a pretty picture?
Inflation through alliteration:
Required Reserve Ratios? Racist!
So if folks like Charles don’t want people to hope that Obama FAILS at implementing policies that are clearly the slippery slope to a fascist government, then what the hell do they want instead? Ask him nicely to stop trying to nationalize our entire economy?
I’ve said it before, but can you imagine how many more folks would be involved with the Tea Party protests if enormous bloggers like Charles were actually promoting them instead of pissing all over them?
Seriously, fuck these guys. I’m all about giving Mr. Johnson credit for detailing the rise of the Islamofascists, but now we have to fight back against Obama unravelling all the progress made in the last 8 years on that front, and guys like Charles are whining about Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh?
Um, big picture you dummies. We’re here for you whenever you are ready to face the music.
The Cole/Johnson comparison seems pretty apt to me too, by the way.
Now ain’t that a pretty picture?
And still people deride those who’d like to opt out of this strong central government system. The mind, it boggles.
Jonah Goldberg says that this is more akin to “corporatism” than “fascism.”
Nonetheless, this is some scary shit.
Question 1: Yes!
Question 2: Yes!
Question 3: Is that a rhetorical question? I denounce you as a right wing extremist for even suggesting anything negative about Charles Johnson. I denounce myself for agreeing with you.
Hood:
I have often wondered that myself. Whenever I post a comment about Cole’s tranformation on some blog no one seems to respond.
I just don’t think people can change THAT much. He was a libertarian type righty. Then he went WAY left. Seriously, how does someone change that much? It seems to be a affectation of some kind.
Plus his other poster (back in the day) was just virulently hateful. By his lights there were no good conservatives. That person is disturbed, like Olby.
ginsocal, I’m not sure how corporatism (corporativismo) is distinct from economic fascism.
Maybe Charles will ride his bike out of his cowardly lizard cave and take this issue on. But he will not because he is a yellow bastard.
I denounce denouncement. In a strongly worded written statement.
The lizard sticks his head out
Charles got his pal Roger Simon to ban Gates of Vienna from Pajamas Media and lable them racists.
Tim Geithner: “I’m a back door man!”
Corporatism must mean “fascism without the nationalism”.
You know, I just don’t think there is much more to say about CJ.
Honestly, do you think Chavez gave Obama pointers on how to nationalize shit? While they were doing their “bro-handshake.”
Rob,
It just means that the uniforms will be khakis and golf shirts. And jeans (or as Orville says, “Demon Pants”) on Fridays!
I thought the Cole thing was weird too, but there were a few more around the blogworld. I can think of three others off the top of my head.
Jeff – Your’s is a voice of sanity, worry not my friend.
It’s backdoor because this way they don’t have to come out and say “You know what? We’re gonna nationalize the banks.” Sdferr at #6 has the context correct.
You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.
Because of the affirmation/adulation.
Squid – I like that phrase demon pants. Not as much as a Juicy Lucy.
Maybe off topic but this feels like the place for obligatorily nuanced heart-ache!
Squish on squish, I love it. It’s
hotter thana chick fightI agree with Carin at 19. The Charles Johnson has no stature to where it’s a lot inorganic to make like he somehow warrants discussion. He’s even more of a loser than the Allah one I think and he makes the Moran one look emotionally stable.
Carin:
Politburo Diktat is one that I know of (calling Obama an elitist was racist in his eyes). What are the others you are thinking of?
Excluding Huffpo, she obviously did it for the money alone.
I’m next. I just rented a whole bunch of 70’s era Union movies, a bunch of 80’s farm in trouble movies, and all of the single black man or woman does something in the 60’s, 70’s or 80’s that makes them the first black person to accomplish that feat and if not, at least the first to do what they did and have a movie made out of their lives movies I could find.
Plus Redford. Lots and lots of Redford.
Who was it that told us calling Barcky skinny was racist? Inexperienced? Half-white?
Gordo is a douchebag. To save him the effort, I will note that you are all RACISTS. Consider yourselves denounced. Denounced and condemned.
I don’t know what’s going on with him these days, but at the very least he was one of the monsters of the blogosphere. He’s done some very excellent work on a number of very important issues. His going round the bend is an unfortunate development and I’m sad to see it.
John Cole went kind of off the deep end.
Ken Layne went absolutely batshit there, for a while. I haven’t looked for a while because, to be honest, it was very disturbing.
That was a Slate one I think JD. brb.
here, JD… I don’t see what the big deal is with the Charles Johnson. buh-bye is what I think. I am a bear of little patience.
I have often wondered that myself. Whenever I post a comment about Cole’s tranformation on some blog no one seems to respond.
Cole’s tranformation isn’t an affectation — it’s a feeble-minded expression of his anti-religious fervor. To him, the Schiavo episode and the gay marriage ban (NTTAWWT) made him positive that every Republican was an ignorant, snake-handling Southern Baptist preacher and every Democrat was a cross between Stephen Hawking and Albert Schweitzer. Hey, Cole was never the brightest of bulbs, by his own admission.
From the blog blurbs on the top left of the page:
He has another one in there too. I chuckle every time I catch one of them.
Off topic, maybe (for Jeff)*
Regards,
Ric
Thanks, hf. That was a particularly humorous one. It was at that point where I realized that it was racist of me to breathe, or even exist.
Question 2) If they use dividend proceeds to unionize congress???
It’s possible Layne has always been a bitter, nailbiting misanthrope. But it seemed to pick up quite a bit between 2002 and 2005 or so.
I bite my nails and am a misanthrope. Maybe I would like this Layne person you speak of?
The Gift that keeps giving
Goldberg said corporatism-not-socialism, last I read. I don’t think he’d say there’s a union/management/state-amalgamating corporatism distinct from fascism. Because there isn’t.
The “nationalism” thing is usually a red herring. You have to restrict the definition of the term to “only what the Nazis did” to make it fit only what the Nazis did.
And even then, the Nazis weren’t patriotic. Their fervor was for an idealized future Germany and a falsified past one; actually existing Germany was degenerate, derailed from its glorious promise by scummy types they defined as un-German.
“Take our country back!”
Says who?
Layne is the editor of Wonkette, it turns out. If that’s your idea of cool, go with it.
Here’s my plan: Let them equitize the bank’s loans. After they do it, though, start agitating for the government to privatize those shares, along the lines of Czechoslovakia after the Velvet Revolution. It is a bit wealth-distributionist, since the privatization shares would have to be doled out evenly and not in proportion to the amount of tax paid by a given citizen, but hey, it’s better than the government having all that influence…
I am beginning to be very frightened. This new boondoggle about prosecuting former Bush administration personnel for doing their jobs to the best of their ability without the benefit of hindsight is very,very scary. My grandparents remembered the pogroms in Russia and every day I see the rise of antisemitism. How do we stop the country from becoming Venezuela?
Bonus question, on topic: If the Government is majority owner, do they have to comply with Sarbanes-Oxley?
If they don’t comply, will the government fine the government? All of a sudden, I think I have an idea about where the $9,300,000,000,000 is going to come from.
That’s how the dirty socialists talk for real.
transnational fascism
hugh hewitt is doing his whole show on this witch hunt in the making
Hugh Hewitt is leading with the idea that Obama announced the beginning of a witch hunt when he said he won’t rule out prosecuting those who made the decisions that led to the “torture memos.”
And “corporatism” is the financial arrangement that distinguished fascists from socialists. So, fascism without the swastikas and death camps.
Heh. router
Michelle (small victory) and Ilyka both switched teams.
It IS nationalization, and the beginning of our BRAVE NEW WORLD of Corporatism/Social Democracy/Fascism/Whatever you can get away with calling it now…
We are SO fracked…
LOVE the xkcd cartoon. Funny because it’s true!
dicentra @53
I forget who said this, but I remember it went something like this: “Apart from the death camps and Jew hatred, there isn’t much about Nazi Germany that the modern liberal wouldn’t like.” I’m not even sure about the Jew hatred at this point.
An interesting essay by James DeLong at AEI (h/t Insty) that attempts to disentangle the current political monoline-backlash-rat’s-nest and to predict what comes next. The Coming Fourth American Republic
I hasten to point out, despite H. Hewitt’s topic today, that Mr. Hugh was pushing for all of Obastard’s nominations to go quickly through the Senate. Just give Geithner and Daschle a pass, no big deal, these things just happen to movers and shakers. I’m not kidding, he said this, precisely one day before Daschle took himself out of the running. It has become difficult to listen to Hugh and take him seriously, for me.
…to describe a government that wishes to completely control the private sector, and is has already asserted that desire?
Too Big To Fail means Too Big To Exist.
Decentralize, indeed. Blow up the Beltway.
BTW where the frickin’ frick has Geitner’s punch ready mug been this past week, anyway? Spending extra time poring over his TurboTax files?
Carin
Sorry to hear about Michele; she was one of my first regualar reads. I knew she had stopped political blogging, butI didn’t know she went all the way over. It just seems odd when it happens; I don’t think Obama is really her cup of tea either. Must be a lot of anger involved.
Revisited Ilyka about 6 months ago; learned while I was there that her last blogging had been about and amongst some very hardcore feminists.
Ah well.
Layne’s moment was when Zell Miller took the stage at the 2004 RNC. Was disheartening to see someone so completely lose it.
i like his show b/c he interviews alot interesting people like lileks and steyn.
pogo-obama “we have met the enemy and it is us”
#58: They’d like the death camps just fine; Billy Ayres was perfectly comfortable with the idea of executing 25 million Americans during his youth….
Ilyka went full-moonbat crazy. Michelle not so much. Close the election, she wrote a piece about Obama that was unreadable. When people called her on it, she closed ranks.
A line in that Slate link needs updating,
My point is that any discussion of Obama’s “skinniness” and its impact on the typical American voter can’t avoid being interpreted as a coded discussion of race.
should now read,
My point is that any discussion of Obama can’t avoid being interpreted as a coded discussion of race.
And even then, the Nazis weren’t patriotic. Their fervor was for an idealized future Germany and a falsified past one; actually existing Germany was degenerate, derailed from its glorious promise by scummy types they defined as un-German.
Their loyalty was to the party, like most Democrats these days.
Is partiotic a word?
65
Yes, the only bright spots on his show are usually those kinds of guests. But I just change the station when he talks to the lefty lawyer, or lets Obastard apparatchiks from, for example, Politico bloviate without challenge. Religion is fine, but some of his “evangelical” interviews are too parochial. And I don’t think interviewing a sponsor selling mortgages counts as a real interview.
me too i go to wabc and listen to levin. nice this internet radio thing
The DeLong essay should be given one’s time. I think he perfectly splits up the life of the republic into its major parts, with the Civil War and the New Deal as turning points.
I cannot see where this all leads. Even if we accept Obastard’s fantasy numbers for the deficit, how will the current arrangements hope to pay for the swelling burdens of Social Security, the prescription drug benefit, the effects of nationalized (in effect) medicine and environazi regulation? Where will the money come from? If any of you have a better grasp of history, was there ever a society that relegated so much of its own economy to public coffers, and made material success so dependent upon political power? I eliminate the USSR simply because its economy was so poor to begin with that I don’t know if a useful comparison is there. What about Imperial Rome? Various dynasties in China?
maybe the chicago model?
Mr. Hugh was pushing for all of Obastard’s nominations to go quickly through the Senate.
Because he thinks that’s what should happen to GOP nominees when it’s our turn. He’s very attuned to How The Game Is Played, having served in the Nixon Admin. I still like him, even when he is dismissive of things important to me.
If any of you have a better grasp of history, was there ever a society…
You can stop right there. When it comes to the U.S., the answer is NO, there wasn’t. We’re sui generis, top to bottom, alpha to omega. That’s not to say that history has no analogs, just that none can speak to more than a slice of what we are.
And it’s lefty whiny lawyer, BTW. Dude has a typical liberal voice.
How come that is? You can spot them when they call talk radio from the first faltering “I voted for George Bush twice, but…” to the final “…well I think it’s immoral.”
#75
Hugh’s problem with his strategy, if that is what it is, will be that even if the GOP plays ball with the Dems, the Dems will do no such thing in return if the GOP ever returns to power. And given the current GOP, that is a big if.
We’re sui generis, top to bottom, alpha to omega. That’s not to say that history has no analogs, just that none can speak to more than a slice of what we are.
I suspect you’re right, and that’s why it’s so hard to imagine what is coming our way.
John Rhys-Davies on Muslim immigration in Europe.
Not everyone is nuts.
Party Uber alles works for me.
For a while, 50’s to 80’s or so California was the model for the next step. I pray it is not now.
USA has been walking point for humanity for quite a while. It has both upsides and downsides.
Hugh’s problem with his strategy, if that is what it is, will be that even if the GOP plays ball with the Dems, the Dems will do no such thing in return if the GOP ever returns to power.
What’s with the future tense, George? The GOP has always decided to play by Marquis of Queensbury rules, and the Dems have always played smash-mouth.
At least for the last 30 years. I don’t always understand Hugh, but he’s an eternal optimist, and I’m an eternal pessimist, so I need the balance.
And I love his interviews with Steyn, Lileks, and most everyone else. And the movie hour on Fridays can be pretty fun. Hugh plays the idiot to the Unblinking Eye’s savant quite well.
For me, the movie hour is plain meh, but your mileage may vary. I prefer Duane to Hugh any day. I suppose Hugh may be an eternal optimist, but I have a hard time squaring the Hugh prior to the election, howling repeatedly about Obastard that “He’s a radical,” with the Hugh that thinks it’s good strategy to let Turbo Tax Timmy skate through the Senate confirmation process. From our “conservative firebrands,” I want to see opposition, continuous and virulent. McPain didn’t win on deference and moderation. He didn’t win, period.
I think I’m edging closer to the conclusion that the GOP is essentially a neutered relic. While I used to think the “party first” approach of people like Medved was serviceable and useful, I’m not so sure any longer. I don’t imagine David Frum is attracting hordes of new voters and younger people, since he’s selling Democrat Lite. I’m seriously wondering if it would be easier to change reddish Democrats into less statists beasts than to put hopes into getting the GOP to act like, well, the GOP.
It was a feeling that there was not a sufficient difference now between the parties that kept a majority of the voters away from the polls. When have we ever advocated a closed-door policy? Who has ever been barred from participating?
The linked file at #59 will make very, very interesting reading in light of your remarks.
Limbaugh has been banging that drum for more than 20 years, but no one in the GOP leadership will listen. You’d think that lesson would have been learned with the 1986 Budget Reform bill, where Reagan played ball with the Democraps and got mud thrown in his face in return, while the Donks laughed at all the gullible rubes in the GOP.
Very good point. I wonder if maybe a type of subconscious battle fatigue might be responsible for the seeming abdication of morality you see in so many on the left now. Maybe they just want someone else to lead and make the tough decisions once in awhile.
From our “conservative firebrands,†I want to see opposition,
Hugh isn’t a firebrand. Never was, never will be. We can count on him to say that even mentioning prosecution for policy decisions is a bad bad bad idea, but we can’t count on him to defend Ann Coulter’s latest outburst.
He declared today (and I have to believe it’s true), that our national defense got weaker today, right when Obama opened the door to the prosecutions, because now every bureaucrat and operative will start playing CYA instead of going after terrorists.
Best use for Hugh and Prager is to prove that not all wingers on the radio are fire-breathing hate-mongers. Well, proof for those who care to accept proof. To all others, we look exactly the same.
We’re doomedly fucked.
the problem with hugh is that he takes the opinions of Erwin Chemerinsky
seriously
Erwin Chemerinsky is a “smart” guy only in a maxwell way
actually hugh hewitt is part of the problem as posted @59 Comment by Sdferr on 4/21 @ 5:03 pm # The Coming Fourth American Republic.
he’s a parasite lawyer that does alot work in environmental law.
The big problem I’ve had with Hugh Hewitt over the past couple of elections is that he acted as though he were some kind of kingmaker. He wasn’t; he was just being used by the GOP, same as the other RW talk show hosts. That said, he usually runs a good show. I like his Thursday evenings with Mark Steyn.
he’s a cleveland fan
and hugh has the intelligence of a steeler fan.
He declared today (and I have to believe it’s true), that our national defense got weaker today, right when Obama opened the door to the prosecutions, because now every bureaucrat and operative will start playing CYA instead of going after terrorists.
Spot on, dicentra. Spot on.
Hugh may act as a kingmaker, but he doesn’t usually make any kings. He was all for Mitt and was hard on McCain until McCain won the nom, then he was McCain all the way (though he announced that he’d root hard for the nom no matter who it was).
Intelligence of a Steelers fan? It’s funny when Hugh does that, because Limbaugh is a Steelers fan. I like it when Hugh talks trash vis à vis sports. He’s not any kind of a tough guy, so it’s funny that way.
Hewitt was the only radio personality I listen to, who backed Bush on his inexplicable nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court.
#73
He’s gonna tax the living shit out of everything. What the hell did you think he was gonna do?
Hugh is Hugh, whadda gonna do?
I suspect Mitt may be the best positioned in 2012. Mitt unfortunately had the ability to alienate pretty much everyone he came in contact with–but if he goes back to what he truly his–a policy wonk who can fix the economy, that could work. If Obama keeps doing what he is doing there will not be a recovery by 2012.
I wouldn’t equate “firebrand” with “fire-breathing hate monger.” I don’t expect Hugh or anyone else to defend Coulter, she is quite capable of doing so herself. My beef goes back to the whole case of vapours the Proper Republicans were having over “I want Obama to fail.” I quite agree with that statement, and it’s sad that there are many conservatives who simply want to dismiss that statement as toxic and continue to play by the enemy’s rules. Prager is routinely called a right-wing extremist hater, and given the man’s careful reasoning and mild demeanor, I think that gives the lie to the notion that any high-profile conservative will be given a fair shake by The Deciders in the MSM. I see little utility in hoping that “they’ll just like us a little more if we sound moderate and mild.”
Attack, attack, attack. By that, I don’t mean “foam at the mouth.” I mean criticize, demean and debunk every action of your enemy. Small example: That noxious bill to force retailers to collect sales taxes for internet commerce, no matter if it’s interstate, is back. I read a comment saying that we can’t hang this around Obastard’s neck because the bill has been in the pipeline prior to January. I say, we can and must hang it around his neck. He promised no one making under $250K would pay a single dime more in taxes. He didn’t isolate that to income taxes. He is the President. He needs to start threatening to use that veto pen. That law cannot go into force without his signature short of a veto override, and in this sick economy he wants to force virtually everyone who shops online to pay more taxes? That’s not rabid foaming, but it is rather a fact that he can stop this if he chooses. And we should demand he do so. It’s also irrelevant that technically you and I are required to pay sales tax on out-of-state purchases to our respective states right now. The fact is that more tax will be collected with new enforcement, and this tax really screws the lower income end as well. It will make a lot of small online retailers hang it up. When this bill passes, it is entirely fair and proper to make it Obastard’s millstone. He’s in charge now, and can use that pen to eliminate this effectively massive tax hike.
hugh hewitt isn’t that far from Ron Gettelfinger in playing the angle of using the government to make money
Getting back to the original topic, do we understand that even if the gubmint holds preferred stock in a company without voting rights, that any decision on the part of the gubmint to sell or otherwise dispose of said shares will effectively have an enormous influence on share price? And will this possibility not influence the actions of that company’s board? I say this as a rebuttal to the excuse I’ve heard that “this isn’t socialism or nationalization” because the shares have no voting rights. I say the gubmint will perforce have enormous sway over the operations of such a corporation, when large percentages of equity in the firm belong to the State.
oh now your downloads are taxed
#102
heh heh
Sorry, OT, because when the comments section gets too long here – as in the previous thread – the “say it” button totally disappears behind the left margin of my screen:
“In time of victory, why is the left so angry?â€
Perhaps mostly because having achieved “victory”, proggs soon wake up to find that they are still the very same sad, afflicted-by-life/having-to-live people they’ve always been.
b/c hugh hewitt states on his show that his schtick is enviro law. hugh knows about the polar bears.
I cannot see where this all leads. Even if we accept Obastard’s fantasy numbers for the deficit, how will the current arrangements hope to pay for the swelling burdens of Social Security, the prescription drug benefit, the effects of nationalized (in effect) medicine and environazi regulation? Where will the money come from?
He doesn’t care. Or put another way, running the economy irretrievably into the ground is not a bug it is the prime feature.
Obama wants to fully remake society. You can’t do that so long as strong capitalist/free market underpinnings remain present and functioning. Anyone who resist the plan will be taxed until they cease their efforts or the fruits of their efforts are wholly owned by the state.
In order for Obama’s plans to succeed there can be no viable alternative or parallel course of action available. Liberty must be wholly eradicated just like smallpox.
That was the first guy I thought of. He was pretty solidly libertarian/right during the 2004 election, and my favorite blog at the time. I think his transformation started with a case of War Fatigue when things were not going so well in Iraq, and I honestly can’t fault anyone for that. But to simply adopt all the other positions of those who were for so long your political enemies seems oddly opportunistic. What grown adult does that? Funny that he decided to dump the whole “Commisar” shtick right around the time he moved severely leftward.
so hugh hewitt,gettelfinger and feinstein @ fdic and frank @ fannie and murtha et al and dodd at the trough. oh acorn. dc feeding frenzy.
Hugh lost me by being, in my view, visciously dismissive of Fred Thompson.
dicentra’s made a number of spot-on observations here–histoical analogs, national security…
Obama wants to fully remake society. You can’t do that so long as strong capitalist/free market underpinnings remain present and functioning.
I’ve been trying to picture where that leads. You can’t get enough money from taxes to cover all the skittles and gubmint sugar. So can the gubmint keep borrowing? Sooner or later won’t it run out of lenders? Are Zimbabwe and Weimar the endgame? It seems unthinkable. But…
At present, I think a little more than half of filing taxpayers pay zero income tax. What happens when only one out of four pays income tax? One out of ten? I guarantee the nine will not vote to start paying their “fair share.” What happens?
The federal and combined state budgets now spend about 36% of GDP, it keeps rising. What happens when it hits 50%? 75%?
Fred.
mpg file, h/t PaulL at JOM
it’s a doozy.
Comment by Sdferr on 4/21 @ 5:03 pm #
@111 the essay here ? speaks volumes about hugh hewitt; or the enviro thugs; or the union thugs: or the aarp thugs; they all want a piece of the federal bacon. how do you shut down this greed?
dicentra’s made a number of spot-on observations here–histoical analogs, national security…
Yes indeed. Well done.
I love that Fred! mp3 too.
Shut down the commerce clause?
“In time of victory, why is the left so angry?â€
Perhaps mostly because having achieved “victoryâ€, proggs soon wake up to find that they are still the very same sad, afflicted-by-life/having-to-live people they’ve always been.
Because for progs, the state is their religion, and when society is not utopia, then salvation has not arrived. It’s a bitter irony – the more they try to “fix” things among, the worse they get. Salvation never arrives and the rage builds further.
Look at Janeane Garofolo? Would you want to spend a moment with her, let alone a lifetime? These are miserable people, in both the literal and figurative sense.
Michael Greve, Commerce, Competition, and the Court: An Agenda for a Constitutional Revival, a lecture linked internally in the DeLong AEI article.
On the subject of fascism, the word has become so bastardized that it has lost its original meaning under the actual original Fascist parties.
It’s best at this point in time to describe our Sim President and his cohorts as corporatists. Perhaps Newsweek can do a fun front page cover declaring “We Are All Corporatists Now”.
I think her bitterness comes from the realization that she may not get to be a Re-education Camp Commandant while she’s still young enough to really enjoy it.
nice fascist posters of the O! during the election
1. Nationalize banks
2. ?
3. Profit!
I actually think the appropriate analogy is not Weimar and Zimbabwe. We will never have inflation in the multiple thousand percent (knock on wood). I think the more appropriate analogy (at least much closer to our current situation) is Argentina in the late 90s, a very prosperous nation that got overburdened with debts and eventually had to default which led to economic crisis.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argentine_economic_crisis_(1999%E2%80%932002)
This didn’t end well for Argentina. It won’t end well for us.
The only way to stop this particular end is to convince the stupid part of our public (roughly 53 percent, although we’d only need to bring a few percent over to our side to build a majority) that despite the media’s cheerleading of him, the Sim President is leading us over a cliff and is a complete disaster.
I feel more liberated to speak my mind that I ever did during the last 8 years actually. There’s no Bush boogeyman to defend (since he would never defend himself) and I can say whatever I damn well please now. You’d be surprised how many otherwise intelligent people you know still buy that everything will be fine since “only the rich are getting their taxes raised”. Trillion dollar deficits can be closed, the rich are just hiding their money in Switzerland…or something.
They’re fools. It’s our job to show them why. In a nuanced way of course.
Sooner or later won’t it run out of lenders? Are Zimbabwe and Weimar the endgame? It seems unthinkable. But…
Imagine a world of Weimars. A total collapse of international finance leading to a rejection of consumer culture -that is what they ultimately want. It really is a new form of puritanism.
Of course, it is doom to fail, and it will kill untold numbers. But when has that ever stopped them before?
You are also dealing with some true believers that think the Sim President cutting a $100 million in government waste (and then doing a huge press conference about it) makes him “fiscally conservative”.
This is the intelligence you are dealing with. Construct your arguments towards these people accordingly. After all, they did vote this clown into office to begin with.
If we had a media in our little country things would be different over night. It would be abrupt and that dipshit in our White House would be a lot confused and helpless.
#123
I like the cut of your jib.
Argentina’s fate sounds like a possible future here… I can see easily massive tax evasion and elaborate schemes to get parts of the economy underground. I can also imagine something else happening to all that gubmint sugar we’re supposed to get. For example, the free college education. The scheme will be larded up with so many qualifiers and restrictions that many will not be eligible or will refuse to take up the deal, effectively reducing the overall expenditures on “free college.”
We don’t though, and we need to stop wishing we do. Fuck the media, the NY Times is going out of business and I say the hell with them.
It’s time we fight back, and we do it by going around the media filter. I think people need to hear that we have an incompetent president who’s never run a goddamn thing in his life and is now bankrupting our country, because they’ve never heard those kind of things before. It’s a fucking revelation to them.
Say what you will about Bill Clinton (since it was mostly because he was dragged kicking and screaming by Congress), but at least under him we had:
A)Balanced budgets
B)Welfare Reform
C)Free Trade Agreements
D)”The era of big government is over”
Now we have:
A)A country on the verge of bankruptcy
B)Welfare reform essentially killed in the “stimulus” package
C)Sim President talking out of two sides of his mouth to union workers (“free trade sucks”) and to Canada (“that was just campaign rhetoric”)
D)A government that keeps getting bigger
This guy is a fucking disaster, Jimmy Carter squared. We need to tell people that. They’ve never heard it before. And there is no time like the present.
Even punitive tax rates will not be able to raise enough revenue to come close to covering the cost of Jimmy Carter^2’s plans. So will we reach the point where the gubmint can’t sell enough bonds to cover its outlays? Already certain Treasury auctions have been poorly received, and it was only worse in the UK and Germany. Will we see more of this? It’s hard to see how the gubmint won’t just start printing money if backed into a corner. I can also imagine the gubmint choosing to “reschedule” its payment on debt instruments. I can’t see it flatly defaulting on payment, given the demands to maintain legitimacy. I can see almost anything short of it. Will people actually want to flee the dollar?
dicentra’s made a number of spot-on observations here–histoical analogs, national security…
The national security thing — that the threat of prosecution induces CYA above all else — is from Hugh. I can’t claim it.
Of course, it is doomed to fail, and it will kill untold numbers.
Feature, not bug. Less atmospheric CO2, dontcha know!
Say what you will about Bill Clinton … but at least under him…
Events, dear boy, events! Clinton was not a hard-core ideologue and he reaped the benefits of the post-Soviet world. His narcissism led him to want only popularity and adoration. He didn’t have a messiah complex or any real beliefs of his own.
And I never thought I’d look back wistfully on Slick Willy. Curse you Obama!
Even punitive tax rates will not be able to raise enough revenue to come close to covering the cost of Jimmy Carter^2’s plans.
If they confiscated everything that everybody had it wouldn’t be enough. A few months ago, we crossed the line where our debt was greater than our wealth. The country is already bankrupt; it just hasn’t gone to court yet.
And if we’re Argentina, who sings “Don’t Cry for Me, Lib’rul Fascists”? Please say it’s not Madonna.
I don’t think W.J.Clinton ever conveyed the sense that he believed the United States a dishonorable nation all told (yeah, I know he apologized for some things), do you?
Whereas with B. Obama, I have yet to get the sense that he has the first clue what the United States is and isn’t.
The more I think about that DeLong essay, the more it rings true. This ignoramus in the White House is the crumbling capstone on a ziggurat of special interest statism that has been swelling since the New Deal. If one tries to consider Obastard in the light of Constitutional ideals and the categories of individual rights, the limits of government power and abstract nouns like “freedom” or “liberty,” he is incomprehensible. But when you look at His Hooves as the ripest fruit of a tree whose branches are race, sex, entitlement to material wealth, class envy, group identity, things become much clearer.
I really believe that he will try to print his way out of all the debt problems. First stop or limit the inflation adjustments to everything, Social Sec., union contracts, tax brackets etc. Then inflate the debt away.
That this will bring down the entire world economic system is an added plus. There is no entity like IMF that can lend enough for what we will need. Our debtors will not react kindly.
To put it another way, what Jefferson or Hamilton saw when they considered the State in relation to Man has as much in common with what Obastard sees as a battleship has to do with a baby carriage.
#135
Yes… what will the baby boomer Obastard voter do when he raises the Social Scamcurity retirement age to 85? Will they revolt? Can Barry find the balls to crush, say, COLA adjustments to Teachers’ Pensions?
Events, you say? That one should be interesting.
“…does Charles Johnson have the power to ban me from my own website…”
I can see him searching the web for names of people that he perceives have slighted him, then creating an account for them so that he can ban them.
This boomer non-Obama voter will just keep working. Somehow, somewhere.
“Typical foie gras production involves force-feeding birds more food than they would eat in the wild, and much more than they would voluntarily eat domestically. The feed, usually corn boiled with fat (to facilitate ingestion), deposits large amounts of fat in the liver, thereby producing the buttery consistency sought by the gastronome.”
Mmmm, buttery.
Garçon, throw another banker on the fire, will you?
That’s not a given, obviously. Read today’s news on Citigroup. The shareholders couldn’t even oust the board when they tried.
Obama’s plan is resurrecting the Republican collapse quite nicely.
I thought the teacher’s pensions were through investments which were all in the tank like the IRAs and 401Ks. The main, from a government perspective, COLAs would be on SocSec and government union employees.
Under high inflation it is not just having a COLA but how often it is adjusted. The yearly adjustments used now would not help anyone under an inflation that was enough to knock down the debt the US has and Obama plans to add. More rapid adjustment would be a reward for the loyal.
143
Yes, I suspect you’re right about teacher’s pensions. I was merely trying to come up with a concrete example of what kind of political capital Messiah would have to spend in order to scale back on gubmint sugar. In other words, which special interest groups will be the first under the bus?
On the other hand, I wouldn’t put it past the Divine Administration to simply decree whatever plan X, Y or Z is expedient at the time. Foolish consistencies like legality don’t seem to be a priority any longer. Look at what the Treasury is doing with TARP and related programs… there appear to be no bounds on the amounts of public money to borrow or what it does with the money. The Treasury seems to have such leeway that they can literally drive trillions of dollars through it. “Limits” seems to be a word unknown to these people.
Victory is within their grasp at last. Limits are such a quaint concept which never apply to the “One”. Only to other lower beings.
He can probably ban people who have accounts at his place and who comment here, claiming they’re “talking behind his back” or similar.
he scheme will be larded up with so many qualifiers and restrictions that many will not be eligible or will refuse to take up the deal, effectively reducing the overall expenditures on “free college.â€
I foresee any “free college education” scheme would result in the rise of book prices like you wouldn’t believe. Once students didn’t have to worry about that pesky tuition… the skies the limit.
#130
No it won’t, but he’s (Obama) putting super chargered hemis on the money presses as we speak. Not that it’s going to help, but they don’t think along those lines. Before this is over we’re going wish we were like Argintina at its worst. I’m not optimistic.
Read today’s news on Citigroup. The shareholders couldn’t even oust the board when they tried.
Is Citigroup a tropical corporation? Or are they seasonally tropical? Prolly what the problem is.
We’d better run that question by TurboTax Tim.
Comment by B Moe on 4/22 @ 5:18 am #
Please ignore the talking asscrack.
Thank you.
” think his transformation started with a case of War Fatigue when things were not going so well in Iraq, and I honestly can’t fault anyone for that.”
I can. I had to fight in the darn thing (twice – once in Afghanistan and once in Iraq). Should I have used “fatigue” as an excuse to totally tank? That was P. Noonan’s excuse – she was “tired” from all this history being made. Stupid and baffling to hear from people who’s involvement in a conflict is/was commentary.
LTC John–thank you.
Indeed. The horror of having your brow repeatedly wrinkle over your morning cup of Lady Grey and a copy of the NYT sort of pales in comparison to waking up in the shit day after day. Well said, LTC John.
Interesting how an politically ideologically shift quickly changes into a “I don’t want to talk about it anymore.” The commissar doesn’t do politics. Michele doesn’t either.
Very OT but any chance we could have a thread about the Miss. California/Perez Hilton thing. Preferably with a number of pictures of the lovely Miss California. Her interview with Roger Aisles last night on fox is also worth watching- she handled the entire affair with the poise and grace severely lacking on the left.
(she’s also against bailouts and handouts).
I see that the interim head of Freddie Mac, Frank Pantangello has committed suicide. I see more blood to come from this administration.
I’ts in the pub. Yes, lotsa pictures. None of Perez.. NTTAWWT.
I shoulda checked first. Thanks Carin =)
And thanks again. That entire Carrie thread made my morning bearable.
Perez Hilton is a tool.
153
Yeah it was funny as hell hearing all those people bitch about the war more than I did. Now all those people don’t seem to care anymore about the war. Yeah real funny.
/
Godfather II? No wait that was Frankie Pentangeli.
Yeah, Sorry Geoff. To all, be sure to eat with your back to the wall.
As noted just above, this fellow, David Kellerman handled Sarbanes-Oxley compliance for FreddieMac.
Kellerman/Pantangelli, it’s all the same story.
Perez Hilton is a symptom.
FTA: Bonus third question: does Charles Johnson have the power to ban me from my own website for raising questions 1 and 2?
No but he will ban you merely for down dinging his recent suck up articles dealing with obama and napalitano. I know cause he just banned me. Did me a favor since I was going to quit reading his propaganda anyway.
Hf, “Perez Hilton is a symptom.
”
What’s the disease and is there a cure?
Soory if the comment makes no sense. My mouse has developed a mind of its own, and I can’t see the left side of the comment as I type.
Perez Hilton is a silly, silly man, and not really the best face for the gay marriage movement.
I mean, perhaps they should pick someone who doesn’t draw cum stains on the faces of Hollywood starlets.
just saying.
I eat more chicken than any man ever seen…
All I know is Hugh went off on the fair tax last night and wouldn’t address any of the principles names, as he spoke to this guy Hank who stressed that he didn’t know the names of any of the proponents of the fair tax. I suggest they pick up Neal Boortz and John Linder’s books on the fair tax and give them a good read. Personally I’d love the fair tax because I have read and I acknowledge all of eht players, which Hugh and this Hank dude are apparently too dishonest or able to acknowledge. Just the elimination of the IRS would make it ok with me.
but of course I’m old, and tired of the fight, so I’d take a 10% flat tax and move on.
But Hewitt was disgraceful and dishonest last night. He lost me, he can go fuck himself.