Eminentoes
Three Little Piggies
… go against the market in trucking with the government.
(Page 2 of 2)
He [Emanuel] recalled that Mr. Dimon once phoned to protest the anti-business populism taking hold as voters tired of bailouts, and snapped, “Washington doesn’t get it!” “You guys don’t get the anger out there,” Mr. Emanuel replied. “Jamie, you’re asking then American people to bail out the industry. And if they’re going to bail out the industry, it’s got to change its habits.”
With its lofty motto of “All the News That’s Fit to Print,” we must assume that the New York Times demurely deleted all the F-words that studded at least one side of the conversation.
Of course, another part of being in the government relations business involves making the right noises about the environment, diversity, etc. And the darling Jamie does not disappoint here either. Among other bits of gratuitous information, we learn from the JP Morgan website that the bank’s “portfolio includes interests in 54 wind farms as well as several solar projects that together can power close to 1.5 million U.S. homes annually.” There is no mention of how many coal-fired electrical generating plants are in the “portfolio,” or how many U.S. homeowners have them to thank for cheap and abundant energy.
IN THEIR DREAMS OF revving up the economy, saving the planet, and meddling in the nation’s politics and social affairs, the three CEOs seem to have lost sight of the basic idea that the business of business is business. They may think they are gaining “a seat at the table,” but what they are really doing is playing a sucker’s game in inviting further intervention into the marketplace by people who have no respect for the marketplace.
A long time ago, Milton Friedman pointed out why he distrusted businesspeople who run on about the “social responsibilities of business in a free-enterprise system.” It is because “the doctrine of ‘social responsibility’ involves the acceptance of the socialist view that political mechanisms, not market mechanisms, are the appropriate way to determine the allocation of scarce resources to alternative uses.”
This is certainly the case with the Obama administration, whether one is talking about job creation, economic stimulus, health care reform, trade policy, limiting carbon emissions, financial and auto company bailouts, or changing the rules to make it easier for unions to monopolize the supply of labor at more companies.
Absolutely the last thing that this government wants to do is to
encourage market mechanisms at
the expense of political mechanisms.
Jamie and Jeff and Mikey-you can trust me on this one.
But maybe you still don’t get it. So let me be real clear: BEWARE THE BIG BAD WOLF. He may act nice…but he really doesn’t have your best interests at heart.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (33) | Leave a comment
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Eric G.| 9.2.09 @ 9:31AM
The craven capitulation of capitalists to a national socialist who wants to suck their blood dry is always shocking to lovers of freedom. How could someone be stupid or immoral? Yet it's happened over and over throughout history.
What these CEO government-butt-kissers need to understand, however, is that by abandoning freedom/free-market principles they are demolishing the only reliable support they have: freedom-lovers who supported them on principle.
At this point I will be happy to stand back and let the butt-kissers be destroyed by government, because the worst of all worlds is national socialism disguised as faux capitalism, in which capitalism and freedom get blamed for the misery caused by socialism (as is happening right now). Yes, I realize this is like calling down artillery on our own position, but that is the desperation of our situation.
So today, for example, I will for the first time call my congressman and demand strict price controls on pharmaceuticals. For years I defended their right on principle to profit from life-saving innovation, only to find they’re plumping for Obamacare and financing his propaganda campaign. Now their profiteering will be at the expense of my healthcare freedom, and their profits gained not through freedom but through government force.
And if Walmart is going to help the socialists destroy small retailers with government-forced healthcare regulation, then I say I’m done defending Walmart on free-market grounds. The next time they try to open a store in my area I will be shouting “NO” at the first public meeting with my “tea-bagger” friends.
Obama is the biggest threat of facism that we’ve ever seen in this country because he is so adept at corrupting capitalists into the service of national socialism, to the point that there is no political opposition remaining among the powerful institutions of the country. The populus stands alone as, for the first time, all the power elite align together against their interests.
martin j smith| 9.2.09 @ 10:41AM
Here is a new division Obama has created: Big business versus small business.
Ken (Old Texican)| 9.2.09 @ 11:13AM
Martin Smith You betchum Red Rider!
(a little indian boy comic book hero of my youth; his favorite saying to his adopted dad.)
TEAM AMERICA IS MADE UP OF SMALL BUSINESS NATION WIDE AND VETS!
http://judgeroy.wordpress.com
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