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Special Report
The Moocher’s Credo
Deconstructing Elizabeth Warren’s ode to crab antics that has made her an instant celebrity.
Elizabeth Warren has become an instant celebrity among liberals for her rant before what appeared to be a small coffee klatch of supporters captured on YouTube in her bid to replace Scott Brown as the Senator from Massachusetts.
The former Harvard professor, who blazed the trail for President Obama’s new Consumer Credit Financial Protection Bureau (although Republicans in Congress blocked her being appointed the first head), puts forth a spontaneous declaration of liberal and Democratic claims on the American economy. I’m going to print the whole thing because I think it’s worth deconstructing, word-by-word. You don’t have to look any further to see why Obamaism points straight towards Greece.
I hear all this, you know, “Well, this is class warfare,” this is whatever.” No. There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own — nobody.
You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I want to be clear. You moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate. You were safe in your factory because of police-forces and fire-forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn’t have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory — and hire someone to protect against this — because of the work the rest of us did.
Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea. God bless — keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is, you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along.
Got that? OK, let’s take a look at what she’s saying.
My first reaction on reading this is, “Wow, this is the crab bucket syndrome.” It’s well known among police officers, social workers and community organizers (like Barack Obama) that one of the most difficult and tragic phenomena in African-American ghettoes is that when one individual starts succeeding at something, like crabs hanging onto the legs of another crab trying to escape the bucket, everybody will impede his or her progress to the point of making it impossible for them to escape into the outside world. For a while there was a practice in eastern cities known as “kneecapping,” where a young athlete who was showing promise as a basketball player would have his kneecaps broken so that he could not leave his buddies behind. Any student who tries hard to succeed at school is accused of “acting white.”
“We’re the ones who made you what you are!” “You never would have gotten anywhere without us!” “You owe us!” These are the common cries of people who are afraid they will come up short. And of course all this glides easily into, “You’re not going anywhere unless you take us.”
It’s not an isolated phenomenon. It’s common enough in families, particularly the extended families of developing countries. People who study immigration have found that the Senegalese salesmen who sprout on the sidewalks of New York selling umbrellas whenever it rains or the Guatemalans trying to make a living mowing people’s lawns are usually sending half their income back home to their extended families in West Africa or Central America. It’s an admirable act of loyalty but also a real impediment to any individual success, since workers are constantly being drained of their savings.
Developmental economists who studied the Third World in the 1960s and 1970s found this one of the most difficult roadblocks to growing a commercial economy. It is, in fact, the age-old problem of capitalism — whenever an individual succeeds at something, they immediately earn the resentment of their neighbors who believe that if someone is getting rich then other people must be getting poor. Anyone who starts a business is immediately overwhelmed by the claims of friends and relatives — and government officials — demanding their share.
This produced what seemed an extremely puzzling anomaly — that throughout the Third World the entrepreneurial sectors were run largely by foreigners, often immigrants from other Third World countries. The small business sector in Latin America was dominated by Japanese and Chinese immigrants. Cuba had a large complement of Chinese entrepreneurs who, when chased out by the Cuban revolution, moved to New York and opened a string of restaurants advertising “Comidas Cubana y Chinoise.” The commercial sector in East Africa was run largely by Indian immigrants. The most important step in development, the economists argued, would be to get native peoples to accept entrepreneurial success among their own countrymen. This is what Deng Xiaoping was trying to do when he told his fellow Chinese that it didn’t matter what color a cat was as long as it could catch mice.
What Elizabeth Warren is trying to do, then, is bring this Third World mentality to America. “Nobody in this country ever got rich on their own. Nobody!” “You only made it because of the rest of us.” Which is to say, “You owe us, buddy — big time.”
To her way of thinking, things such as roads, law enforcement, and education can only be provided by the government. Without the state, every private business in America would be besieged by mobs trying to rip off their inventory and sell their machinery for scrap. (That “community organizers” such as Elizabeth Warren and Barack Obama would probably be leading such mobs will pass notice for now.) Let’s look at the examples Warren offers:
Roads and transportation. The fact that government now owns most of the roads in the country does not mean without government there would be no roads. It simply means that road building and maintenance are mundane and unimaginative tasks that have been turned over to the government because nobody sees any chance of making money at it— or rather that the government would undoubtedly prevent anyone from profiting at it if they tried. Many of America’s first roads were toll roads built by private companies. Ferries, bridges, and commuter railroads were also private. Eventually people began to resent paying these fares and asked the government to take them over “for the good of the people.” Road building has also devolved to the government because, as the landscape becomes more settled, it requires the power of eminent domain to push roads through populated areas. This is a compromise most people accept, although the details of “taking private property without due compensation” are still being worked out in the courts.
Perhaps the best example of this is the New York City subway system. The original subway line — the Interborough Rapid Transit (IRT) — was built in 1905 on contract by a private corporation and then leased back to it by the city government. The Brooklyn-Manhattan Transit (BMT), built shortly after, was entirely private. During the 1920s the Independent (IND) line was built by the city government to prove it could do things just as well as private enterprise. The big problem was the “5-cent fare.” Because the fare had been 5 cents in 1905 when the first line was built, New York City politicians decided it should be 5 cents forever. Whole mayoral campaigns were run around “saving the 5-cent fare.” Finally, just before World War II, the 5-cent fare bankrupted both the IRT and the BMT and the city took over. The fare stands at $2.50 today but must be hugely subsidized in order to pay the wages and pensions of the Transit Workers Union.
About the Author
Green Lantern is the pen-name of an East Coast writer.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (170) | Leave a comment
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Drudge Ette Obama| 9.26.11 @ 6:30AM
If it is true that Timothy Geitner nixed Warren's appointment behind the scenes, we may actually owe him some credit.
This woman is a loon - I saw her on television and she appeared angry, dogmatic and somewhat unstable. That aside, I would watch that video again where she stands at the doorway of the house, waiving her arms around and insisting that no one earns money on their own, that the rich businessman uses publically built roads to move his materials to production and market, so he should pay more. She may have had too much pinot grigio and brie that night, but it is very enlightening and instructive to see the kooks unleashed in their natural state.
And to think, there are more of these types out there - they are good at keeping a low profile because when exposed, rational people see fruit with cake.
SpiralArchitect| 9.26.11 @ 1:56PM
Surely she would take a nominal wage & certainly disperse her pension when put in any Gov position, elected or appointed or otherwise.
She would obviously pay back her income to the people (ie:taxpayers) that allowed & assisted her to her position.
No doubt she would easily repay her debt to the people that volenteered to promote her for any position or post.
Undoubtably, she would not be happy until any person that wants to set out to start any business starts an autocracy whereas they could build all the foundations from a plain piece of land to whatever they required - using their own private funds. Of course how they obtained their funds would be suspect unless they found them in a hole or simply miracled them.
Yes, unless we all go tribal again, mind you this is impossible doing it on a solo basis, this lawyer will not be acceptant nor content.
Adam Smith| 9.26.11 @ 2:38PM
She never earned "HER" money - She was given OUR money - so it's not "Her" mouth she's running it's OURS!!!! Anybody out there get a useful and FAIR exchange for their hard earned tax dollars from this nasty dope and her wicked mouth?
Yeah, didn't think so -
So, STFU Ms Warren!
You have heard from you betters. . .
Bill A | 9.26.11 @ 3:33PM
There is nothing about this woman's politics that I agree with. Her statements were geared to her audience. She is trying to become a US Senator from Mass. This is the same state that considers Scott a Republican. What she is saying sells in Mass.
Nina| 9.26.11 @ 4:01PM
Geesh, I used to be embarrassed before for living in MA, but this woman put a whole new meaning on that! Hopefully, people in this state are sick and tired of the rhetoric and class warfare, yep class warfare, and not vote her in as a Senator! Someone shook that family tree a little too hard and the nuts are falling out!
Bill A | 9.26.11 @ 4:39PM
Nina, remember in 1994 we were the first state to vote in congressional term limits. In that same election Ted Kennedy was elected to his sixth term in the US Senate. How one puts those two pieces of logic in the same puzzle escapes me.
Darin| 9.26.11 @ 6:53AM
She completely ignores the fact that people got paid to do these things (build roads, teach kids, protect others, etc.). No one forced them to do any of these jobs. In a free society, you can choose to do (or not do) things and should expect to be compensated (or not compensated) accordingly. The road crews, teachers, and police received their compensation. Apparently, the business owner is not entitled their compensation.
Lets take her twisted logic one step further. Teachers should be force to give up a large portion of their pay. Why? Someone built the building they use. Someone provided the electricity and water. Someone provided the desks, chairs, paper, etc. Ridiculous? Of course, but so is her rant against business owners.
farmboy| 9.26.11 @ 7:18AM
The funding of all she spoke of first comes from business activity. She has the cart before the horse.
Occam's Tool| 9.26.11 @ 2:21PM
Liberals are economic idiots. Surprise, surprise. I learned this first hand from a very pleasant marxist (openly so, and I did get an "A.") sociology professor, who misstated the purpose of the capitalist entrepeneur the first week of class. And he was the smartest Leftwinger I've ever met and he didn't understand how capital had to be guided and molded by an operating intelligence in order to grow.
Teaghan| 9.26.11 @ 10:56AM
AND someone made those CHILL-REN that they're teaching!
DLB| 9.26.11 @ 7:11AM
The businessman builds a factory that employs hundreds or thousands of people, and this bloated government tick who never created a dime of wealth wants a bigger cut? How anyone can celebrate this disgusting parasite is beyond me.
Mike D.| 9.26.11 @ 7:26AM
These people worked hard to build the entitlement class, took decades and now this is mainstream thinking. I like the fact that they are now out of the closet and feeling their oats, just makes them look exactly what they are. This women is a basket case of leftist dribble. What makes it worse is that their are people who vote for this creature willingly.
Appleby| 9.26.11 @ 7:26AM
People who have never had jobs in the reall world or lived on a middle class budget or had to put anything on lay-away will never understand how things fit together. I would like to hear her explanation of how a jigsaw puzzle is put together!
Timothy L. Pennell| 9.26.11 @ 7:28AM
It's Penis Envy. Pure and simple. (Okay, not so pure and simple)(And, No, Alan Brooks, this isn't about you) I'll explain.....................
These Liberals. These Progressives. These Socialists. These Marxists. They've never DONE anything in their lives. They've never had Real jobs. They don't CREATE any jobs. They add nothing to Society, whatsoever. They're TROUBLE MAKERS. Like the Serpent, in the Garden of Eden.
What's the old saying? Idle hands are the Devil's tools?Another old saying is: Divide and Conquer. The two go hand in hand.
They divide us, on a daily basis. By Race, by Colour, by Creed, and by Wealth.
See how she manipulates. Imagine. Thinking that the things you've acquired through your own Blood, Sweat, and Tears, aren't really yours, at all. All of the 18 Hour Days, you put in. The things your fertile mind has come up with, and have made life better, for your fellow man (Walter E. Williams) and you, a Wealthy person, have nothing to do, with YOU. The things you think are yours, are not yours at all.
They belong to the MASSES.
Everyone had a part in it. Everyone paid for the Roads. Everyone paid for the Power Lines. Everyone paid for the Sewer Treatment. You just happened along, at the right time.
Actually. Last time I looked, "Everyone" doesn't pay Taxes. "Everyone" doesn't have "Skin in the game".
The thing about these people (Here comes the whole Penis Envy thing) is that they want to do something, too. They want to be NEEDED. Self Importance, is not enough. And since they don't CREATE anything? The only thing left, is to TEAR THINGS DOWN.
If I can't make something, nobody can. If I can't be rich, nobody can. And, if I can't be with HAVES? Then I'll rile up the HAVE NOTS ala Lenin, Mussolini, Hitler, Castro, Mugabe, and Chavez.
There's nothing new under the Sun. We've seen her type, before. Over and over again, throughout History.
And, it NEVER ends well.
Gary B| 9.26.11 @ 8:01AM
She's singing the same old siren song of something for nothing (imagined entitlement). It's the easiest sell in the world.
Here's their problem. We can't afford massive transfers of wealth any more because there is NO MORE MONEY. Government has stolen every last dime of it.
The Republican candidates need to stop debating irrelevant details and start addressing the big picture. It's a much simpler message and people understand it.
victoria| 9.26.11 @ 11:43AM
so well put. thank you.
i might add that once they have torn it down, they put themselves in power and amass wealth they confiscated from others.
Brian Mc| 9.26.11 @ 7:28AM
I asked the individual Saturday, when this popped up on FB, whether this rant reminded them of the Constitution or the Communist Manifesto. I haven't checked back yet to see a response, which I doubt will be forthcoming and if it is, most likely will come in the form of an attack.
Teaghan| 9.26.11 @ 10:59AM
I didn't see word ONE from the libs on my FB page pertaining to this communist rant. Curiously silent.
Edward White| 9.26.11 @ 7:30AM
The facts are that in the past two decades the factory owner did not pay his fair share of taxes. He did not equally pay for the roads, fire service and police and in fact mooched off of the previous generations who built and paid for them. The factory owner voted for lower taxes for himself and pushed for removal of benefits and increases in 'hidden' use and sales taxes that burdened his employees.
He did not take care of his employees. He instead started firing people and asking fewer people to do more work...calling it efficiency while at the same time putting everyone on salary to skirt overtime and fair wage and benefit laws.
The factory owner you so admire got a hell of lot richer than his previous generation Republican factory owners and paid LESS in taxes than any previous generation of factory owners in American history. The factory owner supported getting rid of social programs that benefited his underpaid and overworked employees.
The factory owner started purchasing supplies and materials from overseas because it was cheaper (he made more money but put other American factories out of business). When that was no longer cheaper the modern factory owner moved his entire business overseas and stayed in his big house in America driving on public roads and relying on publicly funded programs to protect his water, his food, his environment, his home, his kids.
He is resting peacefully by his pool, comforted in the knowledge he has police and fire protection for which he paid nothing in comparison to his (beloved?) employees.
I could go on for pages, but I think I've said enough for right now. AmSpec, as ususal, gets it wrong.
Lullabys, Legends and Lies| 9.26.11 @ 7:43AM
Fag Commie!!
da monk| 9.26.11 @ 8:21AM
Huh! What's that comment all about? LLL, you have a problem. Better check under your bed for bogey men.
Lullabys, Legends and Lies| 9.26.11 @ 11:15AM
Da punk: Thanks!! I checked under the bed, no bogey men there, just a bunch of Communist Dust Bunnies!!
Hod Bacon| 9.27.11 @ 12:27PM
Thanks for the tip about checking under the bed. You'd never guess what I found there.
Truth to Power| 9.26.11 @ 8:43AM
That is no way to talk about commies. They are people too.
JmsA| 9.26.11 @ 9:54PM
"I could go on for pages'...", and you'd still be wrong, EW.
Timothy L. Pennell| 9.26.11 @ 7:49AM
That's what's so sad. You probably COULD, "go on for pages".
Where do YOU wanna live? Which Country is the one for you?
How much do YOU pay in Taxes? How many people do YOU provide with a Paycheck, and Health Care, and a 401K? What did YOU ever make, that made anyone's life, better.
And, how did the Concentration Camps and the Gulags, ever get bye, without YOU?
RustyG| 9.26.11 @ 7:52AM
I'll get the pitchforks Eddie, you get the torches. We'll call Elizabeth and The One and go get them Sons-of Bitches. After a while the Federal Government will own everything and we'll be on easy street, me and you baby.
George S| 9.26.11 @ 8:13AM
What factory owner? That's another Marxist straw man for: landscape business owner, dry cleaner, restaurant owner, web site domain holder, general contractor, trucking owner, graphic design studio owner... get the picture?
You want factory owners, open the Beijing yellow pages (no slur intended). There you will find them in their natural habitat: free from EPA and OSHA and NLRB.
SJC| 9.26.11 @ 8:53AM
So what's the answer Ed? - communism? - the state controls everything and everyone is equally poor - no reward for innnovation or for taking a gamble that may not pay off - communism has worked so well in places like Cuba and the Soviet Union that maybe we should try it - Ed - keep drinking that Kool Aid buddy because if you ever find out what's really going on outside you're tiny little, insulated, liberal fantasy world you'd probably explode - then someone else would have to clean it up.
Lucius Severus Pertinax| 9.28.11 @ 5:07AM
Were it my task to accomplish, I would enlighten Ed....and risk the Inquest.
Stormzeye| 9.26.11 @ 9:19AM
Edward, with all due respect, you are an idiot. An employer who abuses and mistreats his employees is no different that someone who abuses the chef who cooks his food.
I employed many people for years and they made good money for me. I paid them well, provided them excellent health insurance at no cost to them and sick and personal days were always on the honor system. I essentially took care of many families and they took care of me. I never had anyone leave me voluntarily except to advance themselves in a bigger company.
Now I'm retired and sitting by my pool having to respond to New Deal class warriors like you who stew in the bile of their own resentment.
Teaghan| 9.26.11 @ 11:01AM
"The factory owner started purchasing supplies and materials from overseas because it was cheaper (he made more money but put other American factories out of business). "
AND silly liberal/progressive, that is because the democrat run UNIONS forced them to do so.
I hear the HufPo callin you. Move along.
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 11:28AM
Edward "the Red" White;
If you take a quick look, in this country the bottom 50% of taxpayers pay less than 5% of the taxes. The top 10% pay something like 75% of the taxes.
So, Ms. Warren's "you did not pay for the roads, schools, cops" ain't exactly right - the factory owner paid way more than his share. The factory owner paid the workers their wages, of which 22.5% go to SS and Medicare, he pays utility taxes, real estate taxes, corporate taxes, the list is endless. He pays these out of his profits, you don't.
Roads? Roads in this country are paid for by the fuel taxes. Factory owners require a lot of trucks, a lot more than consumers. Ever notice the little sign on the back of the big trucks "This vehicle pays $8,000 a year in fuel taxes." I bet you haven't. Before we had roads, we had canals and railroads - all built with private capital until, as the Green Lantern pointed out, the government took it over. And they do it with tax money they take from the users, the factory owners and everybody else.
Education? Please - the teachers (in Atlanta) change their uneducated students' wrong answers to the right ones so that they, these hardworking, cheating teachers, can earn merit pay from the government. Our students do horribly in intercountry rankings. Ever had a job, Red? The first thing they do is walk you through a training program! Most of today's students can't even make change! (They should sue their math teachers!)
Security? Anybody notice that 49 states have passed concealed carry laws? Is that because the citizenry are confident of their personal security? No they are exactly not.
Ever notice that nowadays factories have big fences, security systems, guards, and all kinds of other security measures? These are not paid for by Ms. Warren's "us," they are paid for by the evil factory owner.
And what about that evil factory owner? What is he up to? Ever notice how well most people in this country live? How much stuff they have, how they are too fat, not too thin? It's because those awful meany factory owners have been making their products more efficiently and less costly so that you, you ungrateful moron, can pay less for your triple cheeseburger, your flat screen tv, your collection of Elvis paintings on velvet. If they do it right, they get to keep a little of the money they have invested as profit.
You have not a single shred of reason behind your entire argument - you and Ms. Warren both are either communists or 'useful idiots.'
Which is it: commie or idiot. Pick one, damn ingrate! Let's hear! Thief or dope? Which is it!!! We are waiting.
DO NOT TREAD ON ME!
Nina| 9.26.11 @ 4:09PM
Don't ya love how they fail to give out all the information? Apparently, too, the business men and woman who started factories or small businesses never paid taxes for those roads, cops and firemen, or schools!
ladydi| 9.26.11 @ 9:50PM
As always, Dan, a great response!
J3| 9.26.11 @ 12:06PM
You've provided an agenda-driven narrative. That's all. Facts are the furthest thing from being integral to your story.
The facts are that tax rates on the engines of our economy (see Congressional Budget Office's website for "Trends in Federal Tax Revenues and Rates") over the last 30+ years have modulated in the mid- to upper-20%. Another fact is that ANY amount of taxes paid by ANY business owner is more than the ZERO taxes paid by almost 50% of the population.
Oregon Mom| 9.26.11 @ 9:56PM
Exactly! And sadly, that 50% of the population that does NOT pay taxes are the very people who are easily targeted by liberal politicians...just for their votes.
J3| 9.26.11 @ 12:06PM
You've provided an agenda-driven narrative. That's all. Facts are the furthest thing from being integral to your story.
The facts are that tax rates on the engines of our economy (see Congressional Budget Office's website for "Trends in Federal Tax Revenues and Rates") over the last 30+ years have modulated in the mid- to upper-20%. Another fact is that ANY amount of taxes paid by ANY business owner is more than the ZERO taxes paid by almost 50% of the population.
maximumrandb| 9.26.11 @ 12:10PM
Mr. White, your points are invalid:
Businesses moved activities overseas because it got too expensive to do them stateside, because of labor unions (unaffordable contracts, restrictive labor policies), government bureaucrats (via regulaton) and increasing taxation.
Skirting overtime and other regulations is illegal. Identify some company who did that, please.
Improving efficiency via capital spending instead of hiring people results in doing more with less, thereby improving living standards. Or would you rather we get rid of all the machines and do everything by hand, just to keep people employed? Replace construction equipment and give everyone a shovel when building a road? Or perhaps build automobiles by hand, so that only the very wealthy can afford them?
You mention Repiblican factory owners. Do you mean Like Obama's good friend Jeffrey Immelt at GE? Or his other pal Warren Buffet who owns billions of dollars worth of shares of US industrial concerns?
Adam Smith| 9.26.11 @ 1:50PM
Shut up and lets see you do better if the competitors factory is run so poorly as you say. . . well, that's all the opportunity you need to get rich and server your fellow man with a better service or good. tick, tick, tock.
Oh yeah, you know that's not really the case and you also know the Government is FAR, far worse at running things. You are just a goon, a lazy thief who needs the government to steal for you, who is also so stupid as to think when the globalist dictators take over excrement agitators like you will be given positions of power, but in every revolution - complainer activist like you are the first ones lined up and shot. Why, because you are just trouble makers with no useful skills and dictators never allow what helped bring them into power to remain once they have it.
Occam's Tool| 9.26.11 @ 2:22PM
Who pays the taxes for those policemen, etc---the rich guy, overwhelmingly. Mot you.
Occam's Tool| 9.26.11 @ 2:22PM
Sorry---"not you."
James Solbakken | 9.27.11 @ 2:15PM
Why don't YOU build a factory and hire people and run it the way YOU think it should be run!!! I know why you don't: Because you DON'T KNOW HOW!!!!
You are what is called, "Stupid," but with a big mouth and a huge appetite.
Lullabys, Legends and Lies| 9.26.11 @ 7:34AM
I guess nobody in this Country has ever pooped on their own either!! You eat the food, that was grown by Farmers that the Government subsidized so that they could force you to put ethanol into you car, making your food more expensive, and creating manmade food shortages in Third World Countries. You walked across your floors, built by Trees felled by Loggers in the most expensive ways, due to the endangered species list, and forced Unionization. You use toilet paper that was trucked to the stores on highways made more expensive by the tolls for bridges that were build 50 years ago but are still not paid for, plus the taxes added on to each gallon of fuel to pay for those unpaid bridges too, and by crushing regulations that takes hours each week to fill out, that you fill out while you’re sitting in traffic trying to get across one of those unpaid bridges.
So you took a poop by yourself? Good for you!! Now what are you going to do? You’ll have to flush that toilet three times, because the Government forced you to buy a water saving toilet, that doesn’t save any water because,…. YOU HAVE TO FLUSH IT THREE TIMES!! Admit it, this isn’t your own poop, this is the People’s poop, this is the poop for the kids of tomorrow. So don’t be such a Sh*thead thinking you took a poop on your own!! Let me make this perfectly clear, we’re going to sh*t together, or we’re not going to sh*t at all!!
Vote for Elizabeth Warren (if you have sh*t for brains)!!
Adam Smith| 9.26.11 @ 1:54PM
Oh, man! This is PERFECT!
God Love You, Lullaby!
I'm going to save this - evil, envious people never go away!
Peppermint Tea| 9.26.11 @ 5:28PM
Best post of the day!
Edward White------ Part 2| 9.26.11 @ 7:40AM
The internet you use to write your comments to AmSpec, dear readers, wouldn't exist without the higher taxes that previous generations of factory owners paid and the internet would not continue to function without maintenance and oversight from government agencies around the world.
You do realize that it is, so far, government 'interference' that is keeping you, dear reader, from having to pay by the minute or the megabyte for your internet. It is government 'interference' that is preventing your internet provider from blocking you from websites that don't pay your internet provider money (access extortion). Access extortion costs that would make your internet provider rich on both ends but costs that would immediately be passed to the factory employees (because corporations don't eat costs like that...they pass any increase in cost to the consumer).
My dear, AmSpec readers, I suggest you move to an undeveloped island and SEE just what it is like to not have government. Better yet just stick your head in a sandbox filled with clean (federally mandated so your kids are safe) sand and pretend you don't need government.
Lullabys, Legends and Lies| 9.26.11 @ 7:46AM
Part 2 sucked just as much as Part 1!! Fag Commie!!
Travis V.| 9.26.11 @ 7:53AM
The semiliterate Lullubys, Legends and Lies replies to Edward White's seasoned reasoning by calling him "Fag Commie."
Pathetic, but Lullabys, etc., in his fury, is capable of using only hateful, snotty juvenile insults.
Ted| 9.26.11 @ 8:20AM
"Seasoned reasoning?" Really?
ladydi| 9.26.11 @ 9:55PM
More like diarrhea of the mouth, a common libtard disease.
maximumrandb| 9.26.11 @ 12:12PM
Mr. White's reasoning is not "seasoned," it is poorly thought out.
da monk| 9.26.11 @ 8:25AM
LLL:How do you associate someones SUPPOSED sexuality with his SUPPOSED political agenda? Please explain.
Lullabys, Legends and Lies| 9.26.11 @ 11:17AM
I just can!! Call it my "superpower" if you will?
da monk| 9.26.11 @ 8:25AM
LLL:How do you associate someones SUPPOSED sexuality with his SUPPOSED political agenda? Please explain.
Lullabys, Legends and Lies| 9.26.11 @ 11:17AM
I already explained this to you, you stupid Commie fag!!
Emily| 9.26.11 @ 7:47AM
Edward White, your lucid, undeniable points are well taken.
Thanks for taking the time to write them, you clever man. Keep the comments coming. I have read you before, and you are one of the few contributors who know how to look at an issue objectively.
Eddie White, Parasite| 9.26.11 @ 8:13AM
Emily, this Eddie fellow is using your handle to respond to himself, it would appear. I guess he envies that too.
Darin| 9.26.11 @ 7:55AM
You bewail business owners for not paying their "fair share," but you ignore moochers who pay no share at all. You attack the person who does the work and ignore the leech who only sucks the life blood out of others.
It appears you're a leech who thinks you are entitled to what others have shed their blood, sweat, and tears to earn. I will gladly help someone truly in need. I have little regard for those who actively violate the Tenth Commandment (thou shalt not covet).
Emily| 9.26.11 @ 9:32AM
This is a great day for America. Elizabeth Warren is a true champion of working Americans, devoted to ensuring fairness and of holding the powers of the corporate elite accountable for their actions. That she was basically kicked aside by the president in deference to opposition from Republican thugs in Congress and Corporate America will forever be a stain upon the Obama presidency.
For her to end up in the Senate would be appropriate vengeance.
As a Christian progressive from Massachusettes, I am behind Elizabeth all the way!
Kudos and salutations to Elizabeth Warren!
J.C.Eaton| 9.26.11 @ 11:00AM
Sorry madame, your heroine is grotesque from the inside out. She speaks as a mean, viperish termagent; are you one too? Bon chance.
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 11:33AM
Emily,
You silly girl! You forgot Joe Stalin, Pol Pot, Chairman Mao, Karl Marx, Vlad Lenin, and Satan!
Em' babe: Are you a communist or just a useful idiot? You have to be one of the two which is it?
DTOM
irish19| 9.26.11 @ 12:19PM
I thought you said you were a Country Club Republican with (a) little class and sense.
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 12:23PM
To avoid confusion, irish19 is referring to an earlier post by Ms. Emily, not me. Just to maintain clarity.
DTOM
irish19| 9.26.11 @ 2:31PM
'Zactly.
I am irish19, and I approved this comment.
irish19| 9.26.11 @ 3:09PM
I meant DH's comment. I apologize for any confusion and denounce myself.
cowgirl| 9.26.11 @ 12:41PM
More Koolaid drinkers here...
Nina| 9.26.11 @ 4:14PM
Ugh! Haven't you had enough dems running this state? You can't be a Christian. Your a progressive!
Oregon Mom| 9.26.11 @ 10:12PM
Poor Emily has not quite realized that the term "Christian Progressive" is an oxymoron.
mac| 9.27.11 @ 8:16AM
And Progessives are sometimes just morons
rjh| 9.26.11 @ 8:12AM
Edward, the free market and competition would take care of all the imagined problems in your poorly reasoned comment. In addition, I missed the part in the article and comments where anyone called for government to be abolished. Government has several important functions that it should perform, but it has to be controlled and limited by the people. That is our system.
George S| 9.26.11 @ 8:44AM
Of course, all credit for this internet thingy goes to either Al Gore or the Department of Labor's crack Entrepreneur Swat Team. Now I know why those overweight clerks were sitting there arms folded staring blankly and only responding with "Can't You See I'm On My Break!?". They were busy working on developing the technology that Bill Gates and Steve Jobs would eventually steal from them.
squalis| 9.26.11 @ 10:25AM
I thought we had Al Gore to thank.
Nathan David | 9.26.11 @ 8:51PM
You're making the usual mistake that many regular people make here. You're basing who you believe created the internet on the words of a politician, Al Gore. During a CNN interview, following his January 11, 1994 speech about the internet, Gore stated, "During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet." This statement was a blatent and 100% total lie! What Al Gore DID DO, was coin the term "information superhighway," by using the term in his January 11, 1994 speech. In truth, the internet was first conceived in 1961, and later put into planning in 1962. It was introduced to the public in July of 1969, and following further developments that same year, email was also introduced in 1969. (Oddly enough, that just happened so to be the exact same year that the UN acquired the right to coin its own currency... Sound like the mark of the beast in the works, maybe?). Anyway, Al Gore was born in 1948, so when the internet was first conceived, he was only 13. When the internet was actually introduced to the general public, Al Gore was 21. Al Gore was not elected into the U.S. Congress until the Tennessee folks, God help them, screwd up and elected him to the House of Representatives in 1977, at which time the internet was already 8 years old! We should never make a habit of listening to the mainstream press. If you let them, they'll have you believing that Obama is your daddy, and we already know that Chinese leader, Hu,'s our daddy! LOL
Dagny Taggert| 9.26.11 @ 10:26AM
Eddie, our "free" internet was bought and paid for by the internet bubble, circa 1999. Even though the vast majority lost a lot of money when the bubble burst, the one thing left was oodles and oodles of fiber in the ground. A great example of the "village" providing the infrastructure with no government guidance on how or where to invest other people's money. Yes, Global Crossing and Worldcom went belly-up. But when their valuations peaked in the multi-billions in 1999-2000, fiber was in the ground thanks to those valuations. Government had NOTHING to do with it. Enjoy the free internet, but stop pretending it has anything to do with pointy-hat bureaucrats in Chicago-on-the-Potomac.
DaveD| 9.26.11 @ 12:05PM
How very fascinating, Edward. You said, "because corporations don't eat costs like that [extortion costs]...they pass any increase in cost to the consumer." You could very easily replace "extortion costs" with "taxes" and have the statement remain true.
Thank you very kindly for reinforcing what conservatives have been saying for years - corporations don't pay taxes, they collect them.
Adam Smith| 9.26.11 @ 3:00PM
I laugh at how you seem to have taken away all of the PEOPLE in your island challenge along with your largely worthless bureaucracy you seem to think is so grand. If you allow me just some other people then the place was/is called Hong Kong and was one of the poorest most squalid places on the face of the planet with no natural resources or even space for it's population. The British that governed it after WW2 were almost entirely hands off and occupied themselves mostly in playing cricket letting the local sort out their own affairs. Locals who cheated their customers got justice from their customers and quickly learned the Golden Rule and by the time the Chinese took over Hong Kong had one of the highest standards of living and fastest growing economies in the world. In fact, without Hong Kong on it's border Red China probably would never have reformed itself as it did. So in effect, Hong Kong help promote FREEDOM to over a Billion people!
Peppermint Tea| 9.26.11 @ 5:30PM
Like Warren herself, once again confusing voluntary contracts of people with government. Yes we are richer with voluntary cooperation; no, the government shakedown industry should not get credit.
James Solbakken | 9.27.11 @ 2:19PM
Most AmSpec readers are not anarchists. Most are probably not even true Minarchists as I am.
They do not want NO government, dummy. They want limited, CONSTITUTIONAL, accountable government. What they don't want is SOCIALISTIC, fascistic, communist, re-distributing government. If the choice is communist government or no government, I vote for no government, but I KNOW that those are NOT the only options. YOU are deliberately dissembling by pretending that if we want government, it can only be of the oppressive, redistributive type.
PAUL| 9.26.11 @ 7:56AM
Another affirmative action super star, attorney, college professor, that never worked a day in her life (who does that remind me of?) who is going to explain to us working stiffs how things work in the real world. And why do they always look like ugly men?
Emily| 9.26.11 @ 8:01AM
Paul, you need to read the intelligent reasoning in Edward White's posts. The man has made some undeniable potent points that really deliver a powerful punch - - - that is, if you're capable of objective thought.
RustyG| 9.26.11 @ 8:19AM
I agree Emily. I plan to sell liquidate all my assets today and return them to their rightful owner ..... the U.S. government. Edward has shown me the light and the way.
RustyG| 9.26.11 @ 9:15AM
UPDATE: The wife was pissed when I told her the asset liquidation plan. I'm really dissapointed in her. Is there some kind of retreat or camp I can send her to to re-educate her to Elizabeth Warren's way of thinking? I am awaiting more words of wisdom from Edward.
Eddie White, Never Right| 9.26.11 @ 8:21AM
Eddie, you need to learn to read. That is the reason you're too unintelligent to not respond to your own (Edward White's) posts. The man (?) is undeniable impotent... a eunich, perhaps. The point is that he really drank a powerful punch - - - making him (?) incapable of objective thought.
John Navratil| 9.26.11 @ 9:32AM
Emily,
Intelligent reasoning? The man made a series of unsupported points. His very first sentence is:
"The facts are that in the past two decades the factory owner did not pay his fair share of taxes."
Government grew and debts grew, but it is the factory owner who didn't pay his share? Perhaps it's the half of the worker who pay no income tax that aren't paying their share? Could that be it? Could Mr. White deconstruct two decades of public finance more pithily?
White's entire comment is a screed that mirrors Warren's and is nicely debunked by "Green Lantern." You needn't agree, but neither can you call it objective. It is, in fact, entirely subjective.
2Anglico| 9.26.11 @ 9:57AM
Hey Emily, are you capable of describing the difference between "lower marginal tax rates" and actual taxes paid??? If not, stop lecturing us, we actually pay taxes.
Larry| 9.26.11 @ 8:12AM
She's an ugly man wanna-be. You know who's who in that relationship as well as why she's angry at the world. Just call her "Chaz".
Liz owes me. I think that I'll stop by her house, spend a few months mooching off of her and telling her how to run her home.
Liberalism is mental disorder.
REGIME CHANGE
da monk| 9.26.11 @ 8:32AM
Paul: What jobs did Romney, Reed, Bachman, Gingrich, Santorum, hold before they went into politics?
Datou| 9.26.11 @ 9:28AM
Romney was a hugely successful management consultant, ran the successful Salt Lake City Olympics and was the CEO of a successful venture capital firm. Bachmann was a lawyer for the IRS, Newt a college professor, Santorum a lawyer who's parents were immigrants. WHAT IS YOUR POINT? Did magical government fairies take all their tests and get their degrees for them?
da monk| 9.26.11 @ 8:39AM
Paul, Larry, LLL: I think you fellows have a problem with your own sexual image, else why are you always accusing someone you disagree with as being a homosexual? Is it something in your psyches or is it the fact when you can't argue logically you call the person you disagree with names, like we used to do in the playground. Grow up and act like adults, please
Larry| 9.26.11 @ 8:44AM
The fact is that you know nothing about me or anyone else here. You come off sounding just plainly stupid.
*europa*| 9.26.11 @ 9:21AM
You nailed them, da monk, when you say that Paul, Larry, and Lullabys, etc "can't argue logically."
We've got a lot of name-callers on this blog. Name calling. That's all they're capable of doing.
And their favorite taunt is the school-boy taunt--"faggot." They're little boys with little boy mentalities.
Truth to Power| 9.26.11 @ 10:18AM
You guys are turning into whining crybabies. Lose with dignity, please.
Lullabys, Legends and Lies| 9.26.11 @ 11:25AM
Actually Europa fag is not my favorite taunt at all, Douche Bag is. So would you prefer me to call you Douche Bag or Fag? Either one of them works for me. How about the hybrid Douche Fag? Yeah, that's good!! Commie Douche Fag!!
Teaghan| 9.26.11 @ 11:08AM
da monk, are you gay? Do YOU have a problem with your sexuality? I suggest if you don't like what is being said here that you skip back on over to MediaMatters, MoveOn and/or the HuffPo.
BuBye!!
Pecos Pete| 9.26.11 @ 8:40AM
The trolls have this thread useless. They are employees of the U.S. Justice Department paid to visit TAS, among others.
George S| 9.26.11 @ 9:01AM
We should all aspire to be Democrat factory owners. Then, you need not worry about making a product that will sell, for all you have to do is secure a taxpayer loan (forget the fine print, you really don't have to pay it back -- unless you want to). In exchange, all you have to do is hire contractors who are recommended by local Democrat bosses. Don't worry about local building permits and environmental roadblocks -- just hire "consultants" who are really girlfriends or socially retarded offspring of local politicians and the permits magically appear.
On opening day's press conference, just remember to wear a suit that is a subordinate shade of the president's, smile and applaud (and practice looking humble) as the president holds you up as the next Henry Ford, then run like hell when the financing collapses so as to get out of town with as much money as possible. Then pay it forward; that is, donate generously so they can send the FBI to sanitize your pad.
squalis| 9.26.11 @ 10:29AM
The reason you don't need to make a product that would otherwise sell is because the Dem's will just legislate a mandate that every man, woman, and child buy X quantity of the product.
chris haynes| 9.26.11 @ 9:05AM
"Factory Owner"?
"You built a factory"?
Hey, Elizabeth Warren, please wake up. This is America. We dont build factories. We close them. last 10 years, 50,000 of them. 30% of all manufacturing jobs, gone.
Thanks to both parties, and to your friends, those elite globalist traitors who hand out the bribes
Brian Mc| 9.26.11 @ 9:05AM
This whole direction of response is proof that the tenth should have been the first...commandment...since most (who are rambling along in opposition to the article) stopped reading said commandments after disagreeing with the first.
John Navratil| 9.26.11 @ 9:34AM
Brian Mc,
Nicely put!
Brian Mc| 9.26.11 @ 11:01AM
I appreciate that, John. I suppose that I'm just tired of a God-less government gone crazy. That the left refuses to watch what it wishes for and drags the rest of us along, kicking and screaming, to the altar of autocracy, where we subservients are supposed to beg for scraps from the all-powerful is the most tiring point of all. Can the damnation of all that is decent be that far off?
I'm tired of getting knocked about by do-gooders and am considering the fact that knocking back at the ballot box is getting me nowhere. The left incrementally achieves and the right goes along because cutting and slashing at the monstrosity we created would supposedly be too...inhumane?
Yep, the god the left has fomented and that we've fought all along, (at least, so we thought), is more dangerous than we could have ever anticipated and now the parallels to the Weimer Republic are startling. I never thought that I'd live in the day where I was ashamed and fearful of my government. The left owns our schools and the fall is imminent.
After all, this is not ancient, let alone modern Greece we are talking about, here. The calamities on every level and every scale that will occur worldwide if this country continues to falter will make the sum of the fall of every other 'civilization' that came before us pale in comparison
Puddintayne| 9.26.11 @ 9:10AM
I just farted.
^00^| 9.26.11 @ 9:35AM
Another intelligent comment from this mag's readership.
BarbaraS| 9.26.11 @ 9:37AM
I've said this before on other blogs. This woman is Danae of Non Sequitor comic strip all grown up. Only her church is not the church of Danae but the church of communism. She has an answer for everything and usually that answer won't work in the real world. These people live in never-never land where they are the smartest, most respected people on earth. In their world they get the recognition they think they deserve. I have never seen such arrogance (except for the occupant of the WH). She thought she could set the time frame and rules for her testimony in congress. A real Walter Mitty type. If the electorate had any conception of the type of people in DC, they would be up in arms.
Old Soldier| 9.26.11 @ 10:11AM
She really does seem like a cartoon version of a liberal douche.
irish19| 9.26.11 @ 2:33PM
Why are you insulting Danae?
Radioman777| 9.26.11 @ 9:39AM
Her rant was just straight up marxism; something she's apparently well schooled in.
sparch| 9.26.11 @ 10:03AM
It is Warren's "Joe the Plumber" moment. Is anyone listening that has ears? Most everyone listening to Obama did not catch the gravity of the words.
Of course we pay for the roads, the education and the civil protections. As a collective whole we pay taxes so these services can be provided for all of us. It is up to us to utilize them to our betterment. Some choose wisely, others do not.
Petronius| 9.26.11 @ 10:10AM
What needs to be done is the closure of every kindergarten in this country. That is where every 6 year old learns "sandbox" economics: "share your toys and play nice." And most people never get beyond it. Pro tempore, it's all well and good when the resources being shared come from the adults supervising yon budding yard apes. Have Ms. Warren and Ed White ever read or heard the story of "The Little Red Hen?" No other animal in the barnyard would help her sow, grow, or harvest the wheat or bake the bread, but when she asked who would eat it, all of them said "yes" and she told them "no way." The urban populace of this country has reached the point where it has almost no sense of value; just an insatiable appetite for other peoples money and resources. They must be taught again the hard way what is and is not theirs. George Bush Sr. lost to Clinton because he refused to tell that pony tail weenie to grow up and earn his way. And all these rotten spoiled snotty Liberals have been sucking the life blood from our commerce for too long. American business should refuse to sell to government above local level because government must learn that businesses are Not support groups as Ed White believes. There is no such thing as a "fair share", for him or any other Moocher who refuses to compete. A "Share" is a financial instrument called Common Stock. Anybody who wants one or more is required to Buy them. They must also understand that it then becomes a personal asset to be looked after and cared for because it's market value rises or falls relative to that company's activity, quality, and sales margins. Oh, I've gone and done it again. One cannot mention the word "market" to people who live in the sandbox. But the real world is an arena. All the moochers in our midst are millstones about the necks of the producers. And they are the "Mob" which Ann warned us about. If their power to vote themselves largess is not broken we will continue to drown just like Greece. The days of inflated paychecks for the minimal pursuits of mindless occupations are over. And We are tired of being over taxed to subsidize the ignorant, indolent, incompetent, infantile losers who bring nothing to the table but their needs. To them I say get off your asses and off our backs or take your deficiencies someplace else.
Brian Mc| 9.26.11 @ 12:02PM
"Mooch-Mob"...I like it, Petronius!
Old Soldier| 9.26.11 @ 10:14AM
"What Elizabeth Warren is trying to do, then, is bring this Third World mentality to America."
There are so many reasons that the Third World came in third.
John Navratil| 9.26.11 @ 10:25AM
Old Soldier,
Shhh! You can't say that! It's non-aligned nations ;)
Old Soldier| 9.26.11 @ 2:24PM
I call them crap-holes when I'm in polite company. Visited a few on my own dime and few courtesy of Uncle Sam.
Howard| 9.26.11 @ 10:17AM
I think Warren's words can be accepted at face value, if we didn't know that her real aim is to confiscate wealth for the "common good". By this, I can accept that certain public goods such as roads are indeed required to move goods. And in a better world, perhaps public schools would work (they mostly don't). However, what Warren stands for is a larger, more intrusive state. This larger state will provide more because successful business people really are lucky, and "we" really provided their wealth. She is arguing for a serf like role for wealth producers. I would like Professor Warren to read Atlas Shrugged, as well as Das Kapital.
squalis| 9.26.11 @ 10:21AM
Green Lantern eloquently said:
"The enemy of all this is individuality -- individual enterprise, individual responsibility, individual initiative, and individual creativity. There is nothing more difficult in the contemporary world than starting your own business -- having the courage to risk your savings and years of work effort and defying some traditional way of doing things by saying, "I'll bet I can do this differently, and better."
It is hard to imagine America without this."
------------------------------------------------------------
I say: It is hard for libs to imagine America with this.
Adam Smith| 9.26.11 @ 2:23PM
To your point, THEY can't control individuals.
Who educate their own children, save their own money earned by their own by their toil in free exchange with others for goods or service. Who then risk some or all of it to try and serve their fellow man with a new or better good or service. And once you are established serving your fellow man and have a large stake in that system you become an outstanding member of society - not a crook or a thief or a vandal like the people that choose to live under the Dem's Gov housing and lifestyle. Let's be clear, they want to destroy the middle class so poor people never get to even see the true path to a better and happy and fulfilling life because if you did see it, you would realize the left has been lying to you, to keep you on the plantation and have a system of Elite's and Serf's.
Evil, evil people.
Melvin| 9.26.11 @ 11:11AM
What this be-speckled granny glass wearing aging hippie is not telling everyone is. I want to be in charge of redistributing yours, while I keep mine. Take Sen. John Kerry for example, the guy has gazillions coming out of every orifice on his body, but he wanted to berth his mega sailboat in another state to scam the tax man in Massachusetts out of a few quid.
Then there is senator Diane Frankenstein, who steers government construction contracts to her contractor husband, and all were cool with that. "Oh, Diane made just a little boo boo in her judgment, we'll just suggest she step down in her committee chairmanship."
Elizabeth Warren isn't going to be any different. She is going to spew all this noble Haavard doing the noble thing crap, all the while realizing as all the politicians do, "Hey, I can really rake in the cashola as long as I tow the party line."
Elizabeth Warren belongs to the angry, and bitchy feminist crowd of Clinton, Feinstein, and Boxer.
The last thing we don't need is a another pissed off, Haavard professor who has worked and lived in her nice cozy Haavard cocoon, and doesn't know her ass from a hole in the ground in how reality really works.
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 11:40AM
Melvin,
Actually didn't John (I served in Viet Nam) Heinz Kerry, and Diane Feinstein acquire most of their wealth through the offices of their bodily orifices? Neither earned it, they married it, Kerry doing so serially...
I'm just saying...
DTOM
RCV| 9.26.11 @ 11:28AM
You're looking at America's future first female President.
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 11:41AM
RCV,
Not me. I corrected my vision. You might try it!
DTOM
John Navratil| 9.26.11 @ 12:14PM
RCV,
I've got to hand it to you, you are ever the optimist.
Given that it took 32 years for the voters to forget what a mistake Carter was and vote for Obama, my guess is that Elizabeth Warren will be 93 before she has a chance.
Warrior | 9.26.11 @ 3:54PM
Whose her VP of choice? Maybe Putin?
RCV| 9.26.11 @ 10:13PM
Definitely not Palin!
Skippy| 9.27.11 @ 4:46PM
No, you're wrong.
That woman looks nothing like my daughter.
Get your eyes checked.
no name| 9.26.11 @ 11:32AM
Ok. I see elizabeths point. But I don't understand if everyone had the same opporunity, why didn't she build a factory? Evidently she didn't. What if no one had built a factory, where would we be then? Even the chinese would be trying to invent the wheel. We know where her head was at the time, and that was to be a liberal, left wing, the world owes me a living, and I'm the only one that knows anything harvurd professor. Well I don't know about the rest, but I don't need any more harvuurd professors telling me ANYTHING. I have had a gut full of their FbidenG stupidity.
Betina| 9.26.11 @ 11:33AM
She's a dumb broad like so many others. Women should have to pass an IQ test in order to vote. They have emotionalized the political landscape and that is why they are the darlings of the left. THEY LACK THE MASCULINE VIRTUES that would qualify them for governance. That is why Sarah Palin scares the crap out of the intelligentsia. She has got them and more to spare. She is the UNFEMALE, the opposite of the stereotypical left wing ninny the left loves to use and abuse. Bitsy Warren even LOOKS the part. Pale faced, bespectacled, vestiges of hippy grooming, barely an effort to look like a woman who pulls down boatloads of cash every year, she strives to appear careless about her appearance without giving offense, while still maintaining enough of an effort to look less threatening. She has the calculated put together look of what was once known as a bluestocking, an educated female above all others. She thinks an awful lot about herself and she is going to give we peasants a good talking to. She is the prototypical HYSTERICAL female, excused because she is bug eyed and ranting for Marxism. Dour, deadly serious, lock step, and determined, she is terrifying in her abject STUPIDITY. She has shunned the female touches in her appearance to drive home the fact that she is like all good Marxist revolutionaries: FEMININITY is the construct of male hegemony and the petit bourgeois mentality. We lumpens are the target of her berserk rant. In this instance we can surely judge this illiterate book by its cover. She telegraphs to this observer that she might be a woman but she can out Marx the best of them and she stomp at the same time. America is too full of women who are constantly trying to "prove" themselves by the embrace of revolutionary politics. They have been egged on by the left and their own conceit because they have been convinced that left wing politics is proof of intelligence. Those whose politics are diametrically opposed are labeled dimwits. Witness what has happened to Palin who manages to appear very attractive and female while she out maneuvers the brain cell of the left. Bitsy Warren is more qualified for the position of prison warden in a federal pen. Oh wait. That's just what she is proposing, isn't it.
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 11:44AM
If only Lizzie would decide that we really weren't worthy of her efforts... if only, sigh.
DTOM
Butch| 9.26.11 @ 4:38PM
Did you ever think of how bone stupid you have to be to be "convinced that left wing politics is proof of intelligence?" Intelligence leads to certain conclusions, not vice versa.
Thanks, Betina. On that one, you nailed it.
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 6:26PM
Butch,
I'm thinking you have just insulted bones everywhere and need to be thinking about how you can apologize to them all...
DTOM
Nathan David | 9.26.11 @ 8:19PM
Betina, that is really an unfair thing to post about women and their emotions. Deborah, the prophetess, was also a judge in Old Testament of the Bible. There are some very strong women in our society who can do ALOT to better this country. What YOU refer to as women's emotions, is better considered in the light of their passions. The passion of a woman can be a great thing if it is in line with the right path to true freedom. The volatility of the female can sometimes lead her off track in Spiritual matters, but when it comes to ruling in the worldly matters, it is quite the opposite, depending on whether or not she is wise enough to surround herself with strong righteous people.
Nathan David | 9.26.11 @ 8:22PM
Oh, in my other reply, I was not disagreeing with you about "this particular woman" being a dumb broad, although I don't think the use of the word broad is going to score you many points with most women. Some women probably are broads, and the one in this article, whether or not a broad, certainly is unwise.
Dick S| 9.26.11 @ 12:34PM
She forgot to mention the INTERcontinental Railroad!
Dave| 9.26.11 @ 12:54PM
Sadly, many of these 'factory owners' aren't contributing enough. Greed is rampant. Dispute it all you want, but it's empty talk. Greed.
They should not be taxed to death, but the level of greed is proportional to the amount of angst workers feel.
Gone are the days where you got paid a decent wage, and if you were hard working you got paid more. Greed.
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 2:27PM
DAve,
Did you happen to notice that as the economy has worsened that the government has taken TRILLIONS of dollars and built exactly no jobs with this borrowed money that we are going to have to re-pay?
Did you happen to notice that the bottom half of the population pays less than 5% of the taxes while the top 5% of taxpayers pay over 50%?
You need to get some facts - don't listen to me, don't listen to MSNBC, get on your little computer, click on a search engine and start finding out about how much money the government spends and where it takes it from.
The facts that you referred to above are neither sad nor facts....
DTOM
Dave| 9.26.11 @ 2:41PM
Dan,
You need to re-read my message. Then get some truthful facts, or experience life for yourself.
Dave| 9.26.11 @ 3:40PM
Oh, and I never said they were facts. Just the truth.
Dang noobs...
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 6:39PM
Dave;
Go back to grade school and re-learn what truth is. Truth is a statement of fact. No facts, no truth. Know facts, know truth.
It ain't that hard. You still haven't brought a single fact to this conversation.
Go get some facts, and we can talk. Your opinions are not based on facts or truth.
If you were at all familiar with market capitalism, you would understand that if you define "greed" as "self-interest" which is not that farfetched a definition you would know that actually greed that actually makes things better for all the players in the system.
Now you are confused because this doesn't make sense to you. That's not what the teacher told you in PS 453. Bad news for you, she didn't educate you, she indoctrinated you. Didja go to college, take an econ course? Still got the book? I'll bet it was written by Samuelson who has been pushing Keynesianism for decades, even though Keynes has been thoroughly disproved.
So, Dave ol' buddy, ol' pal, don't you worry about me. You go figure out the relationship between facts and truth and you'll be a lot better off.
Warning, if you really do this, you are going to be awful sore at all of the people who pretended to educate you while they were really just drycleaning your brain.
'kay?
Now, Don't Tread on Me!
Warrior | 9.26.11 @ 6:00PM
Dave:
1. Environmental Protection Agency - Good luck manufacturing anything in the US.
2. OSHA - Heavens forbid that someone gets a paper cut while shuffling a piece of paper.
3. Cost of compliance with governmental paperwork and red tape.
4. Unemployment insurance, workers compensation, social security, health care costs, insurance against PI cases...
5. City, county and State licenses.
6. Equal opportunity and discrimination complaint defense.
7. Labor unions
There are many other issues which create a hostile environment for businesses. I just wanted to give a few quick ones without much thought. Of course it's always the greedy factory owners who are evil for wanting to make a profit. It's never the over regulation and litigious environment we've created which gives the greedy owners no ability to expand a business or actually disincentivize the expansion.
PJINTERROGATOR| 9.28.11 @ 9:34AM
And they wonder why jobs have moved overseas.
More jobs here? Try Tort Reform.
Nathan David | 9.26.11 @ 8:12PM
Not to sound offensive, Dave, but you sound like you've never watched a day of Cspan in your life. Even if the rich weren't already paying far more than their "fair share" of our nation's tax burden, taxing them more would not help. Congress has a long time history of NOT using new revenues in conjunction with reduced spending to lower our debt burden. Give congress more money, and they won't pay down our debt with it. They'll just use it to increase the size of government and further burden the job creators in this country with more rules, regulations and mandated employee benefits. The expanding federal government is unconstitutional against its own constituents. It is the spoiled union labor and their thug union bosses who helped put Obama into office, and yet by the time "big brother" is done expanding itself into a full blown socialist regime, they'll be competing with those same union bosses, and competing against the private sector is unconstitutional. Government take over is just a bad idea, even if they're taking over the unions one day.
James Solbakken | 9.27.11 @ 2:30PM
The greedy ones are the ones salivating over what others have earned. Coveting is a still a sin, being a Marxist turns coveting into a religion, and that's why Marxism can only destroy itself the more it "succeeds."
Boogalie| 9.26.11 @ 1:36PM
Wow....loon is right. Funny, when the government takes a risk and it doesn't work out, taxpayers bail them out. When an entrepreneur takes a risk and and it doesn't work, they lose everthing. Wonder why she didn't address that?
ironhorzmn| 9.26.11 @ 2:56PM
The only 'marauding bands' I've been seeing lately are Democratic union thugs being led by Obama union cronies.
UnknownMike| 9.26.11 @ 3:05PM
Could someone please remind Elizabeth Warren that she no longer wears the Schoolgirl look well and it's been a good 30 years since she even was a schoolgirl
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 6:40PM
Wonder what she smells like? Musk? Patchoulli? Worse?
Ewwwwww.
DTOM
Osamas Pajamas| 9.26.11 @ 3:27PM
Hard to tell if Elizabeth Warren is ignorant of all of the foregoing facts --- or if she is aware of them and hopes that no one else is.
Pat| 9.26.11 @ 4:09PM
So, you easily borrowed half a billion dollars from the American taxpayers to build a new Soylandra factory dedicated to “green power”. And, in your case, it really is true it was “the people” who made your factory possible. But then the factory quickly and mysteriously failed, so our elected parasites immediately went into cover-up mode to prevent us “people” from learning where that $535 million actually went. This “social contract” the parasites constantly talk about invariably demands that Washington insiders take our money and give it to their friends but only so long as “it’s for a good cause” - like saving energy through building solar panels, but then subsequently revising that same fairy tale rationale to “creating jobs”. Now, most experienced business folks realize that no one can blow $535 million in less than 2 years on legitimate business transactions so therefore much of the money must have disappeared by very roundabout ways into the bank accounts of well-connected people whose names we are not allowed to know.
And the social contract also demands our media blur the story as much as possible because this highly profitable form of government swindle is too lucrative to risk revealing those “good causes” actually involved. Cover up mode as practiced by the good folks at the New York Times and Washington Post involves creating an instant myth whereby a lot of words are written describing the swindle but nothing of substance is actually said.
For example, the federal loan “approver” who facilitated this massive swindle has entered the media’s Witness Protection Program for Corrupt Federal Employees and won’t be telling any of us his story. The Dept. of Energy’s spokesperson must speak – and speak in vague clichés - for this anonymous federal employee - we’re not allowed to know the person’s name or hear the excuses for failure directly from the horse’s mouth. The Times even quoted an expert completely unrelated to this swindle as claiming this mysterious federal employee must have suffered an “excess of zeal” when approving the massive handout.
Exactly who suffered “this excess of zeal”? We won’t be told. Because if we knew who, then we, “the people”, might ask our federal employee why he or she approved the loan – and where the money actually went. And if we did ask, the answers might very well be indiscreet. We would learn the corruption extends high up in the Obama administration, that certain people got a piece of the action in return for pushing the loan through the pipeline. And we might then conclude this social contract nonsense is no more than fodder for the weak minded among us and the real motivation is plain, old fashioned greed, not altruism.
ella8| 9.26.11 @ 5:04PM
Doesn't she understand that the business itself is a form of payback. I am thankful for all of the businesses and industries that provide goods and services that my family needs and desires, even if we have to (gasp) pay for them. Imagine that, one person toils to create something and another person trades money for that toil and there is a net benefit to both parties.
Ross Kaminsky | 9.26.11 @ 5:50PM
Dear Dr. Lantern,
While you're right about Elizabeth Warren's words being a perfect exposition of the looters and the moochers, which is to say of the Progressive left, I would suggest that you missed, or at least underemphasized, the most important point:
Warren's words imply not just that the rich get rich by making others poor but more fundamentally that the factory built or the goods moved to market benefit nobody other than the producer. But of course they must benefit the consumer (by the consumer's way of thinking) at least as much as they benefit the producer or else the producer would not be able to become rich by his investment and production.
It is along the lines of Bastiat's "That which is seen and that which is not seen": What is seen is a capitalist building a factory and getting rich. And perhaps what is seen is the consumers buying his production. But what is not seen is the value that the consumer perceives in his purchase in excess of the purchase price, whether in enjoyment, productivity, or whatever. And what is barely seen is the many jobs created by the factory or the required transportation of goods or the Internet infrastructure for marketing the products (or services.)
All you said about government-provided services or protection versus potential private supply of those things is right, but it's not the real point. In fact, I would suggest that arguing that we could just as easily have private police as government police is a sure way to get most people to dismiss you as a naive libertarian. (For the record, I'm a libertarian and have to work quite hard to keep people understanding that I'm not naive, at least not most of the time.)
Instead the real point is not just that the rich don't get richer by making others poorer; they get rich by making others richer, happier, or otherwise gaining, in their minds, greater value than $1 for each $1 they spend on the producer's stuff. We need to keep educating people that capitalism is the reason America is a rich country, that the state of nature is poverty and it's only through allowing some people to get very rich that almost everybody else's standards of living are also raised.
Best regards,
Ross Kaminsky
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 6:46PM
Ross;
And greed is not the EVIL greed, it is self-interest. Self interest is a quintessential human quality; and it is the almost universal quality that drives the entire market system to make things actually better for everybody who participates...
Ross, you down here in the trenches,I again? You de' man.
DTOM
PS We do have a bet about that possible presidential candidate, don't we? DH
Dave | 9.26.11 @ 6:04PM
Well, I'm certainly not a spiritualist, psychic or even a card reading mystic. Having confessed that out front, I have to say that if, indeed, there is such a thing as an "life after" or "second life" ... then I've got a pretty fair notion as to what the late "Arnold The Pig" came back as after leaving Green Acres a few decades ago.
Your thoughts?
Dave | 9.26.11 @ 6:04PM
Well, I'm certainly not a spiritualist, psychic or even a card reading mystic. Having confessed that out front, I have to say that if, indeed, there is such a thing as an "life after" or "second life" ... then I've got a pretty fair notion as to what the late "Arnold The Pig" came back as after leaving Green Acres a few decades ago.
Your thoughts?
Dan Hirsch| 9.26.11 @ 6:49PM
Dave,
Posting it twice didn't really improve it. But you did bring some facts and truth this time. To wit: you are not a seer.
And are calling Ms. Warren a pig re-incarnate? Careful, you might end up with some irate, offended, immortal pigs on your doorstep. That's be bad, very bad...
DTOM
Trinacria| 9.26.11 @ 6:57PM
We build factories in America? Who knew. I was under the impression that punitively high corporate tax rates, infinite regulations, and extraordinarily high human resource costs (thanks unions!) had all but rendered factories a thing of the past in the US.
Nonetheless, Ms. Warren's claim that factory owners owe their success to the governments who paved the roads that carry their goods to market and provided the police who protect their buildings is curious in it's failure to recognize that the government couldn't build roads without equipment manufactured BY FACTORIES and it couldn't provide police protection without automobiles and firearms manufactured BY FACTORIES. Additionally, are facotory owners the only ones who benefit from the factories' existence, or do the employees (and, by extension, the government that taxes their wages) and customers not benefit as well?
Finally, her argument regarding education is laughable on it's face. Education is a local - not a federal - responsibility. The notion that a factory owner owes the federal government for educating it's workers is about as absurd as suggesting that I owe the fed for the lovely landscaping that my homeowners association provides in my community.
Another example of a pointed headed academic who is utterly detached from reality...
Trinacria| 9.26.11 @ 6:58PM
That's "pointy-headed" (damn auto spell correction...)
Timothy L. Pennell| 9.26.11 @ 7:04PM
It's Penis Envy. Pure and simple. (Okay, not so pure and simple)(And, No, Alan Brooks, this isn't about you) I'll explain.....................
These Liberals. These Progressives. These Socialists. These Marxists. They've never DONE anything in their lives. They've never had Real jobs. They don't CREATE any jobs. They add nothing to Society, whatsoever. They're TROUBLE MAKERS. Like the Serpent, in the Garden of Eden.
What's the old saying? Idle hands are the Devil's tools?Another old saying is: Divide and Conquer. The two go hand in hand.
They divide us, on a daily basis. By Race, by Colour, by Creed, and by Wealth.
See how she manipulates. Imagine. Thinking that the things you've acquired through your own Blood, Sweat, and Tears, aren't really yours, at all. All of the 18 Hour Days, you put in. The things your fertile mind has come up with, and have made life better, for your fellow man (Walter E. Williams) and you, a Wealthy person, have nothing to do, with YOU. The things you think are yours, are not yours at all.
They belong to the MASSES.
Everyone had a part in it. Everyone paid for the Roads. Everyone paid for the Power Lines. Everyone paid for the Sewer Treatment. You just happened along, at the right time.
Actually. Last time I looked, "Everyone" doesn't pay Taxes. "Everyone" doesn't have "Skin in the game".
The thing about these people (Here comes the whole Penis Envy thing) is that they want to do something, too. They want to be NEEDED. Self Importance, is not enough. And since they don't CREATE anything? The only thing left, is to TEAR THINGS DOWN.
If I can't make something, nobody can. If I can't be rich, nobody can. And, if I can't be with HAVES? Then I'll rile up the HAVE NOTS ala Lenin, Mussolini, Hitler, Castro, Mugabe, and Chavez.
There's nothing new under the Sun. We've seen her type, before. Over and over again, throughout History.
And, it NEVER ends well
R. Kavanagh| 9.26.11 @ 7:18PM
Warren is in good company with the whole "mooch" crowd. They are sick individuals all. Obama, Michael Moore, Ron Howard, Bill Maher. Take your pick, they all sleep cozy under the same umbrella of the "communal parasite class". Listening to them makes one despise any sense of personal achievement or desire to better oneself economically or otherwise. For this reason alone she and the rest of them are as dangerous as any neo-fascist spouting their own brand of hate. Start at the top and remove these charlatans in November 2012.
Nathan David | 9.26.11 @ 8:00PM
Several parts of this article tickle my Bible sense. First, we probably are looking down the road to Greece. Get this, Obama descends from the Luo Arab tribe. Luo is the Greek word for "rough, " in the New Testament. Daniel 8:21 refers to a rough goat, which is a symbol of the king of Grecia. I immediately made this connection as our economy tanked and tanked and tanked. Second, people DO get jealous and try to prevent prosperity. The Bible warns of trying to make a gain such that it makes others jealous. Third, God sometimes will make a people prosperous just to provoke the righteous into turning back to Him. It is evident that the evil woman in this speech, is waving her socialist hands in the air in worship of some god other than the one true God, because she is appealing to rebellious sentiments, not humble planning. We all have the same access to the roads that make the rich rich and the poor poorer. God, simply, will have mercy on who He will have mercy. I don't think we have much to fear from the rebellious wicked woman who has been gracefully taken apart in this article!
al bundhii| 9.26.11 @ 8:22PM
Oh My; did you just attack Opie? He may be SoCal Left, and he made Far and Away--but Opie is an American cultural Icon. I have not recovered from hearing that the lady who played Aunt Bea was a nutcase, and Joan Davis was mean.
Leave us Mayberryphiles with our illusions.
Brian| 9.26.11 @ 10:22PM
No difference between her and Brown. At least she is honest while Sen Scott Brown works behind the scenes pushing socialism.
Ed Farrell| 9.27.11 @ 12:04AM
Me: a ‘Quarryist’. I cut a block of marble out of my quarry, and I sell it to you for a hundred bucks. You give me the hundred, I’m happy, you’re happy.
You: Michelangelo. You transform the block to your ‘David’, and sell it to the Ufizi museum in Florence for ... what: ten million dollars? The Ufizi is happy, you’re happy.
I’m not happy. “You couldn’t have done it without my marble! I deserve a fair share!”
You: Greedy capitalist, enriching yourself by stealing from the poor.
Me: Pathetic exploited loser whining about income disparity.
NO.
I deserve the hundred bucks, no more. You deserve the ten million, no less.
I was content until YOU got rich. What’s up with that?
Elizabeth Warren’s ‘social contract’ is really the ‘socialist contract’. “From each according to his ability ... “. That’s not just a bumper sticker, it’s the heart and soul of the discussion.
Socialism is not about fairness, it’s about envy. It’s about cutting yourself in on someone else’s stuff. It’s about shaking down the talented, the industrious, or the just plain lucky.
James Solbakken | 9.27.11 @ 2:36PM
May I suggest that WHOLE IDEA OF SOCIALISM is to create enough confusion that the people can't figure out that they are getting ripped off by criminals. It works because people are naturally stupid, evil, and crazy. History shows that it takes what amounts to a MIRACLE to change people's hearts such that they do not fall for the temptation to hate their neighbors for accomplishing more than themselves, and coveting what others have earned.
PJINTERROGATOR| 9.27.11 @ 5:57AM
Elizabeth Warren needs a boyfriend.
Skippy| 9.27.11 @ 5:06PM
Her husband may have something to say about that.
Or not!
PJINTERROGATOR| 9.28.11 @ 9:38AM
She looks like a woman who would not have a husband. As you said, Wikipedia confirms that she is married. Whatever the case, she needs a hot date from SOMEBODY to take the edge off of her personality. Railing against the American Free Market system is Bolshevist.
stmichrick| 9.27.11 @ 8:18PM
And on top of all of the above is the DRIPPING CONDESCENSION of the Left. Few have personified it better and the challenge for 2012 is to convince as many voters as possible how their perceived collective ignorance is defined by Warren, Obama and followers.
Marc Jeric| 9.28.11 @ 2:40PM
This former refugee from a communist hell can recognize a communist when he hears him - or her, in this case. The capitalist taxes built those roads and pay those teachers and policemen. Marxism,wherever it was tried, produced inevitably a) terror, b) utter poverty, and c) mass murder. In communist countries they have 100% employment, counting those in their gulags. I think that komrad Waren should be exiled to that workers' paradise in North Korea.