Who would have believed this, back in November? But the sad fact is that Obama has, by his disparate treatment of Wall Street and Michigan Avenue, demonstrated that he is just George III. Wasn't George III the mad one? Yes, yes he was.
It was Henry Ford in 1914, who ticked off the rest of his fellow capitalists by increasing, nay doubling, wages of his hourly workers. The quote: raising their wages "has the same effect as throwing a stone in a still pond," which would lead to an "ever-widening circle of buying". In other words, he understood the need to spread the wealth around, a little bit. More to the point, he set in motion the creation of a blue collar middle class. Gompers had a say in things too, but Ford's act got people's attention.
The argument that today it's fine to destroy the blue collar middle class because Obama's plan will replace it tomorrow with a new middle class based on a Green Economy is all well and good for tomorrow, if it is possible to live long enough. The Bushies took the attitude that the USofA would be fine if all those old union workers would just shut up and die. Obama is implementing their plan. This is a betrayal of what he said while he campaigned. The notion that this country can't afford health care for all citizens is bogus. We can afford it, if only we had the will.
On the other hand, Obama, Geithner, Summers, and Bernanke take a kid gloves approach to Wall Street malfeasance, and nonfeasance. Social Darwinism is generally understood to mean that the rich are so because they are better, in whatever sense one needs to believe. The problem with Social Darwinism is that it really doesn't work. Mad George III was the product of Social Darwinism. Aristocracy is a form of Social Darwinism. Inbreeding for rich people. All of those cracies are modes of Social Darwinism; with the possible exception of meritocracy. If there ever is one.
Yet, those that caused this collapse are paid off, while those that actually make real goods are punished. It violates what Obama said he stood for. It also is stupid. There cannot be a United States of America which matters more than Nova Scotia if it doesn't even make its own automobiles. The assertion that the US automakers pay more than the foreign automakers in our South has been disproved. The "Times" has been taken to task for repeating that nonsense. It just isn't true.
Barack Obama lied to us. His solution is no different from Bush II.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment