Obama '08?

@okie,

It's certainly nice that you've been able to maintain your rights to freedom of speech okie.

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@Cycloptichorn,

I think Obama and the government is flirting with Fascism, but I am not one to declare them Fascists at this point, I think it is enough to just call them liberals.

I think if GM comes out of its troubles and returns to its former status more or less, and competes along with the other companies as before in a more or less free market, then fine. However, if Obama attempts to take over more of how the auto industry is run and attempts to install alot more dictates onto the industry, then yes, we may be talking about Fascism.

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@okie,

You are reading too much into a hypothetical scenario. The wish bone offense doesn't work in pro-football.

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@okie,

I had to take a refresher course in our collective ownership of GM.
The U.S. gave GM $52Bn with $6.7Bn of that being a loan and the rest being a 61% ownership of GM.
Canada threw in $9.5Bn with $1.4Bn being a loan and the rest being about 12% ownership.
The loan portion ($8.1Bn) to the U.S. and Canada has been paid back, meaning that the U.S. still has an investment in GM of $45.3Bn and Canada has $8.1Bn.
In mid-May GM reported revenues for the 1st quarter of $31Bn and a profit of about $1Bn. 2nd quarter results should come out in mid-August.
GM had cash on hand of $35Bn at the end of the 1st quarter.
GM claims that they intend to do an IPO later in 2010 but I have my doubts about that given the continuing weakness in the economy.

1 Reply

@okie,

Felina Fascism, the reality television star, the one with a quart of silicon in each breast? The one who was so popular on Big Brother? Is that the Facism Obama is flirting with? What will Michelle say?

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@realjohnboy,

Thanks for filling us in on GM. I notice that money we loaned them was the word "billion" with a "b." That is not chump change by any means. Now, the problem I have is that if the administration is pulling too many strings or plans to pull strings to give an unfair advantage to GM for example, over the competition such as Ford or Toyota, I have a huge problem with that. And in fact, what about the safety stuff that Toyota has had to deal with, is the government really administering the safety standards and other regs fairly and evenly from company to company? I don't know that they are not, but I think we now have a situation that presents the temptation for the government to play favorites or turn a blind eye when it is convenient, and that is why I think the government should stay completely out of private enterprise. They should only be referees, not players as well.

1 Reply

@okie,

Quote:

They should only be referees, not players as well.

Think of it as the League stepping in to rescue a team that was failing - and whose failure would have dragged other teams down with it.

Now it's in reorg, soon it will be privately owned again, and there ya go.

Cycloptichorn

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@Cycloptichorn,

American sports leagues and teams are privately owned and managed. When a league's management steps in to rescue a team's management that is of course appropriate, when such behavior is in accord with the powers the teams themselves have voted to grant to their league management.

However, it is not appropriate for the federal government to violate the "supreme law of the land" (i.e., the Constitution of the USA) by stepping in to rescue a team or any other private organization from their unsatisfactory economic decisions. The powers that the federal government actually has, and some of the powers it does not have, are clearly specified in the Constitution.

A team (e.g., a business, a corporation, a partnership, a club) rescue is not one of those powers, nor should it be. Those are powers (per the 10th Amendment) that are reserved to the states or to the people. The federal government's primary power is for securing the liberty under the law of each and evevryone of us against anyone attempting to deprive any of us our liberty under the law to make our own economic decisions.

The federal government is not granted the power to equalize or reduce the differences in economic results. Nor should it be. Doing that not only violates the Constitution, it violates the liberty of individuals to profit as best they can from their lawful actions.

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@ican711nm,

A corporation is an entity created by the Department of Commerce as a person needs to file papers of incorporation.

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@Cycloptichorn,

Cycloptichorn wrote:

Quote:
They should only be referees, not players as well.

Think of it as the League stepping in to rescue a team that was failing - and whose failure would have dragged other teams down with it.

Now it's in reorg, soon it will be privately owned again, and there ya go.

Cycloptichorn

I was talking about the referees not playing the game. For example, if a referee sees a pass going incomplete so he steps in and catches the ball, runs for a touchdown and then hands it to the team that was trying to score, and gives that team 6 points, that would be cheating, including cheating the other team, which is of course a violation of the game rules and highly inappropriate. So if an administration does essentially the same thing, it is a violation of the constitution and the government has completely overstepped its jurisdiction and authority in doing so. The government has not only violated the rights of competing companies, but have also violated the rights of the taxpayers that have been robbed in process of doing what the government has done.

1 Reply

@ican711nm,

Cyclo used an analogy. Do you know what an analogy is?

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@plainoldme,

ican pointed out his analogy was faulty. Do you know what "faulty" means?

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@okie,

okie wrote:

I think Obama and the government is flirting with Fascism, but I am not one to declare them Fascists at this point, I think it is enough to just call them liberals.

In regard to this subject, here is an interesting article about that.
http://conservativeamerican.org/dems-libs-socialists/dems-libs-socialists-obama/is-obama-a-fascist/

Here are some selected quotes from that link:
"Even Democrat Senator Robert Byrd says President Obama is “pushing the limits” of the Constitution with his power-grabs.

President Obama is the leader of what I believe is an extreme left-wing political movement. He exalts nation above individual. He is demanding (and getting) a more centralized autocratic government headed by himself. He continues to push the limits of the US Constitution, even trampling on it for more centralized power. He speaks of the redistribution of wealth and making enemies of wealthy citizens. President Obama also is acting like he wants to forcibly suppress the opposition. That sounds an awful lot like the Webster’s definition of Fascism we list above."

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@okie,

okie wrote:

Cycloptichorn wrote:

Quote:
They should only be referees, not players as well.

Think of it as the League stepping in to rescue a team that was failing - and whose failure would have dragged other teams down with it.

Now it's in reorg, soon it will be privately owned again, and there ya go.

Cycloptichorn

I was talking about the referees not playing the game. For example, if a referee sees a pass going incomplete so he steps in and catches the ball, runs for a touchdown and then hands it to the team that was trying to score, and gives that team 6 points, that would be cheating, including cheating the other team, which is of course a violation of the game rules and highly inappropriate. So if an administration does essentially the same thing, it is a violation of the constitution and the government has completely overstepped its jurisdiction and authority in doing so. The government has not only violated the rights of competing companies, but have also violated the rights of the taxpayers that have been robbed in process of doing what the government has done.

Woah there - the government isn't 'cheating' on behalf of one team. Bailing a company out isn't cheating on some big game, Okie. It's just making sure that the team doesn't go out of business, so the game can go on.

Cycloptichorn

1 Reply

@Cycloptichorn,

And that is, IMO, an unfair advantage.

To use your analogy, if the govt bails out one team, what is to stop that team from using that bailout again?
If the team management makes bad decisions that cause the team to fold, the players will get picked up by another team.

The problem I have is with the "to big to fail" reasoning used to bail out some of the banks and companies, is that every company or business is "to big to fail"
The little store down the street from me has 3 employees, so arent those employees entitled to the same considerations and bailouts, if needed, that the banks got?
To use your analogy again, isnt a "minor league" team also to big to fail?
BTW, the store is in no danger of closing, I am just using them as an example.

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@mysteryman,

It was an emergency situation as this bailout was not a planned affair. Failure to bailout the failing institutions would have led to a greater disaster. You cling to straws to make any sort of argument trying to skip important details.

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@talk72000,

talk 72000 wrote:

A corporation is an entity created by the Department of Commerce as a person needs to file papers of incorporation.

While some corporations are created by state or federal government, the great majority are created by one or more private persons.

Quote:

http://unabridged.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/unabridged?va=corporation&x=32&y=7
Main Entry: cor·po·ra·tion
Pronunciation Guide
Pronunciation: k(r)prshn
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): -s
Usage: often attributive
Etymology: Middle English, from Medieval Latin corporation-, corporatio, from Latin corporatus + -ion-, -io -ion
1 : a body of persons associated for some purpose (as standardization of conditions): as a obsolete : a group of merchants or traders united in an association : a trade guild b : the body of municipal authorities of a town or city <the Corporation of the City of London>
2 Roman & civil law a : a group of persons or objects treated by the law as an individual or unity having rights or liabilities distinct from those of the persons or objects composing it : UNIVERSITY -- called also body corporate b : a single person or object treated by the law as having a legal individuality or entity other than that of a natural person : ARTIFICIAL PERSON
3 or corporation aggregate English & US common & statute law : a body formed and authorized by law to act as a single person and endowed by law with the capacity of succession : an entity recognized by law as constituted by one or more persons and as having various rights and duties together with the capacity of succession <a corporation is an artificial being, invisible, intangible, and existing only in contemplation of law -- John Marshall> -- see COMPANY 3, ECCLESIASTICAL CORPORATION, MUNICIPAL CORPORATION, PRIVATE CORPORATION, PUBLIC CORPORATION, PUBLIC SERVICE CORPORATION, QUASI CORPORATION
4 : the area governed by a municipal corporation <within the corporation limits of Chicago>
5 : an association of employers and employees in a basic industry or of members of a profession organized as an organ of political representation in a corporative state and responsible for supervision and control of production, wages, working conditions, and all matters pertaining to that industry or profession -- see CORPORATISM
6 : a fat or protuberant belly : POTBELLY

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@georgeob1,

That frozen Pelosi smile gives me the creeps.

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@mysteryman,

mysteryman, your mention of the "too big to fail" issue is an interesting one. When was the last time anybody noticed a Mom and Pop business down the street being saved from bankruptcy, or any small business for that matter being saved? It seems obvious that the government does not care at all about small businesses, in fact thousands of them probably go broke every year, if not every month.

At the very least it is an unfair set of rules that are being employed by the federal government when they bail out big corporations, but do not care a whit about small businesses. For example, by bailing out GM, the small used car dealers in all the towns across the country probably took a hit in regard to how they potentially could have had their businesses increase when GM departed the scene. The reason businesses should be allowed to fail is because it weeds out the ones that are poorly run and mismanaged, thus increasing the overall quality of the remaining businesses, which ends up benefiting the public. The fact is that the free market benefits by failing businesses giving way to the more efficiently run ones.

One of the lessons learned by parents in raising children is to allow them to fail, so that they will learn. This can be seen clearly when a child is learning to walk, they need to be allowed to fall over a little now and then, so that they can learn to correct their balance. This principle persists into teenage years and later, so that they can grow into responsible adults that can live responsibly. It is no different with businesses, including large corporations, they need to learn how to operate responsibly. If they learn they will be bailed out, they don't learn what they need to learn.

1 Reply

@okie,

Quote:

When was the last time anybody noticed a Mom and Pop business down the street being saved from bankruptcy, or any small business for that matter being saved?

The city of Oakland helped bail out a Bakery this year, who had fallen on hard times but had been making bread there for about a hundred years.

We didn't bail out GM because we wanted to, or because it 'seemed like a good idea,' we bailed them out b/c they were failing in the middle of a bad recession, and it was determined that allowing them to fail would lead to an unacceptable level of further job and business losses. There was compelling evidence that the many suppliers of both GM and Ford would also have failed; that could have been an additional million jobs lost right there, and that's if Ford managed to keep going. Keep in mind that at this time the banks were frozen and weren't lending money to anyone at all - the normal process of bankruptcy wasn't going to work.

Either way, the bailout of GM was an unqualified success that eventually will see the company survive and lots of jobs survive. It was a good call on the part of GWB.

Cycloptichorn

2 Replies

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