Obama and the Progressive Movement’s Plan to Bring America to Her Knees
Posted on 07. Sep, 2009 by James Devere in American Politics, Political Commentary, Political News
We hear a lot today about our struggling economy, even about the failure of capitalism; we are told that our economic system, not just our economy, is broken. However, the notion that our system, that the American system is broken must be rejected. Our economy and our banking system were mismanaged to the brink of disaster by a special interest beholden congress. But is our free enterprise system broken? No, not until politicians silence Middle America; not until the people return the same bad apples back to the congressional barrel. The economic brinkmanship embodied in massive spending bills threatens to push our economy over the edge. Not voting out the architects of our current economic trouble may allow the final nail to be driven into the coffin of our economic future.
Obama and his progressive Administration admittedly have a problem with the economy. Their issue, however, is not a struggle to devise a way to fix the economy; they are more concerned with the fairness of the economy — their public rhetoric is dripping with class envy and a loathing for America’s success. Rather than striving to promote a system that has allowed for the highest standard of living in history — even though some poor people in America still have just one cell phone and have to survive on basic cable — rather than tout that economy, our leaders apologize for our arrogance and our success. They are not concerned with a sputtering economy or one that is misfiring. They see our economic engine as an SUV, opulent and sucking energy, and are bent on its destruction.
Imagine taking your SUV to the local mechanic for a tune up (it was not hitting on all cylinders and something had to be done) but instead of fixing the vehicle, the mechanic takes a sledge hammer to the engine and sets fire to the interior. In its place you are given a used Yugo, free of charge. You just have to pay the taxes. A far fetched analogy, yes, but the lesson is that if your economy is just misfiring it can be fixed, but if you destroy the economy…then it has to be replaced.
Virtually every fiscal decision that the Administration has made flies in the face of sound free-market economics. To understand this is to understand that they do not want to fix the economy. The administration looks at our capitalist system as the enemy. Rather than viewing the recession as an obstacle to be overcome in order to put the economy back on a path of growth, they embrace the recession as a tool to justify the rapid absorption of GDP.
So why is our progressive Administration after control of GDP? Just follow the money. In 2008, GDP was 14.29 trillion dollars but government revenue was a measly 2.59 trillion (and that is just not enough to redistribute). A fundamental belief of the progressives is that government must provide all means of subsistence, healthcare, recreation, education, and even entertainment to the people. Therefore, they need to control all aspects of the economy and distribute to each citizen their fair share. It is widely accepted that the economy will shrink under such a system, and it will, but the government sector will grow, and the progressives in power will remain our guardians for the foreseeable future.
In one scenario, under massive government regulation the economy may consolidate to 70% of its 2008 GDP or 10 trillion dollars. This would cause a monumental drop in our standard of living, but if the government, using massive government regulation, can absorb 50% of GDP, government revenue would be 5 trillion dollars. At 5 trillion dollars the types of programs this Administration envisions start to become plausible. In fact, the programs would become essential. GDP at $10 trillion would include crushing under/unemployment and the need for large government subsistence programs. The lowest earning 8% of households would see their standard of living increase under such a plan; the remaining 92% of households would decline.
Before they can break the system they have to control the system. We are, as a society, handing over the keys to our free-enterprise SUV in exchange for a Yugo. Over 70 percent of Americans believe that their healthcare will be worse under a government plan that increases spending by 1 trillion dollars. Yet Congress and the Administration are on the brink of pulling off the largest entitlement program in history. Healthcare represents one sixth of the US economy. Add to that the automotive sector with GM, the financial sector with the bank bailouts and the energy sector with cap and trade. Agriculture has been controlled by the Farm Bill for decades, and Carter effectively killed the mining industry in America in the 1970′s. High-tech jobs are headed overseas at an alarming rate and the Administration has announced sweeping cuts to the defense industry. What is left? What part of the private sector is not within reach of our economic sledgehammer-wielding government? What will happen to small businesses as the driving industries in each community begin to stagnate under increased regulation and taxation?
At what cost does the Administration pursue the shiny new subsistence economy? Cap and trade will, by conservative estimates, double the energy bills of American consumers, leaving less money to spend in the community. Healthcare reform as it is proposed will, at a minimum, take an additional 8% of Americans’ annual income, leaving less money to spend in the community. Café standards for new cars will further cripple the American automotive sector, leaving even more people out of work. The rising high-tech industry in Asia will eventually become a brain-drain of America’s best and brightest and will stifle ingenuity. Investment dollars will head to greener foreign pastures.
Striking at the knees of the economy will not allow for the economic recovery that investors are hoping for and entrepreneurs will not return to drive innovation. Some sectors will be shored up, to allow the Administration to claim small victories, though they will state that “more is needed to help our most unfortunate, who are in danger of being left behind in the recovery.” The 2009 stimulus is still largely unallocated, most likely being held back to affect economic numbers that will be more pertinent to the 2012 reelection of Barack Obama.
If the Administration is successful in quietly killing our economic drivers, we will be confronted with double digit unemployment, a devalued currency, soaring interest rates and economic growth at less than 2% per year. Job growth will be supplied through the government sector rather than coming from the innovation and ingenuity of the American people. Social services will be over-taxed and the productive few will support the entitlements of large sectors of a formerly productive workforce. There will be increasing calls for the Government to do more. Our socialistic economic stagflation will have robbed our children of the greatness that previous generations have enjoyed. The ability to climb above one’s station in life will be lost. There will be only two stations: the political, economic, and academic elite, and then the rest of us.
The failure of American free enterprise may be viewed as a disaster by most Americans, but for Obama, George Soros, and their cohorts, it is what they are counting on. To spread democracy and capitalism to them is to spread arrogance, gluttony, racism, and greed. The American system would promote freedom and individuality on a mass scale and this Administration is afraid of independent acting and thinking people, they are afraid of the ability of Americans to be responsible for their own livelihood. They are afraid for their own self importance.
Is it too late? Our leaders have chosen to walk away from the challenge of securing our future, and have instead decided to hijack it. Our last chance to stop them may be the 2010 elections. New candidates are starting to emerge. If we vote enough of the Obama enablers out in 2010, there is hope to stall the economic slide and get back on track to a strong economy and the steady growth that allowed America to be the shining example that once she was.
