By David Cribbin
“A Government Big Enough to give you everything you want is Strong Enough to take everything you have.”—Thomas Jefferson.
That quote by former president Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, was a warning about the danger to our freedom and liberty inherent in Big Government, by a man who was well acquainted with the tyranny of big government. Having disregarded Jefferson’s advice, we now bear witness to the very real threat to our liberty that unbridled Big Government has now become.
The weak Federal government created by the founders, whose primary role was to protect our rights and guarantee our freedoms, has been superseded over the years by a powerful central government that has lost sight of its raison d’etre . The raw power of Big Government was clearly on display in its handling of the automaker’s bankruptcy negotiations. Their actions served to upend bankruptcy law and defraud bondholders of their private property rights. When a private citizen steals another’s money and is caught he goes to jail; which is where Bernie Madoff resides for his participation in a scheme to defraud investors. When government officials steal from investors they go to Hollywood to tell their supporters what a great job they are doing, I think the line was “Los Angeles, you ain’t seen nothing yet,” then they ask for additional campaign contributions.
This is not the sort of behavior one expects from government officials. Just ask the teacher and police unions of Indiana, whose retirement accounts have been pilfered by this same auto task force. I don’t think this is the change they voted for, but what the heck, it is change, and as we’ve been reminded, they did win! As unfortunate as it may be, you expect the administration to demonize Wall Street as merchants of greed and bash the Hedge Funds types, but cheating one group of union employees out of their retirement savings in order to fill up another group of union retiree’s accounts? How do you square that one? Has someone’s campaign contribution envelope been a little light lately? What else might explain it?
You can’t chalk this outcome up to the fact that the task force followed the rules and one group came out on the short end of the stick. They have been breaking the rules right from the start. The TARP legislation doesn’t authorize money to be spent on non financial institutions like the automakers in the first place. The rules in bankruptcy court, where Chrysler is now and GM is heading don’t allow the judge to show favoritism towards a group of unsecured creditors’ claims over another group of secured creditors, even if the Judge is a Latina woman, which Judge Gonzales is not. In my reading of Article II of the Constitution of the United States, which defines the power of the executive branch, I can’t find the power which gives the President the authority to buy an automobile, let alone the whole automobile industry!
Lucky for the UAW that where they are concerned the rules are meant to be broken, and broken they have been. Just ask anyone who’s been in the unfortunate position of having to negotiate with them and the political thugs for hire who do their bidding. I don’t Blame the UAW; they paid good money for these services, they may be brutish, but they can only talk tough. Besides it’s not Uncle Vito who’s doing the knee cappings in the auto wars; believe it or not it’s Uncle Sam. All these years I’ve labored under the false impression that Uncle Sam’s wrath was reserved for folks like the Nazis, the Commies and the Terrorists. I guess we can add law-abiding retirees, bond holders and car dealers to the list of undesirables.
So, there you have it. After every investor who evaluated an investment in the bankrupt US automakers dismissed the idea, concluding they would not return to profitability, Big Government in its infinite wisdom jumped into the breach with a sack full of your Franklins. Flexing its muscles in an unprecedented takeover of the weak sisters from Detroit, it thumbed its nose at the wisdom of the investors, instead forcing its citizens, whom it claims to represent, to fund these unprofitable enterprises through increased government taxation.
“Hear, Hear for Big Government. Let the Taking begin!”
David Cribbin is an ALG News Contributor and the President of the TailWind Capital Group. His blog can be read at http://therightsideofdave.blogspot.com.
