A new order is rising.
After failing to return to profitability—as ALG News predicted they would—GM and Chrysler have been “granted” 60 and 30 days respectively to present “acceptable” plans. GM Chairman, Rick Wagoner, has been forced out as a condition to receive more federal bailout money, and Chrysler has 30 days to complete a merger with Italian automaker, Fiat.
ALG News warned these companies about accepting bailout money—that this was not an innocent favor by a benevolent government trying to “help”—that it would come with strings attached. Now, they know.
But it’s too late. Such is the state of the American auto “industry.” These are no longer companies. These are now de facto agencies of the federal government.
This is a new order not just for the American economy—but for the nation’s entire system of government. The executive branch is taking upon itself seemingly limitless powers to push around those who took Federal Reserve loans or TARP companies, firms, and insurers.
Stringent terms and conditions are now being applied to the dispersal of these funds. They are called “taxpayer protections.” They are anything but. They are carte blanche to continue the bailouts, increase the troubled firms’ dependency on government funds, and to further regulate them.
Therefore, the bailouts only serve to increase the taxpayers’ burden, not decrease it. How does this work?
By perpetuating the economic emergency, President Obama is now ensuring that investors will want no part of troubled firms, or the bailouts—a double-edge sword. The only way the bailout firms will now be able to remain funded for the foreseeable future now will be through government-backing. Meanwhile, Ford is increasing its market share, as ALG News has previously reported.
The President’s actions today and the Treasury Secretary’s move last week to request authority to seize TARP-recipient firms now crystallize the intentions of the Administration to both market and government observers. This is war.
The President is engaged in a chess match against the markets. And he is at present winning. Why?
Because, in one short year, the government has moved so quickly to take over the financial system, and now in extension all investments, pensions, funds, and everything else that presently needs to be back-stopped by the FDIC, Federal Reserve, the Treasury, and Congress.
It overtook Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac over the summer completely—thus ensuring that the government owns most every mortgage in the country.
It has signed up to buy every single mortgage-backed security out there, creating a limitless line on the budget without much thought as to its final, bottom line, as the bailouts pile up and spiral out of control, and the taxpayer is left on the hook to wither and dry.
All of which is a dramatic departure from constitutional limited government.
There now are no limits, and the Federal Constitution is but mere paper. Even the fiat currency the government prints with abandon now carries more value at the moment to the elected and unelected officials giving it away seemingly for free but in reality at the costly price of leverage upon the bailout’s recipients.
The reason for this rapid succession to tyranny in such a short period is because there now is no effective defense of the Constitution and its limits being waged. There is a weak opposition on Capitol Hill, and a fervent and yet powerless conservative movement on the airwaves and embodied in dedicated organizations in and near the capital and around the nation.
Once these industries—whether they be the mortgage, financial, and now automakers—are subsidized by federal dollars, officials, whether they be Congressmen, the Treasury, the Federal Reserve, or the President, arbitrarily apply so-called taxpayer “protections” while simultaneously perpetuating the need for taxpayer assistance.
This new order is decidedly fascist, and it will rapidly proceed to being outright socialist. First, the monster will subsidize, then it will take ownership, and then it will destroy the American economy.
And if men who love liberty do not act quickly, it will be the end of limited government as we know it.
Robert Romano is the Senior Editor of ALG News Bureau.
