For bloggers:
Sanchez’ bill goes way beyond cyberbullying and comes close to making it a federal offense to log onto the internet or use the telephone. The methods of communication where hostile speech is banned include e-mail, instant messaging, blogs, websites, telephones and text messages.
We can’t say what we think of Sanchez’s proposal. Doing so would clearly get us two years in solitary confinement.
These people don’t care about either the first or second amendment.
[Update a couple minutes later]
Somehow, this seems related:
Left-wing bloggers have been saying that the White House’s denial of making threats should be taken at face value and that Lauria’s statement is not evidence to the contrary. But that’s ridiculous. Lauria is a reputable lawyer and a contributor to Democratic candidates. He has no motive to lie. The White House does.
Think carefully about what’s happening here. The White House, presumably car czar Steven Rattner and deputy Ron Bloom, is seeking to transfer the property of one group of people to another group that is politically favored. In the process, it is setting aside basic property rights in favor of rewarding the United Auto Workers for the support the union has given the Democratic Party. The only possible limit on the White House’s power is the bankruptcy judge, who might not go along.
Michigan politicians of both parties joined Obama in denouncing the holdout bondholders. They point to the sad plight of UAW retirees not getting full payment of the health care benefits the union negotiated with Chrysler. But the plight of the beneficiaries of the pension funds represented by the bondholders is sad too. Ordinarily you would expect these claims to be weighed and determined by the rule of law. But not apparently in this administration.
Obama’s attitude toward the rule of law is apparent in the words he used to describe what he is looking for in a nominee to replace Justice David Souter. He wants “someone who understands justice is not just about some abstract legal theory,” he said, but someone who has “empathy.” In other words, judges should decide cases so that the right people win, not according to the rule of law.
Laws are for the little people.
[Afternoon update]
Mickey Kaus says that Chrysler Plus Fiat Equals Chooch:
My objection isn’t so much to the screwing of the secure lenders (let’s agree it’s a “dangerous” precedent) or to the strong-arming of the banks that received TARP funds (another dangerous precedent!). It’s to the screwing of the secure lenders and the strongarming of the banks in order to produce a bailout plan that will not work, that will flop like Chooch. The rationale for the bailout was that a bankruptcy would kill car sales, so the government had to step in and negotiate all the bankruptcy-style concessions without actually having a bankruptcy. But Obama was unwilling to get the U.A.W. to make the bankruptcy-style concessions that would be necessary to have a viable Chrysler. And Chrysler wound up in bankruptcy anyway. Prediction: It will either fail or suck up continuing annual taxpayer subsidies in the billions. In the process it will keep flooding the market with cars and make it harder to save GM and Ford. It didn’t have to be that way…
And there is something creepy in the way many analysts simply accept that, of course, banks receiving TARP funds must now do Obama’s bidding on unrelated matters like the Chrysler bankruptcy. This is a long way from JFK using his presidential power to face down a steel price hike–a long way toward an unpleasant economic model that creates at least the potential for political thuggery, that preserves capitalism’s inequalities without its freedoms and efficiencies. Let’s not give it a name…
Oh, it has a name. It starts with “f,” and ends in “ism.”
[Update early evening]
The price of the King’s shilling:
This is troubling, because it’s now clear that the worry many of us had at the time of the bank bailouts has come true: the government is using its intervention in the banking system to pressure banks to give special deals to the government’s special friends.
Countries that use their banking systems this way don’t get good results. If you’re a fairly uncorrupt developed country, you get slower growth and bloated “critical” sectors that are usually more critical in providing campaign support, lavishly remunerated make-work jobs, and photo ops, than any products the public actually wants. Then, if something like Japan happens, you have a twenty-year “lost decade” while everyone pretends as hard as hard can be that everything is all right, in the sincere but misguided believe that wishing hard enough will make it so.
This won’t end well. Particularly if it’s like the Depression, in which the cultists managed to convince people that they were doing the best that could be done, and we just had to be patient.
[Bumped]
I think the word “just” is important in understanding the maning of the Obama quote: “justice is not just about some abstract legal theory…”
If I say to you “I won’t just go to Titan, but I will also stay there”, I’m not saying that I won’t go to Titan.
Bob, apples are calling on line one complaining that all you got are oranges.
basic property rights in favor of rewarding the United Auto Workers
Except that the UAW has “basic property rights” in the form of a contract providing retirees health care.
Regarding Sanchez’s bill – the right has also attempted censorship. Remember the Chile Online Protection Act? In that case, the only thing protecting your rights were Federal judges. (That’s what they do.)
Since Sanchez’s bill isn’t even out of the House yet, you’ll forgive me if I don’t start packing to head for the hills.
Except that the UAW has “basic property rights” in the form of a contract providing retirees health care.
Then you let a judge sort it out, not thugs in the White House.
Josh, can you think of a sentence which has the form “not just x but y”, which excludes x? Maybe there is one, but I haven’t thought of it.
Here’s a relevant candidate sentence, but I don’t think it qualifies: ” I’m not just making a point about logic, I’m making a point about English comprehension.”
Anyway, if justice is not just about some abstract legal theory, then justice is indeed about, among other things, some abstract legal theory.
I concede this is a very narrow argument that doesn’t shed light on the overall subject of Rand’s post, but the author’s misinterpretation of Obama’s quote vexed me.
Then you let a judge sort it out which is exactly what we are doing.
Obama was trying to negotiate an alternative arrangement. There is nothing wrong with such a negotiation. Said negotiation can even include harsh words. Here in my business I have personally seen such threats made.
Mmm, yes, Chris, but have you seen threats that include jail time? Maybe fines and confiscation of your property if you don’t go along? Unfortunately, that’s what the government is weilding. Remember that 90% confiscation of last year’s income, retroactively applied, to AIG employees? How about changing the rules of taking TARP money after it’s already paid out?
In business, between private parties, threats are made, yes. But they’re threats of non-cooperation, of the possible loss of future income, scary stuff like that. They do not include threats to your freedom, or the theft — there’s no other just word for it (nor empathic, for Bob) — of your personal property.
We’ll put it in terms the Left can understand. When Steve threatens Linda Sue with consequences if Linda Sue doesn’t go down on him, it matters whether Steve is her boss or not, whether the “consequences” include “I won’t call you ever again, nor send you flowers” or “you’re going to lose your job and pension.”
Obama was trying to negotiate an alternative arrangement.
That is not his job. Apparently, you don’t understand the role of the presidency. It is not supposed to “make threats” to private citizens. He’s a president, not a king.
but have you seen threats that include jail time? Maybe fines and confiscation of your property if you don’t go along?
Read the blankety-blank article. The threat was to use the “full force of the White House press corps would destroy its reputation if it continued to fight.”
Color me unimpressed.
Also, Bob, your analysis is certainly spot on, but I would suggest the difference between you and Rand here is that you are taking The O’s word’s at face value. You think he means what he says, that he’s intellectually honest about stuff. So when he says “not just X but Y” he really means to add Y to a basic core of X.
I think perhaps Rand, as an engineer more interested in measureable facts than spectulative lovely theory, is looking past O’s literal words to what he might actually mean by them — to that which he can be counted upon to do.
Unfortunately, from that point of view — using the assumption, not unjustified by experience, that the guy can and does lie out of both sides of his mouth simultaneously — that “just” stops having its English grammar meaning. It becomes like the “but” in “separate but equal,” a bit of a code phrase that means something quite different from the literal meaning.
In this case, the suspicion far and wide is that what this code phrase means is “I want a SCOTUS Justice who is concerned about outcomes, not process. Someone who will vote to have a certain agenda enacted whether or not that is consistent with a certain old fussy bit of parchment from 1797.”
“make threats” to private citizens. He’s a president, not a king.
So all he can do is say “pretty please with sugar on top of it?”
Color me unimpressed.
Chris, you’d be unimpressed if Team Obama put a horse’s head in the bedroom of the biggest Chrystler bondholder. If Rahm Emmanuel sent men in masks with AK-47s to abduct their kids to ensure their good behaviour. You don’t care about these people, nor their rights.
horse’s head in the bedroom of the biggest Chrystler bondholder
Bullshit! If the Obama administration does anything illegal I shall immediately criticize them. But you could run the entire Kentucky Derby through the gap between kidnapping and embarrassing somebody in the press.
Earth to Carl – please come back to reality.
So all he can do is say “pretty please with sugar on top of it?”
Again, it is not his job to determine the outcome of an industrial bankruptcy, even if it helps pay off a political constituency. This is a corrupt use of executive power.
And you should ponder the implications of a threat to use the White House press corps against his political enemies.
But you won’t, because he can do no wrong in your eyes.
It’s not just being embarrassed in the press. It’s having your reputation and credibility destroyed in the press.
Actually, Rand, his job is to prevent the collapse of the US economy. If that means involving himself in a bankruptcy with the authorization of Congress which gave him the money to do so, then so be it.
The “implication” of using the White House press corps to embarrass somebody is that the White House will provide names, have Gibbs stand up there and talk about them, and otherwise make sure that the somebody in question is a topic of discussion.
Actually, Rand, his job is to prevent the collapse of the US economy.
That does not give him carte blanche to do anything he wants in the name of “preventing the collapse of the US economy.”
have Gibbs stand up there and talk about them
That’s not using the press corps. That’s using his press secretary.
Try again.
Rand – Obama doesn’t have “carte blanche.” That’s why Chrysler is in bankruptcy court.
Any attempt to use the White House press corps would involve Gibbs, since it’s his job to deal with them.
That’s why Chrysler is in bankruptcy court.
And that’s where the issue should be resolved, without interference (and threats) from the White House.
Any attempt to use the White House press corps would involve Gibbs, since it’s his job to deal with them.
You continue to evade the point.
We’ll put it in terms the Left can understand. When Steve threatens Linda Sue with consequences if Linda Sue doesn’t go down on him, it matters whether Steve is her boss or not, whether the “consequences” include “I won’t call you ever again, nor send you flowers” or “you’re going to lose your job and pension.”
Let’s revisit Carl’s example. If it were sexual harassment in the workplace, you’d be hearing stuff like:
or a bit further on (for some 1998 flavor)
Even though Obama is not a supervisor of these bond holders, he holds a tremendous amount of power over them. There’s a good chance that one or more of these bond holders has committed some small infraction. That’d explain why only one bond holder dropped its case. Seriously, what could Obama tell the press corp that would get a bondholder to settle for 33 cents on the dollar (or less as it may turn out)? I think an SEC or FBI investigation. That’d be a crime, extortion, if that were the case.
Chris, you wrote:
Actually, Rand, his job is to prevent the collapse of the US economy. If that means involving himself in a bankruptcy with the authorization of Congress which gave him the money to do so, then so be it.
That’s not at stake. This is nearly identical to the “national security” excuse that the Bush administration used over and over again to pass bad law, break existing law, and hide important information from the public.
The bankruptcy of GM and Chrysler, though they are large, do not involve the collapse of the US economy. Further, even if they did, Obama is interfering with the distribution of assets. What danger to the US economy is represented by secured bond holders (which include pension funds) getting more than retired UAW workers?
Anyone who thinks Obama is qualified to take out the garbage, much less save the US from financial collapse, has been ingesting ergot fortified wheat.
It is not sort-of fascism, it is a criminal form of fascism — as if Mussolini and the Mafia had joined forces in the ’30s to save Italy’s economy.
Obama’s band of zombies is in full denial mode, but facts speak for themselves.
Karl – the first danger to the US economy is that the secured bond holders only get more then the offer in the event of a liquidation, since their security is physical plant. The second danger is the loss of jobs in the event of a Chrysler collapse, and the third danger is a whole bunch of UAW retirees tossed into poverty.
“So all he can do is say “pretty please with sugar on top of it?””
Yes, he is the executive, not a judge, he cannot order you to do anything unless you are in the military. Just like your local mayor cannot order you to do anything. That’s not the job of the executive branch.
In other words, Chris, there looks to be some cause to expedite the bankruptcy of these companies, but not to shift welfare from the usual distribution in bankruptcy. And I have limited sympathy for UAW retirees. They had a great job and the current pension default has been in the pipeline for some time. Plenty of time to prepare for the inevitable. I don’t see the case to selectively bail them out at the expense of other people which includes other retirees.
Keep in mind that the UAW had to have agreed on the secured bond issue when it came out. They could have scuttled that by dropping the company into bankruptcy court (probably among other legal recourse). They didn’t.
Finally, it’s worth noting that the current Obama scheme would have Chrysler and GM controlled by the UAW or the US government respectively. It’s so infernally convenient that “danger to the US economy” dovetails so neatly with a huge power boost to a Democrat constituency. I think it should be stopped now. If hundreds of thousands of UAW retirees should be plunged into real poverty, then that is by all means a better outcome than this.
Yes, he is the executive, not a judge, he cannot order you to do anything unless you are in the military. Just like your local mayor cannot order you to do anything. That’s not the job of the executive branch.
Yes, he can. It doesn’t have much in the way of legal standing, but the executive branch has considerable leeway in how it persecutes those who oppose its wishes. Perhaps you recall those peace demonstrators who ended up on no-fly lists? Obama probably would use the power of the IRS and the SEC.
I think the word “just” is important in understanding the maning of the Obama quote: “justice is not just about some abstract legal theory…”
Oh, I agree. You run into judges like that every now and then, who try to split the baby between the law and whatever their preference is. Not pretty stuff.
Bullshit! If the Obama administration does anything illegal I shall immediately criticize them.
So as long as they pass a law first, the horsehead is OK. Gotcha.
Adam – if you can’t see the difference between threatening violence and asking somebody to do something you want them to do, then I am wasting my time talking to you.
Particularly if it’s like the Depression, in which the cultists
Rand, if you’re looking for cultists, look in the mirror. You insist on relying on hack, partisan and demonstrably incorrect “histories” by Jonah Goldberg and Amity Shales. That is, if not the definition of “cultist” certainly every bit as wise as relying on Flat Earthers for geography.
I don’t see the case to selectively bail them out at the expense of other people which includes other retirees.
Its worse than that. Giving taxpayer cash directly to the UAW retirees would still be bad policy, but it wouldn’t ne nearly as much an abuse of power as is this stuff about bullying some bondholders. And lets not even get started on the TARP bondholders that the government is threatening even more efficaciously.
Chris G.,
If you don’t know why the word “bully” in “bully pulpit” means, I’m wasting my time talking to you. If you think bondholders are widely alleging that the Obama Administration threatened them just because “he asked them to do something,” I’m wasting my time talking to you. If you think the TARP bondholders have all fallen in line with the government’s position because they’re convinced that UAW management is just what Chrysler needs to survive, I’m wasting my time talking to you.
Now run off to your struggle session, there’s good fellow.
You insist on relying on hack, partisan and demonstrably incorrect “histories” by Jonah Goldberg and Amity Shales.
Ignoring your misspelling of Amity’s last name, please “demonstrate” the incorrectness.
Regarding Shlaes’ errors, see here. (Also follow the links in the article.) Essentially, she ignores real GDP growth and deliberately understates job growth.
Regarding Goldberg, a good summary of his errors can be found here.
Other errors:
1) Mussolini, the intellectual father of fascism (he named it) renounced the Left repeatedly.
2) The very name “fascism” was a throwback (deliberately) to the Roman Empire, as were the gold emblems carried on staffs at parades.
3) Fascism did not advocate the then-current leftist ideas, such as workers’ control of the means of production or abolishing monarchies. In fact, Nazi Germany didn’t nationalize its industries until 1943, years after Britain and the US.
Since I’m coming up on Carl Pham-ish length, I’ll try to wrap this up. The events of the 20th century are well-known and understood by historians, conservative and liberal. I studied under conservative historians at the U of I. Shlaes and Goldberg are not historians – they are people trying to obscure history for personal and political gain.
Its a simple logical exercise that flows from foundational premises:
1. Liberalism good.
2. Fascism bad.
Ergo,
3. Goldberg and Shlaes, worse than Flat-Earthers.
The Chile Online Protection Act was not nearly as cool as I thought it would be, btw.
Adam – if you can’t see the difference between threatening violence and asking somebody to do something you want them to do, then I am wasting my time talking to you.
Perhaps you have a short memory or weren’t paying attention to what happened to the AIG executives. After being ridiculed and held up by the press, they received death threats and had protestors outside their homes. Even when told of these threats, the NY attorney general demanded a list of their names. Perhaps you’ve also forgotten the reports of Obama telling bankers that he was all that stood between them and the pitchforks. That’s an implicit threat of violence and it starts by having a lapdog press do his bidding without question.
The Chrysler bondholders have a stake in the bankrupsy proceedings as determined by law. Their claims on Chrysler assets is greater than that of the UAW but Obama is trying to force them to accept a lessor share to benefit the union. That is well beyond the powers of a president and is the actions of a political hack doing things the Chicago way.
My view on fascism is that it is an authoritarian concept and has little to do with either Left or Right, liberal or conservative ideologies. Most tyrannies of the 20th century have some mix of ideologies, usually a leftist sop for the plebes (universal employment, old age pension) along with rightwing treats like a strong military and strong police.
How these are implemented and what other policies the powers chose to pursue can have a strong Left or Right flavor to them. We’ve gone over this before. Also it doesn’t make sense to define a fascist by who he opposes. Even parties on the same side ideologically are threats to power. So claiming Mussolini was right wing because he renounced a number of leftist groups just doesn’t work. I think there’s a lot of Right wing ideology though in the fascism of Italy – crime control, pro-private ownership, discipline, etc.
And as far as appealing to ancient empires, several Leftist fascist states have made that appeal. The Pol Pot regime of Cambodia occasionally compared itself to both Angkor (the culture and empire that occupied Cambodia from 800-1400 AD roughly) and to a time 2,000 years ago before foreign influence. That doesn’t make them rightist. The Communist Chinese asserted that they had the mandate of heaven, inherited from the empires of the past.
It seems like every totalitarian government has made some claim to ancient times, usually reforging the tales of history to reflect their ideologies. Other governments have done so to some degree as well. For example, the US has also compared itself to the ancient Roman Republic and the ancient Greeks (especially during a phase in the 19th century), but that didn’t make the US rightist either.
Adam, you wrote:
The Chile Online Protection Act was not nearly as cool as I thought it would be, btw.
I’d have thought it’d be pretty hot.
When evaluating where a regime falls on the left-fight spectrum, it helps to look at who they arrest and who they reward. Fascists arrested leftists, like communists, and rewarded rightists like business owners and aristocrats.
Cambodia was very unique in leftist regimes for calling to the past. The USSR, for example, didn’t make any references to the past until the Nazis invaded. That’s when the new national anthem, singing about the Motherland, was unveiled.
But yes, much like dolphins resemble fish, authoritarian regimes resemble each other. The mechanics of moving through water or running large-scale police states limit one’s options.
When evaluating where a regime falls on the left-fight spectrum, it helps to look at who they arrest and who they reward. Fascists arrested leftists, like communists, and rewarded rightists like business owners and aristocrats.
Chris —
Are you so innocent of history as to imagine that Stalin didn’t arrest and send to the Gulag many “leftists”?
For Pete’s sake…
Lauria is an advocate for his clients. He has broad latitude to say things that make them look good, or improve their chances of prevailing in litigation, and a duty to do so zealously.
OK, be skeptical of what the government says. But equally remember that Lauria’s duty is not to the truth, but to his clients.
Lauria Argument #1: The mean government abused their power by threatening to crush holdouts with the White House press corps. It follows, then, that holdouts suffered that grim punishment. Which apparently consisted of Obama calling them “speculators’. Oh, the horror.
Dude, if you’re in the business of trading in Chrysler debt, you are speculating. You are holding assets that are very volatile and of uncertain value. I don’t have a problem with that. As far as I am concerned, people that put up their own money in the marketplace to buy assets they think are overpriced are serving the general good, since they bring those goods closer to their true value. Good for you.
On the other hand, if you are speculating in assets of uncertain value and you are upset because someone calls you a speculator, you really need to rethink your career.
Hmmm, in the article, “The Price of the King’s Shilling”, the last sentence asserts that “they are planning to do it again”. What industries would be “next” in that sense? I’d guess something large, old, and unionized. Maybe some of the airlines.
that Stalin didn’t arrest and send to the Gulag many “leftists”?
It’s called a purge. One gets rid of folks that are in the wrong faction, not a whole class of people.
Some dictators purge, some don’t. Mussolini, IIRC, didn’t purge, nor did Franco. Hitler did purge – he got rid of homosexuals, mostly, but that was internal politics. Even Hitler didn’t get rid of industrialists or aristocrats.
“Even Hitler didn’t get rid of industrialists or aristocrats.”
Except the Juden ones.
Obama has a lot of leverage.
With all that tax money in chrysler he is a major creditor.
pity all those smart harvard mba’s put their firms into credit crises.
When they send us to the gulag, I hope they give us the day off from forced labor when the temp drops below 40 degrees.
“they are planning to do it again” With GM in June, I expect.
Just a reminder – the UAW will have to sell off their stake to cover their retiree healthcare benefits.
Plus, if George Bush had done anything remotely of this sort there would be a -gate at the end of this somewhere.
Bush exercising overarching powers in the name of the War on Terror had the press’s head spinning. Now with the ‘War on Greed’ the press is stirring the presidents bucket of tar for him.
“With all that tax money in chrysler he is a major creditor.”
7 billion of is now gone. Won’t be recovered. I guess he’s not as major as he used to be. Too bad, I and my fellow Americans could have used that 7B on something useful.
> It’s called a purge. One gets rid of folks that are in the wrong faction, not a whole class of people.
Let’s review.
When someone jails/kills some leftists, that’s evidence that said someone is a rightist. However, when a known leftist does so, that’s a purge of rivals.
Same act, different meaning, the difference being the point that Gerrib is trying to argue.
Aghain, more right-wing paranoia. I don’t know about this Sanchez, but surely if she did consider abridging our liberties, President Obama would put the kibosh on it. If you winguts would read something other than GUNS AND AMMO and the Bible once in a while, you would know that if the writings, speeches and very biography of the World’s Greatest Community Organizer tell you anything, it’s that no one on earth is more committed to liberty than our Beloved Leader, Il Dufe.