Olmsted Falls Asks for $100 Million Bailout; Slightly Less Stupid Than Auto Industry

OK.  This is getting out of hand.  Right?  I mean, this guy asking for $100,000,000 from the federal government for his school system is taking it too far, isn’t he? 

Well, my answer would be yes and no.  Of course it’s completely stupid.  Yes, it’s possibly one of the biggest insults to capitalism in the history of our nation.  But it’s really no more ridiculous than the auto industry asking for a bailout.  As a matter of fact, at least the school is some kind of government-run institution, so there’s an excuse for sucking.  The auto industry brought this on themselves. 

Many people are trashing the unions right now for being money-hungry, blood-sucking, business-destroying, and other unnecessary hyphened words.  However, the businesses let these unions do these things.  They knew the results would look just like this, but they kept letting the unions get their way because they feared losing a little money to a strike.  Really, they needed to stand up to the bullies and not let them take their lunch money. 

What I’m trying to say is this:  these companies, along with banks who were bullied by groups like ACORN and the like, let this happen to them by not having a backbone and bending to pressures from mindless collectivist groups.  So they should be left to suffer their fate, just as I would for making bad decisions.  If I listened to that idiot Jim Kramer and made some really poor investment decisions because of it, the government wouldn’t give me money to make up for following dumb advice from a complete simpleton, would they?

Now, we’re all laughing at this probable publicity stunt from an already highly-taxed suburb that I happen to live right next to.  Whereas the idea that they deserve government money from people not in their district because of their own mismanagement is almost unthinkable, that doesn’t mean it’s any dumber than the other bailouts.  We all know that offering federal government money for private industries is a mockery of everything the United States of America stands for.  If I sound angry, it’s because I am.  We were supposed to be individualists that took responsibility for our successes and our failures, and were defined by what we did in life.  Now, we’re acting like we are being bullied into things we don’t want to do because of far left collectivists.  We, and by we I mean everyone from an individual to a large company, have to fight back against these jerks.  I hope we have the guts to do so.  I’m done writing.  I’m too mad.

“We Should Just Raise Tariffs on Them…”

Sound like an angry union worker or laborer in a manufacturing position you know?  I have heard this brilliant cure-all statement from two people close to me that clearly either don’t think about consequences of their actions (totally possible) or don’t care about those consequences and the crappy things that would happen to others as a result (also possible).  The common response if I say this?  “Who cares about those people in other countries?!  We need jobs here!”

These people couldn’t be more misinformed, misguided, misdirected, or mis- anything elsed.  It’s not people in other countries you would hurt.  It would be people here that would suffer.  There are a number of reasons your own country would be the ones paying for this but I’m not going to name them all.  Instead, I’ll link, once again, to the ever on-point Walter Williams.  Click here for his commentary summed up in a small article on the merits of free trade vs. protectionism. 

The most important consequence for people in our own country is increased price of goods.  If we raise the prices of things brought in here, the cost of living increases for citizens here.  Increasing the costs of living decrease the quality of life.  It’s simple logic.  You might say, “well, if we just do it on cars, people will just buy American cars.”  Sure, but that would happen regardless of tariffs if the cars were a better deal.  People are going to act in their best interest, and if they think that the Toyota they are going to buy is a better value than a GM car, why should you be allowed to hinder their choices?  Fascism is OK as long as you force people to buy your product? 

Look at the tariff option in practice.  In Japan, their tariffs force its citizens to buy Japanese rice or pay the tariff-loaded foreign rice.  Both prices are about the same, because the Japanese companies can charge more as long as they don’t pass up the foreign companies’ price.  they will always be cheaper.  All they’ve done there is increase the price of rice for the people of Japan.  Seeing as it is the main ingredient in much of what they eat, the average citizen could have saved a decent sum of money had the tariff not existed.  You have already harmed the quality of life of the average citizen.  Just imagine if we started doing that here in the United States. 

Imagine adding$20 or more every month to a family’s grocery bill.  Families may start to buy less quality goods or have to cut back somewhere else to make up for that.  Now do you feel the same about tariffs seeing as you harmed the average family?  Just so you could save a couple jobs at a company that probably doesn’t deserve to stay open on its own merits?  How could anyone be for this kind of thing?  Walter Williams, in his article, explains how the average consumer doesn’t have millions of dollars to lobby the politicians into looking out for their interests.  But companies do.  So they can create a push for these taxes without regard for how it would harm the average consumer.

So yes, guys, you go ahead and tax the crap out of those foreign companies.  The rest of America thanks you for making things more expensive.  You guys are great.  Jerks.

Ayn Rand on Barack Obama’s New Socialism

I figure, now that Obama and his staff our getting all excited and ready to “fix” the economy, it is a good time to go over why everything the government is doing is wrong.  No, it’s not just Obama.  The entire government, with all their bailouts, handouts, or whatever you want to call them, are falling into the Socialist trap.  We want a quick fix so the government is going to give us what we want.  Let’s let probably the most brilliant mind of all time let us know how she would feel about this:

Socialism may be established by force, as in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics—or by vote, as in Nazi (National Socialist) Germany. The degree of socialization may be total, as in Russia—or partial, as in England. Theoretically, the differences are superficial; practically, they are only a matter of time. The basic principle, in all cases, is the same.

Instead of prosperity, socialism has brought economic paralysis and/or collapse to every country that tried it. The degree of socialization has been the degree of disaster. The consequences have varied accordingly.

 Ayn Rand from The Virtue of Selfishness

The first paragraph is especially important for us to understand right now.  Socialism of any kind, such as the government taking ownership of private property, is socialism nonetheless.  When government can take control of private property, they take control of individuals.  By allowing control of what we as individuals create, we are acknowledging that we are nothing more than slaves.

The second paragraph is stating the obvious.  I hope that this large-scale economic takeover by our government comes to a halt soon because the degree of disaster will get larger with each bailout or whatever they decide to create.  I’m not sure how much more “help” our freedom can survive.