All Posts Tagged With: "corporatism"

Obamanomics: How Barack Obama Is Bankrupting You and Enriching His Wall Street Friends, Corporate Lobbyists, and Union Bosses

In his previous book, The Big Ripoff (reviewed in the June 2007 Freeman), author Timothy Carney launched an attack on two of America’s preeminent political myths—that the Democrats are “the party of the little guy” and the Republicans are “the party of free enterprise.” Both notions are useful to candidates in the endless quest for [...]

20May2010 | | 1 comment | Continued

The Washington-Wall Street Kabuki Dance

When I watch the public furor over the ruling party’s attempt to “toughen” regulations on the financial industry, I get the same feeling I often have in a theater: Good show but it’s not real.

23Apr2010 | | 5 comments | Continued

Is Obama a Socialist?

President Obama is not a socialist, at least not in the usual ways that term is used. However, that hardly means his ideas are not of concern.

22Apr2010 | | 56 comments | Continued

The State of Obama’s Union

Despite what some popular right-wing talk-show hosts claim, Barack Obama is not pushing Marxism, revolutionary or otherwise. He’s pushing good old American progressive-corporate elitism.

29Jan2010 | | 23 comments | Continued

TGIF: What Next?

Liberty always walks uphill. Read the rest here.

1Jan2010 | | 0 comments | Continued

America: Corporate State

At ThinkMarkets, Gerald O’Driscoll, building on a Wall Street Journal column by George Melloan, describes how Fed policy is leading America further down the corporatist road. Here’s a sample: Melloan doesn’t state it, but there is a name for this economic policy: corporatism.  Big government favors selected big business and rewards big labor as a [...]

25Nov2009 | | 0 comments | Continued

Chrysler's Government-Sponsored Bankruptcy

Is anyone disturbed by the role the executive branch is playing in Chrysler’s bankruptcy? Here’s how the Wall Street Journal report began, President Barack Obama pledged to give Chrysler LLC “a new lease on life” by ushering the storied auto maker into a bankruptcy reorganization that will empower its union and put Italy’s Fiat SpA [...]

1May2009 | | 1 comment | Continued

Where Will It Stop?

From today’s New York Times, regarding the impending auto bailout from the Bush administration: In addition to the emergency loan package, officials are working with the finance arms of G.M. and Chrysler to convert them into government-regulated financial institutions, a designation that could make them eligible for separate loans from the Federal Reserve. The administration [...]

18Dec2008 | | 0 comments | Continued

Republican Betrayal on the Auto Bailout

The Senate Republicans who killed the auto bailout betrayed the free-market principles they claim to embrace. (I know what you’re saying: Is this really news? No, it’s not.)Why betrayal? The Republicans did not say they opposed a bailout on principle under all circumstances, which is what free-market advocates would be expected to say. Rather they [...]

13Dec2008 | | 0 comments | Continued

Governmental Logic

Mitch McConnell, the Republican Senate leader, had this to say in connection with the auto bailout: We will not let the taxpayers spend their hard-earned money on ailing carmakers unless these companies are forced to reform their bad habits — either inside or outside bankruptcy. So the way McConnell sees it, we taxpayers want to [...]

11Dec2008 | | 0 comments | Continued

The Case Against the Auto Bailout

1) If no conditions are attached, then the taxpayers would be forced to aid unaccountable companies.2) If conditions are attached, then the taxpayers would be forced to aid (quasi) nationalized companies.3) Both scenarios are objectionable.4) Ergo, the bailout is objectionable.(The New York Times today discusses the implications of nationalization.)

9Dec2008 | | 4 comments | Continued

Too Big to Fail?

This week, Henry Paulson said in an interview with the Washington Post that he wants the Federal Reserve to be able to regulate and ultimately take over any failing financial institution that it considers crucial — including hedge funds. This echoes a notion that has been endorsed by executives of some industry associations, that to [...]

22Nov2008 | | 0 comments | Continued

TGIF: Auto-Destruct

The Big Three automakers got a cold reception in Congress this week when they asked for a bailout loan of $25 billion. But I wouldn’t count them out just yet. After appropriating over $700 billion to bail out the financial industry — with nothing to show for it but an ominous precedent and a scary [...]

21Nov2008 | | 0 comments | Continued

Bail Out Detroit?

It seems certain that the taxpayers will be forced to save GM and the rest of the Big Three, if not during the lame-duck session of Congress, then some time after January 20. The bailout backers say the United States can’t survive as an economic power without them, but why should we believe that? About [...]

17Nov2008 | | 0 comments | Continued

Bush to Tell G-20 Not to Dismantle Free Market. Really.

George W. Bush today will “urge leaders of the world’s biggest industrial and developing economies not to abandon principles of free-market capitalism as they seek an escape from the international financial crisis, calling it the ‘best system’ for delivering growth” (Bloomberg).That’s not a joke. I swear. Really. Stop laughing. Please. (Is there anything left of [...]

13Nov2008 | | 28 comments | Continued

Sign of the Times

My local newspaper, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, has five stories on page one today. Three are about government bailouts: of homeowners having trouble paying their mortgages, of automakers, and of banks. Not a good sign.

12Nov2008 | | 0 comments | Continued

Free Market vs. Corporatism

Roderick Long, professor of philosophy at Auburn University and a Freeman author, has an excellent article at Cato Unbound on why libertarians are too often mistaken for defenders of corporatism.  This error is tragic not only because it is an error — no two things could differ more starkly than laissez faire and the corporate [...]

11Nov2008 | | 9 comments | Continued
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