Posted on 09/25/2008 6:17:23 AM PDT by TBP
Former Reagan diplomat Alan Keyes commented Sept. 23 on the federal government's bailout of mortgage lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The former Assistant Secretary of State, currently running for president as an independent, said the bailout plan as proposed by the Bush administration would effectively transform our nation into "a socialist society."
The following is the text of Keyes' statement:
What I have to say about the bailout is that, with a concrete proposal on the table, it becomes much more obvious what is actually going on right now, and I think that we have to confront it. And I've noticed a little bit with satisfaction that some voices are being raised which call this by its right name and which understand that what we are watching is the transformation of our nation from a society that was based on a concept of economic freedom to a socialist society.
And unhappily, it means that, in the elections and the parties that are offered us in terms of the Republicans and Democrats, we've got what I would call the bureaucratic socialists — the people who believe in government domination for its own sake, like Barack Obama, who are essentially communists in their orientation and who want to push us down a socialist road which represents the supremacy of that government bureaucracy; and on the other hand, you have what I think of as the corporate socialists — the people who are pushing us down a socialist road because their corporate clients now see themselves as the kind of premier recipients of the tax dollars of the American people and can operate in an environment where, after they have made profit through risk-taking that could not be justified on a sound business basis, they can then be rescued from the results with taxpayer dollars while keeping their profits intact.
I think it's important to note that. And it's why some people have been so outraged that the failed CEO's are trotting off with umbrellas that amount to tens of millions of dollars, and it shouldn't be surprising to us because in a lot of ways — whether it's Lehman Bros. employees with their profits in a trust fund or others — they, along the way, have secured themselves so that in essence, the money that's being spent on the bailout is just to bailout the rich investors who took the risk. It's a way of re-distributing that risk so that the American people, who didn't realize that they were co-signing these investments, now have to end up footing the bill.
But at the end of the day, however, all of this — whatever its terms, whatever comes out in terms of financial transfers — the key is that in the Paulson plan, the Federal Reserve takes over the financial system lock, stock, and barrel. It has already been recognized in a regulatory role in various ways with the institutional banking system, but now the great financial institutions, including those that attract the investment capital, are by fiat going to be placed under the control of the chairman of the Federal Reserve and become essentially agents and factors of the government — and also, by the way, of the quasi-government, yet private sector, institutions that constitute the Federal Reserve Banking system.
In all of this, where are the American people? Well, they're sitting on the sidelines, waiting for the next time they will be called upon to foot the bill, and watching as one of the key and most important elements of a socialist takeover of the whole society is put firmly in place. And to add insult to injury, and irony to everything else, it is put in place under the leadership and with the approval of a Republican from a party that supposedly has, over the years, championed free enterprise, opposed socialism, and won power and votes on the basis of what now turns out to be a hollow lie.
And this is happening in the context of an election year where, no matter if they turn in one direction with the Democrats or the other direction with the Republicans, they get no one except one of these socialists. You get the Barack Obama government, bureaucratic-socialist with their government programs and handouts, or you get the John McCain corporate-internationalist socialists with their bailouts dipping into the pockets of the American people. Between the handouts and the bailouts, it should become clear that from the point of view of those who are now competing for and holding onto political power, we are to be subject not to a government of, by and for the people, but to a government that consists of three factors: the political elites, the allegianceless corporate elites, and the bureaucratic elites who are now colluding with one another in order to impose this yoke upon the American people and essentially bring the republic to an end.
And I think that the events that we are seeing simply confirm my sense that in some way and by some forces in this country, our liberty was never intended to survive this election year. And sad to say, what is being put in place with this so-called "bailout plan" is nothing of the kind.
We ought to be debating not some bailout, not some so-called rescue plan, but whether or not we are in fact, as a people, ready to accept socialism as our form of government. But since we have amongst our political elites so few voices — though some have been raised — that will tell the truth, the debate is not centering on these realities, but instead it is centering on a bunch of buzz words that act as if this is once again the government doing something for the rest of us, when in point of fact, all it is the consolidation of a form of government that will leave the American people out in the cold, bearing the yoke, but no longer having the power to do anything that really determines the destiny of their country.
And I have to say over all, that the spectacle is heart-breaking, and it confirms the sense of urgency I still feel that if the American people have sense to wake up and take directly the power that is being taken from them — don't take these phony choices, don't accept these phony alternatives — if they don't find a way to wake up, then they're only going to wake up into the bondage that is being prepared for them.
And with this, we will see the loss of that hope that Lincoln spoke of and that republic that our framers put in place, and we will lose what has been, in some ways, the most unique opportunity any people ever had in the history of the earth to be free.
http://www.washtimes.com/news/2008/sep/24/no-bailout/
"The massive federal scheme ($700 billion and apparently growing) to have taxpayers buy up bad mortgages that is currently being cobbled together by the Bush administration and a bipartisan coalition on Capitol Hill is a terrible idea. It constitutes a large transfer of wealth from the American taxpayer in an effort to revive failed private-sector businesses that should be permitted to fail - something that is essential if a free-market capitalist system is to survive and prosper in the future. Aside from the dubious substance of the legislation, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, the Bush administration's point man in pushing for the mortgage bailout bill, is pressing Congress to act with what can only be called unseemly haste, insisting that if lawmakers do not fork over the money right away, the American economy will collapse. Congress may vote on the bill (which is still being written) as early as Friday."
Okay..."Ignoratio elenchi."
Red Herring
This fallacy is often known by the Latin name "Ignoratio Elenchi", which translates as "ignorance of refutation". The ignorance involved is either ignorance of the conclusion to be refuted—even deliberately ignoring it—or ignorance of what constitutes a refutation, so that the attempt misses the mark.
"En archei aiteisthai"...the conclusion of an argument is implicitly or explicitly assumed in one of the premises.
You say the message is not the problem...As I said, the message was not the problem... and you only have a problem with the messenger...but the messenger is made of straw.
All I'm asking is if you would believe another messenger since your only problem seems to be with Keyes discussing the issue instead of Rush.
Let's go back to my very first words of the post to which you replied...
The message is right.What am I missing that makes such a simple statement unclear? I'm not trying to be difficult, but I don't see that the messenger matters regarding the message. It's just that Alan Keyes was an interesting messenger for such a message.
Of course, we could get into subtleties of the term "socialistic" or "socialism." Harvard historian Gaetano Salvemini pointed out that even with government interventionism of FDR, America wasn't "fascist" at the time (because we retained personal freedoms), but in describing the economics of Fascist Italy, he noted:
"In actual fact, it is the State, i.e. the taxpayer, who has become responsible to private enterprise. In Fascist Italy the State pays for the blunders of private enterprise. As long as business was good, profit remained to private initiative. When the depression came, the Government added the loss to the tax-payer's burden. Profit is private and individual. Loss is public and social."That seems to me to be a pretty good description of what we see in America today. Wouldn't you agree?
--Under the Axe of Fascism, by Gaetano Salvemini
So I would say that this bailout idea might be "socialistic," but would use that term as an adjective along with others. And I would also say that such a socialistic element can exist in many systems (even Fascist Italy)--so even if someone could argue that we are not fully Socialist economy, that doesn't mean this is not "socialistic."
That seems to me to be a pretty good description of what we see in America today. Wouldn't you agree?
No, I don't agree that the statement is a good description of what we see in America today. I would, however, agree that such a description is what many want America to be in the very near future.
An aside, which I will discuss with you if you so choose...why in the world did you ping jan in Colorado to our conversation?
“I care not what puppet is placed upon the throne of England to rule the Empire on which the sun never sets. The man that controls Britain's money supply controls the British Empire, and I control the British money supply.”
— Baron Nathan Mayer Rothschild
“Banking was conceived in iniquity and born in sin. If you want to continue to be slaves of the bankers and pay the cost of your slavery, then let the bankers continue to create money and control credit.”
— Sir Josiah Stamp, President of the Bank of England
Lincoln prepared for his presidency by studying mathematics. During the Civil War, bankers harassed Lincoln to accept an unlimited loan to finance the North against the South. Pondering the costs of mere evidence of debt the country could have issued to itself without interest, Abraham Lincoln too ventured the rectification of economics. Lincoln avoided the usurious national debt the country would have been subject to ever afterward had he instead accepted the mere paper or records of debt of the bankers. He printed the money himself. & Bankers and “economists” have since denounced the currency he issued as “inflationary”. It was of course no more inflationary than the currency the bankers would have created at virtually no cost whatever. Lincoln's currency lacked only the “interest,” by which the bankers would have profited perpetually. He was soon assassinated, from the_rear_.
&
“The money powers prey upon the nation in times of peace and conspire against it in times of adversity. The banking powers are more despotic than a monarchy, more insolent than autocracy, more selfish than bureaucracy. They denounce as public enemies all who question their methods or throw light upon their crimes.
&
I have two great enemies, the Southern Army in front of me and the bankers in the rear. Of the two, the one at my
rear is my greatest foe. [As a most undesirable consequence of the war...] Corporations have been enthroned, and an era of corruption in high places will follow. The money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until the wealth is aggregated in the hands of a few, and the Republic is destroyed.”
— Abraham Lincoln
“Certainly no nation ever before abandoned to the avarice and jugglings of private individuals to regulate according to their own interests, the quantum of circulating medium for the nation — to inflate, by deluges of paper, the nominal prices of property, and then to buy up that property at 1s. in the pound, having first withdrawn the floating medium which might endanger a competition in purchase. Yet this is what has been done, and will be done, unless stayed by the protecting hand of the legislature. The evil has been produced by the error of their sanction of this ruinous machinery of banks; and justice, wisdom, duty, all require that they should interpose and arrest it before the schemes of plunder and spoliation desolate the country.”
— Thomas Jefferson to William C. Rives, 1819. ME 15:232
“If the American People EVER allow the banks to issue the currency, their children will wake up homeless on the continent their forefathers established.”
— Thomas Jefferson
It's a red herring to ask me about something I've already plainly stated, as if my comment on the messenger would refute the message. (Your argumentum ad verecundiam posting of Rush Limbaugh's comments was irrelevant.)
And "interesting messenger" does not at all backtrack from the fact that he is made of straw. I find it rather interesting that he would make such claims, when he does not appear to follow the same principle (or at least he didn't, at one time) in his own dealings.
And I'm fine with letting it drop, as that explanation should be amply clear.
No, I don't agree that the statement is a good description of what we see in America today. I would, however, agree that such a description is what many want America to be in the very near future.
This isn't the first bailout. It's merely the most recent and biggest.
An aside, which I will discuss with you if you so choose...why in the world did you ping jan in Colorado to our conversation?
Why does it concern you?
As it happens, I thought that she might be interested in the discussion. If you wish to discuss things privately instead, please feel free to FReepmail me.
I have to say, I’m impressed with Keyes’ statement. These are words of steel.
Once he said this, Forbes was accepting the bailout, and the rest is boiler plate. It doesn't matter how many pieces the $1,000,000,000,000 is split into, it's still going to cost that much.
There is no business model in making and packaging bad loans. What happened over the last 10 years was a complete government takeover of the home mortgage industry, and a business model of making very bad loans and reselling them. A private business can't run that business model without folks eventually going to jail.
Going back to 20% down payments with income verification means that the housing market drops 50%. Because that's the proportion of Alt-A and other sub-prime mortgages over the last couple of years. But selling 20% down/income verified loans is the only profitable business model here.
And rates have to go up.
Rates need to go up, because no private business is going to be allowed (or should not be allowed anyway) to run with as much leverage as Fannie/Freddy used.
Rates need to go up for a private company, as they won't have access to the same special loan window used by Fanny/Freddy.
Rates have to go up, as everybody in the world thinks the market is riskier than past assumptions.
Rates have to go up, as we are going to have a big round of inflation to cover the $1,000,000,000,000 loss.
The bit about 'recapitalize' probably means some government regulation to make sure that the new money isn't wasted by the new companies, and to make sure the new companies stay capitalized. And, what do you know, we are back to the horror movie "Fannie and Freddy have Kids!".
As for giving the previous shareholders warrants, I suggest giving them a splintery stick and instructions on where to put it.
You are right. We know what we need to know, the money is gone. The rest is all about protecting somebody elses butt, not yours or mine.
He speaks wisely...
Alan, go sit down, you’re not helping.
In what way is he “not helping”?
In any way. He broke his plate with me when he called GW “Massah George”, for no reason at all, during a 2000 debate. He is not well.
Bush endures slaps from GOP rivals in fully attended candidate forum
A majority of the other candidates joined Forbes in criticizing the Bush tax plan, and the current revenue collection system. Hatch recommended the "terrible" tax code be rewritten top to bottom, while Alan Keyes -- easily the most animated of the six speakers Thursday -- called for a return to the early American system of revenue collection.
"We need to get rid of the 16th amendment, and return to the original system that funds government with a variety of tariffs and duties," Keyes said. Of the Bush plan, Keyes intimated that the current tax process makes slaves of American workers who pay into government coffers with every paycheck.
"We are supposed to thank Massah Bush because he is going to give us some (money) back," Keyes said.
But, HEY, to each their own. Personally I believe we are tax slaves and probably will be for the rest of our lives, no matter who the POTUS is and as long as the 16th Amendment stands.
Once he said this, Forbes was accepting the bailout, and the rest is boiler plate.
Yet you, even after your plethora of words, say this...
The bit about 'recapitalize' probably means some government regulation to make sure that the new money isn't wasted by the new companies, and to make sure the new companies stay capitalized.
...so I thank you for sharing nothing more than your opinion.
Keyes bump
Keep calling, faxing, emailing. We stopped the Dubai Ports deal, we stopped amnesty, we can stop this. But we’ll vhe to be persistent.
I agree. Let them fail if thy can't survive in a free market.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.