There is only ONE THING in common between Sputnik
and the undocumented tyrant from Kenya.
Posted on 01/29/2011 5:01:49 AM PST by Kaslin
One of the difficulties progressives face is trying to make centralized planning sound like a good idea. Even the president, with all his rhetorical genius and majestic vagueness, can struggle with the task. So from time to time, it's important to mold history a bit to, you know, make a point.
Early on in his State of the Union, for instance, President Barack Obama reminisced of an age when "good jobs" meant "showing up at a nearby factory or a business downtown." A time when you "didn't always need a degree, and your competition was pretty much limited to your neighbors," and if you "worked hard, chances are you'd have a job for life, with a decent paycheck and good benefits and the occasional promotion. Maybe you'd even have the pride of seeing your kids work at the same company."
Way to dream big! Really, was this country ever about being proud that your children ended up in the same plant you slaved in for 30 years? Even with a promise of a union pension and -- if you're lucky -- an "occasional" promotion, it sounds like a soul-crushing grind you'd want your offspring to escape, tout de suite.
Luckily, in the real world, history tells of a story filled with dynamic movements of people, class climbing, churning innovation, booms and busts, and widespread embrace of risk taking.
Now, as the president explained, "painful" changes have crashed down on his revisionism, and Americans have been forced to compete, find India on a map, move from town to town and study.
How do we deal with this daunting future? Obama says that "none of us can predict with certainty what the next big industry will be or where the new jobs will come from." And by "none of us," he means you. Because Obama proceeded to give a speech that laid out exactly what needs innovating, which sectors will be innovative, where new jobs will be found and how we are going to get to those jobs. Can you say high-speed rail? The president can. He mentioned railroads six times, because how else are we going to win the 19th century back?
Actually, this fixation with building an extraordinarily expensive, outdated and tax-funded rail system is a great example of why central planning undermines progress.
By the time the president's promise of high-speed Internet for everyone comes to fruition, we'll probably be teleporting like Sulu. But at the very least, let's not re-fight the battles of the early 20th century. Someone already invented airplanes and cars, which, unlike trains, can be pointed in any direction we want, whenever we want, as often as we want.
Maybe that's the problem. Blame capitalism. Sure, the president says our "free enterprise system is what drives innovation," but it doesn't seem to play much of a role in his plan to "win the 21st century."
Obama, for example, used the word "invest" -- a well-known euphemism for more spending and subsidizing -- 13 times in the speech. Didn't he just get through telling us we don't know where modernization will emerge? Didn't he just explain that free enterprise drives innovation? True, but government knows how to guide the markets in the right direction. Just think of it as an ethanol additive for capitalism.
I know, this is a "Sputnik moment," and being cynical is unpatriotic. And maybe the Sputnik analogy can be instructive in other ways. Yes, the Soviets were the first to send junk and animals into space -- a race they lost in impressive fashion when it was all over. But were we really ever "behind"?
Of course not. The Soviet Union's intense effort to erect a facade of accomplishment was achieved by investing in an unnecessary, costly, symbolic, ideology-driven project that did nothing for the aspirations of its citizens or its stagnant, dying economy.
Let's be sure we're not on the wrong side of the Sputnik moment.
this Jimmy Carters Iran/Shah moment only with Eqypt
this is Jimmah’s stagflation moment with the ecomony
this is the FDR moment that will turn a recession into a 12 year depression....
sputnik moment my @$$
I'm not looking forward to "waiting in line for 3 hours to fill my tank II" either, but it's coming.
We are the Americans, but I think this time the greatest threat to our way of life , is Obama.
This is our Sputnik moment.
We launched our first communist Islamic African president and he’s in flames now, crashing down to earth.
Anyone who lived that life is now being scorned by the Ivy elites in both parties as the “most selfish” generation for having the bad manners and unmitigated greed of coming to age for Social Security and MEDICARE en masse.
And if they paid the house off and saved a nest egg on the side, the progressive marxists with help from libertarians are gonna try to reduce the deficit on their backs, and “means test” them right out of the social security amd MEDICARE they and their employers were FORCED to pay “premiums” for all those years.
There is only ONE THING in common between Sputnik
and the undocumented tyrant from Kenya.
No. Not only vis-a-vis the fall of the U.S.S.R. decades later but at the time we were ahead.
As I recall the Navy's Viking/Vanguard was to be our vehicle into space but problems abounded
.. meanwhile Redstone (and Von Braun) had Jupiter (and the Air force had Atlas). Jupiter could have orbited in 1956 but for political reasons -- including IMO the subterfuge of those Washington commies Senator McCarthy had told us about years earlier.
That statement from the guy that guts NASA to further prop up his union thrash thug enforcers...LOL. He hasn’t a clue.
He is like a sputnik, in orbit sending vapid signals to American earthlings who just wish he’d STFU and go away.
Banal boosterisms.
The two most important assets on the planet are the Suez and Panama canals.
All commerce depends on their condition and stability in the area.
Read the histories of these monumental human endeavors and note how the British Empire began to decline in 1956 following the loss of Suez; and the US’ (Carter) surrender of Panama in 1977 reduced its influence in S.America & around the world. JMHO.
What a great phrase. I Obama's case, it carries tons of meaning.
That's an understatement.
There were so many failures it became embarrassing.
Rockets blowing up on the pad, firing then simply tipping over, lifting a few feet, then collapsing.
All this while being televised, Our proud 'we can do it too' moment up in smoke.
More like a Pananma Canal moment - more frittering away of what Americans worked for, paid for, and even died for.
I watched Fareed Zakaria on CNN about a month ago (to see what the Anti American communists watch), and he had a show about how we will get more jobs. Basic theme was that high tech and education are the answer... maybe another “space program”.
I suspect that Imam Mohamed Obama feels comfortable watching a fellow America hateing Islamo immigrant explain the world to him. So if you want to know where Obama is going next, watch this Islamo news show.
Maybe Pearl Harbour... Mohamed Obamas job wont be done until we are all on our knees.
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