Chris Adamo
Can liberals "wish" socialist utopia into existence?
By Chris Adamo
California is in the midst of a monstrous debt crisis, the inescapable result of its leading Democrats having gambled on an annual deficit less than $9.2 billion (an immense sum in itself), but now facing a shortfall of nearly twice that amount. For the good of the country, anyone who is actually surprised at this development should be barred from voting in any election until they can pass a third-grade remedial math exam.
The inevitability of the California crisis has long been glaringly obvious to all but the most ideologically blinded leftists. Unfortunately, the government of the Golden State is overwhelmingly dominated by just such individuals. As a result, the implementation of any viable fix has become an impossibility. California will undoubtedly continue down its current disastrous course to eventual financial implosion.
Meanwhile, those who could and should exert the necessary political force to avert the catastrophe will most certainly refuse to take the necessary action. Doing so would require drastic cuts in social spending, accompanied by significant reductions in taxes in order to jump start the state's flagging economy. And the political left has historically rejected such a course, preferring instead to point fingers of blame at "the rich" while exhibiting total contempt for those who will suffer most in the impending calamity, by pretending that the ruse can continue in perpetuity.
What is needed, according to Democrat policy makers, is more of the liberal disease in order to cure its symptoms. To nobody's great surprise, Jerry Brown, California's Democrat Governor, is in lockstep with this insanely flawed ideology. Though he speaks of "spending cuts" in his latest plan to rescue California from its ocean of red ink, federal mandates and an intransigent block of leftists in the state legislature renders this an impossibility. On the other hand, California's liberal government will most certainly muster the political resolve to raise income and sales taxes to the highest levels in the nation.
Of course this will only further depress the currently ailing economy, already overburdened by excess taxes and regulation. Any "vicious cycle" is by definition difficult to escape. Yet when a state's population becomes thoroughly convinced over time that it can simply demand "benefits" from government coffers, and consistently elects politicians who ascribe to the same twisted premise, financial calamity becomes its destiny.
In the interim, an even greater injustice will ensue. Embodying the worst aspects of "taxation without representation," the liberal/Democrat cabal back in Washington will force the rest of America to foot the bill, at least until that source of funding implodes. And sadly, as long as this travesty continues, California stands little chance of realizing its mistakes or correcting them since, in the minds of its citizen "takers," any continued flow of money proves that the government need only hear the rising volume of protests and complaints in order to magically retrieve those dollars from some undefined but ostensibly limitless "stash."
Across the Atlantic, the disaster of Europe's own effort to create a socialist paradise is coming unraveled at a considerably faster rate than even the California boondoggle. Enraged at the prospect of "austerity," the thoroughly dependent populations of France and Greece have voted to move sharply left, demanding that somebody continue providing those government handouts, with no concern at all for who will be footing the bill. If any politician is foolish enough to attempt to inject an element of reason into the chaos, as did French President Nicolas Sarkozy in recent months, he will simply be shown the door, and replaced with a more compliant redistributionist.
As of last Sunday, Sarkozy's desperate effort to forestall total financial meltdown in France, and consequently in Europe, was sternly rebuffed by French voters. They are now happily under the headship of Francois Hollande, an avowed socialist who intends to make everything right in France with his unique and creative agenda of "raising taxes on the rich." Somewhere, through force and subterfuge, those Euros will miraculously continue to stream into government coffers, the only deterrent being those "greedy" individuals who think they ought to keep what they have earned.
Elsewhere in the wonderland of the European Union, Greece remains as it has been for months, in a disturbingly similar "financial crisis" brought on by the combination of low productivity and enormously excessive social spending. No more capable of recognizing this cause and effect relationship than are the people of France (and California for that matter), Greece is pondering an exit from the EU, as a means of precluding its own austerity as stipulated by the leaders in Brussels.
In recent months, the streets of Athens and other major cities have been the scenes of riots by a citizenry that stubbornly refuses to consider any possibility of a day of reckoning. The money should simply continue to flow from yet another mythical "stash" (in this case referring to somewhere in Germany where actual work and productivity continues). And if its guardians are too stingy to endlessly spread the wealth, then all the Greeks need to do is break the financial ties, crank up their own printing presses, and start dispensing a newly established currency of their own. Life will be beautiful.
Little thought has apparently been given to the dire and inescapable consequences of a nation whose legal tender is worthless, since it is backed by no wealth or property, and still worse, represents no competitive production of goods or services on the world market.
Seeking to gain politically from the European debacle, or at least forestall any comparisons to his own disastrous economic policy, Barack Obama asserted that Europe needs to "balance" any attempts at austerity with a "growth agenda." This was an odd statement, considering that he has in so many ways, steered America directly towards the disastrous course on which Europe has embarked. In contrast, Real America stands to gain a great deal if it can learn from the grim outcome of these misguided quests to partake of the empty promises of socialism and collectivism.
The November elections are coming. The portion of the nation that produces sufficient food, pays its bills, and still seeks to pass on these blessings to its posterity can turn back the malicious tide of bloated government, and the crippling dependency of the citizenry that fuels it. On the other hand, if the "takers" prevail, and America follows the world down this dark path, the day will come when they can throw whatever tantrums the want, but nobody will be there to pay the bill.
© Chris Adamo
May 17, 2012
California is in the midst of a monstrous debt crisis, the inescapable result of its leading Democrats having gambled on an annual deficit less than $9.2 billion (an immense sum in itself), but now facing a shortfall of nearly twice that amount. For the good of the country, anyone who is actually surprised at this development should be barred from voting in any election until they can pass a third-grade remedial math exam.
The inevitability of the California crisis has long been glaringly obvious to all but the most ideologically blinded leftists. Unfortunately, the government of the Golden State is overwhelmingly dominated by just such individuals. As a result, the implementation of any viable fix has become an impossibility. California will undoubtedly continue down its current disastrous course to eventual financial implosion.
Meanwhile, those who could and should exert the necessary political force to avert the catastrophe will most certainly refuse to take the necessary action. Doing so would require drastic cuts in social spending, accompanied by significant reductions in taxes in order to jump start the state's flagging economy. And the political left has historically rejected such a course, preferring instead to point fingers of blame at "the rich" while exhibiting total contempt for those who will suffer most in the impending calamity, by pretending that the ruse can continue in perpetuity.
What is needed, according to Democrat policy makers, is more of the liberal disease in order to cure its symptoms. To nobody's great surprise, Jerry Brown, California's Democrat Governor, is in lockstep with this insanely flawed ideology. Though he speaks of "spending cuts" in his latest plan to rescue California from its ocean of red ink, federal mandates and an intransigent block of leftists in the state legislature renders this an impossibility. On the other hand, California's liberal government will most certainly muster the political resolve to raise income and sales taxes to the highest levels in the nation.
Of course this will only further depress the currently ailing economy, already overburdened by excess taxes and regulation. Any "vicious cycle" is by definition difficult to escape. Yet when a state's population becomes thoroughly convinced over time that it can simply demand "benefits" from government coffers, and consistently elects politicians who ascribe to the same twisted premise, financial calamity becomes its destiny.
In the interim, an even greater injustice will ensue. Embodying the worst aspects of "taxation without representation," the liberal/Democrat cabal back in Washington will force the rest of America to foot the bill, at least until that source of funding implodes. And sadly, as long as this travesty continues, California stands little chance of realizing its mistakes or correcting them since, in the minds of its citizen "takers," any continued flow of money proves that the government need only hear the rising volume of protests and complaints in order to magically retrieve those dollars from some undefined but ostensibly limitless "stash."
Across the Atlantic, the disaster of Europe's own effort to create a socialist paradise is coming unraveled at a considerably faster rate than even the California boondoggle. Enraged at the prospect of "austerity," the thoroughly dependent populations of France and Greece have voted to move sharply left, demanding that somebody continue providing those government handouts, with no concern at all for who will be footing the bill. If any politician is foolish enough to attempt to inject an element of reason into the chaos, as did French President Nicolas Sarkozy in recent months, he will simply be shown the door, and replaced with a more compliant redistributionist.
As of last Sunday, Sarkozy's desperate effort to forestall total financial meltdown in France, and consequently in Europe, was sternly rebuffed by French voters. They are now happily under the headship of Francois Hollande, an avowed socialist who intends to make everything right in France with his unique and creative agenda of "raising taxes on the rich." Somewhere, through force and subterfuge, those Euros will miraculously continue to stream into government coffers, the only deterrent being those "greedy" individuals who think they ought to keep what they have earned.
Elsewhere in the wonderland of the European Union, Greece remains as it has been for months, in a disturbingly similar "financial crisis" brought on by the combination of low productivity and enormously excessive social spending. No more capable of recognizing this cause and effect relationship than are the people of France (and California for that matter), Greece is pondering an exit from the EU, as a means of precluding its own austerity as stipulated by the leaders in Brussels.
In recent months, the streets of Athens and other major cities have been the scenes of riots by a citizenry that stubbornly refuses to consider any possibility of a day of reckoning. The money should simply continue to flow from yet another mythical "stash" (in this case referring to somewhere in Germany where actual work and productivity continues). And if its guardians are too stingy to endlessly spread the wealth, then all the Greeks need to do is break the financial ties, crank up their own printing presses, and start dispensing a newly established currency of their own. Life will be beautiful.
Little thought has apparently been given to the dire and inescapable consequences of a nation whose legal tender is worthless, since it is backed by no wealth or property, and still worse, represents no competitive production of goods or services on the world market.
Seeking to gain politically from the European debacle, or at least forestall any comparisons to his own disastrous economic policy, Barack Obama asserted that Europe needs to "balance" any attempts at austerity with a "growth agenda." This was an odd statement, considering that he has in so many ways, steered America directly towards the disastrous course on which Europe has embarked. In contrast, Real America stands to gain a great deal if it can learn from the grim outcome of these misguided quests to partake of the empty promises of socialism and collectivism.
The November elections are coming. The portion of the nation that produces sufficient food, pays its bills, and still seeks to pass on these blessings to its posterity can turn back the malicious tide of bloated government, and the crippling dependency of the citizenry that fuels it. On the other hand, if the "takers" prevail, and America follows the world down this dark path, the day will come when they can throw whatever tantrums the want, but nobody will be there to pay the bill.
© Chris Adamo
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