A Trip Through The California Desert Reveals How Out of Touch The Liberal Left Truly Is
Windmills turning. Wires buzzing, carrying expensive electricity through the desert. Sandscape flashing by. Cacti and Joshua Trees along the highway. The oven-like heat outside made me appreciative for the air conditioning in my truck. The city of Indio, California lay on the horizon, and AM Radio provided mostly static, and a few Spanish-only stations.
During the day, when I am in my vehicle, I normally listen to talk radio. Sometimes, when I am not in the mood for listening to the various talkers, the Christian music network, Air 1, plays on my speakers. As I drove through the desert, the Air 1 station out of Yucaipa was loud and clear, but I was more in the mood for talk radio, than for music.
Scan buttons work wonders, and allow radios to search for viable signals. After running through the full gamut a few times, my scan finally revealed a talk station, though the format was not along the lines of what I usually listen to. The found nugget was KPTR, AM 1340 - Progressive Talk Radio.
National Public Radio represents the occasional leftist offering on my radio. Once I actually allowed myself the opportunity to tune into Air America. Normally, liberal radio is not something I normally expose myself to. It rarely provides any factual information, and spends more time damning the right, rather than discussing the issues. However, in the desert, this station was not the usually stuffy, elitist sounding, elevator boring offerings the Leftist radio networks often offer. The host on KPTR was animated, entertaining, and downright comical. He wasn't trying to be funny, understand, but to a conservative like me, he was quite comical. I had never heard of this host, but nonetheless, I was about to be treated to an interesting rant by a progressive talk show host by the name of Ed Schultz.
Ed was saying something about green energy, calling it cheaper, cleaner energy offering thousands of new jobs. Well, perhaps cleaner. Perhaps. The truth regarding green energy sources is more along the lines of expensive, unreliable energy killing more jobs than it produces, in my opinion.
Then Mr. Schultz shifted gears, talking about how General Motors plans to lay off 21,000 U.S. employees, but elsewhere in the world GM plans no more cuts. Also, GM plans to import from China in two years. Furthermore, Chrysler plans to eliminate 789 of 3,200 dealers, while General Motors has revealed they are going to do the same thing to 1,100 dealerships. In short, especially in the case of GM, under restructuring American automakers are going to build more cars overseas after the U.S. government has poured billions of dollars into the industry in the hopes of reviving the domestic economy, and saving thousands of American jobs.
Ed Schultz asked the question with a desperate tone in his voice, "What is going on here? What about saving American jobs?"
The program continued to condemn the "greedy business owners" for failing to do what is right. Obama, according to the liberal host, bailed out these businesses in the interest of saving American jobs, and what GM and Chrysler are doing is shameful. "Unbelievable what they are doing here," said Schultz.
Like most liberal lefties, Mr. Schultz hasn't been listening to conservative talkers. Folks on the Right predicted this. If you make doing business in America undesirable, businesses will take their business elsewhere.
Ed Schultz does not understand business models, apparently, or the fact that these bailouts are hurting business to the point of driving large companies out of the country.
In a perfect liberal world the automakers would get together and say, "Gosh, guys, I know it isn't profitable, and we may take a blood bath, and heck, it might even run us out of business, but to save American jobs, and with the U.S. government behind us to catch us if we fall, let's just put all of our eggs in one basket and shift all operations to U.S. soil.
Reality begs to differ.
Of course, government intrusion into the auto industry is nothing new, and it could be argued that their past intrusion is a large part of the reason that the American automakers are in serious trouble, while their international counterparts are not.
Liberals have never been too fond of the auto industry anyway. This is why the Left is always proposing more public transportation. Cars offer individuals a tangible means to exercise his self-reliance through mobility. In 1975, in an effort to stifle this means of independence of Americans, the government forced upon the industry the Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards, urging cars to be built with fuel efficiency as the primary focus in order to reduce reliance on foreign oil and to reduce the pollutants spewed into the atmosphere (sound familiar?)
As with everything the Left ever proposes, the policy was counterintuitive. The cost-per-mile dropped with the fuel efficient vehicles, so Americans drove more often, and longer distances, and actually increased the use of oil instead. Meanwhile, under the CAFE standards, the cars were built smaller, and less safe with more materials like plastic and aluminum, making occupants more vulnerable to injury and death when the vehicle encountered a collision on the roadway. More Americans are killed because of the standards the government forced on the automobile industry than American soldiers killed in Iraq each year of the war. In short, the goal of decreasing the amount of oil usage by Americans was never met, but the effect of this policy on human life was catastrophic, and of no consequence to the leftists that proposed it.
Memory is short for the liberals, as well. The lessons of history are fleeting, and memories the Democrats allow themselves to be privy to changes with the political winds. Now, the Democrats are placing the steering wheel of the auto industry into the hands of a labor union, while the President of the United States calls for curbs on offshore tax havens while making the business environment inside the U.S. hostile with increased taxes, regulations, and governmental control (like forcing GM's CEO to resign). These policies, as seen in the past, are going to create the opposite of what Obama intends with the major powers of American commerce.
Restructuring is about eliminating less profitable functions or activities of a business, while encouraging the more profitable aspects of a company. The Democrat's policies, however, are moving against business, and are crippling economic growth here in the U.S. and is penalizing them if they dare have major overseas operations as well. These moves by Obama and company are giving corporations more incentive to move jobs overseas, and less incentive to bolster stateside production operations. Obama and gang may think that corporations are shirking their duties to the American economy, but they are not in business (as horrible as this may sound) to fix the economy. They are in business to be profitable. And America is becoming hostile to profitability with all of what the Obama Administration has been proposing, and accomplishing.
Ed Schultz asked what's going on. The answer is obvious. Obama's governmental takeover of the private sector, punitive tax policies, and outrageous (and intrusive) proposals are placing American corporations at a competitive disadvantage, and to survive American industries are heading where it is most profitable to do business - beyond the American borders.
To bring businesses back to America, the U.S. government needs to propose policies that will enable them to achieve and thrive. Capitalism encourages business to grow, which fuels economic growth, and provides more jobs to the people. Lower taxation, relaxed fee schedules, and limited restrictions and regulations allow corporations to pursue what is most profitable, and as the industries grow, jobs will be provided, and the economy will pull out of the funk it is in now. Class warfare kills economic growth. Government intrusion stagnates growth. Handcuffing businesses discourages them from being productive. Obama's policies are driving much needed economic growth (in the form of flourishing corporations) out of the country.
Unbelievable, Mr. Schultz? The Conservative Right predicted this would happen should Democrats enact what they have been planning to more than a year ago. You may be surprised, liberal talkers, but those of us on the Right are not surprised, and saw this coming.
Ready to promote a Tea Party, KPTR?
-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
Progressive Talk KPTR AM 1340 - The Coachella Valley's Progressive Voice
Chrysler moves to eliminate 789 of 3,200 dealers - One News Now, Tom Krisher and Dan Strumpf
G.M. Tells 1,100 Dealers It Plans to Drop Them - The New York Times, Nick Bunkley
Chinese Imports Could Bring GM Political Troubles - My Way News, Tom Krisher
Under Restructuring, GM To Build More Cars Overseas - The Washington Post, Peter Whoriskey
Obama Calls for Curbs on Offshore Tax Havens - The New York Times, Jackie Calmes and Edmund L. Andrews
Union Takes Rare Front Seat in Deal for Chrysler - The New York Times, Micheline Maynard
Putting the Brakes on the Automaker Bailout - The Heritage Foundation, James L. Gattuso and Nicolas Loris
Capitalism in Crisis - The Wall Street Journal, Richard A. Posner
On Enviro-Statism, Understanding CAFE Standards - Liberty and Tyranny by Mark Levin, pages 123 - 125
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