Don’t Dare Call it Socialism
Here it comes:
But now, in a little-noticed move, the House Financial Services Committee, led by chairman Barney Frank, has approved a measure that would, in some key ways, go beyond the most draconian features of the original AIG bill. The new legislation, the “Pay for Performance Act of 2009,” would impose government controls on the pay of all employees — not just top executives — of companies that have received a capital investment from the U.S. government. It would, like the tax measure, be retroactive, changing the terms of compensation agreements already in place. And it would give Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner extraordinary power to determine the pay of thousands of employees of American companies.
Our betters in Washington have been trying to determine salaries and wages for decades now, and most any method — or excuse — has been just fine with them.
Soon, they’ll determine what a manufacturing job is worth, as they struggle to “save” Detroit. The financial sector is already theirs. The health industry is going to feel Washington’s warm embrace in months or maybe weeks. Then the politicalization of everyone’s pay will become a simple fact of life.
Forget performance. Forget your worth. What will matter is your pull and your status as a victim. Value won’t matter nearly so much as your group’s ability to whine and agitate.
And this is how we’re going to achieve enough growth to offset Obama’s big budgets?
So, if we – all of us who retain a functioning forebrain anyway – vow to absolutely refuse to do business with any company that has taken a cent of bailout graft (or otherwise bends a knee to the new Tsars) then presumably said companies will sink in a welter of Fail, causing the economy to correctly adjust and spontaneously right itself. Et voila.
Pay for Performance? Wasn’t that the name of Fwank’s home-based business?
Faster, please.
More heat. Bring on the horrible results. It’s the only chance the frog in the pot on the stove has to wake up and jump out.
I heard Geithner’s quote yesterday that soon no one will care what they make – they’ll only be concerned with what they do. Wow. Just wow.
Gee, one could almost conclude that the economic downturn is the best thing that could have ever happened to the Democrats. Who would’ve thought that the party that once sang “Happy days are here again” would morph into the party that stands for the government confiscation of wealth, the destruction of property rights and stripping people of their liberty. All to make you as miserable and poorly compensated in your job as the average Postal Worker is in theirs under the flag of “fairness”.
Suddenly, I’m very happy that I never got bailed out.
Not socialism, fascism. They don’t want to own only to control.
I agree with D.F – this is fascism.
And don’t forget, fascism comes with charismatic leadership. We may be starting to see a breakdown of the left-right axis into the liberty-authoritarian axis.
Just ’cause Barney likes it up the ass doesn’t mean we have to like it!
It would, like the tax measure, be retroactive…
Apparently Senator Frank needs to review Article I, Section 9, of the US Constitution. It’s the bit that relates to what Congress can and can not do, so it’s not surprising that Senator Frank is unfamiliar with it.
Among other things, it contains a pretty unambiguous statement:
“No bill of attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed.”
Senator Frank has already pissed hundreds of billions of our tax dollars down a rathole, and he’s going to waste millions more by passing a law that will end up with government lawyers arguing a case they are going to lose on constitutional grounds.
Wait, you’re talking about the Constitution?
People are so cute when they quote out of date documents.
We haven’t used that old thing in long time. It’s just too unfair.