By Robert L. McMahon
The last year has been, if nothing else, a watershed moment in our country’s financial history as the US government has stepped forward to prevent a worldwide financial calamity where bank accounts, investment accounts, and homes and livelihoods are all lost forever. But what does the systemic failures of the banking, mortgage, derivatives and housing markets have to do with “rescuing” the American auto-industry?
Since the early 1980’s this industry has been walking on thin ice and has been sustained through witless and craven congressional interference, witless and spineless corporate management, and witless and ignorant union demands that have bled the goose dry. And now the US tax-payer is supposed to come in and save what the foolish, cowardly and ignorant couldn't? This is business?
This situation got me thinking – “I’ve heard this before.” It was a long time ago, but not in a galaxy far away. It was a book I read the summer of 1979 and I have read it six times since; maybe I’ll read it again this year. Let’s see who’s first to send me the name of the book and the author. Here’s the passage that today’s financial crisis and the US auto-industry prompted:
“We voted for that plan at a big meeting, with all of us present, six thousand of us, everybody that worked in the factory. The Starnes heirs made long speeches about it, and it wasn’t too clear, but nobody asked any questions. None of us knew just how the plan would work, but every one of us thought that the next fellow knew it. And if anybody had doubts, he felt guilty and kept his mouth shut – because they made it sound like anyone who’d oppose the plan was a child-killer at heart and less than a human being. They told us that this plan would achieve a noble ideal. Well, how were we to know otherwise? Hadn’t we heard it all our lives – from out parents and schoolmasters and our ministers, and in every newspaper we ever read and every movie and every public speech? Hadn’t we always been told that this was righteous and just? Well, maybe there’s some excuse for what we did at that meeting. Still, we voted for the plan – and what we got, we had it coming to us. You know, ma’am, we are marked men, in a way, those of us who lived through the four years of that plan in the Twentieth Century (Motor) factory. What is it that hell is supposed to be? Evil – plain, naked, smirking evil, isn’t it? Well, that’s what we saw and helped to make – and I think we’re damned, every one of us, and maybe we’ll never be forgiven….Do you know how it worked, that plan, and what it did to people?
Try pouring water into a tank where there’s a pipe at the bottom draining it out faster than you pour it, and each bucket you pour makes that pipe an inch wider, and the harder you work, the more is demanded of you, and you stand slinging buckets forty hours a week, then forty-eight, then fifty-six – for your neighbor’s supper – for his wife’s operation – for his kid’s measles – for his mother’s wheelchair – for his uncle’s shirt – for his nephew’s schooling – for the baby next door – for the baby to be born – for anyone anywhere around you -- it’s theirs to receive, from diapers to dentures – and yours to work, from sunup to sundown, month after month, year after year, with nothing in sight for you but their pleasure, for the whole of your life, without rest, without hope, without end …From each according to his ability, to each according to his need…..”
Okay, be the first to go on record with the author's name and book title!
When laws are brushed aside by governments and investor rights get trampled people need to hear it and understand it. Companies, corporations that are publicly traded and borrow money from investors (i.e. the public) are the first line beneficiaries in a bankruptcy; that’s corporate and investment law. If the government begins trashing investor rights in a bankruptcy to benefit union workers at the expense of bond-holders our financial system, and government, is no better than Venezuela’s. Adios amigos.
The last year has been, if nothing else, a watershed moment in our country’s financial history as the US government has stepped forward to prevent a worldwide financial calamity where bank accounts, investment accounts, and homes and livelihoods are all lost forever. But what does the systemic failures of the banking, mortgage, derivatives and housing markets have to do with “rescuing” the American auto-industry?
Since the early 1980’s this industry has been walking on thin ice and has been sustained through witless and craven congressional interference, witless and spineless corporate management, and witless and ignorant union demands that have bled the goose dry. And now the US tax-payer is supposed to come in and save what the foolish, cowardly and ignorant couldn't? This is business?
This situation got me thinking – “I’ve heard this before.” It was a long time ago, but not in a galaxy far away. It was a book I read the summer of 1979 and I have read it six times since; maybe I’ll read it again this year. Let’s see who’s first to send me the name of the book and the author. Here’s the passage that today’s financial crisis and the US auto-industry prompted:
“We voted for that plan at a big meeting, with all of us present, six thousand of us, everybody that worked in the factory. The Starnes heirs made long speeches about it, and it wasn’t too clear, but nobody asked any questions. None of us knew just how the plan would work, but every one of us thought that the next fellow knew it. And if anybody had doubts, he felt guilty and kept his mouth shut – because they made it sound like anyone who’d oppose the plan was a child-killer at heart and less than a human being. They told us that this plan would achieve a noble ideal. Well, how were we to know otherwise? Hadn’t we heard it all our lives – from out parents and schoolmasters and our ministers, and in every newspaper we ever read and every movie and every public speech? Hadn’t we always been told that this was righteous and just? Well, maybe there’s some excuse for what we did at that meeting. Still, we voted for the plan – and what we got, we had it coming to us. You know, ma’am, we are marked men, in a way, those of us who lived through the four years of that plan in the Twentieth Century (Motor) factory. What is it that hell is supposed to be? Evil – plain, naked, smirking evil, isn’t it? Well, that’s what we saw and helped to make – and I think we’re damned, every one of us, and maybe we’ll never be forgiven….Do you know how it worked, that plan, and what it did to people?
Try pouring water into a tank where there’s a pipe at the bottom draining it out faster than you pour it, and each bucket you pour makes that pipe an inch wider, and the harder you work, the more is demanded of you, and you stand slinging buckets forty hours a week, then forty-eight, then fifty-six – for your neighbor’s supper – for his wife’s operation – for his kid’s measles – for his mother’s wheelchair – for his uncle’s shirt – for his nephew’s schooling – for the baby next door – for the baby to be born – for anyone anywhere around you -- it’s theirs to receive, from diapers to dentures – and yours to work, from sunup to sundown, month after month, year after year, with nothing in sight for you but their pleasure, for the whole of your life, without rest, without hope, without end …From each according to his ability, to each according to his need…..”
Okay, be the first to go on record with the author's name and book title!
When laws are brushed aside by governments and investor rights get trampled people need to hear it and understand it. Companies, corporations that are publicly traded and borrow money from investors (i.e. the public) are the first line beneficiaries in a bankruptcy; that’s corporate and investment law. If the government begins trashing investor rights in a bankruptcy to benefit union workers at the expense of bond-holders our financial system, and government, is no better than Venezuela’s. Adios amigos.
The first to respond:
ReplyDeleteMerlin Myer-Mitchell of the Royal Bank of Scotland!
Answer: Ayn Rand, "Atlas Shrugged"
Merlin and I worked for a brief time together.
Cheers to Merlin!