PrintJanuary 28, 2009
America's New Indentured Servanthood (updated)
With today's likely vote in the House of Representatives for an $825 billion economic stimulus bill, the peoples' house will take a long stride toward the new era of our collective indentured servanthood to the master that is the Federal Debt. Whatever dams once held back the deficit spending are crumbling, and there will be no spending cutbacks next year from Obama and the Democrat Congress.
We will become a nation of indentured servants. All of it masked in claims of classlessness.
"Our country was founded on the principle that all men are created equal...Although we have yet to realize that goal, we aspire to be a classless society, a middle-class country in which the doors of opportunity are open to all."The Plan: Big Ideas for America, Rahm Emanuel and Bruce Reed, p. 94
indentured servant: an individual voluntarily or involuntarily contracted to working for another for a fixed number of years (often four to seven) in exchange for specific considerations (such as passage to the Colonies in the 17th and 18th centuries), usually including freeman status.
The classless society, that is the aspiration of those who think like Rahm Emanuel, will be made up of debt bondage workers with no fixed term of servanthood. In the Obama Administration's "Era of Reform" the bondage master will exercise increasing influence over ever-widening aspects of our lives as it feeds on its own debilitating effects. The class of taxpaying Americans will shrivel, while the class of dependents on transfer payments will grow. Our contract of indenture will require compliance with a widening range of dictates from a government once established to free us from the whims of a foreign King and his parliament.
If government today were driven by the imperialism of King George III and his colonial vassals, we would once more stand the line at the Old North Bridge in Concord. But this time we, through our elected officials, are signing an indenture we ourselves have written, and we must therefore own.
Back on November 18, the WSJ reported that,
President-elect Barack Obama's new chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, spoke of the Era of Reform, offering few details but working to shape the narrative of the next administration. He said the current economic crisis offers opportunities for change that wouldn't have otherwise been possible. "Never let a serious crisis go to waste," he said.
The party in power, with complicity from some within the minority party, is today poised to make a serious crisis much worse.
Update:
The House Republicans stood together today against House Bill 1. That's worthy of celebration. If there is to be a resurrection of the GOP it will come first from the House. The focus now shifts to the Senate, where the most ridiculous low-hanging-fruit expenditures will be trimmed from the Senate's version of the bill. Nevertheless, a substantial bill will ultimately be passed by the Congress representing hundreds of billions added to the first $850 bln bailout. The net is record federal deficits and inflation down the road. Eventually, the question is this: Can we spend our way out of recession by borrowing and printing money? Excepting the prohibition against printing money, ask yourself this: How well would that strategy work in your personal financial lives?
Update:
The House Republicans stood together today against House Bill 1. That's worthy of celebration. If there is to be a resurrection of the GOP it will come first from the House. The focus now shifts to the Senate, where the most ridiculous low-hanging-fruit expenditures will be trimmed from the Senate's version of the bill. Nevertheless, a substantial bill will ultimately be passed by the Congress representing hundreds of billions added to the first $850 bln bailout. The net is record federal deficits and inflation down the road. Eventually, the question is this: Can we spend our way out of recession by borrowing and printing money? Excepting the prohibition against printing money, ask yourself this: How well would that strategy work in your personal financial lives?
