Obama May Have Already Won

While we're sure to be discussing the finer points of politics over the coming years - limiting executive pay at bailed-out companies is the best way to ensure they get the weakest managers of the bunch, for instance - the real battle for America's future may already be over. The issues we'll be fighting about are just the icing on the cake for Obama.

Obama's Energy Secretary Steven Chu is already providing warnings about Global Warming that are about as extremist as they get. That single issue, supported by enough Republicans in Congress (including McCain) so as to render most resistance all but futile, opens up the door to all the government intrusion into the private sector and our private lives that a liberal statist could ever want.

Reporting from Washington -- California's farms and vineyards could vanish by the end of the century, and its major cities could be in jeopardy, if Americans do not act to slow the advance of global warming, Secretary of Energy Steven Chu said Tuesday.

From the entire economic engine of America to the engine in your car and what model you can drive, right down to how you set your thermostat in your home, the government liberal doesn't need any other issue besides Global Warming to take near complete control of America and American lives.

Comments

[Fred Beloit]

Obama's Energy Secretary Steven Chu is at least as qualified to pontificate on the climate as I am; he is a physicist. You know, it would be like listening to a cabinet maker tell you what will go wrong with your computer sometime soon.

[Lala]

It's the new religion. Much, much worse than communism or fascism. Take, for instance, the reaction to Lomborg's book "The Skeptical Environmentalist" (my view is that Lomborg gave other people the courage to speak up)

"I don't necessarily agree with every word of Lomborg's impressive book, but that is not the issue here. The environmental movement has become riddled with extremism, misinformation, misguided priorities and downright deception. It is wonderful that this dogmatic conceit is now being effectively challenged. Let's put some wind in Lomborg's sails!"
http://www.greenspirit.com/lomborg/

[Fred Beloit]

People may ask the musical question, "Why are Obama's choices for high-level positions so terribly bad?"

The answer? Because they are all progressives. Progressives are subject to: want to use other people's money to solve still other people's problems, use their emotions to make decisions, bite off way more than they can chew, refuse to recognize there is a Right and Wrong in human affairs, think the government should be used for every purpose under the sun, and assume they know how everybody else should live their lives.
Of course there is more, oh much more.

[Lala]

There's an audio of Gore that Glenn Beck will have on his show today -

Wednesday, February 04, 2009
Audio: Al Gore Tells Kids Not To Listen To Their Parents About Global Warming

[Fred Beloit]

NYT: "The Obama administration is expected to impose a cap of $500,000 for top executives at companies that receive large amounts of bailout money, according to people familiar with the plan."

Help. Any lawyers out there? By what authority can the POTUS cap salaries at private enterprises? I know he is talking about enterprises that will receive our money, but still, where does he get authority to do this? If any branch has it, surely it is the Congress. Has Obama declared marshal law or something?

[Fred Beloit]

Al Gore and Steven Chu are afflicted with CC[AKA GW]DS (Climate Change--Also Known As Global Warming--Derangement Syndrome).
Gee, doesn't it look more scientific with those extra letters?

[mark l.]

I have never been happy about executive compensation, BUT this attempt to appease the public is the equivalent of passing an ex post facto law.

The companies hold existing contracts for compensation. If the govt were to effectively nullify those existing contracts, the precedent it would create would prove disasterous.

I'm looking at goldman sachs...40 billion market cap, it received 10 billion of TARP money. If the govt was given a stake they still would hold a minority position, but buying 10 billion allows the govt to determine how the majortiy of company holdings can be distributed?

there is zero chance that they can retroactively change existing contracts.

(a long shot theory? the admin does pass a retroactive law, knowing that it will fail in court. Every law firm in new york goes thru the motions of filing the complaint, and collects 10-20% off of the awards, which, according to obama is 20 billion. The effective result is that the execs are happy to get their 80% of what was due to them, and the democratic law firms in new york receive an economic stimulus of 2-4 billion. no one will utter a peep.)

[seekeronos]

"--- By what authority can the POTUS cap salaries at private enterprises? ---"

Absolutely none. The power to create, amend, and dispose of laws is granted by the Constitution of the United States to the Congress.

However, there are quasi-legal methods the Executive Branch uses to get around Congress - Executive Orders and Presidential Signing Statements.

It is not completely outside the realm of possibility that the Obama administration could attempt to retroactively enact something to cap salaries.

HOWEVER: while under normal circumstances, capping compensation for top level corporate officers runs counter to the notion of free enterprise - the government has (to the best of my recollection of current events) taken a majority ownership interest the corporations which are recipients of the benefits of the bailout.

THEREFORE, at the point which the government assumes a majority stakeholder share of ownership, it receives also the right to dictate the salaries and manpower doctrines of those corporations, among a vast array of other concerns - which may include the right to dispose or annul existing contracts.

Like Mark said... it is something that will have to be tested in the courts.. and invariably, some lawyers will be vastly enriched by it.

As the Japanese would say... "Shou ga nai"...

..."it cannot be helped".

[a giant slor]

Ha ha. Schadenfreude.

[mark l.]

I seem to remember a clinton lawyer, greg craig(?), suing the US for the bombing of the pharamceutical plant in the Sudan. The payout was 50 mil?