Chrysler & Obama's War on Capitalism

If the rule of law still means something to you ...

If truth and justice are still worth defending ...

If free enterprise still has a prayer of surviving ...

You must read today's editorial at National Review Online, entitled, "Obama Declares War on Capitalism." A couple of excerpts:

Obama’s first 100 days have occasioned a number of dispiriting moments, but yesterday’s attack on Chrysler’s bondholders represented a new low. In a speech announcing the company’s bankruptcy filing, President Obama blasted “a group of investment firms and hedge funds [that] decided to hold out for the prospect of an unjustified taxpayer-funded bailout.” That is nothing short of a lie. The consortium wasn’t holding out for a bailout. It was holding out for a bankruptcy.

Why?

Because Obama wanted the legitimate bondholders, representing a lot of people who had invested billions in Chrysler, to agree to "pennies on the dollar" in a government-negotiated settlement, while the United Auto Workers would sacrifice nothing.

“I stand with Chrysler’s employees and their families and communities,” Obama said — not “those who held out when everybody else is making sacrifices.” He stands, he said, “with the millions of Americans who own and want to buy Chrysler cars.” If millions of Americans wanted to buy Chrysler cars, the company wouldn’t need the president of the United States to be its pitchman.

Liberals took their cue from the president and immediately denounced the holdouts as “vultures,” too consumed with greed to think of the national interest. But the law compels these firms to act in their shareholders’ interest.

Aw, to hell with the law. To hell with old-fashioned principles of paying off legitimate debts. Never mind that if it were anyone but the government trying to drive the failed deal, they could be prosecuted for the violation of various and sundry statutes.

If you were one of those "greedy vultures" whose 401(k) investments included Chrysler bonds, and you were about to watch a significant piece of your retirement vanish into thin air, you'd be rooting for bankruptcy too. That would make you selfish, unable to think of the "national interest." Socialist looter bullcrap!

Even today it is uncertain whether the Chapter 11 bankruptcy will be free of government interference, and who knows what new tricks the Obama administration will deploy as they further erode public confidence in America's financial markets and industrial base.