Say Anything Blog

It’s come to this.  Private companies basically being run by the government.

The Obama administration asked Rick Wagoner, the chairman and CEO of General Motors, to step down and he agreed, a White House official said. ...

Wagoner’s departure is one of the remarkable strings attached to a new aid package the administration plans to offer GM.

The White House confirmed Wagoner was leaving at the government’s behest after The Associated Press reported his immediate departure, without giving a reason. ...

Industry sources had said the White House planned very tough medicine, which turned out to be an understatement. And it went to the very top. The measures to be imposed by the government will have a dramatic effect on workers, unions, suppliers, retirees and the communities where plants are located, the sources said.

Obama apologists will no doubt point out that this is a condition of yet another bailout for GM, and that if Wagoner didn’t want to resign then his company shouldn’t have taken the bailout money.

That’s all well and good, but let’s keep a few things in mind:

First, this is exactly why big government liberals like Obama want these giant corporations on the government dole.  Because once on the dole, the government can essentially run them by pulling strings on the money they’re handing out.  This is why the government bailed out nearly 500 banks across the nation with the TARP program even though most of those banks would have been just fine without the money.  It’s because once they took the money, the government could turn around and start pulling strings.

Government dependency means government control.  And the politicians love to control stuff.

Second, let’s also remember that Geithner’s much-ballyhooed economic rescue plan includes using TARP money to essentially initiate hostile takeovers of companies the government feels aren’t being run in a proper fashion.  Which is pretty much a blank check for Obama and future Presidents to nationalize companies at will.

Think about how much power that gives the government.  For the most part, the government wouldn’t even have to nationalize most companies in order to start pulling strings.  The government could simply hint at nationalizing them in order to get them to toe the line.

And that’s scary, scary stuff.

The government shouldn’t be forcing private sector employees to resign like this.  And before anyone says it’s ok because it’s just a condition of a bailout, remember that we shouldn’t be bailing these companies out either.

On a related note, only 14% of Americans feel the government can run GM better than GM has run GM.  So this isn’t exactly the “will of the people” Obama is exercising here.