THE PLAN IS WORKING
President Obama recently stated that:
"We tried our plan - and it worked"
Needless to say, right-wing blogs ran with this and the left pretty much ignored it. But it is an important quote, and something to keep in mind as we inch ever closer to November. Today I'm going to do something that I try very hard to avoid. I'm going to take a step into the realm of conspiracy theory (hey, if it's good enough for a former cabinet-level advisor, it's good enough for me!) I generally try to stay away from those rabbit holes of circular logic and half-truths. I guess I just don't have that much paranoia in me. But there are a few - a very few - theories that have some weight to them, some merit. Sometimes it is possible to prove or disprove these theories over time. One such theory which is in the process of being proved and which I became acquainted with during the 2008 presidential election, involved something called the "Cloward-Piven Strategy of Orchestrated Chaos".
This strategy, cooked up in the 1960's by Columbia University professors Frances Fox Piven and Richard Cloward, is a plan to bring down our capitalist system by overwhelming it and causing it's collapse. What would they replace the capitalist system with? Why, a European-style cradle-to-grave nanny state, of course. A collapse would be the excuse needed to throw out the constitution and, as Obama himself said just days before his election, "fundamentally transform America".
Transition to socialism is usually achieved through revolution or war. We have neither on our shores, and the wars we fight half a world away don't cause the deprivations that triggered the socialization of Europe after the two world wars decimated that region. In the absence of those things, then, how is change brought about? By overwhelming our system in other ways.
Why is it important to talk about this theory now? Because, as President Obama says, he has implemented his plan, and it is working, right before our eyes:
- The payroll tax he instituted and demanded stay in place means taxpayers are contributing 2% less to the Social Security trust fund each week. Which is already overwhelmed and expected to collapse by 2035. Surely this "tax holiday" the president put in place has something to do with the fact that we are now looking at running out of cash in 2016.
- The senate has not done its constitutional duty in more than three years by refusing to pass - or even seriously consider - a budget. As a result, deficit spending has increased from a high under Bush of $410 billion to an average of $1.4 trillion under Obama. For the record, that's $1 trillion more per year than Bush the Profligate at his worst.
- There is a determined push to get people on government assistance and entitlements, resulting in an unprecedented - and unsustainable - increase in participation. In addition, the absolute refusal by this administration to consider the effects their policies are having on job creation means unemployment has not gone below 8% in 41 months. Keeping people reliant on government instead of themselves has a twofold benefit for the president. First, the more dependents, the more indebted voters. Second, increased dependent participation and reduced taxpayer income create an unsustainable burden, hastening collapse.
- The housing crisis was never really dealt with, aside from a few confusing, unpopular government programs that helped few and harmed many. But that isn't the problem with this issue. The real problem is that Attorney General Eric Holder's Department of Justice is actually forcing banks to do the very same things that helped cause the crisis in the first place by bringing down the power of the DoJ against any banks that refuse to lend to unqualified buyers.
- One of the first things Pelosi and Obama did upon his rise to power was to revoke the main part of the Clinton-era welfare reform. The key to the reform - aside from the job training - was removing the incentive for states to add to their rolls. States are now being seduced by much-needed federal dollars to encourage citizens to jump on the dole.
- A month later, Obama's HHS Secretary, Kathleen Sebelius, dealt the final death blow to the wildly successful welfare reforms of the 1990's, wiping out the other key to the reform - the work requirements that had effectively ended generational welfare. This now adds potential welfare collapse to the toxic entitlement brew threatening to bubble over.
- The requirements for entitlements have been reduced so that more options are available to more people. In addition, active recruiting for candidates is going on, from the increased number and visibility of ads to parents being called by their children's schools to encourage them to apply for the lunch program. Selling foodstamps to seniors as if it was a great way to lose weight ("Margie looks amazing! What's her secret?") instead of a humiliating state of dependence in their golden years is particularly loathsome.
- Entitlement requirement reduction has resulted in an historic 45 million Americans receiving food stamps (aka SNAP). This has not resulted in hand-wringing and promises to get people off the program and into jobs. If fact, the president hasn't really addressed the issue at all.
- For two years, the democrats spent taxpayer money like it was their own private stash, doling out favors and riches to cronies and donors with very little check from republicans, who were so much in the minority that their input was neither requested nor desired.
- Through executive fiat, regulation, and legislation, this administration has managed to make government a direct "partner" with the energy, health care, automotive and banking industries. Other sectors of the country are so crippled by the excessive regulation and looming taxation that they are unable to make forward progress. The result has been a "recovery" that is worse than the original recession.
- At a time when we have been experiencing long-term unemployment and our workforce participation rate is at the lowest it's been in decades, the president just granted amnesty and offered our job market to upwards of a million new workers aged 18-35. Can't wait to see the impact that has on the job market.
- Obama's amnesty is a double whammy. Not only will it increase our stubbornly high unemployment with the added competition for jobs, it also allows those former illegals access to our social safety nets - most notably unemployment benefits.
- More people signed up for disability last month than got jobs, and the administration seems to be just fine with that, if their absolute radio silence on the issue indicates anything.
- Obamacare was designed to increase the cost health insurance for companies while simultaniously offering a cheap "penalty" to not offer insurance at all. This is what will make Obamacare what Pelosi and company promised it wouldn't be - single payer. And just who is that single payer? Why, government, of course. When businesses start dropping coverage in favor of the cheaper penalty, their employees will be shunted into health insurance "exchanges" that will basically put people into Medicare or Medicaid instead of private insurance. After all, these two fine agencies are well in the black and can easily accommodate more citizens on their rolls. One-sixth of the economy will be under complete control of the federal government if we go to single payer. And, considering how well all of our other entitlements are doing, it's just a matter of time until Obamacare is teetering on the brink of collapse, too.
- More than 20 million Americans out of work, and all we get from the administration is promises to "pivot" to the jobs issue. Eventually. Maybe in his second term?
- 46 million Americans living in poverty. Yet another historic first. Where's the outrage?
It's not possible to look at all of these things and not start to wonder about what exactly the "plan" is. The result of these policies and actions has been the dismal "recovery" we have been treated to, massive deficits and mind-boggling debt. They are combining to create an unsustainable welfare state that that is doomed to collapse. What Obama is offering Americans is welfare writ large. Everyone is on the dole. Remember, Barack Obama is a genius. He knows what he's doing. That's what they keep telling us. He's ivy-league educated. He's brilliant.
So what did he study at those ivy-league colleges? Who did he hang out with? What ideas did he pursue? By his own admission, he espoused radicalism, even taking Piven's classes in his time at Columbia. He was immersed in it as a child, and even taught it later in life. He admitted in Dreams of My Father to not just hanging out with radicals and communists, but actively seeking them out - they are the ones he identified with most. As for the ideas he pursued, his career after college has been a tribute to Cloward-Piven, from his time as a community organizer to his church of twenty years to his membership in the socialist New Party to the people he has chosen as his administrative inner circle and the policy decisions they have made.
When President Obama said the jobs numbers were "a step in the right direction", he wasn't misspeaking. When he claimed his plan was working, that wasn't a gaffe. In order for Cloward-Piven to work, this three-year sustained crisis is exactly the right direction and the plan is unfolding exactly as envisioned. An expansive welfare state funded by a shackled economy and scapegoat one-percenters And if it isn't, it means the president and everyone in his administration, as well as former Speaker Pelosi and Leader Reid, are utterly incompetent.
Either way, they need to go.
Cross-Posted at The Ripley Report
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