Democrat Racketeers

“A racket is a service that is fraudulently offered to solve a problem, such as for a problem that does not actually exist, will not be affected, or would not otherwise exist. Conducting a racket is racketeering.[1] Particularly, the potential problem may be caused by the same party that offers to solve it, although that fact may be concealed, with the specific intent to engender continual patronage for this party.”

˜Wikipedia

Sound familiar?

Back in the 60’s and 70’s, liberals in the U.S. decided marriage was an unnecessary and outdated tradition (now that same-sex couples want to get married marriage has, of course, become a noble cause worthy of a civil war, but I digress).  Whereas it was once a sin to bear children out of wedlock, the Left made it a sin to pass judgment on those who behave self-indulgently and without any apparent regard for the consequences of their actions.  The result is that we’ve seen an enormous social shift, including an alarming increase in the rate of illegitimacy and children being raised by single mothers who struggle financially to support themselves and their children.  This self-inflicted dynamic then leads to hand-wringing by those same liberals, who demand to know what we’re going to do about poverty and the challenge of single parents to afford daycare, after-school supervision, healthcare and adequate nutrition, smugly oblivious to their own culpability.  So Democrats get together with purposeful looks on their faces and cluck like hens to come up with the same solution they have for every crisis they instigate:  higher taxes and more government control.  Welfare, food stamps, Headstart, Medicaid, all-day kindergarten and subsidized daycare – these are the rackets that have been birthed from leftwing meddling in social tradition. 

Create the problem, then force taxpayers to subsidize the solution.

Speaking of education, let’s talk about the astronomical rise in costs that have created, as the Left likes to say, a “lack of access” to college.  Would someone please remind me who’s had control of higher education in this country for the past 50 years or more?  Oh yes, I remember – the Left.  They’ve been busy little bees, creating bloated administrations and paying themselves very handsomely for the back-breaking task of brainwashing our young.   That champion of the poor consumer, Elizabeth Warren, pulled down about $350K per year at Harvard, and we all know what a nice living Hillary Clinton made taking lucrative speaking fees from our institutions of higher learning.  Nice work if you can get it but unfortunately those fat salaries and speaking fees make college very expensive.  To keep the gravy train going and the peasants from revolting the Left has to figure out a way to shift that burden onto someone else.  Thus we have a million ways that someone can qualify for a tax-payer subsidized education as long as they are not too honest or too hard-working (those folks have to pay for themselves).  Our government and banks hand out student loans like candy, comforted in the knowledge that should anything go wrong it will be taxpayers – not those making the loan decisions – who take the loss.  And now the racketeers, - Elizabeth, Bernie and Hillary – want to save the day.  Is that rich irony or what?  They are predictably demanding free college for everyone, to be overseen, naturally, by more government.

Create the problem then extort the cost from taxpayers.  That’s the name of this racket.

How about the housing “crisis?”  Whose idea was it to legislate the lowering of credit standards to encourage home-buying by people who couldn’t afford it?  Who dreamed up Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?  Liberal politicians like Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton were behind these schemes but The Left likes to blame the whole thing on George Bush on the logic that he happened to be sitting in the Oval Office when the music stopped (that’s about as complex as their analytical skills get).  To be fair, Bush presided over policies that kept interest rates artificially low, and that certainly contributed to the economic bubble; but the game was already set up for failure.  How much did this racket cost taxpayers?  Somewhere between a trillion dollars (stimulus) and a hell of a lot more than that.

Create the problem - be the solution.

Now let’s talk about the artificially manufactured “crisis” in healthcare.  Healthcare is like any other service commodity.  When left to its own devices, it’s kept in check by natural market forces like supply, demand and price sensitivity.  But alas it is not the nature of a racketeer to leave a market to its own devices; thus government liberals brought us Medicare, Medicaid and the federal HMO Act, all of which led to greater and greater separation between consumer and provider, which in turn led to increased demand, rampant fraud and higher prices.  Our great champions in government brought us more regulation so that we now collectively subsidize things like contraception, dieticians, rehab, in vitro fertilization and other things that were once the responsibility of the customer, and like anything that’s subsidized, the demand has gone up accordingly, as have the costs.  It’s liberals who stand with the trial lawyers and block tort reform, adding billions to our healthcare costs for lawsuit payouts and – more importantly – lawsuit prevention.  It’s liberals who block interstate sales of health insurance, stifling competition.  Each of these, and probably a million more, contribute to the unnecessary increases in the cost of healthcare, a cost that’s borne by only a fraction of Americans while the rest get a free or subsidized ride.  What’s the racketeer’s solution:  Obamacare.  And when Obamacare fails?  Then we’ll be talking “single-payer” or full government takeover of our healthcare delivery, and this may be the biggest racket of them all.  Touché to Obama & Company.

Al Capone was an amateur compared to these guys.  The only big difference is that people recognized Capone for the despicable crook he was.  This election cycle will you stand up to the Capones at last or will you continue to let the thugs call the shots?

˜CW

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