Obama's Straw-men Sylvia Bokor Obama's "blame-the-rich-and-the-banks-because-it's-not-my-fault" rhetoric is tir esome. He repeated it in his "Teddy Roosevelt Speech.

" Charles Krauthammer noted in his excellent critique of the speech that Obama's " obsession with a sock-it-to-the rich tax hike . . . would have reduced this year 's deficit from $1.30 trillion to $1.22 trillion." A trifle. But Obama's paranoia with the rich is not about their wealth. He uses them as leverage, evading, distorting and lying to bludgeon a deeper target. The Roosevelt Speech is monumentally disingenuous. Obama evades the fact that g overnment printing more money without increased production causes inflation. He evades the fact that paychecks cannot grow when businesses are being choked by t oo many taxes and too many regulations. He lies when he blames banks and investo rs and CEOs---i.e., "the breathtaking greed of a few"---and distorts the cause o f what "plunged our economy and the world into a crisis." Yet, we all know that Barney Frank's "Affordable Housing" in conjunction with Fa nnie Mae and Freddie Mac forced people to buy a house they could not afford. We all know that the government forced banks to accept risky mortgages. We all know that government intervention in the economy caused the meltdown. But Obama declares: "After all that s happened, after the worst economic crisis sinc e the Great Depression, they want to return to the same practices that got us in to this mess." The system he alludes to might not be recognizable unless one is familiar with t he long history of attacks on capitalism. Nevertheless, the brazen impertinence of that statement in the face of what we know did get us "into this mess", takes first prize for stupendous deceit. Lies don't work. If you're willing to look, they reveal more than they hide. And so it is with Obama. Forthwith, he reveals the object of his deepest hatred: "T heir philosophy is simple: we are better off when everyone is left to fend for t hemselves and play by their own rules." That underscored phrase is a straw-man that has been used to distort individuali sm for centuries. Obama also sets up capitalism as a straw-man, falsely characterized in words ide ntical with those of other's: "a free license to take whatever you want from who ever [sic] you can." That's Obama's "dog-eat-dog" philosophy. It is not capitalism. Capitalism is "the economic and social system in which all property is privately owned," and from which the initiation of coercion is prohibited. Capitalism is the economic expression of individualism---"the doctrine that the state exists f or the individual"---and follows from the rights of the individual: the right to life, property, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The antipode of individualism is collectivism---the doctrine that the individual must live for the state. The Roosevelt speech shows which side Obama is buttered on. He declares: "I m here t o reaffirm my deep conviction that we are greater together than we are on our ow n."

His need of the group is gagging. He refers repeatedly to "not going it alone," to "we're better off together," to things being "unfair" and, of course, to the wretchedness of "economic inequality." Although ten seconds of thought shows that were all men economically equal, the level of equality would be at ground-level and the economy would be stagnant, Ob ama says nothing about that. Obama is no originator. He relies upon, is supported by and is the child of lite rally hundreds of academics and writers who have long championed the collectivis t notion that man must live for the state, that capitalism is a soul-draining mo nster in which scoundrels swindle everyone and cause poverty everywhere. It is p ure Marxism, the political progenitor of the claim that making money is evil and building a business is dishonest and riddled with corruption. Of all the lies perpetrated upon the American people, this is one of the most da maging. It casts as immoral those who earn their own way. It also undercuts the ambition of the young who seek to build their own fortune. The demonizing of the productive is not new. It has been around for millennia. From farmers and herdsmen to tradesmen, merchants and industrialists---all have been damned and enslaved that politicians might live in splendor. That is what r egulation is all about. That is what the demonizing of businesspeople is all abo ut. That is what the attack on individualism and capitalism is all about. Obama's lies and distortions are wearing thin. Americans are beginning to learn that capitalism was not "tried in the decade before the Great Depression," it wa s not "tried during the last decade," it was the cause of the post-war boom of t he 50s and 60s in the form of some last vestiges of capitalism seeping through f rom the somewhat relaxed regulations of WWII. In short, the system he claims "d oesn't work," and has "never worked," in fact has never existed in full unadulte rated form. Capitalism has never been given free rein to show its mighty, benevolent power t o produce. Although our economy is mixed, with some freedom and many controls, t he breath of freedom is so powerful a motivating factor that even in today's str angled freedom, our businesspeople still bring forth a cornucopia of values. But Obama claims that "we are a richer nation and a stronger democracy because o f what [Teddy Roosevelt] fought for." Roosevelt, the founder of the Progressive Party, fought for the nationalization of all our railroads and communication sy stems, one of the earliest and most sustained attacks on private property. These are some of the things Obama has said. What has he done? He has increased the size of federal government, increased the number of regulat ory agencies, increased the national debt, increased the power of the government , increased the reach of the Executive Branch. He has violated individual rights and has sought to curtail Constitutional freedoms, to rescind states' rights an d raise taxes, while refusing to cut spending, refusing to shut down business-ch oking agencies and reduce the employment rolls of the federal government. One sentence in Obama's speech is true: "This is a defining moment." But not mer ely for the middle class. It is a defining moment for our beloved country. Eith er we will sit on the sidelines and let our nation be demolished by a second-han der, a supercilious community organizer, or we will get off our duffs and work m ightily to stop Obama in 2012. We must not allow this castigation of our Republic, of our Constitution, of our

individual rights to continue any longer. Obama must go