The Fallacy of Redistribution . . . .

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The history of the 20th century is full of examples of countries that set out to redistribute wealth
and ended up redistributing poverty.
-Thomas Sowell

http://lewrockwell.com/sowell/sowell113.html

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The Redistributor-in-Chief

By Jeffrey Lord

http://spectator.org/archives/2012/09/20/the-redistributor-in-chief


Constitutional rights, free speech, religion, jobs, poverty, and everything else are up for grabs.

"I actually believe in redistribution."
-- Barack Obama, Loyola University, 1998


Shall we play a game?

Which of these things doesn't belong?

Coal.
Health care.
Jobs.
Religion.
Movies.
Gas Prices.
Poverty.
Answer? They all belong.
They all belong to the redistributionist World of Obama.
Let's work our way through these items one by one for a glimpse of what Obama's re-distributionism has in fact meant:

• Coal:
Alpha Coal Company announced this week that they are shutting down 8 mines and cutting 1,200 employees. CEO Kevin Crutchfield says this is necessary in part because of "a regulatory environment that's aggressively aimed at constraining the use of coal."

• Health Care:
Welch Allyn, the medical device firm, announced the other day that "it will reduce its workforce by 10 percent over the next three years in reaction to the 2.3 percent medical device tax slated to begin in January 2013 in accordance with the Affordable Care Act." This from a report at Health Finance News.

• Jobs:
The unemployment rate for August was 8.1%. The 43rd month in a row the unemployment rate was over 8%. Some 368,000 Americans stopped looking for work altogether.

• Religion:
Asked if the Obama Justice Department would "never entertain" or "advance" any kind of proposal that would "criminalize speech" against any religion, Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division Thomas Perez refused to answer.

• Movies:
Local authorities swoop down on alleged Innocence of Muslims filmmaker Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, escorting him from his home after midnight, to meet with federal officers. The Obama White House, the State Department, and the UN Ambassador all blame Nakoula's video for causing the violence in dozens of countries around the world. The filmmaker goes into hiding.

• Gas Prices:
Gas prices skyrocket, eleven cents in one day last Friday.

• Poverty:
The nation's poverty rate has increased to 15.1% from 14.3%. While fresh statistics are due next month, the rate is expected to increase. This increase, said CBS News, represents "the largest number of Americans in poverty in the 52 years since such estimates have been published by the U.S. Census Bureau." The Median Household Income of Americans has decreased.

So again. What was it that Mr. Obama said on that tape?

"I actually believe in redistribution."

Yes, he does.

Let's run through some of the groups and individuals that the President has associated with over the years. What were their thoughts on redistribution?:

• Frank Marshall Davis: Davis, mentioned frequently by Obama in his book Dreams from My Father as an early mentor, is the subject of a new book by Reagan biographer Paul Kengor. The book, The Communist: The Untold Story of Barack Obama's Mentor, charts with definitive accuracy the progression of Davis's communist ideas from Chicago to Hawaii. He explores how certain elements of the Obama administration's agenda reflect Davis's columns advocating wealth redistribution, government stimulus for "public works projects," taxpayer-funding of universal health care, and nationalizing General Motors. Davis's writings excoriated the "tentacles of big business," blasted Wall Street and "greedy" millionaires, lambasted GOP tax cuts that "spare the rich," attacked "excess profits" and oil companies, and perceived the Catholic Church as an obstacle to his vision for the state -- all the while echoing Davis's often repeated mantra for transformational and fundamental "change."

• Chicago's Socialist Political World: Stanley Kurtz, in his thoroughly researched book Radical-in-Chief: Barack Obama and the Untold Story of American Socialism, did incredible detective work in going through Obama's past and nailing down precisely what organizations and people were important in forming his political outlook. Surprise, surprise, these connections turned out time after time to be socialist organizations and people who made no bones about their socialism. From ACORN to the United Neighborhood Organization to the Midwest Academy to the Socialist Scholar Conferences. Says Kurtz:

Obama has adopted the gradualist socialist strategy of his mentors, seeking to combine comprehensive government regulation of private businesses with a steadily enlarging public sector. Eventually, in his hands, capitalist America could resemble a socialist-inspired Scandinavian welfare state.

The list of individual names out of the American far left who have influenced this president and hence the results mentioned above could go on and on. Some of them now infamous, others unknown to the American public:

• The Reverend Jeremiah Wright -- the anti-American Black Liberation Theologian.

• Bill Ayers -- from the radical Weather Underground.

• Saul Alinsky -- the Obama hero who wrote Rules for Radicals.

• Frances Fox Piven -- a member of the National Executive Committee of the Democratic Socialists of America.

• Michael Harrington -- founder of the Democratic Socialists of America.
Again, the list could go on.

The point, of course, is that made by Frank Marshall Davis biographer Kengor.

"The people who influence our presidents matter."

"Eventually," as Stanley Kurtz called the end goal of Obama -- "eventually" being the tilting of America into the status of a socialist state -- is now here.

The tipping point, if you will. The tipping point for America.

And the results are already alarming.

Poverty is on the rise.

More Americans on food stamps.

Unemployment soars above 8%.

Gas prices climb through the roof.

Coal companies are cutting employees because of new environmental regulations, fulfilling a presidential pledge that Obama would deliberately seek to bankrupt coal companies.

A medical device company is cutting employees because of Obamacare taxes.

An Assistant Attorney General of the United States refuses to answer a question about criminalizing criticism of religion -- read: Islam. At the same time the Catholic Church is under direct assault from the same administration's Department of Health and Human Services.

And last but not least, the government is seen dragging an American citizen from his home at midnight to intimidate the hell out of him for making a bad movie trailer and a presumably worse movie.
To borrow from the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, as a direct result of the Obama presidency, socialism's chickens are coming home to roost in America.

Which is another way of saying America is being set-up for failure.

Why?
The President of the United States is in reality the Redistributor-In-Chief.

And if anyone has missed that point after the last four years, they're simply not paying attention.

"I actually believe in redistribution" Barack Obama said.

Indeed he does. And the results are in.