Mussolini is Smiling

Several oil company leaders have been summoned to Washington to appear today before the political leadership.  They will be asked to explain what they intend to do with their "windfall" profits.

Think on that for just a second. 

Let's say you recently got a bonus at work.  You receive a summons in the mail from your city council to appear and explain to them what you intend to do with that "windfall" income.  I know what my answer would be.  "Whatever the heck I dang well please."  If I even bothered to show up at all.

Fascism (also called Corporatism) was all the rage in the '20s and '30s -- even Winston Churchill was fawning over Mussolini's economic prescriptions.  At root it is the exact opposite of Classical Liberalism and Enlightenment traditions.  In Fascism, the individual has not rights, only duties.  He lives to serve the State.  In this view, what you earn is not yours -- it is the State's.  Anything you keep is a gift of the State.  It is therefore quite reasonable for the State to ask you what you intend to do with its money.

The Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution were written by students of the Enlightenment who fervently believed in the Classical Liberal ideals -- that individuals have certain unalienable rights which the State cannot violate.  They had hoped to protect the individual from ever-encroaching government.  The State exists simply to protect the rights of its individuals, not the other way around. 

You should be outraged.  You should do something about it.  Speak up.  Send a letter to you Representative.  Vote these guys out of office if they keep it up. 

It might be fun to watch Big Oil billionaires on the hot seat.  But just think for a second of the consequences.  It could be you next at an upcoming city council meeting.  It's not as big a leap as you might think.