The New Communists

This image was a full-page ad in the September 23rd’s New York Times paid for by Bill Perkins, a Houston-based venture capitalist, who’s disgusted with the government’s plan to bailout Wall Street. As can be seen, it shows Bush, Bernanke and Paulson erecting an American flag (mimicking the iconic American photograph by Joe Rosenthal called “Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima”) with the hammer and the sickle inscribed with “Big Insurance,” “Detroit Auto” and “Wall St. Banks.” In the background you see the tombstones of “Private Enterprise” and “Capitalism.”

This is a widely held opinion. Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky) is called the bailout “economic socialism and “un-American.” Martin Schram’s column “The September Surprise shows Bush to be a socialist” says Bush will be remembered as a president who “brought socialism to the citadel of capitalism — Wall Street.” Every column by Cliff Kincaid, editor of the right wing Accuracy in the Media Report, invokes socialism: Socialist “Bailout” Could Spark Collapse (9/29), Will Conservatives Embrace Socialism? (9/27/), Senator Bunning Blasts “Financial Socialism” (9/24).

Interestingly, most of these critiques don’t actually explain why the bailout could be a bad idea. They operate under the assumption that Americans will stay true to Red Scare logic: “If the bailout looks like financial socialism and everything socialist is bad, the bailout must be bad.” Last time I checked, China’s economy wasn’t doing too badly. I wasn’t around during the Red Scare; can someone tell me what’s wrong with financial socialism?

These critical voices are not part of the mainstream, they’re coming from the free market freaks on the far-right who want the bill to fail. Sen. Jim Bunning’s quotes are buried in the tail end of hard news stories. The mainstream opinion, as demonstrated by the two presidential candidates (you can always count them to be in the middle of the road on rogue issues) supports the bill.

This pro-bailout stance isn’t surprising coming from the mainstream media, they’re own by corporations anyways. You wouldn’t wish destitution on your parents. But I’d bet in a country with healthy, vigorous, independent media outlets, this bailout would be opposed by editorial pages of all ideological slants: those on the far left are eager to see what happens when Capitalism is left to its own devices and those on the far right want to keep the free market intact.