Ted Rall for April 18, 2012

Sick.

Great Rallic portrait of Jobs.

Ted never met a capitalist he didn’t hate. He loves the freedoms our form of government affords (The freedom to criticize policies he doesn’t like) but he isn’t willing to accept the responsibilities it places upon us (To be industrious and self sufficient).

Industrious AND self sufficient? Wow, what a concept! Far to deep a concept for some, who demand that the Government support them by fleecing others!

I’ve always felt that being industrious didn’t involve sitting in a plush office deciding which factories to close.

China is not a capitalist system, they have allowed for a planed semi-capitalist system on their west coast but the majority of the people are still under a system that is just as communist as Soviet Russia. The Chinese government is afraid to allow full and real capitalism because that would entail a huge transfer from the government to the people.

@STLDan – People like you are why this country needs Globalization. I’m sure you love the idea of holding companies hostage by starving off the supply of goods and labor through strikes and intimidation of workers and shippers.

What you don’t realize is that the only people you hurt with those strikes is other Americans. While you are throwing wooden shoes into the machinery of progress there are companies in other countries that are eating our lunch because they have workforces that don’t use the government to distort the laws of supply and demand.

You find my position disgusting? I am for investment, employment and progress. What could be more disgusting then a group of Union thugs threatening to harm anyone that tries to cross their picket line to exercise their freedom to work? I’m management but I have worked in the shop when our Unions have gone on strike to keep product moving out the door and to keep my company profitable so that it can employ me and other hardworking people in the community. I’ve been Video taped crossing the picket line, threatened with violence, replaced tires that were punctured on jackrocks tossed out by union thugs. Do not preach to me about the nobility of the poor downtrodden union worker. I’ve seen them in all their ugliness and I’m glad my company is global enough that it can continue to produce goods even when thr local union bosses are threatening another strike.

Globalization benefits everyone. I and everyone else can buy goods produced at the lowest cost. That leaves more dollars in my pocket to buy other products or invest in my community.

@johnlofton – First of all, they weren’t MY employees. They were employees of the company that employed me too. You can smear fecal matter all you want but I was just one of many sent out into the plant to do the job because someone else refused to work. And there were more then just words being tossed at cars. When you resort to violence to make your point you have already lost the argument.

Second of all – Your tired ranting that the only way a worker can get a fair shake is with unions is patently false. Unions make up a very small portion of the private workforce today and yet most of us feel we are being paid what we are worth. Yes Unions worked hard to get workers many benefits. Good for them. They could do that as long as Manufacturers had no other choice.

I am not protected by a union. I work hard for my company and in return my company pays me a good salary and provides a lot of other benefits as well. I make sure that my company is efficient and effective so that it can compete on a global scale and it does. Not through intimidation but because it produces a good product at a fair price.

I too am an American worker but I recognize that the only way we can compete is by outworking and outthinking our global competition. The Chinese are under the same pressure as we and they can vote for more laws, regulations, and protectionism anytime they want. Notice they don’t do that. Because they recognize that would be self defeating.

@Donald – Having a job with a good company is not akin to working in a concentration camp. And having pride in ones self because of the work they do is not akin to being enslaved. Yes I remember reading “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” and I speak a Low German Dialect.

Unions can’t hold back the clock and they can’t overcome the laws of economics. Investing in ones self through education and learning discipline is the difference between those that will succeed and those that will fail in a global economy.

You can be like Master Debater JohnLofton and throw names at people and decry how unfair things have become. Or you can accept that the world has changed and figure out how you will adapt to the changes.

I was born in the 60s and grew up in the 70s and 80s. I remember when almost everyone drove an American car and the world was a kinder, gentler place for Americans. But the rest of the world wants to live like Americans too and they seem willing to work really really hard to make a better life for their families and tolerate more demands from their employers to make things better for the next generation.