Directive 10-289: Obama Becomes Wesley Mouch

In Atlas Shrugged, the novel by Ayn Rand, the government passed Directive 10-289. It was a directive to make everything fair and equal, and was sold to the public as a remedy for the economic mess that the country had gotten itself into via government interference with business and redistribution of wealth. The New Intellectual Blog provides the full text of the fictional executive order here.

Directive 10-289 can be summarized as a series of regulations that attempt to freeze the economy in place, and to end the "creative destruction" that occurs in capitalism as innovation sustains long-term economic growth while at the same time destroying the economic stability of established companies and their employees that have been operating in the existing business environment. Among the eight points that make up Directive 10-289 are those that freeze individuals at their jobs, freeze prices and wages, nationalize patents and other intellectual property, and require that production and consumption rates continue at present levels. The natural consequences of Directive 10-289 drive the plot of the second half of the novel, as the economy of the United States is destroyed, the infrastructure of business and commerce collapse, and the nation falls into ruin due to the loss of innovation and commerce, manufacturing and the normal economic transactions that make life in a modern society possible.

Although no adminstration in the United States has ever attempted all of the mandates in the fictional Directive 10-289, many of the individual points have been tried at various times since the beginning of the progressive era. Readers familiar with the precepts of the New Deal, or of the attempted economic fixes of the Nixon era will recognize some of them. In general the United States federal government has not tried to freeze consumption and production to mandated rates; rather it tries to nudge producers and consumers into acceptable (to the government) levels of production and spending through the use of subsidies, tax breaks and other such inducements.

In the past year however,
Chairman President Obama has in effect created Directive 10-289 through the passage of a number of laws that put the apparatus in place for the federal government to control a major portion of the US economy. The Stimulus Bill and the Healthcare Act have already been shoved down our throats, and now with the Financial Reform Bill, the government stands poised to control 60% of the United States economy, and monitor not only the health and financial records of the entire populace, but also to monitor credit card transactions and spending habits as well.

That this adminstration intends to dictate to citizens how much money they will be allowed to make, what kind of health insurance they will be forced to buy and what healthcare they may have access to, what financial products they may buy and sell, and what property they may own is now obvious. To flagrantly violate our liberty and property rights through such legislation marks this admininstration's intent to enslave the American people to the service of a fascist socialist new world order that is now clearly out in the open.

In Atlas Shrugged, the men who plan the enslavement of the American people claim to do so out of concern for the "common good." They say things like:

"We must not let vulgar difficulties obstruct our feeling that it's a noble plan motivated soley by the public welfare.

"They fail to recognize that production is not a private choice, but a public duty. They have no right to fail . . . they've got to go on producing. It's a social imperative."

"What we've got to think of is jobs. More jobs for more people."

So they lie--some even to themselves--about the true motive for enslaving the people. But some of them know that in reality the issue is not the so-called "common good", it's not the public welfare, the social imperative or even jobs. It's about power. And that power is gained by criminalizing any action that a person would naturally take in the pursuit of his own self-interest.

"We're after power and we mean it. You fellows were pikers, but we know the real trick, and you'd better get wise to it. There's no way to rule innocent men.The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws."

It's the same with the Obama adminstration's collection of laws that add up in practice to Directive 10-289. There's a reason each bill is so long and so convoluted. It is not because any of the publically proclaimed objectives of them need that many pages. Rather, it is in order to slip into the bills the structure that will make ordinary life as free human beings impossible to most citizens; it is to create slaves.

Just remember this as Obama halts one third of US oil production after doing nothing for five weeks, and ignoring the emergency plans for just such an accident as happened in the Gulf. Remember this as he goes on vacation this weekend without answering Bobby Jindal's request for permits to save his own state's coastline. Clearly, his actions are not about saving seagulls and fisheries from oil pollution.

Remember this as he moves to control 60% of our economy, and brings down the economy because of the loss of of fisheries, and the rising price of oil. A member of this adminstration has been recorded as saying that they need the price of oil in the US to equal that of Europe. Remember this when the price of food goes up because oil is the major energy source for its production and distribution across the country.

It's about power. It's about shoving irrational legislation down the throats of the American people in order to put in place an economic-political system that has failed miserably everywhere it has been tried.

Obama has become Wesley Mouch.