What's the difference between the US and Venezuela?

Well, at the top of the food chain, perhaps not much. It seems our cuddly leaders have more in common than a handshake, hug, and NY Times bestseller these days. This comes from Mary Grabar, a professor in Atlanta:

"Obama rivals the tyrants of history in his race to nationalize companies and banks. Although he asserted during his town hall meeting that he has no interest in running companies, he has forced financial institutions to accept TARP money and then refused to allow them to pay that money back. He has fired the top GM executive and forced the merger of Chrysler with a foreign car company. He told bank executives that only he stands between them and the “pitchforks” — after Soros-supported “protesters” showed up at executives’ homes days earlier. The repeated refrains by Obama and his administration that “we won” to upbraid dissenters reveal a profound divergence from the traditional notions of national service. This refrain is suited to the leader of a coup."

Interesting. Americans appeared to be angered when Hugo Chavez began nationalizing oil companies (especially those interests based in the US) and banks in Venezuela. However, the exact same thing is quietly happening here under different pretenses, is it not?

We are told that this is an extreme situation that REQUIRES government intervention so that it doesn't get worse. Since when has government intervention made anything better? Sometimes it is important to ask for a little restraint from knee jerk reactions, especially those with billion dollar pricetags and huge implications for the future of our free market economy.

Who knows what the true intention of the administration is. I "hope" it is legitimate, but there is something unseemly about the frenetic pace of these dramatic changes in American business within the first 100 days - not to mention Rahm Emanuel's notion that you "never want a serious crisis to go to waste". Much like the halls of Washington, there is considerable disagreement on whether this is the best course of action, or if it is the administration's desired course of action. Is it leadership or manipulation? We need to ask more questions of Washington and stop accepting their "honest assessments" of critical situations. Very little coming from our nation's capital is honest anymore.

During the campaign, Obama did say he wanted to fundamentally change the country. Were 53% of us not really paying close attention? We need to now.