A Socialist Against Labor? Barack Obama

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama couldn't let General Motors fail, but he won't concede he's taking over the company.

With a 60 percent equity stake in the carmaker and $50 billion in taxpayer money riding on GM's success, the federal government isn't exactly a hands-off investor.

As GM enters into Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, Obama's economic team is stressing that its goals are to maximize the return to taxpayers and to exit from its involvement as quickly as possible. But as one administration official put it Sunday night, there is an inevitable tension between those two objectives.

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WASHINGTON, D.C. (daily kenoshan) - General Motors, the 100 year old industrial superpower and maker of Chevrolet, Buick, Cadillac and other automobiles, announced they will file for bankruptcy protection, the outcome of which will cut 21,000 jobs and reduce to 2600 the number of automobile dealerships. President Obama applauded the reorganization move and estimated the time frame for the court action to be completed at 60-90 days. Once the bankruptcy is finalized, the government will own 60% of the failed GM Corporationand will pump billions into the leaner, reorganized company. This will be the governments biggest foray into private industry in history.

Nat'l Security v. Free Speech (Chris)

The First Amendment of the United States Constitution states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” This cherished right has been actively fought for since its creation. Unfortunately, during times of war, attack, or panic, this right has been in some ways flat out suspended in the name of national security.
Encarta.msn.com defined national security as “protection of nation from danger: the protection of a nation from attack or other danger by maintaining adequate armed forces and guarding state secrets.” Supposedly, in order to protect the nation from danger, free speech has been suspended at certain times in our history and today. As a result of this, it has received massive criticism, as well as for the suspension of civil liberties and human rights.
Historically, there have been several laws passed during wartime that have restricted free speech in the name of national security. World War I was a major example of this. During this war, the Espionage Act of 1917 was passed, which made it a crime to interfere with the armed forces process. Then the Sedition Act of 1918 was passed, which made it a crime to simply speak out against the government. Eugene V. Debs received ten years in prison for saying, ‘“master classes” caused the war, the “subject classes” would have to fight it.”
Another famous instance in which free speech wrestled with national security was the landmark Supreme Court decision in the New York Times v. U.S. (1971). Fortunately, in this instance, during wartime, the court ruled that it was unconstitutional for the papers not to be able to print the then-classified Pentagon Papers. In order to claim prior restraint, the government had to demonstrate how publication of this information would cause a “grave and irreparable” danger.

Howard Zinn's Philosophy

Just for you Jack