November 6, 2009

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand says the purpose of cap and trade is to enrich investment banks
by Bill Levinson

The enemy doesn’t expect us, reckons us 100 versts away, and if a long way off to begin with, 200, 300 or more– suddenly we’re on him, like snow on the head; his head spins. Attack with what comes up, with what God sends; the cavalry to begin, smash, strike, cut off, don’t let slip, hurra!
Aleksandr V. Suvorov (1729-1800)

“Attack with what comes up, with what God sends,” underscores the need to exploit opportunities to destroy an enemy, and Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) has provided such an opportunity to demolish Barack Obama’s cap and trade agenda. It allows our side to totally reverse the focus of cap and trade from protection of the environment, polar ice caps, polar bears, and so on to enrichment of investment banks and similar entities at the expense of the working American. Gillibrand’s letter to the Wall Street Journal says openly that the real purpose of cap and trade is to enrich Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan Chase, the New York Stock Exchange, and the Green Exchange, and supporters of so-called greenhouse gas regulations agree with us that she has endangered Obama’s agenda.

Here is what Kirsten Gillibrand wrote in the Wall Street Journal. This is important because this is no longer from Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, or other vocal opponents of carbon taxes and cap-and-trade; it is from a Democratic Senator who supports it.

An infrastructure is already beginning to form, as entities like the New York Stock Exchange, J.P. Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, and the new Green Exchange are developing carbon trading platforms or expanding their environmental trading desks. There are nearly 100 funds already focused on green investments.

The psychological warfare opportunities here are enormous, and Senator Gillibrand has provided the perfect enemy against which to direct these techniques: the same class of investment bankers and similar entities that recently gave us a 40 percent stock market decline and ten percent unemployment. As stated by Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger’s Psychological Warfare,

Then go after the Propaganda Man [hypothetical listener on the other side] yourself. He is your friend. You are his friend. The only enemy is the enemy Leader (or generals, or emperor, or capitalists, or ‘They’). (Linebarger, p. 154)

For psychological warfare purposes, it is useful to define the enemy as: (1) the ruler, (2) or the ruling group, (3) or unspecified manipulators, (4) or any definite minority. It is thoroughly unsound to define the enemy too widely.” (p. 51) “The sound psychological warfare operator will try to get enemy troops to believing that the enemy is not themselves but somebody else- the King, the Fuhrer, the elite troops, the capitalists. … ‘We’re not fighting you. We are fighting the So-and-so’s who are misleading you.’”

In this case, the Propaganda Man is obviously the working class American who makes up the backbone of the Democratic Party. We are his friend. We wish to protect him or her from:
(1) Unemployment due to shipment of his or her job offshore to avoid payment of carbon taxes
(2) Higher electricity and heating costs, for which he must pay with after-tax money
(3) Higher gasoline prices, for which he must pay with after-tax money

The enemy to be demonized consists of the unholy alliance between Barack Obama’s Democrats and greedy corporate special interests. It is very important to say “Barack Obama’s Democrats” and not “Democrats.” Remember that it is bad practice to define the enemy too widely, and there are in fact Democrats (e.g. Chris Carney of Pennsylvania) who voted against Waxman-Markey. There are also a few Republicans who voted for it, and they also should be targeted for removal in the next election. The corporate special interests are, however, very clearly defined. They consist of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership and the companies that Senator Gillibrand identified in her letter to the Wall Street Journal.

Not only that, many of them (including Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan Chase) are on record as raising six figures in bundled contributions for Barack Obama’s campaign. Bundled contributions are entirely legal (they are not corporate contributions, but a collection of donations by the company’s employees and other stakeholders) but this nonetheless paints a very unflattering picture: Barack Obama is dancing with the ones who bought, er, brought him as opposed to doing what is right for the Democratic base. He is selling out the Democratic base to enrich the kind of executives and stockholders who can afford the maximum $2300 contribution to a political campaign, the kind who attend expensive fundraisers with billionaires like George Soros. The following picture illustrates the kind of propaganda that can be made from this.

Note that it is impossible for the other side to contest this story. It is a fact that Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan Chase raised six figures each in bundled contributions for Obama, and it is also a fact that Kirsten Gillibrand named them as specific beneficiaries of cap and trade.

In addition, trading of carbon credits (the modern equivalent of medieval indulgences for sins) was a major part of the business plans of Lehman Brothers, Enron, and AIG. It is very important to use “carbon credits” in the same sentence with epic failures like Lehman Brothers, AIG, and Enron as often as possible. Our position is that there is indeed a connection between carbon credits and bankruptcy (Lehman) or the need for government handouts at the taxpayers’ expense (AIG). These firms wanted to profit from an artificial commodity that has no value whatsoever to society, much like Dutch speculators in tulip bulbs or American speculators in dot-com stocks that never made a cent of profit. Unlike a carbon credit, in fact, one can at least plant a tulip bulb. Even the mortgage backed securities were backed by genuine property, albeit overvalued property.

The corporations that are agitating for cap and trade, including those that resigned from the Chamber of Commerce because of the latter’s refusal to support cap and trade, can be depicted as profiteers and the modern equivalent of medieval indulgence peddlers. Consider for example General Electric, a member of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership. GE hopes that carbon emission regulations will compel businesses to buy its “green” products. If GE’s “green” products could pass a Net Present Value analysis, they would sell themselves. Philips agitated for a ban on incandescent lights because it wants to sell compact fluorescent lights. If Philips was up to the job of engineering eye-friendly CFLs, they would sell themselves because of the amount of electricity they save. “Corporate welfare at the people’s expense” should be the operative phrase.

To all of this may be added the fact that taxpayer money is being used to purchase or support the purchase of wind turbines that are made in China and Spain (Iberdrola). This gives the lie to Barack Obama’s promise of “green jobs” through greenhouse gas regulations. The only “green” involved is the color of the money that will flow offshore and into the pockets of corporate special interests.

In summary:
(1) Kirsten Gillibrand’s ill-advised words in the Wall Street Journal provide the opportunity to destroy Obama’s so-called climate agenda, along with a very big part of the Democratic Party. The Republicans are showing some intelligence for a change by acting on it.

(2) Gillibrand allows our side to seize the moral high ground from the enemy (climate profiteers, the modern equivalent of medieval indulgence sellers). Cap and trade proponents have hid behind the polar ice caps, cuddly polar bears, and the environment as a whole, but now they have been exposed as representing Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan Chase, the New York Stock Exchange, and the Green Exchange. Note that this class of entities is already hated by most of the Democratic Party’s base because of the mortgage-backed security meltdown, the Enron scandal, and so on, so most of our work is already done for us.

Another way to look at this is the analogy of a confrontation between cavalry (e.g. Suvorov’s) and an infantry square. A frontal attack on an unbroken square was suicidal in the horse and musket era. If, however, a few men in the square abandoned their positions to create an opening, the cavalry could break through and then rip the square apart from inside. Kirsten Gillibrand has just created that fatal opening. Another such opportunity would arise if even one or two Democratic Members of Congress could be convinced (or compelled through the threat of electoral defeat) to withdraw their support of cap and trade. The instant you can make your opponent take a step backward, he’s done for.

(3) The companies named by Gillibrand, along with USCAP member GE, are on record as raising six figures in bundled contributions to elect Barack Obama. Bundled contributions are legal, and we must never say or imply anything to the contrary, but this is nonetheless not what people who are struggling to put food on the table or keep up with their mortgages want to see.

(4) The Propaganda Man (the person we seek to convince) is the working American who is the Democratic Party’s foundation. The enemy against whom we direct his righteous anger is the unholy alliance between Barack Obama and his “fat cat” campaign donors.