Polish American Walt Kowalski, played to anti-hero perfection by Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino, stands against corruption and lawlessness and wins. But not before sacrificing his life. Kowalski is a Korean War veteran and retired auto worker living outside of Detroit. He is old and tired, and just wants to be left alone after the death of his wife. But fate and duty had other ideas. He carries a long held guilt over killing a surrendering soldier in the Korean War. His death redeems, not just his soul, but the soul of his town.
Events lead Kowalski to resist a local takeover by a Hmong youth gang. The Hmong are an ethnic Southeast Asian people, primarily from Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand. In real life Michigan, they are among the fastest growing immigrants. Many Hmong people emigrated from South Vietnam after Democrats shamelessly withdrew monetary support from South Vietnam in 1974. The Paris Peace Agreements thus became toothless and North Vietnam conquered South Vietnam. “Boat people” fled Vietnam and the insane, murderous Pol Pot created the Cambodian Killing Fields.
Gran Torino can be viewed as metaphorical microcosm of the Vietnamese conflict with an alternate ending. Eastwood, the quintessential symbol of American independence and strength, helps defend a group of Asian Americans against a gangster group of other Asian Americans. Kowalski’s courage and independence led to his death and the defeat of the gang members. The image of protagonist Thao Vang Lor (Bee Vang) driving in Kowalski’s Gran Torino, left to Thao in his will, cements the “good Hmongs” victory, and ultimate commitment to America. The juxtaposition of this scene, versus Kowalski’s children trying to unload him in an old age home is striking.
Another morality play is occurring today in the real Michigan. Michigan has a 15% unemployment rate. Detroit’s auto industry, which made the 1972 Ford Gran Torino, has been decimated in large part by federal regulations. In classic “anti-comparative advantage” style, a sclerotic EPA required individual auto companies to meet mandated “CAFE” standards. Even if one wanted the nation’s entire car fleet to meet CAFE requirements on average, the EPA implemented it in the most inefficient way possible.
US automakers’ comparative advantage was in SUVs and small trucks. To keep their fleet within mandated averages, they were forced to build unprofitable, uncompetitive small cars. If the Feds just let comparative advantage work, the US auto fleet would have likely met federal CAFE standards without each company being compelled to build every type of car. But Government does not know economics. They simply know better.
Obama’s “new environmental energy plan,” the Waxman-Markey “Cap and Trade” bill, is a ruse. It is not an energy bill, but a regressive consumption tax in disguise. It is favored by Wall Street, George Soros, Al Gore, GE and other corporatists looking for subsidies paid for by the tax payer. Cap and Trade is the ultimate economic destruction machine. The bill passed the House of Representatives this summer by six votes, 219-213. Forty-four Democrats voted against it. The Senate has not yet voted.
Michigan Congressman Thaddeus McCotter, a real life political “Kowalski” and GOP Policy Committee Chair, opposed this monstrosity. He is among a group of opponents being targeted for attack in the next few weeks. Others include House Minority Whip Eric Cantor and Missouri’s Roy Blount. The campaigns are funded by Soros’ groups MoveOn.Org and Americans United for Change. The attack is preposterous, as this video shows (Groups target GOP on cap-and-trade). What is the goal of the bill?
The goal of the bill is to replace cheap energy with expensive energy. This is called “saving the environment.” This is accomplished by requiring consumers to purchase more expensive electricity, biomass power for example, while also paying taxes to subsidize these enterprises. As we consume more expensive energy, the same amount of labor and capital creates less output. Even if one believed the ridiculous 1.7 million “green job” increase advertised, it doesn’t factor the lost jobs from lower productivity and higher energy costs. The manufacturing heavy states and big users of energy, like Michigan, are clearly poised to be the big losers in such legislation. They are already seeking “exemptions” from regulations because of the bill’s potential economic devastation (Michigan Economic Impact on the State from the Waxman-Markey Bill).
Meanwhile, Wall Street firms like Goldman Sachs, and self important financial traders like George Soros, strongly support this legislation because they get to buy and sell “CO2 credits.” The rationale is this legislation will combat “global warming.” Climatologist Chip Knappenberger estimates the best case impact of the bill would be to lower global temperature by “0.1” degree centigrade in the year 2100. This bill does not address global warming. The bill’s costs exceed its “benefits” by a factor of at least ten, using the UN’s officially approved climate models. This means lost jobs and/or lost real income. This is also why Greenpeace joined with pro-growth conservatives and opposed it. The whole thing is a sham.
So why do Democrats want this bill? They want to raise your taxes under the cover of “climate change” reform. It also gives Government the power to decide which industries get benefited more heavily than others. It is part of the transformation from a free society to a government controlled society. This is yet another highway toward the ultimate c goal of centralized government planning.
McCotter understands, like Walter Kowalski, what it means to be an American. A great American can be a first generation “Hmong” from Vietnam, like Gran Torino’s Thao Vang Lor. Conversely, a treasonous American can be born in Chicago to great advantage, like Weatherman terrorist and Obama supporter Bill Ayers. This speech by Congressman McCotter provides a very clear vision of what America is and should be about. Let’s not permit anti-American fakes, like George Soros, sacrifice McCotter’s (or Cantor’s or Blount’s) “political life” by trying to pull the wool over our eyes. “Green jobs” are a wolf’s tax in sheep’s clothing.
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