Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Ben & Jerry's Want To Get Money Out Of Politics....They Should Stick To Making Ice Cream

By, Chris Rossini

Ben & Jerry's, famous for their ice cream, is going all political again; as they have a history of doing. The latest is a campaign called StampStampede, where Ben & Jerry's sells stamps to people that they can then use to imprint phrases onto paper dollars. The goal is to 'get money out of politics'.



There are a bunch of problems with this.

First, the stamps say "AMEND THE CONSTITUTION".

If Ben & Jerry's would have actually read the constitution they would find it says nothing about giving the federal government power to create a central bank with monopoly control of the money supply. The very paper that Ben & Jerry's want people to put stamps on are unconstitutional!

Next, money is not the problem with politics. Rather, it is the granting of power to politicians. When power centers are created, people and corporations will seek to influence that power. They'll try to direct the politician to use the power in their favor.

Handing money to a politician is only one way to influence him. You can promise the politician a lucrative job after his term expires. This is an often-used tactic known as "the revolving door". You can promise the politician a fun night out on the town (*wink wink*). The number of ways possible in gaining influence are limited only to the imagination.

"Stamping Money Out Of Politics", assuming that were even possible, would accomplish virtually nothing. Removing power, on the other hand, is where the solution lies. A powerless politician is useless to lobbyists and those who specialize in gaining influence.

It's also the key to achieving Liberty.

So Ben & Jerry's....dump the stamps...and stay focused on making great ice cream.


Chris Rossini is on TwitterFacebook & Google+

8 comments:

  1. Brilliant takedown, sir.

    The thing I find most disheartening about well-intentioned liberals is they don't realize the best way to take money out of politics is to take away the money available to politicians for doling out. A flat broke politician is almost as useless to lobbyists as a powerless one.

    So, repeal the 16th Amemdment, abolish the Fed, allow no import tariffs, no excise taxes, no regulatory fees, and very quickly we'll see a massive deflation in campaign contributions, no loophole-filled "campaign finance" laws needed. Washington will return to the sleepy little swamp town it always was until a couple of generations ago.

    If Ben & Jerry's want to persist in the stamp business, they should add a couple: Repeal the 16th! End the Fed!

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  2. Money flows to DC because that's where all the power is located. It isn't rocket science. Reduce and disburse the power of DC and you reduce and disburse the influence of money in federal politics.

    Are these people stupid? Did they really think they could centralize massive political power in DC and people wouldn't try to influence that MASSIVE power in their own interest? Are they really that naïve?

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  3. I'm going to tweet this to B&J. They are good about monitoring their tweets. I suggest anyone who reads this do the same- maybe Ben and/or Jerry will debate RW on his show!

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  4. What the heck does that even mean, "stamp money out of politics"? I suppose this campaign of theirs cost nothing, otherwise surely they would see the hypocrisy in their own message. I always find it interesting listening to Progressives decry money in politics when it is their very policies that create the problem they claim to hate. Money is in politics because the government has power to sell, the more power it has, the more value it has to those that seek to influence that power. It has power thanks in large part to Progressives and Neocons and their infatuation with controlling other people's lives.

    What is also funny, is that Progressives have no problem understanding corporate self interest in the pursuit of profit, but they are completely oblivious to government self interest in the pursuit of power. Power to a government is like profit to a corporation. Even funnier is that the same "greedy" people at the top in the corporate world are also from time to time, the same ones in key economic positions in government. Do they all of a sudden become angels when they go to work for government?

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  5. Agreed, I actually liked that they advertised the honest size.

    Now they want to amend something that has NO BEARING on a problem caused by, and reversible by, simple legislation... not keeping business this way...

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  6. stop manipulating gold and those dollars won't be so easily printed and passed on to the cronies.........

    It was good for Moriarty to come out so far beyond his usual empty sneers and to attempt some argument that can be rebutted.

    "People with deep pockets have the ability to manipulate the markets," Moriarty said. "It's perfectly legal."
    Actually, in the United States and other developed countries it's not perfectly legal. While the definition of market manipulation is not always clear, in the United States anti-trust law, securities law, and commodity trading law all seek to forbid market manipulation, as do the regulations of the Federal Trade Commission, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Prohibited mechanisms of market manipulation include concentration of market share, trading on insider information, and dissemination of false information:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_manipulation

    http://www.cftc.gov/LawRegulation/DoddFrankAct/Rulemakings/DF_23_DFManip...

    Yes, as Moriarty said, market manipulation happens every day. But it happens every day not because it is legal but rather because the rules against it are seldom vigorously enforced.

    http://gata.org/node/13636

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  7. If one were to believe the "liberal" theories, voters have special knowledge and wisdom that can override the horrors of the voluntary marketplace by voting. In fact, the voters know and understand almost nothing, not even who is running for office. Further, the "press" and government education system totally fail to inform the voters (as if they'd pay attention anyway) so that their primary source of information comes from politicians running BS ads just prior to elections. The politicians need money for that which they solicit in exchange for directing the government to engage in forced exchanges to solve problems that either do not exist or only exist due to prior forced exchanges.

    That being said, I think that the main reason liberals dislike of money in politics is that it finances arguments that they cannot control or refute. Or even understand.

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  8. I completely agree with Ben & Jerry.

    Politicians should works as volunteers. Let's see how many there are left when there is no more money to be made in politics.
    I know that's not what they really meant, but you gotta help the dullards with their brainfarts.

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