Wow, Wampum, Win, or Whack?

Yesterday, a L-W regular spotted an intriguing connection: The Obama Administration's "help" for domestic automakers comes from the same mold as Nebuchadnezzar's image. King Neb was king of the ancient world's leading superpower in the sixth century BC. One night he saw a spectacular statue in his dreams. The four sections of the statue represented a succession of four kingdoms. Each was associated with a specific commodity, gold with Babylon, silver with Medo-Persia, bronze with Greece, and iron and clay with Rome.

In a sermon series on the book of Daniel a few years ago, I observed that these metallic associations well captured the leadership philosophy of each empire. Here's my summary from one of the sermon slides. Please note that I have used the tried and true preacher's tactic of beginning each point with the same letter - I'm sure you're impressed:

• Gold /Wow!  Using spectacle and “dazzle” to inspire people to follow
• Silver / Wampum!  Using money to purchase allegiance
• Bronze / Win!  Using superior strength to overcome opposition
• Iron / Whop!  Using terror / fear to crush men’s will to resist

So, which approach best summarizes the administration's plan to limit consumers to "responsible" automotive choices? For the auto manufacturer, the government is using wampum as leverage. Toward the consumer, the government is bent on winning. Consumers want one thing, the government wants another. By using its wampum-based influence over the manufacturers, the administration limits consumers to choices it deems "responsible." Whatever choice the consumer makes constitutes an administration victory. Won't this be fun!

Comments

[Austin]

Perhaps Big Bro's attempt to "win" against consumers by limiting choice is a quick road to victory. But I suspect not, no matter whether he attains ultimate victory or suffers final defeat.

I think Big Bro's attempts to circumscribe choice will just inflate the premiums for choices. Your chubby-pants post illustrates that pretty well. So, the next question is, when faced with a no-win situation, how long until Big Bro's next arrow out of his quiver is Whomp? I allude, of course, to the "planners" in the intermediate stages of Von Hayek's "Road to Serfdom."

[Buy WoW Gold]

Well… I visit your website first time and found this site very useful and interesting!

Marion Barrett
One of the great things about in-game money and virtual economies is that they never went through this whole economic meltdown. So take that to all of those people who think the real world is better then computer games!