Say one thing, while working towards something entirely different

You see what this post is titled? People who see through the Bushevik lies concerning Middle East policy would say that such a statement applies quite well to those who persist in claiming that bombing the shit out of and then occupying foreign countries over there is all about protecting and promoting freedom.

Many war critics realize this, yet don't apply the same idea to another topic that many consider to be important. Corporations and their shills regularly claim to support and clamor for free trade and free enterprise. What many don't realize is that these people are not being honest with you. They may, in fact, be even less honest than the Busheviks who may genuinely believe that they are saviors of freedom.

This is something that some libertarians realize, although it unfortunately may not appear that way if your exposure to libertarians consists of the more mainstream lot who croon about that schmuck Neal Boortz and dismiss corporate criticism as being "anti-capitalist lunacy". While checking out Larry Gambone's Porkupine Blog tonight, I discovered that he has linked to a recent George Monbiot column that deals with this subject. Apparently, Monbiot gets it too, at least this time.

Corporations may claim to support free enterprise, but this excerpt from Monbiot's piece shows a completely different picture:

In the submission it made to the chancellor's pre-budget report, it demanded that the government spend less on everything except business. The state should cut its planned spending on health, social security and local authorities, and use some of the savings to protect and enhance its "support and advisory services for trade and businesses". Our higher-education budget should be used to supply free research for corporations. The regional development agencies should "expand their activities to support more extensive business-to-business networking and collaboration". Further road taxes should be abandoned, and the climate-change levy "should be frozen", but the government should help businesses by building more roads and airports. This is what the CBI means by free enterprise.

(emphasis mine)

He then goes on to expose how big businesses have been the biggest beneficiaries of the EU's farm subsidies, including many businesses that have no connections to agriculture. The examples he provides on this subject are outrageous, as are the ones he provides related to other government expenditure programs, both in Eurpope and here in the USSA.

There are many examples other than the ones Monbiot provides that reveal how the growth and maintenance of large corporate giants usually has more to do with what Gambone calls "the state socialism of the rich" than market forces. These corporations who benefit so tremendously from government subsidy most certainly don't want to lose it all and have to compete in an actual free market, just as imperialists and war profiteers most certainly don't want to see genuine freedom in the Middle East and elsewhere thwart their sinister plans.