The Chicago Way

Nearly every pundit, including myself, has made a reference to Obama and the Chicago way, implying that his methodology is analogous to the Chicago thuggery of the prohibition era or the Daley machine. These articles have claimed that Obama works through extortion and force not the reasoned consensus building of a modern politician in polite society. The reason for the past several years that there exists such a cacophony of claims to Obama acting like a Chicago thug is not just that he hails from Chicago, but is based on real observation of his actions. In other words the reason so many pundits claim Obama is a political thug is because based on the objective evidence that it is true.

Last week we saw another prime example of the thug nature of the Obama administration. Exercising the old and proven method that thugs have used for eons to gather power and force the will upon others, Obama is using extortion. His Health and Human Services office is demanding the resignation of the CEO from Forest Laboratories. HHS wants to exclude Forest from selling its products to Medicaid, Medicare and VA hospitals unless their CEO, Howard Solomon, is let go. This is Chicago style extortion at its finest. This is meant to set an example for every medical company in America. To steal a line from the great gangster movie, The Godfather, Obama is making an offer that they can’t refuse. If you as a medical company dare not do as you are dictated by the Obama political machine, you too can and will be removed from position as CEO. Medical CEOs better "love" Obamacare or pay the price.

It is true that Forest Labs broke the law, marketing a drug, which was eventually approved by the FDA, prior to its approval. As a result they admitted their error, paid a $313 million fine, and complied with everything the Justice Department demanded. In truth, they paid for their crime, in full, as the law dictated that they should. For the Obama administration this wasn’t enough. They want the company’s CEO, Solomon tossed out, even though Forest Laboratories complied with every legal punishment, the FDA will prohibit them from any business involving the government unless they bow down to this extortion.

Never mind that Solomon took a small inconsequential vitamin company and built a major $4 billion company that employs thousands of people, generating millions in tax revenue and creates life-enhancing medicines to the benefit of millions of Americans. As an example to all Medical CEOs, and in absence of any law that grants the Obama administration the authority, Obama is going to exercise power in the tradition of Chicago organized crime, and demand the termination of Solomon, as a sacrifice. I can just imagine Obama in his best imitation Godfather accent saying, “We must make an example of this Solomon fellow.”

That is not to say that if you obey Obama your business will be a success. Last year when Obama, again with no legal authority, fired GM CEO Rick Wagoner and dictated the type of car GM will produce, specifically the Chevy Volt. GM like any other government owned and controlled company is losing money. Thanks to generous tax incentives, GM has managed to sell a whopping 271 Chevy Volts, all at a huge loss. Considering GM sold 592,545 vehicles in the first quarter of this year, the sales of the Volt are statistically ZERO(less than 0.05%). At least GM is temporarily safe by following the dictates of Chicago thugs who extorted them, the Obama Administration. Chicago style thuggery, which when exercised by government is called socialism or fascism, may dictate what a company produces, but because there is a modicum of freedom in the USA and we still have some choice, and there is still some free competition, so even with skyrocketing gas prices, the people prefer the just about any other vehicle over the Government Motors overpriced electric boondoggle.

Just like in Chicago, where the thug nature of how things were run during prohibition resulted in businesses that behaved out of fear not what was necessarily best for business. Buying from the thug approved seller, selling at the thug approved price, paying off the correct thugs for protection, or being eliminated and having your business sent to your thug controlled competitor. Businesses in this environment either become totally controlled by the thugs, move to a place with a better and safer business climate, or simply go out of business because it is no longer profitable. The result is that for people that live in places where business are controlled by thugs, they end up with fewer choices in businesses and products, paying more, and endanger themselves if they buck the system. Obama is trying to run the US the same way as the Chicago thugs historically run Chicago, with force, fear, and a disregard for the rule of law. Equality under the Law plays no part in the Obama administration’s methodology. They openly grant favors and exemptions from the law to those who support and/or obey, and punish beyond legal justification those of whom they want to make an example. You will read and hear more of Obama working in the “Chicago Way” not just as political hyperbole, but because it is objectively true. Obama is a Chicago thug, and his goal is the same as the historic goals of past Chicago thugs like Al Capone or the infamous Daley Machine, power.