Obama may delay high-income tax-cut repeal: aide

Source: Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President-elect Barack Obama may consider delaying an election promise - to roll back tax cuts on high-income Americans - as part of his economic recovery strategy, a senior aide and an adviser said on Sunday.

David Axelrod, one of Obama's closest confidants chosen to be a senior White House adviser, was asked if the tax cut could be ended later than Obama called for during the campaign. "Considerations will be made," he said on "Fox News Sunday."

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE4AM1F1200...

to protect the Olgarchy

Apparently BO is coming to Jesus.

Well, we tried.

great. just great. Oh, sorry. I appear to be 'hating'.

My remark was a response to the hopeless TONE of that post.

I might have to take a break here from DU, the panic that sets in every time the pony is delayed is really annoying - this does NOT include what you just posted-

Could be Obama is responding to new information. Could be he's just another lying sack of shit Republican operative conning the little guy out of his smaller piece of the pie.


Time will tell. (Which would be MY point if I had one, that time will tell.)

The empire continues to thrive.

voted for him, and continue to send him emails. Of course when Rahm reads them he may pack me off to Guantanemo, because I am certainly no fan of Rahm Emanuel, but there you are. I am deeply disappointed in the picks so far. It points to business as usual, which is no picnic for the working people of this country.

Obama said we need to push him left, and I believe that was a very true and honest statement from him. He was elected to govern, and the delusional right-wingers think the man is a socialist. If only. So certainly Obama is going to start from center. It is our job to speak up, send him correspondence, peacefully gather to protest actions we believe unfair and encourage him to consider people-friendly policies. We know the lobbies on the other side of the aisle will be making their efforts as well. Their strength is in their finances, our strength is in our numbers. We need to speak out.

I don't think that is bitterness, that is reality in this country. But I can understand your laughing at my initial terse response. I hope in writing this out that you see my position more clearly.

Following the example set by the US financial sector is always inadvisable.

For him to do, rather than repeal the things during a recession.

The W tax cuts do need to go the way of the Dodo, the best way to do that, politically and economically speaking is to just let them expire in 2010.

be gradually increased. The rich can afford to pay more taxes.

I think the perhaps where a person lives should be factored in to tax rates.
It costs more to live in certain parts of the country.

Overall the 250K cutoff made a lot of sense to me, along with repealing the changes to capital gains (which was the biggest earmark to the rich). But even at 250K, which is roughly top 5%, you have a take-home of about 10K a month depending upon deductions. Maybe it's harder in NY or San Fran, but in most parts of the country you can live nicely on that amount and afford a little heftier rate as well. If we start with modestly repealing the Bush tax cuts and then start cutting the military budget we could have a much better standard of living for folks across many income strata.

I'd put that money towards housing for homeless (tent cities are an embarrassment in such a wealthy country not to mention unsafe/unhealthy), universal healthcare, infrastructure such as bridge repair and subsidizing more mass transit, and educational efforts (including head start and low-rate student loans).

I live in DC where housing costs depend on which part of the city you live in. If you live in a nice neighborhood inside the Beltway like in nw DC or Capitol Hill, you pay dearly. I lived in CT where it's the same. Generally, it's expensive living where the neighborhood is great and there are jobs available but cheap 20 min. away where the environment is a burned out ruin and there are no jobs and the schools suck.

It would be a political and financial nightmare to figure out.

psychological. I think it would probably cause far greater harm to raise taxes right now. With Wall Street and financial markets going up and down every time someone farts, it is probably best to let the tax cuts for the rich die a natural death.

That it seems the smallest thing causes a freak-out....an announcement of repealing the tax cuts would probably cause more instability, at a time when people are desperate for stability.

The tax cuts are due to expire in 2010, let them expire naturally....after they expire the tax level returns to it's pre-2001 level.

It's kind of silly to suggest the tax cuts should continue to stimulate the economy when they were in effect on the road here.

n/t

Obama has given every indication that he will pick his battles, and the timing of such battles, with an eye on long-term goals. Change will not come immediately or be to everybody's liking, but his approach could very well be our best hope of getting it. Fewer confrontational short-term political battles, less public alienation of potential rivals, buying time for real, well-thought out restructuring of our government's infrastructure.

Keep the Hope. It's early yet!

Like I said earlier before the election. Obama was going to be too much the status quo. Just look at his record on continuing the funding for Iraq and his statements on how long he intends to keep troops there, his actions on FISA, his actions on the bankster rob from the poor give to the super rich bill, as well as other actions. In other words I told you so that he was gonna be too much of a talk the talk but not walk the walk on important issues to the working and poor classes.

How much money did Wall Street give Obama? There's your answer.

would help US?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President-elect Barack Obama may consider delaying a campaign promise - to roll back tax cuts on high-income Americans - as part of his economic recovery strategy, two aides said on Sunday. snip

not!

wtf?

but here is the reality...

Obama surrenders on military spending

By Glen Ford, January 15, 2008

Sen. Barack Obama is forsaking the position of most African-Americans on the issue of ever-escalating U.S. military spending. And progressive black leaders are letting him get away with it.

For decades, Black America has maintained a general consensus in favor of “butter” in the national “butter or bullets” debate. The call for a “Marshall Plan” to rebuild America’s cities has been a constant in African-American public discourse, inevitably coupled with demands for lower military spending.

The collapse of President Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty under a tsunami of Vietnam expenditures proved that war spells the death of urban domestic dreams.

Now, however, for the first time since World War II, we witness a self-imposed silence on war spending among a number of black opinion-molders who would be shouting their heads off at the prospect of an even larger U.S. military establishment. The reason for this voluntary stand-down: Barack Obama supports the addition of nearly 100,000 soldiers and Marines in coming years, and he doesn’t want to be embarrassed by loud black voices of protest during his dash for the brass ring.

“I strongly support the expansion of our ground forces by adding 65,000 soldiers to the Army and 27,000 Marines,” Obama told the Chicago Council on Global Affairs last April.

That’s precisely the number favored by President Bush’s Defense Secretary Robert Gates over a five-year period at a cost of $108 billion, as estimated by the Congressional Budget Office. Sen. Hillary Clinton would add at least 80,000 troops, Rudy Giuliani wants 70,000 additional pairs of boots on the ground, somewhere on the planet, and Mitt Romney would add 100,000.

http://www.progressive.org/mp_ford011508

That was during the Primary season....we are nearly a year on and we are now in the post-Election period and he won.

I only hope he does not succumb to the pressure.....

Pentagon Wants $581 Billion From Obama – War Costs Not Included

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/11/pentagon-wants.ht...

By Noah Shachtman EmailNovember 18, 2008 | 10:21:00 AMCategories: Money Money Money, Politricks

Give the boys in the Pentagon credit; they've got chutzpah. While the federal government hemorrhages money -- and everyone from Goldman Sachs to General Motors to the city of Philadelphia is looking for more Washington cash -- the Defense Department is getting ready to ask for its biggest budget yet. The Pentagon is telling the Obama transition team that it wants $581 billion for the next fiscal year, an increase of $67 billion. And that doesn't even count cash needed to pay for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The cash request "includes $524 billion in spending authority approved by the White House Office of Management and Budget this spring... as well as $57 billion in additional needs the Office of the Secretary of Defense identified over the summer," reports Inside Defense.

The final figure does includes some money -- $12 billion -- to pay for a few "predictable war costs," Inside Defense adds. But that's less than what operations in Afghanistan and Iraq cost every month.

In contrast, President Bush inherited a Pentagon budget that was a mere $302 billion.

If he does I swear I will never vote again. I will know the fix is in.

I say people should wait until he says something, instead of getting in a panic beforehand

posted by Robert Dreyfuss on 11/23/2008 @ 9:22pm

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/dreyfuss/385746/print

I hate to say I told you so, but here it goes.

In late September, in this column, I criticized Barack Obama for what I called a "pathetic" debate with John McCain, in which Obama got nearly everything about foreign policy wrong:

"He checked all the boxes. Barack ("Senator McCain is right") Obama couldn't find anything to disagree with the militarist Arizonan about. Support for NATO expansion? Check. Absurd anti-Russian diatribes? Check. Dramatic escalation of the war in Afghanistan? Check. I'm ready to attack Pakistan? Check. (Actually, on this one, McCain was the moderate!) Painful sanctions against Iran, backed up by the threat of force? Check. Blathering about the great threat from Al Qaeda? Check. It went on and on."

I pointed out that Obama went out of his way to say things like: "I believe the Republican Guard of Iran is a terrorist organization." And: "A resurgent and very aggressive Russia is a threat to the peace and stability of the region."

Last July, in a major feature piece for The Nation on Obama's foreign policy, I wrote:

"But in many respects, Obama seems likely to preside over a restoration of the bipartisan consensus that governed foreign policy during the cold war and the 1990s, updated for a post-9/11 world. ... Even as he pledges to end the war in Iraq, Obama promises to increase Pentagon spending, boost the size of the Army and Marines, bolster the Special Forces, expand intelligence agencies and maintain the hundreds of US military bases that dot the globe. He supports a muscular multilateralism that includes NATO expansion, and according to the Times of London, his advisers are pushing him to ask Defense Secretary Robert Gates to stay on in an Obama administration. Though he is against the idea of the United States imposing democracy abroad, Obama does propose a sweeping nation-building and democracy-promotion program, including strengthening the controversial National Endowment for Democracy and constructing a civil-military apparatus that would deploy to rescue and rebuild failed and failing states in Africa, Asia and the Middle East."

So are we surprised that now, as president-elect, Obama is selecting people whose views are coherent with Obama's frequently stated views? Are we surprised that the views of Obama's conservative and centrist advisers are, in fact, coherent with Obama's own? And are we surprised that his choices for his foreign policy and national security appointments are drawn exclusively from conservative, centrist, and pro-military circles without even a single -- yes, not one! -- chosen to represent the antiwar wing of the Democratic party? No, we are not.

<snip>

Not once, but twice he was asked by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to be her deputy secretary of state. Adds the London Times, in an analytical story on Jones:

"Last year he conducted an investigation on behalf of Congress on the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"'Make no mistake, Nato is not winning in Afghanistan,' he said. He also said that the war in Iraq had caused the US to 'take its eye off the ball' in Afghanistan, and gave warning that the consequences of failure there were just as serious as defeat in Iraq – views publicly expressed by Mr Obama.

"Before Mr Obama travelled to Afghanistan during the presidential campaign he was briefed by General Jones, who in 2007 was appointed by Dr Rice as a special envoy for Middle East Security."

National Review Online calls the idea of Jones at the NSC "a pretty good sign for hawks, a pretty bad sign for doves," which just about sums it up.

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/dreyfuss/385746/print

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/Sanswire-Encourag...


Sanswire Encouraged by Obama Administration's Support of UAV Industry

Last update: 9:09 a.m. EST Nov. 24, 2008
FORT LAUDERDALE, FL, Nov 24, 2008 (MARKET WIRE via COMTEX) -- Sanswire Corp. (PINKSHEETS: SNSR) today confirmed to shareholders and technology partners that it is encouraged by President-Elect Barack Obama's plan to utilize Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) as part of the Obama/Biden defense initiative, as outlined in the "Build Defense Capabilities for the 21st Century" subheading of the Defense section on the official Barack Obama website, www.barackobama.com/issues/defense.

"The new administration's plan, as described on the official website, indicates that UAVs, such as those Sanswire makes, can be instrumental in not only helping to equip our troops more thoroughly, but also in preserving our global reach in the air. We find this extremely encouraging as the focus of our business plan is to build UAV products integrated with the customized payloads that help achieve our customers' missions, most of which are expected to relate to global peacekeeping initiatives," stated Jonathan Leinwand, Chief Executive Officer of Sanswire.

Language specific to UAVs contained within that section states: "We cannot repeat such failures as the delays in deployment of armored vehicles, body armor and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles that save lives on the frontlines," and "We need greater investment in advanced technology ranging from the revolutionary, like Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and electronic warfare capabilities, to essential systems like the C-17 cargo and KC-X air refueling aircraft, which provide the backbone of our ability to extend global power."
According to the Government Accountability Office in its November 2008 report on Unmanned Aircraft Systems, the US Department of Defense plans to spend more than $17 billion from 2008 to 2013 for UAV systems with expanded and new capabilities, and it reprogrammed about $1.3 billion in 2008 funds with congressional approval to increase ISR capabilities, including unmanned aerial

--p!

that`s two years from now.

and we will have forgotten this little "disappointment".

...I would call him a traitor. I'm not happy with politicians who promise one thing to get elected and then start breaking their promises before they even get sworn in.

Our dems promised during the '06 elections to end the war in Iraq. What happened to that?

Sure you could give all kinds of excuses, but if our dems made more of an issue about stopping the war, it would been over by now. They could have started shaming repukes over a year ago into coming over to our side. With just promising to revel the name of any repuke who got in our way of ending the war, we could have won every state this year without breaking a sweat.

We're getting screwed by our guys too.

If he doesn't respond in real time to new information, he is violating a basic premise of why we voted for him.....

The obstinate grip on one stance is what Bush used to drive the country into the ground.

I'll wait to see what obama has to say before I toss him under he bus.

Instead of falling in a fit on a daily basis.

I'm confident that the Obama Administration are going to do the right things, I have complete faith in their abilities.

On Edit: Dammit typing error

made his plan before the meltdown. The sad fact is that these campaigners lend themselves to static promises that, when it comes time to implement, are no longer practical.

With Wall Street the way it is right now, hell, who knows, Obama raising taxes might be the death kneel that brings the whole thing down.

Obama is smart and I believe he will do the right thing. We just have to have a little trust and some patience.

and eventually satisfied.

Yeah that's the ticket huh?

is if he goes ahead and breaks this promise.

We will just have to wait and see.

because a promise made months ago should take precedence over an economic crisis.

It would then be impossible for him to do much of anything different from Bush, right?

Without having the wherewithal to increase spending, that would pretty much make the next four years a dead loss.

Tiny little meaningless increments that no one would notice and that's it.

This is why some people worry.

funds.

This is about paygo and there is more than one way to get there.

I want Obama to lead, not worry about someone parsing everything he projected he would do over the last 2 years.

Two years ago our economic prospects were much different.

NT!

That wealthier people get some massive tax increase....doesn't matter if President Obama can generate enough funds via other means....EVEN if he does, you demand that he puts forward a massive tax hike on wealthier people.

Why? Because you seem to have some bizarre disliking and/or vindictive jealousy towards successful people?

from? This is a promise that needs to be kept. Trickle down economics don't work, in case you missed that little fact.

that is farting through silk.

but you are probably right. The people who really run this country must have had a talk with him

Hold onto your hats people.

From?

How can you not get this revenue? & give more bail-out's & stimulus from?

The guy is working on a trillion dollar deficit from the get-go.

That's where he will get the revenue from, President Obama already said that during the campaign.

There also needs to be a cap on these bail outs, you can't bail everybody out.

Social Security, Medicare, Pentagon and interest on the national debt.

You could eliminate the entire federal government, except the four items, and only save 10 cents on the tax dollar.

Budget really needs dramatically reducing, it needs looking at with a fine toothcomb and there needs to be targeted cuts, not slash and burn cuts.

and the Political ramifications of reducing the DOD budget when China and Russia start greatly expanding their military will be suicidal. Not to mention the way the Repukes are going to attack everything Obama tries to Change...

The dicotomy of decisions that must be made to keep the country solvent and the decisions that must be made to keep the country safe is the scariest part of any administration.

i.e., if Al-Qaida is successful in conducting an attack on our soil during an Obama administration the collective howl from the GOP will be that Obama by his reversal of Bush actions caused it creating conditions to prove malfeasance.

What possibly can Obama say to Americans that are faced with this choice?

and flying commercial jetliners into skyscrapers and the Pentagon.

No amount of spending on the war machine could prevent something like that.

The real answer is a balanced Middle East policy involving the acceptance of a Palestinian state and, also, probably overthrowing the fascist Saudi royal family.

We can't go back to "bear any burden, fight any foe". Doing that again means giving up our humanity and abandoning the poor forever.
And, not to put too fine a point on it, it means a draft.

I said it is leaves a quandary for Joe Public. Which can be manipulated by Republicans at the first opportunity.

Remember the meme (Failed to imagine the threat before it materialized)....


If you honestly believe that there will never be another grand attack on American Soil by a terrorist group then you are being a pollyanna.

The simple fact that the Political opposition in America can point to Bush and say that after 911 every liberty robbing, humanity killing act that was put in place by Bush post 911 has protected this country....

If there is to be another attack, they won't hijack planes again, it'll come through a container via a port.

Port security needs to be better funded, in fact it's imperative that it is better funded.

and when he got into office, he couldn't find enough waste to cut to make much of a difference.

The deal about waste is just campaign rhetoric. The waste in this country is in the private sector -- namely in the CEO salaries. And that nonsense about private companies needing to pay those salaries to keep the CEOs on board is nonsense. Those same CEOs love to run for public office where the pay isn't a thousandth of what they earn in the private sector.

But also the private sector is the private sector, so the government cannot get too much involved.

So the government is going to be very much involved, like it or not. And big business CEOs are going to have to realize that what is good for the goose is good for the gander. Their pay scales are also going to become very much public business.

Businesses need to cut the waste. And most of the waste is in the paychecks of the CEOs.

You can't be bailing out EVERYBODY, it's reaching absurd levels already....and this is taxpayers money that's being used to fund these bail outs....there needs to be a limit to all of this.

I agree--I think.

They have been run in a free-for-all and reckless fashion, I think considering it's the companies fault why they are in a mess, it's greatly unfair to keep expecting taxpayers to bail these companies out.

Effectively they are being REWARDED for fucking their own companies up.

When we accepted this whole free trade chimera, we bought into the idea that the products produced by our industry in the private sector of our capitalist economy could compete with products from countries in which industry is very heavily subsidized or government controlled. We have lost our bet. It won't be our choice. Other nations will force us to take responsibility for the losses of our companies. That is what has happened here.

Bush is an idiot. He does not understand that he can scream all he wants about free markets. The rest of the world is laughing at him.

Provide PROOF that MOST of the rest of the world is Socialist or Communist....I bet you can't, what are you seriously saying that the majority of Europe is Socialist or Communist for example?

What are Australia, New Zealand, India, Scandinavia Socialist or Communist?

Not EVEN China is Socialist or Communist anymore.

The majority of the world is Capitalist, often using a combination of moderately liberal and Centrist social policies and the majority of the world operates on a Free Trade basis.

On Edit: Added comment

China allows people to run their own businesses, but it is very much a Communist state and many of the businesses are run by the government. I don't know that much about Australia and New Zealand, but we are about the only large country that does not have a heavy interest in at least certain sectors of business.

I lived in Europe many years. They privatized a lot of things that were previously socialized, but they are still heavily invested and have a great deal of leverage over many sectors. Most important, as we have seen in England, they have no compunction about jumping in and taking over portions of companies.

We do not have that tradition. I'm not saying our tradition is wrong. I'm saying it is not competitive in the context of the free trade agreements that we have entered into. We are being very foolish. If we want to maintain the integrity of our system, then we have to change our trade policy.

Most of Europe isn't Socialist, it's Centrist, name ONE OPENLY Socialist government in Europe, out and out Socialist?

Sweden's government is also Centrist ditto for Denmark and Norway.

The Congress Party in India aren't Socialist anymore, they have had to move on and adapt to changing times also.

Parties (the conservatives) are socialist compared to the U.S. Have you ever lived in Europe? Do you read German and French newspapers? If you had or did, you would understand that European governments play a much, much stronger role in managing the economies and even companies in their nations.

Also, European countries have much stronger laws protecting employees, working conditions and unions. European banks take it for granted that they are invested in their banks and other major sectors. They do not run the local grocery store. They have mixed economies. They subsidize their industry in many ways.

And in addition to subsidies and investments in industrial sectors, they provide excellent education through the university to deserving students at little or no cost and, as we all know, provide universal healthcare. The government takes your healthcare insurance payments right out of your paycheck and also pays for the healthcare of people who have no or very little income. That is socialist. You can call it centrist also, but it is not free market capitalism. It is very different.

I live in Glasgow, Scotland, my husband is Scottish.

The governments might subsidize some industry, but they don't CONTROL industry.

"they provide excellent education through the university to deserving students at little or no cost and,"

Pure fantasyland, in England and Wales ALL students now have to PAY to go to University, it's called Tuition Fees and the majority of students are now facing bills of up to £30,000 to be paid AFTER they leave university.

"provide universal healthcare"

The NHS in Britain is a mess, a shambles, with waiting lists and inadequate facilities and not enough doctors, which is why in total desperation the Health Department is shipping in foreign doctors to try and boost doctor number levels.

People with cancer have to wait up to 12 weeks to get scans and whatnot.....there are long waiting lists for even the most simple of operations.

My husband is a doctor, a consultant btw.


Socialism DOESN'T work, which is why the majority of the planet rejected Socialism years ago.


On Edit: Added comment

You enjoy a mix of socialism and capitalism and that is good.

Capitalism encourages creativity and diversity. Socialism encourages stability and economic fairness plus protection for the weak and poor.

A good mix is the best policy. Bush wanted to go much to far to the right here in the U.S. We don't have socialists here. We have Democrats. In Europe you have Social Democrats. The trend in Europe moved to the right. It is moving to the left. I do not expect the trends to move extremely left in either the U.S. or in Europe. But much more regulation is needed and much more respect for the rule of law is needed than was provided under the Bush administration.

Above all, we need universal access to healthcare. I believe Obama plans to continue to have private healthcare but regulated to require insurers to provide reasonably priced healthcare for all.

I do not like to be insulting but, as an American, when I lived in England (London) (I also lived in several other countries), I found the British to be a bit lazy. I think it is the legacy of the class system. An extreme class system such as ruled in England for centuries kills initiative and hope. We have never had that here. But the Bush extremism was bringing it to us. Because so much money was being concentrated in the hands of the rich. And businesses consolidated to the point that small businesses cannot survive.

In addition, most of our industry has been shipped to the third world. If you don't live here, you do not know that. Basically, our country has been raped and pillaged of its industry and of its good jobs by the free trade agreements.

the supposed conservatives, i.e., Christian Democratic Parties still regulate strongly, subsidize heavily and keep a close watch and control on the economy.

Over three years, "175 billion euro of direct investment" will be injected by the government into economic activity, declared Nicolas Sarkozy in Argonay (Haute-Savoie) on 23 October. In particular, the French President announced the creation of a public intervention fund, which could intervene to support strategic companies in difficulty, as well as a complete exemption from corporation tax for investments made between now and the beginning of 2010.

"The ideology of the market being in control and the public being powerless died with the financial crisis," Mr Sarkozy told businessmen, talking about France’s international action in response to a "global" crisis. In particular, he criticised the US authorities for "allowing" the failure of the Lehman Brothers merchant bank, which precipitated the financial crisis when it filed for bankruptcy on 15 September.

In France, "The government will put 175 billion euro of direct investment into economic activity over three years," the President declared. "Alongside investment in universities, research and the environment, we are going to invest heavily in the digital economy, which will be the driver of future growth, along with clean technologies", he said regarding the development of the digital economy.

http://www.premier-ministre.gouv.fr/en/information/late...

In his speech on 25 September in Toulon on economic policy, Nicolas Sarkozy highlighted the need to tell the truth to the French people in order to restore confidence, and explained the decisive role that the State must play in rebuilding the capitalist system. The President gave the French people a guarantee that their savings would be safe. In response to the economic crisis, he rejected any austerity policies and any new taxes.

“Self-regulation as the solution to all problems has come to an end. Laissez-faire has come to an end. The market always being right has come to an end,” said Mr Sarkozy in the introduction to his speech.

http://www.premier-ministre.gouv.fr/en/information/late...

DIHK and BDI criticize plans of the German Government to restrict foreign investment (August 2008)
Per the new regulations, the German government wants to reserve the right to review and to potentially block foreign acquisitions or investments that exceed 25% in German companies. Acquisition or participation may be denied if German national security or public order is at risk. Control is not limited to certain industrial sectors, but applies to all industries. However, the changes in the law would not apply to investors from EU-countries as well as from the EFTA-states Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Iceland. Germany already has laws in place to control and block takeovers and participation in the military and crypto-technology industries. According to the BDI and the DIHK, these limited investment controls are sufficient. The DIHK criticized further the fact that the proposed law is to include private investors. Germany needs foreign capital to secure jobs and prosperity.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601100&sid=aIj...

has a 20% veto right in Volkswagen.

http://www.focus.de/finanzen/boerse/aktien/vw-gesetz-eu...

Here is an article describing an oil deal between Venezuela and India's government owned oil company ONGC Videsh Limited.

http://www.cgifrankfurt.de/cgiweb/newsletter/2008/pdf/W...

Here is another example of a company owned by the Indian government: Shipping Corporation of India. (The key German word is Staatsbesitz.)

Abgesehen von traditionellen Akteuren, wie ABG Shipyard Limited, haben auch andere, wie Bharati Shipyard, Larsen & Toubro, Sea King Infrastructure, Mundra Mercator Lines, Apeejay Shipping Pawan Kumar Ruia Group, Dolphin Offshore, ebenso wie die sich in Staatsbesitz befindlichen Shipping Corporation of India, Pläne für den Eintritt sowohl in den Schifffahrt- als auch in Schiffbaumarkt.

Oh, and Saudi Arabia's Aramco is owned by the Saudi government:

http://www.stern.de/wirtschaft/unternehmen/unternehmen/...

The French government does not have a majority stock holding in Renault any more, but it still is a big shareholder in that company:

The government of France owns 15.7 per cent of the company. Louis Schweitzer has been the Chairman of Renault since 1992 and was CEO from 1992 to 2005. In 2005, Carlos Ghosn (also CEO of Nissan) became Renault's CEO, with Louis Schweitzer staying on as Chairman.

Renault owns Samsung Motors (Renault Samsung Motors) and Dacia, as well as retaining a minority (but controlling) stake (20%) in the Volvo Group. (Volvo passenger cars are now a subsidiary of the Ford Motor Company). Renault bought 99% of the Romanian company Dacia, thus returning after 30 years, in which time the Romanians built over 2 million cars, which primarily consisted of the Renault 8, 12 and 20.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renault#Possible_Industry_...

The French government also holds shares in EADS, the European Aeronautic, Defence and Space Company.

http://www.eads.com/1024/en/investor/Stock_information/...

EADS helps to make the Airbus

http://www.airbus.com/en /

Many of the French energy companies are state-owned (as are some of ours). Here in Los Angeles, the Department of Water & Power (DWP) is a publicly owned utility that provides our water and electricity. It's great. We love it. Some other areas have privately owned utilities, and frankly, I prefer the DWP.

So, a mixture of privately owned and government owned (or government supported) businesses still works very well. But, generally, Americans prefer to have as little government involvement in business as possible. That's our tradition. Whereas European countries, especially Austria, Germany and France have a different tradition. Even in Imperial Austria, many businesses although in one sense privately run, enjoyed special recognition from the Kaiser and that allowed them to do business in certain areas. It wasn't the equivalent of incorporation which is pretty automatic in the U.S. provided certain laws are obsered.