Getting corporation-y

Ask a hard-core lefty what the most pressing threat facing the world today and they will probably tell you Al Qaeda. Just kidding! The actual answer will most likely be either George W. Bush, judges that favor overturning Roe vs. Wade or corporations. For reasons not quite clear to me corporations are seen as public enemy number one by many on the left. Ask them to elaborate on this and you will inevitably get some blithering akin to the Tim Robbins character in Team America: World Police:

Let me explain to you how this works: you see, the corporations finance Team America, and then Team America goes out... and the corporations sit there in their... in their corporation buildings, and... and, and see, they're all corporation-y... and they make money.

Right. Personally I don't see what the big deal is. Most of the things I like are made by big faceless corporations. I've even worked for one. I always figured if I had a problem with a corporation I would just stop buying their stuff.

Rank and file Democrats, often only being one step removed from the kind of people that led the Cultural Revolution, frequently convey a similar message with only a slight change in tone. Al Gore ranted and raved during his presidential campaign about Big [insert industry here], John Edwards bragged about his credentials battling corporations as a trial lawyer, John Kerry blasted corporations for sending jobs overseas while Barack Obama kept singling out the oil industry for the apparent crime of being profitable.

What really makes my head explode, however, is when you consider that Democrats are now rallying to provide a bailout for the U.S. auto industry, with Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi both sending a letter to the Treasury Secretary urging that the federal spigot be turned loose on Detroit. Now, I kind of understand it when Republicans do this because they have a reputation to maintain as the party of the rich, the establishment, and big business, but how do Democrats shift gears so readily?

Or maybe they only have a problem with corporations that make things people like. For those that churn out crap like GM it's time to open the coffers. Criticizing success and rewarding failure...one can only wonder where this will all end up.

Update: Bush, that corporate shill, is against the auto industry bailout.