Fruity Socialists Doing Yoga: The Perils of Namasté

Namasté’s CEO, Blake Jones, is quite upfront about the benefits of the stimulus plan for his company, a solar panel supplier in Colorado:

Depending on the details, Jones said the passage of the plan would allow him not only to lift his hiring freeze put into place in October but would allow him to start hiring again.

"It might have a huge impact on our business," Jones said. "If things were to continue on the present course without the stimulus, we'd have to lay off half of our staff and close one of our offices."

And we say, fine. Whatever one may think of the stimulus, this is what it is supposed to do, and keeping these technologies rolling along is a net good.

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However, what to make of some of the commentary around Namasté? Jones introduced the President and Vice President during their stimulus bill barnstorm, amusingly mispronouncing Biden’s name after Biden mispronounced Namasté. (You can likely call it what you want as long as you order some panels.)

From the snark side, there’s this:

Obama chose the perfect face for his "signing the stimulus" party: a blonde, clean-cut young yuppie fellow who owns a small business. A small hippie business.

The guy owns a solar power something-or-other called—wait for it—"Namasté." Which meant that half the press conference involved the assembled officials, from Biden to Obama to the governor of Colorado, amusingly mispronouncing a fruity yoga word.

Then the secret hippie who who's stealing all the stimulus money to buy hemp called our Vice President "Joe Bidden." Namasté!

Actually, the leading N and trailing é makes us think of Neslé, so maybe that should be “chocolaty yoga word.”

From the ideological side, here’s Tracy Byrnes on Glenn Beck’s Fox News show:

Now, "Namasté" is a greeting of respect in Sanskrit. Now, the company Namasté will most likely benefit from all the president's energy incentives that are stuffed into this plan. This 2-year-old company needs all the money it can get. It can barely keep its 55 workers onboard.

But it's not just the company's financial distress that's got people thinking. It's these collective in-house rules of this solar company that are making people wonder why the president decided to associate himself with it.

So to start, all Namasté employees, no matter what their job description, are on the same pay scale, and a portion of everyone's salary goes to charity. Hmm. All major decisions are made by a consensus of all the company employees -- all 55. And everyone gets six weeks vacation a year. It's no wonder the company is struggling and needs financial assistance. But for many of us taxpayers, it seems odd.

Actually, “many of us taxpayers” are probably jealous that those 55 folks have jobs that they’re now likely to keep. We’re also fairly sure almost no one outside of Byrnes is wondering “why the president decided to associate himself with it.”

Stuff like this makes us feel very – provincial – small – and stupid.

Namasté’s logo. We guess it’s meant to represent sun rays – it’s certainly colorful.