The only consistant theme throughout Romney's presidential candidacy has been his unwitting descent into irony. He argues vehemently that he is a fiscal conservative who will get the country's fiscal house in order and that he will stop borrowing money from China. He argues that the pending debt crisis is not merely an economic issue, but a moral one, for we should not saddle our children with the debts of our generation. On the other hand, it is apparently perfectly moral to slash public funding, which creates the jobs and opportunities of today, in order to perpetuate some anti-tax, pro-growth pledge.
First of all, public spending does create jobs. After the stimulus bill was passed, the trend of job losses was reversed. No, the economy did not make an abrupt about-face and grow at a rate above 3% of GDP, but that is a wholly unrealistic expectation. I get the feeling that there were no possible gains that would have been high enough to satisfy the unbridled rage of the conservative right. Obama was dealt a terrible hand, managed to keep the ship afloat for four years, and now has the difficult task of convincing voters that it would have been much worse had he not acted.
And it would have been. This is not a "blame-Bush" argument, although there is much that he should be blamed for. What I ask is that people view the Obama presidency and the Obama economy in light of what occurred before. When the economy is shedding jobs at record rates, the housing market collapses, and the global credit and banking industries utterly fail, how can one president rectify the situation in only four years? The only possible answer when the private sector fails is for the public sector to step in and insure that the system doesn't fall apart completely.
Here's the thing: Mitt Romney has fulfilled this role of financial savior many times in the past - in fact, it's what he has built his fortune upon. His fortune, nearly a quarter of a billion dollars, is built almost entirely upon debt. Instead of running on this expertise, however, Romney is hamstrung by the radical right to pledge not to increase taxes or the debt. If Romney wanted to run an honest candidacy based upon his real experience, he would highlight how he has successfully used public funds and debt to turn around failed enterprises. He borrowed hundreds of millions to right the Salt Lake City Olympics, used millions of dollars as governor of Massachusetts, and skillfully used leveraged buyouts at Bain Capital.
But that is not what he is running on. The image that Romney is running on is a lie, albeit a very hazy one. Any time that an issue is staked out clearly, Romney shakes his Etch-A-Sketch one more time and shifts his position. He should run on his experience with leveraging debt, but he is afraid to alienate a base that refuses to listen to basic tenets of economics, biology, physics, or philosophy. Instead, he has adopted a message that offers no solutions, only criticisms.
Remember this: it is always easier to critique than it is to offer your own, better solutions. Obama came into a country that was failing on nearly every account. Health care costs were skyrocketing (yes, before Obamacare), public education was failing, the private sector economy self-imploded, and I don't even need to mention our abysmal foreign policy. Four years later, the country has not descended into socialism, is not being run by a radical Muslim, and Christmas is still very much alive. The hyperbolic commercials about "1000 years of darkness" and "not being able to survive 4 more years of an Obama presidency" are way off. Obama has not made things worse, he has just been unable to live up to the unreasonably high expectations he set for himself.
The bottom line is that when the United States can borrow money for less than the rate of inflation, this is free money. It is not a debt crisis. Lendors are literally giving us free money, because the United States is the driver of the world economy. It is in their best interest to keep the US afloat, because without us, their economies would also fail. They are also betting that we will eventually grow our way out of this crisis, and they are giving us the money to use. Romney could have ran on a platform of sensible debt management, and argued that his business experience uniquely qualified him for the position. Instead, he is running a campaign solely of criticism and generalities, and I see no reason to believe things would improve under his stewardship. If he is not going to use the free money that is being provided to the federal government, I do not want him in the White House.
Mr, Romney, you are wrong. We do need more firemen, police officers, teachers, and other public employees. Those are jobs, just like any private sector position. And those jobs are created by public funds. So don't try to convince me of your myopic view of the nation, where John Galtian millionaires create every last bit of fortune that they have out of thin air. The answer is clear: borrow money, at the absurdly low rates it is being offered, and hire public sector workers. I find it appalling that we would cut education and social welfare funds in the name of some self-imposed fiscal cliff. That is a moral choice, and it affects our kids. Perhaps if they stay uneducated, then they will buy this big lie that the neo-cons are offering. Maybe they're just playing the long game. I don't see any other way that their policies or politics make sense.
Friday, October 26, 2012
Tuesday, October 2, 2012
Elmer Fudd Politics
I am sick and tired of hearing over and over again that Obama is the most divisive president in American history. Like most things for which he is blamed, Obama holds little responsibility for the divisiveness in American politics but makes an easy and convenient scapegoat. The reality is that the electorate is more divided than it has been since the Civil War, because it is more profitable and politically convenient to sow the seeds of derision than it is to govern.
It is always easier to disagree with someone than it is to offer a better alternative, and this has been the weapon of choice of the GOP since 2010, when the Tea Party revolution hit Washington. In fact, Mitch McConnell, the Senate Minority leader (who bears a striking resemblence to a turtle), came up with this whopper: "Our top priority is making sure President Obama is a one-term president." The top priority was not bipartisanship, nor was it entitlement reform, regulatory reform, foreign policy, education reform, or anything that is useful. To McConnell, the idea of Obama is so terrible and terrifying that there is nothing more important or pressing than to deny him a second term.
Indeed, here's McConnell on bipartisanship: "We worked very hard to keep our fingerprints off those proposals. Because we thought - correctly, I think - that the only way the American people would know that a great debate was going on was if the measures were not bipartisan. When you hang the 'bipartisan' tag on something, the perception is that differences have been worked out, and there's a broad agreement that that's the way forward."
To offer a course of complete non-cooperation as the best course for the American people is insulting. Politicians campaign over and over again (as Obama did in 2008) that they will change the tone in Washington, focus less on partisan bickering, and discuss the "real issues." How can we have a real discussion when one side threatens every bill with fillibuster, and refuses to even get its "fingerprints" on any policy proposal? Perhaps we would have had improved legislation from this failed Congress if Republicans had been willing to work their ideas into a Democratic plan. Presenting a bill as bipartisan does not mean there wasn't disagreement, it just means that the call to action is stronger than ideological ties.
Few people have been as critical of President Obama as Rush Limbaugh, whose fire and brimstone doomsday speeches border on madness. To Limbaugh, anyone, literally anyone, would make a better president than Obama in his second term. As he put it, "We are voting against Obama, Mitt Romney might as well be Elmer Fudd." Elmer Fudd is so incompetant that he can't catch a rabbit he has been hunting for decades, yet, according to Rush, he would do a better job of running this country than Obama. I'd turn his comment around and say that I'd much rather have Elmer Fudd as president than Mitt Romney, because I think that incompetance would be a better alternative than wilfully destroying the social safety net.
I don't support Obama on everything that he is done, and I think that he has screwed up in a number of places. For many people, their reality today is not as rosy as it was four years ago, due to the recession and painful recovery. But - and this is a huge but - he was handed a situation that was impossible to solve in only four years. When the stock market crashed in 2008, housing prices came crashing down, incomes fell, and millions lost their jobs. Obama naively set himself higher expectations than he could possible hope to accomplish in one term, yet that is a sin nearly every politician is guilty of. Mitt's purposeful mendacity is on a completely different plane than Obama's failed campaign promises.
The saddest thing of it all is that the GOP's chosen course of Elmer Fudd politics has succeeded. America's two party system consists of a center-right Democratic party and a far-right Republican party that crowd out any hope for a substantive policy discussion. Obama has bent so far to the right in an attempt to appease his detractors that he has alienated a good portion of his supporters. Compared to Bush, Obama has drilled for more oil, coal, and natural gas, assessed fewer EPA fines, continued No Child Left Behind's accountability measures, championed charter schools, kept Guantanamo open, stayed in Afghanistan, and extended the Bush tax cuts for all wage brackets. Whatever his secret intentions may be, Obama's record shows him to be anything but the radical socialist that conservative pundits make him out to be.
Of course, after slandering him for being a socialist, fascist, atheist, anti-American, Muslim, the talking heads turn around and call him divisive too. And that's why I watch Fox News: the incredible irony of it all.
It is always easier to disagree with someone than it is to offer a better alternative, and this has been the weapon of choice of the GOP since 2010, when the Tea Party revolution hit Washington. In fact, Mitch McConnell, the Senate Minority leader (who bears a striking resemblence to a turtle), came up with this whopper: "Our top priority is making sure President Obama is a one-term president." The top priority was not bipartisanship, nor was it entitlement reform, regulatory reform, foreign policy, education reform, or anything that is useful. To McConnell, the idea of Obama is so terrible and terrifying that there is nothing more important or pressing than to deny him a second term.
Indeed, here's McConnell on bipartisanship: "We worked very hard to keep our fingerprints off those proposals. Because we thought - correctly, I think - that the only way the American people would know that a great debate was going on was if the measures were not bipartisan. When you hang the 'bipartisan' tag on something, the perception is that differences have been worked out, and there's a broad agreement that that's the way forward."
To offer a course of complete non-cooperation as the best course for the American people is insulting. Politicians campaign over and over again (as Obama did in 2008) that they will change the tone in Washington, focus less on partisan bickering, and discuss the "real issues." How can we have a real discussion when one side threatens every bill with fillibuster, and refuses to even get its "fingerprints" on any policy proposal? Perhaps we would have had improved legislation from this failed Congress if Republicans had been willing to work their ideas into a Democratic plan. Presenting a bill as bipartisan does not mean there wasn't disagreement, it just means that the call to action is stronger than ideological ties.
Few people have been as critical of President Obama as Rush Limbaugh, whose fire and brimstone doomsday speeches border on madness. To Limbaugh, anyone, literally anyone, would make a better president than Obama in his second term. As he put it, "We are voting against Obama, Mitt Romney might as well be Elmer Fudd." Elmer Fudd is so incompetant that he can't catch a rabbit he has been hunting for decades, yet, according to Rush, he would do a better job of running this country than Obama. I'd turn his comment around and say that I'd much rather have Elmer Fudd as president than Mitt Romney, because I think that incompetance would be a better alternative than wilfully destroying the social safety net.
I don't support Obama on everything that he is done, and I think that he has screwed up in a number of places. For many people, their reality today is not as rosy as it was four years ago, due to the recession and painful recovery. But - and this is a huge but - he was handed a situation that was impossible to solve in only four years. When the stock market crashed in 2008, housing prices came crashing down, incomes fell, and millions lost their jobs. Obama naively set himself higher expectations than he could possible hope to accomplish in one term, yet that is a sin nearly every politician is guilty of. Mitt's purposeful mendacity is on a completely different plane than Obama's failed campaign promises.
The saddest thing of it all is that the GOP's chosen course of Elmer Fudd politics has succeeded. America's two party system consists of a center-right Democratic party and a far-right Republican party that crowd out any hope for a substantive policy discussion. Obama has bent so far to the right in an attempt to appease his detractors that he has alienated a good portion of his supporters. Compared to Bush, Obama has drilled for more oil, coal, and natural gas, assessed fewer EPA fines, continued No Child Left Behind's accountability measures, championed charter schools, kept Guantanamo open, stayed in Afghanistan, and extended the Bush tax cuts for all wage brackets. Whatever his secret intentions may be, Obama's record shows him to be anything but the radical socialist that conservative pundits make him out to be.
Of course, after slandering him for being a socialist, fascist, atheist, anti-American, Muslim, the talking heads turn around and call him divisive too. And that's why I watch Fox News: the incredible irony of it all.
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