With the jobs market stagnant 17 months after Democrats in Congress (joined by three then- (including two current) Republicans in the Senate) overwhelmingly supported their party’s “so-called stimulus,” instead of defending their record, these Democrats are planning on attacking Republicans. (Via Washington Examiner.)
And ready as they are to tie the GOP to George W. Bush, people may be waking up to the fact that that good man’s successor has been far worse on jobs and spending than was the Republican. Recall Obama decrying Bush for excessive government spending (your know “living beyond our means)? Recall his campaign concern about a deteriorating jobs market?
Now, the president may tell us that the economy would be even worse and unemployment even higher without his plan, but remember the promises made by his economic team. If the “stimulus” passed, unemployment wouldn’t climb above 8%. Well, it’s been a year since the unemployment rate was supposed to have peaked at 8% and this past month it declined to 9.5%, declined only “because 652,000 people gave up on their job searches and left the labor force.”
And for those not good at math, let me remind you of something, 9.5% is higher than 8% — 18.75% higher.
As Democrats return to attack mode (did they ever leave it), some of their commentary is particularly rich. Get this from White House senior adviser David Axelrod: “If we allow a Republican Party that took a $237 billion surplus and turned it into a $1.3 trillion deficit over eight years to masquerade as the party of fiscal responsibility, then shame on us”. $1.3 trillion over eight years?!? not bad given that that’s the approximate one-year deficit for the Democrat Axelrod helped put into the White House.
In linking the Post article, the Examiner‘s Chris Stirewalt makes an interesting point, “The first thing they do is manage the expectations, suggesting that anything other than Republicans winning a majority in the House is a victory.”
We need to make clear that the goal is simply to elect enough Republicans to Congress to block Obama from enacting his big-government agenda. But, it won’t be enough for Republicans to stand athwart statism yelling stop. Republicans to deflect Democratic criticisms that they’re offering nothing more than rehashed Bush-ism, but put forward conservative reforms similar to those proposed by the Gipper and articulated in the Contract with America.
All that said, what is most fascinating about the Democrats’ 2010 strategy is that for the first national elections after taking office, the man who was going to transform American politics returns to the old strategy of attack your opponents.
Not a very new kind of politics that.
As long as the elected GOP continue merely-obstructing, they are not going to gain much traction as too-many are viewed as equally-part of the problem in Washington and in the state capitals. They need a tactical-leader with a plan and a program…not just the mantra of “cut-taxes”.
It’s not the tax-burden that upsets voters and small business owners, it’s the looming deficits, the stalled economy and the “porkulus”. It’s not the current taxes thtat weigh-heavy on their minds…it’s the fear of HUGE increases 5, 10-year out to cover the ever-ballooning Keynesian-driven, deficit-fed bungling of the current regime.
The GOP can not simultaneously promote “…throw the bums out”, while begging to be returned to office one-more-time. A substantial-number of leading GOP office-holders need to voluntarily step-aside for the National Interest and promote new, fresh GOP faces to the electorate.
Obama and the Democrats had a golden opportunity to make some major structural reforms in how America worked when they potentially had Wall Street, the major banks, and a major portion of the automobile-sector by-the-throat. Instead they wasted huge-amounts of political capital and unrecoverable time on “fixing” health-care…which could have muddled-along for another term before reform.
Look at what the US constructed before and during WW2 in just a few years and ask;
– Where are the wind farms?
– Where are the bio-fuels and hydrogen/natural gas options.
– Why isn’t every GM and Chrysler car a hybrid or electric?
– Why aren’t we actually building anything? Rebuilding roads and replacing schools, power plants?
I’m not so sure as Ted B. that the opportunity to make major structural reforms was ever quite there. I can’t remember a proposed reform that lacked a group ready to oppose it vehemently.
It didn’t help that reforms were discussed in gauzy terms that avoided uncomfortable realities. The specific promises the President made about being able to keep your health plan if you liked it come to mind. I can imagine the the fuss that would have occurred if the President tried to implement wind farms or mandatory hybrid/electric vehicles.
That said, I think the stimulus package and the tactical decision to go with a Democrats-only political strategy were huge mistakes.
Hi. A few points.
Saying “Obama and the GOP both spent money, and Obama spent more, so that’s bad” is like comparing a CEO’s budget to a Hollywood starlet’s credit card bill. The Dems are not saying “Obama is just doing what the GOP did.”. They are saying, “Fixing the economic mess left behind by Bush/the GOP will cost and is costing money.”
You mention Obama’s deficit this year. Where did part of that cost come from? Well, lets count a few things.
* the cost of the wars: bush and the GOP didn’t count the war costs in their budgets; they pretended war costs somehow were above accounting rules. One of the first things obama did was actually account, on paper and everything, the costs of the war. One example of how Obama’s bill is huge due DIRECTLY to fiscal and accounting irresponsibility of the GOP.
*what did the GOP spend money on? Besides badly managed wars of choice, that is. What has obama spent money on? Let’s see: the GOP cut taxes for the wealthy and spent billions on earmarks for friends and pet projects. Oh, and setting up prescription drug benefits the forbade the government from negotiating lower prices from the drug companies, essentially subsidizing private business profits rather than save money (the GOP free market at work, I suppose). What has Obama spent money on? A health care bill that is projected to save billions. A stimulus bill that has been effective at positively affecting employment and GDP, necessary, again, after years of GOP mismanagement of the economy and the banking system.
I hear-tell Boehner and the crew aren’t going to do anything about getting rid of ObamaCarless, so I don’t get the impression their standing athwart of much of anything.
They need a tactical-leader with a plan and a program…not just the mantra of “cut-taxes”.
There is a logical, scientific reason for cutting taxes, Ted.
It’s damned effective.
At this point, what is needed is to return money to people. The government is sucking this country dry and utterly failing at it. Give the taxes back and let the millions of bright, intelligent, creative Americans use it to create wealth.
ND30: Then why didn’t the years of tax cuts under Bush avoid the disastrous economy we now face?
A few points on the OP:
Saying “Obama and the GOP both spent money, and Obama spent more, so that’s bad” is like comparing a CEO’s budget to a Hollywood starlet’s credit card bill. The Dems are not saying “Obama is just doing what the GOP did.”. They are saying, “Fixing the economic mess left behind by Bush/the GOP will cost and is costing money.”
You mention Obama’s deficit this year. Where did part of that cost come from? Well, lets count a few things.
* the cost of the wars: bush and the GOP didn’t count the war costs in their budgets; they pretended war costs somehow were above accounting rules. One of the first things obama did was actually account, on paper and everything, the costs of the war. One example of how Obama’s bill is huge due DIRECTLY to fiscal and accounting irresponsibility of the GOP.
*what did the GOP spend money on? (besides badly managed wars of choice, that is) What has obama spent money on? Let’s see: the GOP cut taxes for the wealthy and spent billions on earmarks for friends and pet projects. Oh, and setting up prescription drug benefits that forbade the government from negotiating lower prices from the drug companies, essentially subsidizing private business profits rather than save money (the GOP free market at work, I suppose). What has Obama spent money on? A health care bill that is projected to save billions. A stimulus bill that has been effective at positively affecting employment and GDP, necessary it’s important to add, again, after years of GOP mismanagement of the economy and the banking system.
When the GOP complains that Obama is spending too much, that’s like blaming the repairman for giving you a large bill for fixing the garbage disposal after you spent 8 years pouring scrap metal into it. The GOP helped destroy a great economy, and this nation will require years to get back on track. Don’t ever forget, though, who did all that destruction. Angry about how expensive fixing things is? Blame the people who romped through the house with baseball bats and chainsaws, not the contractor hired to fix all the damage.
This is a little out of sequence but I had to send it.
I live in CA but I get a weekly newspaper from Franklin, WV. It ALWAYS takes 2 or 3 and some times 4 weeks to reach me. The one that was dated July 1 with a half of the front page and picture of Sen Byrd. I received the next day. He may be dead but—-
I have a friend who died before Byrd and I have not yet received the Times with his obt. My cousin e-mailed me a copy about 2 weeks ago.
My, my, my, torrent, we do have our talking points down, don’t we now?
And you get your facts wrong to boot. No, only in liberal fantasy land is Obamacare projected to save billions. All the objective studies that have come out since it passed show it increasing costs.
And if the “stimulus” bill created all the jobs you said it did, how come unemployment is higher than its authors said it would be?
And please tell me how sending money to the states to pay off their inflated budgets does anything to fix an economic mess? Oh, and as to that mess, if it was left behind by the GOP, how come it started only after Democrats’ took charge of Congress?
Now that I’ve asked questions you won’t be answering, let me at least point out one thing. In your entire post, you do exactly what your party is doing–attacking Republicans. Interesting you can’t defend Obama save to offer his point about the “stimulus” creating jobs–without addressing the fact that unemployment remains far higher than forecast by the Administration.
In short, instead of taking issue with the point of this post, you’re helping make it.
I think we need to acknowledge, that both democrat and republican voters were betrayed by elements in both parties. The neo conservatives dumped too much money in defense, and corrupt democrats inflated a huge housing bubble that produced a financial crisis.
What we need is politicians who do what they say, and aren’t extreme ideologues. Certainly I have more faith in republican ideals winning in the end, in an environment that isn’t so polarized or extreme (as I think history shows that extreme ideological policies, from either side, never works).
After all, I think the EU has shown that in such a moderate environment of solving real issues, republican ideals tend to win out over big-brother government 🙂 (I’ve recently spent some time living there, and I found it fascinating). Protectionist big-government policies are unsustainable, and simply lead to default (look up some day the sheer number of countries that *have* defaulted in only that past twenty or thirty years).
There isn’t enough money for big government. Leftists don’t understand that wealth and prosperty come from human beings, not money. Money is merely a tool for one person to transfer part of his prosperity to another; it’s only as valuable as the total amount of real value from real human beings in the economy (just look at the sheer number of failed attempts in history for big governments to print money to fuel their economies).
I’m not against reducing taxes, my objection is the current GOP doesn’t have a plan, and just recites “cut taxes” without any specificity or program like some magic incantation in a language they don’t actually understand.
The GOP needs more than three magic words: “no”, and “cut taxes”, they need a demonstrable plan, one concise that people will understand…and support even if it means personal pain.
So let’s see, talkingpointsprime’s argument consists of the following:
– Government spending is always good and always increases the economy.
– Government spending during the Bush administration was bad and destroyed the economy.
Mhm.
actually it is not that hard to setup wind farms, the only problem is that it requires lots of capital investment.”*;