I.
People do not connect the dots.
There is a general, underlying malaise in the country that somehow America is losing its position as the worlds leader. The effort to understand this focuses on a slew of foreign policies that may or may not be successful, and in this focus the dots are missed.
When the US withstood the USSR for decades, it was, of course, our nuclear weapons that played the major role. But hardly the only role. The unseen force that the Soviet Union could not defeat was the American economy. When Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev famously told Vice President Richard Nixon in 1959 that his system would defeat ours, he meant his economic system. Khrushchev was right that the true test of the communist and the capitalist systems was an economic test. Its just that the Soviet Union ended up on the wrong side of the bargain.
Now, as the US faces a communist regime of a much more formidable nature China the extent to which a nations economy determines its international power should be clear. The US also faces a new and powerful European Union, which, despite its current, deep troubles, remains a much more powerful economy than in the pre-EU days. Add to that the growing economic power of Russia, Iran, Brazil, India, Saudi Arabia and other, smaller countries, and we have an unprecedented challenge to American power, which means, increasingly, American economic power.
America neither perceives nor responds to the challenge. We believe that our largest economic challenges are internal: Are our citizens universally, comprehensively and immediately taken care of? We have dropped our long-range perspective. The substance and the symbol of all this is encapsulated in a single word: debt.
We pretend that we can spend our way to economic supremacy, when the reality is the opposite. The more unearned income we spend the more money we print the less powerful we become. Every country around the world, but us, sees this.
On the bipartisan edges, Republicans and Democrats also see it, but the parties are not listening to their best minds, Democrat Erskine Bowles and Republican Alan Simpson. They recently put forward a plan to reduce the debt. Not suprisingly, the choices were painful.
II.
Which brings us to the recent tax compromise of President Obama and Congress. It totally skipped over the pain quotient, instead doling out goodies for everybody. Instead of bipartisan discipline and commitment to reducing the debt, the tax deal represents bipartisan irresponsibility and indulgence.
We cannot understand why some Republicans rejoiced in the deal. The tax compromise entailed an additional expenditure of nearly $1 trillion on welfare, which is a nice short-term benefit, but a long-term disaster. Are these rejoicing politicians only interested in the welfare of private pocketbooks, secured by extending the Bush-era tax cuts, but indifferent to the long-term, destructive effects of adding another $1 billion in welfare payments to the national debt?
This incomprehensibly huge addition to the national debt is only the most recent act of irresponsibility, the blame for which is bipartisan. Both Republicans and Democrats have gotten into the habit of living comfortably with long-term disasters.
III.
George Bush started two wars without a plan to pay for them. The IJN supported the war in Iraq and supports the war in Afghanistan. We believe there is no rosy way to fight terrorism. Sometimes, war is the only way. However, the IJN did not support Bushs failure to ask this country to make sacrifices. Bushs idea of fighting terrorism while continuing to go shopping was embarrassingly short-sighted. War means sacrifice. Bush failed to lead us by demanding personal sacrifice as the price for waging necessary wars for survival. The result: a crippling rise in the national debt.
George Bush launched a poorly managed and ridiculously large stimulus package of nearly $800 billion and Obama foolishly followed with another stimulus package of his own. Neither president has a handle on how to right an economy in a major recession. These stimulus packages have not worked.
For just one piece of evidence, note how many states are either on the verge of banktruptcy or are drastically cutting services. In this respect, Colorado is just part of the crowd. From both Bush and Obama, we have an even worse rise in the national debt.
Both presidents pretend that long-term solutions to massive problems such as health care costs and job loss can be sustained without balancing the nations budget.
Both presidents have printed money without a clue as to how to end the spiral, other than by invoking vague, almost mystical beliefs in theoretical projections of economic recovery to justify their hope thats all it is, pure hope for a better day.
Obama has taken a step in the right direction by freezing federal salaries for two years. At a $5-$6 billion savings, thats almost a symbolic gesture. It will become a significant gesture if it is followed up with additional acts of fiscal responsibility.
Maybe the Bush tax rates should have been extended; maybe not. Maybe higher taxes on the rich would slow the economy, or bolster it. We dont know. The question can be argued both ways. We doubt there is a definitive answer. We do know that these tax cuts have not correlated with a stronger economy. Be that as it may, additional, massive expenditures be they for welfare payments, war or stimulus weaken the country.
IV.
At some point, a president who is a true leader will need to stand up and say to the nation:
I regret to tell you, my fellow Americans, that our country will not be able to fix every mortgage, pay for every heroic medical procedure, repair every highway and produce every weapon, until we once again become fiscally responsible. If we dont, then all those mortgages we fix, medical procedures we pay for, highways we smooth and weapons we design will be short-term gains, to be followed by a radically diminished place for America and Americans in the world. This will inevitably bring far worse economic woes. We must prevent that.
Therefore, tough though it will be on all of us, we will need to learn to balance our budget and to reduce the deficit not just reduce the rate of its growth. We will need to weed out inefficiencies, to cut earmarks, and temporarily learn to get along without many of the benefits and entitlements we have gotten used to. Social Security benefits will need to drop a bit; Medicare reimbursements to doctors will need to drop a bit; and many social advantages, from airports to bridges to parks, will need to be delayed a bit.
This is the only responsible way forward; the only path to return to our status as the worlds preeminent economic power. This will assist in the economic opportunity of every citizen. To get there, we will need to practice what we preach to our children: delayed gratification.
We will need to connect the dots to see that our our long-range economic health and power depend on spending discipline.
We will also need to connect the dots in order to retain our clout against Iran, to play a major role in Middle East peace, to stand up to an increasingly belligerent Russia, to continue to be idealistic in extending aid to victims of disasters around the world, to serve as a beacon of freedom and hope for the oppressed around the world. In short, we need to connect the dots in order to keep America America.
Copyright © 2010 by the Intermountain Jewish News
