Posted by
Good Mojo on Saturday, August 14, 2010 11:47:00 PM
I recently read and commented on this piece by Matt Towery
America Free Falling
08/13/2010
It's been months since I wrote in this column that our economic woes
were not going to end anytime soon. That was generally a different
prognosis than many, more upbeat economists and analysts were providing.
Now, months after the $862 billion stimulus bill and the promise that
it would tamp down unemployment to less than 8 percent, that rate is
closer to 10 percent. The new government spending was supposed to spur
the economy. All it has spurred is the federal debt, which is now a
record $13.2 trillion after a 23 percent jump. The latest spending
splurge was a cool $24 billion for "state bailouts" (read: jobs for
teachers, a key Democratic Party constituency). And who will bail out
Washington when the printing presses run out of green ink?
The Federal Reserve has come out with the news that more than $1.8
trillion in capital is sitting idle because businesses are too uncertain
about the economic and government-regulatory future to risk putting
their money on the line by investing it.
New polls show voters more disenchanted with
elected officials now than in a long while. Most of this political
animosity is directed at Democrats, but disapproval of Republicans is
also very high.
Here's the situation in its essentials: Small businesses can't get
loans. They have sluggish cash flow at best. And they are coming to
realize that the reels of government red tape they are up against in the
coming years may drown them in another kind of red -- red ink.
Many of these businesses are owned by men and women who likely will
be moving to a higher tax rate than the one they're in now. They'll be
forced to fire employees to keep their own income at adequate levels.
Over half of the American workforce is employed by these small
businesses. The end of this could be catastrophic.
Corporate America has a reckoning coming, too. Wall Street has been
riding high, but with blinkers on. Only now are some of these economic
kingpins coming to see what the Obama administration and the
Democrat-controlled Congress have wrought. They have embedded into both
the new health care reform laws and the new financial reform laws so
many hidden costs and so much hidden bureaucracy that the same
financiers that used to toast Obama are starting to despise him.
The market looked good this year, yes. But compared to what? Last year. And last year would make any year look good by contrast.
General Motors has made a profit. But that came out of our pockets.
And who will show up this fall to buy the cars GM has built to please
the Democrats and their "green" allies? For that matter, who will take a
fall vacation? And what will Santa leave under the tree this year?
Lumps of coal, sad to say.
Some have labeled columnists like me unrealistic doomsday prophets.
Of course, most of these more seemingly measured and optimistic voices
belong to those who enjoy fat paychecks, limo rides and plush apartments
or homes in Manhattan or Washington.
I have something to tell all of them -- from someone who has a
payroll and doesn't live in a bubble. America is free falling. Worse, I
can't honestly say when it might stop.
And let me be the first to declare it: We haven't suffered a great
recession. Technical language aside, we are in a depression. And not
even the Heartbreakers can take away the pain.
To conjure a feeling of happier times, I
recently went to a concert given by rock legend Tom Petty. It was hard
not to notice that his band is called the "Heartbreakers." Read on, and
I'll detail the point in a way many of you will identify with.
Mr. Towery served as the chairman of former
Speaker Newt Gingrich's political organization from 1992 until Gingrich
left Congress. He is a former Georgia state representative, the author
of several books and currently heads the polling and political
information firm InsiderAdvantage.
I directly addressed one of the other "commenters", who wrote:
Perhaps Kipling's poem best expresses our predicament
:
"Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smooth-tongued wizards withdrew
And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was true
That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more."
http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_copybook.htm
Indeed,
the Gods of the Market Place are now tumbling... and the lights are
going out in the U.S. Reckless trade policy (massive China imports),
the reckless and interminable Bush wars, reckless federal deficits,
reckless salary hikes and tax cuts for corporate execs, reckless Wall
Street bankers, reckless home lending, reckless unfunded federal and
state liabilities... all pointing to the now-unfolding greatest economic
wreck in human history.
My response:
HD, AK 08/13/10 @ 06:31 pm
While some of your post is "spot on"; I
notice the only name in your "litany of recklessness", is Bush. He
obviously has some culpability. Like many who would call themselves
"conservative", I was firmly and vocally against GWB as his proposed
spending went off the rails (with the help of a Democrat controlled
Congress).
At issue, for me, is your failure to attach OBAMA's name to any part of it(after NEARLY 18 months).
-He has proposed NOTHING to begin to offset a trade imbalance,
-He has proposed nothing to conclude EITHER war, nor has he brought the troops home;
-He has proposed nothing BUT to increase the federal deficits into the future.
-Reckless salary hikes are NOT THE GOVERNMENT'S BUSINESS.
I'm
not sure if by, "reckless tax cuts for corporate execs", you mean,
"reckless tax cuts for corporations"; but either(or both) would be
helpful to reverse our economic direction. (ALL, repeat: ALL taxes are
paid by the "people", by the "consumer").
The reckless Wall St. bankers are, in large part, a core Democratic constituency.
Reckless
home lending is a major by - product of Carter's "Community
Reinvestment Act"; poorly executed during Carter's time, run amok during
Clinton's time; dishonestly (perhaps CRIMINALLY) protected by US Rep.
Barney Frank(D-MA), and US Sen. Chris Dodd(D-CT) during Bush's terms. In
the interest of honesty, they had "political cover", from a few
so-called conservatives masquerading as Republicans.
Reckless
unfunded state and federal liabilities ALMOST all have names: Social
Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Romneycare, TennCare, Obamacare, etc. Note
the decidedly liberal - Democrat (and their Union soldiers) origins of
these social and financial anvils chained to the ankle of the American
taxpayer.
Indeed, the "economic wreck""now-unfolding" will be the
"greatest in human history"...if we cannot stop it. Its' cause will be
arrogant, unwise GOVERNMENT meddling in the markets, both financially
and socially.
Honesty as to the origins, OR solutions to our
economic woes is not optional. Much of our public representation has
abandoned us. No matter party affiliation, the child-like belief we can
save people from their EARNED negative consequences has been
unrelenting; and it is now choking the most powerful economy in history.
Our
ONLY hope to save it... beginning to move back toward a "freer" market
economy. It has not been free in many years, but lessening the weight of
onerous taxation on business, the people who OWN them, who are EMPLOYED
by them, who's RETIREMENT PLANS invest IN them, and who CONSUME their
products, can turn this around. REMEMBER:
EXTENDING the "Bush tax cuts" = POSTPONING an "Obama direct tax increase
That's not JUST good for "business", it's good for EVERYONE!
After November, maybe we can get a group who will REPEAL the "stealth taxes" buried in Obama's entire agenda.