JR Dieckmann
Straw men on the other side
By JR Dieckmann
There can be little doubt that the election this year will be a referendum on public rejection of Obama's socialist, economic policies. The people who, because they reject socialism, high taxes and debt, are considered "the enemy," "radicals," "fringe right wing extremists," and other such nonsense by Obama and his Progressive allies.
I'm sorry, but I have had enough of Obama constantly blaming "the other side" for his failures, mistakes, and bad policies. "The other side?" Have you ever heard such hateful and partisan talk from a president in your life? Even the independents are now considered by "post partisan, great uniter" Obama to be "the enemy" on "the other side." At some point, you have to wonder just how few people are actually on Obama's side.
Obama has even referred to the tea parties as "the 'Republican' Tea Party funded by giant corporations." There is no "Republican tea party," this is just another straw man characterization by Obama. Either he is completely ignorant of tea party funding and of whom the tea parties really represent, or he is a deliberate liar. Tea party ideology is about individual freedom, smaller government, low taxes, and constitutional federal government. It has nothing to do with any established political party.
The Republican Party is only slightly more in alignment with these principles than is the Democrat party. The tea parties support individuals who represent these principles regardless of political party. These used to be the principles of the Republican Party and hope is that Republicans will return to their former conservative founding. The influence of progressives within the party and establishment politics-as-usual is destroying the Republican brand.
Obama must learn to distinguish between tea party ideology and the Republican establishment, and stop this continual lying about people who disagree with his socialist ideology. This partisan rhetoric coming from a president who is supposed to represent all of the people and be governing for the good of the country is taking its toll on Obama's former popularity.
Obama would be completely lost without the straw man argument. "What troubles me is when I hear people say that all of government is inherently bad," Obama said in a commencement speech at the University of Michigan. From whom has he heard this ridiculous assertion? I've heard nothing of tea party goers promoting anarchy.
He not only characterizes the tea parties as an arm of the Republican Party, but also portrays business owners as millionaires and billionaires and giant corporations. And, of course, bankers are just greedy businessmen out to victimize low-income people who can't afford to buy homes. He is all for the "middle class," as long as they belong to a union and vote Democrat. Otherwise, they are just selfish, greedy, evil people.
The market is rapidly shrinking for the goods that Obama is selling. He has put himself into a box with room only for far left liberal progressives and the rest of the country isn't buying it. That box will have to be wrapped up and sent back to Chicago, preferably on a Fed-Ex flight originating from Yemen.
It would appear from all of the recent election campaign news that Bill Clinton is far more popular with Democrats than is Barack Obama. Obama couldn't seal the deal for Democrat candidates so they brought in the big gun, Bill Clinton, who they characterize as a fiscal conservative in contrast to Obama's progressive socialism. Democrat candidates have been running away from Obama and his policies and hope that Clinton will be more popular with their constituents.
Isn't it interesting that during every election cycle, liberal candidates campaign as conservatives? Then when they are returned to Congress, they go right back to voting as liberals. Even John McCain, in his bid for president in 2008, suddenly became a fiscal and social conservative for a few months before the primary election. He did it again this year to win reelection to the Senate, but McCain is no conservative.
You might expect that from liberal Republicans like McCain, but why then don't Democrats campaign as extreme liberals? The reason is that they all know that the vast majority of American voters consider themselves to the right of center, especially on economic issues.
Liberalism just isn't that popular in America, so candidates misrepresent themselves as conservatives so that they can go back to Congress and continue with their liberal agenda. Even the newly elected "blue dog" Democrats became nothing but lap dogs once they got to Congress.
We keep hearing that Bill Clinton created a budget surplus of $230 billion and created 23 million jobs. Not so. Bill Clinton didn't create a budget surplus. Bill Clinton didn't create jobs. Democrats and Clinton keep taking credit for them, but they didn't do it. Nor did Clinton cut federal spending. Federal spending continued to increase throughout the Clinton administration.
Clinton spending was restrained only by the Republican Congress under the "Contract with America." Clinton was forced to sign the Republican budget or face a government shutdown. By year 2000, there was an apparent $69 billion surplus but only because Clinton had been borrowing money from established, non-budgetary government programs to cover the deficit, which caused an increase in the national debt.
Clinton never created a single private sector job in his life. The computer industry and the Internet boom in 1990s created millions of jobs during the Clinton years. As a result, federal revenue increased at a much higher pace than federal spending. Clinton had nothing to do with it.
During the period from 1992 to 2000, federal spending increased by 29.49% while tax revenues increased by 85.58%, which account for the perceived budget surplus. Taking from the claimed $230 billion surplus, the $246.5 billion borrowed from numerous off-budget funds, Clinton actually ran a deficit of $16.5 billion at the end of his term. The deficit they claim was only a projected figure that never materialized.
Then came the dot com bust and the 9-11 terrorist attacks, which dealt a huge blow to the nation's economy, and necessarily caused dramatic increases in government spending under Bush. Additionally, there were unplanned expenses to conduct wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which were dwarfed by the added domestic spending programs.
Even though many of these Bush spending programs were opposed by most conservatives, Bush still managed to maintain a stable economy and near full employment with a record low unemployment below 5% at one point of his term in office.
From 2004 to 2007 the budget deficit was reduced from $412.7 billion to $162 billion, and then Pelosi, Reid, and the Democrats took over the Congress. The deficit jumped to $459 billion in 2008, then skyrocketed to $1.416 trillion after Obama was elected.
Congress writes the budget and writes the federal spending checks. When Obama criticizes Bush and blames bush policy for driving the car into the ditch, he is talking about his own spending that he voted for while a U.S. senator. He and the Democrats wrote the checks and Bush signed them. That is "the same philosophy that led to this mess in the first place," as Obama is so fond of saying.
Bush didn't "drive the car into a ditch." If he had, it would have happened long before the election year of 2008. Obama and the Democrats did it with liberal housing and welfare policies including the Democrat owned and operated Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. It was the Democrats' Fannie and Freddie, and "fair housing" legislation going back to the Carter and Clinton administrations that caused the 2008 recession, not any Bush policy.
"We don't mind if Republicans come along for the ride," says Obama, "but they're going to have to sit in the back." What does this tell you about Obama's thought processes? Does this represent his "post racial" and "post partisan" campaign rhetoric? It sounds to me like he is saying I have my Marxist philosophy and agenda and if you don't like it then sit down and shut up, which is what he also said when talking about his "socialist mop."
Most critics believe this was a reference to Rosa Parks. Is Obama telling us that blacks are in charge now and whites will have to sit in the back of the bus, or just that his progressives are in charge and Republicans will have to sit in the back?
Issues and substance, not straw men, will decide this election providing we all get out to vote. Pack the polling places so that uninspired liberals simply turn around and go home rather than wait in line. Then we will see who will be sitting in the back after the new Congress convenes in January to start mopping up the mess that Obama has made.
© JR Dieckmann
November 1, 2010
There can be little doubt that the election this year will be a referendum on public rejection of Obama's socialist, economic policies. The people who, because they reject socialism, high taxes and debt, are considered "the enemy," "radicals," "fringe right wing extremists," and other such nonsense by Obama and his Progressive allies.
I'm sorry, but I have had enough of Obama constantly blaming "the other side" for his failures, mistakes, and bad policies. "The other side?" Have you ever heard such hateful and partisan talk from a president in your life? Even the independents are now considered by "post partisan, great uniter" Obama to be "the enemy" on "the other side." At some point, you have to wonder just how few people are actually on Obama's side.
Obama has even referred to the tea parties as "the 'Republican' Tea Party funded by giant corporations." There is no "Republican tea party," this is just another straw man characterization by Obama. Either he is completely ignorant of tea party funding and of whom the tea parties really represent, or he is a deliberate liar. Tea party ideology is about individual freedom, smaller government, low taxes, and constitutional federal government. It has nothing to do with any established political party.
The Republican Party is only slightly more in alignment with these principles than is the Democrat party. The tea parties support individuals who represent these principles regardless of political party. These used to be the principles of the Republican Party and hope is that Republicans will return to their former conservative founding. The influence of progressives within the party and establishment politics-as-usual is destroying the Republican brand.
Obama must learn to distinguish between tea party ideology and the Republican establishment, and stop this continual lying about people who disagree with his socialist ideology. This partisan rhetoric coming from a president who is supposed to represent all of the people and be governing for the good of the country is taking its toll on Obama's former popularity.
Obama would be completely lost without the straw man argument. "What troubles me is when I hear people say that all of government is inherently bad," Obama said in a commencement speech at the University of Michigan. From whom has he heard this ridiculous assertion? I've heard nothing of tea party goers promoting anarchy.
He not only characterizes the tea parties as an arm of the Republican Party, but also portrays business owners as millionaires and billionaires and giant corporations. And, of course, bankers are just greedy businessmen out to victimize low-income people who can't afford to buy homes. He is all for the "middle class," as long as they belong to a union and vote Democrat. Otherwise, they are just selfish, greedy, evil people.
The market is rapidly shrinking for the goods that Obama is selling. He has put himself into a box with room only for far left liberal progressives and the rest of the country isn't buying it. That box will have to be wrapped up and sent back to Chicago, preferably on a Fed-Ex flight originating from Yemen.
It would appear from all of the recent election campaign news that Bill Clinton is far more popular with Democrats than is Barack Obama. Obama couldn't seal the deal for Democrat candidates so they brought in the big gun, Bill Clinton, who they characterize as a fiscal conservative in contrast to Obama's progressive socialism. Democrat candidates have been running away from Obama and his policies and hope that Clinton will be more popular with their constituents.
Isn't it interesting that during every election cycle, liberal candidates campaign as conservatives? Then when they are returned to Congress, they go right back to voting as liberals. Even John McCain, in his bid for president in 2008, suddenly became a fiscal and social conservative for a few months before the primary election. He did it again this year to win reelection to the Senate, but McCain is no conservative.
You might expect that from liberal Republicans like McCain, but why then don't Democrats campaign as extreme liberals? The reason is that they all know that the vast majority of American voters consider themselves to the right of center, especially on economic issues.
Liberalism just isn't that popular in America, so candidates misrepresent themselves as conservatives so that they can go back to Congress and continue with their liberal agenda. Even the newly elected "blue dog" Democrats became nothing but lap dogs once they got to Congress.
We keep hearing that Bill Clinton created a budget surplus of $230 billion and created 23 million jobs. Not so. Bill Clinton didn't create a budget surplus. Bill Clinton didn't create jobs. Democrats and Clinton keep taking credit for them, but they didn't do it. Nor did Clinton cut federal spending. Federal spending continued to increase throughout the Clinton administration.
Clinton spending was restrained only by the Republican Congress under the "Contract with America." Clinton was forced to sign the Republican budget or face a government shutdown. By year 2000, there was an apparent $69 billion surplus but only because Clinton had been borrowing money from established, non-budgetary government programs to cover the deficit, which caused an increase in the national debt.
Clinton never created a single private sector job in his life. The computer industry and the Internet boom in 1990s created millions of jobs during the Clinton years. As a result, federal revenue increased at a much higher pace than federal spending. Clinton had nothing to do with it.
During the period from 1992 to 2000, federal spending increased by 29.49% while tax revenues increased by 85.58%, which account for the perceived budget surplus. Taking from the claimed $230 billion surplus, the $246.5 billion borrowed from numerous off-budget funds, Clinton actually ran a deficit of $16.5 billion at the end of his term. The deficit they claim was only a projected figure that never materialized.
Then came the dot com bust and the 9-11 terrorist attacks, which dealt a huge blow to the nation's economy, and necessarily caused dramatic increases in government spending under Bush. Additionally, there were unplanned expenses to conduct wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which were dwarfed by the added domestic spending programs.
Even though many of these Bush spending programs were opposed by most conservatives, Bush still managed to maintain a stable economy and near full employment with a record low unemployment below 5% at one point of his term in office.
From 2004 to 2007 the budget deficit was reduced from $412.7 billion to $162 billion, and then Pelosi, Reid, and the Democrats took over the Congress. The deficit jumped to $459 billion in 2008, then skyrocketed to $1.416 trillion after Obama was elected.
Congress writes the budget and writes the federal spending checks. When Obama criticizes Bush and blames bush policy for driving the car into the ditch, he is talking about his own spending that he voted for while a U.S. senator. He and the Democrats wrote the checks and Bush signed them. That is "the same philosophy that led to this mess in the first place," as Obama is so fond of saying.
Bush didn't "drive the car into a ditch." If he had, it would have happened long before the election year of 2008. Obama and the Democrats did it with liberal housing and welfare policies including the Democrat owned and operated Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. It was the Democrats' Fannie and Freddie, and "fair housing" legislation going back to the Carter and Clinton administrations that caused the 2008 recession, not any Bush policy.
"We don't mind if Republicans come along for the ride," says Obama, "but they're going to have to sit in the back." What does this tell you about Obama's thought processes? Does this represent his "post racial" and "post partisan" campaign rhetoric? It sounds to me like he is saying I have my Marxist philosophy and agenda and if you don't like it then sit down and shut up, which is what he also said when talking about his "socialist mop."
Most critics believe this was a reference to Rosa Parks. Is Obama telling us that blacks are in charge now and whites will have to sit in the back of the bus, or just that his progressives are in charge and Republicans will have to sit in the back?
Issues and substance, not straw men, will decide this election providing we all get out to vote. Pack the polling places so that uninspired liberals simply turn around and go home rather than wait in line. Then we will see who will be sitting in the back after the new Congress convenes in January to start mopping up the mess that Obama has made.
© JR Dieckmann
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