All through the campaign Barack Obama told us not to listen to the “politics of fear.” These are the ways of the old guard, the naysayers, the negative ones – he said. Those who won’t sit and talk with the bad men are the warmongers – he called them. These are the guys who created our enemies, he inferred. Don’t listen when they use words like “terrorist” and “disaster” and ignore the call to be vigilant. It’s a neo-con ruse. It’s a plot to scare you.
So what has our president been saying lately? The economic slump is a “continuing disaster,” he told us. He said the economy is “in crisis.” Back in December he told us it was “going to get worse.” Recently he warned of a “national catastrophe” if the stimulus bill wasn’t passed. He kept his speech before the joint session somewhat more positive in a stylistic sense (style points count when you blow off your promise about not tolerating any earmarks). But still, again down goes the Dow.
I can’t remember a president in my lifetime who out of the gate, has been so pessimistic and directly affected the markets so negatively. This man sits in the most powerful position on the globe. His words BOOM above every other chief on the planet. A president says it – the world listens. He keeps telling us he inherited this problem. No sir, you wanted this problem. You ran on it, with it and for it. Time to stop the blame and deliver on your promises, deliver on your hope. The markets need some.
Now, say for instance you have several million dollars and are thinking about investing in a start up business but you turn on the tube and the leader of the free world is saying words like “disaster” and “crisis” and other doom gloomy tidbits. Maybe you put your dinero back in your pocket? I think so.
Or, you employ a crap load of people and are teetering on some layoffs due to the fear that things just might get worse, and you punch up the boys at MSNBC playing some tape of our president doing the henny penny deal. Hmmmmm, maybe Bob Cratchit needs to go, after all. Screw, Tiny Tim.
Obama laid the groundwork for the market’s fear of him during the campaign by inferring capitalists were villains, and wealthy folks were their henchmen. Pure class warfare. Earth to the White House: Big business employs people.
In order to help Main Street, we need to make sure there are some stores left on Main Street. And in order to help the worker, we have to be sure he has a place to work. Watching corporations and passing sensible regulation is fine, but turning them into villains and crying disaster every five minutes has its repercussions. The repercussions are evident in the markets. We need a leader who can instill pride, confidence and a spark in the American worker, and most importantly in the American corporation. Like it or not, we depend on corporations for almost everything we touch.
During WWII, when England cringed under Hitler’s bombs, Winston Churchill inspired a nation to come together, to persevere through adversity, and he told them that in doing this, it would be their “finest hour.”
However, we keep hearing the bad news. We keep hearing how bad all those nasty corporations are. Mr. President, you need to inspire, not fatigue. You need to lift us up and grease the wheels of commerce (hint: lower their tax burden).
Being so unhopeful, you’re sounding to us like a sort of Anti-Churchill.
“We will hand out on the land, we will hand out on the sea, we will punish the wealthy. We will reward failure and incompetence, debtors and greed; with a new start. We will transfer the wealth. We will demand that those who planned and saved, worked and sacrificed, turned down the vacations, and didn’t run up debt, PAY UP to help you – my overspending brothers and sisters.”
To me it is plain as day; our president must inspire hope in business, as well as the common American. He needs to remind us that we have gone astray in our personal spending and debt, and spur on the corporations.
Americans are addicted to credit and spending. It’s time to realize that we as a nation have a personal problem and we need to take the personal steps to correct it. Not everyone can afford the best cars, houses, toys, vacations. Credit needs to be paid back, and at a much higher cost. Addiction is a nasty thing, and denial is part of the problem. So by taking the focus off our real problem, and praying for the leader to bail us out, we just might be hiding the problem that is still there. They say addicts sometimes trade one addiction for another, then delude themselves into thinking they have truly kicked their addicted ways.So just maybe, America is trading it’s addiction to spending… for its addiction to Obama.
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