Today (2/12/11) i accidentally heard the president's weekly radio address. Sorta' makes some sense to me because we've been totally trashed by companies sending our manufacturing jobs overseas. Most manufacturing jobs don't need a college education to do. I think that's pretty obvious. So, to put people to work, they gotta' be educated to work in some other way. Ok, I buy that (with my tax dollars :) (and with my own, personal dollars as i was one of those who were trashed when the H1-B cap skyrocketed in the early-mid 2000s because u.s. technology workers were "unavailable" [aka won't work for peanuts] and paid for college to get a b.s. for my new career. Went into debt to get out of debt hole. On the surface it doesn't make sense unless you think about it for a bit).
So, we pay some money to educate workers in a hard-hit industry. We spend a little money to get them from being a tax dollar sink to a tax dollar source. Who can think that's wrong? The other possibility is to let them flounder until they've used up all the unemployment benefits and then go on welfare. Hmmm....still a tax dollar sink.
Or, as the response side proposed today, we drastically cut back the budget to pay off the deficit as soon as possible. What can we cut? The military budget, around $600,000,000,000.00 , seems like a good place to start as just a few percent would be a really big chunk of change, except the smaller government movement won't allow us to touch that. That's Lie Number 1: smaller government really isn't about smaller government, it's about maximizing income for those that have.
The response side also blames the president for the bailout bill. Hmmm...the bill was passed in 2008 and obama didn't take office until 2009. That means it was passed by a republican president and congress. I'm not debating the merits of the bill here, i am pointing out Lie Number 2.
Here's Lie Number 3: the current regulatory climate is stifiling recovery. Let's look at that from a different angle: the lax regulatory climate pioneered by the responding side caused (or allowed to happen) the financial market crash. Had it been better regulated, perhaps we wouldn't be in this morass.
Should we remove regulations from the mining industry and eliminate all the safety requirements? Methinks not. Those guys (and some women) work hard enough, let's keep it safe for them. Let's also keep it safe for the environment (the place where we get our breathing air and drinking water).
How about the chemical, drug, and nuclear industry? Remove regulations and have another love canal? Methinks not.
How about the food industry? Can anyone say they enjoy harmful drugs in our imported fish and shrimp? Antifreeze in our toothpaste? How about melamine in our cat and dog food? Lead paint on our children's toys? Should we remove these regulations? Methinks not.
And car safety? Nah, let's keep things safe.
Lie Number 4: All this complaining by the responding side is not about improving the country. It is about improving the lot of the "haves" at the expense of the "have nots."
So, suck it up responding side and stop lying. Say what it really is and perhaps i'll at least be able to respect that portion of your position.
I Jes' Wanna Know
p.s. The NYTimes has a cool little app to let you fix the financial problems yourself. Check it out.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/11/13/weekinreview/deficits-graphic.html
Here's my solution:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/11/13/weekinreview/deficits-graphic.html?choices=1lf5qbq0
