Opinion
If there is one thing Republicans have been good it, it is
convincing the pubic that a budget deficit crisis is worse than an unemployment
crisis.
Campaign advertising and the right-wing blogosphere has been
the GOP’s most prominent messenger of
fear since Barack Obama took office. But the concept of give to the rich and take
from the poor is not a new one for conservatives.
The GOP political mission that favors a deregulated corporate
America over workers’ benefits has been going on for decades, in small increments
so the shifts would be real, but more subtle.
However, when the economic design was more fully implemented,
under the George W. Bush administration, Wall Street CEOs used their new-found capitalistic
freedom to commit mortgage securities fraud for profit. The result was a disaster.
American taxpayers had to bailout Wall Street, so global
financial markets would not crash and set off a second Great Depression. Still,
the TARP fund bailouts were still not enough to blunt the damage the bankers
had caused. The US housing market collapsed, unemployment soared, and the
federal deficit expanded.
In the 2012 elections, voters soundly rejected the tried-and-failed
ideologies of the Republican Party, handing them devastating losses, from the senate
to the White House.
Despite their Election Day rebuttal, Republicans continue to
damage their public image by trying to force their minority views and failed
policies on the masses. In their public relations battle, they continue to
insist that the only way to solve America’s problems is to cut federal spending
in just about every area – except defense.
But their math still does not add up.
The Washington
Post writes:
“If Republicans really
want deficit reduction, they simply need to accept that it will have to be
accomplished through a mix of spending cuts and new revenues, via closing
loopholes on the wealthy…”
There is another way to bring money into the Treasury. It’s
called job growth. But the Republicans fail to see the value in creating jobs
that pay American workers a living wage.
In the three years since taking control of the House, the Republican
majority has done nothing to stimulate job creation. Nothing.
It is not enough to give lip-service to the American public
on the campaign trail, then go to Washington and say “No” to every idea that
involves actual governing.
The American people want and deserve more than partisan
battles that pit government favors for the rich, against everyone else. Been
there, done that.
America does not need another George W. Bush economic plan,
and it’s time the Republican Party understood that.
