Mr President Keep the Change (Guest Voice)
Mr President Keep the Change
by Michael Reagan
In late April of this year, at the three-month mark of his administration, President Obama challenged his cabinet to save $100 million over the following 90 days. Well, not surprisingly those 90 days have come and gone without the spend-happy administration saying anything about meeting the goals of this self-imposed publicity stunt.
Now don’t get me wrong, any effort to curb out-of-control spending by the rapidly expanding bureaucracy is a good thing. However, at a time when most Americans are personally feeling the pinch of the economic crisis and are understandably cutting back on their own spending, we should expect the president’s own cabinet to be able to respond to his challenge by finding a mere $100 million in savings out of the $3 trillion-plus annual federal budget. After all, that kind of money is only the equivalent of the average American forgoing their daily Starbucks run.
And while I fully anticipate the administration to quickly find a quick way out of this public relations nightmare, it does raise an important question: If the cabinet cannot make these miniscule cuts now, then how can we have confidence that they will show future restraint in an effort to slow down the skyrocketing national deficit? Unfortunately, we cannot.
The federal government’s potent spending combination of bank rescues, bailouts and other economic “rescue” programs is getting costlier by the minute. According to the recent congressional testimony of Neil Barofsky, a special inspector general assigned to the nation’s finances, these bailouts could end up costing us an astounding $23.7 trillion — a number that exceeds the combined cost of every war the United States has ever fought and is far north of the nation’s annual GDP.
Of greater concern is the fact that this calculation does not even include the administration’s proposal for comprehensive health care reform — an effort that will require massive tax increases on American families and likely push our nation into even greater debt.
Our nation is continuing to lose jobs at record pace; the economic forecast remains murky at best, and the federal government simply refuses to control its spending. The result is that the $1.84 trillion projected year-end deficit — already four times larger than past records — may in fact have been way too optimistic.
In short, we are spending at record pace and putting our country into back-breaking debt — a lasting “gift” that we can expect to pass on to our children’s children.
It is no wonder that Americans are starting to question President Obama’s ability to handle our economy effectively. In a recent poll conducted by USA Today, 49 percent (and climbing) of Americans disapprove of the president’s handling of the economy.
It hasn’t taken Americans long to recognize that we were short-changed on the promises then-candidate Obama made to us about his stewardship of the nation’s finances. It is time for the president to start following through on government policies of fiscal discipline and decreased spending, beginning with his own cabinet. Then, perhaps an increasing number of Americans wouldn’t be telling President Obama that he can keep his “change.”
Mike Reagan, the elder son of the late President Ronald Reagan, is chairman and president of The Reagan Legacy Foundation (www.reaganlegacyfoundation.org). Look for Mike’s newest book, “Twice Adopted” and other info at www.Reagan.com. ©2009 Mike Reagan. Mike’s column is distributed exclusively by: Cagle Cartoons, Inc., newspaper syndicate. The cartoon by John Cole, The Scranton Times-Tribune, is also copyrighted and licensed to run on TMV. All Rights Reserved. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited
9 Responses to “Mr President Keep the Change (Guest Voice)”
Ah, another supremely objective column by Mr. Reagan.
Not a word as to why we are in the mess we are.
Not a word on the deficit spending by Obama's predecessor.
Noty a word about eight years of destroying our economy
Not a word about the fact that when Mr. Bush left office we were losing more than 700,000 jobs every month (Unemployment is still too high, and rising, but monthly job losses are down)
Not a word about the fact that when Mr. Bush left office the housing market was in free fall, and is now recovering.
Not a word about the fact that when Mr. Bush left office our entire financial system was near collapse.
Not a word about the fact that our financial markets have more than recovered the losses that peaked in early March, and recovered from the lows under the Bush administration. (Yes, I know, these are just irrelevant, momentary ups and downs)
Very objective, Mr. Reagan
Yes, I know (and I am sure readers will remind me) that after so many months (six?) after Obama took over an economic disaster eight year in the making, our economy still hasn't fully recovered.
Shame, Mr. Obama!
I really don't like these syndicated columns masquerading as blog posts. The whole point of a blog is that there is interaction between author and readers.
DE, I don't like Michael Reagan either but in this article he is correct that Obama has not followed through on his promises to control his own spending. As I've said before you can blame the recession on Bush but Obama has to take responsibility for the recovery. Obama's failure to control spending in his own cabinet can't be blamed on Bush.
And I still think you need not to pay so much attention to short term fluctuations in the stock market – in that sense you have a lot in common with Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh.
Ah, yes, “those short term meaningless fluctuations” that have now ” meaninglessly fluctuated” for four consecutive months upwards… what is it 30 percent for the DJIA and about 50 percent for NASDAQ?
The DJI of today is not the same as the DJI of 6 months ago so you really say it has increased 30%.
qwert321,
As site administrator, I respect the opinion you made regarding syndicated columns. Maybe we'll try to distinguish them more as syndicated columns.
Thanks for the input.
Michael Reagan has posted some pretty weak columns in the past. Respectfully, this is not one of them. I left the Republican party in 2005. Why? Because Republicans were spending like drunken sailors. In comparison, in six short months, the Dems have made them look fiscally conservative. If things continue as they're going, there will be many new GOP members of Congress elected in 2010. Perhaps this is the real reason Senator Reid has postponed the health care vote until September. He and his colleagues, are they beginning to hear rumblings in the electorate after the Dem-led massive spending binge? Can you spell overreach?
I don't know how you recover from a recession characterized by greatly lowered demand without spending.
DE I usually watch the SPY as a proxy for the broader market. It's been running around 90-95 for the past couple of months which is pretty much where it was when Bush was a lame duck Nov-Jan. TARP I started in early October. Since Obama's inauguration the SPY went down and has come back up, make of that what you will.
In the past week it's broken out to 98 which I think is bullish but I've been wrong before many times. We won't know we're out of the recession until we've been out of it a while though.