Added: Oct 12, 2008
From: AntiConformist911
Duration: 7:0
President Bush peeked out the window of the Oval Office yesterday morning at the crowd awaiting him in the Rose Garden, then went back to pacing. He had little reason to be enthusiastic about the task at hand. It was the 20th time in recent days that he had tried to calm the markets, according to a CBS News tally. The previous 19 times, the market ignored him and continued its downward plunge. And this time would be no different. A few minutes before he walked into the Rose Garden to say that "the American people can be confident in our economic future," the Dow Jones industrials were trading as high as 8530. A few minutes after his speech, the index was at 8224. His chore of reassuring the markets thus completed, Bush turned to more pleasant tasks. He hopped on Air Force One and flew down to Florida for the first of the day's two fundraisers. He had some urgent work to do on the Republican Party's liquidity crisis. The country desperately needs strong leadership now, but there's none to be found at the White House. The president is voicing the right sentiments, even if his words (Thursday's "we'll get through this deal") are characteristically clumsy. He's even affecting the right demeanor, between concern and confidence. But nobody seems to care. Maybe it's his approval rating, now trading at pennies on the dollar. Maybe it's because his credibility was shot by his administration's previous claims about Saddam's nukes and yellowcake and cakewalks and being greeted as liberators and mission accomplished. Either way, White House press secretary Dana Perino had some difficulty explaining the president's role as she briefed reporters aboard Air Force One on the way to Florida. "What's the communications strategy for the president on this crisis?" asked the Associated Press's Deb Riechmann. "I mean, we've heard from him almost every single day since the bailout was announced, yet every time he talks, the Dow goes down." http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/10/AR2008101002555_2.html?sid=ST2008101002842 The lesson for Americans suffused with anxiety and dread over the crackup of the financial markets is that the way you vote matters, that there are real-world consequences when you go into a voting booth and cast that ballot. For the nitwits who vote for the man or woman theyd most like to have over for dinner, or hang out at a barbecue with, I suggest you take a look at how well your 401(k) is doing, or how easy it will be to meet the mortgage this month, or whether the college fund youve been trying to build for your kids is as robust as youd like it to be. Voters in the George W. Bush era gave the Republican Party nearly complete control of the federal government. Now the financial markets are in turmoil, top government and corporate leaders are on the verge of panic and scholars are dusting off treatises that analyzed the causes of the Great Depression. Mr. Bush was never viewed as a policy or intellectual heavyweight. But he seemed like a nicer guy to a lot of voters than Al Gore. Its not just the economy. While the United States has been fighting a useless and irresponsible war in Iraq, Afghanistan — the home base of the terrorists who struck us on 9/11 — has been allowed to fall into a state of chaos. Osama bin Laden is still at large. New Orleans is still on its knees. And so on.I dont for a moment think that the Democratic Party has been free of egregious problems. But there are two things I find remarkable about the G.O.P., and especially its more conservative wing, which is now about all there is. The first is how wrong conservative Republicans have been on so many profoundly important matters for so many years. The second is how the G.O.P. has nevertheless been able to persuade so many voters of modest means that its wrongheaded, favor-the-rich, country-be-damned approach was not only good for working Americans, but was the patriotic way to go. Remember voodoo economics? That was the derisive term George H.W. Bush used for Ronald Reagans fantasy that he could simultaneously increase defense spending, cut taxes and balance the budget. After Reagan became president (with Mr. Bush as his vice president) the budget deficit — surprise, surprise — soared. In a moment of unusual candor, Reagans own chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, Martin Feldstein, gave three reasons for the growth of the deficit: the presidents tax cuts, the increased defense spending and the interest on the expanding national debt. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/11/opinion/11herbert.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
Channel: News
Tags: barack biden crisis debate economic economy energy gas interview iraq joe john lie maddow mccain meltdown obama oil palin president rachel sarah show speech street tax the wall war
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