We are in the midst of an economic collapse that is rapidly changing the financial landscape of America. Every day it seems we get more bad news. Today, we get the grim news that unemployment is at 8.1%, the economy lost 651,000 jobs last month and the total for the recession tips the scale at 4 million jobs lost. With the looming prospect of General Motors seeking bankruptcy protection and a number of banks in real danger of collapsing, the economy is really on the precipice of a serious turn for the worse (believe it or not). Americans, especially older Americans, are faced with a retirement date that is moving further away each day. These are scary times for a lot of people. America needs clear, positive leadership. That is not what we are getting.
As Peggy Noonan pointed out in the opinion pages of the Wall Street Journal, President Obama sees this crisis as an opportunity to push through sweeping changes to our nation. Changes in how we do business, health care, taxes, banking, defense. Seismic changes to the relationship between the government and the people, with the government taking on a much larger and vastly more expensive role in American life. All under the guise of fixing what ails our nation. The recession is providing political camouflage for new policies of tax increases, socialized medicine, massive income redistributionist policies and an exploding national debt.
This is a time for leadership, a time for stabilization. Americans need to turn on the TV and see our President being frank and honest about the challenges we face, but also providing the leadership and vision we need to get out of the economic morass we are in. What we are getting instead is a man who is trying to build a legacy, making a name for himself at the expense of the economy and the long term future of America. Most Presidents, especially two term presidents late in their second term, start to worry about what their “legacy” will be. How will history and future generations of Americans view their Presidency? President Obama seems to be preoccupied with trying to forge his legacy RIGHT NOW, in March of 2009, a scant two months into his administration. Instead of being a leader, taking charge and leading this country forward, when Obama acts or speaks he seems to make things worse. The stock market should have stabilized by now, but it continues to drop because the policies being put forth by this administration are hurting America’s hopes for long term growth and economic vitality. We need solutions that will stabilize the economy and address the fundamental problems, painful though that will be. Instead we get massive pork spending under the guise of “stimulus”. The same institution that brings you the DMV is about to seize an enormous parcel of the economic system of this country and turn it into an inefficient, wealth destroying shell of itself that looks more like the weak economies of once great nations in Europe and a lot less like the economy that had been the envy of the rest of the world throughout my lifetime.
Millions of older Americans have seen their invested wealth evaporate. That is not a big deal for me. At 37, I am entering my peak earning years and this is a great time to sock money away. But for those who are approaching retirement age or are already retired, the stock market downturn has turned into a free for all. Where is the leadership? We cannot count on future generations making up the shortfall because the ranks of the elderly continue to grow and the replacement rate of new workers continues to fall, thanks to the new American worldview that children are a burden, an economic line item and a threat to the environment.
I am pretty sure that the Obama team, like most of America, has little idea what has gotten us into this situation and even less idea of how to get us out. I also don’t think that they care. This is an opportunity the likes of which the American Left has not had since before Nixon to radically reshape this nation and they are not wasting a minute in enacting it. One hopes that the enduring legacy of the Obama administration is not that they used the current recession as cover for a Leftward lurch because in normal times the American people would reject neo-socialism. This is a time for us to be getting the truth from our leaders, but unfortunately the truth is a scarce commodity that is becoming increasingly rare.
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