Romney’s Advice to Obama

In an interview with Fortune Magazine, Mitt Romney gave President-elect Obama some advice on the economic crisis we are now in. Perhaps the most profound advice he gave was that Obama “should forget about re-election and focus on helping the nation at a critical time. He should dismiss the people who helped him win the election and bring in people who are above politics and above party. He should surround himself with statesmen and economists, businesspeople and leaders.”   How true that is.  Besides if Obama took this advice and worked the economy issue, re-election would work itself out.

In further addressing the economy Mitt gave some great points:

• Regarding unions:

The unions have helped Barack Obama. They will hope to be paid back. I’m particularly concerned that organized labor would call on Barack Obama to pass the card check program. This removes from American workers the right to the secret ballot in deciding whether or not to accept a union. This legislation would do more to harm America’s long-term competitiveness than almost anything I can imagine. It would be a partisan payback for organized labor but it would come with devastating consequences for the nation.

• On the Auto Industry

Right now, the auto industry is on life support, and its prospects look extremely dim. But they don’t need to be. The industry could be turned around. There is no inherent reason why America can’t build and sell cars to Americans at least as well as the transplants are doing. Any effort to help the auto industry has to be made as part of a comprehensive strategy. Before the government issues loans to the auto industry, as has been authorized by Congress, it should insist on seeing credible and independent strategies that will return the companies to long-term sustainability. Government should not finance ongoing losses and declining market shares.

• On the Global Economy

Far too little attention was paid to America’s long-term competitive position during the campaign. I see four major economic strategies at play in the world today: the first is ours. It combines freedom and free enterprise.

The second is China’s. It combines free enterprise with authoritarianism.

The third is Russia’s. No longer is Russia’s plan for dominance based upon industrial capacity but rather upon controlling energy throughout the world. Hence Russia’s cozy relationship with Iran and Venezuela as well as its belligerent entry into Georgia. Russia’s strategy is based on energy and authoritarianism.

The fourth strategy is represented by radical violent jihad. The intent of the jihadists is to cause the collapse of the other three, such that the “hidden Imam” or the Caliphate remains the last man standing.

The real challenge for America is how to strengthen our competitive position so that our economy outperforms those of the other three. If we’re successful, freedom will be preserved for the world. If we’re unsuccessful, the results are unthinkable.

• On the apparent populist shift in American ideology

I can only hope the President abandons the populist current, which seems to be growing in our country. An effort to block foreign trade will only hurt America. Ultimately products in this country would become uncompetitive. Look what happened to the Soviet Union. Its cars, its watches, its goods became a joke.

The only way to remain the leading economy in the world is to be successful on a level playing field around the world. Some individuals, at the behest of special interests, seek to prevent trade with other nations by imposing America’s labor requirements and other peculiarities. That is a disguised form of protectionism.

And the GOP chose McCain!  What a bunch of idiots.  Mitt Romney is smarter than any of the candidates that ran in 2008.  And America lost when he did.  Anyway, enough of looking backwards, we need to get him in the White House in 2012, but I digress.

The fact is, on the economy he is right.  Capitalism and ‘free’ trade are what made America great and strong.  Our military might is a result of our economic might.  Our freedoms are because of economic freedom.   Protectionism and isolationism will fail every time.   The thing with capitalism is that it is not an easy pill swallow all the time.  Sometimes the market is booming and other times it is crashing, sometimes people succeed other times people fail.   But all of that is what makes capitalism great, everyone has an opportunity and everyone can pull themselves out of the “social class” they were born into.  While socialist and other economic models may succeed in bringing equality (though they never have yet), but if they do, they undoubtedly make everyone equally poor and miserable.  Capitalism is not perfect, but it is the best system in the world none the less and America’s movement away from it would be a danger to us and to the world at large.  Russia and China aren’t going to be as benevolent and nice as America and ultimately, those are the three countries that will determine the world’s future.   I would certainly rather live in a world guided by America.

11 Day’s Out, It’s All Over

It is probably a bit pre-mature, but the presidential race between Barack Obama and John McCain might as well be over.  I have been contemplating writing this post for the last two weeks, but haven’t been convinced.  Well, today I am.  We are 11 days out of the election, less than two weeks and Barack’s lead is anywhere between 3 points and 11 points nationally, he is safely winning all the states that Kerry won in ’04, is comfortably ahead in a few states that Bush won in ’04, and is within the margin of error (+/-) in many states that have gone GOP in the past few elections.   There is not one state that Kerry won, even those considered “swing” states, that McCain has a chance to win. Don’t believe me?  Let’s review two “blue swing states”: Minnesota: O=56%, M=41% – 15 point lead and Pennsylvania: O= 51%, M= 41% – 10 point lead. Ouch!

Every “swing-state” is a state that went Red in ’04 and some should be solidly red. McCain is struggling mightily in Ohio, Florida, Virginia, North Carolina, Missouri, Nevada, and Colorado. Even in states like North Dakota and Montana there has been talk of Barack making a push. Are you kidding? McCain is entirely playing defense and no offense. This is not a winning strategy, in order to win the election he will pretty well have to win each of these states; at most he could lose one of them and perhaps still pull out the win. That is not going to happen.

So why is it so bad? Well, the first reason is the economy. People blame the Bush administration and by default McCain. They shouldn’t (solely) blame either. Blame falls on everyone, but especially congressional democrats who refused to address the mortgage issue when GOP congressmen were warning of an inevitable collapse. But Democrats disagreed and said the system was good because it was getting poor people into home ownership. Well we have seen how well that worked out. But McCain has failed to get that message out, he has failed to spread the word that he called for an investigation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac 2 years ago. Sure much of this is the media’s fault as they refuse to seriously cover any news that may harm Obama (just look at how they have ignored the Ayers story, if that were reversed and McCain were the culprit, McCain would have been crucified). But it is also McCain’s fault. He has been awful getting information out and going on the attack. I know he doesn’t prefer that kind of politics, but it is necessary for important issues. Sarah Palin has been effective, but what can a veep do?

The other reason that McCain is losing so bad is that he is a terrible, terrible candidate. What were the GOP thinking nominating this guy. I still don’t know anyone who actually wants HIM to be President. Most people are voting for him because they don’t want Obama or because they like Palin. McCain is a terrible speaker, has no energy, doesn’t have much a platform and no message, and isn’t terribly intelligence (I am not saying he is dumb, but he is no smarter than the average American). If the GOP had nominated Mitt Romney or Rudy Giuliani we would probably winning or tied with Obama. The only serious GOP candidate that would have been a bigger disaster is Mike Huckabee.

A friend of mine made a great point the other day, as he has paid attention to the campaign he hears Obama speak and notices that Obama has a message. It may not be a message of much substance, but he has a message and sticks to it. That is change and hope and when he discusses his specific policy ideas he ties them all into change and hope. When he hears McCain there is no message. McCain is all over the map. Thus, there is nothing memorable about McCain, there is not one thing where people can think of McCain and think of him as President. His advisors have not handled him well. Both Karl Rove and James Carville admitted that in their elections as advisors to Bush and Clinton respectively, one of their most important responsibilities were to keep the candidate on message. Remember people don’t care about policy and specific ideas they care about what ever candidate makes them feel good, moves them, and builds trust. That’s largely it. McCain hasn’t done it in the least.

The silver lining to all of this for me is that I can’t stand either candidate. I am voting for McCain, but while holding my nose. On Tuesday night, November 4th, when CNN announces that they project Barack Obama as the next President of the United States at 9:42 pm EST (before the polls even close in the West), I will shrug my shoulders, go back to watching “Scrubs” and begin fasting and praying that the American people, and especially GOP voters, will be smart enough to nominate Mitt Romney in 2012. I still can’t believe that the GOP was stupid enough nominate McCain over Romney, amazing.

Comrade Bush

 

Hugo Chavez, the dictator of Venezuela, referred to President Bush as Comrade Bush and said Bush has moved “left” in the financial crisis. Normally, I would defend the President and his actions, I can’t say that I have minded the Bush administration and generally feel he has done a better job than most give him credit for.  But in this instance Hugo Chavez is absolutely right!

President Bush moved left like I never thought possible.  First, fully supporting spending 700 billion dollars to bailout mortgage companies, then announcing that the federal government will buy majority shares of private banks!

Is he kidding? What have we become as a nation?  Is our society and culture so reactionary that we will compromise the very founding principles that made us great?  Apparently so. But if I wanted to live in Venezuela or Russia I would move there.  But I don’t, I want to live in America, moreover I want to live in a place where I can work hard, earn money to support my family and live a comfortable life, and have the freedom to worship, play, work, speak, and move the way I want to. But the actions of our government over the last few years continually erode those rights. 

But, you may be saying, what does the nationalization of banks have to do with the way you want to live?  Well, it is yet another step towards socialism and government control.  Government, no matter where you live, loves its power and will rarely relinquish it but often seeks to expand it.  Does anyone honestly think that the continued forays of the government in to the private markets and our citizens pocketbook is going to slow down any time soon?  Especially considering the legislature will continue to be controlled by America’s socialist party (Democrats) and will soon have the most left of their Senators as her President?  No chance.

And that is the most frustrating aspect of this whole move by Bush to begin nationalizing these banks. He came out and said that he wasn’t a fan of this action but felt it was necessary to ensure stability in the banking structure of America and then he promised that this is a short term nationalization and that the government will sell the shares back to the companies when stablized.  Does he think we are stupid?  Do any of you believe him? Not me.  And it is not that I don’t believe him per se, it is that the decision will not be his.  If this occured in his second year as President, I would be more inclined to believe him. Why? because he would be the one to decide on the action of selling the shares a year or two down the road.  But he has three months left in office.  So unless he sells those shares before January 20th, they aren’t getting sold anytime soon.  Do you think Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, or Harry Reid will sell them?  No chance.  They have little faith in the free market, support government control, and have no desire to relinquish power.

How dare our government take such irresponsible and reactionary actions? In any free society and market there are going to be ups and downs.  Major collapses seem to occur every 10-15 years (see 2000 and the Tech collapse) and every time our market pulls out of it and becomes stronger (see the Bush economy around 2006).  The free market is like nature: unpredictable, wild, efficient, successful, and prone to forest fires and disasters.  Additionally, just like a forest fire in nature is initially devastating to the forest, it is always a net positive.  The forest grows back healthier and stronger.  The market is the same way.  A fire is often necessary to get rid of the chaff and strengthen the economy, except in this instance, our government decided to use taxpayers money…MY MONEY… to keep the chaff in the market.  It will be a disaster, everything the governement touches usually does.

Barack is Right, but He Should Have Known Better

It is no secret that I am no fan of Barack Obama, but generally speaking I agree with him that this whole Pig comment thing should not really be a controversy.

For those of you who are not familiar with the controversy overtaking the United States, in a speech about economics yesterday, Barack Obama said, “You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig.” At first glance most anyone who has been following Sarah Palin and the election could understand how one would think this was a slam against Palin. But when one reads the context for which the comment was made it is clear that he was referring to Bush’s and McCain’s generally similar economic plans. Essentially he said that McCain can talk about change all he wants, referring to the economy, but “You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig.” And then he added, immediately following that line, “You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called ‘change,’ it’s still going to stink.”

Was it a slight at Palin (referring to the lipstick)? Maybe. Was it a slight at McCain (referring to the ‘old fish’)? Maybe so. I kind of think it was meant to be a subtle jab, but I don’t put much stock into the whole controversy, those phrases were reasonable for the topic to which he was speaking and it probably shouldn’t be the issue it is.

But this politics. Anything one says can be and will be used against the candidate. I find it really disingenuous that Barack is criticizing the McCain camp for using this for political gain, as both parties take statements out of context, just as ridiculous as this, all of the time. Obama and his advisors should have known this and should have known better.

So while I think there is no merit to the attack from the GOP, Barack should have been smarter than this. And it demonstrates his political newness. You see, the most memorable line from Sarah Palin’s speech at the GOP convention was, “What is the difference between a pit bull and soccer mom? Lipstick”. As a result, anytime anyone hears the word lipstick, for whatever reason, voters are immediately going to associate that comment with Sarah Palin. If you think I am wrong, just watch the below video of Barack’s comments and pay attention to the crowd’s response when he says the lipstick line.

That kind of response would not occur in normal circumstances, the people there immediately associated the comment with Sarah Palin. Barack and his advisors should have been aware of this. And making a comment like that, regardless of its innocence and in a climate where Palin is ridiculously popular and any negativity against her that seems remotely unfair only results in increasing her popularity, is a stupid move.

You see, in this election people don’t care about policy. I think most people who have been following the election since the beginning of the primary season were well aware of this. It is about being a fixer and having a responsible leader. Most voters are fickle and fairly ignorant anyway. They don’t want to hear the nuts and bolts of welfare reform or economic policy, they want to be comfortable, safe, and feel like their President is someone they can feel safe with while the sleep. That’s it. So little lapses of judgement like this, by either candidate, is what matters. Because this is the stuff voters pay attention to. Personally, I think it is ridiculous, but it is the nature of the democratic process, at least in this election. And this is why I think McCain will ultimately win. He generally knows how to avoid these mistakes and will make fewer of them than Barack. Game over.

Vice President Sarah Palin?

According to at least Fox News, backstage sources are saying the Vice Presidential pick for John McCain is Sarah Palin. If so, this is a fantastic pick.

Sarah Palin is the current Governor of Alaska, a mid-40’s female, very attractive, a solid conservative, though environmental minded, and anti-corruption. She would be the best pick for McCain.

What Palin does for the ticket is soothes over conservatives who are concerned about McCain’s moderate stances, wins over many female Hillary supporters who are currently undecided, and potentially brings in the “Soccer Moms”. She is one of only two GOP potential veep selections that can get any where near Obama in terms of exciting the American people (the other being Bobby Jindal). So if this is indeed the pick look for McCain to 1. stifle any bump that Obama got from the convention. I am now fully behind McCain/Palin this year.

BREAKING- The campaign just confirmed the choice according to FoxNews!