THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume XIII, Issue # 185, July 30, 2011
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
UNLEASHING AMERICANS
By Alan Caruba
AMERICA'S CURRENT ECONOMIC DIFFICULTIES: A RECESSION THAT FEELS LIKE A DEPRESSION -- THE REALITY OF A
FINANCIAL CRISIS THAT BEGAN IN LATE 2008, WHEN THE HOUSING BUBBLE BURST -- AMERICANS FINALLY ENGAGED IN A
REAL DEBATE OVER THE NATIONAL DEBT & THE FUTURE OF THE U.S.A. -- RECOGNITION THAT THE FEDERAL DEBT MUST BE
REDUCED & WHAT HAVE BEEN THE DISASTROUS ECONOMIC & WELFARE POLICIES OF THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION
MUST BE REVERSED -- RECOGNITION THAT THE U.S. CENTRAL GOVERNMENT MUST BE REDUCED IN SIZE & SCOPE -- THE NEED
TO SUBSTANTIALLY REDUCE GOVERNMENT REGULATION & CONTROL OF THE ECONOMY, END GOVERNMENT RESTRICTIONS
ON DOMESTIC ENERGY PRODUCTION & EXPLOITATION OF OUR OWN NATURAL RESOURCES, END THE GOVERNMENT'S
UNCONTROLLED BORROWING OF MONEY, CURB & SLOW DOWN THE GROWING NATIONAL DEBT & ITS INCREASING BURDEN
ON THE PEOPLE, & THEREBY UNLEASH THE ENTREPRENEURIAL ENERGIES OF AMERICANS.
FULL STORY:
“I predict future happiness for Americans if they can
prevent the government from wasting the labors of the
people under the pretense of taking care of them.”
-- Thomas Jefferson
My father was a certified public accountant, as is my older brother. I not only lacked any arithmetical skills, I spent much
of my early years ignoring the ups and downs of the economy, thinking that these matters were beyond my
comprehension. What I failed to understand was that the economy was as much a creature of meddling politicians as
economic theories.
I was born in the midst of the Great Depression and have now lived long enough to be caught in a new one. I know that
economists and others say we are in a Recession, but it feels like a Depression to me and to the millions of other
Americans who are out of work and being laid off weekly. It feels like one to those who suffered foreclosure on their
homes. It feels like one every time we go to the supermarket and gasp in disbelief at the cost of groceries.
The unimaginable debt that Americans have incurred by borrowing far too much as a nation and as individuals with credit
cards, and the ease with which one could borrow against home equity, has now forced us to deal with the reality of a
financial crisis that began in late 2008, when the housing bubble burst.
Historically, it started far earlier, when Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, elements of the 1930s New Deal, were created to bring
“social justice” to the housing market. By the time of the 2008 implosion, they owned more than half of all mortgages
issued in the nation.
While the politicians seek to position themselves to blame the other party, the saving grace is that, in 2010, voters returned
power in the U.S. House of Representatives to the Republicans; doing so by electing a large number of “Tea Party”
candidates pledged to reduce the debt and reverse what have been the disastrous policies of the Obama administration.
Despite the breathless reporting of the 24/7 news channels, the parade of politicians on both sides explaining their
positions, the real news is that Americans are finally engaged in a real debate over the debt and the nation’s future. In 2012,
they will vote to change course and, just as European nations that also borrowed too much, they will have to accept
austerity measures.
A lot of government programs and, indeed, whole agencies and departments should be ended.
It’s not the death of statism and socialism in America, but it is the recognition that a government that seizes and
redistributes the wealth of working Americans must be reversed, revised, and reduced in size and scope.
Too much taxation, too much regulation, too much borrowing, and too much wasteful spending is what the national debate
is all about and it is a long overdue debate.
In the land of the brave and the home of the free, Americans want to be free to decide what kind of light bulbs they can
purchase, what kind of cars they can drive, and end all the other restrictions that make doing business in America an
expensive, unrealistic nightmare.
In a way, the infatuation with a completely unknown, untested, and inexperienced president has been a wake-up call.
Barack Obama was packaged to be a celebrity, a “messiah”, when all he really was, was an ill-prepared, standard issue
Marxist. He surrounded himself with economic advisors and unvetted “czars” who shared his belief that one last, big push
could “transform” a nation that was more in need of a sensible budget than grandiose and failed socialist solutions.
The result was the appalling Obamacare law that attempted to seize twenty percent of the nation’s economy. The House of
Representatives has voted to repeal the law. Twenty-six states have gone to court to have it nullified. A Republican
president and Senate in 2012 will end it.
Obama and the “green economy” advocates around him have dumped billions of dollars into wind and solar energy
companies that could not exist without government subsidies, coupled with government mandates for their use. Combined,
wind and solar provide less than three percent of the nation’s electricity and will never meet America's needs.
The nation’s auto industry, once the envy of the world, is almost entirely controlled by the U.S. central government, which,
even in the midst of the debt ceiling debate, was telling the industry it must produce lighter, more dangerous automobiles
to meet unrealistic demands that they provide more mileage per gallon. You cannot get more energy from a gallon of
gasoline than you can from any other source of energy that is ruled by the laws of physics.
Openly scornful of fossil fuels, the Obama administration has rendered the nation more dependent on foreign oil and waged
war on coal and, now, on natural gas.
The Obama moratorium on drilling for oil in the Gulf of Mexico has wreaked havoc on the oil industry, pursuing the same
policies of earlier administrations that have thwarted exploration and extraction of the billions of barrels of U.S. oil that go
untapped and unused. Oil rigs have been departing the Gulf to other nations, along with thousands of jobs and millions in
the revenue they contributed to the economy. The vast resources of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska remain
off-limits, even though only the tiniest part of the refuge would be affected.
We suffered a socialist “stimulus” that stimulated nothing but an increased multi-trillion dollar debt.
I think America has turned an invisible corner and that, as soon as we rid the nation of President Obama and his
tax-and-spend Democratic Party supporters in Congress, the nation will begin to correct its borrow-and-borrow-some-more
profligate ways. A smaller, less intrusive government may emerge in the years, the decades ahead.
The entrepreneurial energies of Americans will be unleashed if that occurs. The present Recession/Depression will join all
the previous ones we have been through. We have all been chastened, and we will conclude it wasn’t just Barack Obama’s
policies, but also decades of statist and socialist policies dating back to the earliest days of the last century.
If that occurs, our children and grandchildren will have the excessive burden of debt lifted from them and Americans' energy,
innovation, and optimism will prevail.
-------------------------------------------------------------
© Alan Caruba, 2011
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Political Economy -- Philosophies, Systems, & Public Policies:
Government, the Economy, & Economic Prosperity
Fiscal Policy: Taxation & Government Spending
Political Environmentalism Versus Human Progress & Prosperity:
Policy Issues Relating to Energy, Environment,
& Natural Resources
The American Political & Cultural Left:
Liberals, Statists, Socialists, Marxists, & Other Leftists:
The Democratic Party, Academia, & the Mainstream Media
Liberalism Versus Conservatism in American Politics
-------------------------
POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY & POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES:
COMPETING SYSTEMS OF POLITICAL THOUGHT
Conservatism
Traditional Conservatism: Questions & Answers
Conservatism: Attitudes, Types, & Present Status
Constitutional Conservatism: American & British
Liberalism
Classical Liberalism: Intellectual Foundations
Classical Liberalism: Conservative Liberalism
Manchester Liberalism & Social Darwinism
Modern Social "Liberalism": Statist "Liberalism"
Radical & Totalitarian Ideologies
Radicalism, Utopianism, & Totalitarianism
Alan Caruba's commentaries are posted daily at Warning Signs, his popular blog -- and thereafter on dozens of other
websites and blogs. His monthly report on new books is posted at Bookviews.
A business and science writer, Caruba is the Founder of The National Anxiety Center, a clearinghouse for information
about "scare campaigns" designed to influence public opinion and policy.
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Conservative & Free-Market Analysis of Government, Politics & Public Policy, Covering Political, Legal, Constitutional, Economic,
Cultural, Military, International, Strategic, & Geopolitical Issues
Conservative Government Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity