Posted by
reasonmclucus on Sunday, September 28, 2008 2:51:21 PM
The economic portion of the so called debate Friday night was a waste
of time. Neither candidate provided more than a vague set of conditions
for evaluating any proposal. They want us to put them in charge,
but have nothing to offer for dealing with the current
crisis.
But their lack of any solution shouldn't be surprising. If either had a
solution to the credit he would have been in Washington trying to get
Congress to
adopt his solution instead of debating in Mississippi. Hopefully,
President George W. Bush will solve the problem before they take office.
Sen. Barack Obama kept trying to bring up the issue of health
care which is
irrelevant to the credit crisis. In general Obama seems more
concerned with playing the blame game than ending the crisis.
The important thing now is to end the crisis.
Both candidates repeated the old religions of their parties.
Sen. John McCain says he is going to freeze federal
spending except for defense and entitlement programs. It'll never
happen. Republicans have been talking about that for decades
and haven't succeeded.
Most programs have too many supporters in Congress to be reduced.
Federal agencies often have regional offices, and the communities with
those offices will pressure their congressional
delegation to keep those offices open. The
communities or organizations that benefit will also lobby
for keeping the programs.
Sen; Obama claims he's going to raise revenue by closing corporate
loopholes. Democrats have been promising to do that for decades
and haven't succeeded yet. Congress creates new loopholes faster
than it eliminates old ones. Even if Congress did eliminate
loopholes no money could be raised by taxing companies that are already
losing money.
McCain has a better chance to freeze spending than Obama has to
eliminate corporate loopholes. The president can veto spending
bills. The president cannot force congress to close tax loopholes.
McCain is correct that Obama's spending program would
require a general tax increase rather than a reduction. If Obama
really believes that he can cut taxes and increase spending, those nice
young men in their clean white coats need to take him to the happy
home.
According to the Main Stream Media, Obama is supposed to be stronger on
economic issues. I saw no evidence of that Friday night.
Based on the comments the candidates made on the economic
situation during the debate we would be better off keeping
President George W. Bush for the next four years or bringing back Bill
Clinton. Many people have forgotten that Bush
brought us through the economic crisis that followed
the 9/11 attack.