This post is about twice as long as my usual piece. I apologize in advance.
I came away from the President’s “Jobs” speech disappointed. This was his chance to inspire a nation. The best he could do was advocate for the very things destroying it. Doing so, he showed himself out of touch with the nation and with history.
The President began:
These men and women grew up with faith in an America where hard work and responsibility paid off. They believed in a country where everyone gets a fair shake and does their fair share – where if you stepped up, did your job, and were loyal to your company, that loyalty would be rewarded with a decent salary and good benefits; maybe a raise once in awhile.
He got the first sentence right and not much more. Hard work and responsibility pay off. Because in the real world fair shakes are hard to come by and successful people got that way by doing more than their fair share. There was a time when a family could make it on one income and people stayed at jobs for years. That America was destroyed by government meddling and nothing in his speech restores it. He said not a word on the Market producing prosperity; just a vision of Government as savior.
He continued
The question is whether, in the face of an ongoing national crisis, we can stop the political circus and actually do something to help the economy; whether we can restore some of the fairness and security that has defined this nation since our beginning.
Washington is driven by politics, not reality. The President asked for what I want: stop making decisions based on politics. He then offers up political pablum. What was Fair about the Great Depression, the Civil War or the struggle for Civil Rights? Where was the Security at Plymouth Rock? In the Gold Rush? At the Alamo? America has never been a fair or secure place for any man. Instead, America provided an equal opportunity to every man to risk everything on his dream.
Those of us here tonight can’t solve all of our nation’s woes. Ultimately, our recovery will be driven not by Washington, but by our businesses and our workers.
The most accurate statement he made all night. But he doesn’t believe it. The rest of the speech was how Washington would drive recovery, not the Market.
I am sending this Congress a plan that you should pass right away.
Really? Right away? Without reading it? Without considering the consequences? I should just trust you even though you haven’t done anything to turn the economy around and arguably have driven it further in the hole? Arrogant is the kindest way to describe such an attitude.
Everything in here is the kind of proposal that’s been supported by both Democrats and Republicans
Everything, sir? And which Republicans? Marsha Blackburn and Marco Rubio? Or Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe? Politics only recognizes a “D” or an “R.” Responsible governance requires truth, transparency and a grasp of reality. What we got were words implying the GOP is just fine with everything in his plan.
The President came to the core of his argument just a minute or two into his speech. He said
The purpose of the American Jobs Act is simple: to put more people back to work and more money in the pockets of those who are working. It will create more jobs for construction workers, more jobs for teachers, more jobs for veterans, and more jobs for the long-term unemployed. It will provide a tax break for companies who hire new workers, and it will cut payroll taxes in half for every working American and every small business. It will provide a jolt to an economy that has stalled, and give companies confidence that if they invest and hire, there will be customers for their products and services.
The only jobs actually addressed were in education and construction; great for folks in those fields. How many of the 9% to 15% unemployed work in those fields? How many will actually get a lost job back if the President’s plan passes?
I can’t find a lot of unemployment turnaround in his numbers. The President can’t either and so he wants to extend unemployment benefits for another year. We’ll be paying people to stay home for 3 years now. How will that help the Market drive recovery?
The President says we owe veterans a job. We owe them respect and gratitude. We owe them the best medical care available for as long as it takes to address the ravages war visits on them. We owe them our struggle to keep the country they fought for the same one they return to. But we don’t owe them a job. A civilian job was never promised. Given the military’s high regard for actual ability as opposed to charity, I’m unclear how even veterans would agree with this.
Young people? That Labor segment has one of the highest unemployment rates in the market. Yet nothing the President actually said addressed the problem. Young people are unlikely to be teachers, construction workers or veterans. It sounded nice but was empty of meaning. It was politics. The very thing he said should be done away with.
The rest of his speech was just as vacuous. He asked why China should have new airports and fast railroads. Perhaps because they need them? Do we have millions of people clamoring for passenger rail service? There really isn’t room to build new airports so we’d have to just improve the ones we have. But billions were spent on exactly that in the President’s 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). That stimulus package didn’t fix the economy and neither will this one.
The President promised tax breaks and tax cuts to businesses. But not all of them, just those who hire people. If your company needs a new computer system, building or machinery instead, it’s out of luck. Tax reduction for all businesses would really help the Market drive recovery. Picking what Market behavior gets subsidized just says don’t modernize, don’t upgrade. Just hire people. To do stuff. They need jobs. Somehow that will produce customers. Nice political words. Nothing a business can use in the real Marketplace, though.
He promised relief from burdensome regulations. He exempted those which would impact the safety and security of the workforce. Fine. But sitting in the audience was Gibson Guitar CEO, Henry Juszkiewicz. Gibson’s Tennessee operation has been shut down idling scores of workers and costing hundreds of thousands of dollars not over safety regulations but because the wood in Gibson’s guitars might come from “an endangered tree” in another country.
The President promised
… everything in this bill will be paid for. Everything.
This was perhaps the most “political” statement of the evening. It implies responsibility. Yet Washington has no money to “pay” for anything. All it has are tax dollars. The projected cost of this bill is almost half a trillion dollars. The President says he can find more budget cuts and more money to pay the bill. If so, why not just apply it to the current plan. The $447B would erase 20% of this year’s deficit. Where was this money during the debt ceiling debate? Why spend it on dubious Job plans? Why not put it towards a balanced budget?
The President’s speech was political posturing for an election cycle, nothing more. He denounced politics and shamelessly engaged only in politics. His solutions mean bigger Government, less transparency, less Liberty, savaged productivity and higher taxes. In short, more of the same policies which have hamstrung our economy and from which sensible nations are fleeing since it is demonstrably destructive.
If the President’s words were serious, he would do the one thing he clearly promised he would not do. He specifically rejected the
… larger notion that the only thing we can do to restore prosperity is just dismantle government, refund everybody’s money, and let everyone write their own rules, and tell everyone they’re on their own — that’s not who we are. That’s not the story of America.
Actually, that is exactly the story of America. President Obama misrepresents the argument for Limited Government and contradicts his own observation at the beginning of his speech; that business and not Washington would drive recovery. His only answer is more and bigger Government. He insisted repeatedly that Congress should “pass this bill” to revive the economy. But if Congress wants any hope of changing our economic woes, it won’t pass this bill, it will just pass …
SEE ALSO:
Live Tweeting Obama’s Job Speech: More Big Government Boondoggles by Warner Todd Huston @ Publius’ Forum;
Same Scheme – Different Speech by Leslie Carbone @ Bearing Drift;
The President’s Jobs Speech by Susan Lynn @ Susan Lynn;
Obama’s ‘Jobs’ Speech: Second Verse, Same as the First by Maggie Thurber @ Thurber’s Thoughts;
Which Word was Missing From Obama’s Speech Last Night by Ed Morrissey @ Hot Air;
Excellent piece and well worth the time reading. One small point of correction. The @GibsonGuitar issue isn't about the wood being endangered, as I understand it, its on the definition of 'finished'. The Feds are interpreting the Indian law that requires the fingerboard blanks to be 'finished' by their own standards. Personally, I think if the contract requires them to supply blanks of AxBxC size and 'finished' with 100 grit sandpaper and they do, that's finished per the contract. If the Gibson folks then take those blanks, use 600 grit sandpaper on them, install inlay and frets and seal the fingerboard, that's none of the DOJ's concern.
I don't think it's the DOJ's concern regardless.
Kay -
Your guess is as good as mine as to what really is behind the Gibson Guitar debacle. I've heard that the real culprit is a clerical error on shipping documents and that the Feds are going jihad on Gibson with that as the excuse.
I think you are correct that there is a part of the issue related to process. How the wood is being worked or at what stage it is in the process.
But it is more than just that. It is not only how the wood is worked but what wood is worked. The Lacey Act at the heart of the matter is related to protected species. Originally it was only protected animals and it was recently amended to include plants and, presumably by extension, plant products.
Not only guitar manufacturers but furniture, flooring and other wood manufacturers are under the gun on this because of the type of wood and not just its condition. It's why the law enforcement bureau involved is the US Fish and Wildlife Service and not another one.
"How many of the 9% to 15% unemployed work in those fields?"
Well, uhh I haven't seemed to find any 15% unemployment at the public schools or massive teacher layoffs. None of their properties with "For Sale or Lease" signs out front. They all seem to be in business – enjoying their 0% unemployment rates, public-funded retirement pensions AND RAISES. I can't believe Obama (and the public) are so stupid to believe we need "more teachers" at this point.
Construction is another story. Many companies out of business, layoffs, reduced hours, etc. Don't know on a percentage basis what they would account for, but again one of the only industries (like government schools) the federal government can "stimulate" with make work.
Just another observation on the Construction angle. This applies to the segment of the the construction industry which builds and repairs roads and bridges, railroads, airports and such along with more traditional construction firms dealing with larger projects like schools.
Again, how much of the unemployment in that Market segment is in this sector of the segment. Larger construction projects and bridges and such are specialized projects. It's not like anyone with a tool belt and a hammer can do this work. My guess would be the vast majority of them are currently working at pretty much full capacity.
But the person most of us think of when we think of Construction worker; the plumber, electrician, painter, dry wall guy, landscapers and so on, many of whom are self employed sub-contractors, how will these guys benefit from the AJA.
It seems more like obfuscation and dissembling to me as opposed to a plan addressing the problems which really exist.
I would hazard that there is little or no unemployment in the ranks of union construction contractors who do roads and other big publicly funded jobs. I know there isn't in my state. We still have years worth of publicly funded projects backed up that we haven't even turned the first shovel on and the only people at the union hiring halls are people from Outside paying dobie dues trying to get on if a job can't be filled with a resident member. So much money was appropriated to roads and other publicly funded construction around the Country during the Republican period and even the Ried-Pelosi period that the select group of contractors, almost all union even in the RTW states, and the skilled labor they use have work for years. The people who don't have work are those in residential and privately funded commercial construction where the plight of many is getting desperate.
This is just the sort of thing that I was thinking about when writing. It is one thing to toss out platitudes and bromides that sound both good and compassionate. It is quite another to have them deal with the reality that exists on the ground. Critical thinking, a commodity all too often in short supply, cannot simply accept a statement as given. It must investigate and search for evidence that supports it. I am not suggesting that people making such statements are automatically deceptive or disingenuous. But neither am I willing to accept that their good intentions automatically lead to good results. To apply Reagan's dictum to this situation, we ought to trust but verify! The President says he wants to get jobs to the people most impacted by joblessness. Fine. He has proposed some plans to do so. Fine. Since he is spending my money to do so and not his own, however, I insist on a minimum effort to evaluate the expected effectiveness of his ideas. If he is not willing to participate in that, opting instead to tell everyone in sight "They should pass this bill right now!" I'm going to be skeptical … I'm just sayin' …
Mr. Obama also said, "Now it’s time to clear the way for a series of trade agreements that would make it easier for American companies to sell their products in Panama and Colombia and South Korea -– while also helping the workers whose jobs have been affected by global competition."
Yet, HE is the person now responsible for holding this process up. The documents have been on his desk for quite some time and he has done nothing with them. The Democrats, as a party, have held this up for years.
Hypocrisy?
Incredible.
The very worst thing the Republicans could do to Comrade Obama would be to pass his "jobs" bill. I've seen this movie dozens of times in dealing with public employee unions; in election season public employee unions don't want an agreement, they want a worked up membership out singing songs and carrying signs about how awful the employer is. Obama wants the same thing; he wants every un or under employed person in the US blaming those racist, obstructionist Republicans for their plight.
Actually, $3-400 Billion is chump change in the overall scheme of things anymore and it isn't enough to make any stimulative difference even if we weren't borrowing it. All the "shovel ready" infrastructure work will go to union contractors paying Davis-Bacon wages and that is a small select group and this spending won't put a single unemployed residential or light commercial construction worker back to work.
Having played this game a time or two, my countermove would be to take his bill, if he ever actually produces a real, written bill, and amend it so that it is unpalatable to Comrade Obama's various benefactors yet still looks like it is stimulus spending to try to help the unemployed. Say, you go ahead and appropriate money for infrastructure but you statutorily prohibit Project Labor Agreements, suspend Davis-Bacon for stimulus projects, and require open competitive bidding with no set-asides. All of those go straight to the institutional interests of the unions and the poverty pimps who will give him Holy Hell if he were to sign such a bill. Yet, the millions of unemployed who might have a chance to get a job will just see that the Administration's real interest was shoving some more money to its buddies, not really going after the people actually affected by the recession and the destroyed housing market.
Love the counter move, Art! You should write that strategery up as a bullet point white paper of sorts and get it to the GOP members at the Federal level. Perhaps we could get some support for it there. Great comment. Thanks for stopping by!
Thanks for the kind words! I talk about counter-negotiation with public employee unions in my book; it is the same theory. You leave the employees alone, even give them stuff if you can, and go after the institutional interests of the union. Comrade Obama uses the same play book politically. He produced that bill on the expectation that the Republicans would reject it. He isn't really interested in passing a bill, he wants the issue of there not having been a bill.
My rule in dealing with unions, and he thinks like a union goon, was always to do everything in my power to keep from doing what they wanted me to do. Comrade Obama wants the Republicans to reject his stupid, vapid bill. If he's true to form, he'll never even produce a real bill. So, the logical thing is to give him back his stupid, vapid bill in a form that the Democrats can't stand.
I dealt with something like this early in my tenure as Alaska's director of labor relations. The Legislature had passed a resolution directing the Democrat Knowles Administration that it would not approve a labor agreement that required any increase in the State's budget for "personal services," our wage and benefits line. So, of course, coming into the '02 election, the Democrats "negotiated" agreements with the unions that had significant increases in personal services with the full expectation that the '02 Legislature, meeting in the spring before the election season, would noisily reject the agreements and give the Democrats several thousand pissed off public employee votes. Well the Legislature ain't stupid, and they had me whispering in their ear, so why would they give him what he wanted? In the dark of night at the very end of the session they approved the contracts but refused to give the Executive Branch any additional funding, which meant the executive branch had to pay for the increases with vacancy and with layoffs. But, the employees had a raise, those that weren't laid off, for the first time in years and the Democrats didn't have their issue. For me, though, the downside was since the Democrats never expected to live under those agreements, they would have been more coherently written if they'd been copied off the restroom walls. I had one Helluva time administering those agreements until we could get some of the garbage re-neotiated in the next cycle.
Ken,
My thoughts exactly! Thank you for such a great piece!
Lori
Thank you Miss Lori -
I am honored that you liked it enough to comment!
PASS THIS BILL!! More Job creation!
Do not let republican's change how America should be. They
take away money from insurance, education funds ( only for
the rich schools are given special resources). They want to
take away medicare, medicaid, and social security! Not just
that much more! It will drop our economy into another great
depression. No one will be putting money into shopping to
stimulate economic growth! No one! What happens when
millions of people suddenly don't have the money to do any-
thing even keep their own child from dying because he needs
that medicaid to keep him on dialysis? They do what they can
to save whatever little money they have for the treatment, or
what they need to save for funeral costs. Don't make count-
less people suffer and have to bury their families!
Please do not let this happen!
M -
It is difficult to know where to begin with your comment. I'll start by encouraging you not to believe the fear mongering that the Left substitutes for discussion. I'm not saying that there are not tough times ahead. There may very well be. But they are the result of decades of bad fiscal policy eased only occasionally by same policy.
You seem to be laboring under some very unfortunate notions concerning the purpose of Government. The Republicans are not trying to take money away from the Insurance industry. They are trying to keep that industry from selling its soul to the Government and its offer of money.
The GOP is not trying to take away money from Education. What we want is for Education to be removed from the responsibility of the federal government and returned to the umbrella under each state's government to do with as they see fit. Besides, if the feds are doing such a great job with Education, why are our national test scores always lower than the year before and why do politicians always ask for more and more money every election cycle to "fix" education. And if the billions the feds have spent on it over the last 40 years have not been of benefit, why are you arguing for us to throw good money after bad?
No one wants to take away Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security. Many of us would like to make participation in it voluntary. And it needs to be altered. Even the President blames these three things for handcuffing him in what he would like to do. We have hundreds of TRILLIONS of dollars in promises made from just these 3 programs. Even if we took every dollar made by every American for a decade, we couldn't pay that bill. Would you simply let it remain just as it is? If it bankrupts the nation, how will that generate spending for economic growth?
The reason people have no money, sometimes even for necessities, is not because the government has not taken too little from them, it is because the government has taken too much from them. If their taxes were lower and the government did not cost as much they might have money they could save, accumulate against serious misfortunes AND live their lives.
But until the government agrees to wean itself off of the money from taxpayers in a significant way we will continue down this most difficult of roads.
Your words are poison
@Cardinal –
And your dialectic style leaves a few things to be desired … but thanks for stopping by …
Washington's policy is not real.
Well I believe that the president open up to america the best way he could. I seen nothing wrong with what the president said in his speech. Everything he said was true. Everyone deserve thier fair share and its time to start from somewhere. If things was more fair then maby things wouldn’t be the way things are. President obama made the right decision making and i believe that that bill should be passed right away because all these people who are up here making thier opiion about the president already have thier money and their homes and care and ect so why not pass this bill and help those who help america to be the way it is. lets not forget like president Obama said that its poor and middle class citizens who built america to be the way america is not the rich the poor and the middle class. So let stop with all these negative stuff and start making a change here in America