House Republican Leader Slammed Obamanomics
This morning, in Cleveland, OH, House Republican Leader John Boehner (R-OH) slammed President Obama's economic policies and called for the resignation of Tim Geithner and Larry Summers. Here's the video, and here are his prepared remarks. He railed against "job-killing tax hikes," stimulus spending that "has gotten us nowhere," and "government run amok." Boehner is right on about ending economic uncertainty, particularly about future tax rates and unsupportable levels of future public debt. However, he sounded as if all of our problems began when President Obama was sworn in as president on January 20, 2009. Our current suffering mostly arose from the Iraq War, Medicare Part D, and the very lax regulatory environment that allowed the financial crisis and the Gulf oil spill to occur, all courtesy of President George W. Bush and the Republicans. In my opinion, Tim Geithner, Larry Summers, and Ben Bernanke are all to be commended for their Herculean efforts to keep us from falling into a Depression. Today, the Congressional Budget Office estimated how much worse off we would have been without the stimulus bill. Mr. Boehner also forgot the mention that his tax and spending policies would make the rich a lot richer and the rest of us worse off. The main advantage of being in the minority is that you get to blame the majority for everything that is wrong in the world. We'll see how the American voters feel on November 2, when Mr. Boehner hopes to find himself on his way to becoming Speaker of the House next January.
As a republican
I wish Boehner would just just up and pack his bags. I might not care for Obama but you're right so much of this stuff started when Bush was in office. I wish we had real leadership in the republican party because it sure doesnt come from him
I must be missing something here....
Republicans seem to be running on a three pillared platform of:
1. Repeal Healthcare Reform
2. Repeal Financial Reform
3. Make the Bush tax cuts permanent
As if this is some sort of cure for what ails us. And they're winning hearts and minds, somehow.
Implementing those three things just puts us back to where we were earlier this year, last year, and the year before. Am I missing something? Do people think that economic conditions were good last year and the year before? That all of our problems started this Spring when Obama signed HCR into law?
You Are Missing Something
The racist southern strategy is still an effective campaign tool the GOP uses.
Pete, I know Democrats love
Pete,
I know Democrats love the talking point of blaming Republicans for the fiscal irresponsibility of Medicare Part D, but don't you think it's unfair to criticize Republicans -- implying that Democrats would not have been as irresponsible -- given that Democrats wanted to spend MORE, not less on this Medicare expansion, and Democrats drove the issue all along, with Republicans basically trying to keep up -- to come close enough to what Democrats wanted to spend so that they didn't lose the whole senior vote??
Just one quote:
New York Times, June 22, 2002:
"At a cost of $310 billion over 10 years, the House Republican bill would be the biggest expansion of Medicare since creation of the program in 1965. But Democrats in both chambers said it was inadequate. Their proposals call for spending $400 billion to $800 billion or more."
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/22/us/gop-drug-plan-for-elderly-nears-pas...
No, I don't think it's
No, I don't think it's unfair. The Democrats' proposals were (a) funded, and (b) included substantial long-term cost-reduction measures (e.g. letting Medicare negotiate for a better prices) which the Republican leadership killed off to benefit their friends in the industry.
Can you (or Mike S. below)
Can you (or Mike S. below) substantiate that claim that the Democrats' proposals were funded? Have a link or two to articles that back that up?
Ditto for substantiating your claim "b" -- were Democrat's plans scored (or projected by some independent analysis) to end up costing less than what Republicans were proposing. Pointing to one factor that would have had the effect of lowering cost does not establish that a proposal was associated with lower costs overall.
Half the story
Perhaps Democrats wanted to spend more on Medicare Part D but since they were not in power at the time, you do not know what they would have done to increase government revenue to cover these expenditures. The GOP raised no money to pay for Medicare Part D. I am willing to bet the Democrats, while likely to have spent more than the GOP on this program, would have offset it with increased taxes to cover for it.
Medicare Part D
Good point. Neither party was pushed. They jumped together. Thanks for the cite to the New York Times article.
I would go further than that.
I would go further than that. I'd say the Democrats (Clinton, then candidate Gore and then Congressional Democrats) pushed the idea and proposed higher spending at each step of the game, and the Republicans were playing defense, trying to keep close enough in spending level (vs. what Democrats were proposing) to avoid losing too much of the senior vote.
True, Republicans (including scandalous Billy Tauzin who was soon richly rewarded with a highly paid post as president of PhRMA and Tom Scully who I think immediately got some nice position shilling for the drug industry or some player therein) did have that "giveaway" to the pharmaceutical companies that added to what the cost of their program would have been without that provision, and also true that the Bush Administration (apparently deliberately and unethically) officially underestimated the cost of its plan, but overall I think the Democrats were on offense with this issue and the Republicans on defense, per my recollection and the bits I dug up the other day (albeit with just quick & dirty Googling) -- that NYT article plus a couple more below:
From PBS Newshour, June 28, 2000: "The Democrats' prescription drug plan, twice as costly as the Republicans..." http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/health/jan-june00/medicare_6-28.html
Another, NewsHour, September 5, 2000: "Gore's own plan calls for spending more than Bush, about $253 billion over ten years." http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/health/july-dec00/rx_campaign.html
I'm glad, though, that at least you seem to be agreeing with me that it is invalid for Medicare Part D to be among the list of examples of Republicans being less fiscally responsible than Democrats, particularly if the tax cuts are also listed separately on that list and any higher spending preferred by Democrats not addressed*. In other words, the Medicare Part D legislation, in itself, is not an example of Republicans being (even) less fiscally responsible than Democrats, because Democrats wanted to spend at least as much (and I'd say more), and neither proposed offsets (to my knowledge).
* I expand on this analytical point in a loooong comment at Aug 27th, 2010 at 9:40 pm on this other thread http://capitalgainsandgames.com/blog/bruce-bartlett/1899/am-i-right-or-l...
President Obama certainly is
President Obama certainly is not responsible for the foundations of the current financial malaise, but he did exacerbate it immensely and continues to promise to stay the course.
Regulation of offshore wells may have been lax and contributed to the spill, but Obama's administration signed off on the final safety checks and Congress, over years, has pushed drilling into deeper waters to protect shoreline vistas.
There is no doubt that this economy is the result of 60 years of excessive government spending and was greatly exacerbated by President Bush II who never saw a spending bill he wouldn't sign and increase government budget deficits immensely through the ill considered Medicare Part D. But now we have a president who has doubled down on bad policy and brought us to our knees fiscally.
Obama, the man of change, has kept on firmly entrenched on the same roller coaster. The budget projections are fictitious and CBO validates based solely on information supplied by bill sponsors, rarely does that information veer towards reality. This is a vicious cycle of irresponsibility.
This economy is the result of
This economy is the result of 30 years of deregulation and supply side nonsense.
I don't see it like that
I see our current economy as beginning with the collapse of Bretton Woods. In that light, our current economy has been active for only 40 years.
Decade 1 was stagflation. Enter Volker.
Decade 2 was supply-side. Enter MNCs.
Decade 3 was the Clinton years. Balanced budget. Surplus.
Decade 4 was the Bush years. "Deficits don't matter."
And here we are.
Nixon keeps looking better and better.