Lying To Make Friends

On Meet the Press, Morning Joe Scarborough claimed the reason that Republicans are so unpopular right now is because of the reckless spending of the Bush years. He then noted that President Obama thus far is spending at twice the rate Bush did and warned that if this continues, Obama and the Democrats are headed towards the same fate as Bush and the Republicans. Not that I’m worried that the president will be turning to Scarborough for advice, but I really hope Obama ignores him and anyone else warning about the dangers of government spending in the abstract. While small market conservatives may like to believe that Americans are primarily concerned with how much money the government spends, Obama should gamble his presidency on the belief that Americans are more concerned with the results achieved by the government. The problem with Bush wasn’t the amount of money he spent, but what he spent it on — tax cuts for the wealthiest, Medicare reform that amounted to corporate welfare for drug companies, and an unnecessary and mismanaged war– and how little benefit most Americans saw from his spending. If Obama is sincere in his rhetoric about meeting the day’s great challenges and is successful in creating jobs, lowering health care costs, and increasing energy independence, it won’t matter matter if he spends significantly more than Bush did. It’s the same principle by which a person would be willing to spend $40 for a good steak but unhappy about spending $5 for a Big Mac. Or, to provide a more apt analogy to the Bush years, unhappy about chipping in $5 to buy a steak for the CEO of Pfizer.

-AR