The Economics Section - Page A4
Opinion Piece August 13, 1996
WHAT IS THE GOOD OF BEING PRESIDENT?
by Howard Hobbs, Ph.D., Economics Editor, The Daily Republican Newspaper
PALO ALTO DESK - The federal government has clearly failed to do the job under the Clinton White House. Liberal government policies have created more problems in welfare, education, housing, food stamps, Medicare, and Social Security. There is insufficient planning and funding for military defense.
International trade, imports, exports, are a shambles. Domestic manufacturing has gone South. Since president Clinton(D) moved into the White House in January of the year 1993 a deep seated insecurity has swept over the nation.
Has America lost its will and ability to compete! Where have the jobs gone for workers over 45 years of age? Why has all of the Social Security tax money collected since 1935 been wasted by Congress?
Other economic indicators also point to serious trouble ahead. For example, personal savings have dropped by nearly 25% since Clinton was inaugurated three- and one-half years ago. The yield on the U.S. Government's long bond is down over the same time. Meanwhile the Consumer Price Index on all food items of urban consumers is up more than 10% over that period. Worst of all is the labor force participation rate in a down trend since January 1993.
Most numbing of all, is the enormous growth of the debt. For example, under the Clinton administration for the past three and one-half years the Office of Management and Budget reported the actual debt is $ 5.1Trillion. If president Clinton is returned to office in November and federal borrowing continues at the same rate by the year 2000, Clinton's national debt will be nearly $13 Trillion. That's the whole ball-game!
Bob Dole(R) and Jack Kemp(R) have a new broom. They have promised the American people a brisk improvement in the national economy. After Bob Dole takes back the White House on November 5, 1996, a new economic plan will be initiated to become operative in 1997. Dole and Kemp regard that promise as a moral commitment. The promises made by the Dole White House will have a moral virtue in them.
In a recent column, conservative Nancy Roman of the Washington Times explored the apparent lack of ethical consistency in the language and action of president Clinton.The president's long standing inconsistency on political and ethical issues is a frequent source of inquiry by a variety of media services.
Last week Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich (R) pointed out some of president Clinton's mis-steps. Gingrich hurled a devastating ethical attack on Clinton's political strategy. Gingrich pointed out that Clinton had intentionally mislead the American people.
Gingrich accused Clinton of making false statements to the media about the budget, welfare, and Medicare and in Democrat Party ads paid for by the president's re-election committee.
Anyone who picks up the newspaper today holds in his hands the chronology of the most infamous White House administration in the history of the United States.
The essence of president William Jefferson Clinton's politics is - "You can get away with murder!"
Clinton takes his direction from his preference for a life of leisure at the American tax payer's expense and sets White House policy on the basis of "What is popular today?" rather than forming the more difficult and disciplined moral question of the conservative republican's "balanced budget" approach "What should be done for tomorrow?"
The White House hires its aides only after screening them for those people who are capable of not doing good. The aides are hired, and apparently placed in high positions where they can carry on with what they are capable of not doing!
To Clinton, it is virtuous to betray his trust to the American people. He acts without faith or commitment, without mercy, and without religion.
A glimpse of the real president Clinton was printed in a local Washington D.C. newspaper last week. It seems as though there is a long standing custom for Washington golf courses to grant automatic honors to the president, a sort of corporate White House welfare.
However, the private courses are becoming impatient with the delay in play caused by president Clinton who has the habit of hitting two or three balls from every lie. When complaints were conveyed to him, instead of speeding up play, he stopped and began to argue. Clinton is said to have justified causing delays with the statement: "What good is being the president if I can't hit a few extra golf balls when I want to?"
Perhaps what he really meant was "What's the use of being the president if I can't get away with murder?" After all, president Clinton is the only occupant of the White House who has ever perfected the art of being able to cry out of only one eye, isn't he!
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