The economy is in near recession, again, and if the indicators — the unemployment rate, business expansion indices, low or inadequate government revenues, etc. — don’t change for the better, there appears a worse-case coming.
In January 2010, following the State of the Union speech to Congress and the country, President Barack Obama went to a GOP Caucus (Philadelphia, Pa.?) and challenged the opposition. The President looked confident and optimistic. He proposed conservative/business-type measures to get the economy moving toward the red. Hallelujah, here was a Democratic Party President sounding pro-business with specific proposals, i.e., small business loans from returned “big-bank bailout” government money. Months later, GM and Chrysler were back in the competitive automobile manufacturing business, which was largely because of his administration’s progressive business policies.
At that time in January 2010, the President obviously was over-confident and over-optimistic about bipartisan support for those proposed pro-business programs. The House of Representatives, newly controlled by the GOP/Tea Party, ignored the President and his positive plans and created financial deadlock, purposefully causing the debt-ceiling crisis that was witnessed recently in early August 2011.
Some serious observers have criticized President Obama for thinking and acting too cooperative and academic on the bad economy. There is confusion and it appears to reflect his belief that the market economy will right itself.
These critics and supporters alike think that he should take more aggressive measures by utilizing his own legislative power and propose a list of legislative bills and send them to Congress, immediately. The programs could be on the level of a national public works program, tax reform that would bring in more revenues to the U.S. Treasury, and show a detailed national debt-reduction plan — starting with an end to the Middle East wars and downsizing the U.S. Department of Defense annual budget.
BRUCE G. KAROLLE
Tamuning, Guam
