Another Fine Mess

The presidential candidates and the issues that divide them now are well defined. Social issues appear to favor Obama, with the possible exception of gay marriage. According to polls the big one, the economy, favors Romney. On matters such as immigration and contraception he has been simply playing to the Tea Party to win the nomination. As president my guess he would be at least as apt to renege on his promises as Obama has on some of his. In Romney’s case they were of no concern to him to begin with.

The only subject on which Romney’s words and beliefs have been consistent is the economy. They also happen to benefit him personally. We can expect him to do what he can to reduce taxes on the richest Americans and benefits for the rest. This is of no material benefit to the Tea Party whose votes he needs to be elected. But Ma and Pa Kettle don’t know or care about supply side economics as long as the government spends less money on things such as food stamps, particularly for you know who.  

The fundamentals of what feels like perpetual Republican economic orthodoxy are that richer Americans deserve the lion’s share of the wealth because they produce the bulk of the jobs, a reasonable assumption as far as it goes. But it doesn’t go far enough. Jobs exist to produce goods or services for people to buy. The less the public can afford the less it can buy, hence the fewer the jobs. It’s all quite simple.

At first glance this might cause problems for the people with the big money. But many of them were born to great wealth and don’t have a problem supporting the life style to which they’ve become accustomed. Those who feel compelled to enlarge their already existing fortunes have their own super sized Les Vegas on Wall Street. But with much better odds!

You can win or lose at either. But on Wall Street, if you are too big to cover your losses without bringing an entire nation down the government comes in and saves you as it did four years ago. I for one felt it had to. Support for such a mission was mixed even at the time. An encore would meet with more resistance and could likely lead to a national financial Armageddon.

Since the most frequent argument for a Romney Presidency is his presumed business experience I’d like to close by citing a president with probably stronger credentials in the world of finance than any in our history. Among the many achievements in his early years included running a company that had mining interests in every continent in the world. After the First World War he supervised the rehabilitation of many of the distressed European nations. Later he served as Secretary of Commerce for eight years. The president’s name: Herbert Hoover.

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