It is astounding the degree to which liberals have been making fundamental mistakes. They almost seem to be suffering from a physiological disorder. It is as if they are physically unable to see what is there to be seen.
For some reason, contemporary liberals are deficient in both hind and foresight. Evidently the victims of social myopia, they remain fixated on ideological fantasies and/or their immediate political advantage. Oblivious of what failed to work in the past and blind to what is likely to go wrong in the future, they flail about hoping against hope that their dreams will still come true.
Barack Obama has taken to chanting that his administration is dedicated to “winning the future.” This mantra, invoked as a magical incantation, makes it unnecessary to perceive that similar policies failed abysmally when earlier undertaken by Franklin Roosevelt. Keynesianism looked good on paper, but spending billions to revive a faltering economy succeeded only in increasing the nation’s debt.
Obama insists he has saved us from economic ruin, but cannot offer compelling evidence that he has. Meanwhile unemployment remains stubbornly high and is predicted to remain so for the foreseeable future. The president knows this and promises to focus like a laser on improving the economy, but then does the opposite.
By now the news is out that Obama’s current budget proposals are unlikely to reduce the deficit. He says he is doing so, but it is clear that his proposals will increase the national debt by almost ten trillion dollars over the next decade. Amazingly, it does this while also increasing taxes by about a trillion.
But let us put these numbers aside. Let us assume, as many commentators have, that the president’s budget was a ploy; that he punted so as to put Republicans on the defensive. His goal may indeed be to force them to make unpopular cuts that he can later demagogue to death.
Let us go even further. Let us suppose that he succeeds. Having jacked up federal spending by almost twenty-five percent, let us assume the opposition will be forced to accept the status quo. Obama says he will veto deep cuts, so let us take him at his word and agree that the House will be unable to override him without shutting down the government.
What then will be the outcome? Does anyone believe the deficits will suddenly come under control? Even the president acknowledges this is unlikely. It’s just that he does not worry about it. Gifted with an inability to see ahead, it does not matter to him that he is driving us over a cliff. Pleased with himself for, by his own account, getting us out of a ditch, he doesn’t care where we are now headed.
So what will happen when inflation kicks in? And what will occur when the economy remains in idle for a lost decade analogous to that experienced during the Great Depression? What too will transpire when Medicare, Medicaid, and social security go broke? Anyone who can add numbers understands this must happen, but do Obama or his crew?
It looks like they do not, hoping instead to keep doing business as usual. Evidently they expect to convince the electorate the problem is not serious. But it is. There is a disaster waiting around the corner. Denying it will not make it go away. Painting it over with a rosy scenario or hiding it under accounting tricks will not either. Nor will persuading the public that he is right.
So what happens when the deluge arrives? If things get really bad, and it looks like they will, who gets blamed? Even if Obama wins reelection, if there is an economic crisis, he and his party will not get away with pointing fingers at others. This time there has been ample warning. This time others have seen what he refuses to see and sounded the alarm.
So what will the outcome be for Obama and company? I suggest that they prepare for a generation in the political wilderness. Refusing to see what is there to be seen and declining to do what requires doing will not rescue them when the nation collides with reality. They may not believe this, but there is an iceberg dead ahead and they had best open their eyes or get lasic surgery.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
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