|
|
|
Jewish World Review Oct. 21, 2009 / 3 Mar-Cheshvan 5770 Blank-Check Economics By Paul Greenberg
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
How simple it all was to Mr. Bordenave had a simple solution to all the Here his city was still struggling to recover from Katrina and the country's financial meltdown in general, but The president could only reply, "We are working as hard as we can as quickly as we can. I wish I could write a blank check." To which Mr. Bordenave shouted back, "Why not?" Yes, Mr. President, why not? If the politicians in And if Hasn't the Congressional Budget Office just reported that the annual federal deficit has reached a record So how come the president can't just sign a blank check and fix everything in post-Katrina, post-Rita, still recession-struck The president's response, if any, was not reported. If he did want to answer/educate Mr. Bordenave, where would he start? Or finish? How teach a course in Economics 101 right there and then? Welcome, Mr. President, to the economic expectations of entirely too many Americans, who think your job is as simple as signing a blank check. How do you suppose so many of us could have got that idea? Surely it wasn't the tone of your own Spread-the-Wealth campaign promises that encouraged such delusions. Even this president, who's no stranger to spending money here, there and everywhere, and is about to spend still more on the nation's health care, or at least on its health insurance with far from certain results, knows there is a limit to what even America can spend without inviting the direst consequences. For the inflation that is the surest result of blank-check economics can be the cruelest tax, driving up prices and weighing heaviest on those least able to pay. Governors know they have to balance revenue and expenditures, at least in states like What happens is that the nation's currency is devaluated. See the short, unhappy history of Weimar Germany, a case history of inflation gone wild. See what's happening to the value of the U.S. dollar even now, and the worried sounds coming from those who hold huge amounts of them in bonded debt, like Communist China's leaders, who can be the savviest of capitalists when they hold American securities. But the president of
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here. JWR contributor Paul Greenberg, editorial page editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, has won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing. Send your comments by clicking here.
© 2006 Tribune Media Services, Inc. |
Arnold Ahlert | |||||||||||||
