The worst economy since the Great Depression and you might think at least one of the candidates would come up with a few big ideas for how to get us out of it.
But you'd be wrong. Neither candidate wants to take any chances by offering any large, serious proposals. Both are banking instead on negative campaigns that convince voters the other guy would be worse.
President Obama has apparently decided against advancing any bold ideas for what he'd do in the second term, even if he has a Congress that would cooperate with him.
He's sticking to a worn script that says George W. Bush caused the lousy economy, congressional Republicans have opposed everything he's wanted to do to boost it, it's slowly on the mend anyway, the Bush tax cuts shouldn't be extended for the rich, and we shouldn't take a chance electing Romney.
Yet the public wants bigger ideas from the President, and wants to know what he'll do in his second term to get us out of this mess. A New York Times-CBS News poll released last week showed that a majority of voters believe the president "can do a lot about" the economy. That's a double-digit jump from the fall of 2011.
The President could propose a new WPA, modeled after the Depression-era jobs program that hired hundreds of thousands of jobless Americans to rebuild the nation's infrastructure, or a new Civilian Conservation Corps.
He could suggest permanently exempting the first $25,000 of income from payroll taxes, and making up the lost revenues by eliminating the ceiling on income subject to it. He could propose resurrecting the Glass-Steagall Act and breaking up the big banks, so Wall Street doesn't cause another financial collapse.
But you won't hear any of this, or anything else of this magnitude, because the White House doesn't want to take any risks. Polls give Obama a slight edge in the critical eight or so battleground states, so, the thinking goes in the Obama camp, why say anything that might give Romney and the GOP a target?
Besides, polls also show Romney isn't well-liked by the electorate.
So Obama has decided to campaign as the anti-Romney.
Mitt Romney is playing it even more cautiously. His economic plan is really a non-plan: more tax cuts for the rich, undefined spending cuts, and no details about how he'd bring down the budget deficit. No presidential candidate since Herbert Hoover in 1928 has been more vague about what he'd do on the critical issues facing the nation.
Romney's advisors assume Obama can't possibly be reelected with the economy this bad. Just 44 percent of registered voters in a Washington Post-ABC News poll earlier this month approve of the job the president is doing on the economy, while 54 percent disapprove. Even more encouraging for Romney is that 41 percent of those polled "strongly" disapproved of Obama's economic performance, while just 21 percent "strongly" approved -- an enthusiasm gap of major proportion.
So Romney's advisors have concluded that all Romney has to do between now and Election Day is avoid a mistake that might give Obama and the Democrats something to shoot at.
Romney has decided to campaign as the anti-Obama.
The two anti-the-other-guy strategies fit with a ton of negative advertising that's just begun but will reach mammoth proportions after Labor Day. Much of it will be financed by super-PACs and by political fronts already taking in hundreds of millions of dollars in secret donations. Romney's camp hopes to out-negative Obama by almost two to one.
So whatever happens on Election Day, the next president will have to contend with two handicaps. The public won't have endorsed any new ideas or bold plans, which means he won't have a clear mandate to do anything on the economy.
The only thing the public will have decided is it fears and distrusts the other guy more. Which means the winner will also be burdened by almost half the electorate thinking he's a scoundrel or worse.
The worst economy since the Great Depression, but we're in an anti-election that will make it harder for the next occupant of the oval office to do a thing about it.
ROBERT B. REICH, Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley, was Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration. Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the last century. He has written thirteen books, including the best sellers "Aftershock" and "The Work of Nations." His latest is an e-book, "Beyond Outrage." He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine and chairman of Common Cause.
Follow Robert Reich on Twitter: www.twitter.com/RBReich
Brendan Nyhan: New Surveys Show the Persistence of Misperceptions
 |
 |
|
| Obama | Romney | |
|---|---|---|
| Electoral Votes (270 to win) |
332 | 206 |
| Obama | Romney | |
|---|---|---|
| Total | 65,899,660 | 60,932,152 |
| Percent | 51.1% | 47.2% |
| Democrats* | Republicans | |
|---|---|---|
| Current Senate | 53 | 47 |
| Seats gained or lost | +2 | -2 |
| New Total | 55 | 45 |
| Democrats | Republicans | |
|---|---|---|
| Seats won | 201 | 234 |
I think the lack of substance and leadership is the current nature of our democracy - a democracy that is basically a plutocracy, in which the person with the most advertising money wins.
The message you are sending is spend enough money smearing all the candidates and people won't vote. so the rich can pick the leaders.
If you are a conservative/tea bag radical, a vote for anyone but Romney is a vote for Obama.
It is sad, but at times you have to pick between two mediocre or bad options for President. As Genders talks about if you vote for Progressives or Conservatives for Senate and the House, then push them to put in the programs that you want, which can force the President's hand.
FDR made the statement that he agreed with the Liberal/Unions on economic and labor policy, but he told them to make him push for those changes.
We have to push our legislature and Presidents to do what we want. If they don't it is our fault.
He will need to explain in detail how and why these proposals are in the best interest of the people and the economy of our country, and he can compare his proposals and long-term vision for the country to the management style of Bain Capital, and why the short-term turnover and profit style of management is not the best strategy for the long-term sustainability of a country.
The United States should not be treated as a business to be taken over, bled for profit, and sold off in pieces to cover the debts. We're in this for the long haul.
Debt and potential bankruptcy affects virtually every State in the Union. CA ranks 25th place in DEBT/GDP ratio trailing an equal number of both RED and BLUE states who are gobs more in debt with considerably higher DEBT/GDP ratios.
Granted the top 10 is infested with democratic leaning states such as RI,CT,MA,IL,HI,NJ. However your right leaning states (the usual suspects:LA,OK,MT,WV,SC,KS,MS,AK,KY,MO,NM,SD) follow closely behind with the same problems, primarily unfunded liabilities for pension/health for future retirees.
The situation is dismal everywhere. The states ALL being non-sovereign, must look elsewhere for stop gap funds, typically the federal government (Monetarily Sovereign). But of course that ain't gonna happen any time soon with the tea goons in Congress.
California for instance "receives back" 71cents for every taxpayer dollar they send to Washington. Guess who gets typically more back than each dollar paid in? That's right, RED states. So CA,MA,NY,NJ,IL,CT,etc foot more of the bill. Wanna continue to blame idiot demos? Go right ahead.
"permanently exempting the first $25,000 of income from payroll taxes, and making up the lost revenues by eliminating the ceiling on income subject to it."
1) PAYROLL TAXES, aren't REALLY taxes at all, they are insurance premiums. And there is no good reason I can think of, the wealthy should be hugely subsidizing the old age benefits of everybody else.
This concept transforms SS, Disability, & Medicare from entitlement programs that people have earned through their own contributions
. . into simple welfare programs paid for primarily by the wealthy.
******
YOU WANNA BIG IDEAS BOB?
How about these?
We shore up SocialSecurity by tightening up eligibility, and increasing, at least temporarily, the FICA rates to make it fully self-funded for 75year sustainability.
Shore up Medicare by simple rationing, LIKE OREGON, AND EVERY OTHER ADVANCED NATION ON EARTH. Govt bargains for drug prices.
We develop a plan to completely PAY OFF the entire debt in 12-20 years.
We permanently eliminate all the 15% tax bracket giveaways for the rich, and tax EVERYTHING, as ORDINARY INCOME, while permanently fixing the AMT, allowing the IRS to automatically index it for inflation.
MORTGAGE INTEREST DEDUCTION, once-in-a-lifetime, not to exceed median home price in the nation.
ELIMINATE CHILD TAX CREDITS, go back to just the old system of normal exemptions.
Transparent,drastically reduces red tape, and the collection mechanism is already in place.
I am no fan of any tax system that cuts taxes even further for the wealthy.
That, unfortunately HAS TO effectively increase taxes on everyone else.
This may sound extreme or eccentric to some folks but its become increasingly clear that our representative government, or any government for that matter, is often the obstacle in solving problems, not the solution. In writing this I am mainly trying to be silly.
To many this idea is probably terrifying, including me, but it may be a very practical way to deal with serious issues and don’t kid yourself, they already control us.
Campaign finance reform.
There are automatic spending cuts that kick in in 2013 which could cause a reduction in GDP.
http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/economy/231451-automatic-2013-defense-budget-cuts-to-cost-1-million-jobs-study
I think if Romney gets elected, that there will be that one last shake of the Etch-a-Sketch, and he won't proceed with the austerity cuts. Maybe he'll pull Cheney out of mothballs to run around the country again proclaiming that Reagan proved that deficits don't matter.
The record of deficit cutting austerity approaches perfection. Wherever it is tried it succeeds – succeeds, that is, in tanking the economy. Around the world, dozens of anemic economies have had the leeches of austerity applied, and as the financial blood is drained, the doctors scratch their heads and wonder why their patients sicken and die.
The dreaded budget deficit, which by mysterious coincidence, seems to rise in lock step with economic growth, now is being blamed for — what? — economic growth? Or just being misnamed “deficit”?
Never mind that a government deficit = private sector surplus, and the bigger the deficit, the more money people spend, and the more businesses grow.
And everywhere the dreaded deficit is “cured,” the underprivileged suffer, but isn’t that the whole point?