Frum: Obama rich with ideas, not funds
Commentator David Frum says President-elect Obama's stimulus programs will cost America a pretty penny, money we can't afford to spend or borrow.
David Frum (David Frum)
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TEXT OF COMMENTARY
KAI RYSSDAL: With apologies to Benjamin Franklin, there are only three things in this life that are certain: Death, taxes, and a really big stimulus package sometime early next year. The president-elect himself said so in his radio address this past weekend.
Commentator David Frum doesn't think it's such a great idea.
DAVID FRUM: Barack Obama is collecting accolades for his super-smart economic team. Now let's see what this super-smart team wants to do.
The president-elect tells us he is planning a huge new spending program. Vast subsidies for alternative energy. Renovation money for schoolbuildings. Grants to local governments for construction projects on a scale that would impress the pharaohs. Altogether, a stimulus budget as big as the interstate highway program.
These are not initiatives to last a season or two. And while they are all packaged together as "stimulus," most of them will start -- and most of the bills will arrive -- long after the economic crisis ends.
Without much debate, Americans are undertaking a grand, generational commitment. We are redirecting the economy away from competition and toward government oversight on a scale not seen since World War II. We are building a much more tightly concentrated banking system: a few colossal national financial institutions with seat for government at the board table. We are effectively nationalizing the automobile industry. These are steps very easy to take that will be very difficult to undo.
And we are doing it all with trillions of borrowed dollars. These new debts will accrue just as the old debts to finance the retirement of the baby boomers begin to come due.
The future public finances of the United States looked grim even before Obama's big plans. Now the fiscal future looks desperate.
Barack Obama suggests he can pay for his plans by cutting back on Iraq spending. OK, that'll support the first couple of months. He has talked about rolling back the Bush tax cuts and maybe increasing the income limits for Social Security taxes. There's a few months more.
So what's the plan? There is no plan. We are just assuming that we can continue borrowing forever, refinancing as necessary.
Wait a minute. Isn't that how we got into this mess?
RYSSDAL: David Frum is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. His most recent book is called "Comeback: Conservatism That Can Win Again."
Comments
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From Lousville, KY, 12/11/2008
I don't get it. We have spent approx 4.6 trilion dollars for the bail out of companies. There are only $300 million people in the US. Thats $15,000 per person. If they gave all that money to the poeple, they would invest (good for stock market), save it and feel secure (good they would start spending their income), or spend it(good by stuff and jobs start coming back). Why would this not work? Poeple wouldn't be loosing houses. Peolpe would be spending and investing. Get on board the earlier the better.
From Bethel, CT, 12/10/2008
Have you been paying attention, David? Investors are giving the US Treasury money for nothing. Public works projects always involve substantial bonding - borrowing - we might as well do it now, with interest rates at or near 0%. Or do you just want to keep letting bridges and levees collapse?
From State College, PA, 12/10/2008
Dear Mr. Frum,
What about the "grand, generational commitment" that was apparently made sometime around 1980 - and sustained through 28 years of Reagan, Bush, Clinton, and Bush again - to radical deregulation of the nation's financial, energy, and health care industries?
How did that work out?
Cheers,
DF (different DF)
From Winston-Salem, NC, 12/10/2008
"We are just assuming that we can continue borrowing forever, refinancing as necessary. Wait a minute. Isn't that how we got into this mess?"
Finally, someone noticed the real underlying problem! After decades of both political parties creating deficit spending, our entire society has been desensitized to the importance of balanced budgets.
From Warwick, NY, 12/10/2008
I would rather be interested to hear Mr. Frum's suggestion of how to get out of this economic mess that his fellow colleagues have gotten us in in the first place. It is a very telling that all he has to offer it criticism and no solutions. Even if I could counter every and each of his statements with solid economic data it would give him too much credit. Marketplace deserves better qualified commentators that offer ideas and solutions instead of opinions motivated by anger and frustration about a lost election.
From Portland, OR, 12/10/2008
Not to get all political, but David Frum? Are you kidding me? Seriously. Can't I cook dinner without --- what is he doing on Marketplace? This is the former Bush speech writer, the mushroom cloud invoker, the jingoist doink, the man who wrote "The Right Man." GGGRRRR!!! Worst!! Commentator!! Choice!! Ever!!
ok, I feel better.
Don't do that to me again Marketplace!!
From Santa Cruz, CA, 12/10/2008
Behold the lengths to which those who demand personal responsibility of others will go to avoid it themselves. Mr. Frum will continue to do his profession, his party, and his country a disservice until he balances his accusations with his confessions.
From Garfield, WA, 12/10/2008
Everyone get so political. The facts are clear. Today the Federal Government spends 46% of the budget on Interest for our national debt, Social Insecurity and Medicare/Madicaid. We were in bad shape before the war. This is before the majority of baby boomers retire and need SS and health insurance. How will we get ourselves out of this? That is the real question!
From Iowa City, IA, 12/10/2008
Here's a question: Why should we listen to David Frum's opinion on economic issues -- or anything else?
His entire private sector experience is as a journalist, which quickly turned into that of a pundit/speechwriter. He has a law degree -- but that doesn't mean he has any special insight. Our current financial crisis is so complicated no one seems capable of outlining a sure fire fix, and you'll notice Frum doesn't either, he just lobs a few pithy criticisms based on summaries of selective quotes applied to the theory he's ingested like the good soldier that he is.
I've read The Right Man and even taught it in a freshman rhetoric class and his writing is both simplistic (which makes it easy to understand) but often misleading, dishonest and incurious. This is someone who, when it was popular, said Bush was the "right man" for the job -- then reversed course when public opinion went south on his former boss. As the person (mostly) behind the "axis of evil" line he is responsible for a level of fearmongering and outright deception. That should not be rewarded by an opportunity to clutter the airwaves with bon mots. The standard for selecting commentators should not be arbitrary attempts at "fair and balanced" ideological tit for tat but people whose credentials and intellect are beyond reproach and offer something beyond the sleepily conventional -- and that's not Frum.
From New York, NY, 12/10/2008
You've gotta love the way the ideologues of the hard right have assumed this measured, moderate, even forebearing tone. Frum is correct, of course. Obama's public works programs will be spending the money the United States doesn't have. But Frum is a classic case when the messenger IS the message. Sure "The future public finances of the United States looked grim even before Obama's big plans. Now the fiscal future looks desperate." But wasn't it you, Frum, your neocon buddies and your former boss George W. Bush who got us into the fiscal mess in the first place? Wasn't it your idiotic tax cuts and misbiggoten GWOT that created the current budget gap?
Let's not be disingenious, Frum. Your commentary here is a trap. Soon, you'll be discussing in the same condescending, impartial way Obama's no-win predicaments in Iraq and Afghanistan--as if you had nothing to do with creating the no-win situation there.
Unless Obama puts you and your neocon parteigenossen in the dock, both as individuals and as an ideology, you'll keep making these sly sideline comments until he ends up owing your disastrous legacy. Then perhaps "Conservatism Will Win Again", to paraphrase your book's title.
But watch out, Frum. The more you try to pin the blame on Obama, the more likely it is that he will effect de-Bushification on a large scale and you and your former boss will make a nice long visit to the Hague at taxpayers' expense.
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