Obama Campaign’s New Buzzword: Economic Patriotism?

KYLE BECKER SEPTEMBER 29, 2012

There’s a new kind of patriotism in town, one exactly antithetical to everything our Founding Fathers railed against and millions of Americans fought and died for: economic patriotism.

What is this new kind of patriotism? It’s essentially a euphemism for wealth redistribution and central planning.

A mild-mannered and extremely reasonable Barack Obama explains in a new campaign ad how everything that made American great, and especially economic freedom, has been a failure. Now it’s time for those smart and honest guys in the Democrat Party to fundamentally transform our nation.

Here’s Obama’s “plan” for what he’d like to do in the next four years that for some reason he hasn’t done so far.

1. “First, we create a million new manufacturing jobs and help businesses double their exports. Give tax breaks to companies that invest in America, not that ship jobs overseas.”

What has stopped the president from creating those manufacturing jobs here? Could it be the environmental and financial regulations? Maybe one of the highest corporate tax rates in the developed world (nearly twice the OECD average)? And what about tax breaks to companies that invest in America, not ship jobs overseas? You mean like GE and GM?

2. “Second, we cut our oil imports in half and produce more American-made energy, oil, clean-coal, natural gas and new resources like wind, solar and bio-fuels — all while doubling the fuel efficiency of cars and trucks.”

This is hardly serious coming from a president who put the kibosh on the Keystone pipeline andviolated a court order to reimpose an offshore drilling moratorium. The administration has also fought “fracking” for natural gas and has carried out a war on coal. This is not to mention that the president’s big plans for government-subsidized “alternative energy” are being tried in Europe and are a miserable failure. About improving gas efficiency, three words for you: “cash for clunkers.”

3. “Third, we insure that we maintain the best workforce in the world by preparing 100,000 additional math and science teachers, Training 2 million Americans with the job skills they need at our community colleges. Cutting the growth of tuition in half and expanding student aid so more Americans can afford it.”

Now where have I heard that 100,000 math and science teachers line before? Oh yeah, the 2011 State of the Union address. And about training 2 million Americans with the job skills they need in the workplace at community colleges, the specifics about the $8 billion fund that would supposedly achieve that can be found here.

But how does government know what job skills people will need for the future job market? Because the government is subsidizing millions of students to get useless skills at colleges across the country, which explains why 53% of new college graduate won’t get jobs in their field under this administration. As for cutting the rate of tuition growth in half, it is absurdly obvious that the tuition rate explosion of three decades has paralleled increased government subsidies. And moregovernment funding of education is this administration’s track record.

4. “Fourth, a balanced plan to reduce our deficit by four trillion dollars over the next decade on top of the trillion in spending we’ve already cut, I’d ask the wealthy to pay a little more. And as we end the war in Afghanistan let’s apply half the savings to pay down our debt and use the rest for some nation-building right here at home.”

Whenever the president uses the word ‘balanced’ conspicuously in this context, he means doing something radically different, whether one agrees with him or not. The risible bit about the deficit is not even worth anyone’s time to seriously address, since the president sustains more than trillion dollar deficits on a yearly basis and feigns to not even know how much is the national debt. But about ending the War in Afghanistan, Barack Obama promised to end the war in July 2011, but timeframe estimates have us at least until 2014.

“It’s time for a new economic patriotism. Rooted in the belief that growing our economy begins with a strong, thriving middle class. Read my plan, compare it Governor Romney’s and decide for yourself. Thanks for listening.”

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