PLANK AUGUST 27, 2012
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TAMPA—As they assemble in Tampa, the Republicans should consider not just whether they can win back the presidency in November, but whether they can create a viable majority that can endure past an election cycle. But they won’t. Mitt Romney and his party are oblivious to their longer term prospects. They are committed to a strategy that may win this year, but will lead to another Democratic landslide in two or four years.
For a party out of power, the key to creating a viable majority is to pick up important groups within the opposition’s coalition, and to increase the support of groups within its own coalition. In 1980, Reagan brought into the Republican party the Southern and white working class voters that had begun moving away from the Democratic party in 1966. At the same time, he retained traditional Republican support among the business and professional classes. From 1992 to 2008, Democrats picked up professionals and Northern suburbanites—women in particular—who had become disenchanted with the Republicans’ social agenda. The Democrats also dramatically increased their vote among minorities, and particularly among Latinos. As the white working class vote has shrunk, the minority proportion of the electorate has risen, giving the Democrats a demographic advantage. This advantage is evident in a state like California, but also in states like North Carolina or Colorado that Obama won in 2008.
What, then, could be the path to a Republican resurgence? The first thing would be to break the Democratic hold on the minority vote by winning back a reasonable share of the Hispanic vote—say, 40 percent or more, which Republicans once got. Success in this case depends on advancing policies on immigration that win favor among Hispanics, but it also may hinge on Republicans take the side of Hispanics in a battle over scare public resources with blacks. One could see this kind of black-Hispanic division surfacing in 2005 Los Angeles mayoral election pitting James Hahn, who enjoyed black support, against Antonio Villaraigosa.
George W. Bush and Karl Rove always understood the importance of the Hispanic vote to the Republican future. That accounted for Bush’s support for immigration reform; his repudiation in the summer of 2000 of Republican congressional attempts to eviscerate social spending (you can’t attract the Latino vote by promising to dismantle the welfare state); and by the elevation of half-Latino George P. Bush at the convention and during the campaign. Bush got about 35 percent of the Hispanic vote in 2000 and above 40 percent in 2004, although the exact numbers are in dispute.
The second element of a Republican strategy would consist of cutting into the Democratic advantage among women and professionals. Bush and Rove were also into that. In 2000, Bush ran on a slogan of “compassionate conservatism,” he kept the religious right at bay during the conventions (and in 2000, believe it or not, said he would not impose a litmus test on the appointment of Supreme Court justices) and he tried to convey through the prominence of Colin Powell at the 2000 convention a politics of tolerance and inclusion. Bush did not create a lasting majority—the Iraq war, the Great Recession, and his unwillingness or inability, once in office, to defy the radicals in his own party doomed the Republicans in 2008—but his political efforts in 2000 and 2004 at least showed an understanding of what Republicans had to do to create a majority.
In 2012, the Republican presidential nominee enjoys favorable circumstances. Barack Obama remains saddled with an economic downturn; and he has been unable to clearly establish himself as the candidate of Main Street against Wall Street. But Mitt Romney could not only lose the election, but set back any attempt by the Republicans to re-position themselves as a majority party. Romney has abandoned Bush and Rove’s strategy. He has taken a hard line against illegal immigration, backing measures in Arizona and other states that would stigmatize Latinos; desperate to defeat Texas Gov. Rick Perry, he even opposed Perry’s attempt to provide tuition for the children of illegal immigrants. Little that Romney can do at the Republican convention will erase an impression of hard intolerance toward Hispanics. Romney will be lucky if he wins 30 percent of the Latino vote.
Bush and Rove understood that majority coalitions have never been built on strict consensus. Instead, successful coalitions are heterogeneouos. They include groups (such as Southern whites and Northern blacks during the New Deal) that don’t get along with each other, but still prefer the one party coalition to the other. And a successful candidate will offend one part of the coalition (with the expectation they’ll still vote for him) in order to reach out to parts of the opposing coalition. Bush could support immigration reform and pick off Hispanic votes with the expectation that he would still win white working class votes. But Romney, perhaps because he is not really a Republican conservative, has sought to be all things to all parts of the Republican base—from the Tea Party opponents of any social spending to the nativists worried about a Mexican takeover of America to religious conservatives wanting to ban all abortions. As a result, Romney has closed off opportunities to pick off parts of the Democratic coalition.
Romney’s strategy is largely a reprise of Ronald Reagan’s 1980 election strategy, minus Reagan’s public show of amiability and his support among Hispanics. With his recent ads on welfare, Romney is playing on the racial resentments of the white working class the same way Reagan did. Meanwhile, Republicans—perhaps with Romney’s support—are attempting to reduce the Democrats’ support among minorities by keeping them from the polls by passing new voting regulations. The Romney-Republican strategy is the dark side of the older Republican strategy: the Reagan of hardline conservative Pat Buchanan rather than of public relations man Michael Deaver. It could still work in November 2012—because of Obama’s weakness among the electorate. But it won’t lay the basis for a new Republican majority. If anything, it will guarantee the Republicans’ defeat in the decade to come.
44 comments
If only it were so, John. If Romney is elected and the economy picks up somewhat (whether thanks to a stimulus he might well introduce because he knows it would be helpful - and which the Right will go along with if he throw it big bones on most other issues - or more slowly without that move), he has a calling card for reelection. Not that he'll do a great job on the economy, but because he can compare his middling track record to the bad old days of his Democratic predecessor. In the meantime, he'll also be able to stack the electoral deck, via appointments that ensure a continuation of a Supreme Court that validates the dominance of big money in politics and/or approves ever more egregious voter suppression laws.
- Thunderroad
August 27, 2012 at 12:34pm
Chait agrees with Judis, with a twist: Romney probably knows he can at best be a one-term president, has accepted it as part of a grand strategy for Republicans to take both the Senate and the Presidency, and is willing to do his part to repeal Obamacare, blow up what's left of the welfare state, lower taxes even more to benefit the rich and starve the beast, and blow the lid off the budget, doing so without any support from Democrats and in defiance of a Democratic filibuster in the Senate. Chait puts more emphasis on race, that this may well be the last hope for white voters to elect a President; and if they do, Romney intends to leave a scar that won't be forgotten for a long time. Maybe we should buy some real estate in Missouri.
- rayward
August 27, 2012 at 1:00pm
G*d I hope they don't get even close to winning. I don't feel like rolling the dice here. I'm scared to death. When I see polls indicating a close race...it's outright terrifying. We are dealing after all with blatant liars, misogynists, racists, people who scream about "freedom" and demand a police state.
- Sophia
August 27, 2012 at 1:37pm
PS where oh where is the press. Not isolated examples like TNR, thank G*d for which; Krugman et.al., Chris Matthews. I mean NBC, CBS, ABC, what's left of the newspapers. CNN.
- Sophia
August 27, 2012 at 1:38pm
If BHO wins in Nov.. AND the economy collapses in 2013 as Keynesian economists have been predicting for some time (and CBO calculations also predict), Progressives like Sophia may rue the day they got what they currently wish for. It is not only the Repubs that are catering to short-term strategy as opposed to long-term strategy. BHO and the Dems have no plans or realistic hopes of ending the 4 year initial recession/miniscule inadequate recovery--- much less dealing with a second recession/depression.
- drofnats1
August 27, 2012 at 1:55pm
How about spelling the name of our mayor correctly. It is Villaraigosa, not Villagarosa. --From Los Angeles
- lbevans@earthlink.net-old
August 27, 2012 at 2:52pm
Uh huh drof. I'm going to rue the day that Obama/Biden are re-elected? Why? I should be overjoyed at the prospect that a racist, reactionary, misogynist, whites only, men only, rich people only political party that's busily trying to dismantle our civil society, our democracy and our social contracts, and even undercuts basic science, wins an election? WHY?
- Sophia
August 27, 2012 at 3:15pm
At this point, Sophia, drof isn't even an interesting parody of himself.
- miceelf
August 27, 2012 at 3:22pm
Read a history book, drofnats. You have a lot to learn.
- Claris
August 27, 2012 at 3:51pm
Read a history book, drofnats. You have a lot to learn.
- Claris
August 27, 2012 at 3:51pm
Sorry, folks, that was an accident. But it does bear repeating, doesn't it?
- Claris
August 27, 2012 at 3:52pm
"Romney’s strategy is largely a reprise of Ronald Reagan’s 1980 election strategy I see a difference but it is in the picture they each paint of the problem. Romney pretends that unshackling the free market with low top rates and no regulation will deluge us with growth (even though there is no evidence that top rates and regulation are the problem). Reagan, instead, had implied that tax cuts would create an overwhelming incentive for economic activity (He practicailly tripled the national debt). If there is an investment that rises with the National Debt, it will do well under a Romney Administration.
- Nusholtz
August 27, 2012 at 4:06pm
Republicans had a chance to nominate Ron Paul. He would have had fiscal integrity, he would have saved Social Security, he would not have started WW4 against Iran or Syria or whoever Israel wants us to attack. But Republicans didn't nominate Paul. And TNR readers were told that 25 years ago someone who wrote for a Paul newsletter criticised MLKing, and we can't have that. So the Republicans have nominated Romney, who will start WW4, but pretend to cut domestic spending. Pretend means the Democrats will propose ,let's say, 10% spending increases, Romney will propose 5% increases, and TNR will pretend that a 5% increase is a 5% decrease. Meanwhile, TNR will live in its Cohn fantasy world where Romney will result in an apocalyptic devastation. TNR readers who don't get out much don't know that they are being mocked at takimag, where the editors write satirically "Paul Ryan is Evil." Imitating the pseudo-facts of Cohn & the unintentionally hilarious Media Matters, takimag writes: FACT: Paul Ryan has submitted legislation requiring women to have a copy of Atlas Shrugged implanted in their vaginas. Meanwhile, we will rush over the fiscal cliff w/Obama, crawl over the cliff w/Romney, & further destroy America w/war in either case.
- raygun
August 27, 2012 at 4:20pm
The flip side of this analysis is the Dems need 40% or so of the white working class vote, which they aren't getting. They could have it, and then some, if they played serious class war. But they seem to be focussing instead on their traditional interest groups: minorities, women, gays, youth. Don't believe this demographic strategy is going to be as clean as you might think. Retreating armies tend to be underestimated. You expect these people to go gentle into that good night? I see the Dems setting up a decade of indecisive conflict by their unwillingness to solidify their real and natural Jacksonian base. After that, it's like Keynes said.
- Vogelfam
August 27, 2012 at 5:02pm
drof, the only thing I have left to say about your theory that a Romney victory will be to the Democrats' longterm advantage is that it is far too complicated and relies on too many contingencies. Yes, if Obama wins AND if the economy dips into recession 2013 AND if the govt's response is inadequate AND if things are still in the shits in 2016 AND if the voters blame Obama and not the GOP Congress (in contrast, by supposition, to 2012), maybe some Democrat somewhere might reasonably conclude the party would have been better off had Obama lost, but gosh that's a lot of holes in a lot of Swiss cheese slices that have to line up. You want Democrats to trade a bird in hand for two in the bush. There's a reason that old saw still sees the light of day: it speaks to a fundamental truth, one to which you seem to be utterly blind.
- AaronW
August 27, 2012 at 6:12pm
" were told that 25 years ago someone who wrote for a Paul newsletter criticised MLKing" At long last we have some honest to goodness Ron Paul supporters, for so long part of the furniture on The Atlantic, here at TNR. I guess when one self-publishes a newsletter under one's own name, and never credits any other "someones", it is reasonable to suggest that it might not have been you that wrote everything. But it's a bit weak. And I think there were a few more things than some criticism of MLK that prompted the scrutiny.
- Nari224
August 27, 2012 at 8:11pm
Mr. Judis: After reading your column, I could not help but feel that you would like the Republican Party to be weak, so that the Democrats can rule for several generations. America needs a President who speaks the truth about our fiscal mess and is not afraid to say that he or she believes in American exceptionalism. BHO, no matter what you think, has never been ready to be the leader of the free world. Furthermore, his main goal seems to be to redress 230 years of American history. He does not have the temperment, training, or discipline to be an American President. He should move to France. The GOP can become the majority party by presenting policies that give all Americans the opportunity to achieve economic freedom and independence, and by not caving in the social anarchists, those who equate same-sex marriage with marriage between a man and a woman, those who assume that partial birth abortion and still-born infanticide is another form of birth control, and those who believe in open borders. Look at the kooks in the Democrat Party: Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Janet Napolitano, Nancy Pelosi, Patty Murray [she is a genius], Elizabeth Warren, Sandra Fluke [she belongs on Mt. Rushmore], and Howard Dean. Not only are they hardline ideologues, they do not listen, and they spend half their day lying. Americans want results: they want their politicians to get the job done. If the Republicans get the job done, the Republicans will be the majority party.
- john336
August 27, 2012 at 8:22pm
john336: "Americans want results: they want their politicians to get the job done." Yes, and the party willing to do that is the Democratic Party. Pelosi is willing to take a 4:1 spending cut to revenue increase deal to address our long-term fiscal problems. Boehner's caucus is not. And every Republican presidential candidate said they'd reject a 10:1 deal. And the Democrats are called "hardline ideologues"? It seems to me that it's Republicans who have consistently refused to compromise. They reject economic data in favor of abstract free market fundamentalism, even in the face of ample evidence that markets don't work everywhere all the time (see: health care). They reject science. They reject things that a majority of Republican voters want (a "balanced" approach to deficit reduction, disclosure of campaign spending). They've reversed their positions on things they used to support (health insurance mandate, cap and trade, campaign finance disclosure). Obama has governed as a moderate, pragmatic Republican, and they call him a dangerous leftist. Only shows where the true ideology resides. (As for "partial birth" abortion, it makes no sense even from the "pro-life" view to ban a medical procedure. The abortion is still allowed with other procedures that may pose a higher risk to the woman and the same result for the fetus. How does that benefit anyone? If the issue is late term abortion, then let's have that discussion. But that's not what the "partial birth" procedure ban addresses.)
- dsimon
August 27, 2012 at 9:02pm
john336 "America needs a President who speaks the truth" What makes you think Romney tells the truth? The truth is something Romney can't expose with his tax returns. He bragged that his budget concealed enough detail so that it could not be scored. He took credit for the auto bailout even thought he advised against it. And he accuses the president of cutting medicare knowing said fact to be untrue. Romney speaks with forked tongue.
- Nusholtz
August 27, 2012 at 9:06pm
john336 -- I think if you want an American president that speaks the truth, you need one that actually has a concept of the truth. I beg to suggest that Mitt Romney has offered much evidence that either he doesn't have one or he doesn't care if he does or not. In any event, we'll see what happens in the debates when Obama congratulates Romney on his Mass. healthcare reform providing a model for the ACA.
- ironyroad
August 27, 2012 at 9:26pm
john336, hilarious parody of a rightwing nutjob because why would a nutjob shell out money for a TNR subscription to launch into a rant that is absolutely batshit insane. And I love how juxtapose the Biblical John 3:36 with basically evil hate thy neighbor speech (especially women, that is quite a list you have there only throwing in one male name)
- blackton
August 27, 2012 at 10:30pm
dsimon -- I think the word "compromise" is overused, by pundits and by the President, and it makes Obama appear weak to me. I'd rather he would talk about the inability of the Republicans to *cooperate* with the President to address the problems of our country. There are two meanings here: to work with the President, and to comply with the President, and while the latter may be asking for too much, the former is what the American people want very badly.
- aboufade
August 27, 2012 at 11:13pm
John336 typeth: "If the Republicans get the job done, the Republicans will be the majority party." Yea, & verily 'tis so, John. Problem is though, the Repugs can't discern "the job" from a hole in the ground. Same with their asses. This is because Tea Party numbskulls control that political party like Mr. Toad steers an autommobile, & believe that government has no legitimate functions, beyond perhaps raising armed forces & protecting the borders. Well, we already have a military establishment which dwarfs any such ever before seen in the history of the world, in terms relative to the threats it faces & its competitors, by a huge factor, so that can't be part of "the job" remaining to be done. And illegal border crossings have been down considerably the past few years, despite all the hysteria about illegal immigration, so that's probably not a huge part of "the job" to be done. So what exactly comprises "the job" you think the government needs to accomplish?
- Haole45
August 27, 2012 at 11:43pm
raygun, The "social anarchist" Obama has closed the Mexican border tighter than any previous president. Even Jeb Bush admitted on Meet the Press Sunday that the net border crossings are at zero now.
- magboy47.
August 28, 2012 at 12:57am
Romney is obviously a selection by the RNC, as is his vicious VP. RNC is run by the cabal, which is an evil mix of Wall St money (read US taxpayer money) and Fox news media control, and Rovian electioneering. They pit the subsets of their party, all white and older, against each other, garner their votes with social issues, and then steal all our money while we watch the spectacle. Someone should tell the GOP's irate screamers that Rupert Murdoch is an immigrant, here illegally as far as I am concerned. His photo shouldn't appear in legitimate publications, because many of us consume our news first thing in the morning, and his prune face sickens me, even a glimpse. He corrupted Australia and left. He bought British government from the erudite Thatcher, enriched himself through massive corruption of their media, police, politicians, and even their health system, before he scampered off in the night taking his contemptuous son with him. He ought to be #1 on Interpol's most wanted. I pray the US Justice dept goes after him with all the smart liberal attorneys it has at its disposal.
- smabry03
August 28, 2012 at 6:03am
Well, it's good to see that my good friends are alive and well and that not much has changed. The election of Romney will be the apocalypse, Republicans are evil, etc. All I need now is roi to call me stupid, like old times. It's clear to me that BHO has not been a successful President in many, if not most aspects of the job. However, I have no great confidence that the Mittster will be a lot better. I think Raygun has it pretty close - off the cliff quickly or slowly, name your poison. We could get serious about entitlement reform and tax reform, but this administration is not up to it. How come we could do tax reform in 1986, but not today? And when Turbotax Timmy goes to the Hill and says, hey, we don't have a plan for Medicare reform, we just know we don't like yours, well, that's an embarassment. Ah, cheers to you all. Glad to check in.
- butchie b
August 28, 2012 at 11:12am
Interesting piece Judis, you know it's a good one when the trolls come out from under their various bridges. After Bush/Delay's Medicare Part D boondoggle any conservative or Republican tut tutting about the need for entitlement reform is a twisted ahistorical joke. Ryan and Romney's cynical promise to keep the current Medicare system for people over 55 tells you all you need to know about how "serious" Republicans are about entitlement reform. News for the Paulists: your guy is a weird old bigot. Trying to create a hard metal Candy Land economy isn't going to stop all war on Earth, sorry. Isolationism and magical thinking will not make a great country or solve anyone's problems. However, if Paul is right I for one will welcome our new UN Overlords and will enjoy learning Esperanto, the language of the new one world government.
- Pnaut
August 28, 2012 at 11:45am
butchie b, Last year Obama offered to cut the federal budget in the amount of $10 trillion over a period of years in exchange for $1 trillion in closed loopholes for rich people, and the Republicans turned him down flat--4 times. Obama made an effort to turn things around, and the GOP made an effort to turn things down. That's their modus operandi--the Party of Hell, No! I do agree with you that we will soon be going over the cliff one way or another, either quickly or slowly. But I'll reverse the roles of the parties involved. Under Obama in a second term we'll slide off the cliff from inertia. Under Romney in a first term, due to the GOP's obsession with deregulating Wall Street and other parts of the economy, we'll leap off the cliff suicidally. I guess a quick death is preferable to a slow one. That's why Romney will probably win. Fixing America has become too much of an intellectual challenge for most voters. That's why they want to return to the simple-minded ideas and policies of the GOP that got us into this mess.
- magboy47.
August 28, 2012 at 12:43pm
Note to TNR editor/proofreader. (You do have one, don't you?) Third paragraph down: "Success in this case depends on advancing policies on immigration that win favor among Hispanics, but it also may hinge on Republicans take the side of Hispanics in a battle over scare public resources with blacks" Well, maybe the author does mean "scare."
- skahn
August 28, 2012 at 1:19pm
I don't know which of the flawed men will win, but the trouble with your scenario, magboy, is the tax increases get enacted, but we just can't quite summon up the will to actually cut as much as we promised. I mean, has BHO ever told his own party to shut up and take the deal, the way WJC used to? He can't even get to a deal, because he either doesn't want to or doesn't know how to split a difference. Where's the leadership? You know I'm a good R, but I pine for the days of WJC.
- butchie b
August 28, 2012 at 3:59pm
John 336 seems like a plain Republican, not insightful. But I wonder about the commentors looking down their nose at him. Is TNR a boy's club for poofters? One poster/poofter asks why John bothers to subscribe. Maybe John tries to read diverse views! Maybe he didn't know that only sweethearts are allowed to post here. I have read TNR since the 1970s. I read NYReview of Books in the 1960s and recall civil rights reportage by Bartle Bull. I know that as a senior citizen, Bartle Bull has written in disgust at Obama's Eric Holder for dropping already won indictments against the Philadelphia New Black Panthers who intimidated white voters w/baseball bats.Many TNR posters seem to have taken up bats to attack John. I am far from a Romney supporter, but I wonder if TNR posters believe "diversity is our strength" until it comes to posting here, in which case they revert to Stalinist limitations.
- raygun
August 28, 2012 at 4:05pm
Are George Bush and Karl Rove, the men John Judis loved to hate when they were in office, now the men he admires because he thinks he can use them to disparage Romney? Romney's a smart man. If elected, he will surely try to expand the GOP coalition to include more Hispanics, African Americans and professional women.
- Spengler47
August 28, 2012 at 4:14pm
butchie! Nice to hear from you. You talk sense now and again (you're ahead of me, in any case). Hope you stick around for a while. But precisely because of that (the sense) -- I'd like to ask you directly: How do you think Romney is going to respond in the debates when Obama says "And governor, I think both the people of Massachusetts and Americans at large know this -- you managed to set up a working universal health coverage plan in your state that we used as the model for the Affordable Care Act -- that has the same objectives for the country as a whole as yours did for your state, and you should stand by your achievement!"? I confess to being baffled, thinking about what he can say.
- ironyroad
August 28, 2012 at 6:10pm
Ditto irony re: nice to hear from you butchie. I'll just add throw in my flyboy analogy for your consideration if you've got time after his question. The Aircraft of State was encountering some manageable turbulence at a high cruising altitude when the previous aircrew took over the controls. The turbulence got worse, and they reacted in a way that seemed immediately practical, but soon produced a series of over-reactions and misapprehensions that threw the craft into a stall, followed by a violent spin, heading straight into the ground at increasing speed. They turned over to the current aircrew, which with a series of drastic maneuvers pulled out of the spin and began slowly gaining altitude. The party of the previous crew says they should return to the controls because the current crew hasn't returned to the previous cruising altitude yet. Seems like a weak argument to me. Anyway, great to have you back. Dodged Isaac by a whisker, back in Euroland for a bit. Tigers rule in 2012. Geaux!
- Robert Powell
August 29, 2012 at 9:18am
Can't say, irony, but I expect they're working on it. The MA experience is instructive. The good - almost everyone is covered. The bad - the cost curve is not bending - insurance in MA, always high compared to other states, is very high and requires ever more subsidies. Also, there aren't enough PCPs for all the newly insured and people still seem enamored of ERs. The popular myth that preventive lowers costs is just that - it might, but only over decades. In the short term, it just costs more. RP, I find your analogy humorous, but flawed. Mitt ain't W, and we're at a different spot. The flaw is that when the aircraft started to go down, the crew was mixed. Ds tend to forget that from Jan 07 on, Nancy and Harry were in charge, Barney and Chris were chairmen. Either Congress matters or it doesn't. The Obama folks want to blame the current Congress for obstructionism of all things good, which is fine and all, but what about 2009-10, when the Ds had the whole government? I still like "he took a bad situation and made it worse" as a slogan to run on. Look, BHO may still win, but his domestic presidency is over unless he learns how to really compromise, which I think he is intellectually unprepared for and disinclined to do. We'll see. No Honey Badger - sorry, Bama's better. Go Gators!
- butchie b
August 29, 2012 at 12:49pm
Should be "preventive treatment"
- butchie b
August 29, 2012 at 12:50pm
All this is wasted breath. Once business-friendly Romney is elected on November 6, risk-taking, private entrepreneurs, in big companies and small, who have been sitting on piles of money waiting to see if business-hating Obama will get reelected, will start doing what they almost always do when interest rates are low and money is abundant, that is, taking risks and creating jobs – by the millions. I say “almost always,” because under Obama, the risks have been too great and the rewards too small. Romney’s election ALONE will reduce the risks enough to set off a big increase in job creation – entrepreneurs won’t wait until Inauguration Day – they want to get going, if only to beat the other guy. They will be rightly assuming that after Romney takes office, he will increase the rewards. By November 2016, we’ll have created at least 12 million new jobs, and probably a lot more, and analyzing voter coalitions and blocs will be pointless – Romney will be secure for a second term. Entrepreneurs and job creators won’t need new demand. To a person, they believe that if they build it, demand will come. Where will the demand needed to justify the new jobs come from? Where it ALWAYS comes from – from the NEWLY CREATED SALARIES AND WAGES of the NEWLY CREATED JOBS. NOT from lower saving or greater borrowing of those already employed, who are ALREADY spending what they can or should spend, but from the NEW HIRES, in a bootstrap operation that has driven every economy in history. “Supply side,” “trickle down,” whatever, such labels mean nothing. It’s the economic process that counts. And the process couldn’t be simpler. All government need do is lower the risks and increase the rewards. Profit-seeking, risk-taking entrepreneurs - MILLIONS of them - will do the rest.
- truthman
August 29, 2012 at 1:36pm
"The MA experience is instructive. The good - almost everyone is covered. The bad - the cost curve is not bending - insurance in MA, always high compared to other states, is very high and requires ever more subsidies. Also, there aren't enough PCPs for all the newly insured and people still seem enamored of ERs. The popular myth that preventive lowers costs is just that - it might, but only over decades. In the short term, it just costs more." butchie, I'll bet you dinner (if you ever come to Knoxville) that that won't be Mitt's answer!
- ironyroad
August 29, 2012 at 3:08pm
No bet, my friend. No doubt the Mittster's answer will befit a President. He hasn't been to all 57 states yet, but soon.....
- butchie b
August 29, 2012 at 3:51pm
Funny thing, but all my Republican friends and colleagues (there are a couple) go very shy when I ask them to put their money where their mouth is. They claim Romney has a good shot but won't even bet a $40 dinner check on it. Maybe I should have offered $10,000 . . . .
- ironyroad
August 29, 2012 at 8:51pm
I wouldn't take the bet either butchie--seems to me the Repubs are fully committed to trying to lie their way into the White House. While I yield to no one in my contempt for the Harry and Nancy Show, the idea that they were ever totally in control of Congress, much less "the entire government" as the current Repub meme goes, is risible. I think that as in the case of Clinton, Democrat Congressional leaders were excessively deferred to by the new kid in town, and that any chance of bi-partisan problem-solving (if there ever was one) was lost as a result. But that's about it. By Jan. '07, the plane was already in a stall, and the spin more or less inevitable. You're right about the bi-partisan nature of the screwup though. The origins of the problem go back at least to the Rubin/Summers Treasury, if not the home mortgage interest deduction. But the key moment was probably marked by Cheney's "deficits don't matter" remark. In any case the recovery is on the way no matter who wins. Some kind of grown-up deal that addresses the tax code short term and entitlements long term will provide all the "certainty" business needs, which traditionally is not much.
- Robert Powell
August 30, 2012 at 4:08am
My point, RP, was the bipartisan nature of the screwup, thanks. But when you control the House, Senate (59-41) and the WH, that's all 2 branches. Risible it ain't. A real leader could have made real progress, but that's not what we got in 2009. The most lightly qualified candidate in my lifetime instead. I agree that the economy will get better, and would have even if the feds had done nothing. Maybe faster if they had done nothing. A grown-up deal indeed - perhaps something like Bowles Simpson, that Ryan voted against and Obama walked away from. I'd bet dinner, but I'm not that confident. BTW, does anyone hereabouts have any idea what BHO will do in 2013-16? Is there any basis for his 2nd term beyond the digs anre good and he gets to play golf a lot?
- butchie b
August 30, 2012 at 11:40am
With the Iranian nuclear issue, he may have little time for golf.
- ironyroad
August 30, 2012 at 3:57pm
C'mon butch. If you don't have 60-vote majority in the Senate these days you're basically fucked. As we were. I'm betting on the O-team again, think the second term agenda will certainly be something like Bowles Simpson domestically and an extension of the re-focus on Asia from the Middle East abroad. Unless we go to war with Iran, in which case all bets are off.
- Robert Powell
August 31, 2012 at 3:56pm