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The liberals in Congress - those who believe they know better
how to spend your money than you do - have devised a new
strategy. While they are repulsed by the idea of allowing
citizens to keep more of their own paychecks, they also realize
that failure to acknowledge the desires of the majority of
Americans could lead to a loss of Congressional seats in 2002.
Thus, although Democrats are gritting their teeth and grudgingly
supporting the "concept" of a tax cut, they are doing
so in the partisan manner which the claim to abhor. Rather than
debating the pros and cons of lower taxes, the liberal cadre of
Washington has decided to focus on what it claims are the root
causes of economic downturn. They seek to institute class
warfare, pitting those who don't pay taxes against those who
do. Their goal is to increase their political currency by
spreading lies and half-truths about those who spearheaded the
proposed cuts in the first place.
Democrats, in their infinite hypocritical malfeasance, crave a
continuation of the methodology which was a hallmark of the past
eight years. You stand tall, you look straight into the
camera and you lie like a dog while blaming everyone but
yourself.
In short, the Democratic leadership has become a full-fledged
proselytizer of "Shoot The Messenger" theology.
The most vocal cheerleader for this odious school of non-thought
is South Dakota's Tom Daschle. The Senator is now shouting
from the rooftops that our pecuniary malaise can be laid at the
feet of George W Bush. Daschle asserts (now stay with me
here...it's confusing) that President Bush caused our
approaching recession by suggesting we might be approaching a
recession. This is a little like claiming John Kennedy
caused racism by discussing civil rights, or that FDR was
responsible for World War II because he approved the invasion of
Normandy.
It gets worse. A couple weeks back I happened to catch
Daschle on TV. He had his usual graphs and visual aids, and was
claiming a correlation between Bush's fiscal comments and
market declines. He said Bush's interpretations appeared to have
been a major factor in causing the slump. They eroded public
confidence, Daschle told us, and created a sort of self
fulfilling prophecy.
How scientific. I have my own graphs, and they indicate
Daschle missed a number of other factors which appear to be
synergistic with America's financial woes.
For example, over the past winter my dogs have been shedding
quite heavily. I noticed that, during the exact same
period, stock prices went down. Thus, if we follow Senator
Daschle's logic, the fall of the Nasdaq can be blamed on my
dogs' propensity to go bald. Also, I realized the other
day I haven't barbecued any ribs since December. In the period
between December and now, the Dow has plummeted.
Obviously, if we follow Senator Daschle's logic, the
atrophy of the Dow is all my fault because I didn't provide the
public with succulent pork ribs slow-smoked for a minimum of
five hours over lightning struck Ozark hickory. If I hadn't
closed my BBQ joint for the winter (The Pony Bar-B-Q, located in
downtown Pony, Montana) we'd all be fat and happy. Lucky for
America I re-open May 9th.
Oh
yes. To add hypocrisy to lunacy, Daschle failed to mention the
observations uttered by his good buddy Dick Gephart last January
on the Today show. Gephart spoke of a "looming
recession." If Daschle truly believes that Wall
Street's sluggish pace is a result of the President's
statements, why isn't he crediting Dick's pronouncements as
well? Doesn't he like him anymore?
Our monetary stumbles can be traced to a number of factors, all
of which began over a year ago, long before George Bush was
elected. We began experiencing a shock wave from
collapsing Asian markets, and the bubble that was the "dot
com revolution" burst when investors discovered many
"dot com" companies had no assets or potential for
revenue. The government filed a pointless suit against
Microsoft, one of the few tech companies that is highly
profitable, thus destroying public confidence in tech stocks
generally and precipitating a market crash. An energy crisis was
bearing down upon us, thanks largely to the previous
administration's successful efforts to stifle exploration and
production in exchange for the votes of the environmental lobby.
I can go on,...but I won't. Many factors led to our
current situation, but President Bush's admirable desire to
publicly identify problems and seek their solutions is not
one of them.
Daschle and his supporters would hang President Bush for telling
the truth. They would blame him for a sour economy brought on by
routine domestic cycles, international events and the
intellectual sloth, self deception and managerial apathy of his
predecessor. Apparently Daschle believes that if you close your
eyes and click your ruby slippers three times all the bad things
will go away.
Do you think Daschle REALLY feels that a problem doesn't exist
until someone identifies it? If so, I'm very glad he's not my
physician.
"Dr. Daschle," says the nurse. "The patient is
dead!"
"Keep it to yourself," replies the caring healer.
"What he doesn't know won't hurt him."
Ron Marr is an award winning newspaper and
internet columnist, not to mention the celebrated Pitmaster of
the Pony Bar-B-Q, Pony, Montana. To subscribe to Ron's
FREE weekly e-mail newsletter - loaded with news,views, snooze,
blatant self promotion and BBQ tips - just write to [email protected].
Ask for his Marr-Mail Alert.
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