I'm certainly not going to react as one who embraces all the the new President has done. I don't. I'm particularly in disagreement with the inefficiency of much of the government spending that has occurred. I will not vote for President Obama's re-election. But I feel compelled to provide a different interpretation of some of the statements from the National Review article."Bi-partisanship" is a two way street. There was little bi-partisanship in the Congress in prior administrations and that continues in the 111th. The President has made an effort to invite his political opposition to meet and hear their concerns and desires. If the Congress in it's entirety continues their partisan behavior under the leadership of the two political parties, I don't think that President Obama should be blamed, any more than President Bush or President Clinton should be assigned total responsibility for the bitter partisanship before him.Only by the most closed-minded assert that all of big government is dubious.. We've already determined, right here in this forum, that few if any of us would describe government-run programs such as Medicare or the Veteran's Administration as "dubious".These words by this author, while possibly effective in inflaming the emotions of those who don't study the facts, are totally untrue in the eyes of almost any economist or expert in government finance that has opined on the actions taken to correct the economic crisis. While some disagree with all the steps taken, all agree that dramatic actions were necessary by the governments of all the major world economies to reverse the slide of recession into depression. Those that look at the effect of those steps in a fair-minded way must agree that what was done seems to be working.I guess it needs to be pointed out...again..that the President has no Constitutional authority to increase spending, authorize debt limits or create new taxes...NONE!Again, nice sounding words, but how has "this administration" done that? Unless I missed a new law somewhere, not a single tax increase has been enacted since January 20, 2009. Have regulations been enacted to limit excessive compensation by executives of companies who needed massive taxpayer funding to assure their survival? Yes, and appropriately so. All they need do is pay the money back and they can go back to paying themselves as much as they want.Has there been increased federal spending? Yes, absolutlely. Is it fair to calculate such spending as a percentage of GDP at a time when GDP is at a cyclical low point? Only if you were a statistician or political opinion-writer trying to prove a point with misleading numbers. There are some pretty well-qualified economists that have projected that even the current elevated levels of federal spending will not result in such spending consuming a higher proportion of GDP. In fact, some have projected that with only modest economic growth from where we are now and inflation no better or worse than has been the norm, that government spending as a percentage of GDP will actually decrease in the next ten years. That decrease will be from a level of spending already significantly lower as a percent of GDP than many of the major developed countries in the world.
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So yes, Bucco, I think we should all consider the opinions of various people of different political, economic and social persuasions. I have and I think you have as well. But I felt compelled to comment on the statements of this particular author.