Conservative Refocus

By Barry Secrest

We hear these same economic arguments all the time these days, to the point that these virtual and actual ideological skirmishes often take on an almost Ground Hog Day-ish repetitive cycle of nauseating repetition. The Political Right says "spend less," the Political Left says "tax more," so that, ultimately, many Americans are left feeling measurably unsure, if not completely confused, as to what the proper course of action should actually be for America as a nation, when in fact it's not so terribly difficult.

Over these past few weeks, we have also further witnessed a depressing number of moderate Republicans, as well as an equally impressive number of middling Liberals, essentially second-guessing their own positions throughout these economic debates.  Maybe not so much outwardly--but rather in a passing glimpse, a splinter of doubt in the the mind's eye or even a certain identifiable hesitance in their verbal tirades.  Both sides doubting what they have formerly held to be as sacrosanct and undeniable. Perhaps that doubt can be actively identified as where compromise begins taking form, or could this spate of heavily veiled penance also be where a correctable mistake begins to snowball into a ground-skipping comet of fiscal oblivion?

Put in another way, what if we as a Nation are looking in all the wrong places in order to find the true answers to the Nation's economic problems?  There is an old saying that goes something to the effect that "if everyone is thinking the same thing, then no one is actually thinking."  With some, it now appears that America has reached a sort of aggregated professional lunacy as to the true facts that may be in play.  As we have alluded to increasingly throughout this current President's term, there appears to be much, much, more to our economic morass than meets the proverbial eye.

A Bizarre Approach

When we realistically look at the performance of our Executive Branch up to this point, we see what could be termed as an ostensibly bizarre approach to all things economic and otherwise. When we should be doing one thing in reaction to some ever-present mushrooming dilemma, our leadership often takes an opposite tack that actually worsens a given situation rather than ameliorating it. Take for instance the subprime lending debacle that in large part placed our economy into this position in the first place. The Obama team's reaction was to vastly over-regulate the mortgage industry and even add staff  bank regulators to various bank branch offices in order to intensively micro-manage each and every loan.

So, at a time when our Nation's building industry, which is one of the major engines of America's economy, needed to be aided and fortified in every officious manner possible, the White House put forth draconian measures to essentially restrict and even hasten the down-fall of our residential builders, thereby also denying families needed housing...but then again, not exactly all families it would seem, as we are now given to understand.

Continue reading...No really....

Epic Fail: Cloward-Piven and Obama's Engineered Destruction of America's Economy