It's Not the Economy, Stupid
The white-hot political scene here in California
will cool down next week, after Tuesday's election.
But with a presidential election just a year away,
things will not stay quiet for long. Already,
Democrats aspiring to replace President Bush in the
White House have started slinging mud and talking
trash. They're seizing on every dime-store drama
and shadow of a scandal like it's Watergate
Revisited. And it's only going to get worse.
One of the foremost issues to serve as a
lightning rod in any election year is the economy.
And with the U.S. economy (as well as local
economies) limping out of one of the worst periods
since the Great Depression, this election year is
no exception. President Bush has already begun to
receive the slings and arrows of blame for the
recessionary times of the past two years. As
President Clinton took the credit for the boom of
the late nineties, so President Bush is assigned
the responsibility for the downturn of the new
millennium.
This is how it always works, and I'm sick of it.
I hope my fellow Americans are similarly fed up.
How many people honestly believe that the person
sitting in the Oval Office has a significant effect
on the state of the economy? The answer, I fear, is
"too many." Sure, most presidents have specific
agendas for improving a bad economy, or keeping a
good economy strong. But whatever effect they exert
upon the economic well-being of the country is
surely long-term. President Bush, therefore, is no
more responsible for the recent recession as
President Clinton was for the expansion of the
nineties. Such arguments are tailor-made for
ignorant voters who make their choices in the
polling booth based on sound bites.
Unfortunately, Democrats are not the only ones
guilty of such faulty logic. They pumped up
President Clinton by giving him credit for the boom
of the nineties, and now try to bring down
President Bush by blaming him for the bust that
followed. But in the current recall election here
in California, Republicans have used the same fuzzy
logic to try to bring down Governor Davis. True,
Davis has done plenty to affect the economy here in
California, but in my opinion, the state primarily
suffers from the same economic malaise which has
struck the rest of the country. If the downturn in
California is due to one person, who's to blame?
Davis or Bush? I guess the answer depends on the
political affiliation of the person you ask, but
the likely answer is neither. Credit for the boom
of the nineties should probably go to President
Reagan, whose seeds of "Reaganomics" bore fruit
long after he left office. Blame for the subsequent
bubble-burst is best assigned to the millions of
investors who bought into an artificially inflated
market—and should have known better. Only a
blind idiot or a hardcore gambler would pour money
into a company called
Nobusinessplanbutaflashywebsite.com and expect to
make a sizeable return on his or her investment
over the long term.
My basic premise is this: in an election, there
are plenty of valid issues by which to judge the
incumbent and candidates. But the state of the
economy is not one of them. A chemical company may
be charged with polluting, but you don't blame it
for the ozone hole or global warming. A gross
polluter may contribute to such environmental
problems, but does not bear the sole blame for
them. Any accusation of such is erroneous, as is
any charge that the incumbent president (or
governor) is to blame for a bad economy. Such barbs
are strictly intended as sound bites, so ignore
them when you hear them—unless you use such
biased claims to choose whom to vote for.
©2003 Michael
Strickland ALL RIGHTS
RESERVED
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