I keep hearing criticism that the only reason the economy grew last Q is because of gov’t action. Well, duh! That’s the whole point of economic stimulus, isn’t it? So, in other words, Obama was right: we needed massive stimulus to avoid a far deeper recession and a graver crisis. But I thought the Republicans said “the stimulus isn’t working”?
That very much depends on what you mean by “work”.
When Joe Mama mentioned that strand of Republicanism characterized by intolerant bible-thumping hicks, this got me thinking about Nate Silver questioning why the Republicans weren’t on message anymore – the problem isn’t that the Republicans have lost their mojo, the problem is those hicks.
Because saying that the Republicans used to be more on message oversimplifies the accomplishments of Atwater and Rove. The Republicans, across the board, were simply better brand managers, they didn’t dilute their brand through contrary messaging – or contrary anything else for that matter. If the uneducated hillbillies with the “These Colors Don’t Run” bumper stickers on their pickup trucks wanted to hang out in the tent, their votes (and meager dollars) were welcome, but they were also encouraged to STFU.
Palin changes all that. Palin gives the hillbillies a large megaphone in the Republican tent. Which, in the context of brand management, is highly problematic. Its not that Republicans have lost their focus (per Silver), its that the brand’s focus is broken, and the road to repair is not readily apparent. The guy who would be responsible for that task (Michael Steele) is one of the stupidest individuals in the public arena.
Contrast this with Obama’s Lincoln-esque team of rivals. Unlike the Republicans, the Democrats of the last generation have been poor brand managers, preferring internecine squabbling to putting a public face on their party. By bringing in demographic rivals like Biden and Clinton into his administration, Obama effectively achieves the things that Rove or Atwater achieved by force.
Think about it (connected to this thread): a young, inexperienced, black President watches the economy sink into the sea (economy being the biggest factor in an election). He is also managing a foreign occupation that is redefining quagmire. All that said, who is the Democrat to play the Teddy Kennedy 1980 role and turf his re-election?
Such a person is unimaginable right now – really a testimony to Obama’s brand management skills.
Meanwhile here in Washington, the recent decision to locate a second 787 line in South Carolina is leading local Republicans to criticize the Governor and Senators for not doing enough to swing the decision in favor of our state.
So which is it, should government stay out of buisness or stick their nose in more? Republicans need to pick a position and stick to it.
This topic must be a stimulus for conversation on this board.
I saw an Obama ’12 bumper sticker on a car while driving down Crenshaw yesterday.
Washington State Dems did let Boeing escape. As much as I loath Gov. Gregoire and her false promises, they did the right thing on that issue:
South Carolina waved all major taxes on Boeing and promised to spend $190m to build the infrastructure for the plant. Time will tell if that investment pays off in the long run. In the short run, they’re bleeding money to prove their love to Boeing.
SC Article:
“Lawmakers Create the Illusion of Economic Growth”
Washington Repubs are a bunch of whiners. Gregoire got reelected despite 4yrs of bumbling, largely due to Republicans inability to come up with any original message. Her challenger tried to score points on her when the Sonics left Seattle. He lost my vote by saying he would have tried harder to keep them. He lost my vote because that is a lie, and the Boeing finger-pointing is a lie too.
Republicans would have done the exact same thing.
In Short, I agree with David K.
Brendan, the idea is that the growth is temporary. Nobody disputes that government spending works as a pump-primer, but unless you leave something afterwards that can continue economic growth, what you have is a bottle rocket, not an engine.
We’d like champagne, not just the bubbles.
Thanks for making the argument for why we should not stop the stimulus spending now Mike.
This is all daft of course, there is no way to say where we are in this mess now. Nor can we no now what is ultimately working and what is a waist of money. None of this will be known until we are well on the other side of this mess.
What we can do is try some stuff and if it doesn’t work try some other stuff… Which is what we are doing. Something seems to have worked, at least in the short term. But that’s not a reason to get either overly excited or overly dower.
The problem with economics is that has more to do with how people feel than it has to do with anything really solid. Panics happen because people panic. Sometimes it has something to do with reality, and sometimes people just panic. Then while panicking no one wants to do anything. The economy is a almost completely a self fulfilling prophecy. But generally what the majority of people think is going to happen is what happens because that’s what the majority of people thought would happen. If I think the market is going to go down so I sell the market goes down a little bit. If everyone thinks the market is going down so they all sell the market crashes. But it didn’t crash because something was wrong, it crashed because people thought there was something wrong. The same thing happens in speculative bubbles, just in the other direction.
The basic point is, we live in a post modern economy in which the fundamentals of the economy have almost nothing to do with the economy itself.