Testing Outcomes
We’ve heard a lot about change over the past three years; first during a two + year presidential campaign and now 9 months into the presidency of the Barak Obama. On the domestic front, the ideas on the table from the left:
- Cap and Trade
- Massive Health Care Reform
- Repeal of the Bush tax cuts
- T.A.R.P.
Just to name a few…
Of the above, only T.A.R.P – an $780 billion economic stimulus package – has been enacted. This legislation was so massive in scope and so out of control that even today legislators are “surprised” by its content. Why? Because by their own admission they did not, and could not, have read the bill before the House and Senate leadership brought it to the floor for a vote. The President, his Treasury Secretary, and congressional leadership had everyone whipped into a panicked frenzy with claims that if this legislation was not passed in days the entire world economy would collapse.
So, it passed, and the deficit ballooned, and the money is rolling out and the results are pouring in. Month after month, the unemployment rate continues to rise – e.g. reaching 9.8% nationally just yesterday (17% if you include the underemployed and those who have just stopped looking for work). Month after month, businesses continue to fail – e.g. GM announces the closing of Saturn this week.
Saturday, during the Defending The American Dream Summit sponsored by American’s For Prosperity, CNBC’s Larry Kudlow said. “Look, if it (T.A.R.P) was going to work, it would have worked by now.” In Kudlow’s opinion, T.A.R.P. is already a failed, massive, government intervention into the free market and our society.
Regardless if you agree with Kudlow’s assessment or not, one thing is true: Irrespective of the success or failure of T.A.R.P. to stimulate our economy, our children and grand-children are going to have to foot the bill. To me, that is simply irresponsible on our part to allow that to happen.
According to Senator Demint (R – SC): “This year alone, the Senate has passed a $787 billion stimulus, a $350 billion Wall Street bailout extension, a $400 billion earmark-infested omnibus spending bill, a $109 billion loan to the International Monetary Fund, $6 billion to federalize charities and pay volunteers, $3 billion for cash for clunkers, $400 million in corporate welfare to help tourism corporations advertise overseas, and a $4 billion bailout of the Postal Service.” [1]
Given the apparent dismal, albeit short, track record of this administration, would it not be helpful if we were able to test their ideas before implementing them? After all, don’t we test drugs before we give them to humans to cure them and don’t we test cars before we give them to drivers to drive them? So, before we try to fix or drive our economy/health care/environment, would it not be a good idea to test these ideas before our legislators vote on concepts (not content) and implement change blindly?
Fortunately, the ideas being proposed by the Democrats in charge in Washington D.C. have in fact been tried and we have the ability to examine the results. For example, California has implemented Cap in Trade and the Federal legislation passed by the U.S. House and under consideration by the U.S. Senate. So, how’s it going in California – and elsewhere – where Cap and Trade has been implemented?
According to the Legal Planet, a blog run by UCLA’s Berkeley Law School (hardly a conservative think-tank), Cap and Trade laws have a dismal track record where ever they have been implemented. In his article, “Cap and trade: it’s never worked, so let’s try it on a massive scale”, the author Ethan Elkind points out that the failure is the result of the lack of ability for government(s) to effectively legislate and administer environmental change with the resulting outcome being only massive tax increases and manipulation of so-called Cap and Trade markets [2]. Elkind’s position is supported by a law suit recently filed by several environmental advocacy groups against the California Air Resources Board (CARB) – the agency charged with implementing California’s Can and Trade Law – claiming that the government is failing to meet the objectives of the legislation [3].
So, if Cap and Trade laws have failed because governments, for a number of reasons, have been unable to implement them in a way to achieve the desired outcomes, then why are we moving forward to implementing them on a national scale with one economic analysis after another warning of massive job loss to India and China along with massive tax increases and massive negative economic impact on both businesses and individuals.
This is not the kind of change we need.
Footnotes:
[1] Washington Politicians’ Most Titanic Lie The Washington Examiner, Oct. 1, 2009 by Sen. Jim DeMint