First Do No Harm

by Steven M. Cohen  •  Apr 8, 2008 at 6:00 pm

http://www.buyselljump.com/2008/04/first-do-no-harm

Would you administer strychnine to a dying man?

That's precisely what both Democratic candidates propose for the U.S. economy. Well, perhaps "dying" is an overstatement when it comes to America's financial health. But it's hard to argue that our economy at present is a picture of robustness.

Democrats appear determined to ignore--indeed, to defy--the most basic principles of Economics 101, which neither one evidently bothered to take in college. Unfortunately, both of them appear to have been preoccupied with other activities at the time. It's too bad, because a little basic knowledge would come in handy in the event either one of them is elected to the most powerful position on Earth.

Retro is in right now. New baseball stadiums resemble, at least superficially, edifices from the Golden Age of the sport. Automobile companies put out new models reminiscent of muscle cars from the Sixties and Seventies. The Democratic candidates look back even further, to Herbert Hoover and the origins of the Depression. Has it occurred to them that perhaps it's an era not worth replicating?

The similarities are too profound to ignore. Present-day populist cant requires a call for eliminating the Bush tax breaks in true Hooveresque fashion. Repudiation of Nafta conjures up the Smoot-Hawley protectionism that helped usher in bad times, indeed, very bad times. Maybe we should all don fedoras and double-breasted wide-lapel suits to really complete the picture.

How many economists from how many think tanks must weigh in on the oft-repeated lessons of pro-growth tax reduction before these folks pay attention? Does populist rhetoric always have to trump proven real-world experience and common sense insofar as Democratic candidates are concerned? Isn't a program of wealth redistribution getting kind of old, so Woodstockian, so passe, in a global economy?

Oh, that's right, we're not supposed to be in a global economy, insofar as Democrats are concerned. Nafta is a just a nasty arrangement that eats up American jobs. You can stick your head in a hole and presto, the global economy disappears! Another example of the Retro yearning that informs the policies of the Left.

Hard to believe that there are a number of European countries that can now teach us a lesson about the benefits of allowing people keep their money before government can spend it. It's called economic growth.

At present the putative Republican candidate is more or less an empty vessel when it comes to economic policy, although his record on governmental restraint isn't particularly comforting. Let's hope he can offer something more sensible than the populist duo who pander for votes with the hackneyed argument that the present arrangement benefits fat-cats at the expense of the little people.

That kind of sophistry--if ever enacted into law--could finish off a patient that probably is already on the mend without governmental intervention. Sort of like administering strychnine to a dying man.

receive the latest by email: subscribe to steven m. cohen's free mailing list