“Are you better off today than you were $4 trillion ago?”
— Former presidential candidate Rick Perry
It’s the campaign line of the year, and while the author won’t be carrying it into the general election, the eventual nominee will.
The charge is straightforward: President Obama’s reckless spending has dangerously increased the national debt while leaving unemployment high and the economy stagnant. Concurrently, he has vastly increased the scope and reach of government with new entitlements and oppressive regulation, with higher taxes to come (to offset the unprecedented spending).
In 2010, that narrative carried the Republicans to historic electoral success. Through most of 2011, it dominated Washington discourse. The air was filled with debt talk: ceilings, supercommittees, Simpson-Bowles.
What’s the incumbent to do? He admits current conditions are bad. He knows that his major legislative initiatives — Obamacare, the near-trillion-dollar stimulus, (the rejected) cap-and-trade — are unpopular. If you can’t run on stewardship or policy, how do you win re-election?
Create an entirely new narrative. Push an entirely new issue. Change the subject from your record and your ideology, from massive debt and overreaching government, to fairness and inequality. Make the election a referendum on which party really cares about you, which party will stand up to the greedy rich who have pillaged the 99 percent and robbed the middle class of hope.
This charge, too, is straightforward: The Republicans serve as the protectors and enablers of the plutocrats, the exploiters who have profited while America suffers. They put party over nation, fat-cat donors over people, political power over everything.
It’s all rather uncomplicated, capturing nicely the Manichaean core of the Occupy movement — blame the rich, then soak them. But the real beauty of this strategy is its adaptability. While its first target was the do-nothing protect-the-rich Congress, it is perfectly tailored to fit the liabilities of Republican front-runner Mitt Romney — plutocrat, capitalist, 1 percenter.
Obama rolled out this class-war counter-narrative in his Dec. 6 “Teddy Roosevelt” speech and hasn’t governed a day since. Every action, every proposal, every “we can’t wait” circumvention of the Constitution — such as recess appointments when the Senate is not in recess — is designed to fit this re-election narrative.
Hence: Where does Obama ostentatiously introduce the recess-appointed head of the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau? At a rally in swing-state Ohio, a stage prop for Obama to declare himself tribune of the little guy, scourge of the big banks and their soulless Republican guardians.
For the first few weeks, the class-envy gambit had some effect, bumping Obama’s numbers slightly. But the story was still lagging, suffering in part from its association with an Occupy rabble that had widely worn out its welcome.
Then came the twist. Then came the most remarkable political surprise since the 2010 midterm: The struggling Democratic class-war narrative is suddenly given life and legitimacy by … Republicans! Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry make the case that private equity as practiced by Romney’s Bain Capital is nothing more than vulture capitalism looting companies and sucking them dry while casually destroying the lives of workers.
Richard Trumka of the AFL-CIO nods approvingly. Michael Moore wonders aloud whether Gingrich has stolen his staff. The assault on Bain/Romney instantly turns Obama’s class-war campaign from partisan attack into universal complaint.
Suddenly Romney’s wealth, practices and taxes take center stage. And why not? If leading Republicans are denouncing rapacious capitalism that enriches the 1 percent while impoverishing everyone else, should this not be the paramount issue in a campaign occurring at a time of economic distress?
Now, economic inequality is an important issue, but the idea that it is the cause of America’s current economic troubles is absurd. Yet, in a stroke, the Republicans have succeeded in turning a Democratic talking point — a last-ditch attempt to salvage re-election by distracting from their record — into a central focus of the nation’s political discourse.
How quickly has the zeitgeist changed? Wednesday, the Republican House reconvened to reject Obama’s planned $1.2 trillion debt-ceiling increase. (Lacking Senate concurrence, the debt ceiling will be raised nonetheless.) No one noticed. It made page A16 of The New York Times. All eyes are on South Carolina and Romney’s taxes.
This is no mainstream media conspiracy. This is the GOP maneuvering itself right onto Obama terrain.
The president is a very smart man. But if he wins in November, that won’t be the reason. It will be luck. He could not have chosen more self-destructive adversaries.
Charles Krauthammer’s email address is letters@ charleskrauthammer.com.
Charles–finally a few of the republicans are telling it like it is, next they may finally admit trickle down does not work. Obama is about 2 jumps in front of that bunch picked for the presidental race. They really are a sorry bunch.
Krauthammer is upset because Newt Gingrich is pointing out that Romney may have destroyed more jobs while at Bain than he created. For instance, Bain Capital helped turn Staples into a successful chain — but purchased K-B Toys and took a big payout before the company declared bankrupcy. It’s fair to look into Romney’s dealings at Bain. How that will play with the Party For Millionaires remains to be seen.
I think Krauthammer is truly panicked at the thought of Gingrich getting the Republican nomination. This is interesting to watch!
We’re seeing that Republicans are a bunch of hypocrites. Sure they have good lines once and awhile, but they’re never delivered out of principle — instead, they come out of opportunity. Whatever sounds good, they’ll say it. Republican voters want a social conservative who speaks to their “family values” — they vote for a guy married 3 times. Republican voters want a conservative who cares about the Constitution — they seek to put prayer back in school. Republican voters want a fiscal conservative — they vote for guys with irresponsible and costly tax plans.
They have nothing right now. It’s all just empty rhetoric.
Trikle down,
Snooker me once shame on You,
Snooker me Twice shame on Me!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKgPY1adc0A
Lol. The sinking GOP ship means every man and pundant for themselves, run for cover, blame each other !
The problems that we are having with our economy and lack of funding for government programs all stem from sending our jobs overseas with total disregard for all of the ramifications that it would cause. Both parties are equally guilty and should be run out of town on a rail. Voting Republican or Democrat is the act of a total rube.
The current batting order of Republican’s, in either the House or the Senate, is one of nothing more than a bunch of whining and temp tantrum throwing children who want to use the Capitol for their own version of a sandbox and a session of ‘Who’s is bigger ? That it got this way is nothing less than a complete suicide surrender of the Republican Party’s principles and leadership to both Big Money Interest’s and the Greed of their major campaign contributor’s own interests at the expense of the country as a whole. Both Boehner (who’s about as useful as a speed bump at the Waterville Speedway), Cantor and the rest of the House GOP leadership have done absolutely nothing other than to say NO every time ANY legislative proposal comes up that might move the country ahead and get the economy moving. Instead, Boehner and Company all get up on their media bandwagon and start denouncing the proposal, even if it come from their own Moderate’s, as a ‘Going no where’ piece of legislation before it’s even had time to be read unless it passes the House ‘litmus’ test.
It is clearly going to be very rocky road between now and this coming November as far as the Country is concerned. What is also more than a little disturbing is the constant whining and crying from the GOP’s Radical Right Wing, and the even more so Tea Party, that their sole effort is on defeating Obama, not on solving the Country’s economic problems. The Country has never before seen this level of political outright hatred between Party’s, and in some case’s their own Party’s Candidate’s, ala Buddy Roemer. The only obvious conclusion is that the Party’s are so frustrated in their not being able to get a cohesive message together and understood by their own electorate and are struggling to get it so, that, and much more dangerously, their own racial annimus toward the 1st Black President of the United States is now more important, and regretfully, useful as a political weapon to be used at every opportunity. This Country has a Constitution. The Constitution was written, and has been amended, for everyone, not just those who think they have the God given right to apply it to whoever ‘they’ decide deserves it. Such ‘Our kind of people’ thinking has been used for years to justify any number of racial or political message’s or philosophy’s bigotry or racism. They also usually wind up as a breeding ground for any number of sicko’s who decide they have the right to apply their own ‘standard’s’ regarding social, racial or economic issue’s. Such standard’s, if Mr Krauthammer had ever bothered to investigate, usually wind up as a ’cause’ for any number of radical group’s, like the old Covenant, Sword and Arm of the Lord group’s to form and wind up trying to destroy the very Constitution that they so fervently declare themselves to be in alleginace to. And what is so sad is that the Country has seen this all before, back from the 1860’s all the way thru today with the Klan. Oh, it’s here all right. Not really visible but you can be assured that it’s still working, even if it’s hiding under another name. As Edmund Burke once so clearly stated in 1745 “All that is need for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing”. Mr Krauthammer, his wheelchair notwithstanding, is apprarently determine to do just that. The question now before us is simple. Do we do something for the whole benefit of the Country or do we all sit and cry and do nothing ? Between now and Nov. 12th the voter’s need to decide. Tick tock folk’s. And time stops for no one, not even a Presidential Election.
12 of the 14 trillion deficit at the end of the Bush administration was due to unfunded spending programs initiated and promoted by Republican Presidents. The 4 trillion since then except for less than $1 trillion are due to the Bush Great Recession of 2008. Obamacare is costing nothing so far. Social Security and Medicare are reducing the debt. The Obama stimulus (reduced to 1/2 what was needed by Collins among others) still reduced Federal Spending by employing more than a million people. The autobailout made a profit for the Federal Government. The whole premise of this article is my god what can Obama do when faced by all these Republicamn lies. What he has done all along. Tell the truth.
Charles, your party is worse than a pack of lemmings. Lemmings actually don’t run off cliffs, but your party is about to do that this fall.
You actually helped start the stampede years ago as you backed George W. Bush in all of his insanity: invading Iraq and recklessly cutting your taxes and those of the uberrich who had previously paid their fair share under Clinton.
You are now concerned that the inmates are running the asylum in your party. The inmates have been running the asylum since at least 1980.
I agree, the President is a very smart man. And when he wins in November it will be because he is head and shoulders above the bunch of dangerous dimwits the GOP is offering up. The GOP candidates apparently are unable to marshall competent campaign staffs to boot. I hope Gingrich gets the nomination because he is an excellent representative for the mean, petty, hypocritical party the GOP has become, but he will never represent the American people.
In this battle between the insane wing of the Republican Party and the insanely rich wing of the Republican Party, I am rooting hard for the insane wing. Let the GOP be newtered!
Having watched the dog and pony show that has been the Republican primary race so far, I have come to the conclusion that they would rather not win the White House in November. They may be realizing that if they won, they might have to produce something of merit for the citizens of this country. I really don’t believe that they have anything that will work.
“GOP suicide march” is the definition of anyone that would vote for Romney