by Tina Grazier
The legacy of Hugo Chavez can serve as a lesson for America.
So much of what the dictator accomplished in Venezuela mirrors the aspirations and goals of progressives in America. Maybe that’s why the President chose to send a delegation to the funeral of the man who cursed a sitting U.S. President at the United Nations and had ties to Iran and the terrorist organization, Hamas. It seems odd that progressives would be so chummy with an avowed enemy of America until you realize they have so much in common. Daniel Greenfield of FrontPage Magazine counts the ways of the dictator in a compelling article:
On his deathbed, Hugo Chavez devalued his country’s currency for the fifth time by 32 percent, after tripling the deficit during his previous term when the national debt had increased by 90 percent. From 2008 to 2011, Chavez’s oil-rich government increased the debt by nearly 50 billion in a country of less than 30 million. That same year, The Economist speculated that Venezuela might go bankrupt.
Chavez had swollen the ranks of Venezuela’s public employees to 2.5 million in a country where the 15-64 population numbered only 18 million. With 1 public employee to every 7 working adults, the entire mess was subsidized by oil exports and debt. When the price of oil fell, only debt was left.
Those public employees became Chavez’s campaign staff with no choice but to vote for him or see their positions wiped out to keep the economy from crashing. And they won him one last election.
The dead tyrant leaves behind the lowest GDP growth rate and highest inflation rate in Latin America. He leaves behind an economy where more than half the population depends on government benefits or government jobs. He leaves behind a giant pile of debt for the people and 2 billion dollars in misappropriated oil money for his heirs.
If you love the United States of America, if you love freedom and opportunity, please read the entire Greenfield article as he also counts the ways that the United States, under President Obama, is sliding into the same devastating sink hole.
Senator Jeff Sessions talks this weekend about how Obama’s policies are failing to produce a robust economy for the American people and are instead creating growth in government and a big transfer of wealth to Washington DC. Read the article, or watch the video, at Investors Business Daily.
Sessions isn’t all gloom and doom. He also outlines a common sense plan to get our economy growing and to help Americans get back to work so they can, once again, stand firmly on their own two feet and enthusiastically invest time and energy to grow the economy:
• Make welfare temporary and the welfare office an employment and job training office.
• Unlock America’s vast energy resources to create millions of good-paying jobs.
• Defend American workers from unfair foreign trade practices.
• Reform the tax code to make America globally competitive, creating more jobs here.
• Make government leaner, less wasteful so it produces greater results for the money you earned and sent here.
• Enforce an immigration policy that protects legal U.S. workers from unlawful competition.
• Eliminate every burdensome federal rule or regulation that isn’t needed and that destroys jobs.
• And, finally, we must balance the federal budget.
Reforms and policies based on these ideas would create a positive, common sense solution to the dead in the water economy we are currently enduring in contrast with the tax, print, and spend option that has run economic progress aground.
On March 7th NPR posted an article on the jobs report for February and accompanied it with charts that show the depth of this jobless recovery. Others in the media are trumpeting the slight improvement as evidence that the economy is improving. Unfortunately, the happy face that the administration and its media allies try to paint on the slightly better jobs number doesn’t excite; even the World Socialist Web Site can’t defend the numbers as positive:
At February’s rate of job growth, the US economy would not get back to the pre-recession level of unemployment until 2017.
By and large, the new jobs created pay much less than those lost during the crash. According to Friday’s figures, average hourly earnings for production workers have risen by only 2 percent over the past year, a figure wiped out by rising prices.
In addition to paying lower wages, an increasing number of new jobs are part time. Compared to late 2007, 5.8 million fewer people in the US are now working full time, but 2.8 million more are working part time. The share of people working part-time has grown from 16.9 percent at the start of the recession to 19.2 percent today.
Even as payrolls increased in February, a significant number of people simply stopped looking for work and dropped out of the labor force. With 130,000 people dropping out of the workforce, the labor force participation rate fell to 63.5 percent, the lowest level in over three decades.
The percentage of the population that is employed fell from 63.3 percent in February 2007 to 58.5 percent in February 2010. This figure has stayed essentially unchanged at that level since then, with the latest figure coming in at 58.5 percent.
Long-term unemployment has likewise increased significantly in the most recent report. The percentage of unemployed people who have been out of work for more than half a year hit 40.2 percent in February, up from 38.1 in January. At the end of December 2007, this figure stood at 17.4 percent.
The latest jobs report came after a surprise drop in the United States’ gross domestic product in the fourth quarter of 2012, which was revised up to a growth of only 0.1 percent. The combined economies of the advanced industrial countries in that quarter shrank by 0.2 percent.
The socialists, of course, come from a totally different perspective than my own but they did a fine job of pointing out the unemployment and economic problems that persist.
It’s incredible to me that we don’t hear more about this devastating record in the media.
The absence of negative media attention to accurately portray the terrible economy is testament to the way they use (and abuse) their power to make progressive policies seem to work.
The press, democrats, and republicans all roundly criticized republicans for spending too much under President Bush. The Republicans were tossed out of Congress at the next opportunity giving Democrats a super majority. The media helped to make that possible. They criticized Bush’s economy of strong growth and low unemployment for six years. That posture continued in the media to elect and re-elect President Obama under the worst economic recovery since WWII. When media fail to criticize and report accurately too many of our citizens continue to believe in progressive solutions and in the President when he says, “We’re making progress”.
What will it take to get the greater public to take note of the wide disconnect between what President Obama promises and what his policies have actually created? President Obama does not participate in governing or leading but instead stands on the sidelines pointing fingers at others so that he is perceived as blameless. But it is his job to lead. It is his job to think in ways that serves all of the people. Its his job to do what is necessary to move this nation to economic vibrancy! I’m afraid his socialist agenda is more important, as it was with Chavez in Venezuela.
The DOW hit an all time record high last week as corporations continue to rack up profits, much of it from sales overseas. This impressive high doesn’t mean all is coming up roses in America. Business Insider lists the “The 21 Largest Mass Layoffs Of The Year” for 2012 and the numbers are daunting when unemployment numbers are already so high: Texas Instruments, 100 workers and two plant closings; Archer Daniels Midland, 1200 layoffs citing swings in commodities prices as a factor; Cisco Systems, 1300 layoffs in the sales force; J.C. Penney, 1350 layoffs; Citigroup, 1550 layoffs, Kraft Foods 1600 layoffs; Lexmark 1700 layoffs; Best Buy, 2800 layoffs; Supervalu subsidiary, Albertsons, 3300 layoffs, Google, 4000 layoffs, Research in Motion, 5000 layoffs, Pepsi, 8700 layoffs in restructuring worldwide with a 30% loss in America; Lockheed Martin announced as many as 10,000 could lose their jobs citing defense cuts; American Airlines, 14,200 layoffs; Hewlett Packard, 27,275 layoffs. (Scroll down on the linked page where you can find another link to the 29 ugliest charts concerning the world economy)
I wish I had better news but it looks like 2013 won’t look any better as long as the same economic policies are allowed to stand:
Employers announced plans for 55,356 layoffs in February, according to outplacement consultants Challenger, Gray & Christmas. That’s up 37 percent from January and 7 percent from February 2012.
America was once an economic bright spot in the world.
Our country is young. But it is, and was, unique in a world that had been ruled by socialists, kingdoms, tyrants and dictators. The ideals of freedom and equality under the law set America apart and has always given people in other countries hope. Freedom ensured that every man’s dreams could be realized, innovation and job opportunities could be in abundance, and real progress was possible for anyone with a bit of ambition and hard work. Freedom is the firm platform that inspires people to dream and risk to improve their life condition and represented a bright light for individuals in a sea of darkness. We must fight to restore this light of freedom and hope both for ourselves and for others.
President Obama has promised to transform America and redistribute our wealth through higher taxes and a growing federal government. Unfortunately this has a blunting effect on free will, innovation, and risk taking. We are witnessing severe decline as his socialist plans unfold. The lessons for America are contrasted and illustrated daily right in front of our eyes.
We must have the courage and foresight to see the evidence of our decline and face the root causes honestly if we are ever going to restore this great republic to the land of opportunity for future generations.