The Voters have spoken! Yeah right.......

Today President Obama was giving a speech where he said that the voters have spoken, that they want progress and for Washington to just be politics as usual. This seems to be referring to his reelection. But by my count, nothing has changed at all in washington. It seems like the voters are ok with this gridlock and divided Government. Yes, The president won reelection, but so did the majority of republican house members as well as Democratic senate members. This seems to say that the voters wanted nothing changed. I simply don't' follow the logic any other way. The argument seems to be, that since Obama was reelected, the voters aggree with his agenda and want it passed and are against the obstructionist measures of the republican congress. There are two problems with this. It is arbitrary to label the house the "obstructionist" since it requires both houses to pass a bill, and the senate voted down several of the House's bills that were passed, so they are probably more obstructionist than the house. Secondly, if the voters were so against the house, why were they elected? It seems to me this argument is bunk, and that the voters do want a continuation of business as usual. However counterintuitive that may seem.

Oh america.....

I'm watching the election returns and while its still to close to call... well that's my problem. To me it seems anyone who's taken any intro economics class or even taken a math class as high as college algebra should be able to see that the fiscal plans of the Democrat party are what is sending us over the so called 'fiscal cliff'.  Tax and spend is the name of the game for so called "forward thinking" and "progressive" economic strategies, and economically they never work. While the idea of "just tax the rich!! they can take it!!" sounds good and the stance of "Give the poor people all the monies!!" feels good, math is against you. The first rule of taxes in economics is that you don't control who pays them. All taxes will in some way be spread out through the entire economy. The resulting lift in prices is just deadweight loss to the economy and slows production. This is based on an almost unquestionable economic principle:

1. People will always act in their own financial self interest.

Now this isn't to say people will break laws all the time to help themselves, but they will do what they can legally to save and or make money. For example, if there are two identical vending machines next to each other, one that has items at a lower price than the other, a customer will almost always buy out of that one unless its empty. This same logic applies to taxes. People will do whatever they can legally to pay the least amount of taxes. Notice this isn't saying they'll attempt to 'dodge' taxes necessarily, though they may. Rather, it is simply the case that people will live,buy, and act in the way that costs the least taxes for them so long as they can. This means taxing the wealthy will only 'trickle down' those costs to all working class consumers, and as a result less goods will be purchased. Add to this the massive inflation of all the Quantitative easing the federal reserve is engaging in and you have a recipe for a double dip recession.


In my opinion the great divide in this country that's holding back our political progress is Social issues. While its quite possible the majority of the "independents" lean fiscally conservative and agree with less taxes and spending, they just can't side with the republicans on social issues. Whether its Gay marriage, abortion, or even drug legality, the swath of moderates side with the democrats. It is for this reason I think the Democrats have been so successful in recent national elections. Between the margin that agrees with tax and spend fiscal policy and the margin that agrees with more liberal social policy, the Democrats are the proverbial "bigger tent" and that is huge in such a divided nation as ours.

My solution, specifically if i ever get into politics, is to move one of the parties towards a truly "moderate" platform and take away many of the "bullets" of the other side. My prefered Situation would be to move the Republican party to accept in policy, but not necessarily in value, the social issues of the left. I say this because to much of the Democrat party is tied up in the idea of spending money as a way to "pay" for votes and getting them to reject that concept is wishful thinking. However, getting the Republicans to accept for example, Abortion, drug legality, and even gay marriage; while probably difficult, would swing national politics in a drastic way. Half of the Democratic weapon is social issues, without that, I doubt they would be able to win a fiscal Debate and this was evidenced in the first Presidential debate that focused on these topics. How I pray for a day when this sort of party arises....