Will we be better off in four years?????

Weekly Opinion Editorial

WILL YOU BE BETTER OFF FOUR YEARS FROM NOW!

 by Steve Fair

     

     When Ronald Reagan was running against Jimmy Carter he asked the question: “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?”  With run away inflation, record unemployment, and an uncertain economic future, Reagan struck a nerve with the voters and won the election in a landslide with President Carter winning just three states. 

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     Many are comparing the current economic climate in America with 1980, and there are a number of similarities.  For example gasoline has doubled in price in the past four years, unemployment has doubled, and there doesn’t seem to be any relief in sight, so way is President Obama still hanging onto poll numbers that suggest he could be re-elected?  Three reasons:

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    First, he was a transitional figure.  President Obama is a young, energetic figure whose appeal to youth is he would provide hope and change.  The specifics on what that hope and change were unclear, but by Obama’s own admission, he was able to capture ‘lightening in a bottle,’ in 2008.  He will not be able to duplicate that again this year. 

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     Second, the vast majority of minorities vote as a block for him.  It only takes about on third of the rest of voters to give him the election.  Unfortunately our electorate consists of this many liberal ideologues- social and economic- that bind together in elections better than conservatives. 

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     Third, Obama is winning the sound bite war and easily obscuring his own record with the barrage of negative attacks on Romney that are so far going unchallenged.  Amazing that Romney is being attacked for being successful in business.  Ads that portray those who vote for Romney as being racist are inappropriate and over the top, but are never challenged by the main stream press. 

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     The question of this election should be: “Will you be better off four years from now if Obama is re-elected?”  Based on what he has done, what will he do in his second term?  What is Obama’s vision for a second term?  His campaign slogan is ‘Forward.’  There is little talk of what the country would move forward toward, or the specifics.  On economic policy, the President has said his vision is to “create an economy built to last.” But this talking point has, even to Democrats, begun to wear thin.  “Nobody really knows what that means,” said Joe Trippi, a Democratic strategist who handled Jerry Brown’s gubernatorial campaign in 2010.
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     The President has said that the most important policy he could address in his second term is climate change, one of the few issues that he thinks could fundamentally improve the world decades from now. He also is concerned with containing nuclear proliferation. In April, 2009, in one of the most notable speeches of his Presidency, he said, in Prague, “I state clearly and with conviction America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.” He conceded that the goal might not be achieved in his lifetime but promised to take “concrete steps,” including a new treaty with Russia to reduce nuclear weapons and ratification of the 1996 Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty.   In March during a meeting on Nuclear weapons at the White House with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, Obama said, "This is my last election ... After my election I have more flexibility."  "I will transmit this information to Vladimir," said Medvedev, Putin's protégé and long considered number two in Moscow's power structure.

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     It is also likely the President would tackle immigration reform, which means amnesty with no repercussions or penalties. Obama has also said that he hopes to have the time and the attention to address a more robust foreign aid agenda for developing countries than he was able to muster in his first term. Translated, that means sending more of your tax money to foreign countries. 

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     Would we be better off four years from now with Obama as President?  Absolutely not!  If re-elected, he will tax and spend America into bankruptcy, disarm our military, open up our borders to illegals and destroy what liberty we have left.   I would urge every American to see 2016-Obama’s America.  It will give you a idea of what frames his thinking and it’s not the civic rights movement of the 1960s.