Last night as I was watching Obama's speech, I was struck by how non-specific he was when he was trying to be specific. He and his sycophants in the media may have thought he was specific laying out all that he intended to do as president but I believe he raised more questions than he answered. As he as introduced each new government entitlement, I wondered about how he intended to implement and fund them. Specifically:
I will cut taxes - cut taxes - for 95% of all working families. Because in an economy like this, the last thing we should do is raise taxes on the middle-class.How does he do that when he plans to let Bush's tax cuts expire (we know that Rangel has already promised that all of Bush's tax cuts will expire) and as much as the left would like to demagogue this issue, Bush's tax cut did include the middle class, I should know we save about $1,000 since they went into effect. So what taxes will he cut? The tax rate for those making under $250,000? What does he intend to lower it by? How does he intend to make that up? By raising the top margins?
And for the sake of our economy, our security, and the future of our planet, I will set a clear goal as President: in ten years, we will finally end our dependence on oil from the Middle East.How do we end our oil independence when he won't allow off shore drilling? How does he end our oil addiction when the best estimates for new technology are years away? Isn't taping the oil reserves a stop gap measure? How would that even lower the cost of gas and what would we do if someone cut off our foreign oil supply? What would our military do? How would we defend ourselves? And what about replenishing the oil supply that's been depleted? Wouldn't that raise the cost of gas and wouldn't it be more expensive to replenish now that oil is more expensive.Washington's been talking about our oil addiction for the last thirty years, and John McCain has been there for twenty-six of them. In that time, he's said no to higher fuel-efficiency standards for cars, no to investments in renewable energy, no to renewable fuels. And today, we import triple the amount of oil as the day that Senator McCain took office.
Now is the time to end this addiction, and to understand that drilling is a stop-gap measure, not a long-term solution. Not even close.
As President, I will tap our natural gas reserves, invest in clean coal technology, and find ways to safely harness nuclear power. I'll help our auto companies re-tool, so that the fuel-efficient cars of the future are built right here in America. I'll make it easier for the American people to afford these new cars. And I'll invest 150 billion dollars over the next decade in affordable, renewable sources of energy - wind power and solar power and the next generation of biofuels; an investment that will lead to new industries and five million new jobs that pay well and can't ever be outsourced.
How does he intend to pay for this investment? Windfall profit tax? How does clean coal and nuclear help the prices at the pump and end our oil dependence? How is he going to help us afford the new cars? With a tax break? A voucher? What new cars is he talking about? Hybrids don't end our oil dependency and is still pretty expense. Electric cars? The current electric car price is over $20,000, how much of that will he give us? How will he pay for this? He isn't going to be able to tax corporations enough to afford the cost of a new car (especially when he intends to provide universal healthcare,money for college, train and pay for more teachers). Will we all be junking our current cars? Where does he expect us to dump them? Mexico?
Why in the world would he think that 150 billion would be enough of an investment to get us on the road to wind and solar power? A thousand mega watt coal power plant costs a billion to build but new technology would double the cost. What about storage? Currently there is no good way to store power, so most of that money would have to go into research. How do we end our dependency on foreign oil in ten years when the technology isn't in place to do it?
I'll invest in early childhood education. I'll recruit an army of new teachers, and pay them higher salaries and give them more support. And in exchange, I'll ask for higher standards and more accountability. And we will keep our promise to every young American - if you commit to serving your community or your country, we will make sure you can afford a college education.Does he intend to give the states yet more money to hire new teachers and to train them or does he intend to create a federal bureaucracy to do the job the states are doing? Does he intend to make the states take the teachers that the federal government hired and trained? How does he force them to do that?
Does he intend to reimburse the college students the money instead of loaning it with the promise of repayment in work? Does he intend to create another level of bureaucracy to assign the jobs and make sure they get done?
Now is the time to finally keep the promise of affordable, accessible health care for every single American. If you have health care, my plan will lower your premiums. If you don't, you'll be able to get the same kind of coverage that members of Congress give themselves. And as someone who watched my mother argue with insurance companies while she lay in bed dying of cancer, I will make certain those companies stop discriminating against those who are sick and need care the most.How does he intend to lower the price of privately held insurance? Set prices for what the health insurance providers can charge? Does he intend to cap what the hospitals and doctors charge as well? Does he intend to set up a federal bureaucracy to oversee the insurance companies and will he mandate what treatment they'll have to fund?
And now is the time to keep the promise of equal pay for an equal day's work, because I want my daughters to have exactly the same opportunities as your sons.How does he intend to make sure the corporations comply with this mandate? How do you ensure equal pay for equal skills and equal education? Does he plan to enact law that forces corporations to pay women the same amount whether they deserve it or not?
I will also go through the federal budget, line by line, eliminating programs that no longer work and making the ones we do need work better and cost less - because we cannot meet twenty-first century challenges with a twentieth century bureaucracy.How does he do that? What? There's a line item veto? Does he actually think that he'll be able to cut through the red tape and bureaucracy and make an end run around Congress to cut governmental programs? When he said this, I wondered if he didn't understand how Washington worked since he hasn't really been there much since getting elected, as Kaus notes:
Gave voters little sense that he understands and can master the pressures--bureaucratic imperatives, unions, civil service rules-- that have often caused previous idealistic liberal presidents to fall short while sucking up taxpayer dollars.It's funny that he intends to cut bureaucracy while at the same time adding so layers: energy, education, healthcare and someone to oversee salaries in the private sector.
His speech didn't represent much of a change, it sounded like a typical liberal politician's speech: promise everything but don't tell us how you intend to fund or implement it. Saying that he'd end corporate loopholes (yet another example of a vague promise to do something but nothing specific) and tax 5% of Americas doesn't even come close to funding everything he intends to do.
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OK, everyone, the subject has changed. Obama's speech is so ... yesterday!!
Don't know if you've watched the Sarah Palin speech in Dayton during the past hour .. but all I can say is .... "WWWWWOOOOOOOOWWWWWWW" !!
She really knocked it out of the park ... especially with her emphasis on reform and rooting-out corruption and wasteful spending. What a gutsy, gutsy person this young Governor from Alaska is.
Hi Michelle,
By the way, I think your analysis of Obama's speech is "spot-on." Yes, all the so-called "specifics" in his speech raised more new questions than answered old questions. Thanks for fleshing out all the details.
Would strongly recommend Charles Krauthammer's column today, entitled, "The Perfect Stranger." It deals with the fact that (except for his wife) no one from Obama's pre-2004 past stood up to vouch for this guy at the Convention ... and how odd and truly exceptional this is for a party nominee for President.
The Dems. have truly nominated a self-created, Jay Gatsby-like candidate. Krauthammer did point out that the two people from Obama's early days in Chicago politics who MIGHT have vouched for him -- Reverend Wright and Professor Ayres -- aren't exactly the kind of folks the campaign wants to trot out. This guy remains a mystery ... and a great opportunity for some enterprising journalists out there (assuming they can get past the political goons in Obama's campaign that are keeping reporters away from old friends and family members of Obama -- which begs the question, "why does the Obama campaign feel the need to do this, and what are they hiding?").
michele, you've shown again, and again, and again that you are incapable of reading answers to the same questions that you ask over and over. if you really cared to know, the information is available on his website. i've already provided links with independent comparative analysis of his tax plan and mccain's (and obama's is better for low- and middle-class and small business and for the country, by the way. you really should take the time to find out).
"Saying that he'd end corporate loopholes (yet another example of a vague promise to do something but nothing specific)"
hm. what are mccain's specifics on this? obama said that he would end tax subsidies to the big oil companies that are raking in record profits while we are suffering at the pump. how much more specific do you want? he will stop giving tax breaks to companies that outsource jobs. how much more specific do you want? he will revise the tax laws so that the 2/3 of all u.s. companies that are currently not paying taxes will. how much more specific do you want? he will not have 130,000 combat troops in iraq for another 100 years and work to make sure that the iraqis start spending their own oil profits to rebuild their own infrastructure, saving us billions. how much more specific do you want?
you still wrongly claim that existing alternate energies (like solar and wind power - come out west and see for yourself) are decades away. simply not true. but it would be 10 years before new drilling offshore would hit the market. that's what the experts say... not some politician spin. btw, it costs less to build a wind farm than it does to build a nuclear plant. and if someone flies a plane into it, it won't be the next chernobyl.
"How do we end our dependency on foreign oil in ten years when the technology isn't in place to do it?"
conservation can be done now. most of our imported oil is used for transportation. h-cell cars are already being manufactured and tested and can be on the market in 5 years. electric and hybrid cars are already in high demand, diesel cars can run biodiesel. efficiency standards can be raised. natural gas can be run in cars. better sources of ethanol are being considered.
"How does he do that? What? There's a line item veto? Does he actually think that he'll be able to cut through the red tape and bureaucracy and make an end run around Congress to cut governmental programs?"
you didn't seem to mind bush's constant end-runs around congress. please. maybe you don't understand how our government works: if he's elected, he will most likely also have a majority in both the house and senate - end-run not required. you should also know that there are many programs that don't originate in the congress, like the faith based initiatives, reading first program... and you pretend to be so informed.
"How do you ensure equal pay for equal skills and equal education?"
to start with, you fail to read what he stated so very plainly, "equal pay for an equal day's work" not equal skills, not equal education. don't you understand that simple statement? that means that if my co-worker has no college education and i have a ph.d., we are paid the same if we do the same job. if my coworker is a woman, or hispanic, or black, or gay, we get paid the same if we do the same job.
salaries should be open information. right now in many companies people don't know what their equal peers make, so there's no way for them to know that they are being discriminated against. the right-wing supreme court just shot down a a case won at the federal court by a woman who should have won her pay-discrimination case, except the right-wing justices said that she should have filed her lawsuit earlier (not that she wasn't discriminated against). problem with that is that she didn't know for many years because the company keeps salaries as secret as possible. obama could either make sure that wages aren't secret, or remove the corporate lever that the supreme court righties based their judgment on. democrats and obama will continue make sure that the starting point - minimum wage - keeps up with the cost of living.
btw, reaganite in nyc, krauthammer is an right-wing idiot who has no more credibility than limbaugh. not worth listening to (or reading). oooooooooh... "what are they hiding?" spare us your conspiracy theories. there have been plenty of people from his past years in the illinois state senate (including republicans) and the community who have given excellent reviews of obama. you just don't listen over the constant looping of wright videos.
palin offered no specifics. she was intimidated and quaking in her pumps. how will she stand up to our evil enemies?
rooting out corruption? she's corrupt. she admitted abusing her power to go after her ex-brother-in-law.
Hi Michele,
As an Australian, I won't pretend that I know about American politics - and I don't want to buy into any of the issues raised, because that would be rather silly and arrogant of me.
What I would like to say is that both Obama and yourself raise some interesting points about the equal pay issue.
Firstly, Obama is correct in saying that women still do not have equality in the workforces (which is different to equality of opportunity). The culture of many organisations works against us (otherwise there would be equal numbers of women and monorities at the pointy end of corporations).
Secondly, you raise some interesting questions about how equal pay is actually going to happen, because, given the way that organisations are structured, at any hint of sharing the benefits the wagons will be drawn into a circle. In other words, people with power (i.e. white middle class men) don't want to share the benefits with people who are not like them (i.e. women or minorities) - no matter how hard the "others" work or how educated they are! Men also think that sexism and racism has been somewhat "fixed", because it's not overt any more.
How do I know this? I'm doing a doctorate in this area! Thanks for asking great questions... I'm not sure we will see any answers soon!
Perhaps if we hadn't spent several hundred billion dollars on the Iraq war there'd be funds for all of Obama's plans plus money to spare.
Hey, here's a thought. Let's cut military spending since it eats up more than half of the federal discretionary budget.
Wow! Let's do both: end the Iraq war and save billions of dollars and cut military spending to save billions more.
Or is that too "liberal?"
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