The American Spectator : Obama Redefines America's Gift to the World

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The Obama Watch

Obama Redefines America’s Gift to the World

By Andrew B. Wilson on 11.11.10 @ 6:10AM

No, it’s not himself but his commitment to binge spending.

America’s gift to the world isn’t freedom or democracy. It isn’t the example of a free market that has created unparalleled prosperity for the nation over more than 200 years. It isn’t the generosity of the American people or their willingness to go to the defense of others threatened with tyranny. And it isn’t baseball, football or basketball… or any of the exports of Hollywood and American popular culture. No, it is none of those things.

According to Barack Obama, America’s gift to the world is spending. More precisely, it is our willingness to spend beyond our means — in the happy thought that we (or if not we, they, the Obama administration) are spending someone else’s money.

Margaret Thatcher got it right when she said that all socialist governments would go on spending — and spending — until they ran out of other peoples’ money.

According to the president, we make the world a better place by continuing to live beyond our means. This enables people in other, less fortunate parts of the world to lift themselves up by the bootstraps by lending us the money we need to buy their products — or by accepting payment in deliberately devalued dollars. What a deal! The latest wrinkle in this narrative is the U.S. Federal Reserve’s decision to print enough new money to purchase another $600 billion in long-term government bonds.

That is how the president explained things to skeptical (or make that outraged and rebellious) fellow leaders in the Group of 20. “The United States will do its part to restore strong growth, reduce economic imbalances and calm markets,” he explained in a letter prior to the G-20 meeting beginning on Thursday in Seoul, Korea. “A strong recovery that creates jobs, income and spending [emphasis added] is the most important contribution that the United States can make to the global recovery.”

Yes, let’s go out and “create” some more spending by creating more money — out of thin air…money which can used to inflate away our IOUs (and our savings) at a later date. We can then pretend that in doing so we have also “created or saved” a few million jobs, even though the actual effect will be truly to pave the way to another great depression.

With his trademark rhetoric (filled with false, Kennedy-like parallelisms), Obama went on to say: “When all nations do their part — emerging no less than advanced, surplus no less than deficit — we all benefit from higher growth.”

That sounds like Karl Marx — “to each according to his need, from each according to his talents.” Only in this case, the United States, as one of the richest countries in the world and, until recently, one of the most entrepreneurial, is also the neediest and the least able to cope for itself.

What a shameful thought! What a repudiation of everything that “America’s gift to the world” used to mean.

By a resounding margin in the November 2 elections, American voters rejected this thought. Without a doubt, it will be similarly rejected at the G-20 meeting.

About the Author

Andrew B. Wilson, a frequent contributor to The American Spectator, writes from St. Louis.

Letter to the Editor View all comments (39) | Leave a comment Leave a comment

Melvin| 11.11.10 @ 6:45AM

To hell with this Communist, To hell with the people who voted for him and still support him. To hell with the members of his party who have wrought so much economic damage upon those who just want to work, raise families and be left alone.
To hell with those judges who overturn laws after the people vote to approve them.
Because of this bastard and those who support his political philosophy my family is torn asunder wandering like nomads looking for work to support their families.
To hell with every corrupt politician, union official whose graft and corruption from our hard earned money that line their Armani Suits.
To hell with every Marxist college professor who fill up young minds with visions of Communist Utopian society.
And last but not least, to hell with that half-wit elitist bitch Katie Couric who thinks that millions of her fellow Americans as the great unwashed masses.
I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm sick and damn tired of playing nice, because all it does is get thrown back into our faces with recriminations.

Deborah D | 11.11.10 @ 7:49AM

Bless you, Melvin, and I'm right there with you. I'm sick and tired of these know-nothings acting like they know it all -- basically fiddling while the USA burns. If this POS president gave a fiddle about the country, he would be right back here with his nose in the account books helping Paul Ryan and the Republicans who aren't insane fix this mess we're in, and he'd be making his POS Dem Party legislators get real too. That he isn't doing that shows you the unreal world this president and his entire party live in. Well, it's going to get real really fast if they continue down this road.

Pecos Pete| 11.11.10 @ 8:08AM

Ditto.

Louis Jenkins| 11.11.10 @ 8:25AM

Dear Melvin:

Having read your posts for sometime I can understand your inner anger. Well, it is time we begin to get even, to regain our former selves, and cast off the "Couric" malaise that has permeated our society. I too am angry. This may very well have been the last free election we will ever have. Maybe not, but if it is....

Eyes Wide Open| 11.11.10 @ 5:45PM

Melvin, please see my response to your comments, in parentheses below:

To hell with this Communist [If Obama’s a Communist, he’s a crappy one. A real Commie wouldn’t have allowed GM to get out from under partial-Government ownership; a real Commie wouldn’t have signed a health law that allowed private insurance companies to retain so much power; and a real Commie certainly would have used the financial crisis to nationalize Wall Street, which Obama certainly didn’t do. If anything, he deferred too much to the free market, by bailing out these firms and letting them continue about their business, all at the expense of American taxpayers], To hell with the people who voted for him and still support him. [I have no problem with that comment, since it is your opinion] To hell with the members of his party [“members of his party” should be replaced with “financial engineers on Wall Street,” since it was those folks, with the support of a light-touch regulatory environment, who were able to bring yours and my savings to the Wall Street casino and recklessly gamble every single day. My point is that your anger is misdirected here.] who have wrought so much economic damage upon those who just want to work, raise families and be left alone.  To hell with those judges who overturn laws after the people vote to approve them. [The Judiciary was never intended to vote based on popular sentiment. If that was the case, interracial marriage could still be outlawed. The courts overturned those bans at a time when the majority of Americans disapproved of doing so. Where they wrong then because they acted against the will of the people?] Because of this bastard and those who support his political philosophy my family is torn asunder wandering like nomads looking for work to support their families. [I certainly don’t know you and therefore won’t pass any judgment on what’s happening to your family, but I hope it’s not as bad as you say] To hell with every corrupt politician, union official [AMEN to that - but let’s be equal-opportunity in damning people, and include business tycoons who have made millions (or billions) on the backs of ordinary Americans, whose careers are simple numbers on a financial statement and are meaningless to the corporate leaders.] whose graft and corruption from our hard earned money that line their Armani Suits. To hell with every Marxist college professor who fill up young minds with visions of Communist Utopian society. [Sorry, but you can’t throw a statement like this out there without supporting it.] And last but not least, to hell with that half-wit elitist bitch Katie Couric who thinks that millions of her fellow Americans as the great unwashed masses. [I hope this comment doesn’t have anything to do with the Palin interviews...] I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm sick and damn tired of playing nice, because all it does is get thrown back into our faces with recriminations [Did you ever play nice?]

Sabrina| 11.11.10 @ 8:00PM

You sir, are an idiot. The country has the problems it does because of jackasses like you. And as far as not passing judgment, you are the biggest hippocrate I have ever seen. Go back to your left wing loons. Melvin, you are spot on and believe their are millions of people that feel the same way. YOU BETCHA!

Eyes Wide Open| 11.11.10 @ 8:13PM

Sabrina,

Dispute one thing I said.

indianajim| 11.12.10 @ 9:27AM

I'll help Sabrina out; this is TOO easy: Just read this book and if you want a sampling of the extreme left bias that college students are plied with:

http://www.amazon.com/Professo.....0895260034

Occam's Tool| 11.12.10 @ 5:26PM

Left wing profs: the fellow who taught me Roman history at TCU in the 80s---he would excuse Caligula by day as a Professional historian, and protest against Reagan at night. I also had a self-proclaimed marxist teaching me sociology. Give me a break. The majority of non-science academics not at Hillsdale College are Liberal or Radical.

Further, our financial problems were started by the Democrats in bed with Fannie and Freddie. Come on, get real.

FastJohnny| 11.13.10 @ 6:46PM

Oh my god, I went to a liberal arts college in the 80's and it was infected with Marxist professors. The 80's and early 90's was their heyday in higher ed. They were replaced with the current crop of Revisionists, who are still pretty socialist, in that the world revolves around oppressive groups and oppressed groups. Hence the big diversity culture. Anyway, I see those same people touting the moral highground that they liberals insert in all their talking points and attempts at policy, whether it be domestic or foreign. We have a perfect example of a marxist/revisionist professor in the White House right now, in the form of the Lecturer-and-Chief.

Lynn Repko| 11.12.10 @ 7:28PM

"business tycoons who have made millions (or billions) on the backs of ordinary Americans, whose careers are simple numbers on a financial statement and are meaningless to the corporate leaders.] whose graft and corruption from our hard earned money that line their Armani Suits."

This is pure wealth envy and based on a common economic fallacy known as the Zero Sum Theory of Wealth. Look it up.

If you are who I think you are, you have been successfully indoctrinated in Marxism and believe that is what constitutes compassion in spite of ALL evidence to the contrary.

Appleby| 11.11.10 @ 6:47AM

The parallel with the wealthy college sophomore continues -- the kid who thinks that all money originates in the post office box (or these days is magically deposited in his bank account) and his only duty is to spend it.

The same generation who believes that work is what you do when you cant do anything else, and that Mom and Dad will continue to work and own their home forever, and all Junior has to do is stretch out his greedy little hand.

Melvin| 11.11.10 @ 7:06AM

Amen sister. We can still......say Amen can't we?

Louis Jenkins| 11.11.10 @ 8:21AM

You can say "Amen" but that puts you on a watch list.

Dallas based| 11.11.10 @ 7:56AM

Amen, brother. Yes, we can say Amen. I agree with you and Appleby completely.

cyberdog| 11.11.10 @ 8:52AM

We hear you loud and clear Melvin and we agree.

On November 2012 we take the trash out.

Yosemeti Sam| 11.11.10 @ 8:53AM

" ... With his trademark rhetoric (filled with false,
Kennedy-like parallelisms), Obama went on to say: "When all nations do their part -- emerging no less than advanced, surplus no less than deficit -- we all benefit from higher growth."...."

HUH?

Was THAT - Teleprompter speak?

Yo, to the dust BIN of Mumbo Jumbo Jungle CRAP!

Um, JFK - not to be confused with that J.F. Kerry
chap who incidentally served in Vietnam and slimed fellow servicemen on the Leftoid cheap - said to his fellow Americans, and I paraphrase: ASK not what your country can do for you; ASK
what you can do for your country.

BHO, though, wants YOU to do the ASKing of his countrys' preferred GOVT: gimme, gimme, gimme ad infinitum.

And thus America would be - to BHOs' scrambled ideological inculcation; a recipe - a templative model for the restive World to emulate: gimme, gimme, gimme.

BOLD leadership talk from a Cyclopean SOCIALIST.

Has this Clown in Chief ever read the broad expanse of mankinds' perspective HISTORY?

Yikes, a plain old street organizer is better suited to lead America than the the the the the - Um, scratch that notion.

Steve A| 11.11.10 @ 9:32AM

Big inflation is coming. It is just a matter of time. This is by design. The people most negatively impacted are those living on the edge already who can barely afford groceries at current prices.

The result when these astronomical prices do hit will be civil unrest. The left will obviously try to blame tax cuts & the wealthy. They will not succeed this time. Obamanomics will be on trial when this inevitable catastrophe occurs.

California70| 11.13.10 @ 5:04PM

I certainly hope you are correct relative to Obamanomics being on trial when this occurs.

What are people who have to live on just social security going to do? What are the people without jobs going to do? Will they increase the amount of Unemployment pay each week to enable these people to eat? I think not.

gearjammer| 11.11.10 @ 10:30AM

Soon we will have the purse strings. Without endless money they collapse. It seems easy. Sorry NPR no big subsidy for you-we need it to fund food stamps-you know feed the children. But, we can only afford one thing-cause we must reduce deficit as well. We even send a management consultant to NPR or PBS and help them be more efficient. Then, we do the same for California, etc. It will all be dull and by the numbers and it will drive them nuts.

California70| 11.13.10 @ 5:07PM

I say the government needs to stop paying anything $$ to NPR. George Soros is now funding them to pay for their reporters. That means it is going to be ONLY left-wing marxist reporters from now on.

So let's just let George fund the whole damn thing.
The Hell with them.

martin j smith| 11.11.10 @ 12:37PM

The Tea party Movement --those people who joined will need to continue to monitor every piece of legislation regarding the deficit and how to deal with it. The battle is already underway and there is absolutely no break from activism.

Nose Hit| 11.11.10 @ 12:52PM

It seems like a rerun of the late seventies when the Fed also inflated the currency in order to try to help the economy grow. And we all know how that turned out.

However, the contrarian in me just wonders if maybe there’s more to this than meets the eye. Ever since the Fed acknowledged it was going to buy $600B worth of bonds, all we’ve gotten is an overwhelming vote against this move, especially by supposedly smart and experienced people.

If so many “wise” guys are against this action, why is it being allowed to happen? Is Bernanke a dictator? Granted, figuring out the inner workings of the Fed is like the old days trying to do the same with the USSR’s Kremlin. Still, the Fed chairman is not the only vote on the decision-making committee, so maybe there’s more to this than the public knows about, or that it would be good to know. Some things should be kept secret, until they don’t matter.

After all, one of the most long lasting maxims is to buy when there is blood in the street. Remember how Rockefeller, or was it Kennedy, on getting a tip from his shoe shine boy to buy stocks, in the twenties, realized that if conventional wisdom had reached that low in the knowledge area, it was time to sell?

Here’s another thing to consider---maybe the Fed is in an impossible condition. It could be that they have no choice BUT to inflate a little bit for a while, or else much worse things will happen, and THEY know it. After all, what’s worse, a cascading deflation or a little inflation?

We did, after all, survive and recover from the mistakes in the Carter years, even as the misery index went wild, so I imagine America-the-adjustable will somehow do so again.

As Churchill once put it, America always does the right thing, after trying all the others.

eric johna | 11.11.10 @ 5:46PM

We can still , I trust you Obama

J.C.Eaton| 11.12.10 @ 12:11AM

Eric my lad, would that I could play poker with you. But I doubt you have any of your own money.

Kaintuck| 11.12.10 @ 12:31AM

But you just don't understand. We are being led by the SPHAM, who knows all, and sees all.

The Smartest Person in the History of All Mankind.

That's what we were told at least, by our Betters, including the leg-tinglers. I'm beginning to suspect we were deluded. Maybe he's just a convenient political hack from Chicago who can't compose a sentence without teleprompter help.

We are doomed.

Explosion Proof Light | 11.13.10 @ 12:28AM

For most Americans, Obama doesn't seem to be giving them something they don't have, but instead to be taking away something they already value.

Beth| 11.12.10 @ 4:38PM

wow, you people are stupid. the author either can't read or doesn't understand basic economics, and you readers can't seem to understand his misreading of Obama's comments. he (Obama) is NOT talking about government spending, idiots. and he isn't talking about spending on credit either. he is talking about the free market, where companies hire workers, make products or provide services, pay wages, and employees and businesses use their income from salaries and sales to purchase other goods and services. HELLO???? that's how the world works. an economy does not function without demand for goods and services. someone has to buy washing machines or nobody can make washing machines. SPENDING is what keeps the market going. like I said, you people are really blinded by either stupidity or hate. good luck with your silly tea party foolishness.

Occam's Tool| 11.12.10 @ 5:32PM

O Brilliant Beth, I who am but a Conservative WORM in the face of your beauteous countenance beg your indulgence to ask one question: if our glorious Messiah wishes to encourage private investment and spending, why does he wish to take Capital from it in the form of higher taxes and give it to the government sector?

I beseech thee, pulchritudinous goddess, answer the question my humble, unworthy self poses to thy all-knowingness. I await your answer, crawling in the slime of my ignorance awaiting the joy of your wisdom falling like micturition from an incontinent ancestor.

PattyMor| 11.13.10 @ 4:29PM

I am tired of the Pols. who find a never ending list of the down trodden to "help".

Let start with lazy and shiftless people living and sucking the life blood out of us via an array of welfare programs. Then their children run wild and terrorize the neighborhood & schools.

The seniors who flock to subsidized housing and prescription drugs (which they never contibuted to).

The rent seeking corporations looking for a never ending amount of subsidies for "green" energy and a host of other things.

The money grubbing marxists at our colleges and universtities. The elite universities charge $40,000 per semister yet have large endowments. Funds for college & University studies and grants for some new building or center.

Money grubbing agriculture via price supports and ethanol subsidies.

Money grubbing eco-marxists who sue the pants off anyone who want to produce energy or drill for it.

Money grubbing unions who plead for special rules for themselves at the expense of everyone else. Their member (note not the leaders) pension plans are underfunded, yet they can find millions of dollars to throw into elections.

The money grubbing George Soros who is morally bereft of any ethics other than to make money. He has turned the Democrat party into the radical party that it has become. Father of the Secretary of State project ie. he who counts the votes wins.

The money grubbing CBC. Full of corruptocrats and marxists. Gave scholarships to insiders instead helping really poor kids. Divise an never ending array of special "protections" for minorities, while they promote abortion clinics that locate in minority neighborhoods.

ACORN the mother of all voter registration fraud machine. Feigning bankruptcy. Look for the phoenix to reborn under some other name. Its just too successful to let go of.

The illegal alien lobby, yelling and screaming for "
"rights" in a country they broke into. Don't you just wonder why they have their march on May 1st? May Day, for the Communists. Hmmm

Islamists still telling us that Islam is a religion of peace. Suing Oklahoma over their prohibition of using Sharia law in deciding cases. If they had no such intent, why the law suit? Ground Zero Mosque as a sign of reconciliation. Pleeze spare me!

Finally the corrupt judges who affirm any crackpot theory to come to the conclusion that they want. Let rapists & pedophiles off the hook.
Truly disgusting.

California70| 11.13.10 @ 5:26PM

Well Said PattyMor