The newest pro-Obama, media-generated scandal is this
Middle-East diversion of a story about
Mitt Romney stating that “47 percent of the people … will vote
for the president no matter what.” These are people who, said
Romney, are “dependent upon government, who believe that they are
victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care
for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to
food, to housing, to you-name-it.”
The Obama media think this new magic number will help Obama.
They hope it diverts our attention from the
disaster in the Middle East, where Obama faces a
Carter-like catastrophe. They hope it shifts our focus from
genuine shockers, like the fact that Obama has missed a literal
majority of his
daily intelligence briefings, including all of them in the week
leading up to the anniversary of 9/11 and the Middle East eruption.
Our nation’s so-called “journalists” dig feverishly for something
negative regarding their true enemy: Mitt Romney. They smell blood
(or so they hope) in this “47 percent” thing. They sense a winning
issue for the president who they strive not to cover with objective
reporting but to shamelessly promote.
If I were they, however, I wouldn’t be so confident. You want to
talk about “47”? I’ll give you a “47” that all of this comes back
to: It’s the 47 million Americans who are on food stamps. That’s an
astonishing number, truly unprecedented, and it strikes at the core
of Mitt Romney’s message, and, more so, at what works to Romney’s
advantage in this election — and to Obama’s disadvantage.
Newt Gingrich has used the phrase “food stamp president” to
describe President Obama. He has done so for good reason. No other
president has overseen such an upsurge in the number of Americans
on food stamps. It’s a record — a dubious record of, yes,
heightened dependency.
A few weeks ago, a colleague of mine was talking to a friend who
owns several grocery stores. He was amazed when the owner told him
about the level of distortion caused in his business by this
food-stamp epidemic. For instance, there are currently so many
customers on food stamps that store managers must carefully
coordinate with suppliers and vendors to ensure there’s enough food
in the store when food stamps flood in at the start of each month.
In other words, the normal store estimates are so distorted that
the store must make special plans to accommodate the food-stamp
onslaught.
This also means that a much larger portion of the store’s
revenues come not from cash in private hands but from government
money collectivized and redistributed. This is money that has been
transferred from one group of Americans to another. It’s what the
late Hans Sennholz referred to as “the Transfer Society.” In his
stores, said the owner, the volume of food stamps seems like it’s
10-20 times higher than just four or five years ago.
This is merely one segment of Americans who are currently
depending on the government. We also have all of those depending on
government for unemployment payments. And then there are those like
Sandra Fluke, a new liberal superstar, dutifully demanding that
government (i.e., taxpayers) pay for her contraception. Recall,
too, the infamous “Julia,” the Obama administration poster girl for
cradle-to-grave dependency.
Those are just a few examples. And guess what? The Obama media
could care less. They have one interest: Obama’s re-election. Thus
their focus on Mitt Romney’s “47 percent.”
Hey, that’s fine with me. This brings the presidential/political
debate right where conservatives have wanted it all along: on the
economy, on big government, and on Barack Obama’s redistributive
state. You want to talk “47”? Bring it on. Let’s start with the 47
million on food stamps under President Obama.
