The President has announced his new “jobs” package, the centerpiece of which is a small commitment to infrastructure spending.  I say a “small” commitment, because by most estimates the transportation infrastructure deficit in this country is in the trillions of dollars, and the President has proposed a $50 billion package of spending.  So this new proposal is not, and is not intended to be, a well planned, long term proposal to meet the transportation needs of the country.  If the President had really wanted to modernize our transportation system, he would have spent most or all of the first “stimulus” package on transportation in early 2009.  In fact, only a small percentage of that spending went for roads, highways, and rail, and none of it was used for the even more pressing responsibility of the federal government: defense.  None of the funds included in the first “stimulus” went toward buying new ships, planes, and vehicles for a military that is operating with an inventory of equipment that is aging and out of date.

Of all the sins of the Obama Presidency, the worst is the tremendous burden of the federal debt on the backs of every man, woman and child.  Americas is nearly $3 trillion dollars more in debt than we were before Barack Obama became President.  It certainly didn’t have to be that way.  In the twelve years that the Republicans controlled Congress, they made a start at getting the budget under control.  In three of those years, the budget was actually in surplus; the average deficit during that time was about $100 billion (approximately one/fifteenth of what it has been under Obama).  America suffered a deadly attack and a recession in 2001, and the deficit surged, but by 2006, when the Democrats took over the Congress, the deficit had been reduced and the government was actually projecting surpluses in the near future.  All of that progress has now been squandered; trillions more have been borrowed, and there is nothing to show for it.

I am an incurable optimist where the United States is concerned.  The voting public is about to act.  The new Congress will be very different from the current one.  We will begin the path back to greatness, and the inherent dynamism and genius of America is such that the recovery of our fortunes may well be faster than we have any right to expect.  Those in the world who wish us ill are going to be surprised, once again, at the resiliency of the United States.

But in the meantime, we must mourn the decline of our fortunes.  The illogic of this waste – the sheer stupidity of it – beggars description.

Climate change advocacy groups seem to be in denial of reality.

The “cap and trade” bill  was designed to raise the cost those forms of energy on which America depends:  coal and oil.  That was the point of the legislation:  to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by raising the cost of traditional fuels so high that the economy was effectively forced to use less energy.

Now here are some questions:  Will energy price increases be good or bad for economic growth?  When gas reached $4  per gallon, did that help or hurt the economy?  If utility bills went up by, say 25%, would that make you more or less likely to increase your purchases as a consumer?  If a business believes that it will have to buy much higher energy prices in the future, will that make the business more or less likely to hire additional employees now?  And if the same business has to pay such higher prices in the United States, but not in China, will that make the business more or less likely to move off shore or to lose customers to businesses that do move off shore?

The last two years have reminded the American people of an important truth.  We all depend on national prosperity to achieve our personal and political goals.  Whatever your place on the political spectrum, you need jobs and economic growth to get what you want:  opportunity, security, help for the poor – and environmental protection. Poor countries do not have strong environmental laws.  And prosperity depends, among other things, on access to affordable energy.

“Cap and trade” – like the health care bill, the high taxes, the huge deficit spending, the threatened card check legislation – is bad for the economy.  The voting public realizes that common sense truth, and that is what has stopped the “cap and trade” bill.  The groups quoted in this article are not fighting the oil companies, but a huge majority of the American people.  That is why they are losing, and why so many of their supporters will lose their seats this fall.

The headline here says it all: The Most Fiscally Irresponsible Government in U.S. History.  And it’s what we’ve been saying for the last year.  What is happening in Washington makes no sense from any coherent view of economics.  THAT is what the public realizes, and it’s why voters across the spectrum are abandoning the President.  Naturally many committed Democrats are still supporting the administration politically, and no one should begrudge them their loyalty to their Party.  But a significant number of these Democrats – when asked about the policies of the Administration rather than their support of the President himself – show a deep concern about the irrationality of, for example, deliberately driving up the deficit over the long term.  It would be an insult to liberalism to suggest that it embraces a “stimulus” that is really irresponsibility masquerading as policy.

We are right to be concerned about the deficit and the national debt, but more importantly – we should look at why these symptoms exist.  The national debt is about to top $13.4 trillion dollars because the government is simply spending too much.

Governor Mitt Romney walks through his plan to encourage businesses to start hiring in his OpEd in the Boston Globe, and he isn’t talking about a new government program. As a businessman, he understands that cutting taxes and spending, promoting exports and a long term energy strategy that reduces our dependence on foreign energy is the best way to stimulate job growth. Today, unemployment in Missouri is holding steady at 9.2%. The government stimulus plans have created a huge debt and actually reduced economic growth by undermining confidence.

With all due respect, the Wall Street Journal OpEd “The end of American Optimism” – which accurately sums up the condition of the economy – wrongly tends to blame mysterious “structural” issues rather than the government for our current problems, just as Jimmy Carter blamed a “national malaise” in 1979 for the failures of his Administration.

What the government needs to do is not all that difficult to figure out. As a beginning: Stop spending so much money. Don’t raise taxes. Repeal the health care bill, and declare a moratorium on new regulations that impose greater burdens and uncertainty on the economy.

To be sure, America faces long term challenges in areas like education. But right now, the problem is the federal government. Once the private sector becomes convinced that the government will actually stop attacking the free market, the private sector will once again begin hiring.

When Ronald Reagan was campaigning for President, he said the following. “A recession is when your neighbor loses his job. A depression is when you lose your job. And a recovery is when Jimmy Carter loses his job.” And so it proved.

Businessman and Las Vegas developer, Steve Wynn expresses the sentiments of American business owners of all sizes in this interview with CNBC. He will be expanding his operations overseas because he believes that China is more stable and certain than US considering the job killing the policies coming out of Washington.

You can sense the frustration in his voice.

While the health care bill was being considered by Congress, voters had serious concerns over the affordability of the legislation and its impact on Medicare and existing health care coverage.   The President never honestly addressed those concerns.  He insisted that the bill would not increase the deficit, though it will, that Medicare will not be adversely affected, though that will surely happen, and that people could keep their existing health insurance, when for millions of Americans that is plainly not true.  I predicted at the time that if the President did not abandon the bill or address the concerns, the debate over health care  would turn into a power struggle between the electorate and  the White House.

In my experience, voters can respect political officials who disagree with them, if there is an honest dialogue and if the public at least understands and trusts the reason for whatever action it does not like.  That dialogue has not occurred, and voters are now beginning to assert their  authority.  The public – and particularly independent voters — will tolerate disagreement, but  will not tolerate arrogance thinly masked by deception.  Whether the White House chooses to admit it or not, it is in the middle of a political and governance crisis that was not only foreseeable but inevitable – and was in every respect self inflicted.

Again, the President gives us reason to believe that he is out of touch with reality.  Even the Democratic leaders on Capitol Hill have come to understand that a climate bill would devastate job creation in our current fragile economy, but the President says he’ll keep pushing for a climate bill.  Potential climate legislation only adds to the uncertainty currently in the market place – it is this uncertainty that paralyses economic growth and job creation.  Businesses are not going to grow, expand and hire new employees if they aren’t sure what the rules and regulations of their industry will be.