Posted by
AmericanMind on Wednesday, April 16, 2008 2:13:42 PM
Contrary to popular belief, a bad economy can be an advantage for Senator McCain - it depends on how he handles it. Just because the GOP has the White House during an economic downturn, doesn't necessarily mean the country will replace them with Democrats.
Three things can happen after November - economy gets better, stays the same, or gets worse. Putting Dems in the White House could make the economy worse - in fact, if history is any guide - that's likely. Since McCain is a self-described economic light weight - he needs some help.
Here are three steps to help McCain address the economy - the number one issue for most Americans:
1) Announce (early) Mitt Romney will be his Vice-President. Romney is a private sector superstar that fills a huge gap in McCain's otherwise strong resume. Romney's excellent at promoting free market solutions to effectively counter the populist rhetoric of Obama/Clinton. He’s also great at explaining why doing nothing (letting markets sort things out) is usually best. Make no mistake, both Democrats seek to turn this country left and back to the bad old days of socialism and progressivism. We need a strong defender of capitalism on the ticket - nobody better than Mitt Romney.
2) Working with Romney, McCain should draft a major economy speech that educates voters about the successes of capitalism and how markets work best unfettered. For example, he can highlight how many hundreds of millions of people from India and China have moved from poverty to middle class and how that helps our economy (exports). He could talk about how liberal government policies and unions have crippled Detroit and Michigan hinting if you want America to follow the same course - elect Obama/Clinton.
3) The knockout blow would be to debunk the myth that America can trust Democrats with the economy because of the great Clinton economy of the 1990s. The fact is the booming economy of the 1990s began with a recovery in March 1991 - 20 months before Clinton took office in January 1993. (See the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis @ bea.gov). In addition, the Clinton budget surpluses that Hillary's so proud of were a direct result of the fiscal discipline of the historic 1994 Republicans and their Contract with America.
McCain should help Americans understand that an Obama-Clinton economy would look more like Jimmy Carter’s economy than Bill Clinton's economy. In 1976, like 2008, a Democrat became President (Carter) with a struggling economy and a Democratic Congress. That combination (Dem President & Dem Congress) made a bad situation worse.
Do we want to repeat history and be worse off in four years?
Now that's some straight talk!