Tuesday, June 13, 2006
The new fuzzy math: liberals = jobs
E.J. Dionne opens today’s column with a remarkable declaration:
“There is no sturdier liberal or Democratic slogan than "Jobs, jobs, jobs." In Search Of a New New Deal
Now Mr. Dionne is as sturdy a liberal Democrat as you’ll find on the Washington Post editorial pages so it’s no surprise when he later follows that whopper up with this one:
“But conservatives are expected to stand up for the rich. Liberals are supposed to expand the standard of living for everybody else.”
His column then devolves into some kind of call for a “New and Improved Deal”. As usual, such rails against modern capitalism are long on rhetoric and short on details. He does reference one standard liberal answer for many of our woes:
“What's needed, they've said, is heavy investment in education and job training to allow people to make the transition from the "old" economy -- those auto jobs -- to the new.”
(Left unexplained is why people primarily educated by the reliably liberal Democrats of the teachers’ unions are so ill-equipped to handle this changing of the guard.)
Without digressing into a history of liberal thought, let me just say that, in my lifetime, any association between liberal Democrats and “jobs, jobs, jobs” must have been a clandestine one. I can’t think of one policy introduced and advanced by these so-called progressives that can be positively linked to job creations. Higher taxes? Health care mandates? Regulations? …well, maybe the growth of government but the Republicans deserve much of the blame there too.
So, bottom line, I have no idea what Mr. Dionne is writing about when he connects liberals and jobs as if they were synonymous. Of course, maybe he just got confused and meant to write about LiberIA instead: ‘Jobs, jobs, jobs’ are Liberia’s top priority
“There is no sturdier liberal or Democratic slogan than "Jobs, jobs, jobs." In Search Of a New New Deal
Now Mr. Dionne is as sturdy a liberal Democrat as you’ll find on the Washington Post editorial pages so it’s no surprise when he later follows that whopper up with this one:
“But conservatives are expected to stand up for the rich. Liberals are supposed to expand the standard of living for everybody else.”
His column then devolves into some kind of call for a “New and Improved Deal”. As usual, such rails against modern capitalism are long on rhetoric and short on details. He does reference one standard liberal answer for many of our woes:
“What's needed, they've said, is heavy investment in education and job training to allow people to make the transition from the "old" economy -- those auto jobs -- to the new.”
(Left unexplained is why people primarily educated by the reliably liberal Democrats of the teachers’ unions are so ill-equipped to handle this changing of the guard.)
Without digressing into a history of liberal thought, let me just say that, in my lifetime, any association between liberal Democrats and “jobs, jobs, jobs” must have been a clandestine one. I can’t think of one policy introduced and advanced by these so-called progressives that can be positively linked to job creations. Higher taxes? Health care mandates? Regulations? …well, maybe the growth of government but the Republicans deserve much of the blame there too.
So, bottom line, I have no idea what Mr. Dionne is writing about when he connects liberals and jobs as if they were synonymous. Of course, maybe he just got confused and meant to write about LiberIA instead: ‘Jobs, jobs, jobs’ are Liberia’s top priority
