Path Forward

Things have been busy and I haven't put anything on here since the end of February. While I believe the main purpose of this is for me to journalize my thoughts it is a very useful tool for that purpose.

There is so much going on that need to be talked about that it isn't easy to decide where I want to start. I guess since the economic issues tend to be my primary focus I'll start there. We are currently playing politics with the Debt limit and while I think everyone agrees that we need to make some fundamental changes in the way we spend and tax, not raising the debt level is simply unacceptable and will lead to a tremendous impact to the economy. This is so unacceptable that any party that is seen as responsible for this will be dooming themselves in future elections. So we will watch the Republicans threaten and all the Democrats really need to do is stay reasonable and wait. It reminds me of some positions taken in a misguided fashion by totalitarian regimes who later paid a heavy price.

We have three things we need to do to solve our current fiscal deficit.

First, we need to increase growth in this country and the first thing that will help that is to switch from foreign oil to domestic energy, gas and coal and eventually renewable. The jobs and related taxes from this type of effort will be a stimulus for the economy and will protect us into the future.

Second, we need to review spending, and this includes all spending. However, the reductions cannot be at the expense of our social obligations. Republicans like to throw the word socialism around and almost always inappropriately. However, the issue is not socialism but social conscience. Of course the wealthy and upper middle class can do perfectly well without Government help. However, if you believe that all citizens are entitle to adequate health care and at least some minimal financial help after a lifetime of working and paying taxes, we can not now gut Social Security and Medicare. Yes some changes to make the programs more affordable may be necessary, but don't fall for the idea that we can transfer all the responsibility to so many of our citizens who are not able to handle it. We don't have a time machine so we have to deal with the present situation and not discuss the failure of both parties to take appropriate measures in the past.

Third we can not ignore the revenue side. I believe we can make fundamental changes to our tax system that will lead to a more competitive business environment and more revenues. We need to encourage business in this country by making sure we don't impose hidden taxes as well as the public ones. Perhaps the greatest hidden cost is the cost of health care that we make employers in this country pay. Most of our competitors finance health care via the tax system making this not a direct business cost. I have heard a lot of silly things related to health care and I don't hear anyone dealing with this fundamental issue.

I hope to discuss these issues more in the near future.