Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader, whilst speaking with friends about this blog recently, was asked why he isn’t writing long political screeds this election year. Well… That is pretty easy. This election is not getting your Maximum Leader’s juices flowing. Allow him to briefly enumerate the reasons.
First, your Maximum Leader doesn’t particularly like either candidate. President Obama has been, in your Maximum Leader’s eyes, the European-style, left-of-center, mildly-socialist leader that he anticipated. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t want to say that he is an out and out socialist (as many on the right would). But he does have that left-wing collectivist bend that so many Democrats do. The President’s health care laws is the greatest example of this. Your Maximum Leader also feels that President Obama and his team are not particularly adept at what they do. Indeed, they don’t seem to have any plans with which to match up to their rhetoric. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t think that the President knows exactly what to do now, except get re-elected.
Secondly, Governor Romney is not your Maximum Leader’s favorite either. Your Maximum Leader feels that Romney would be the mirror of Obama. You would get a European-style, right-of-center, mildly-pro-business leader. Of course that would be an improvement; but it isn’t really thrilling either.
Third, your Maximum Leader has long believed that President Obama will win re-election in a squeaker. The bad economy and all of the other signs that point towards the President not winning re-election are not enough to overcome the advantages of incumbency, the polarization of the electorate (which will break slightly for Obama) and the weakness of Romney.
Fourth, neither candidate, party, or commentator is regularly talking about a serious plan to fix what ails our nation. We need to control spending and reduce the debt. In order to do this we need drastic spending cuts, and we need to grow government revenue. That means taxes of one sort or another. We are in a sticky wicket here as your Maximum Leader does feel that making the dramatic changes needed in the midst of an anemic economy will only worsen that economy. But the long-term problem looks to be more severe if you don’t act quickly and immediately. So, your Maximum Leader doesn’t have a plan to address the problems of the nation. He has a host of ideas that would move towards that end. All of the ideas are unpopular and would make your Maximum Leader completely un-electable to any position in the Federal government. Some of the ideas are: letting the “Bush” tax cuts expire; raising the retirement age for Social Security and means-testsing Social Security benefits; repealing Obamacare; drastically changing how Medicare and Medicaid work; drastically changing laws concerning how private health insurers can operate across state lines; and evaluating how we spend our defense dollars. We have to make changes and no one is talking about the areas of the federal budget that really cost money (Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid) and no one (except the President and he is only talking in half-measures) is talking about revenue/taxes. Basically, anyone with an iota of sense can see the problem; but no one in a position to do anything about the problems has the balls to take the first step.
Finally, there is no civility in talking politics. And where there is no civility in talking politics there is no joy in talking politics. Your Maximum Leader probably will make some pronouncements here between now and the election; but what he’ll say likely will not please anyone. The up-side of this is that his readership is so small now that the few of you who remain will likely not be too offended or too prone to be uncivil in your comments…
By the way… Your Maximum Leader means for you all to read the title of this post and think of Mel Brooks in “History of the World, Part 1.” (And your Maximum Leader still awaits History of the World, Part 2.)
Carry on.
