FOD 2012.01.30

Today's guest commentator (unbeknownst to him) is columnist Jonathan Gurwitz of the San Antonio Express-News.

Obama blueprint dramatically flawed

Man plans. God laughs. In his State of the Union Address, President Barack Obama presented what he called the blueprint for an economy that's built to last. The future may hold different designs.

Take the president's plan to save taxpayers $500 billion over the next decade by cutting defense spending. Let it be noted that he has at least found one area of government spending that he is willing ... no, is eager to reduce. The problem is that there are no others.

In an era of real bureaucratic austerity, every government department, agency and program — including the Pentagon — should be subject to cuts. President Obama, however, lays down the budget ax when he's finished with defense.

The president said Tuesday night that even with those cuts, his strategy will allow the United States to stay one step ahead of its adversaries. Perhaps.

The Obama strategy is predicated on the belief that the security challenges the United States will face over the next decade can be met with a much smaller military and, specifically, much fewer ground forces. North Korea, Iran, an Arab world roiling with revolutionary change or some unforeseen threat from the next “failure to connect the dots” may determine otherwise.

The Obama economy of the future envisions a world in which the expectation of increasing global harmony will allow the United States to safely reduce defense spending from 4.5 percent of gross domestic product last year to 2.7 percent in 2021. That would be its lowest share of GDP since 1940, for those seeking an ominous historical analogy.

Here it's worth remembering John F. Kennedy's admonition that “only when our arms are sufficient beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt that they will never be employed.”

The Obama economy of the future also envisions a world in which national debt evidently does not matter. In his address to a joint session of Congress in 2009, President Obama said it was time to “make hard choices to bring our deficit down.” He made none.

In his State of the Union address in 2010, he said the U.S. government had to live within its means like cash-strapped American families and warned, “If I have to enforce this discipline by veto, I will.” He didn't.

Last year, he declared, “We have to confront the fact that our government spends more than it takes in.” A month later, he submitted a budget with a $1.2 trillion deficit.

On Tuesday evening, the president offered only a throwaway mention of the national debt, a debt to which he is on track to add an unprecedented $6.2 trillion in only one term. He suggested using half a presumed peace dividend to pay down the debt, a plan so lame that Associated Press fact-checkers called it a “budgetary sleight of hand.”

While the defense budget, which accounts for 20 percent of the federal budget, is set to decline to a historic low, the Congressional Budget Office estimates entitlement spending, which accounts for 42 percent of federal spending, will continue to grow from 9.9 percent of GDP in 2010 to 12 percent in 2021. About this, the president of hard choices and vetoes said ... nothing.

President Obama calls this evasion of responsibility his “Blueprint for an America Built to Last.” Would you accept a blueprint for a home that offers only partial shelter against the elements, costs more than you can afford, will leave your children paupers and has a $16.2 trillion hole where the foundation should be?

That pretty much sums things up. Now if only the clowns running for the republican nomination would quit beating each other up and focus instead on Barry's record we'd all be a lot better off.