VOICE OF REASON

Republicans, you don’t get to say that President Obama is a President whose policies didn’t work, he made the economy worse, and he is the worse President ever, when you conspired to, then literally blocked almost all of his legislative efforts. You did this deliberately and with malice simply to make the first black President of the United States fail, and you set this plan in motion even before he took office. This disrespect for the office of the Presidency is unprecedented and can only be classified as Racist. Your obstructing is hurting millions of Americans and you don’t seem to care about those people. To force the failure of an American President and thereby the American Government, and additionally harm the American people, is not only shameful, but it is treason.

Not only do Republicans refuse to tax the wealthy and huge corporations, but they also refuse to eliminate tax loopholes for things like jets. Yet, at the same time, they propose cutting benefits and services to the rest of America’s population. They promised jobs and won many offices in Congress and in States across the U.S. in 2010. Since 2010, they are blocking President Obama’s Jobs Bill, busting unions, legislating abortion and contraception, denying gay rights, and proposing transvaginal Ultrasounds. Some of the Republican proposals are clearly based on their religious ideology, which is a clear violation of our Constitutional law to have separation of church and state. Where is their jobs legislation? Where is their budget that is fair for most of Americans? I agree we need a balanced budget, but not on the backs of the poor and middle class. These people have sacrificed enough already. There are plenty of places to start trimming the budget without starting with the American people.  Here are some ideas, stop current wars, make the wealthy and large corporations pay their fair share, stop approving projects like bridges to nowhere, and set up a nonpartisan Enforcement Bureau to look for and eliminate fraud and abuse at every level in the Government and the private sector.

Republicans assume they are the only party that can heal the economy and create jobs, but they want to do it with “trickledown economics”, an old idea that has never worked. They are too arrogant to adopt an economic policy that worked under President Clinton’s Administration, and one that President Obama is trying to emulate. Here is a very important point that all American’s need to understand. We are operating under a Republican economy. During the debt crisis, President Obama and Mr. Boehner hammered out a budget compromise that was soundly rejected by the Republican House majority. Afterwards, Mr. Boehner stated that Republicans got 98% of what they wanted. From that point on, the performance of the economy is directly attributed to Republican policy and not President Obama. This current economy is 98% Republican and 2% President Obama. With this Republican win, make no mistake about it, this is a Republican economy, and our credit was downgraded and the recovery slowed. President Obama can’t be blamed if the Republicans got 98% of what they wanted. So what’s wrong with our current economy and why is it so sluggish? This Republican economy is not fair or balanced. It’s not fair in the sense that Corporations like GE can reduce their taxes to 0% and get a 3 billion dollar tax credit check from the government. Corporations and wealthy individuals should always have to pay something, at least 5%-20% and not 0%. Their tax credits should only reduce their income tax liability to established minimum levels to be determined, and not below 0%. It’s unbalanced because to truly have a balanced budget, you need budget cuts done with a scalpel and not a meat clever, sensible spending, and new revenues (everyone pays a fair share). Of course the new revenues are taxes and the Republicans signed a contract that said they will never raise taxes. Really, that’s like saying, “I’m never going to put any money from my paycheck into savings in case there is an unexpected financial crisis.” That kind of thinking is crazy. Budget cuts and reduction in spending only help prevent a debt increase but does nothing to reduce current debt. New revenue can help pay down the debt. This is simple math and Republicans get an F.

Finally, Republicans don’t get to say what’s wrong with the economy and what’s wrong with President Obama’s policies without offering solutions. I’d like to know how Republicans would have fixed the 2008 recession without a stimulus. I can’t imagine what they would have done instead. FDR’s stimulus worked during the great depression and President Obama’s stimulus prevented a depression. It would have worked better if it was larger, and that’s something the Republicans would not allow. What are the Republican plans to fix the economy? To date, they have given us no clues. Republicans need to clearly outline their plan to improve the current economy. Just saying that President Obama has failed, which was a recurrent theme at your 2012 Convention in Tampa, doesn’t help anyone to understand how you can do a better job. At least we know President Obama can stop an economic disaster from getting worse. Yes, the price of gas is rising and unemployment is above 8%. But before you blame President Obama for all our economic woes, remember he was facing a Republican Congress that was doing everything they could to make him fail, and yet, he has still done some remarkable things. He has passed health care reform (it’s only negative is the individual mandate which is much like making you have car insurance, and that didn’t make America crazy), lowered taxes on Americans making less than $250,000, got equal pay for women, got credit card reforms, initiated banking and finance reforms to help prevent greedy businessmen from gambling with the money of the American people, helped millions who are upside down on their mortgage, kept student loan interest rates low, got our troops out of Iraq, gave small business tax credit incentives, was tough at the U.S. border yet compassionate with illegals already in our country, got the stock market up over 12,000, helped job growth consistently increase for over 20+ months (-750,000 to 100,000+/month), gave dignity to the gay rights struggle, and eliminated Osama Bin Laden. There are many more things the Obama administration has accomplished, and most were very good for the American people. Just use Google to get a full list. During your search, you will also find sites that adversely criticize his accomplishments. When a site doesn’t give President Obama credit for anything he did, even the things that were good for the American people, you know that’s a site you cannot trust. Both parties use creative license with the truth, but the Republicans do far more obstructing, outright lying, and are malicious about their half-truths. These tactics have effectively brought Government to a grinding halt. An example of this is that since 2007, Republicans had over 360 filibusters in the Senate. That’s almost more than all previous years combined, and this rate dramatically increased after President Obama was elected. Don’t take my word for it. Here are some websites where you can find the facts and the truth:

1. Bureau of Labor Statistics at www.bis.gov

2. www.senate.gov

3. www.house.gov

4. www.factcheck.org

5. www.OpenCongress.org

6. The Congressional Budget Office at www.cbo.gov

Of course I would like for you to vote for President Obama, but what I really want is for you to do your homework and make an informed decision. Balancing the budget is very important, but not at the expense of making more people suffer. People should always come before money. Let the Republicans know that in November.

ANTHONY J. CAMMACK, MD

Written SEPTEMBER 3, 2012