Dobbs: Our leaders have squandered our wealth

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: dewayne () warpspeed com (Dewayne Hendricks)
Date: January 23, 2008 9:48:49 AM EST
To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <xyzzy () warpspeed com>
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Dobbs: Our leaders have squandered our wealth

Dobbs: Our leaders have squandered our wealth

   * Story Highlights
   * Lou Dobbs says a stimulus package won't prevent a recession
   * Our leaders have squandered the nation's wealth, he says
   * Dobbs says mistakes of past 25 years have led to this crisis

By Lou Dobbs
CNN

Lou Dobbs' commentary appears weekly on CNN.com.

NEW YORK (CNN) -- President Bush's assurances that we'll all be "just  
fine" if he and Congress can work out an economic stimulus package  
seem a little hollow this morning.

Much like Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke's assurances  
last May that the subprime mortgage meltdown would be contained and  
not affect the broader economy. And it seems Treasury Secretary Henry  
Paulson has spent most of the past year trying to influence Chinese  
economic policy rather than setting the direction of U.S. economic  
policy.

There is no question that Bush, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate  
Majority Leader Harry Reid will quickly come up with an economic  
stimulus package simply because they can no longer ignore our economic  
and financial crisis. That economic stimulus plan will amount to about  
1 percent of our nation's gross domestic product, an estimated $150  
billion.

But all of us should recognize that the stimulus package will be  
inadequate to drive sustainable growth in our $13 trillion economy. An  
emergency Fed rate cut and an economic stimulus plan are short-term  
responses to our complex economic problems, nothing more than bandages  
for a hemorrhaging economy.

Bush, Pelosi, Reid and the presidential candidates of both parties  
have an opportunity now, and I believe an obligation, to adjust the  
public policy mistakes of the past quarter-century that have led to  
this crisis. And only through courageous policy decisions will we be  
able to steer this nation's economy away from the brink of outright  
disaster.

We all have to acknowledge that our problems were in part brought on  
by the failure of our government to regulate the institutions and  
markets that are now in crisis. The irresponsible fiscal policies of  
the past decade have led to a national debt that amounts to $9  
trillion. The irresponsible so-called free trade policies of  
Democratic and Republican administrations over the past three decades  
have produced a trade debt that now amounts to more than $6 trillion,  
and that debt is rising faster than our national debt. All of which is  
contributing to the plunge in the value of the U.S. dollar.

At precisely the point in our history in which this nation has become  
ever more dependent on foreign producers for everything from clothing  
to computers to technology to energy, our weakened dollar is making  
the price of an ever-increasing number of imported goods even more  
expensive.

All Americans will soon have to face a bitter and now obvious truth:  
Our national, political and economic leaders have squandered this  
nation's wealth, and the price of this profligacy has just come due  
for us all.

[snip]

Find this article at:
<http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/01/22/Dobbs.January23/index.html>


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