Hitting 70-year-old GOP nominee Donald Trump with everything but the kitchen sink, 68-year-old Democratic nominee former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton tried to land a knockout blow. Ripping Trump for saying in last week’s GOP acceptance speech for say “I alone can fix it,” Hillary harked back to “It Takes a Village,” her 20-year-old book talking about politics as the ultimate team sport. Hillary scored some big points against Trump, especially pulling the race card, painting the real estate tycoon as a garden-variety racist. Playing well the DNC’s heavily minority audience, Hillary hit all the politically correct points about a multi-racial-ethnic-religious society working together for the common good. Preceded by her 36-year-old daughter Chelsea’s “good Mom” introduction, Hillary touched all the right themes, ignoring the sputtering economy and problems with Islamic terrorism.
No one can deny that Hillary spared no detail in her speech, painting Trump as an un-American racist, proudly looking into her optimistic American crystal ball. But if history’s any guide, the sluggish U.S. economy doesn’t match the glowing evaluation given by Hillary, contrasting today’s economy with the 2008 Great Recession under former President George W. Bush. Well if anything’s compared with that historic economic mess, it’s easy to look on the bright side. Hillary mentioned nothing of Federal Reserve Board Chairman Janet Yellen deciding to leave the Federal Funds Rate at 0.25%, nearly the record low set by former Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke Dec. 17, 2008. While Hillary praised the bull market and low unemployment rate under Obama but couldn’t explain the flat Gross Domestic Product growth, leaving the economy dangerously close to recession.
Hillary talked in her speech about fixing bad trade deals and returning manufacturing back to the U.S., something nearly plagiarized out of Trump’s July 21 acceptance speech. What Hillary didn’t say is how she going to reverse what looks today like a Japan-like zero growth scenario that plagued the world’s third-leading economy for the past 25 years. Known as the “lost decade” from 1991 to 2000, Japan couldn’t imagine that it’s once vibrant economy could be stuck in endless neutral. When you get beyond the flowery rhetoric and patriotic slogans, Hillary offered nothing other continuing the Obama policy. Raising the debt ceiling, heavy borrowing from the Federal Reserve and nearly doubling the national debt since President Barack Obama took office Jan. 20, 2009. Congressional Budget Office projections expect a $287 billion interest payment on a $19.2 trillion national debt.
Hillary speech offered no way out of the current Japan-like flat growth scenario other that raising taxes on the rich to fund her ambitious expansions of Obamacare and eventually universal health care, Social Security, Medicare, subsidized college tuition and a host of other social programs. Hillary talked about bringing back manufacturing jobs but offered no plan on how she gets a Republican Congress to go along with what looks like whopping future raises to the debt ceiling. While her audience cheered every word, especially her attacks on Trump, she didn’t tell the convention how she plans to advance her programs in a GOP-controlled Congress. She touted her experience as Secretary of State, experience on the Senate Armed Services Committee and close ties with Sen. John McCain (R-Az.) as proof of how she’ll work across the aisle, something Obama could never do.
When Trump talked last week about “I alone could fix it,” he wasn’t talking about doing the heavy lifting himself. That work of course goes to ordinary citizens. What Trump meant is that today’s status quo has dug the country into a deep financial hole with no way of climbing out. Without a major change in Washington that only an outsider could bring, it’s unrealistic to think that entrenched special interests will do things differently. Before backing Hillary after losing the Democratic nomination, Bernie warned about Hillary’s close ties to Wall Street, the fossil fuel industry and their close ties to Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States. Hillary talked about continuing the Obama plan of defeating the Islamic State and other terrorist groups threatening U.S. national security. With ISIS terrorism striking Europe and the U.S. with more regularity, the old strategy isn’t working.
Hillary’s acceptance speech addressed all the right target audiences and special interest groups but offered nothing other than platitudes how to fix the economy and failed U.S. foreign policy. Her decision as Secretary of State to topple Libyan strongman Muammar Gaddafi Aug. 24, 2011 brought more death, destruction and terrorism to North Africa. Hillary’s dislike of Russian President Vladimir Putin and continued backing of Saudi Arabia’s proxy war against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has pushed U.S.-Russian relations to the lowest level since the Cold War. Hillary, like former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, calls Iran the world’s chief state sponsor of terrorism but gives Saudi Arabia a free pass to topple al-Assad. She’s all in on defying Putin, backing the Saudi’s six-year-old effort and gambling again that toppling another Mideast dictator will turn up roses.
