Just What Can America Expect Out Of A Mitt Romney Presidency?

By Bill Sardi

Mitt Romney............ Mr. America.  He believes in the good old USA and optimistically says he can lead where others have failed, and that his cadre of technocrats whom he would collaborate with (specifically, he means those consultants from Bain Consulting in Boston) would provide him with the data needed to make a critical decision path if elected to The White House.

An analysis of Mr. Romney's 59-point plan for America sounds like a business-as-usual Presidency.  What America faces is more than a recession or even a depression. It faces a collapse of fundamental anchors in its society, namely finance and currency.  Yet there are no banking reforms in Mr. Romney's revisionist plans for America.  

Planned inflation, the current direction led by The Federal Reserve bank, is eroding Americans banked wealth at the rate of $510-$780 billion a year and Mr. Romney appears oblivious to the crisis.  Savers are being penalized while debtors are getting off Scott free.  From his rooftop, can't he see that America is burning, or does he need a data sheet to confirm that?

According to Mr. Romney, military spending gets a short haircut, -5 percent, at a time when military spending amounts to over $1 trillion a year out of $3.6 trillion federal spending.  Just how do you keep fighting phony wars and maintain US hegemony over the world on borrowed money?  There is simply no way to address the deficit-spending habits of the US without drastic cuts in Medicare and military spending.  

But Romney is giving Americans what they want to hear, spoon fed optimism, that America is the greatest country in the world and his plan would produce a 4% growth in GDP per year, add 11.5 million private sector jobs, reduce unemployment to 5.9%and reduce federal spending by $1.6 trillion.  That would balance the US budget for a nation which now collects ~$2.4 trillion and spends $3.8 trillion.   Mr. Romney pursues a balanced budget amendment, but does it outlaw end-of-year add-ons like Congress puts into play, over and above the US budget for the year?  A great deal of US military spending is off budget.

Every candidate needs a villain

Iran is Romney's evil villain.  Every Presidential candidate must pull out some bogey man to make America beat its chest and flexes its muscles to the drumbeat of patriotism. Mr. Romney suggests he might bomb Iran, but not place US army boots on the ground there.  Just how does that jive with his Mormon/Christian background?  I guess if the data sheets says bomb, you bomb.  The Prince of Peace will not be consulted.

Would Romney's plan raise or lower government spending?

Mr. Romney wants to push for a federal spending cap of 20% of GDP, or what would currently amount to $2.8 trillion.  That would actually be a $400 billion increase over current spending, folks.  

But the GDP figures are conjured up.  America's GDP is declining, only the government doesn't want to admit that.  So what is Romney's plan if the GDP numbers turn south? Romney is also relying on phony unemployment numbers the government provides. Visit ShadowStats to see the real numbers.   The real unemployment rate is above 20%. Getting to 5.9% would likely end up being a continuation in numbers manipulation.  

Romney is a realist.  He wants to reduce corporate taxes from 35% to 25%, more in line with what foreign nations, who compete with the US, tax their corporations.  The US corporate tax rate is forcing many US companies to hold their money off shore.  Mr. Obama was confronted by a coalition of US companies that said it would free-up a trillion or two and bring it back into the US if he would offer a tax holiday, or maybe a lower tax rate like 5%.  Obama passed on the offer. Would Mr. Romney's plan retrieve any of those trillions of dollars back into the US?

Eliminate or down-size Medicare?

While corporate interests have demolished Mr. Obama's now-dreaded health care plan, Mr. Romney says he would roll-back the Obama healthcare plan, but he doesn't say he would eradicate it.  Medicare and Social Security pose a $60 trillion shortfall that Mr. Romney must address.  He ignores it, as do all the others but Ron Paul.  

The boat is taking on water Mr. Romney

Romney is speaking from the helm of a ship that is sinking.  He is instructing the crew to fly the American flag instead of a distress signal.  The boat is taking on water and he is warning of icebergs ahead.  The crew and the ship's purser are raiding the passenger's valuables locked in the ship's vault and reserving the lifeboats for themselves.  If this dose of reality doesn't make it onto Mr. Romney's data sheets, which he says he will heavily rely upon to manage government, then America is S_ _ _ T out of luck.

Wave the flag.  Strike up the band.  Play the stars and stripes forever.  Give us the same old baloney as before + the data sheets.  If you can manage a country like the US from an I-phone, good for you.  The current President has tried it and it hasn't worked.  Bottom line:  more war, more massaging of numbers issued by government agencies, more kicking the can down the road in dealing with the nation's $14 trillion in accumulated debt and incapacitating inflation, and more passage of private debts onto the public ledger.

Will Southerners vote for Romney?

Southerners are not likely to embrace Mr. Romney.  So a big issue will be whether a Romney nomination could sway Southerners (can you imagine) to vote for Obama.  I think Mr. Romney's platitudes won't look very strong against Obama and his hundreds of millions of dollars of campaign money.  Obama will continue to divide and conquer -- saying his proposed cutbacks in welfare at a time of great need would impoverish more Americans. 

No question about it, the Obama reelection is in jeopardy, but facing a millionaire contender who appears to be protecting the rich is not a very electable position. Recall that Mr. Romney offered Rick Perry a $10,000 bet in a televised debate.  It was a big foo-pah for Romney, flaunting his millions around and acting very un-Presidential.  

But he is a family man, has a nice hair-do, a family dog at his side.  Meanwhile, Americans are trying to figure out how to pay their bills.  

What about "none of the above?"

Americans are developing a short fuse on politicians.  Congress has an all time low 11% favorability rating among voters.  The next election needs to be a major turning point in America, not a 10% change in direction that skips past the icebergs.  Every American senses there is something terrible going on in the country that needs fixing.  

Mr. Romney is more of an imagined solution to what ails the nation.  Think of a cartoon character that saves the world after consultation with the Bain consulting group.  If you can imagine Superman stopping to consult with advisors before halting a train wreck, that is Mr. Romney.  Nobody wants an impulsive leader, but maybe can't see the obvious.

Most Americans vote against rather than for a candidate.  The anti-Bush vote got Obama elected. But this time Americans are seeing through some of the phony rhetoric. Whatever the candidates say they will do, Americans are not sure the candidates will actually do.  Recall that GW Bush initially said he would not be a war-monger.  The opposite occurred.  It looked like Bush had a war agenda all along.

At this point in time, most Americans don't have high regard for Mr. Obama or Mr. Romney. Perplexingly, an Obama versus Romney election gives Americans no one they can enthusiastically vote for or against.