Tfgray’s Weblog

Joe Conason, writing at Salon, brings up an interesting point. Okay, don’t be put off by the title, “Dick Cheney Was Right.”

Remember, back in the day, when Republicans insisted that “Deficits don’t matter?” I mean before they lost their shirts in the last election and decided that Deficits Will Destroy Us?

Joe makes a good point. Deficit spending got us out of the Great Depression. The humungous deficit spending package known as WWII not only stopped Fascism, (“The unification of State and Corporate power,” per Benito Mussolini) but also created the industrial base for three decades of unparalleled, widespread prosperity. To use the household metaphor that Republicans are so fond of these days, there’s a difference between borrowing to, say, build a house and borrowing to, say, go on a foreign adventure. There’s a difference between spending that hard-borrowed cash frugally on projects that will bear fruit later on, like, say, planting fruit trees or putting your kid through college, and blowing it at the casino.

It’s not the size of the deficit, it’s how you use it.

I was listening to the news today, and heard many Republicans cackling over Obama’s suggestion that we could use less oil by keeping our tires properly inflated. Let’s leave aside all the stuff from sources as diverse as NASCAR and the Department of Energy that agrees with Senator O.

Has anyone noticed that the Democrat is urging people to help solve their own problems while the Republicans are telling us to forget about personal responsibility and let the big boys take care of it?

Just asking.