By Sen. Mike Lee
July 24. 2013
Today, President Obama will - for the eighth time in five years - officially "pivot" his attention back to the economy.
Unfortunately, word is that the president's remarks will not include any new policy initiatives, but merely repackage ones he has proposed before.
In other words, five years into office, four years since the recessions supposedly ended, and three years since his administration declared "Mission: Accomplished" on the economy (remember "Recovery Summer"?), the president's response is not just to give a speech.
It's to give the exact same speech.
Washington has therefore greeted the news of the president's latest "pivot" with a bit of a shrug. The speech will be more of the same we've heard for five long years - tax increases on the wealthy, more spending on green energy and other fashionable special interests, and Obamacare.
All of the above will be presented as an agenda to support and grow the middle class, which of course Republicans will oppose because they are - the president will insist - the Party of the Rich.
It's a shame the speech is going to be so widely ignored. Because the argument the president is going to make - that bigger government is the only thing that can protect the middle class from our unfair economy - is precisely the argument Republicans are going to have to refute if we ever hope to rebuild a national majority.
The good news is that the president's case is utter nonsense.
Big government is not the solution to unfairness in our economy - it's the cause.
There are three great crises in our economy today, each a crisis of fairness and equality - each caused in large part by the very policies President Obama supports.
First, there is the crisis of upward mobility. In America today, people born in poverty are often trapped there. It's not the free market that forces poor kids into underperforming schools, punishes single parents for getting married, and penalizes people for hard work - it's big government.
Second, there is the crisis of cronyism. If the economy seems rigged these days, that's because it is. Big government, big business, and big special interests manipulate the rules to profit at everyone else's expense.
Companies succeed not by serving customers, but politicians and bureaucrats. In Barack Obama's economy, Wall Street gets a bailout, Solyndra-gets a hand out, liberal interests get a carve-out, and everyone else gets left out.
And finally, there is the crisis of the middle class: stagnant wages, inequality, insecurity, and the exploding costs of housing, health care, and education. Contrary to the president's rhetoric, all of the above are directly tied to federal policy.
Wages rise when small businesses grow. But small businesses can't grow when crony capitalism protects large corporations from smaller competitors. And it's not a coincidence that the industries that have seen the worst inflation - housing, health care, and education - are the very industries controlled by government!
It is liberal big government - Barack Obama's government - that today ensnares the poor, privileges the rich, and squeezes the middle class.
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