Rush is Right, Obama Wrong

Tomorrow (Thursday), I'll discuss Obama's disastrous plunge into class warfare. Yes, many people love to hate "the rich" (whether they're really rich or not). But consider this: Mayor Michael Bloomberg recently spoke out against soaking the rich. He explained that high-tax, high-cost New York has eight million resident. But a mere 40,000 of the eight million provide 63% of the city's revenue. What if one-eighth of those people -- 5,000 -- moved out of the city? It would do real harm to city services. What if one-fourth of them -- 10,000 -- moved out, which they certainly have the resources to do? It would cripple the city's ability to meet the needs of its people. Is Obama aware of such situations? He hasn't shown any sign yet that he is. Sarah Palin does understand such realities, and that's one reason she'd be a much better President than Obama.

Below: "Obama's success would be America's failure." That's why we don't want him to succeed.

Barack Obama has no understanding of how the American economy works. How could he? The man has spent his entire life going to left-wing academic institutions, "organizing" communities, and running for ever-higher offices. If you want to know what's wrong with the economy and what must be done to fix it, don't go to Obama's web site. Instead, come here, where I'll offer simple explanations of what is going on and how we can help improve the situation.

A last word (for now) on Rush Limbaugh's amazing speech to CPAC: What Rush reminds us is that we don't have to "make nice" with people who try to smear Sarah Palin -- or who sling mud at Limbaugh. Being nice to deceitful, dishonest people ensures they will never get any better. We may not change their minds, but we can at least make them uncomfortable.

Frankly, in his LONG address Rush did not say offensive things. His goal was to defend responsible democracy and the American way of life. The accusations he made about Obama's socialist -- or vote-buying -- agenda happen to be true.

Some of our Republican leaders are good people -- John Boehner, Mitch McConnell, Eric Cantor, even Michael Steele -- but they aren't forceful enough. As Limbaugh indicated, when it comes to simple matters of right-and-wrong, "bipartisanship" is not the answer.

When a public policy is bad, compromising on it doesn't make it "half-bad." When Obama is taking steps that harm charities and the housing market, we don't need a bipartisan compromise. When people tell us comforting lies, we need to tell the truth to the best of our ability.

Also, when investors feel gloomy about the stock market's prospects, we need to reveal the negative effects of Obama's efforts to increase the tax rate on capital gains and reduce people's capacity to invest. Finally, when Rush says that's what Obama's doing, is he being "mean" -- or is he just reciting some obvious truths?

We don't want to punish the most productive people in the economy and reward the least productive. Doing so harms the country. That's why many of us, including Rush, don't want Obama to succeed.

In fact, Obama's success would be America's failure. We don't want to become like Britain and France, with slow growth, high unemployment, and a social welfare scheme that reduces opportunity.

Barack Obama likes to talk a lot about Abraham Lincoln and, lately, Franklin D. Roosevelt. One historical individual Obama has never mentioned -- but should -- is Benjamin Franklin.

What's the best way to gain great wealth? Is it to speculate wildly on Wall Street, assuming that the market will always go up -- as you've noticed, it doesn't? Or is it to buy more house than you can afford, believing that the market will always trend upward and you can sell it at a handsome profit. Not anymore.

Benjamin Franklin took a more modest approach, one we might describe not as "get rich quick," but rather as "Get rich . . . slowly."

He said, "The road to wealth, if you desire it [who doesn't?], is as plain as the way to market. It depends chiefly on two words, industry and frugality. That is, waste neither time nor money, but make the best use of both."

In the U.S., tens of millions of people have gotten wealthy by doing exactly what Franklin advised. (In contrast, Obama got rich through two massive book deals for autobiographical volumes that were strong on hope and short on real accomplishments.) His wife got a rich person's salary primarily because she was married to an influential legislator.

Currently, former Gov. Rod Blagojevich is trying to get rich with a book deal of his own. If all else fails, as it did for Blagojevich if not for Obama, then write a book.

For normal people, it pays to follow Ben Franklin's advice, sagacious as he always was.

[Tomorrow: What Obama doesn't know about the economy could fill a book -- one he presumably won't ever write.]