Does the GOP Have the Stomach For What It Will Take to Fix This Economy?

Before BSB took a tumble and came back re-incarnated as an up-to-date blog, a poster named Randy was asking for solutions to our economic problems instead of sniping about whose fault it is. As though on queue, Fortune magazine came out with a list of 5 ideas to stimulate our economy. The only problem is, despite the fact that they came from a conservative magazine like Fortune, I don’t think the GOP will like them very much. It raises the question: Does the GOP have the stomach for what it’ll take to fix this economy?

Does the GOP have the stomach for the “Main Street bailout” suggested by Fortune, where the banks and the government would forgive any debt in excess of the value of the underlying property? After all, there can be no doubt that “under water” mortgages are a serious drain our housing market, consumer spending, and thus the economy right now. What about Fortune’s idea to repeal the 2005 bankruptcy “reform” bill that made it harder for consumers to erase their debts in bankruptcy? Would GOPers be able to ignore the cries of the banks which thought they had bought and sold and paid for the GOP?

Lord knows the Glenn Beck teabaggers would have a serious problem with Fortune’s suggestion of further de-vauling the U.S. Dollar, thus making goods manufactured here cheaper in foreign countries, therefore stimulating manufacturing demand and jobs. Would GOPers be able to ignore the tea party’s hue and cry as they see the value of the dollar slide below euro1.50?

How about economist Jeffery Sachs, whose Financial Times editorial (pay shield) was also mentioned in the Fortune article? Sachs suggests another stimulus (gasp!) this time focused on investment instead of spending on things like tax cuts. Sachs’ five part plan calls for the U.S. to invest in education (greedy teachers’ unions, cries the GOP!), clean energy (global warming is just a left-wing conspiracy theory says John Boehner as wildfires rage outside Moscow (!) but I digress), infrastructure renovation (pork barrel spending wails the GOP!), among other things.

"China saves and invests; the U.S. talks, consumes, borrows, and talks some more," Sachs writes.

Of course, Fortune does throw a bone to its conservative readership and call on the experience of Margaret Thatcher in 1980s UK by saying the best stimulus is no stimulus at all: the government should cut spending and get out of the way. There’s a big difference between 2010s America and 1980s UK that they fail to mention though: We’re already so loaded down with debt courtesy of George W. Bush, who started two wars and paid for it with five tax cuts, that even if the government cut spending to zero right now, it’d still be inevitable that taxes would go up. Deficits, after all, are just deferred tax increases, and  Reagan, Bush I, and Bush II, managed to rack up $9 Trillion worth.

So ask yourself, Randy, dear BSB readers and Americans in general: does the GOP really have the stomach for the heavily lifting its going to take to restore our economy?

The full Fortune article is available here.