Rick Perry should harness an imploding Europe to define his message to GOP voters [Reader Post]

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It is said that history is written by the victors. In the case of the 2012 election it’s hard to see how that’s even possible given that with the current trajectory of the GOP primaries we’re all going to end up losers.

Rarely does it occur that choices and consequences of government policies are so starkly presented for an electorate as they are today. Unfortunately, I’m not talking about the GOP field as an alternative to our big government president.

Today, the national debt stands at approximately $15 trillion, or almost $50,000 per American citizen. $4.6 trillion of that debt was run up under Barack Obama. That exceeds the combined amount of debt accumulated by every president from George Washington through the first George Bush. Everyone knows that too much debt is a bad thing. Even Candidate Barack Obama knew enough and told us on the campaign trail:

The problem is, that the way Bush has done it over the last eight years is to take out a credit card from the Bank of China in the name of our children, driving up our national debt from $5 trillion for the first 42 presidents, # 43 added $4 trillion by his lonesome so that now we have over $9 trillion of debt that we are going to have to pay back, $30,000 for every man woman and child. That’s irresponsible. It’s unpatriotic.

So what George Bush accomplished in eight years, Barack Obama has accomplished in three. And it’s only going to get worse. By Candidate Obama’s rationale that must make President Obama über unpatriotic.

Well, the President will tell you that the policies behind that spending were necessary to save the country from a depression and are finally beginning to bear fruit. He’d point to December’s unemployment rate that dropped to 8.5%, from a peak of 10.1% in November of ’09. As the fourth best president in our history, he’s obviously doing something right.

Or maybe not… When Barack Obama took office the population of the United States was 306 million and there were 186 million people working with an additional 14.9 million people looking for work, resulting in an unemployment rate of 7.4%. (14.9 million / 201 million) That 201 million is called the Workforce and it’s the key to understanding unemployment numbers. Workforce is defined as the following:

Total number of a country’s population employed in the armed forces and civilian jobs, plus those unemployed people who are actually seeking paying work.

Today, three years after Barack Obama took office the population has grown to 312 million but the workforce has actually shrunk from 201 million to 199 million. That means that despite adding 6 million people, the number of Americans working or actively seeking work has dropped by 2 million. Add to that the 4 million working age new Americans and you have a total of 6 million more people not working or even looking since Barack Obama took office. That’s how you get to 8.5% unemployment; you get people to stop looking for a job in the first place. He’s definitely doing something, but it’s not good. Nor is it unprecedented.

The big government policies that Barack Obama is shoving down American’s throats are this very day showing themselves to be utterly unsustainable a mere 5,000 miles away. Within the last week S&P downgraded the debt of nine (9) European countries, including EU giants France, Italy and Spain. The Euro is on the brink and the economies are disasters. If that were not bad enough, unemployment in Europe is so high (10% overall and 9% in France, 14% in Ireland, 18% in Greece and a whopping 23% in Spain) that a continent already unable to replace itself is shrinking even faster as an increasing number of its citizens emigrate to seek jobs elsewhere. In Greece the economic problems are so bad that parents are now abandoning babies and children at hospitals and churches across the country.

Which brings us back to the American election of 2012. The big government policies of Barack Obama are bringing the train wreck that is Europe to our shores. Unfortunately, the candidates leading the GOP charge to unseat him are little better, despite their protestations to the contrary. They claim to be conservatives, but they are not. They are big government advocates, just less so than Barack Obama.

Even more unfortunate is the fact that the only candidate in the GOP field who actually has a record of pursuing small government policies is seemingly unable to articulate those ideas to the average voter. If that candidate, Rick Perry, is to have any chance at all to resurrect his campaign he will have to do something dramatically different and he’ll have to do it soon. He should drop the oafish Bain Capital attacks and instead focus in a laser like fashion on smaller government. That is the one issue that every American can relate to regardless of age, sex, race etc. The rapacious nature of government must be demonstrated in a way they understand. In South Carolina, where the NLRB just tried to kill a Boeing plant, that message should resonate particularly well.

And how should he do that? With PowerPoint of course. PowerPoint might be a stretch, but not by much. The image of a burning Europe with its big government economies in ruin, double digit unemployment, rioters in the streets and babies abandoned on the sidewalks makes a perfect foil for the big government policies of both Barack Obama and the rest of the GOP field. Those are the kinds of images that voters can relate to because they see more and more of them on our own shores. And of course PowerPoint would come in handy when trying to remember what agencies to cut…

It would be a shame if when the history of the 2012 election is written Rick Perry is reduced to a 53 second footnote. Particularly because that means that some big government advocate won. Despite how damaging that sub one minute episode was, it need not be fatal to his campaign, but the time is getting short. With only 2% of the delegates decided, Rick Perry still has an opportunity to resurrect his campaign and maybe change history. His only hope is to harness the power of what Americans clearly don’t want, which is on such brilliant display right across the pond. With the images of Athens on fire, London under siege of by rioters and Naples covered in trash, even the least engaged voter can understand the correlation between big government and economic ruin and social failure. It’s up to Rick Perry to figure out how to make that case. If he does he has a shot at winning. If he can’t he’s destined to be a footnote in American political history.

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Rick Perry? He’s yesterday’s news.

The entire Republican establishment has sold out the base.

Game over.

Rick Perry’s natural constituency would have loved a campaign that told us exactly how he was going to get us out of this damn depression. We really haven’t heard it. A credible program to lower taxes, significantly reduce regulations, cut the deficit, drill everywhere we can and rein in the TBTF would have been a good start. It’s not that difficult.

All I can surmise that Perry is another bought and paid for faux conservative who could not deliver that message because his masters wouldn’t allow it. Particularly the TBTF part.

He ‘s not that dumb or inept; he’s just bought and paid for.

OP:

It is said that history is written by the victors.

Let me fix that for you.

It is was once said that history is was written by the victors.

With the rise of PC (political correctness) came its very useful partner: Revisionist History.
Revisionist History is quite simply history written by the losers.
One generation of gullible school children later and the upcoming generation believes the lies of the Revisionists.

But that’s not my problem with Perry (or anyone else, for that matter) using the imploding Europe as a way to define his message.

Europe has been well ahead of the USA when it comes to revisionist history.
The EU is well past mere Revisionist History now.

The current theory IN EUROPE as to why they are imploding is to BLAME the USA and UK and our credit rating agencies.
This is in German, so I’ll give you the gist:
EPP’s Elmar Brok claims that the US has launched an economic war against Europe.
The US ratings agencies, he says, had no conceivable reason to downgrade nine eurozone states last week.
What this is really about is a political project aimed at advancing ‘Anglo-Saxon interests’ in Europe.
Americans have been becoming increasingly anti-European

Elmar Brok is a senior MEP who, among other things, chairs the EU-US interparliamentary group. His views are widely shared.

The President of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, regularly lashes out at the American agencies, and plans to create an EU one in their place.

Just today the European Commission threatened the American ratings agencies with greater regulation including censorship!

I know that you know that killing the messenger does not reverse the bad news.
But apparently Europe is deep in denial.

They would fight tooth and nail, with lies and deceit any attempt by Perry (or anyone else) to point out their deficiencies.

Vince from OP: Even more unfortunate is the fact that the only candidate in the GOP field who actually has a record of pursuing small government policies is seemingly unable to articulate those ideas to the average voter.

Maybe because the average voter is smarter than the average bear, Vince. From conservative site, End of the American Dream… 14 reasons why Perry would be a really bad POTUS. The first three go to your comment about him supposedly reducing the size of government in Texas.

#1 Rick Perry is a “big government” politician. When Rick Perry became the governor of Texas in 2000, the total spending by the Texas state government was approximately $49 billion. Ten years later it was approximately $90 billion. That is not exactly reducing the size of government.

#2 The total debt of the Texas government has more than doubled since Rick Perry became governor. So what would the U.S. national debt look like after four (or eight) years of Rick Perry?

#3 Rick Perry has spearheaded the effort to lease roads in Texas to foreign companies, to turn roads that are already free to drive on into toll roads, and to develop the Trans-Texas Corridor which would be part of the planned NAFTA superhighway system. If you really do deep research on this whole Trans-Texas Corridor nonsense you will see why no American should ever cast a single vote for Rick Perry.

Perry’s Trans-Texas Corridor doesn’t even bring into play the vast amount of eminent domain that would be going on for the duration….

hummmm…. mebbe you wanna rethink that perception of “smaller government” again?

VINCE
can I remind you or bring the news that RICK PERRY had a back operation which include sedatives,
a short times before entering the race, he had those lapsus because of the sedatives still working in the brain, which he did not mentione or try to use as excuse for the lapsus, and where demolish by his crowd and the opponant visciously, I did not hear nobody appologise for being so mean now that we know the whys and cons,
and as we see he no more show lapsus, because the powerfull sedative is gone,
that is one point on his favor, he showed a lot of values by not informing the torturers the whys, he let them to their own tongues to rot,
he has many more values to be discoverd, but the top ROMNEY has been chosen, AND THAT IS IT,
BUT AMERICA HAS NOT DONE ALL THE WORK NOW,
THE CANDIDAT could use your idea if you choose to commit as anyone could help them, instead of sinking them,
there is surely a way to help and support their cause.
is in it for all the conservatives to join in with one of values which struggle. RICK PERRY HAS THE GUTS TO TAKE A POSITIVE CRITIC IF IT HELP HIM TO RISE,

RICK PERRY
Should question ROMNEY, about how was he thinking when he put his dog on the roof
in a airtight container for a 12 hours trip, and stopping only to hose out the liquid diarrhea from the container and the dog, and continue his 12 hours trip,
SOMEONE IN HIGH POSITIONS MENTIONED
AMERICANS would not appreciate a PRESIDENT TREATING HIS DOG LIKE IT,
SO ROMNEY SHOULD EXPLAIN SOON.

@Vince, weird on the link, but here’s another try with a slight deviation in the URL.

The same site also has a version for Mittens, with 16 reasons why he’d make a really bad POTUS. In that is the figures of big financial institutions that are doubling and tripling their donations to Mittens over Obama. Count on that making it’s way into the Dem’s assault plan as well.

They’ve also got one for Newt. They said if Cain got the nomination it would be a “disaster”. It’s my guess, after scanning a few of their articles, that they are quietly rallying around Ron Paul. He seems to be the only one they haven’t said anything negative about. I just used it for the links to other articles on the main talking points.

@ilovebeeswarzone, I hate the thought of that account. Personally I probably would have ripped him a new one as a family member. But that stuff, while going to the heart of who Mitt is as a “family” man and dog owner, really isn’t up to snuff on the issues facing the nation. I’m quite sure that the Dems will touch on it, but this just isn’t at the top of the list of importance.

But if he won the Presidency, maybe Congress can pass a bill, forbidding Mittens from owning a pet while in the WH. LOL Just kidding, of course. The pet would likely have it much better as First Dog of the nation.

MATA
HI,
I took the info on FOXNEWS, written by a top rank writer
there is another good one from insider, Nan’s link
about RON PAUL.
bye

MATA COME TO THE FIRST TEBOW ” GET OFF….”
CHECK IT OF 4 to go