For those closely following this election cycle, we know our country is teetering on the brink of a double-dip recession, fanatics are burning our flag and killing our diplomats in foreign countries, and U.S. weapons are being used to kill our own border agents. Despite the real demons, the Obama administration is making up phantom issues to scare us.
You and I know what is going on. Unfortunately, many Americans have ducked their heads beneath their blankets.
President Obama, Vice President Biden and the campaign surrogates are on the stump and on television constantly—aided by a cooperative media, manufacturing things to get the electorate spun up about monsters-in-the-closet that don’t exist.
The fictitious war on women is but one example. The Democrats’ talking points consistently upbraid GOP candidates for allegedly denying women the opportunities to health care and reproductive rights. That’s nonsense. With the deficit demon breathing down our neck, the real issue should be whether federal taxpayers’ dollars should be used to pay for abortion by funding Planned Parenthood.
On the tax issue, Vice President Joe Biden continues to accuse Gov. Romney of proposing a tax plan that would raise taxes on the middle-class. He’s wrong. The governor’s plan would reduce the tax rate by 20 percent, eliminate some special interest tax breaks, and give the economy a much needed boost which could put people back to work.
But the Obama campaign isn’t interested in policies that might actually work. For the past three and a half years, the administration has proven its penchant for pandering to certain constituencies in hopes of being reelected to a second term.
To appease the environmental lobby, it denied a permit to the Keystone XL pipeline. The administration also put its “boot on the neck” of the energy industry, to paraphrase Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, by imposing a moratorium on Gulf of Mexico energy development, followed by a “permitorium” that continues to artificially depress Gulf oil production. A drilling permit can be obtained from a state agency in four days, but a comparable permit for drilling on federal land can take more than a year.
Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) also launched attacks on the coal industry by promulgating rules and regulations that make it nearly impossible to mine coal or build a new coal-fired power plant. In a similar move, EPA regulators attempted to spread fear about hydraulic fracturing, the tried-and-true method of producing oil and gas from shale formations. Their gambit backfired. EPA was unable to find any evidence of groundwater contamination directly linked to fracking.
One of the victims of the EPA’s failed attempt at discrediting fracking could be Matt Damon, the actor and producer who stars in a new anti-fracking movie. The film was financed by a media company wholly-owned by the United Arab Emirates, an OPEC country, which has a stake in trying to discourage energy production in the United States.
The Obama campaign is betting that American voters will reelect the devil-they-know rather than vote for the GOP alternatives. Its plan is to force Americans to focus on made-up and scary scenarios because the administration’s record has been truly awful.
Under the president’s watch, the United States has been impotent against threats in the Middle East. The economy continues to be in the doldrums with an estimated 23 million Americans unemployed or underemployed. And the federal deficit, which stands at $16 trillion and climbing, could turn the one superpower in the world into a panhandling country like Greece.
There are better ways to run a nation. We should develop our own domestic energy resources and approve the Keystone pipeline. According to a study, policies that encourage oil and natural gas drilling could create 1.4 million jobs by 2030 and increase tax revenues to the federal government. We should scale back regulations that are preventing private companies from making investments and hiring new workers. And we should resume America’s leadership in the world.
Most importantly, the Obama campaign should stop the fear mongering and be honest with the American people. Freddy Kruger isn’t hiding under the bed.
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