We have pondered about Barack Obama as president but as events unfold and Hillary seems to be getting the upper hand for the Democrat presidential nomination, we need to reexamine what this "smartest woman in the world" would do to our country.
Carl Bernstein had it right when he wrote this about a Hillary Clinton presidency:
"What will a Hillary Clinton presidency look like?
The answer by now seems obvious: It will look like her presidential campaign, which in turn looks increasingly like the first Clinton presidency.
Which is to say, high-minded ideals, lowered execution, half truths, outright lies (and imaginary flights), take-no prisoners politics, some very good policy ideas, a presidential spouse given to wallowing in anger and self-pity, and a succession of aides and surrogates pushed under the bus when things don’t go right. Which is to say, often.
And endless psychodrama: the essential Clintonian experience that mesmerizes the press, confuses the citizenry, confounds members of both parties in Congress (not to mention the Clintons themselves, at times) and pretty much keeps the rest of the world constantly amused and fixated."
There is a reason why so many people have a negative view of the former "First Lady"; for one, she is a shrill-voiced near communist espousing ultra-liberal policies with the character deficiencies well described by Bernstein.
Representative of Hillary’s ideas of authoritarian government control is her universal health insurance plan, disguised as "universal healthcare"; which would provide poor quality cradle-to-the-grave medical care for everyone. Gone would be the individual right to work with their physician to select most appropriate medical treatment, gone would be the ability to have a medical insurance program according to one’s budget, gone would be the need for employers to provide competitive health insurance to their employers and, worst of all, gone would be doctor’s incentives to provide their patients the best healthcare possible. If the Hillary program was made law, replacing all these lost rights would be a government program giving bureaucrats control over who lives or dies.
The fine print in the Hillary healthcare proposal is also interesting, and it’s always important to read the fine print. According to the latest "Hillarycare" program the government would have a great deal to say about your health care. In addition to requiring you by law to buy health insurance coverage, many employers would be required by law to either provide coverage or pay a tax to cover health expenses. States would be "relieved" of the burden of regulating health insurance markets. Healthcare costs in the United States are high but no higher than in the countries with socialized medicine. High costs can be addressed by reducing unnecessary spending so workers' taxes may be reduced leaving them more money to pay for medical needs and by making health insurance companies more competitive by opening up the whole country to insurance companies to offer their products. The free market is still the best way to keep costs down.
Although all Democrats never saw a tax increase they didn’t like, Hillary is quite clear that she would make sure that the "wealthy", defined as virtually anyone earning $75,000 to $100,000 a year, will have to share their wealth with those "less fortunate". Americans would see the Bush tax cuts evaporate and in their place would be an even more socialized tax structure than we have; "from all according to their means to all according to their needs."
Businesses deemed to be "earning too much" would have the government intercede to correct the imbalance. Hillary, like all Democrats, refuses to acknowledge that any added costs placed on business ultimately are paid for by their customers. Even proposals to tax "excess profits" are feel-good programs that will add to the cost of gasoline and other petroleum products and do not lead to lower costs. Although additional income to the government gives Democrats more income to redistribute, the burden is on the public not the oil companies.
Senator Hillary Clinton recently introduced a proposal for a new $10 billion federal program to offer government-subsidized preschool for all children across the country. Under her plan, states that offer such programs would be eligible to receive federal funding if they agree to follow federal guidelines on matters such as teacher training requirements and curriculum guidelines. This is an overt attempt to have the federal government dictate what should or should not be taught to your children.
In keeping with the Clintons' history of opposing school-choice initiatives, Hillary Clinton has attacked school vouchers which could be used by parents to escape the inefficiencies of public education and avoid politically correct indoctrination.
As an advocate of expanded public housing, Hillary Clinton will out do her Democrat predecessors. If she has her way, Hillary Public housing may be coming to your neighborhood. Hillary Clinton is leading a movement to spend billions of tax dollars to buy homes in foreclosure and convert them to public housing. Do you have houses in foreclosure near you; if so you may find yourself in a public housing neighborhood?
In the words of Senator Hillary Clinton:
"If the Fed can extend $30 billion to help Bear Stearns ... the federal government should provide at least that much emergency assistance to help families and communities address [their problems]. That's why I'm calling for the creation of a one-time emergency $30 billion fund that would go directly to cities and states to address the housing crisis. This money could be used to purchase foreclosed or distressed properties, which cities and states could then resell to low-income families or convert into affordable rental housing."
We are all familiar by now with Hillary’s dispensing with the truth regarding her exploits, but the truth-challenged Hillary also easily misrepresents the facts about the state of domestic affairs. According to Hillary:
"[W]e now have the largest budget deficit we've ever had, $311 billion. We went from a $5.6 trillion projected surplus to what we have today, which is a $9 trillion debt."
But the facts show this is wrong on several counts. By calling the current budget deficit the largest in American history, Hillary Clinton fails to consider the need to adjust for any economic growth – or even inflation – over the nation’s 232-year history. Using standard measurements, this year’s projected budget deficit of 3 percent of the economy is a far lower than the actual record 30 percent level in 1943 during World War II.
And even using her unadjusted numbers, Hillary’s mid-year figure has not yet passed the final 2004 budget deficit of $413 billion.
If that isn’t bad enough, Hillary Clinton refers to an alleged $5.6 trillion 10-year surplus in her husband’s term that was projected on paper in 2001 (and therefore never actually existed) and accuses the Bush administration of turning the "surplus" into a $9 trillion debt. However the $9 trillion represents the total cumulative federal debt that has been building since the early days of the Republic. Is Hillary blaming the current administration for budget policies dating back to the Thomas Jefferson administration when we made the Louisiana Purchase in 1803?
Hillary Clinton complains that the Bush administration has been a government for special interests. This is more than a bit disingenuous since Bill and Hillary Clinton have been masters of the illegal campaign donations. Even to this day Hillary finds herself having to return illegal donations "she didn’t know about" and is the subject of a law suit that claims she was a recipient of a major unreported and illegal donation put on by one of her fund raisers.
Hillary Clinton’s "Iraq war policy" is another smoke and mirror attempt to hoodwink American’s tired of the war but the consequences of implementing her plans are dangerous for our long term security. She proposes a speedy withdrawal from Iraq regardless of the consequences on the ground and returning the Reserves to peacetime status. She doesn’t realize that reduction of U.S. forces in Iraq will increase the danger to them and total withdrawal will provide a gift to terrorists.
Hillary’s solution is very simple. As noted by the Heritage Foundation to explain what happens upon American withdrawal from Iraq: "If you are an Iraqi, you will know almost immediately because American troops will start departing your country, leaving the field open for al Qaeda as well as the Shiite and Sunni terrorist groups that nearly tore the country apart before the United States increased troop levels to prevent a full-fledged civil war. All the gains that have been made since the beginning of the U.S. engagement, which marks its fifth anniversary, stand to be lost."
Then there is the general problem of honesty, or rather dishonesty. Ever since she entered the public arena when her husband ran for president in 1992, she's found telling the truth a real challenge. "This is a real difficulty for her," said pollster John Zogby. "With Bill Clinton, there was always an honesty problem. But he always was able to overcome it through charm and brilliance. … It doesn't look like she is able to transcend those fundamental problems that she has with the truth." A recent Gallup Poll found that 53 percent of Americans think Clinton isn't "honest and trustworthy." Just 29 percent said the same of her Democratic rival Barack Obama, and 27 percent said it of Republican John McCain.
Even Hillary’s Democrat constituents don’t think Hillary is a truth-teller. A Pew Research Center poll before Clinton had to back down from her account of her Bosnia trip found that 29 percent of white Democrats considered her a "phony," almost twice as many as the 15 percent who described Obama that way. Researchers at Pew concluded that Democrats' views of Clinton "are more influenced by perceptions that she is phony than by any other trait or emotion tested."
We already had one Clinton president who was a liar; do we want another? Hillary and Bill may perhaps be fun neighbors to have but to entrust them with our future would be national suicide; and rest assured, a vote for Hillary Clinton is a vote for Bill too.
Copyright by Vincent Gioia
Vincent Gioia is a retired patent attorney living in Palm Desert, California. His articles may be read at www.vincentgioia.com and he may be contacted at gioia@gte.net.
