Economics and Fundamentals
(scroll down for the Update)

Senator McCain:

There's been tremendous turmoil in our financial markets and Wall Street. . . . People are frightened by these events. Our economy, I think, still the fundamentals of our economy are strong. But these are very, very difficult times.

Senator Obama:

It's not that I think John McCain doesn't care what's going on in the lives of most Americans. I just think he doesn't know. He doesn't get what's happening between the mountain in Sedona where he lives and the corridors of Washington where he works. . . . Why else would he say, today, of all days — just a few hours ago — that the fundamentals of the economy are still strong? Senator, what economy are you talking about?

Remove a spark cable and the car motor sputters. Remove several and it won't run at all. Let's say you take the car to two mechanics. One says: "The engine is fundamentally sound, but we need to fix some things."

The other says, "What engine is he talking at? How can anyone look at this engine and say it's fundamentally sound? We need to go in and fix this thing on a fundamental level."

Which mechanic do you hire — the one who wants to experiment on your car, change the fundamentals of the internal combustion engine, or the one who recognizes the strength of the fundamental design, and only fix what's broken?

Posted: 9-17-2008
Note: At original posting, all links were active.

UPDATE: If you're thinking, "America's economic problems are far more severe than an engine with a sparkplug cable removed," you're clearly right. The point of the analogy is this — determine what's wrong and fix that. Don't mess up a system that has afforded more wealth to more people than any other in history.

John McCain said the "fundamentals of our economy are strong." Barack Obama ridiculed the comment. In response, McCain defined "fundamentals" as "workers and small businesses." Indeed, the American worker remains industrious and highly productive. But surely the fundamentals of our economy go beyond that. Here is a list, far from exhaustive, of American economic fundamentals. Our is an economy built on:

• Free markets and capitalism.

• A system that encourages (or at least gets out of the way of) entrepreneurs.

• Education.

• An adequate physical infrastructure.

• Abundant natural resources.

• The government beside this economy is a "We the People" government that guarantees fundamental rights while demanding that individuals take responsibility for their own lives.

Strengthen, don't change, any of the above. Only fix what's wrong.

But as everyone knows, there are dangers to the economy. One of the biggest is panic — a fear so great that it encourages politicians and others to rip into the living heart of our Republic.

Here is a list, again not exhaustive, of economic dangers:

• Problems in the home make educator's jobs increasingly difficult. Education is not broken, at least not in most places, but it is everywhere at risk.

• Many parts of the infrastructure have fallen into disrepair, covered in band- aid fixes that will not hold.

• We've been moving our manufacturing base to other countries.

• We have attempted to build a service-based economy that serves only ourselves — turning our economic system into a vast check kiting scheme. We have forgotten that wealth must be created. Stuff must come from somewhere. Someone farms the land, designs and builds the chip, mines the ore, builds the car. Getting rich by finding ways to milk money from others only works if somewhere down the line someone is actually producing something.

The biggest danger to the economy is related to all of the above. It can be found in a series of news items run almost as a novelty over the last few decades — stories of Americans' increasingly lax, "Everyone does it" view of cheating. The greatest dangers to our way of life are the sliding morals of our people.

Our greatest hope is for a spiritual awakening.

Posted 9-24-2008
Note: At original posting, all links were active.