USA, the Banana Republic Embryonic, Romney’s Fix

The Country Club Republican's heir apparent, Mitt Romney is part of the mainstream Republican party, that will go along to get along. He compromises as a politician to curry favor with the press. He may be a good businessman and administrator, but not a statesman. He is the next in line for the old style, old line, second party set Republicans who look down on conservatives, libertarians and the Tea Party.

What is needed is a focused statesman and administrator with a few limited goals (renew our economic strength, limit government regulation and reduce its size, close the southern boarder, prevent Muslim Terror here). Too many politicians, including Trump and Romney brag of their business experience, but that includes their habit to make business grow. That expansive desire carries over into their political life and more government growth.

Romney, with his habit to grow government like a business, coupled with his being a Massachusetts Republican (say New Dealer), left him with his problem: Romneycare!

No dice! ♘

Romney’s Fix - National Review Online

Mark Steyn 5-14-11

Mitt’s health-care “solution” is a major problem for his presidential campaign.

Unless things change, the man (or woman) elected in 2012 will be the last American president to preside over the world’s leading economy. If things get really bad, he will find himself presiding over the early stages of American collapse. Not “decline” but “collapse.” “Decline” is what happens when you’re Britain in the 1940s and you cede global dominance to a major ally that shares your language, legal system, cultural inheritance, and broad geopolitical objectives. That deal isn’t on offer this time round.

Nor was the United Kingdom circa 1948 in thrall to anything like the same levels of spendaholic insanity. The current debate on the “debt ceiling” testifies to how thoroughly public discourse has flown the coop of reality. Sure, Congress can vote to raise the debt ceiling — just as you and your spouse can reach a bipartisan agreement on raising your own debt ceiling. Go on, try it: Hold a vote in your rec room, come up with a number, and then let MasterCard know what you’ve decided on.

In the real world, debt ceilings are determined by the lenders, not by the borrowers. In March, Pimco (which manages the world’s largest mutual fund) calculated that 70 percent of U.S. Treasury debt is being bought by the Federal Reserve.

So under the 2011 budget, every hour of every day, the United States government spends $188 million it doesn’t have, $130 million of which is “borrowed” from itself. There’s nobody else out there.

In other words, however Congress votes, we’re rubbing up against the real debt ceiling — the willingness of the world to continue bankrolling American debauchery.

Barack Obama is offering us a Latin-American future — that’s to say, a United States in which a corrupt governing class rules a dysfunctional morass. He’s confident that, when the moat with alligators is put in, he’ll be on the secure side. If you figure you’ll be, too, you can afford to vote for him.

The rest of us would like a credible alternative. The Republicans have a habit of nominating the guy whose turn it is: Bob Dole, John McCain.

This time the guy whose turn it is is Mitt Romney. Unfortunately...

Read on: http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/print/267220