President Bush Doesn’t Get It

President Bush’s speech identified some key areas of focus and acknowledged the magnitude of problems this country faces; however, his proposals disappointed in every respect. They failed to respond to the increased economic stress of the broadest sections of our population and clung to an ideology that has abjectly failed America’s citizens for the past twenty five years.

It was mildly encouraging that the President did not go out of his way to pick fights over issues like abortion or gay marriage. His emphasis on the major problems of health care, global warming, and energy conservation was a welcome invitation to an important debate.

But the President missed the broader context of the economic hardship and insecurity facing so many American families. Health care is just one piece of an eroding social contract. The issues of job insecurity, stagnating wages, escalating costs of housing, college, and child-rearing, deepening debt, and increased risk in every area of life were entirely missing–but they are ever-present in the lives of working Americans.

Further, the underlying assumption of his proposals for health care and energy independence–that the market will create adequate solutions–is a proven failure and will enrich some and leave millions of people out in the cold.  A renewed, energetic effort of government, leading a problem-solving partnership with the private sector and the non-profit sector, is the way we can solve these problems together, but the President doesn’t get it.

The challenge of leadership falls to Congress and to an engaged citizenry. Proposals which look beyond previous failures and confront the biggest issues we face, with bold investments in the future and in the American people, will not come from an administration so wedded to the past and so lacking in imagination. New research, new policies, energetic public conversation, and citizen action are needed to complement the new leadership in Congress.

Demos welcomes this new moment of opportunity. Let the real work begin.