Stephen Moore at AFP Summit in Wichita

A few remarks from the Wall street Journal’s Stephen Moore, speaking at the Americans For Prosperity Defending the American Dream summit in Wichita, Kansas:

Let’s get rid of the federal income tax, he said. It would turn the country around in a month. Or a flat tax. These are the remedies that we need.

You have to be a total dingbat to believe that the problem is that the federal government isn’t spending enough money. Over the last eight years, the U.S. Federal budget has climbed from 2 to 3.5 trillion dollars. The deficit in 2009 is going to be $1.2 trillion. That doesn’t include the economic stimulus plan. With all included, $2.1 trillion. It’s fiscal child abuse.

We do not need a new New Deal. We’ve let the Left write the history books.

FDR was elected in 1932, on a platform of balancing the budget. Over first 8 years, average unemployment rate was 16%. In 1934, 25%. Even after 8 years after spending binge, by 1941, it was 15.5%. How can anyone conclude the New Deal worked?

We are in the fight of our lifetimes. We can’t allow them to destroy our economy with government programs. From Ronald Reagan’s 1980 inauguration: “All of our economic problems today in America are in direct proportion to the overspending in Washington.”

Our spending is completely out of control.

Ireland became a magnet for capital by reducing tax rates.

Can we agree: “No more federal bailouts.”

With one trillion dollars, we could suspend the federal income tax for a year.

Who is most responsible for the crisis today: Alan Greenspan. We printed so much money in the mid 2000s. We were subsidizing banks to make loans. Lead to subprime lending problem.

What’s been happening to the money supply? Over the last 6 months, the supply has increased by 60%. Friend at the Treasury: “We are printing money so rapidly, that the only thing that can slow us down is if we run out of ink.” This causes inflation.

“We should go back to the gold standard, so that the politicians can’t control our currency.”

Comments

3 responses to “Stephen Moore at AFP Summit in Wichita”

  1. Joe Williams

    We are on an oil standard. That is what replaced gold.

    Oil is basically peaked.

    Watching C-SPAN on the National Debt, oh man!!! We are so screwed. The Federal Government is basically bankrupt.

  2. Derrick Sontag

    Moore’s comments about why more spending is not the answer on the federal level applies to Kansas as well.

    Knowing that we face a budget shortfall of more than $1 billion in fy 2010, why would we want to implement a ten year transportation plan in the hopes that it will spend our way out of the problem? At the very least, we should require a cost benefit analysis of every single transportation project that is proposed.

  3. Rothbard

    I was pleasantly surprised with some of the things I heard from Moore yesterday. I only wish he would be as critical of the FED and Greenspan/Bernake when appearing on Krudlows’ CNBS (err CNBC) show as he was yesterday.

    One pet peeve of mine concerns Moore’s comments on the massive increase in money supply and the conclusion (which I think Bob accurately transcribed) that “This causes inflation.” Wrong. An increase in the money supply beyond an increase in the supply of goods/services is the very definition of inflation. The resulting rise in the general price level is the symptom of the inflation. Inflation is always a monetary phenomenon. Over the years the language has been perverted to the point that the man on the street thinks that rising prices are inflation. The perversion serves to divert attention away from the true source of the inflation (the FED and banks) and place it on other scapegoats such as oil men, monopolies, unions, etc.

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