Serious Implications

This is Part 3 of Stewart Udall’s Letter to My Grandchildren. Udall makes it clear that national emergencies can bring tremendous opportunities. The Great Depression and World War II ultimately brought the policies and efforts needed to build a strong, broad-based middle class. Some excerpts:

Despite the tragedies of the war, what etched the overall experience in memory was the spirit that guided individual decisions and behavior. It was manifest in a creed of sharing and comradeship captured in the evocative postwar film, The Best Years of Our Lives. Those were memorable years for all of us because we dedicated our lives to a common purpose that excluded thoughts of personal gain or personal safety…

It was on display in the GI Bill of Rights, which gave returning soldiers a chance to get a good education. Its concept of sharing could be seen in the rapid growth of a middle class, and in the opportunities afforded veterans to establish small businesses…

In addition, a Depression-born abhorrence of debt resulted in the elimination of a vast war debt. My generation believed in balanced national budgets. As a consequence, leaders of both political parties voted for tax rates that, in the next 25 years, substantially wiped out the debt imposed by the war. To those who fought that war, it was unthinkable to put even part of the repayment burden on our children.

Udall’s right about the paydown of national debt after World War II, as these graphs indicate (related post: The End of Savings).

The national debt as a fraction of GDP fell until Ronald Reagan ushered in the supply-side “Reaganomics.” Reagan cut taxes and spent lots of money on defense contracts. Once all new war machines were built, it was only natural to find opportunities to use them. Such oportunities were Granada, Afghanistan (Charlie Wilson’s War), Panama, Haiti, Kosovo, Somalia, Iraq I, Afghanistan post 9/11, and Iraq II.

Now, as we begin to come to grips with the enormous, overarching energy-environmental problem, we need to heed the counsel of President Eisenhower, a military man who became a peace president. Ike excelled at ending wars other countries started. For example, as president he refused to use military force to rescue the French in Vietnam.

Eisenhower, in his much-admired farewell message, warned Americans to be wary of the growing military-industrial complex that would subsequently saddle the American people with the extravagant huge costs for an imperial presence in the world. Today our nation is spending more on military expenses than all the world’s other countries combined! It is instructive to listen to Ike’s advice about the use—and abuse—of military power.

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired,” the outgoing president warned in his farewell message of January, 1961, “signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, and the hopes of its children.”

I think I would have liked Ike.

McCain constantly reminds us of his POW years.

Is the presidency an enormous job requiring a sharp mind, intellectual curiosity, self discipline and steady nerves? Or, is it a grand prize to bestow upon a citizen who sacrificed as a prisoner of war as a result of service to his country?

That seems to be a stark difference between Barack Obama and John McCain. Obama has proven himself exceptionally focused and disciplined. He’s also a good listener seeking alternative points of view. John McCain constantly reminds us of his POW record, his supreme sacrifice. In effect, he asks us to believe he’s earned the highest political position, arguably, in the world.

In the movie Inherit the Wind, which was a dramatization of the Scopes “monkey trial” in Dayton, Tennessee, Spencer Tracy, who was playing the character modeled after real-life defense attorney Clarence Darrow, made this comment regarding his opposing prosecutor played by Frederic March, who represented the real-life prosecutor and presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan:

“I wouldn’t have voted for him for president, Tracy said, “but I would have voted for him for king…”

If we had a ceremonial king and queen who didn’t have to work too hard, like the king and queen of Norway, someone who, once in a while, stood up and said something inspiring, John and Cindy McCain would be perfect. He’d look great in full military regalia with all his medals. Cindy would look beautiful in a tiara.

But, fact is, we are about to elect a new president of a civilian government. We need somebody smart, disciplined and agile. McCain is none of those things. He is a patriot. He’s earned a nation’s thanks and respect. He’s earned a chest full of medals. He’s a multi-millionaire and a father.

But is the presidency, especially at this point in history, an enormous job with high expectations and a price to pay for incompetence? Or, is it a ceremonial grand prize to be awarded a nation’s favorite patriot?

I think it’s a job – a full-time job for an exceptional individual. Of the two major candidates, Obama has the brains and temperment to be successful. John McCain was never the kind of guy that does his homework.

Is the presidency an enormous job requiring a sharp mind, intellectual curiosity, self discipline and steady nerves? Or, is it a grand prize to bestow upon a most deserving citizen?

That seems to be a stark difference between Barack Obama and John McCain. Obama has proven himself exceptionally focused and disciplined. He’s also a good listener seeking alternative points of view. John McCain constantly reminds us of his POW record, his supreme sacrifice. In effect, he asks us to believe he’s earned the highest political position, arguably, in the world.

In the movie Inherit the Wind, which was a dramatization of the Scopes “monkey trial” in Dayton, Tennessee, Spencer Tracy, who was playing the character modeled after real-life defense attorney Clarence Darrow, made this comment regarding his opposing prosecutor played by Frederic March, who represented the real-life prosecutor and presidential candidate William Jennings Bryant:

“I wouldn’t have voted for him for president, Tracey said, “but I would have voted for him for king…”

If we had a ceremonial king and queen who didn’t have to work too hard, like the king and queen of Norway, someone who, once in a while, stood up and said something inspiring, John and Cindy McCain would be perfect. He’d look great in full military regalia with all his medals. Cindy would look beautiful in a tiara.

But, fact is, we are about to elect a new president of a civilian government. We need somebody smart, disciplined and agile. McCain doesn’t particularly fit any of those criteria. He is a patriot. He’s earned a nation’s thanks and respect.

But is the presidency, especially at this point in history, an enormous job with high expectations and a price to pay for incompetence? Or, is it a ceremonial grand prize to be awarded a nation’s favorite patriot?

I think it’s a job – a really big job, hard work for an exceptional individual. Of the two major candidates, Obama seems to have the brains and temperment to be successful.