The Rhetoric of Crisis

Neo-Neocon writes:

Obama’s response has not only been more partisan, it is also more alarmist. Felix Salmon of Finance Blog compares and contrasts the candidates’ statements on the crisis, and Obama’s comes up short in more departments, including one area I had also noticed: Obama has publicly labeled it “the most serious financial crisis since the Great Depression.” So far it isn’t. But if Obama keeps talking like this, he might do his bit to contribute to it’s ultimately fitting that definition. Obama would do well to remember that it was a fellow-Democrat who understood the principle that investor panic can make these things a great deal worse, and who said as much during that Great Depression, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”

Obama has long been the purveyor of dangerously dishonest rhetoric, but it seems that with news of markets continuing to struggle that he has clearly placed himself above country (to paraphrase John McCain), and continues to use strategies that ultimately are going to harm, rather than help, the economy. This is notable for several reasons: (1) The problems here have a bipartisan basis, and will probably need to have a bipartisan solution. Despite Obama’s continued insistence that he is “post-partisan”, he seems to be positioning himself in an incredibly partisan way. (2) This highlights how little Presidential candidates really can affect the economy. It is primarily a question of how their rhetoric affects it, not what they do. In this sense, what Obama says about the economy is far more important than what he plans to do.

McCain was criticized yesterday for suggesting that the “fundamentals of the economy are strong”, and yet it seems like this statement was probably more helpful in terms of keeping the economy on a strong footing than anything else he could have possibly said. I suspect that McCain knew that it wouldn’t go over very well to make such a pronouncement, however, I’m also sure that McCain realizes how important it is to restore faith in the economy, no matter who’s economy that is. Once again, the motto of “Country First” is proving to be one of the best that McCain could have possibly chosen.