GET THE ECONOCON HIS KOOL-AID:

Bush the Great?: Maybe, if he continues with pre-emption and reforms Social Security. (PETE DU PONT, September 30, 2004, Wall Street Journal)

The best measurement of a president's success is whether his policies and actions had a long-term positive impact for the American people--not just this year or this presidential term, but for decades or generations to come. Lincoln fought a war to end slavery and signed the Emancipation Proclamation, permanently changing America's policies regarding race. Franklin D. Roosevelt established the Social Security system that has helped millions of Americans over seven decades, and Harry S. Truman's Marshall Plan and Berlin Airlift blunted communist expansion into Western Europe. These presidents were strong men whose policies positively and permanently influenced American society.

What of our current president? Will George W. Bush's policies have a positive and significant impact on the future of America? Democrats argue that the Bush presidency is an absolute failure and will have a negative impact on the future of our country--the war in Iraq, tax cuts, his failure to limit international trade to protect American jobs. Some Republicans argue that Bush's large increases in domestic spending will hurt us for decades, and that his steel tariffs continued flawed economic policies.

It is too early to come to a conclusion--judging the success of a presidency requires time and perspective--but two aspects of the Bush presidency may well be good for the country for decades to come.

One is the doctrine of pre-emption, set forth in the 2002 State of the Union address and in June 2002 at West Point. [...]

The other is the president's intention to build "an ownership society," one in which more Americans own their homes, health-care protection and retirement assets, "because ownership brings security, and dignity, and independence." We have been progressing towards an ownership society since the Reagan administration. Significant economic growth has allowed 73 million families, or over 69% of Americans, to own their own homes--and 52% of households own stock directly or through mutual funds, up from just 20% in 1980.

President Bush proposes to take us further: New financial assistance programs will create seven million affordable homes; the president's new Health Savings Accounts are available to 250 million Americans, each of whom contribute up to $2,600 each year to a tax-free savings account for his future health care expenses. Tens of thousands of people--many of moderate incomes--have done so in the first six months of the program's availability and become "owners" of health-care resources.

But President Bush's most important ownership opportunity lies in his proposed personal Social Security accounts; what he calls "a nest egg you can call your own, and government can never take away." If the latter were to come to pass in a second Bush administration, it would benefit more Americans for more years than even FDR's Social Security system.

Even the Reaganauts are starting to see the Gipper as John the Baptist.

Posted by Orrin Judd at October 1, 2004 7:32 AM