NYT: The Republican Contest

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http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/11/opinion/the-republican-contest.html?_r=1&ref=opinion

The Republican Contest
Published: January 10, 2012


Where the Iowa caucuses illuminated the dark essence of social conservatism, the New Hampshire primary was a journey into the dingy, cramped quarters of the right wing’s economic policies.

The Republicans ritually denounced President Obama as hostile to capitalism, disdainful of individual enterprise and lacking in ideas for reviving the economy. All they had to offer were economic ideas that not only are inadequate for that purpose but were instrumental in creating the nation’s current economic problems.

In a flailing effort to address the pain of the middle class, the Republicans repeated familiar charges that Mr. Obama advocates a redistribution of wealth. Gov. Rick Perry of Texas outright called him a socialist. Newt Gingrich tried to focus national anger about income inequality with a faux populist assault on Mitt Romney’s participation in the frenzied world of leveraged buyouts.

It was all exactly backward. Americans are angry about income redistribution — from the middle class to the tiny sliver at the top, not from the top down. Leveraged buyouts were only one factor in the growth of the income gap. Also to blame was a host of benighted economic policies advocated by Republicans for the last 30 years.

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These kinds of policies dominated from the late-1940s to the 1970s, a time of broadly shared prosperity and a strong middle class. Those policies were then systematically reversed, income inequality began to explode and productivity growth slowed. Tax cuts for the rich and assaults on programs for the poor and middle class worsened inequality during the years of George W. Bush.

The answer is not more of the same failed policies. The solution is to revive the successful ones, along with policies to stimulate the economy and stop foreclosures. Mr. Obama understands this. The Republican hopefuls are deluding themselves and trying to delude the voters.