Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Back to Opinion

The Vision Thing

Add our name to the growing list of voices calling upon President Obama to propose a big, bold, far-reaching plan to kickstart the economy and spur job creation. We need the audacity of hope, not the soft prejudice of low expectations, to borrow from a few well-worn campaign cliches. Because make no mistake, this is a campaign.

If Obama were a more skillful (or, perhaps we should say, a more ruthless) negotiator, he might be able to persuade enough recalcitrant Congressional Republicans to support a modest, centrist package of intiatives designed to, at best, help the economy muddle along. But he’s no Lyndon Johnson. And the GOP these days is hardly a loyal opposition.

What many Americans are waiting for is not a legislative strategy but a statement of leadership laced within a soaring vision of what we all — government, the private sector, and ordinary citizens — can do to reverse these damaging economic trends. Let the special Congressional committee charged with finding cuts in the federal budget address excessive regulation, bloated entitlements and inefficient spending and tax reform. Government is surely part of the problem.

But it’s not the whole problem, and decimating government is not the whole solution. This is where tactically the Republicans have it wrong. Most Americans are wise enough to know the good that government can do and has done in the last century — diminishing poverty among the elderly; cleaning air and water; building roads, bridges and mass transit; protecting, educating, healing. America has a strong central government for a reason. It helped us metamorphisize from a bunch of squabbling states into a formidable nation.

By setting out an ambitious plan for the economy, Obama won’t simply be playing to his political base, as some contend. He’ll be providing leadership the world desperately needs. It’s that thing called vision.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.