Political tactic I: Pretend fiscal responsibility

Posted by Marc Hodak on May 25, 2007 under Collectivist instinct | Comments are off for this article

The WSJ presents a great example of this:

Sen. Hillary Clinton took the first step toward outlining her health-care agenda, suggesting a range of cost-cutting moves that she says would wring $120 billion of savings from insurance companies, drug makers and the rest of the health-care system.

She will draw from those savings when she details a much-anticipated plan for providing health coverage for the uninsured later this year.

Translation: Hillary is inventing savings now that she can spend later.

The “savings,” of course, are the product of an infantile imagination, the kind of things that kids dream up who have never actually struggled with the reality of turning managerial initiative into market-tested products or services when they say things like, “I’ll invent a laser that gets rid of cancer” or “I’ll invent shoes that never go out of style.” You don’t want to discourage the tykes, but you’re not about to give them a hundred billion dollars to test their cute theories. But Dr. Hillary will no doubt convince millions of voters that she should be given that access to our tax dollars because she has the cure to what ails them.

The spending–that will be very real. Hillary actually has a track record on that one.