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The
Heritage Network
Heritage
Experts React to First Presidential
Debate
By Amy Payne
October 4, 2012
(Heritage
Network tackles what was discussed
and what was not discussed, then provides links to the full Heritage
opinions… click
the link at the bottom to read them.)
During
last night’s debate between President
Obama and former Governor Mitt Romney, Heritage’s domestic policy
experts were
live-blogging their analysis of the ideas discussed. Below are some of
the
highlights of our experts’ reactions to the major points made.
Competing
Tax Plans
Most
of the time on taxes was spent on Romney’s
tax plan. Romney’s plan, like most tax reform plans, would lower tax
rates and
make other changes to the tax code to encourage growth. The economy
will not
recover fully until we have tax reform…
Education
Spending as a Broad Answer on Jobs
and Other Issues
Further
increasing federal education spending
will fail to improve academic outcomes. Policymakers need to trim
federal
spending—not increase it—and empower state education leaders with
control over
their share of education funding. And there is plenty of room to cut
spending…
The
Contrast on Medicare
Obama
has already made significant changes to
Medicare through his health care reform law. He depends on failed
government
price controls to cut Medicare by more than $716 billion over the next
10
years, not to help shore up Medicare for future generations, but
instead to
help pay for Obamacare. Moreover, he depends on a board of 15 unelected
and
unaccountable bureaucrats to enforce more cuts…
Obamacare
Raises Taxes on the Poor and Middle
Class
Obama
proclaimed that he reduced taxes for the
middle class. What he failed to mention is that he also increased taxes
on the
middle class. Let’s not forget that the President’s health care law
will raise
taxes on the middle class and the poor in four years as reported by the
Congressional Budget Office. For instance, a family of four making
about
$24,600 per year, the projected federal poverty level in 2016, could be
subject
to Obamacare’s controversial individual mandate tax. This is only one
of the 18
taxes and penalties imposed by Obamacare, some of which will hit
Americans as
early as January 2013…
The
Role of Government and the Ladder of Opportunity
When
asked about the role of the government,
Obama brought up his favorite metaphor, “the ladder of opportunity.”
And as
usual, he incorrectly suggested that it’s government spending that
creates
these ladders of opportunity…
What
We Didn’t Hear Last Night
What
wasn’t said at tonight’s debate spoke
volumes. In an hour and a half focused largely on the economy, not a
single
mention was made about the importance that marriage plays in combating
poverty.
Not a single mention of how federal welfare programs can function as
poverty
traps, especially as the Obama Administration has gutted the work
requirements
that made welfare reform a success. As the debate turned to focus
explicitly on
health care reform and the role of government more generally, not a
single
mention of how the federal government under Obamacare, rather than
protecting
religious liberty, is actively coercing citizens to violate their
consciences.
The nuts and bolts of taxation, regulation, Medicare, Social Security,
and
other domestic policies are important, but so too are the ways that
these and
other government actions shape culture and interact with civil society.
At the
end of the day, culture and the institutions of civil society are what
make
America great. Our government shouldn’t be weakening them.
Read
the complete Heritage Network summaries
here
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