Maxine Waters Gets Honest

I worked in Washington, DC many years ago; first as an aide to now retired US Sen. Gordon Humphrey (R-NH) and later as a policy analyst to DC think tanks and as a political consultant. What is hard to find among the politicians I dealt with and what seems harder to find today are those who are noted for being candid. With that, I stand impressed with the unusual amount of honesty displayed by Congresswoman Maxine Waters of California.

Waters is a liberal. Maybe the most liberal in Congress. Most Democrats have read the party's official playbook and know that it simply isn't safe to describe one as a liberal. Barack Obama has the most liberal voting record in the Senate, according to the National Journal, but won't let that word leave his mouth regarding anyone, let alone his own record. You simply don't do it. Maxine Waters did though. She recently told oil executives what "this liberal" intended to do to them. Those words alone caught me by surprise, but she didn't stop there. Oh no, not there.

She went on the say that she had every intention to work towards the government socializing the oil industry. That's correct. Socialize. She paused when she said it (see video, above). "Did I go too far?" her face seemed to be asking. She tried to change the spin a little, by saying "taking over" the industry, but the word was out there and her correction was almost more ominous than her initial statement. Her colleagues sitting by her were honestly shocked by her words as well.

But Waters isn't like most politicians. She described the riots in South Central L.A. following the Rodney King verdict as a "rebellion" that was justified. She was ranked among the 13 most "corrupt" Members of Congress (out of 535 in the House and Senate combined) by the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. She has represented California 35 for almost 20 years, but it is still one of the poorest areas in the state with a median income that is approximately half of the rest of the state. In spite of all these things, Waters gets reelected by over 80 percent every election cycle. I guess with that type of good fortune, in spite of remarkably poor performance, you can call yourself a socialist -- er, liberal -- without much cause of concern.

According to recent surveys on marketing, most advertising attracts sellers (others who want you to buy more ads) and not buyers. Do you want to know why? Email info@HoustonBusinessShow.com and put "marketing audio" in the subject line and we will get it to you.

Kevin Price is Host of the Houston Business Show (M-F at 11 AM on CNN 650) and Publisher of the Houston Business Review. Hear the show live and online at HoustonBusinessShow.com. Visit the archive of past shows here.

In Spite Being Marketed as "New", Obama Sounds Like Old Time Democrat

If you were listening to a radio and the voice didn't tune in very well and sounded distorted, Sen. Barack Obama's announcement could easily be confused with a campaign speech from Jesse Jackson's earlier failed campaigns. Obama talks about a "new day" and a "new chapter" in our history, but his rhetoric is largely stuck in America's past.

He discusses racism and discrimination as if it were as prominent today as when he was born in the 1960s. Frankly, his neighborhood must have been much rougher than mine because we were born the same year and this little white boy's best friend was an African American named Joe Cosby through most of our elementary years. Marty White became one of my best friends in Junior High and he, too, was African American. I'm not saying that America hasn't struggled with racism, but I get the sense that many African Americans of a liberal persuasion want to throw our grandparents racism in our face as means of using guilt to get their ends. Obama is going to find this a dangerous and unproductive trail to take, in my opinion. He needs to become a candidate for all the people and not a man looking for revenge from the past.

His views of the economy are stuck in the past as well. Thomas Friedman has persuasively pointed out that "the world is flat," which means that through technology anyone in the world can compete with anyone else. That is why China and India have become such major economic players in the last few years. Obama acts as though he doesn't live in the same world as we do. He attacks free trade, argues for raising salaries to artificial highs, and taxing businesses into oblivion. Unfortunately, in our world, that would translate to shabby American products, the exportation of jobs, and the demise of job creation. The world we live in requires being competitive, not living in a fantasy world of how it "should" be.

Furthermore, Obama wants to talk about socialized medicine (AKA, universal health care) as a panacea to our medical crisis. There is no doubt we need people covered, but shifting it to government only means that health care will be plagued with shortages and there will be reduced accountability (good luck suing the government for their medical mistakes). My grandfather and aunt died in England waiting for treatment thanks to socialized medicine and that is a common stated cause in countries that use such a system. Obama's proposal is the same Ted Kennedy advocated in the 1960s and there is nothing new to it. An innovative approach would be one that gives 100 percent tax credits for individuals to get their own coverage, even earned income credit for some (meaning they get money directly back for their purchase), the creation of policies with high deductibles and additional tax savings for taking annual visits (prevention is crucial), and other policies that restore responsibility where it belongs (which is on individuals).

Finally, his anti-war rhetoric is a flashback to the 1960s and the Vietnam War. We are not fighting against a potential domino principle (the belief many countries would fall to communism if Vietnam fell), but a real threat. We were attacked by terrorists and many of the ones fighting our brave and trained volunteers there would normally be over here attacking public schools and hospitals if we haven't moved the theater of the war to the Middle East. We didn't start this war and we are very naive to think we can ended by moving troops out of there and over here. There is little question that our enemies will follow them.

There is nothing really new in Obama's rhetoric, it is the same old time liberalism stuck in the tragic decades of the past. We can't protect America's jobs, we have to compete for them. We can't stick our heads in the sand, we must fight for our safety and freedom wherever the war requires. Government cannot solve our health care crisis and many can argue it caused it; instead we need real solutions with more consumer involvement.

The US can't afford Obama's policies, neither in money nor human lives. There is nothing new about him and his approach to politics has been a dying breed for decades. It is my hope that voters can see through the style and the find the lack of substance.