Dold’s resume includes two short stints in Washington at less than prestigious jobs, as well a few years at a struggling multi-million dollar communications company.  Leaving behind a career at a struggling corporation to return home to his parents’ company was not very innovative. Neither is Dold’s economic policy. Dold’s proposal to rebuild the economy has two main prongs: give tax cuts to small businesses, and reduce the federal debt. The only problem with this plan is that it cannot work. With tax cuts, less revenue coming in would mean the government the deficit increases. To account for this, Dold would evidently prefer to cut spending along with cutting taxes. Add this to Dold’s commitment to fiscal austerity and reducing the federal debt overall, and the result is a giant reduction of government spending. If these strategies sound vaguely familiar, it’s because Herbert Hoover used them during his presidency – and we all know how that ended.

As any college student learns in introductory economics, the last thing to do in a recession is to slash government spending. Today, unemployment is very high. The government is not only a major employer, but a major consumer of the services and products of firms in the US.  The double cuts in government spending Dold is advocating would lead to many more jobs being lost (not only in the public but also in the private sector), and would further depress the entire economy. Even with tax cuts, businesses will be discouraged from expanding if the economy continues  collapsing and they are losing customers directly or indirectly due to lower government spending.

Dold’s plans for economic recovery, just like his resume, sound good for about 30 seconds.  Until you realize both are pretty much worthless.

Read more at the new Tenth Dems blog.

Haven’t they added enough economic problems to the US economy to last a few lifetimes? Once again the GOP plan is to rally ’round the richest Americans and then stick the bill with the shrinking middle class. This is insane. From the Washington Post:

“Even as they hammer Democrats for running up record budget deficits, Senate Republicans are rolling out a plan to permanently extend an array of expiring tax breaks that would deprive the Treasury of more than $4 trillion over the next decade, nearly doubling projected deficits over that period unless dramatic spending cuts are made.

“The measure, introduced by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) this week, would permanently extend the George W. Bush-era income tax cuts that benefit virtually every U.S. taxpayer, rein in the alternative minimum tax and limit the estate tax to estates worth more than $5 million for individuals or $10 million for couples.”

–from AMERICAblog.com

Election night didn’t feel good. And, it wasn’t. Democrats lost a Senate seat in Illinois, and in the 10th District we lost a chance to pick up a congressional seat which we thought we could win. We lost other congressional seats in Illinois, as well. But if you get past the national level offices, if you read beyond the big headlines, if you look at the whole picture, it wasn’t as bad as it felt.

There’s no way to sugarcoat what happened on election night. We lost ground on the national level. But if you believe this election was a Republican tidal wave, that description just doesn’t wash. 

In 10th Congressional District precincts, we did lose two freshman state legislators. Both State Representative Mark Walker of Arlington Heights and State Senator Michael Bond of Grayslake lost in their first re-election bids.

But, on the positive side, Daniel Biss of Evanston won a state House seat that had been in Republican hands. And despite huge sums of money spent to capture three other House seats, money which financed incredibly negative Republican campaigns, all three Democrats held on: Veteran legislator Karen May of Highland Park won by a comfortable margin; State Representative Carol Sente of Vernon Hills hung on in her first bid for election after being appointed to a vacant seat; and, first time candidate Michelle Mussman of Schaumburg won a seat which had been held by a Democrat in a very Republican area. These races raise the question: if the Republicans can’t win those seats in a so-called “tidal wave” year, in a year when they targeted those races by spending massive amounts of money on negative campaigns, when can they win?

Beyond the state legislative races, very little changed locally. Democrat Brendan Houlihan lost in his first bid for re-election for a seat on the Cook County Board of Review, but Democrat Mark Levitt won a newly created Lake County judicial seat against a strong veteran Republican judge. In every other local race on the ballot in 10th District precincts, nothing changed. The Republican tidal wave amounted to little more than an uncomfortable splash of cold water to the face.

The basic fact remains, despite everything supposedly going in their direction in 2010, Republicans are not as strong in the 10th District as the election headlines might make you think. Democrat Secretary of State Jesse White still won 70 percent of the vote in 10th District precincts. Democrat Attorney General Lisa Madigan still won 64 percent in those same precincts. A good Democratic candidate like Anne Bassi of Highland Park faced a strong Republican challenge, and still received 68 percent of the vote in her race for reelection to the Lake County Board. Even Dan Seals did better in 2010 than he did in the more Democratic-friendly elections of 2008 and 2006.   

Fueled by the national trend, 2010 represented for Republicans their best shot to remake the political landscape in the 10th District. It didn’t happen, and 2012 is unlikely to provide as good a chance for them. Instead of running against President Obama and Nancy Pelosi, they will have to give us reasons to vote for whoever they nominate for President, and whether it’s Sarah Palin, Mitt Romney or someone else, they all have major weaknesses. Republicans in 2012 will also have to answer for the direction in which Speaker John Boehner takes Congress. On top of that, in 2012 we will have a new congressional district. The state legislature will redraw the congressional district boundaries, and thanks to the Democrats retaining control of the legislature the new boundaries should benefit Democrats in the next congressional race. And with a Democratic governor, instead of Bill Brady, the maps will not likely get vetoed.

In the 10th District, Democrats hit what is probably our low-water mark in 2010. Still, our heads are above water, and the good news is, it will only get better for us in 2012.  

–John Hmurovic

This essay first appeared in the December 2010 issue of Tenth Dems newsletter.  Reprinted with the author’s permission.