"Get in the Game" ?
Last week, the President spoke to American business leaders at the near-by U.S. Chamber of Commerce headquarters in Washington. After opening with regret that, as neighbors, he hadn't brought a cake over earlier, to start their now-rocky-relationship off better, he went on to chide business for sitting-on an alleged $2-trillion in cash, rather than using it to expand, failing to realize that with many months of economic and regulatory uncertainty, responsible-stewardship rightly held investment back. He seemed to imply that, regardless of consumer demand, it was a (quote) "responsibility to America," for companies to add jobs, regardless of need, which, yes, reduces unemployment, but only until those companies, that played Simon-says-do-this, go broke, by over-committing financially. It's not the business community's responsibility to solve the nation's economic problems. That "responsibility to America" rests with the federal government, which so far has flat-out flunked Economics 101.
The U.S. Chamber responded: "The first and most patriotic thing companies can do is stay in business." Said others: "The recovery is going to be driven by the 70% of the economy that's consumption, not the 15% that's investment." The President told these leaders he "understood their challenges," (not likely, having never met a payroll), urging business to (quote) "get in the game." Something the Feds needs to do first, by cutting spending, reducing debt, lowering tax-rates long-term, reversing EPA's regulatory mayhem, and getting serious about real, not speculative, energy independence, so that with a more sane, free, predictable future, companies can invest more confidently, and America's consumers have more money to spend. That's how "getting in the game" works in the real world.
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