Making American Business Great Again
Posted on December 13, 2016
On Making American Business Great Again...
In many ways, Donald Trump is channeling Calvin Coolidge. In many other ways, he is not.
It was Coolidge who once wrote:
"The words of a President have an enormous weight, and ought not to be used indiscriminately.”
But he also said, in a speech to the American Society of Newspaper Editors:
“It is probable that a press which maintains an intimate touch with the business currents of the nation is likely to be more reliable than it would be if it were a stranger to these influences. After all, the chief business of the American people is business. They are profoundly concerned with buying, selling, investing and prospering in the world.”
Most people shorten Coolidge’s famous quote to be that the business of America is business.
Trump’s new Administration, as reflected in his cabinet picks, will surely be the most pro-business since the 1920’s.
This is a good thing for the country, for the stock market, for the Republican Party and for the world.
I love the fact that Rex Tillerson wants to cut deals with Vladimir Putin and get oil out of Russia.
I love the fact that Andy Puzdner wants to grow jobs by getting rid of anti-business regulations.
I love the fact that Wilbur Ross has deep experience in turning companies around and protecting the jobs of middle class workers.
I love it that Scott Pruitt will take a sledgehammer to counter-productive EPA regulations. I am all for protecting water and cleaning up the air, but this can be done without killing jobs.
A growing economy helps all Americans.
Business investment in the inner city can bring families together, get kids off the street, and put people to work.
A vibrant energy sector can help rural America, as can better trade agreements.
Congress must become equally pro-business.
It has to reform the tax code and make America competitive again by setting the corporate rate to 15%.
It has to invest in infrastructure, rebuild our roads and bridges, improve our airports and our rail system. America can only truly compete with the rest of the world by making its infrastructure the world’s best.
It has to reform our immigration system to continue to attract the best and the brightest, but also to deal with the undocumented, who drive down wages by their mere presence.
It has to help the President get rid of job-killing regulations that were the hallmark of the Obama Administration. The sooner the better.
And it has to change the attitude of the political class towards the business sector.
Business is what makes America great, not more bureaucracy.
There has been a troubling trend in conservative circles that somehow it is fashionable to attack big business.
That’s what socialists do, not conservatives.
When the business sector is allowed to compete, allowed to grow, allowed to serve its customers, it will make America strong.
Donald Trump gets that.
He also understands that businesses that rip off the taxpayers aren’t doing themselves or the American people any favors.
There is a place for common-sense regulations. There is a place for due diligence. There is a place for hard-bargaining on behalf of the taxpayers.
It was Lenin who said, “The capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them.”
But Lenin was wrong. Capitalists already sold the rope to the communists and they hung themselves.
Indeed, Communism is dead. And it was the capitalist Ronald Reagan who killed it.
Trump is making American business great again. And that is good for the entire world.