[Editor's Note: Please welcome our guest blogger karennj today. We had a discussion via chat and she reminded us of this.]
In a time when the consequences of fiscal irresponsibility dominate the news, this video from JKmediasouce.org of a Senate Speech that John Kerry gave on November 17, 2004 when raising the debt ceiling was being debated hints at how different the present would be had the results 2 weeks before been different. The speech speaks of the responsibility of Congress to be fiscally responsible.
He speaks of the result of a borrow and spend policy that President Bush had in his first term. He says that because of it we were in a hole that we had to work our way out of. He spoke of how the Congress was “putting the tab on the credit card and sending the bill to our kids.” He said that this was not sustainable and was depriving us of being able to make choices that we should make for our country. He makes the case that debt has consequences were beyond the obvious economic ones They make us a weaker country.
The speech has a sense of old fashion responsibility that reminds me of what I was taught by my parents . It also reflects the values that Senator Kerry spoke of even as he ran for President. It is interesting to find that in 2004, he added a plank to the Democratic platform to deal with credit card and mortgage abuses.
The contrast this year to John McCain, who still calls for more tax cuts in addition to retaining the Bush tax cuts that are less affordable now than they were then, couldn’t be more extreme. On this as on other things, he would be a disastrous third term of George Bush.
The values that Senator Kerry speaks of are values that are reflected throughout his political career. He speaks of having been one of the Senators who worked for fiscal responsibility in the 1990s. It may be ironic that the two votes the Republicans used to claim Senator Kerry flipped flopped, in fact, demonstrated his consistency on financial issues. The votes were votes of principle, he thought then, as he said then that it was wrong to increase the debt to pay for the costs of the war rather than to roll back tax cuts to the wealthy. This brilliant speech outlines the need to act responsibly and is even more compelling now than it was when it was given.
