Florida Governor Ron DeSantis again distinguished himself from Donald Trump and the rest of the Republican field on Monday, advocating not only traditional conservative, free-market economic ideas like limiting taxes and regulations but also a populist and much-need fundamental reordering of the over-financialized U.S. economy that is wrecking the middle class.
The speech was billed as an economic declaration of independence and that’s what it outlined—a future free from Chinese economic domination and preachy, woke Wall Street and corporate poohbahs who see themselves as “citizens of the world” instead of Americans. It will also free us from the Green New Deal.
The American people know exactly what is going on with their country. The White House is heralding “Bidenomimcs” but the chaos that government has inflicted using the pandemic as an excuse for the most radical central planning and spending spree since the New Deal has been devastating.
Alas, according the RealClearPolitics average, only 38 percent of Americans approve of President Joe Biden’s handling of the economy. So much for Bidenomics. (RELATED: DANIEL BEAN: Ron DeSantis’ Distinguished Naval Career Makes Him The Right Man To Fix Our Military)
According to the Institute for Supply Management, the manufacturing sector has been contracting since last October and the rest of the economy (except government) is following. Americans intuitively know that in Biden’s term of office one-fifth of their savings and purchasing power will have been wiped away permanently by inflation. Real wages have fallen even as the rich have gotten richer.
The problem goes beyond just Biden: DeSantis observed that, “The bottom half of American households have less wealth today than in 1989 while the top ten percent have added $29 trillion in wealth over the same period.” These aren’t typical Republican talking points but they reflect a troubling reality.
The basics of the middle class American dream: owning a home and building a family with kids better off than their parents is evaporating amid inflation and a oligarchic economy run by globalists.
Biden and his predecessors in the White House and their amigos in Congress have left us dangerously dependent on China, not only for most manufactured goods, but also for critical items like pharmaceuticals and their ingredients and materials needed for high-tech hardware.
Enter Ron DeSantis with a different approach.
In addition to the traditional pillars of conservative economics like cutting taxes and regulations to stimulate economic freedom and the manufacturing side of the economy, DeSantis has a plan to end the rigging of the economy to the benefit of the elite—a lamentable situation in which, as he pointed out, “gains are privatized and losses are born by taxpayers.” Who can doubt this after the recent bailout of woke-run Silicon Valley Bank?
In calling for an end to “The asymmetric relationship between the U.S. and China … characterized by China’s theft of our intellectual property, trade dumping, currency manipulation, and espionage,” DeSantis has implied that he will expand tariffs on China and implement more export controls. While he did not explicitly call for strategic decoupling from China, his program would achieve that crucial goal. He will end China’s “preferential trade status,” which necessarily implies he will undertake a reevaluation of America’s role in the globalist World Trade Organization.
Vowing to eliminate our “fourth branch of government”—unelected regulators who have come to make up the administrative state—DeSantis will embark on the greatest program of deregulation of energy and other industries in history, unleashing the potential of American business and workers who actually build things. His goals: economic growth of three percent annually or better and “a country where a family can raise children on a single income.” That will also mean a country with more kids and thriving, healthy communities.
DeSantis will stop government from pushing young Americans to incur massive debt for degrees of limited or no value, instead creating a free market in student loans that incentivizes valuable education and ends the gravy train for woke universities that preach hatred of our great country. (RELATED: WILLIAM O’REILLY: The GOP’s 2024 Presidential Field Needs To Be Cleared. It Should Begin With Ron DeSantis)
These and other steps that DeSantis advocated today mark a fundamental change from what has been sought by either political party. Both progressives and the Chamber of Commerce crowd will gripe about his policies and departures from orthodoxy, but his solutions will appeal to voters. He deserves credit for going into far more policy detail than the other major candidates who stick mostly to talking points and bumper-sticker prescriptions.
One other factor: DeSantis can actually enact his plan. After all, he is the man who turned Florida from purple to red, won reelection after the Covid crisis by nineteen points, and stood firm against corporate bullies and a hostile progressive media.
It’s not just DeSantis’s ideas that appeal. Plain-spoken, honest, and direct—a voice of a new generation—he alone has the skill to put his plan to the American people and enter the White House with a mandate to succeed.
Sadly, no Republican has won a majority in the national popular vote since 2004. DeSantis has the best shot of anyone to break that ignominious record, attract new voters to arrive in Washington with a mandate, and serve eight years in a successful presidency in which the American people are set free to restore their country.
Christian Whiton was a senior advisor in the George W. Bush and Trump administrations. He is a surrogate for the DeSantis campaign.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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