I'm pleading with you!

Thursday – December 16, 2010

I’m pleading with you!

The President met with the nation’s top CEOs this week and asked: what needs to be done to get the economy going? He also asked them to get started on hiring people!

I’m pleading with you to understand what is wrong with this picture.

If I was invited to the CEO meeting, I would have said that it is the Democrats and liberal Republicans who have gotten us into the predicament we are in. I would have added that it is the deficit spending, like the new 2,000 page 1.1 trillion dollar omnibus spending package that is attached to the tax cut extension bill. These are the things that prove your lack of leadership at every turn in your presidency and have resulted in the failure to inspire people to work, and that is what brings us here today. I would have reminded him that it was George Washington, the true Commander in Chief, who crossed the Delaware on December 24 and that was no vacation. It was Washington who set the seeds of government and that you have drifted away from what he started. I would have said that his party is so detached that they couldn’t do the right thing if it was staring them in the face.

I would have said, it is going to take 500 deals like the South Korean trade agreement to turn around the economy. I would have said that, by 2050 the Chinese will have 80% of the world’s GDP. I would have said that, all taxes stifle economic growth. I would have pleaded with the president to declare a tax moratorium and make it possible for business to relocate in this country. I would have said that it is these incentives that make business invest and hire.

I would have said that, just because the president asks big business to hire it doesn’t mean they will. I would have said, with all due respect business has no confidence in the system and in you. I would have said, that it would be far better for him to go on a diplomatic mission to Disney Land for the next two years and let business do what we do best. I would have said, it is business that makes it possible for the economy to grow not government - when the economy grows then businesses will start to hire. When hiring starts, people spend and when people spend, they gain confidence.

Confidence is what we don’t have. I see it in my own business and I see it in my customers who are not spending money. It is not because they don’t have it. Some do and those people are holding on to it. Many people tell me all sorts of things during the day. Some are on point and some are so far off it reminds me of the President and his party. But there is a common theme. The word confidence is being used more and more.

I would have said, stop demonizing those who have the resources to start a business or those that can hire to expand their business. Stop playing the class warfare card for votes. Start leading and start inspiring. Pick your Delaware River on Christmas Eve like Washington did and attack those that need attacking. Attack the Unions and attack those who bleed the system. Attack those who want a welfare check and help those who truly need the welfare.

I would have said start acting like a CEO and make the moves that a CEO would when they need to reinvest. Sell off the bad machinery and buy the equipment that will help workers become more efficient and productive. Productivity and confidence are two things that American’s understand.

These are the things that I would have said, but then the President didn’t ask me!

I would have also reminded him what took place on December 16, 1773, it was the Boston Tea Party! I would have reminded the president that we also have a Tea Party happening today.
The Boston Tea Party was a direct action by colonists in Boston, a town in the British colony of Massachusetts, against the British government and the monopolistic East India Company that controlled all the tea coming into the colonies. On December 16, 1773, after officials in Boston refused to return three shiploads of taxed tea to Britain, a group of colonists boarded the ships and destroyed the tea by throwing it into Boston Harbor. The incident remains an iconic event of American history, and other political protests often refer to it.

The Tea Party was the culmination of a resistance movement throughout British America against the Tea Act, which had been passed by the British Parliament in 1773. Colonists objected to the Tea Act for a variety of reasons, especially because they believed that it violated their right to be taxed only by their own elected representatives. Protesters had successfully prevented the unloading of taxed tea in three other colonies, but in Boston, embattled Royal Governor Thomas Hutchinson refused to allow the tea to be returned to Britain. He apparently did not expect that the protestors would choose to destroy the tea rather than concede the authority of a legislature in which they were not directly represented.

The Boston Tea Party was a key event in the growth of the American Revolution. Parliament responded in 1774 with the Coercive Acts, which, among other provisions, closed Boston's commerce until the British East India Company had been repaid for the destroyed tea. Colonists in turn responded to the Coercive Acts with additional acts of protest, and by convening the First Continental Congress, which petitioned the British monarch for repeal of the acts and coordinated colonial resistance to them. The crisis escalated, and the American Revolutionary War began near Boston in 1775.

This is all the history you will need to know today!

Gregory C. Dildilian
Founder and Executive Director
Pinecone Conservatives

A footnote: Our story as a nation is in our own history. I’m pleading with you, teach it and embrace it, it will make you proud. It will also answer many of the questions we have today!