Keller @ Large: Narcissistic Boomer Pols
BOSTON (CBS) -- I don't know if the tax-cut/unemployment benefits deal agreed to by President Obama is going to help snap us out of the job-creation doldrums and boost business and consumer confidence. I don't think either side of the at-times hysterical debate over the deal going on in Washington right now knows, either.
But I do know this -- we're being governed by Baby Boomers, a generation of politicians whose self-esteem far outstrips any proof of their competence.
How so?
The editorial writers at USA Today put it pretty well yesterday when they wrote: "In any circumstance other than the current dangerously weak economy, the tax deal between President Obama and congressional Republicans would be indefensible. It borrows money the nation doesn't have....[and] the argument over raising income tax rates will take place in the middle of a presidential election, when pandering is at its apex and responsibility scarce."
But USA Today notes: "The number of those out of work for more than six months is at record post-Depression levels. So, on balance, a distasteful deal is better than no deal at all."
This is a classic case study of Boomer political leadership in action. Action that should and could have been taken long ago gets put off so narcissistic pols can scratch their partisan itching. Long-term risks like more ballooning of the deficit are ignored in favor of immediate gratification. And few on either side of the fight, including the president, seem able to muster a shred of statesmanship even as they grudgingly cave in to the urgent need for bi-partisan agreement.
This had better work. If it doesn't, 2012 will be the second straight Boomer politician bloodbath, because the "me" generation, in both the public and private sectors, is proving to be the most irresponsible generation ever.
