One need look no further than the new National Journal poll for a Democratic Party winning strategy for near term electoral success.
What's the bigger problem for Democrats right now, high unemployment or government spending?
High Unemployment Government Spending
Democrats (99 votes) 91% 7%
Republicans (97 votes) 54% 28%
Add this piece of evidence from a new Gallup poll:
There are a couple things striking about the Gallup poll. One is that the top three items are liberal policy options in what's supposed to be a Republican resurgence. You know that old expression about there being no atheists in a foxhole? Maybe there's no such thing as conservatives in a killer recession.
The other thing about the Gallup poll; deficit and debt don't make it into the top four, meaning support for addressing them falls below 50% support. The message is pretty clear; push come to shove, Americans want job creation. Don't worry about the debt now. CREATE JOBS.
The logical place to dump stimulus money to effect employment is into the states, nearly all of which are now suffering from lost tax revenue and making deep cost cuts (i.e., services and employees).
Tyler Cowen makes one suggestion:
The real fiscal problem is spending contraction at the state level (expanding and contracting spending are not symmetric in their effects; contracting spend hurts more than expanding spending helps). The correct fiscal policy move would have been, and still is, to take Medicaid away from the states and make it fully federal. This would give state budgets a huge break, and help employment, yet as a one-time change it reduces the moral hazard problems from ongoing outright grants. Furthermore federalizing Medicaid is a good idea in its own right and it also could be a spur to make other improvements in the program.
This isn't rocket science; get employment back to acceptable levels and electoral success is guaranteed.
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