The possible effects of the Presidential candidates on the United States economy.

The problem is a bipolar one, if not a biparty one; but it`s not a simple division over whether or not to have more taxation in support of a health and social welfare system or to have tax cuts in the belief that this will increase the flow of money into spending thereby increasing market demand, boosting business confidence, and providing full employment. It`s about whether or not Barack Obama can convince enough of the white collar vote that their share of the wealth will not be affected by whatever increased taxation it may be felt that he should introduce to offset the trillions of dollars US budget deficit.

 In other words, it`s a perceptival issue; that is, how many people in the electorate view increased taxation as inevitable and are looking to vote for a candidate that has concern for social problems but is not going to upset the economy in such a way that would reduce his appeal to the blue collar vote whose own interests are with their own jobs, rather than with the unemployed, around whom much of the additional funds raised in any new hypothetical tax scheme, could be spent in the form of training and work-based subsidies in the hope of increasing the viability of the workforce and of the economic system.

 Hillary Clinton lost the Democratic Party nomination for the simple reason that she was perceived to be courting economic disaster with a Health Care programme that could cost trillions of dollars in the foreseeable future and could only add to the trillions of dollars budget deficit that the US is already facing. But at least a focus on employment suggested a concern with the overall economic perspective with a view to decreasing the balance of payments deficit with the rest of the world that has given rise to the go-it-alone isolationism that the nation had been prone to pre-WWI and now post 9/11.

 Hence the real results of the World Trade Centre events. Protectionism, militarily as well as economic, leading to a decrease in GDP, increased unemployment, and failing business due to an apparent distaste for free trade with the rest of the world and opportunities for market forces to flourish.

 John McCain with his background of pro-American involvement in Iraq and a Vietnam veteran could be seen as a bolster to the customary economic booster that is the US military-industrial complex. Current inflation and unemployment fuelled by rapid oil price increases means that President George W. Bush's vision of an Iraqi war paid for by conquered Iraqi oil is but one factor in the events succeeding 9/11 suggesting US involvement in world trade is a necessary and vital role for both the US and the rest of the world, because if US involvement economically in global terms is to be that of increased GDP and sustained growth based on the continuous activity of a military-industrial complex that ensures low cost Iraqi fuel, low transportation costs, low prices in the stores, higher consumer optimism in spending, possibilities of greater turnover and enhanced employment prospects, this does not augur well for the rest of us with an otherwise isolated US on which much of the free trade world`s financial well-being has been dependant.

 It would be hoped, therefore, that John McCain  is not the hawkish figure that he`s often presented to be when he sits in the Oval Office, but that seems unlikely, given the fact that Americans as a general rule do not want to face the heavy tax burden that would be essential in dealing with the needs of an aging population, an increasingly unemployed one, and a business community that would need to be expansive rather than defensive if the US economy were to grow rather than contract. US ideas of protecting itself could lead to `protectionism` on a scale that would involve only the role of the military-industrial complex as an externally applied economic factor boosting the US GDP and internal economic success.

 Hillary Clinton was the best Presidential candidate because she recognized the requirements for the future of the nation and that of the free world; the health of the global economy viewed as being intrinsically linked to the health of the USA. Clearly adocates of investment in core health care and infrastructure hope that such a jobs and dollars influx might at the very least be a short term replacement for the role of the MIC as a pillar of national economic development policy. But Barack Obama won't win the US Presidency simply because US citizens are not prepared to sacrifice immediate comfort for the good of the whole. It`s been too long since John F. Kennedy spoke those immortal lines `Ask not what your country can do for you, but ask what you can do for your country.` Ironically, and the cynics would say happily for John McCain, terrorism has won. Noone wants to provide for the good of all, because all are viewed as being threatening at a basic gut level where notions of treating with one`s neighbour become ideas about preventing one`s neighbours from threatening one`s own position.