COMMENTARY Serving the people who make America run
Americans have a fascination with meeting important people. They like to meet the people who make this country run, so let’s go on a brief tour and meet some of them. No need to get dressed up. Jeans and work shoes will be fine, and plan on getting up early because the people who make America run get up early.
On our tour, we are going to stop at a gas station off Route 19 in North Strabane, one off Route 837 in Monongahela, and one off Route 40 in Richeyville. We’ll stop at a country diner off Route 88 in Finleyville, one on Main Street in Charleroi, a couple on Main Street and Jefferson Avenue in Washington. We will visit these places between 6:30 and 8 a.m. because that’s when we can meet the people who fix our roads, work in the coal mines, work on the gas rigs, and repair our household appliances. We can meet our police officers, truck drivers, store owners, factory workers and other hard-working folks. These are America’s truly important people.
As we visit with them, listen to their conversations. It is about their jobs, their paychecks, their health-care premiums, their job security, their future and their kids’ future. What you don’t hear is discussion about international politics, social issues, FBI memos and gutter politics. They don’t care about some college snowflake being “offended,” and they don’t really care what Hollywood airheads think about the president. They are turned off when bombarded by negative political ads.
These are the people who make this country run. They work hard. They deserve respect from us and from our political leaders. They deserve results that improve their way of life and the lives of their families. They deserve results and not the empty rhetoric that flows unceasingly from Washington and Harrisburg. They don’t care about Russian collusion. They want to hear about what is being done to increase employment, increase wages, to protect this nation from unfair trade and to protect their jobs from illegal immigration. They want to hear what is being done to assure that the United States remains free and strong. They want to know that they will be able to protect themselves and their families with a strong Second Amendment. They want their kids safe in school and know gun control isn’t the answer.
The people we are meeting on our tour know that we now have a president who is focused on them. We have a president who doesn’t care about all the peripheral noise and personal attacks. Our president has been delivering for the working people of America.
Those who attack the president are those who do not and have not delivered for the working people of America. They are the Democrats who put in place unfair and unbalanced trade deals that hurt working people by exporting American jobs, crushing heavy industry, and depressing wage rates. They shut down coal mines. They created a tuition subsidy system that has driven college tuition into the stratosphere and made college unaffordable. They imposed regulation upon regulation that has stifled industrial and business development. Their solution is always more government.
The people who attack the president do not have a plan to make America a better place for Americans. They have a foul-mouthed teenager and a has-been stripper as icons. They are banking on a frivolous lawsuit and a special prosecutor who, in one year, has found little but corrupt Obama appointees. Their obsession is to hate the president. Their plan is to import votes and to try to thwart every move he makes that makes America better for its citizens.
The important people we are meeting see unemployment levels at historic lows in all sectors. Unemployment is 4.1 percent, with comparably historic low rates for blacks, Hispanics and other groups.
The Gross Domestic Product has been increasing and is forecast to remain healthy. When GDP growth rate is in the 3 percent range, the economy is growing at a healthy rate. That is good for working Americans.
The president has passed a revised tax plan that has put money in workers’ pockets and has directly addressed unfair trade agreements, two actions that have already resulted in the return of thousands of jobs to America and the repatriation of hundreds of billions of dollars in capital that will mean more jobs.
The revival of the Keystone XL Pipeline after seven years of Obama delay and the completion of the Dakota Access Pipeline are major steps in guaranteeing American energy independence well into the future as well as providing thousands of well-paying American jobs.
The president’s imposition of tariffs on aluminum, steel and many Chinese goods is an important first step in rebalancing a number of very bad trade agreements. Free trade does not mean free-for-all. It means free and fair. It means balanced to population and economy. In the case of China, the new trade agreements are specifically designed to stop Chinese theft of American intellectual property. We will continue to trade with China because we are highly dependent on each other. China is the USA’s largest import partner and third largest export partner. The USA is China’s second largest export partner and sixth largest import partner. The value of China’s currency, the yuan, is tied to the U.S. dollar.
The president’s programs are focused on America’s important people. The president’s job approval rating is now 49 percent. Politicians who are campaigning right now would be well advised to address these people by supporting the president’s agenda and to speak clearly as to how they will work to continue to increase jobs, to grow the economy, to provide better and less expensive health care, to tighten border security, and to make education affordable. Their Democratic opponents can speak to none of this. These are the results the important people deserve.
Dave Ball is vice chairman of the Washington County Republican Party and a Peters Township councilman.