A good op-ed title that isn’t followed by thoughts worthy of it.
Mitt Romney slammed the Obama administration for playing venture capitalist with electric vehicle companies in an Orange County Register op-ed:
First, the good news: President Barack Obama has finally created some “green jobs.” Now for the bad news: They are not in the United States, but in Finland…
But there are larger lessons from this sorry story. First, the U.S. government shouldn’t be playing venture capitalist. It’s not merely that government bureaucrats are bad at picking winners. The very process invites cronyism and outright corruption.
While we obviously agree with Romney on this point, we shudder to think of what deep dark government-venture-capitaling Romney might have engaged in as Massachusetts Governor. Maybe Rick Perry will tell us in the next debate?
Moreover, Romney is still missing the point on the environment. The billion dollars Obama wasted on EVs is only a billion dollars down the drain. We shall recover.
If Romney wants to be serious about creating jobs, however, that task starts with reining in the EPA and the rest of the federal Eco-stein. We have yet to hear him say too much about that.
The economy is like rowboat. It needs to be reasonably level and stable to make headway.
Government is like a rhino in the rowboat, every step they take rocks the boat, and the passengers (businesses) have to choose between sitting still until the boat stops rocking, or abandoning ship.