Obama: It’s the Small Stuff That Will Really Hurt

Last Wednesday, following Barack Obama's sealing of the Democratic nomination, our friends at Kudlow and Company debated whether he would be good or bad for stocks. I've been too short of time to comment on them until now, but I just had to follow up today on some remarks made on air by Jared Bernstein.

Now, Bernstein's a very savvy, likeable guy who makes the case for his (incorrect) side of the aisle beautifully--so beautifully, in fact, that he was able to assert with a straight face how an Obama Presidency would usher in a period of prosperity unlike anything we've seen before.

I could write for days on what's wrong with that statement, but I also think I can also sum up quite briefly why such an assertion is off the mark: Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid.

Said another way: It is clear that Congressional Republicans are going to get slaughtered this Fall, perhaps so much so that they may not even preserve the ability to filibuster in the Senate.  Thus, when you vote for your next President on November 4^th, you will choose either a rubber stamp or a veto over the policies of Reid and Pelosi.

And it isn't just the big stuff, like cap gains tax rates and energy policy, which should concern you. I can tell you that our experience in California proves it's the little stuff which can really damage an economy.

When Democrats here regained control of the statehouse and the Governor's mansion in 1999 for the first time in 16 years, they made up for lost time with a belch of business-killing legislation. One of their classics was turning the theory of workplace liability on its head.

Prior to the election of Davis, it used to be that if an employee got sick and wanted to blame his employer as the culprit, he had to show how he contracted the disease at work. Enter Davis and a Democrat legislature and voila--that presumption of liability was reversed! In a wide range of industries today, it is assumed that the employee contracted his disease at work and it is the employer who has to prove the employee got it elsewhere!

Cancer, meningitis, pneumonia, a hernia...you say you didn't cause these things, employer? Prove it.

What's the result? Settlement City, baby. If an employee claims he got tuberculosis--no kidding, one of the covered diseases in a number of industries--an employer can either go to the time and expense of disproving it or can just write a check to make it go away.  Picture warm-ups at an NBA game: this thing is a trial lawyer's layup drill.

Truly, it's a liberal's dream piece of legislation: it benefits trial lawyers and unions while clobbering employers. How lovely.

And every day, Pelosi, Reid and company will be voting to pass seemingly small, unseen levies and fees across a range of industries. They'll be writing environmental laws making it even tougher to break our energy price spiral or to build affordable homes. They'll be passing a raft of giveaways to their trial lawyer pals that make it increasingly expensive for us employers to do business and provide more jobs. In California, we got rid of Gray Davis by recall in 2003 but I can tell you we're still paying dearly in this state for his brief time in office.

Now, our experience here with Arnold Schwarzenegger also gives me pause; there is great danger in electing a RINO and I sincerely believe the Governator has harmed, not helped, the cause of smaller government. Likewise, I have great misgivings about John McCain and what his policies will look like.

That said, I'm certain where Obama's tendencies lie: with the "fairness" only choking, big government can provide.

When I think about Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and whether I'd like that veto or a rubber stamp over them, however, the choice this Fall is clear: I'll take McCain and the veto every time.