Lawrence Kudlow from Creators Syndicate

A King Dollar GOP? for 02/11/2012

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Out on the campaign trail, Fed head Ben Bernanke is an unpopular guy.

Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich have both said they would replace Bernanke, not reappoint him. Rep. Ron Paul would swap the whole Federal Reserve monetary system for a gold-linked dollar, making the yellow metal legal tender. And it was Gov. Rick Perry of Texas, before he dropped out of the race, who said more q ...

Updated: Sat Feb 11, 2012

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Obama's Lowball Vision: Tax Success and Growth for 01/28/2012

Sat, 28 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

You would think that with one of the weakest economic recoveries on record, President Barack Obama would be searching desperately for ways to promote economic growth. It is, after all, an election year. Most pundits and pollsters agree that it's the economy, stupid.

But instead, Obama used his State of the Union speech to rail on about fairness, inequality and redistribution. The Obama s ...

Updated: Sat Jan 28, 2012

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Mitt's Attack on Crony Capitalism for 01/21/2012

Sat, 21 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Let me build on Charles Krauthammer's great Friday column, "The GOP's Suicide March." Krauthammer argues that just as President Obama's class-warfare, soak-the-rich mantra started lagging in the polls, some Republicans on the campaign trail started making the case that Mitt Romney's Bain Capital was involved in nothing more than vulture capitalism, looting companies and destroying job ...

Updated: Sat Jan 21, 2012

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Isn't a Bainful Turnaround What America Needs? for 01/14/2012

Sat, 14 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

There's a very troubled company out there called U.S. Government Inc. It's teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. And it badly needs to be taken over and turned around. It probably even needs the services of a good private-equity firm, with plenty of experience and a reasonably good track record in downsizing, modernizing, shrinking staff and making substantial changes in management. Yes, layoffs ...

Updated: Sat Jan 14, 2012

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Mitt's Big Next Step on Tax Reform for 01/12/2012

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

While so much attention has been turned to Newt Gingrich's catastrophically mistaken attack on Mitt Romney's Bain Capital, free-market capitalism, investment and profits, a potentially much more significant development occurred in the New Hampshire debate Saturday night. For the first time, Romney embraced a much bolder tax-reform plan.

Under pressure from a number of supply-side conserv ...

Updated: Thu Jan 12, 2012

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The GOP Needs a Bolder Growth Message for 01/07/2012

Sat, 07 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Message to my fellow conservatives: Please don't blame the mainstream media for the improvement in jobs, unemployment and economic growth. Reporters are not making this up. The economy is better. It's going to give President Obama a leg up on the election. GOP beware, and come to your senses.

Take Friday's jobs report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Non-farm payrolls gained 200,000, ...

Updated: Sat Jan 07, 2012

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Paul Ryan's Old-Fashioned American Vision for 12/23/2011

Fri, 23 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

When you think of Republican Rep. Paul Ryan, terms like earnest, serious and important come to mind. So does the term old-fashioned. Ryan comes from an old-fashioned place, the blue-collar town of Janesville, Wis. He cherishes the old-fashioned values of a faithful family man. He even looks old-fashioned, with his white shirts and striped ties. And he uses old-fashioned argument skills, persuas ...

Updated: Fri Dec 23, 2011

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Keystone Blue-Collar Blues for 12/16/2011

Fri, 16 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

The payroll-tax-cut debate is not really about the payroll tax, which is a very weak-kneed economic stimulant and a lackluster job creator because of its temporary nature. Without permanent incentives at lower tax rates, these rebates don't do anything for growth and jobs.

Instead, the key to understanding the payroll-tax debate is to grasp President Barack Obama's leftist vision of taxi ...

Updated: Fri Dec 16, 2011

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Newt the Supply-Side Sizzler for 12/09/2011

Fri, 09 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Say what you will about former Speaker Newt Gingrich. His philosophy, his policy proposals, his track record, his campaign and all the rest. But the one thing you have to acknowledge about Gingrich is that he's a sizzler. He has a way with words. And he's as good a communicator as anyone in modern politics.

In my CNBC interview with Gingrich this week, he slammed President Obama's tax-th ...

Updated: Fri Dec 09, 2011

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Stocks Get by With a Little Help From Our Fed for 12/01/2011

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

It's often said that help comes to those who help themselves. But Europe can't seem to help itself. So on Wednesday, the U.S. Fed came to the rescue. And that rescue triggered a global stock market rally, including a near 500-point gain in the United States.

Basically, the Fed is making it cheaper for Europe to borrow dollars. And this dollar backstop symbolically shows that the Fed, the ...

Updated: Thu Dec 01, 2011

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Ted Forstmann, R.I.P. for 11/24/2011

Thu, 24 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

With a great feeling of loss and sadness, I want to join with so many others to mourn the passing of Ted Forstmann, the brilliant financier, entrepreneur and free-market capitalist.

A Wall Street Journal editorial from Paul Gigot and a column by Charlie Gasparino in the New York Post chronicle Ted's great achievements. It was Ted who invented the leveraged buyout, and it was Ted who walk ...

Updated: Thu Nov 24, 2011

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A Super Tax Hike Spells Disaster for 11/17/2011

Thu, 17 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

It would be a great tragedy if a super tax hike came out of a supercommittee compromise deal. It would do great harm to the economy — just as much harm as President Obama's various tax-hike threats. And on the Republican side, a super tax hike would irreparably split the GOP.

OK. Here's the good news. In a CNBC interview this week, I asked supercommittee co-chair Jeb Hensarling abo ...

Updated: Thu Nov 17, 2011

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Winners, Losers, Misses for 11/11/2011

Fri, 11 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

There were three winners in the CNBC debate: Herman Cain, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich. Gov. Rick Perry was the obvious loser because of his memory lapse.

The guy with the toughest job on Wednesday night was Cain, who has been hammered by sexual-harassment charges. He needed a strong performance to put him back on message with his 9-9-9 tax plan and pro-business, free-enterprise views. ...

Updated: Fri Nov 11, 2011

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Jobs Up, But Not Enough for 11/05/2011

Sat, 05 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Despite some modest improvements in the jobs picture with the release of Friday's Labor Department report, I would guard against any irrational overexuberance that problems with employment or the economy are being solved.

A smaller-than-expected 80,000 gain in nonfarm payrolls was bolstered by upward revisions in the prior two months, amounting to 102,000 additional jobs. So over the pa ...

Updated: Sat Nov 05, 2011

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No Armageddon -- but No Economic Victory Yet for 10/28/2011

Fri, 28 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

The world economy has once again dodged Armageddon. The European Union finally forged a Greek bond deal, and a rescue fund big enough to ring-fence banks and sovereign debt, in order to avoid a catastrophic, Lehman-like contagion event. At the same time, the U.S. economy moved away from the threat of recession with a third-quarter real gross domestic product report of 2.5 percent. In response, ...

Updated: Fri Oct 28, 2011

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The GOP Pro-Growth, Flat-Tax Competition for 10/22/2011

Sat, 22 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

The latest Gallup poll pegs President Obama's approval at a new low of 41 percent. That adds to the thought that the winner of the GOP presidential-primary sweepstakes is going to be the next president.

And inside that Republican contest, the policy pendulum is swinging toward pro-growth, flat-tax reform. A new agenda. With Herman Cain's 9-9-9 plan and the announcement of a Ste ...

Updated: Sat Oct 22, 2011

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Cain the Tax-Code Killer for 10/15/2011

Sat, 15 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Herman Cain is the only GOP presidential candidate who wants to kill the tax code. That's right. Put a knife in it. Junk the entire system. And people are cheering as he rises in the polls in his quest for the nomination.

Cain's 9-9-9 plan is not perfect. But then again, the good should never be the enemy of the perfect.

Rep. Paul Ryan gives the plan a thumbs-up. Supply-side men ...

Updated: Sat Oct 15, 2011

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Still Front End of Recession for 10/06/2011

Thu, 06 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

The stronger-than-expected ISM manufacturing-index reading for September might normally suggest that the economy, at least for now, has dodged a recession bullet. After zero jobs and zero real consumer spending in August, which put the stalled economy on the front end of recession, the ISM number is the first major September reading.

But economist Michael Darda says hold the applause: I ...

Updated: Thu Oct 06, 2011

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Obama as Demoralizer-in-Chief for 09/30/2011

Fri, 30 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

So just when everyone had concluded the Chris Christie matter — saying, "Great speech at the Reagan Library, but he's not gonna run for president" — the New York Post comes along with a story that says the New Jersey governor is seriously considering a 2012 run.

Apparently the Reagan Library experience had a big impact on Christie, and others. He's now bei ...

Updated: Fri Sep 30, 2011

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A Twisted Outlook for 09/23/2011

Fri, 23 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Stocks collapsed roughly 700 points over two days after the Federal Reserve launched its "Operation Twist." The market correctly perceives that the central bank's plan to swap $400 billion of short-term notes for long-term bonds adds no new reserves to the financial system. So it wasn't QE3, that's for sure. No stimulus. In fact, with the Treasury yield curve flattening, the Fed's ste ...

Updated: Fri Sep 23, 2011

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