It is customary for politicians to describe an issue that is important to them as a problem. After all problems require solutions and solutions are what get them elected. Rarely, if ever, will a politician describe a “condition” since conditions occur in the natural order and aren’t subject to positive intervention.
The Obama administration, however, has a new tactic, one that has raised the level of concern and the need for action. Every issue is described as a crisis. For example, we don’t have an unemployment problem, we have an unemployment crisis. We don’t have a health care problem, it is now elevated to a crisis.
Moreover, if it is regarded as a crisis, the government must act immediately. No time to tally. It is instructive that President Obama has noted that there is a deadline for health care reform. If the Congress does not comply, God only knows what will happen.
Chief of staff Rahm Emanuel has said a crisis is too important to be wasted. Surely it is a way to motivate the Congress to act. Presumably that is why bills have been pushed through the byzantine process of law making. Yet it is obvious that no one including President Obama read or had any idea of what was the 1200 page stimulus package of $787 billion. Here was a bill designed to deal with the “unemployment crisis” When it was initiated unemployment was at 7.6 percent; after adoption unemployment escalated to 9.5 percent. But that crisis -even more severe now- has been pushed aside for the health care crisis.
President Obama has said if we do not act now 47 million Americans without health insurance will be left floundering. Unfortunately, the president has neglected to point out that no American can be denied medical treatment in a public hospital. He has also ignores the fact that the large majority in the uninsured category earn more than $75 thousand a year and could afford insurance but choose not to register. And he might have pointed out that a sizable number in this population are uninsured for a year or less. But if he were to say these things it would be hard to sustain the argument that there is a crisis.
While there may be tactical value in claiming a crisis instead of a problem, there is a dangerous side to this claim. At this point President Obama is losing his credibility. This tactic is like crying “wolf” every time an issue emerges. Even if there were a crisis, why would you believe this president?
Moreover, this tactic often confuses relatively manageable events with those that are intractable. As I see it, for example, health care insurance can be managed for a fraction of what the president has in mind if one were to realize there are about eight million people without insurance who do not have the means to pay for it and require government assistance. By contrast, an Iran with nuclear weapons intent on using them to wipe Israel off them map may be a crisis-in-waiting if action isn’t taken to thwart this eventuality. Yet in the rhetoric used by the president there isn’t any distinction. Both are crises of seemingly similar magnitude.
In discussing North Korea’s missile tests, the president employed strong language to chastise Kim Jung Il. He noted at the time that words must have meaning. Rather than use words as an empty gesture, the president insisted that his language be taken seriously. Yet it is the president himself who undermines this assertion with grandiose claims that are unrealistic or heightening the importance of issues with fear-laden terminology.
Surely he must realize that not every matter that crosses his desk is a crisis. But with a mind set of pushing legislation through ala FDR in the first one hundred days of the New Deal, every matter is essential, every bill must be dealt with immediately and every issue is a national crisis.
If, God forbid, a national crisis does emerge that requires mobilizing public support, a significant part of the population will say “not again, this is simply another rhetorical exercise.” If President Obama needs them, his rhetoric may push them away.
Herbert London is president of Hudson Institute and professor emeritus of New York University. He is the author of Decade of Denial (Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2001) and America's Secular Challenge (Encounter Books).
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