Path to Prosperity

There has been much talk and speculation of a new political cartoon on Facebook that basically underlies the difference between the democratic and republican views:  Who is responsible for the economic success in America; Each for their own or each for each other? The cartoon portrays a man talking to a little girl whose parents are both proud democrats.  The man asks the girl if she wants to be a democrat when she is older and the girl says yes, as she wants to be like her parents. The man then asks her, “How would you help a poor person? Would you go get a job and give all of your money to them?”  The little girl thought for a moment and said, “No, I would help them find a job so they can make their own money.” The man then says, “Welcome to the republican party.” As this cartoon was obviously distributed from the conservative wing, both parties have communicated their views on who should be responsible for a successful America.

Michelle Obama argued that we are responsible for helping each other grow.  It is our responsibility to help others prosper once we have succeeded.  She took a very personal and emotional stance in the democratic convention which helped her outline the theme of her speech.     She reflected on Obama’s character who constantly wants to help others and that’s why he is president.  She spoke of sad struggles that her and Obama have both endured in attempt to relate their high status to the average American.  The point of her speech was to make everyone understand that we all need each other to grow and she made it clear that we cannot reach success unless we all help each other.

On the other hand, Mitt Romney’s message was the very opposite.  He spoke of individual entrepreneurs who work on their own and start small businesses because we are Americans and we are hard workers.  He spoke of how bad our nation is under Obama’s policies because we are not better off than we were four years ago.  Romney’s speech was a backdrop to American history, especially the immigrants who traveled here for freedom and worked as hard as they could to make any penny they could.  He wants each person to get an education and to work hard on their own so our nation can become more innovative.  As an American, we have the responsibility to get an education and a job on our own to make the economy prosperous.  We are not to rely on others for help because you can’t help someone else if you can’t help yourself...but is this what American's want to hear?

It was extremely interesting to me that each side of the fence took completely different approaches to their communication tactics. Michelle was much more civil then Romney because she didn't even mention Romney's name once.  She wanted all of the attention on Obama. Romney not only mentioned Obama but he took many shots at his political policies.   These are two completely different candidates with different strengths and they both seem to have lacked solid facts in their speeches.  If anything, I felt that Romney was the most informative of his plan for our country because he gave many facts.  He actually laid out a 5 step plan that he has for our country including the addition of new jobs by just using our own oil resources.  I felt like Obama’s speech lacked detail to how he wants to build our economy in the next 4 years.  We know what he has done but the viewers want to hear his promises again.  Both candidates need to push their economic plans onto the public because I really believe that it is the number one concern in America at this point. Come Novemeber, we will find out what message the American's wanted to hear. 

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/08/30/transcript-mitt-romney-speech-at-rnc/

://www.cnn.com/2012/09/04/politics/michelle-obama-speech/index.html