Candidates fall short on solutions

Stuart Weiss, Las Vegas

Sunday, Oct. 23, 2011 | 2:02 a.m.

Listening to the Republicans debate Tuesday night, I could not understand how the candidates hoped to deal with our economic problems.

Herman Cain offered three different taxes — “9-9-9” — but he did not admit that they would slow consumption and reduce federal revenue. To be fair, he also said he would cut spending, but how much, where, and with what consequences he did not say.

A similar silence on the particulars was true of Mitt Romney’s multipoint plan (online where few if any will read it), of which not one was spelled out.

As for Rick Perry, he offered a miraculous energy plan but did not say what it was. And all the candidates would cut regulations and taxes, but did not spell out which ones and the impact on business, jobs, health, the environment and the budget.

Even accepting their generalities, all the Republican candidates but one were speaking to cyclical recessions, not our structural problem today, with manufacturing and jobs disappearing overseas. The single exception was Rick Santorum — perhaps because of puny poll numbers. The former senator noted that only 5 percent of two-parent families lack work, but that number is 30 percent for one-parent families.

That notation is not a remedy but it is the way we must think in order to solve our economic problems.

They must first be identified, then they must be dealt with pragmatically, beginning with metrics. And that is no less true of President Barack Obama and his pitiful plan.