President Obama, Meet the President of Brazil

Here is a posting from the Institute for Policy Innovation, whose mission is, "Advocating for lower taxes, fewer regulations, and a smaller, less-intrusive government." I present it as written by IPI Resident Scholar Dr. Merrill Matthews.

Dilma Rousseff

"President Barack Obama is complaining that Republicans want to cut federal spending too much--$61 billion for the rest of this fiscal year.

Meanwhile, the recently elected president of Brazil, Dilma Rousseff, is pushing to cut $30 billion in government spending. Considering the U.S. economy is about $14.6 trillion compared to Brazil’s $2 trillion, $30 billion for Brazil is a much bigger step--equal to about a $210 billion U.S. spending cut. And yet Rousseff presses on.

She even fought against a battle for a higher minimum wage increase--and won. The reason: Minimum wage increases translate into significantly higher government pension costs. And the government just can’t afford it.

And it’s not because Rousseff is a mean-spirited right-winger trying to undermine unions. She was a socialist in her youth; you might even say she was a left-wing community organizer.

Who would have thought that in tough financial times we’d have to encourage the U.S. president to look to the president of Brazil--a former socialist and guerrilla fighter--for the resolve and gumption it takes to cut federal spending?"