If Jim Bunning had been President

If I were the king of the world, I’d tell you what I’d do.

Hoyt Axton (Three Dog Night)

I’ve been watching the economic meltdown and the guy who keeps echoing my thoughts is Kentucky Senator Jim Bunning.     

 That is not normal.  Bunning and I don’t agree on  most issues.  I met Bunning in my childhood.  We were on opposite sides of the political spectrum then  and nothing has  changed in the past 30 years.

Expect Bunning has a handle on the economy.  A handle that no one else in Washington seems to have.

Bunning opposed Ben Bernanke as Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board.  He also opposed Alan Greenspan, at a time when the media savvy Greenspan (Greenspan is married to Andrea Mitchell at NBC News) was given   God like status from the main stream media.

God’s gone down a peg lately but it took some guts to oppose Greenspan at the time. Bunning did.  For that Bunning named one of the “10 worst Senators” by Time Magazine.

Bunning was rapped for messing with a well connected guy.  I wonder if Time wants to have a recount.  They could let all the Senators who cooed about Greenspan explain their votes.

If they were re taking that vote today, Jim would have some allies. 

As it was, he as a lone voice.  Like he has been on many things.

 He was in the minority when President Bush decided that the way to revive the economy was by wasting $300 billion dollar on “rebate” checks to taxpayers.

I’d like to ask the President,   how did that work for you?   Obviously not so well.   $300 billion went straight down the drain.

That a lot of money where I come from.

If Bunning had been president instead of Bush, we would not have had Greenspan, Bernanke, and the problems that pushed us to the brink of crisis.

As much as I agree with Bunning on the economy, I would not  want him to be a four year President.  We disagree on every non economic issue.   Beyond that, he has a prickly and abrasive personality.   He is not a back slapping kind of guy.  It makes it hard for him to develop coalitions and create allies.

On the other hand,  President should not be a Mister Congeniality contest.   President’s need to make tough decisions.  We are not paying them to walk around saying “heck of a job” when real crisis is going on.   

Maybe we needed a personality like Bunning over the past few years.

The rush to spend $700 billion and reshape the world economic system also reminds of the rush up to the current war in Iraq.  We are being asked to make a hasty decision by officials whose data we can’t verify and who haven’t done that great of a job.    There is a push to “ignore the fine print” and get on with things.

Ignoring the fine print has gotten thousands of people killed in Iraq.   Ignoring the fine print is a big reason that we have an economic crisis.   I was critical of the rush to make Ben Bernanke Federal Reserve Chair.  Only Jim Bunning agreed.

Bernanke is not the sole reason for the crisis but probably the most important.  He could have stopped a lot of problems before they happened.  

Bush thinks that having $700 billion in Bernanke’s  pocket will then make  him a  financial genius.    There is nothing in his past to prove that might happen.

Although he is a lame duck and unpopular, I keep waiting for President Bush to step up and show leadership. He should be the point man, not his Treasury Secretary or the Federal Reserve Chairman.  

We elected a President of the United States; we didn’t get to elect the other guys.

I don’t want to give power to unelected bureaucrats.  I don’t want to make massive changes in the economic system to cover the mistakes of a few stupid or greedy people.

I want someone who is in touch with how people really live and what they are really thinking.    Like Jim Bunning seems to be.

People are angry.  Really angry.  I’ve never seen such a ground swell of true outrage.

 I don’t think the president gets that.  Just like he didn’t “get it” about Hurricane Katrina.

Jim Bunning gets it..   I don’t want him to serve a four year term but if I were “king of the world” Bunning might find he serving a one week term as President of the United States.

Don McNay is the Chairman of the Board for McNay Settlement Group in Richmond Ky.  You can read his award winning column at www.donmcnay.com or write to him at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it