HEY, MAYBE IT REALLY IS

HEY, MAYBE IT REALLY IS MORNING IN AMERICA: Back in late February, I posted:

It’s waaaaaay too soon to say this with any certainty, but there’s a very good chance that it’s Morning in America for George W. Bush. Unlike his father, who inherited an astoundingly robust economy that was coming to the end of its (to coin a phrase) seven fat years and whose long overdue, and extremely mild recession occurred just as he was running for reelection, Bush 43’s timing could be spot-on perfect: a quick victory in Iraq, followed by overwhelming proof that Hussein really was the Stalin-like tyrant he’s been accussed of being all these years, followed by a long overdue rally in the stock market, and several years of growth whose peak coincides perfectly for Bush’s reelection, made all the easier because of Al Sharpton’s corrosive presence, either in some prominent role with the Democrats, or as Sullivan speculates, a third party, Nader-like spoiler.

This is all pure speculation on my part, and a lot could happen to make 2004 a very, very different scenario. But Bush is in the driver’s seat here.

Fortunately, he knows it. And unlike his father, he knows what to do with it.

Writing in the Washington Times today, Donald Lambro says:

No matter what Mr. Bush’s prospective challengers may say about the state of the economy, people can read the economic indicators. They saw their 401(k) and other stock portfolios rise in the last quarter. They know an economic turnaround is in progress.

And Mr. Bush, his chief advisers and Republican leaders are not going to play into the Democrats’ hands in the months to come. They are going to be on the road talking up the economy and promoting their growth agenda. “Morning in America” ads are being prepared for the coming campaign.

Meantime, House Ways and Means Chairman Bill Thomas has drafted a bill to cut the corporate income tax from 35 percent to 32 percent. It’s aimed at small businesses with $10 million or less in taxable income who produce most of the jobs in this country.

In short, the once-sputtering economy is showing signs of new life, as it did in 1983, just before the 1984 election when President Reagan buried Walter Mondale in a 49-state landslide.

Emphasis above mine. I don’t know if Lambro is speaking metaphorically or not (why not dust off the old slogan? It certainly worked well once), but it’s nice to know we may have been right, even as many on the left felt that things couldn’t have been darker.