ED Lotterman warns us in the Pioneer Press on April 22nd that 'the most harmful lies are the ones we tell ourselves'.  I think he needs to get out and mingle a little with the public to save himself from his own lies.  Lotterman starts well by pointing out the foolishness of President Obama's directive to his cabinet to cut their spending by $100 million, or 0.007% as noted here and he shows his non-partisanship by blaming the Republicans for their role in increasing government spending while not presenting any credible plan for ending deficits after the recession.  But where his sheltered world view comes out is when he calls the Tea Party protests 'willful self-delusion'.  He misses the entire point of the protests.  It isn't that the protesters have all the answers, it is that they are fed up with business as usual in Washington and are looking for leadership.  He forgets that voters just went to the polls less than six months ago to vote for the leaders that would solve some of these problems and now we are seeing them fail.  He claims that the Tea Party crowd 'would have more credibility if they had chanted calls to abolish all farm subsidies and student aid and waved placards to repeal the Medicare drug benefit, to shrink the Army and Air Force to 1938 levels and return the Navy to coastal defense as envisioned by Thomas Jefferson.'  Then he goes on to call the protesters 'simpletons' for being unwilling to acknowledge his view of the facts as he calls for cutting Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid, shrinking the armed forces drastically, and stopping payment on paying pay interest on the national debt.  I don't think any of the 'simpletons' would oppose a discussion to cut social programs, farm subsidies, etc but our country's leadership isn't talking about cutting, they are spending trillions to expand.  That is why hundreds of thousands were protesting ten days ago.

His true colors come out later in his respect for Canada, Germany and the Netherlands and their ability to get out of previous economic troubles.  If his idea of 10% unemployment (as they have in Germany) or the free for all going on in the streets of the Netherlands is the answer, I'm not interested in their solutions.  It's also interesting how much time he spends in the article calling for a reduction in military spending.  He wants to go back to the Navy envisioned by Thomas Jefferson?  Somewhat ironic as Jefferson sent his 'coastal defense' Navy over to the Mediterranean to clean out the pirates in 1801.  I bet Captain Richard Phillips is glad the Navy isn't following Lotterman's advice.

Mr. Lotterman's website outlines an impressive background of academia and government so there is no question that he is alot smarter than the 'simpletons' and the Forgotten Man.  But other than his time as an enlisted army man, it doesn't appear as if he as mingled with any of us in forty years.  The sanctimony in his column is evidence of it.