OPINION:
American presidential politics needs a shake-up. Enter Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Democrats are nervous about President Biden’s age, but judging by the State of the Union address, he’s running for a second term.
Former President Donald Trump remains viable among Republican voters, partly because Mr. DeSantis is not well known enough and needs to say more about national issues to create separation.
E pluribus unum describes our paradoxical national cohesion, but Americans increasingly sort by geography. Progressives are staying put in places like New York, California and Illinois, and conservatives are moving to Florida, Texas and more rural states.
Mr. DeSantis’ accomplishments are impressive but hardly indicate enough about what he could accomplish as president. Tallahassee doesn’t offer the same challenges — and skilled opposition from the left — as he would encounter in Washington.
Publicly held national debt is now about 100% of gross domestic product. The annual federal deficit as a share of GDP going forward — at least 4.3% — will likely be greater than the nominal rate of growth for the economy.
Even without a pandemic or similar crisis, interest rates will be higher and debt service will take a growing slice of what we produce each year.
Raising taxes would slow economic growth — consider the contrast between New York and Florida in economic performance. Consequently, reducing the federal deficit significantly will require curbing entitlements, as those account for 64% of spending.
Presidents since Lyndon Johnson have been creating giveaways, but a lot of basic government functions have gone underfunded.
The Federal Aviation Administration system that failed and shut down commercial flights in early January is woefully out of date and won’t be modernized until 2030 because the line item in the budget is at 2009 levels.
Customer service at the IRS is a nightmare, and this problem repeats throughout the federal bureaucracy.
It’s easy for Republicans to demand spending cuts to raise the debt ceiling, but where’s their plan for entitlement reform? Mr. DeSantis needs one if he wants to be president.
The war in Ukraine reveals what’s lacking in the Russian army but much about the American military, too. Abrams tanks — models of technological wizardry that run on jet fuel — are not logically optimal for the conflict. So just what is the U.S. Army planning to use to meet the Russians head-on if the war spreads into similarly inconvenient NATO territory?
Much of the armaments we send to Kyiv come from stockpiles, but the Defense Department has become so woke and bureaucratic that it’s challenged to process procurement orders for replacements, and production capacity is not readily available.
With a four-star Air Force general telling his officers to get ready for imminent war with China over control of Taiwan, endemic supply chain issues have analysts alarmed.
Mr. DeSantis needs a plan to overhaul the Pentagon and revitalize the military-industrial base.
Like former Presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump, Mr. Biden has tried diplomacy, tariffs and restrictions on exports to curb American economic dependence on China and its rising military.
Still, its exports and trade surplus with the United States continue to increase, and they fuel its overall economic growth and military buildup.
Messrs. Trump and Biden walked away from the Trans-Pacific Partnership. But to counter China’s growing economic influence in Asia, we need to tie their economies to ours and not to the Middle Kingdom’s.
Beyond not selling the Chinese our blueprints and Western hardware to make semiconductors, what’s the plan to wean Americans from Chinese made goods and free trade with the rest of Asia?
On immigration, Mr. Biden is looking more Trumpian.
With the end of the COVID-19 public health emergency, the administration can no longer rely on Title 42, which allowed migrants to be expelled at the border quickly without applying for asylum.
The Biden administration is planning a rapid adjudication system that would process and return migrants to Mexico in a matter of days if they don’t qualify for asylum, and a transit ban that would make migrants who cross the border illegally ineligible for asylum if they fail to apply for protection while passing through another country on their way here.
That’s genuine progress if the White House can stand up to the progressive caucus in Congress, but what about broader immigration reform and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals?
U.S. labor force growth and the economy slows substantially without immigrants. We need to hear Mr. DeSantis’ plan for immigration reform — other than shipping Florida’s unwanted migrants to other states — that meets the American economy’s skill needs and secures the border.
From what we’ve seen, Mr. DeSantis is pretty good at running a state without an income tax and competing with the dolts in New York, Illinois and California, but the pitching is a lot tougher to hit in Washington.
The press and analysts along the Potomac are not terribly forgiving. Mr. DeSantis, what’s the plan?
• Peter Morici is an economist and emeritus business professor at the University of Maryland, and a national columnist.
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