Leadership Quote by Bill Janklow

A neat little diagnosis of American consumer power disguised as a punchline: the world wants what we have, and we want what lets us spend it without feeling it leave. Bill Janklow, a hard-edged, pro-business politician from South Dakota, isn’t waxing poetic here. He’s compressing a whole economic relationship into two blunt nouns: “cash” and “plastic.” The first is tangible, finite, and universally legible. The second is frictionless, modern, and a little unreal.

The specific intent reads like boosterism with a wink. Janklow is positioning Americans as the coveted engine of global commerce: foreign producers, exporters, and lenders all want access to U.S. dollars. That’s the swagger. The jab is reserved for us. “We like plastic” is a sly admission that abundance has been paired with denial. Credit cards let prosperity feel painless, turning spending into a lifestyle rather than a transaction. It’s not just about convenience; it’s about psychological insulation.

The subtext is also political. A politician praising consumption is safer than defending debt, but the line smuggles debt in anyway, normalizing it as preference. Coming from someone associated with late-20th-century growth politics, it sits comfortably in an era when American credit expanded alongside globalization: other countries bankroll and supply; Americans buy and swipe. The humor works because it’s true in a slightly embarrassing way, capturing both the country’s leverage and its self-deception in nine words.