#TammanyHallDemocrats
Posted on 11/12/2015 8:05:02 PM PST by markomalley
The Republican Party, judging by the latest presidential debate, is now the party positioned against crony capitalism and corporate profiteering through government.
So far, this shift is mostly rhetorical, but even that puts many of them on the record. It still represents progress for a party that has historically been more pro-big business than pro-free enterprise.
Carly Fiorina, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and other GOP hopefuls all decried corporate welfare in the latest debate. The candidates also made a crucial case against over-regulation, an argument most Republicans ignored in past years: regulation and government complexity fall heaviest on Mom & Pop businesses, thus protecting the big guys from competition.
In 2009, Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele attacked Democrats crafting Obamacare as insufficiently deferential to industry. That critique was politically brain-dead and factually wrong. Fiorina on Tuesday night launched a more powerful salvo, calling Obamacare "crony capitalism at its worst." She asked, "Who helped write this bill? Drug companies, insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, every single one of those kinds of companies are bulking up to deal with big government."
Fiorina's historical account is mostly true: Insurers helped write the bill, then generally opposed final passage, then fought to save it after passage. Her economic point is dead-on. She continued: "That's what happens as government gets bigger and bigger — and it has been for 50 years under Republicans and Democrats alike — and business have to bulk up to deal with big government."
Ted Cruz applied that lesson to our ugly fruitcake of a tax code: high rates interspersed with countless exclusions, exemptions deductions, and tax credits. "Right now," Cruz said, "with our corporate income tax, giant corporations with armies of accountants regularly are paying little to no taxes while small businesses are getting hammered."
Regulation creates winners and losers, and Cruz on Tuesday night highlighted one loser: Mother and part-time tax preparer Sabina Loving. Loving was the victim of an Obama-administration IRS ruling aimed at cracking down on small-time tax preparers.
Cruz could have gone further and described the winners: Not only did the big guys (H&R Block and Jackson Hewitt) support the Obama regs, but Obama hired H&R Block's former CEO to lead the IRS process of writing them.
AND a conservative is much more able to laugh.
We can make fun of ALL MANNER of stuff —meanwhile THEY are the ones scowling, controlling people, and screaming about condoms in porn.
The left isn’t happy. The left isn’t funny. The left isn’t sexy.
The new, angry Victorians buttoning your tippy-top button are LIBERALS.
They invite you down to Guyana, then pass out Kool-Aid and start talking kooky.
Drowning polar bears, boiling oceans, etc.
YUCK.
Not to worry Mr. Carney, It is not just “rhetorical”. For the vast majority of the candidates, it is really out right lies.
Two, maybe three really believe what they are saying, the rest......................................SSDD.
There is nothing conservative about cronyism. No company, big or small, should receive special favors from government.
Sarah Palin was ahead of them all
I would hope so.
Cronyism is the Nazi/Fascist method of governance. We fought them 75 years ago, but for some reason they keep coming back.
we’re still pro big business. We were never for big business corporate welfare
Corp welfare has a long history in the US. It’s what Congress does.
We expect people to do favors for us if we do favors for them.
Nothing changes except for the size of the favor no matter how far you go up the ladder.
That is why it is a bad idea to let the government grow to the point it can grant a lot of favors. The favors they can grant should be few, far between and subject to public scrutiny.
The republicans will only by anti-cronyism if Trump or Cruz are nominated.
All they other guys will be business as usual.
Well I can say that as Louisiana becomes more red it has become less corrupt. We have politicians going to jail all the time here now.
Anybody who calls Donald Trump “anti-crony” is smoking something. This is a guy who unabashedly believes in screwing property owners with eminent domain on behalf of big developers.
Post 13 is apparently for you too.
#TammanyHallDemocrats
"Positioned against" .... leading to a "revenge of the cronies"?
You're talking about Daddy's Money, now.
<Sigh ....>
Sarah, where are you? Missing you much, we are.
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